Sexting or "sex texting" is sending or getting sexually explicit or suggestive images, messages, or video on a smartphone or through the Internet. Most teens have various ways to get online, Smartphones, tablets, and laptops all can be used in private. It's very easy for teens to create and share personal photos and videos of themselves without their parents knowing about it. Girls may sext as a joke, as a way of getting attention, or because of peer pressure or pressure from guys. Guys sometimes blame "pressure from friends.

In Iowa, Jorge Canal is on the sex offenders registry because, at age 18, he was convicted of distributing obscene materials to a minor after he sent a picture of his penis by cellphone to a year-old female friend who had requested it. In Florida, Phillip Alpert, then 18, was charged with distributing child pornography and put on the sex offenders registry because after a fight, he sent a photograph of his nude year-old girlfriend by e-mail to dozens of people, including her parents. But there is growing consensus among lawyers and legislators that the child pornography laws are too blunt an instrument to deal with an adolescent cyberculture in which all kinds of sexual pictures circulate on sites like MySpace and Facebook.

Between TBH to be honest and lit, it's nearly impossible to keep up with the lingo that teens are using on their smartphones. Unfortunately, more and more code words are popping up that allow teens to secretly send vulgar message even under the watch of their parents. Luckily, there's a list for parents to keep track of to stay in the loop. According to the Daily Mail , the Humberside Police in the United Kingdom handed out a sexting code sheet cheat to worried parents to help protect their children from secretly exchanging explicit messages.