GENDER EQUALITY IN THE AGE OF NEW TECHNOLOGIES AND AI: Criminal Law Responses to Cyber Gender-Based Violence in Europe

This paper explores the intersection between cybercrime and gender-based violence, through the lens of gender, highlighting its central role in understanding the driving forces and the social impact of harmful conduct in cyberspace. Indeed, the promotion of equality online cannot overlook the interactions between gender, sexuality, culture, and technology, as factors intersecting and shaping online discrimination, as well as reinforcing offline gender hierarchies. Therefore, particular attention should be devoted to the interplay between gender roles and dynamics of oppression and domination rooted in modern society—long predating the advent of new technologies—and their impact on the development of online interactions, as well as to the role that new technologies play within this broader scenario. This framework is especially relevant with regard to content-based offences, and in particular to what we term ‘cyber gender-based crimes’, where cyberspatiality and embodied harms intertwine in complex ways. In this context, it seems crucial to understand, first of all, how persistent patterns of violence and abuse, perpetuated by cultural structures of inequality and marginalisation, are expressed through the modalities and logics specific to cyberspace, and then, conversely, how harms emerging in the contemporary digital world can shed light on the mechanisms of exclusion, power and domination in society at large. Accordingly, after laying the definitional groundwork and analysing empirical data, the paper emphasizes how certain groups (including women and non-binary individuals) disproportionately experience cyber-violence, and how this impacts not only the individual dimension of harm but also the collective degradation of their democratic participation both online and offline. Moreover, this contribution invites reflection on the role of AI in the commission and amplification of online gender-based violence. Beyond the widely discussed phenomena of AI-generated non-consensual intimate images and synthetic child sexual abuse material, AI systems facilitate impersonation, harassment, and blackmail through deepfake audio and text. Additionally, AI-driven data extraction and surveillance tools raise concerns regarding stalking and persistent victimization. These dynamics pose significant challenges for existing legal frameworks, calling for renewed attention to prevention and victim protection. Finally, this work examines the European Union’s response to these challenges and compares the national strategies currently pursued by various European States. To date, in several jurisdictions unlawful behaviours falling within the scope of cyber gender-based harms are subsumed under the broader framework of general ‘offline’ offences, with the ‘online dimension’ emerging merely through judicial interpretation or as an aggravating factor within traditional criminal provisions. As can be readily inferred, this approach risks downplaying both the severity and the distinctiveness of these offences. The paper ultimately argues for a multidimensional strategy—that integrates criminal law with administrative law, cybersecurity, and sensitization policies—to provide effective and equitable responses to ‘cyber gender-based harms’, while simultaneously taking into account the limitations of a ‘pan-penalistic’ approach, acknowledging that the resort to criminal law should rather be situated coherently within a broader framework of regulatory and policy measures.