Statute Needed To Curb Gender-Based Cyber Crime

Context: While the prolonged lockdown has pushed women into digital spaces, It is now a proven fact that cyber Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) bears a causality with the digital exclusion of women worldwide.

National Crime Records Bureau 2018 data: About 6030 cybercrimes were registered by women.

Issue of rising ggender-basedcybercrime:

• Anonymous in nature: VAWG has percolated to the digital realm, and in its anonymous non-confrontational, it must be viewed as an impeding factor to gender justice in the 21st century.
• Considered as passive: Terming cyber harassment as passive detracts from the trouble it perpetuates.
  • Issues of ggender-basedcyber-crime have been labelled as elite or “first world” problems.
  • On the contrary, it follows the seamless stream of affordable Internet connection, cheap cellular network and access to smartphones.
• Continued fetishisation of women: It is an indicator of what causes the proliferation of gender-based cyber harassment.
  • Being routinely subjected to objectification and fetishisation has resulted in a lack of self-worth among the many women
• Skewed power dynamics: Often between men and women is another example of what sustains digital attacks on women and girls.
• Symptomatic of societal mentality: There is a paucity of resources to hold perpetrators of gender-based cyber-crime accountable for voyeurism, blackmailing and harassing women.
  • This encourages toxic masculinity and normalises a culture of misogyny.
  • For e.g. Not so long ago, social media was awash with the ‘Bois locker room’ incident that circulated obscene images of underage girls via leaked chats from an exclusive group.
  • Cyber harassment has managed to put a premium on what constitutes the most glaring manifestation of sexism, patriarchy and sexual harassment currently existing in our society.
• Absence of protective legislation: Both the IT Act and the IPC are inadequate; IPC predates the digital era while the IT Act was formulated to enhance e-commerce.

Way Forward:

• Need to understand that the digital space is no different from the offline/real world.
• Devise a gender-responsive digital sensitisation curriculum: For our police and the judicial system will create a mechanism that enables women to address the digital divide.
• Institute, a repository of sex-disaggregated data: Will allow us to prioritise those digital policies that allow for an integration of a much-needed gender lens into our policies and budgetary allocations.