From survivors to changemakers: How women are fighting digital violence in Mexico and Bolivia
Digital violence against women is exploding across Latin America. For women in public life—politicians, journalists, activists, human rights defenders—online abuse isn't just a nuisance. It's a weapon. And it doesn't stay online.
The abuse starts with a message, a deepfake, a doxing attack. Then it spills into real life: fear, self-censorship, lost jobs, physical attacks. A 2023 UN Women study on digital violence against women in public life across Latin America found that half of women interviewed had experienced threats, groping in public spaces, or had their photos weaponized on social media to harass them. Rape was the most frequent physical threat. Across the board, women reported that digital violence was normalized as "the rules of the game" in politics and journalism.
But women aren't accepting those rules. Across the region, survivors are reshaping laws, demanding accountability, and redefining what it means to participate in public life in the digital age.
Mexico: When personal trauma becomes a national movement for change
In Mexico, more than 10 million women and girls aged 12 and over who used the internet in 2024 were victims of cyberbullying in the past 12 months.
"As a survivor of digital violence, I have seen how this violence does not stay on screen", says Olimpia Coral Melo. "It crosses into your life, your surroundings, your presence, your body, and your memory. Survivors are made to believe that we are the ones to blame, while authorities often do not act because they think that if it happened virtually, it is not real."
In 2013, Coral Melo recorded an intimate video with a partner. It was shared online without her consent. Her life collapsed under blame, stigma, and official indifference. When she tried to report it, authorities told her no crime had occurred and sent her home. At that time, Mexican law didn't recognize digital violence.
Sports journalist Marion Reimers faced a different but equally brutal attack. For years, she endured coordinated online harassment for calling out sexism in sports and media. "If someone hacks my account or assaults me on the street, the result is very similar," she explains. "Digital violence also spills into the physical world. There are people who, because of this, harm themselves, or are harassed and attacked offline."
The attacks cost Reimers job opportunities, damaged her reputation, and triggered depression and anxiety. Like Coral Melo, she hit a wall of institutional denial – law enforcement had little understanding of how digital aggression works, and there were no protocols to hold tech platforms accountable.
Both women turned their trauma into a fight for justice.
The Olimpia Law: A regional milestone for stopping digital violence against women
Between 2013 and 2021, survivors organized, campaigned, testified—and won. Mexico reformed its Criminal Code to recognize gendered digital violence and hold perpetrators accountable for producing, disseminating, storing, or possessing intimate sexual content without consent.
The movement came to be known as the Olimpia Law, a pioneering legislative initiative in Latin America that helped bring visibility to digital violence against women. Since 2016, many countries in the region have passed or amended legislation to recognize digital violence as a form of gender-based violence. Among them, Paraguay, Uruguay, Ecuador, Mexico, Venezuela, and Argentina have amended their laws to include these new forms of violence. Other countries, such as El Salvador, Peru, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Panama, Bolivia, Brazil, the Dominican Republic, Costa Rica, and several Caribbean nations (Belize, Antigua and Barbuda, Trinidad and Tobago, Saint Lucia, Dominica, Cuba, and the Bahamas), have enacted laws that criminalize certain manifestations of digital violence against women.
Now Mexico is launching a Digital Violence Observatory to track trends, and OlimpiA—an artificial intelligence tool designed by survivors that offers support in 30 languages, 24/7, and is expanding across the region.
UN Women is supporting Mexico in building a national response
With support from the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation, UN Women is advancing a project to generate evidence and guide public policy addressing digital violence – a crisis affecting more than10 million women and girls in Mexico, according to INEGI data.
In collaboration with civil society organizations, content creators, journalists, survivors, and feminist collectives, the project will create a National Observatory on Digital Violence. For the upcoming 16 Days of Activism, Mexico will launch "It is real. #ItIsDigitalViolence" campaign to raise awareness and prevent online abuse.
Still, experts argue that justice will only be real if institutions invest in specialized capacities and if technology companies are held accountable through content moderation standards and survivor-centred responses.
Bolivia: Data, documentation, and democratic stakes
In Bolivia, feminist data activist Grecia Tardío is documenting how political violence against women has moved online.
Her work with La Lupa Digital and UN Women's "Connected and Free from Violence" project builds alliances, strengthens local capacities, and insists that data be at the center of digital rights advocacy.
Tardío knows the consequences firsthand. Her Facebook account was hacked from the exact location where she worked, costing her years of digital records. "It is not a matter of personal vigilance alone," she says. "Building safe digital environments requires protocols, responsible sharing, and constant learning about risks. Turning vulnerability into collective knowledge is a concrete form of resistance."
Like survivors in Mexico, Tardío encountered institutional barriers when seeking justice. "Judges, prosecutors, and even lawyers often lack the vocabulary and technical knowledge to grasp how digital environments operate, or what a digital crime actually involves", she explains. "There is confusion about what forensic work can and cannot do, and a clear lack of gender sensitivity among the actors who should be guaranteeing protection."
Bolivia still lacks specific laws on digital rights and digital crimes. The justice system has low sentencing rates and weak oversight, so women rarely find protection. This reinforces impunity and the dangerous idea that digital violence has no real legal consequences.
Silencing women weakens democracy
"When women in public office are silenced, society as a whole loses," says Tardío. "Bolivia may have high political parity on paper, but many women still face normalized pressure to resign, stay quiet, or soften their voice. This ultimately weakens democracy."
Her message is clear: "What is not named does not exist. If digital violence is not named and punished, it will continue to silence the very voices that the country needs to hear."
Bolivia's new framework for digital safety
In 2024, UN Women launched "Connected and Free from Violence" with support from the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation. The project places women at the centre of the digital space, promoting autonomy and digital security, generating evidence about online violence, strengthening institutional responses, and supporting public policies with a gender perspective.
The initiative produced Bolivia's first national survey on women's digital experiences: "Conectando Bolivia, A Snapshot of Women in the Digital World." The survey identifies the most common forms of digital aggression and highlights gender gaps in access and use of technology.
UN Women and partners have also developed a toolbox for public officials, such as the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the judiciary, legal service providers and others handling digital violence cases. It has already trained more than 500 officials, improved coordination between institutions, established clearer reporting routes for women survivors.
The programme has also secured institutional and public recognition of digital violence as a form of gender-based violence, bringing it into political and media debate and strengthening the State's ability to respond with a human rights and equality perspective.
The fight continues to end digital violence
Digital violence threatens women's freedom of expression, their safety, and their ability to participate fully in public life. But across Latin America, survivors are refusing to be silenced. Through legal reform, data activism, community organizing, and unwavering solidarity, they're proving that fighting digital violence isn't just about policy – it's about courage, resistance, and redefining the rules of the game.
