'Women bear brunt of online abuse'
Fake social media accounts are making online abuse cases harder to investigate, Police say.
Tuesday 22 September 2026 | 16:30
Women continue to account for more online abuse complaints than men, according to figures from the Online Safety Commission.
Photo: AI Generated
Women are bearing the brunt of online abuse, with hundreds of complaints recorded by the Online Safety Commission and fake social media accounts emerging as a major challenge.
Online Safety Commission prosecutor Joshua Singh revealed the figures today during a workshop on women’s political participation and technology-facilitated gender-based violence in Suva.
The Commission received 946 complaints from women in 2025, compared with 658 from men.
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In 2024, there were 830 complaints from women and 541 from men, while 585 women and 348 men made complaints in 2026.
Mr Singh said many complaints involved online bullying through fake social media accounts.
“Image base abuse most of the it comes from the usage of Artificial Intelligence (AI),” he said.
Complaints involving defamatory posts against people in public office increased from 322 in 2024 to 402 in 2025, before 250 complaints were recorded in 2026.
Image-based abuse complaints stood at 194 in 2024, 155 in 2025 and 88 in 2026.
Fiji Police Force senior investigative officer Avinesh Dutt, who works with the Cyber Crime Unit, said fake accounts were making investigations more difficult.
He said Police used digital forensic tools, including device extraction, to identify suspects behind online abuse.
Mr Dutt said digital evidence must be properly collected, including IP addresses, links and the path showing where the material came from.
He said Police had faced cases where victims only provided screenshots after original posts or photos had been deleted.
“We need the path and the links and the originality of the photos to be given to us so we can produce it in court,” he said.
Mr Dutt said cases involving women and children were given priority because of the backlog faced by the digital forensic team.
He said victims could also be referred for counselling before Police recorded their statements.
The workshop focused on the growing impact of technology-facilitated gender-based violence, particularly on women in public and political life.
