Law against cyberbullying moves forward: Lower House sends bill on digital violence to Senate

Last week, the bill that outlaws, typifies and punishes digital violence was approved and sent to the Senate. If this legislation is approved, violent behavior in the digital space would be punished with prison sentences or fines from 5 to 20 UTM.

Digital violence is an issue that has been under discussion lately due to the growth of these online spaces. Ingrid Bachmann, an academic at the Catholic University and director of the Millennium Nucleus on Digital Inequalities and Opportunities (NUDOS), explains that “empirical evidence shows that digital technologies not only facilitate or amplify existing forms of violence, but also create new ones based on the potential of new media and platforms, and the individuals and communities that use them”.

The academic adds that this type of actions disproportionately affects women and people with different vulnerabilities -such as children, dissidents or racial and ethnic minorities- who are already unprotected in other areas. In this regard, a survey of women in 2020 by the NGO Amaranta, on digital violence in Chile, detected that 73.8% of respondents have suffered digital violence in digital spaces (ONG Amaranta, 2020).

“The vast majority of the time, for these people reporting digital violence means revictimization. That is why it is important to have a regulatory framework that at least sanctions this type of violence and does not downplay its importance,” says the director of NUDOS.

The text, introduced in December 2020 by Deputy Maite Orsini, contains three articles that indicate the punishable conducts and their respective penalties or fines.

First, the exhibition of image or sound recordings in which a sexual action involving another person is represented. The article further states that these may be “obtained with the consent of the affected person, but under the recognizable expectation of not being exhibited to third parties”. This will be punished with imprisonment and a fine of 5 to 10 UTM.

The same article adds that: “In case of sending, dissemination or publication, the penalty shall be a minimum term of imprisonment with a fine of 11 to 20 UTM”.

Secondly, harassment will also be considered a punishable offense and will be punished with a minimum term of imprisonment or a fine of 6 to 10 UTM. Harassment includes: following or watching the victim, establishing or trying to establish contact with her by any means, calling her by telephone or communicating by any means.

If this conduct includes sending intimate records, the penalty will be a minimum term of imprisonment and a fine of 11 to 20 UTM. In addition, if the person responsible for such conduct had a relationship of dependence with the victim, the penalty will be increased by one degree.

The third article adds that disseminating personal data to physically locate the victim for the purpose of harassing her will also be punished. The penalty would be a fine of 5 to 10 UTM.

Finally, the document specifies that the commission of the crimes mentioned above will have a penalty increase of one degree if the victim is under 14 years of age, if there is a relationship of spouse, cohabitant or a child in common with the victim, if the crime is committed anonymously or by falsifying the identity; or if the crime is committed to obtain something in return, such as money, a good or an action.

While there is a positive assessment of the project, Ingrid Bachmann also highlights that there are some aspects that were left out of the regulation, such as deep fakes, images created by generative artificial intelligence, coercion from digital media and impersonation of users in social networks.

“It is to be hoped that the law can be improved to address emerging techniques and new extensions of other forms of violence to the digital sphere,” the academic concludes.