No one should be driven offline by abuse. FDJ confronts harassment, gender-based violence, doxxing, and threats, with particular attention to women, activists, and marginalised communities. We support survivors and push platforms to act.
Being driven offline is a loss of rights, not just of comfort
When sustained abuse forces someone to close an account, they lose a livelihood, a professional network, a source of news and a means of organising. For women in public life, for activists and for people already at the margins, that cost is not distributed evenly — and the people most often silenced are the ones with the least recourse.
The harm is real and it is frequently under-enforced. Doxxing, coordinated harassment, image-based abuse and credible threats routinely go unaddressed by both platforms and police.
The difficulty we take seriously
The same statutes written to address online abuse are also the ones most often turned against critics and journalists. That is not a reason to dismiss complaints of abuse. It is a reason to be precise about remedies.
Where a statement is false and damaging, defamation law already provides a route, and the person injured is free to take it. What the criminal law adds is custody before anything has been proved. We made that argument in the prosecution of the musician Ridwan Abiola, where a dispute between two musicians became a cybercrime case — while taking no position on what was actually said.
Protecting people from abuse and protecting people from over-criminalisation are not opposing commitments. Both fail when the only available response is an arrest.
What we do
- Support survivors of online abuse in pursuing remedies that fit the harm.
- Press platforms for faster, more transparent handling of harassment and image-based abuse reports.
- Advocate for civil and regulatory routes that do not depend on criminal prosecution.
- Work for proportionate laws that protect targets of abuse without handing officials a tool against critics.
If you are facing harassment, threats or image-based abuse online, report a case to us.