Activists and lawyers in Africa are calling for urgent action to protect women, girls and boys as digital violence surges across the continent.
A massive rise in internet users, coupled with huge numbers of people aged under 30, has fuelled an increase in gendered online violence across the continent, according to experts, by giving perpetrators new tools to control and silence women and girls, and influence boys.
“Unfortunately the world offline is not safe, equal and inclusive. But the world online is proliferating that to such an extent that it’s creating a foundation for a very, very unequal future,” said Ayesha Mago, global advocacy director at the Sexual Violence Research Initiative, a global network looking at violence against women.
As the world becomes increasingly digital, the spaces and methods for perpetrating gender-based violence are expanding and proliferating at an alarming rate.
Technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV) is, as defined by the UN, any “act committed using information communication technologies or other digital tools, which results in physical, sexual, psychological, social, political or economic harm, or other infringements of rights and freedoms”. The consequences are severe, affecting many aspects of women and girls’ lives and often forcing them to self-censor or leave the online world altogether. The term reflects how technology can result in harm, both in the digital, and real, world.
Millions of women and girls are affected by TFGBV every year with research suggesting that up to 60% of women around the world have experienced this type of gendered abuse.
TFGBV takes many forms. For example, doxing is the act of sharing someone’s personal information online and can lead to stalking and physical violence in real life. Deepfake abuse, where manipulated images or videos are published online, can damage someone’s reputation and have a lasting impact on their life. Sexual harassment, intimidation and sextortion are also common forms of TFGBV.
It infiltrates homes, workplaces, schools and universities. It has no limits and can occur anywhere. It can start online and escalate into the offline world, or the other way around, culminating in the most extreme forms of violence, including femicide.
Certain groups are more at threat – young women and girls, who are more likely to use technology and are therefore more exposed; women with disabilities, women of colour and LGBTIQ+ people; and women in political and public life such as parliamentarians, activists and journalists.
There are huge gaps in data, policy and the law when it comes to TFGBV, and several international organisations have been working with governments and the tech industry to combat the issue.
“In Africa, internet access is growing exponentially and more than 70% of the population of sub-Saharan Africa is under 30. We know that young people generally face higher rates of online violence and very often are bigger users of any tech,” she said.
Digital violence against women and girls has devastating effects such as mental health problems, withdrawal from public and economic life, physical attacks on LGBTQI+ people in countries that criminalise homosexuality, and femicide.
While there is very little pan-African research, one study across five countries in sub-Saharan Africa showed that 28% of women had experienced online violence. As internet access expands, this number is expected to rise. Only 38% of people on the continent are internet users, according to the International Telecommunication Union – and among women the figure falls to 31%.
Studies, research and anecdotal evidence at a national level paint a horrifying picture of extreme levels of violence and a toxic online environment with dire real-life consequences.
Extensive research conducted in Ethiopia over the past four years by the Centre for Information Resilience (CIR) found that gendered abuse is so endemic online it has become normalised. One Ethiopian woman interviewed by CIR said “no platform feels safe”. The researchers found that while men are attacked online for ideas and opinions, women receive misogynistic abuse related to their appearance and role in society. Threats and intimidation also migrate offline, putting woman at risk of physical attack. At least three women have fled Ethiopia in fear of their lives after a campaign of online and offline abuse.
In Uganda, in 2021, the National Survey on Violence in Uganda revealed that half of the women (49%) reported having been subjected to online harassment.
In South Africa, upcoming research by Equimundo and UN Women found that exposure to harmful content translated into men being 2.6 times more likely to perpetrate violence and 1.8 times more likely to believe misogynistic views.
Primary targets on the continent include women in the political arena, along with human rights activists, journalists and women with a public profile. A 2021 report by the Inter-Parliamentary Union and the African Parliamentary Union looking at the experiences of 137 female parliamentarians across 50 African countries found that 46% had been the target of sexist attacks online and 42% said they had received threats of death, rape, beating, or abduction, often through social media.
A UN Women report in Kenya found that name-calling, blackmail using negative images of women in politics, and other messages were posted online with the aim of spreading fear, and undermining women’s credibility to participate in elections. In focus groups women reported living in fear of being raped while on the campaign trail or during meetings that would run late into the night.
In Tunisia, research conducted between 2019 and 2023 revealed more than 70% of political commentary involving women contained violent or abusive language. Women were frequently dehumanised and called animals, such as cow, goat or sheep, and attacks disproportionately targeted sexuality, morality, age and physical appearance. Black women in politics were singled out, with people questioning whether they belonged to the nation.
Globally, nearly two in every five women will experience tech-facilitated violence while 85% of women who are online have witnessed or encountered online abuse. Fewer than 40% of countries have laws protecting women from cyber harassment or cyber stalking, leaving 44% of the world’s women and girls – 1.8 billion – without access to legal protection.
According to Mago, about 17 countries in Africa have introduced legislation looking at cybercrime. She highlighted South Africa’s Domestic Violence Amendment Act, which has been touted as a good example in the region, with specific provisions that allow courts to order digital platforms to take down abusive content. “Most [laws] don’t acknowledge the gendered nature of abuse,” she said. Instead the law needs to explicitly address online gendered violence. “It is also worth flagging that legislation is a tool for oppression and protection. Unfortunately we found that sometimes laws [relating to digital violence] can be used to prosecute specific groups of people.”
The African Union Convention on Ending Violence against Women and Girls was introduced in 2024 and includes digital violence, but according to Sibongile Ndashe, executive director of the Initiative for Strategic Litigation in Africa, it is “regressive”.
She said: “We’ve spent a lot of time trying to push back on it because we feel that the convention is not doing what it’s supposed to do in terms of setting out rights, required state obligations and providing clarity [around technology-facilitated gender based violence].”
It is not just legislation that is needed, however. “People do not understand their rights,” said Mago. “There is a general lack of awareness that there are laws or specific actions online that are not allowed and that you can get protection from.”
Digital literacy is poor, she added, as is law enforcement. People believe online violence isn’t real and underestimate its effects, and platforms do not pay attention to local languages, contexts and cultures.
“Platforms need to be accountable for the harm that is taking place on them,” said Mago. “And they need to put user safety over profit, and that is definitely not happening anywhere in the world.”
