- Charges against Sean 'Diddy' Combs to be revealed following arrest
- Israel widens focus of war to include Lebanon front
- 'I am a rapist,' says Frenchman in mass rape trial
- Myanmar villagers battle to save rice crop as flood death toll jumps to 226
- Trump returns to campaign trail after weekend assassination scare
- Indian state reopens schools, restores internet after ethnic clashes
- Young Equatorial Guineans yearn for the American dream
- Man City brace for Inter reunion as Akanji fears 'tough' schedule
- Uganda's 'singing fools' use satire to attack government
- Champions League finalists Dortmund ambitious after 'alpha' rebuild
- Coal phase-out fuels far right in rural eastern Germany
- More than 95,000 Japanese aged over 100, most of them women
- 'Crushed and downtrodden': Azerbaijan's COP29 crackdown
- Meta bans Russian state media outlets for 'interference'
- Von der Leyen set to reveal EU's new top line-up
- Climate finance: what you need to know ahead of COP29
- Azerbaijan says 'God-given' oil and gas will help it go green
- Most Asian markets up ahead of Fed but Tokyo hit by strong yen
- Chinese appliance maker Midea soars in Hong Kong after US$4 bn IPO
- Sean 'Diddy' Combs arrested amid assault lawsuits
- Japanese players in vogue as English clubs widen horizons
- Sean 'Diddy' Combs arrested amid lawsuits
- Buoyant Bangladesh seek more history in India Test series
- Boeing, union to resume talks as strike quiets Seattle plants
- UN General Assembly to debate call for end to Israeli occupation
- 'Virus hunters' track threats to head off next pandemic
- Firefighters battling flames around Brazil's capital
- Myanmar flooding death toll jumps to 226
- Peruvian police seize 1.3 tons of shark fins
- Town at center of US migrant conspiracies hit with 33 bomb threats
- Emmy ratings pick up with historic 'Shogun' wins
- Washington, Madrid, Prague seek information on nationals held in Venezuela
- US Secret Service insists Trump well-protected despite second scare
- Pakistani pleads not guilty in alleged Iran plot to kill US official
- Drug-resistant superbugs projected to kill 39 million by 2050
- London Fashion Week: Burberry gives the trench coat a streetwear edge
- US woman died after abortion ban delayed her medical care: report
- Chiles' attorneys file Swiss appeal to overturn Olympic medal agony
- Intel delays Germany, Poland chip factories for two years
- Brady's Birmingham beat Reynolds' Wrexham in 'Hollywood derby'
- UN chief condemns 'collective punishment' of Palestinians
- Chiefs running back Pacheco suffers leg fracture: team
- Ronaldo misses Al Nassr draw in Asian Champions League opener
- Murdoch media empire succession drama plays out in US tribunal
- Players ignored in loaded football season, says Liverpool's Alisson
- Philippines says disputed reef 'not lost' to China despite pullout
- England's Curry 'curled up and cried' after serious injury
- TikTok battles US ban threat in court
- Glamorgan approach Hollywood's Reynolds and McElhenney over Hundred investment
- League Cup still 'significant' for Man Utd boss Ten Hag
Rape and revenge porn: Serbian Telegram groups preying on women
It began with a warning -- Telegram groups notorious for sharing illicit sexual content had set their sights on student Stasa Ivkovic.
The groups were searching for intimate photos of Ivkovic and trying to track down her personal information, according to an anonymous tip she received in 2021.
"They found out everything — my address, who my parents are, and all my other personal information," the founder of the Belgrade-based rights group Osnazene -- or "Empowered Women" -- told AFP.
Then came a daily deluge of vulgar and insulting messages and comments on her social media accounts.
The episode sparked Ivkovic's years-long descent into the dark corners of social media chat groups in Serbia, where members regularly share revenge porn, child pornography and other unlawful images.
Ivkovic and two other women from Osnazene were able to infiltrate multiple Telegram groups and later exposed the methods used to share, purchase and request illegal content.
- Pictures of sisters, mothers -
Osnazene published their findings in a report in June, claiming that an estimated 10,000 messages are sent daily on the groups they monitored in Serbia -- with one of the largest having up to 70,000 members.
According to Ivkovic, members frequently use codes like "teen trade" or "-18" to search for child pornography.
Even more shockingly, "male family members, mostly sons, take pictures of their mothers and sisters and then send them to these groups for rating, sharing, and various other purposes," Ivkovic said.
Images shared online also include upskirting pictures, photographs taken under women's skirts on public transport.
"Women are literally not safe anywhere," Ivkovic told AFP.
In one harrowing case, a video of a rape was shared in one Telegram group, with the victim only learning about its existence after it was circulated on numerous chats.
The video later appeared on a pornographic website but was quickly removed.
Serbia's Commissioner for Protection of Equality attributed the rise of the groups in the Balkan nation to "deep-rooted, traditional, patriarchal stereotypes about gender roles in families and communities, where women are seen as the property of men."
- Telegram on trial -
The findings come as Telegram has come under greater scrutiny after the arrest of founder Pavel Durov in France last month.
Durov has been charged with several counts of failing to curb extremist and illegal content on the popular messaging app.
Telegram has positioned itself as a "neutral" alternative to US-owned platforms, which have been criticised for their commercial exploitation of users' personal data.
But opponents of Telegram have regularly accused it of providing a digital marketplace where users can share extreme sexual imagery, disinformation and traffic drugs.
Serbia has a chequered history with encrypted apps.
A vast FBI-led sting operation in 2021 targeting the Sky ECC app led to the arrest of a leading figure from the Serbian underworld, after accounts linked to the suspect posted pictures of gang members dismembering corpses near the capital Belgrade.
The rapid growth of illicit social media groups has been a persistent issue in Serbia in recent years.
Serbia's Special Prosecutor's Office for High Tech Crimes did not respond to AFP enquiries about ongoing investigations against chat groups.
- Lasting damage -
Authorities, however, have been slow to act, with just 13 groups shut down by officials, according to a report in a local investigative outlet.
Activists like Ivkovic say the problem is only worsening in the face of government passivity.
Unlike in neighbouring Montenegro and Croatia, Serbia lacks specific laws on the sharing of unauthorised recordings and distribution of pornographic content, including revenge porn.
Legal expert Jelena Drndarski said that while suspects in possession of child pornography can be prosecuted, victims of revenge porn have to take a civil case against the perpetrators, who are difficult to track because they use anonymous profiles on platforms like Telegram.
From early 2011 to mid-April 2024, 717 people were charged with possessing child pornography and exploiting minors, but only 408 were convicted -- most being given fines and suspended sentences.
Belgrade's Autonomous Women's Centre (AZC) has called for tougher laws against the sharing of unauthorised and illicit content, with a petition signed by tens of thousands of people.
But even with new laws, life for the victims can be grim, according to AZC's Vanja Macanovic.
"These videos and photos remain online forever, and the victims live in fear that someone will see them again, potentially restarting the cycle of violence," said Macanovic.
L.Dubois--BTB