As the world observed the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women on November 25, a sobering reality pierces through the global solidarity: violence against women isn’t confined to physical realms but has metastasized into the digital ether, where anonymity amplifies cruelty and borders dissolve into irrelevance.
This year’s observance launches the United Nations’ “UNiTE to End Digital Violence Against All Women and Girls” campaign, a 16-day activism drive culminating on Human Rights Day, December 10. Spearheaded by UN Women under Secretary-General António Guterres’ UNiTE initiative, it spotlights tech-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV)—a scourge that exploits algorithms and apps to stalk, shame, and silence. In Pakistan, where 38 percent of women have endured online abuse and 85 percent have witnessed it against peers, this campaign isn’t rhetoric—it’s a clarion call to dismantle the virtual cages trapping half the population.
At its core, TFGBV embodies a profound failure of empathy, predominantly from male perpetrators who weaponize technology to enforce dominance rather than nurture equality. Globally, the Economist Intelligence Unit’s 2024 insights—building on its seminal 2021 study—reveal that 85 percent of women online have encountered harassment in forms like cyberstalking, deepfakes, and doxxing, with 38 percent as direct targets. In Pakistan, the Digital Rights Foundation’s (DRF) Cyber Harassment Helpline, operational since 2016, tallied 3,171 complaints in 2024 alone—a 12.7 percent uptick from 2023—peaking at 386 in May amid election-season vitriol. Cyber harassment dominated with 2,741 cases, followed by non-consensual intimate image sharing (1,200 instances), a tactic disproportionately wielded against women for blackmail and reputational sabotage. Shockingly, 36 percent originated from districts with Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) cyber wings, underscoring institutional blind spots even in fortified zones. Gender breakdowns expose the asymmetry: 1,772 complaints from women versus 1,365 from men, with 90 percent of harassment filings by females, per DRF’s 2023-2024 data.
These aren’t abstract digits; they’re detonations in women’s lives. In a nation where 139 million wield mobile broadband and 143 million surf the web, digital spaces promise empowerment—e-commerce for rural artisans, virtual classrooms for veiled scholars—yet morph into minefields. The FIA’s Cyber Crime Wing processed 171,600 complaints in its inaugural 2024 year under the National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency, a 12.7 percent surge, yet convictions languished below 4 percent—82,396 verified cases yielding a mere 92 resolutions. Women and girls, comprising 80 percent of filers alongside children, endure the brunt: over 1.8 million cyber victims since 2020, per government logs, with fraud alone siphoning Rs700 billion and shattering psyches. Non-consensual imagery, amplified by AI deepfakes, isn’t fleeting— it lingers as “revenge porn,” derailing careers and marriages. A 2024 case in Lahore saw a teacher hounded offline after morphed nudes circulated on WhatsApp groups, forcing her resignation and relocation.
This digital deluge intersects with offline inequities, amplifying a vicious cycle. The Sustainable Social Development Organisation’s (SSDO) “Mapping Gender-Based Violence in Pakistan 2024” unmasks 32,617 GBV cases nationwide—5,339 rapes, 24,439 abductions/kidnappings, 2,238 domestic assaults, and 547 honor killings—yet conviction rates hover at abysmal single digits, with Punjab’s 94.5 percent rape monopoly (6,624 of 7,010 cases) yielding scant justice. Cultural silos—honor codes in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, patriarchal policing in Balochistan—thwart reporting, while digital trails evade porous borders. Women in public spheres bear outsized scars: 73 percent of female journalists globally face work-tied attacks, a figure mirrored in Pakistan where 35 journalists sought DRF aid in 2023 alone amid gendered disinformation.
The toll extends beyond trauma: education falters as girls log off to evade groomers, employment shrinks with 29 percent lacking privacy savvy per the National Commission on the Status of Women, and democracy atrophies—female voter turnout dipped 5 percent in 2024 amid online intimidation. In sub-Saharan parallels, 28 percent of women face TFGBV; in Europe, 23 percent. Yet Pakistan’s 152nd press freedom ranking and unchecked CCTV surveillance in women’s shelters exacerbate isolation. As UN Women warns, without safeguards, “true equality remains out of grasp,” with 117 countries scrambling for fragmented fixes like the UK’s Online Safety Act or EU’s Digital Services Act.
Pakistan’s arsenal—PECA 2016, the Anti-Honor Killing Act—gathers dust amid enforcement voids. The FIA’s 1991 helpline and DRF’s 0800-39393 offer lifelines, but understaffed wings and cultural stigma yield 96 percent impunity for women’s seekers. Community awareness, scarce beyond urban enclaves, starves rural survivors of recourse. The gulf yawns: laws proclaim consent sacrosanct, yet lived horrors mock them.
Bridging this chasm demands multifaceted resolve. First, legislate with laser focus: amend PECA for AI-specific penalties—deepfake creators facing 14-year bids—and mandate platform algorithms to flag gendered hate, aligning with the Global Digital Compact. Enforce via gender-sensitized law enforcement academies, training 10,000 officers annually in trauma-informed probes, and elevate conviction rates through fast-track GBV courts, targeting SSDO’s dismal benchmarks.
Second, ignite digital literacy: scale DRF’s school modules to 5 million girls, demystifying privacy toggles and doxxing perils, while closing the gender gap—women’s internet penetration lags at 21 percent versus men’s 43 percent. Partner with Meta and X for “safety by design,” purging 90 percent of non-consensual content within 24 hours, as piloted in Australia.
Third, democratize prevention: fund grassroots initiatives via a Rs5 billion national TFGBV corpus, empowering imams in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to sermonize consent and NGOs in Sindh to map district hotspots. Tech firms must ante up: Google’s Jigsaw, backing EIU studies, could localize tools like Perspective API for Urdu hate detection. Governments shun elite silos—extend FIA wings to Balochistan’s fringes, where 11 rape cases hid 2024 horrors.
The UNiTE campaign’s clarion—mobilizing governments for impunity’s end, tech for safe platforms, donors for feminist fortitude—resonates urgently in Pakistan. Justice, digital or corporeal, enshrines consent as inviolable, not aspirational. As 2025’s activism ignites, from Lahore’s virtual vigils to global petitions, the imperative is collective: shatter screens of silence, forge fortresses of equity. Women’s stories, altered by abuse’s acid, deserve reclamation—not resignation. In this fight, every voice amplified, every law enforced, carves pathways to a borderless dignity where pixels empower, not ensnare.