- Debated since January by deputies and senators, this bill supported by the majority intends to strengthen the penal system for cases of harassment within the couple or between ex-spouses.
- Last step in the legislative process, the joint committee must make its conclusions public before final adoption on Tuesday in the Senate.
- The text complements in particular the article of the Penal Code which punishes invasions of privacy by adding the fact of locating a person in real time without their consent.
They have been poorly documented. Yet the rare research on conjugal cyberviolence suggests a widespread phenomenon. In 2018, in a dedicated survey, the Ile-de-France center for gender equality Hubertine Auclert estimated that 9 out of 10 women victims of domestic violence had also suffered from a form of cyberstalking from their spouse or ex-spouse. Unwanted reading of e-mails, rain of SMS or unauthorized installation of geolocation software, digital tools very often participate in the control mechanism.
Since January, Parliament has been working on a bill aimed at better protecting victims of domestic violence. The text notably provides for several articles relating to this cyberviolence. Engaged in an accelerated procedure, this new legislative device carried by the LREM majority should be definitively adopted this Tuesday in the Senate.
A useful extension
Today, in very rare cases only, cyberbullying committed by a spouse is considered an aggravating circumstance under the law. On the contrary, in certain situations - when a husband confiscates his wife's computer or phone, for example - he may benefit from family immunity.
To remedy this, parliamentarians now want, in the event of a violation of the secrecy of correspondence (whether it be e-mails, SMS, exchanges on instant messaging), the quality of spouse or ex-spouse is considered an aggravating circumstance. In the event of harassment within the couple, the penalties could be increased, up to ten years in prison when it leads the victim to commit suicide or to attempt to commit suicide. Finally, elected officials want to repress the geolocation of a person when it is set up without their consent.
“The crime of invasion of privacy already allowed us to encompass a lot of facts committed using digital tools. But adding a specific paragraph on geolocation is not useless because it obviously contributes to a general climate of harassment and control. This will make it possible to no longer miss out on certain forms of cyberviolence which did not fall within the already existing crimes ”, estimates Anne-Sophie Laguens, lawyer in family law. The extension to geolocation of this crime of invasion of privacy will be accompanied by a modification of the penalty incurred up to two years in prison if the perpetrator is the spouse of the victim.
Complaints that rarely succeed
However, the lawyer wonders: “If these details in the Penal Code are not unnecessary, legislative tools already exist. But when a woman files a complaint after receiving thousands of text messages from her husband or ex, is that complaint received or dealt with? "
A concern shared by Marie Pierre Badré, president of the Hubertine Auclert center. “In the survey we carried out in 2018, we realized that very few women lodged a complaint for cyberviolence within the couple. And for those who decided to do so, 23% of their complaints were closed and 50% remained unanswered. The law is good, but it must be applied and the rest of the judicial system to follow, ”she warns.
Another point, neglected by parliamentarians, also raises serious concerns within associations helping victims of domestic violence: “stalkerware”. This spyware installed manually on a person's phone allows an individual to know their movements, their call and SMS history. In 2019, an international coalition, bringing together several NGOs, was created to raise public awareness and challenge software publishers.
An approach deemed essential by Marie Pierre Badré: “Punishing non-consented geolocation is important. But you still have to know when you are a victim. Nowadays you can buy spyware very easily and when it is installed on your phone, it is almost impossible to notice it. We are now campaigning with software publishers so that women know how to spot them and especially how to remove them from their phones ”.
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By the Web
How connected objects are used daily to harass women
- By the Web
- Society
- Justice
- LREM
- Femicide
- Cyber harassment
- Womens rights
- Violence against women
- Domestic violence