Like every other technological invention, the internet came with pros and cons too. On the one hand, it revolutionized our lives to the extent that every possible luxury in the world is now just a tap away. On the other hand, however, it has also affected our private lives and created many unwanted complications.
Revenge porn is one of the evils born out of the current cyber age which is impacting individuals both from developed and developing countries. This most obscene form of cybercrime has jeopardized the safety of millions of people around the globe.
The term, Revenge Porn, is relatively new. It refers to the online distribution of explicit images or videos by former lovers or partners. In Pakistan, Digital harassment and cyber-bullying through revenge porn are increasing at a dangerous rate.
According to Digital Rights Foundation, a research-based advocacy organization in Pakistan, DRF’s cyber harassment helpline reported 2,023 cases or 146 calls every month during 2019. It is 45 percent of the overall complaints received in the last three years. This rate increased manifold during 2020 due to “stay at home” orders and seems to be still spiking in 2021.
The laws in this regard are quite loose. There are only a few countries where it is strictly banned, including Israel, Japan, and the Philippines, while others classify it as privacy protection and online crime. In the countries like India, there are no formal laws at all against Revenge Porn.
Pakistan, however, acted and introduced a very basic and vibrant policy against the unnecessary spread of sensitive images in 2016. This law refers to the dissemination of any video or image of a person without his or her consent, which is detrimental to his or her reputation.
The person involved in this heinous act of crime can face up to five years in prison and a fine of Rs 500,000. Although the law looks very strong on paper, the story of a Pakistani girl Maham (supposed name) tells otherwise. Maham is a victim of this crime for whom it turned out to be a nightmare.
Maham was only 16 years old when she first sent a message to the boy. It was 2017 and her family had not yet allowed her to use the smartphone. She used her brother’s laptop to use Facebook.
“It was my first experience of a social networking site. Only friends and family were allowed to join.”
Maham was very interested in graphic designing and sometimes shared her work in this regard. So when the boy sent her a message, she assumed he might have contacted for a project.
The boy lived a short distance from the Maham’s city of Lahore and they started talking on Facebook. Soon things started to change and they got involved emotionally. It was not long before he started asking for the indecent videos.
When Maham objected, he started blackmailing her emotionally and suggested her to make a video and send it to herself only. Maham did the mistake of believing him and ended up sending a video to herself on Facebook messenger.
Surprisingly, as soon as she sent herself the video, the boy’s demands suddenly stopped and it seemed that everything was back to normal.
Their friendship lasted online for two years and ended when Maham found out he was cheating on her.
“At first I was disappointed, but then I cut my hair. I started preparing for college and I was very happy.”
Maham was now 18 years old and no longer a novice in the online world. She bought her mobile phone and started using various social media apps. She created her own Instagram page, where she presented her designing work and also built a fan base.
One day, an unknown Instagram profile sent a screen recording of her personal video she had sent only to herself. Maham remembered her ex-boyfriend had once asked her for her Facebook password. The boy must have logged in and obtained the video.
“He said he was the same boy. Now he was blackmailing me to make friends with him again.”
Maham refused and the boy sent the video to her mother. Sending an explicit video to one’s parents is a violation of privacy anyway, but in Pakistan, this act can get anyone killed. Fortunately, Maham’s family fully supported her in this worst-case scenario.
Maham’s brother worked in the field of information technology and knew about ‘Revenge Porn’ and the laws related to it. So she went to the police and presented the evidence against the boy.
Maham and her entire family were convinced that the evidence they had brought would result in the arrest of the culprit. And indeed, only two days later he was in police custody, but a few days later an FIA officer called the family for a meeting. Meanwhile, the FIA’s lawyer asked Maham to sign a document.
“I didn’t know what those papers were about but I kept signing whatever papers I was given,” she said.
The documents meant that the accused could come out of jail during the investigation of the case. Revenge porn is a non-bailable offense and he was nevertheless granted bail.
A few days after the culprit’s release, Maham received a message from a new Instagram account. Now the same video was seen on a well-known pornographic website. A Google search revealed that the video had been uploaded to 13 pornographic websites, not just one or two.
“I started shivering and crying. Thousands of people had watched these videos. I wanted to delete these videos but I didn’t know how.”
Maham once again approached the FIA officers, but she realized that their ability to understand such a technical matter was limited and that she would now have to remove the videos herself. She took the matter into her own hands and spent hours on her laptop looking at the copyrights and privacy policy of such websites.
Maham claimed copyrights and the video was removed. She also took screenshots of their web pages and documented every moment, in the hope that the case against the boy would be even stronger.
The FIA not only failed to remove the content from these pornographic websites but when the victim did so on her own, they said that now that the videos were no longer available they couldn’t take legal action against the culprit.
Maham returned to the FIA office, hoping to find an alternative. While she was with the officers in a meeting room, Mahim sent a WhatsApp message to his brother. The officers not only forcibly took her phone but also said that they would file a case against Maham.
“We were not revealing state secrets, we were talking about the same case,” says Maham.
The victim’s ex-boyfriend is still gnashing his teeth and what she had to endure in a straightforward case is now in front of everyone. Even today, she goes to porn websites to see if anyone has posted her video again. She is doing most of the work herself without the help of any government agency.
“Criminals made these laws to protect criminals like themselves. These laws are not meant to protect women,” Maham says.
In 2020, a teenage girl reported that a man was posting personal pictures of her online, and the accused was jailed, but then his friends began harassing her. The FIA did not take the complaints seriously and the girl ended up committing suicide.
According to the agency’s own figures, the FIA has “resolved” only 616 of the more than 135,000 complaints it has received since 2016.
Fareeha Aziz, co-founder, and director of the digital rights organization Bolo Bhi, says it is not surprising that Pakistan’s first comprehensive digital law was introduced under the guise of protecting women. The law has been used in many cases, such as to silence unscrupulous individuals, journalists, and human rights activists.
Fareeha asks, “Why introduce such a law when there is nothing to do? It is creating false hope and people are falling further into this trap. They are failing women who are suing for online exploitation.”
Leave a Reply