Technology-Facilitated violence and abuse including image-based sexual abuse (IBSA) is a phenomenon affecting women and girls around the world. Abusers misuse technology to attack victims and threaten their safety, privacy, and dignity. This abuse is gendered and a form of domestic and sexual violence. In this article, the authors compare criminal law approaches to tackling IBSA in Scotland and Malawi. We critically analyze the legislative landscape in both countries, with a view to assessing the potential for victims to seek and obtain redress for IBSA. We assess the role criminal law has to play in each jurisdiction while acknowledging the limits of criminal law alone in terms of providing redress.

we launched the Campaign for Complainer Anonymity at Glasgow Caledonian University. 1 Working with our LLB students, we argue that Scots law should be reformed to introduce comprehensive rules on anonymity for complainers in sexual offence cases, accruing early in the criminal justice process, and framed in a way which allows complainers to set aside these restrictions unilaterally if they choose to do so. 2 Complainers in Scottish sexual offence cases currently have no right to anonymity and may lawfully be identified in mainstream and social media forums without legal consequences unless orders have been imposed under section 11 of the Contempt of Court Act 1981. 3 Our campaign is underpinned by comparative research within the UK, and with other common law jurisdictions, 4 drawing on the experiences of these jurisdictions to ensure that a new Scottish framework learns the best lessons from this international experience and avoids the pitfalls and unforeseen consequences encountered by comparator systems in recasting reporting restrictions for the social media age. This research significantly informed the Scottish Government's consultation on reform of this area of law, which closed in August 2022. 5 Moves to legislate for complainer anonymity have also been endorsed by Lady Dorrian's independent review group, 6 and by campaigning organisations including Rape Crisis Scotland. 7 In parallel with our work, the Scottish Government consulted on the abolition