When Nigeria passed the Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Act (VAPP) in 2015, it marked a significant step forward in protecting citizens—especially women and girls—from gender-based violence. The law addressed domestic abuse, sexual assault, and harmful traditional practices in a comprehensive manner. But in 2025, the digital world has become an extension of our everyday lives, and violence has found new, insidious forms online. Unfortunately, the VAPP Act has not kept pace with this shift.
Technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV) is now one of the most common and least addressed forms of abuse in Nigeria. Women face blackmail, cyberstalking, coordinated harassment, doxxing, and increasingly, the spread of AI-generated deepfake pornography. These attacks are often orchestrated to silence, shame, or manipulate women, and they carry devastating personal and professional consequences. In many cases, the law offers little or no remedy.
To meet this moment, the VAPP Act needs to be amended with urgency and foresight. First, the law must be updated to recognize TFGBV in all its forms. This includes explicitly defining and criminalizing online gender-based abuse such as non-consensual image sharing, sextortion, online impersonation, and the use of artificial intelligence to generate sexual content or threats. These behaviors are not “virtual” in impact—they are real, harmful, and deserving of legal response.
Strengthening institutional capacity is equally vital. Law enforcement agencies need training in handling digital evidence, understanding online patterns of abuse, and providing trauma-informed responses to survivors. The judiciary also requires updated guidelines to interpret and prosecute TFGBV cases effectively, particularly those involving new technologies like AI.
Another critical area for reform is accountability among technology platforms. Social media companies, messaging apps, and online forums must be compelled—through legislation—to establish transparent reporting systems and timely content removal mechanisms. These platforms cannot continue to profit from user engagement while ignoring the abuse taking place on their networks. A revised VAPP law should set standards for platform compliance, cooperation with authorities, and user protection protocols.
In parallel, survivor-centered support structures must be embedded into the legal and policy framework. This includes access to legal aid, digital safety training, psychological services, and government-backed hotlines for victims of online abuse. Survivors should not have to navigate complex, unresponsive systems on their own. Their dignity and recovery should be placed at the center of the legal process.
Furthermore, Nigeria needs a national system to track and monitor TFGBV cases, including incidents involving AI-generated abuse. A centralized data collection mechanism—managed with strict respect for privacy—would help identify trends, inform public awareness campaigns, and guide resource allocation.
Finally, for any reform to be meaningful, it must apply across all 36 states. The domestication of the VAPP Act has been uneven, leaving gaps in protection depending on geography. Amending the Act should go hand in hand with renewed efforts to harmonize state-level laws and align them with existing cybersecurity and data protection regulations.
In this digital age, where a photo can be stolen, altered, and weaponized within minutes, the idea that our laws still treat violence as something that only happens offline is no longer acceptable. Nigerian women deserve a legal system that protects them where they live, work, and express themselves—including online.
We are at a crossroad. We can either allow silence and legislative inertia to normalize digital violence, or we can act now to future-proof our protections and reaffirm that all forms of gender-based abuse—whether physical, emotional, or digital—are unacceptable in a just society.
Olasupo Abideen is an ethical AI advocate and CEO MyAIFactChecker
