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Summary
We are at the peak of where Gender-based violence has moved into the digital world, and AI is making it worse. Now, women are faced with new dangers. As AI becomes more common, so do these threats. We must act fast to protect women from this growing digital harm.
In recent years, a new form of violence has emerged known as AI-facilitated Gender-Based Violence (AI‑GBV). This term is the manipulation of artificial intelligence technologies such as deepfake generators, AI-powered chatbots, surveillance systems, biased algorithms, and facial recognition to stalk, harass, intimidate, and control women. These tools are often used by abusive partners, online harassers, stalkers, and biased tech developers. AI‑enabled abuse is already harming lives and it threatens the victims. Algorithmic profiling is being weaponised to intimidate, shame, and control women and gender-diverse individuals. This new digital abuse largely affects privacy, mental health, reputation, and safety.
Gender-Based Violence (GBV) has existed for as long as human societies have, it didn’t start at one single point in history. It stems from deep-rooted power imbalances, patriarchy, and cultural beliefs that have historically placed women and marginalised groups in lower, unequal positions. The major forms of GBV are domestic violence, sexual assault, forced marriage, and female genital mutilation.
In the beginning, deepfake technology began mostly for entertainment and memes, but soon it became a tool for creating non-consensual sexual content targeting women, especially celebrities. The AI is being used to generate fake nude images of women, misidentifying women and people of colour, leading to profiling, wrongful arrests, or targeted surveillance. AI-facilitated gender-based violence (AI-GBV) started because technology evolved faster than ethics, laws, and protections, allowing existing gender biases and violence to be amplified through powerful digital tools.
With AI becoming easier to use, apps and bots now undress women in photos, stalk them online, and gain popularity. A now-banned app called DeepNude used AI to create fake nude images of women from regular photos. It mostly targeted women without their knowledge. The app was downloaded thousands of times before it was removed. Fake photos were shared on porn sites and social media, leading to harassment, blackmail, and emotional trauma. Similarly, Amazon scrapped an AI recruitment tool after it was found to be biased against women. The system had been trained on resumes submitted over 10 years, and the AI downgraded resumes that included words like “women’s and favoured male-dominated experiences.
Now, what this has done is to reinforce old forms of violence in new, tech-driven ways; therefore, the more accessible and powerful AI becomes, the more urgent it is to create protections and accountability structures. This is a serious problem because it amplifies harm, spreads faster than ever, and leaves women more vulnerable both online and offline.
Sequentially, techeconomy has analysed that over 16–58% of African women report online gender-based violence, and Nigerian platforms reflect that global trend. Reported Cases from (Jan–May 2024) and at least 6,142 gender-based violence incidents both physical and tech-facilitated were recorded “Nigerian NGO Webfala documented increased reports of cyberstalking, doxxing (publicly revealing one’s personal information intending to harass or threaten them), sextortion, and reputational attacks, leading to emotional distress and financial harm.
To help curb this menace, an initiative, Brain Builders Youth Development Initiative (BBYDI), launched ‘Her Safe Space,’ an AI-powered chatbot designed to support survivors of online gender-based violence. The tool offers real-time guidance, educates on digital rights, and collects incident data to inform policy, which becomes the first AI-driven counter to tech-enabled Gender Based violence in Nigeria.
The implication of this act is strong as victims endure anxiety, depression, self-harm, and social withdrawal, which is made worse when explicit content (e.g., deepfake pornography) goes viral, leaving digital scars that never fade and haunt them continually.
Naija Feminists Media seeks to raise awareness on this issue, while recommending that some measures should be taken to arrest the situation, such as incorporating AI-GBV awareness into schools, workplaces, and activism platforms, involving women and survivors in developing AI systems to flag biases early, and mandating ethical standards and code-of-conduct for AI developers.
Furthermore, social media and AI firms must proactively detect or remove abusive content and implement transparent bias audits, deepfake detection tools, and safe reporting features, there should be strengthened enforcement such as Nigeria’s VAPP, Cybercrimes Act, and NDPR (Nigeria Data Protection Regulation) to explicitly criminalize AI-facilitated abuse.
AI-facilitated gender-based violence (AI-GBV) is not just a tech issue, it’s a power issue. These tools are being used to reinforce patriarchal control, silence women’s voices, and exploit vulnerabilities, particularly in digital spaces. The fact that most deepfake victims are women and that this abuse is often sexualized is no coincidence, it reflects longstanding gendered patterns of violence now re-engineered through technology.
Conclusion:
AI-Gender Based Violence is the digital face of misogyny. It weaponizes innovation to continue silencing, shaming, and surveilling women. It is important that we not only expose this injustice but advocate for a future where AI is developed with ethics, empathy, and equity at its core.
