Almost every state recognizes some right of privacy, but the claims go by different names and require you to prove different elements.The Digital Media Law Project provides summaries of invasion of privacy laws in several states at http://www.dmlp.org/legal-guide/elements-intrusion-claim.
Generally, you must prove that the person you're suing intentionally intruded into your private affairs without your consent, and that you suffered monetary damages or some degree of mental anguish as a result.
 You must file your lawsuit in a court that has the power to hear cases like yours as well as personal jurisdiction over the person or company you're suing.If your filing an invasion of privacy lawsuit, you most likely will want to file in state court. However, copyright infringement cases must be filed in federal court. If you're filing for both, you will need to file in federal court.
Generally, you must file in the court located in the county or district where the person you're suing lives or conducts business., Typically the court will have a form or template you can use to create your complaint.Start with the caption, which will take up roughly the top-third of your first page. You can copy this from another complaint filed in the same court, but use your name for the plaintiff and the person you're suing as the defendant.
Leave the case number blank. The clerk will assign this number when you file your lawsuit.
Your complaint generally should be single-spaced, with a double space between paragraphs. Set up your page with one-inch margins on all sides.
 Your complaint identifies you and the person or company you are suing to the court, explains what has happened, and what you want the court to do about it.Begin your complaint with a sentence such as "Comes now the plaintiff, , and respectfully alleges as follows:" and then proceed with numbered paragraphs.
Look to the complaints or templates you found for examples. Generally, you should include only one fact per numbered paragraph, referring to yourself as "Plaintiff" and the person you're suing as "Defendant."
Begin by identifying yourself, then identifying the person you're suing. Continue your numbered paragraphs with each of the allegations that together make up the elements of the claim listed in the law.
Start with the facts, then explain why those facts give you the right to sue that person under the law. For example, you might write "On October 12, 2014, Plaintiff took photos of herself with her smart phone." The next paragraph might be "Plaintiff then texted the photos to Defendant." Then you would write "Defendant understood that these photos were not to be shared with anyone else."
Continue describing the incident and the facts that proceeded, all the way up to the threat of publication – or actual publication – of your private photos.
The last paragraph of your complaint is your "prayer for relief," in which you ask the court for monetary damages or other relief to compensate you for the harms caused by the defendant.
If the person has not yet published the photos at the center of your claim, you should ask for a preliminary injunction or temporary restraining order to stop the person from publishing those photos., You must take your complaint and copies to the clerk of the court where you want to file your lawsuit.Before you go to the clerk's office, make at least two copies of everything you plan to file. The clerk will keep the originals, so you'll need one for your own records and one to have delivered to the person you're suing.
You may want to call the clerk's office ahead of time to find out if you have to include any other documents with your complaint, what filing fees you'll have to pay, and any other information you'll need to file your lawsuit.
To file your lawsuit, you'll have to pay a filing fee – typically several hundred dollars. If you can't afford this, ask the clerk if you can apply for a waiver. Most courts don't charge filing fees if your income falls below a certain threshold. You must fill out an application and provide information about your income and assets.
When you go to the clerk's office, he or she will stamp "filed" with the date on your originals and copies, and give you back your copies. The originals will be kept for the court's official records.
 Once your lawsuit is filed, you must have someone deliver a copy of it to the person you are suing so he or she has proper legal notice of the lawsuit.While you often can serve court documents using certified mail, most courts require a complaint to be hand-delivered to the defendant.
Although technically any person over the age of 18 who isn't involved in the lawsuit can do this, you typically want to pay a sheriff's deputy or private process server.
 If you requested an injunction from the court to keep the defendant from publishing your photos, the court often will schedule a preliminary hearing to determine whether that order should be issued.At the hearing, you generally must be able to show that if the defendant published (or continued to publish) your photos, it would cause a greater amount of harm.
You also must have enough evidence to demonstrate that you are likely to prevail in the lawsuit itself.
Some states have a presumption for certain types of private photos, wherein you are entitled to a preliminary injunction unless the defendant can prove that the law does not apply – for example, because you had already made the photos available to the general public.
Look up invasion of privacy law in your state.
Determine which court you need to use.
Format your complaint.
Draft your complaint.
File your complaint.
Have the defendant served.
Attend your preliminary hearing.
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