The online ‘rape academy’ exposes a terrifying new scale of sexual violence - and our systems are failing to keep up

By Sarah Rosenberg

We have built a system that is structurally incapable of delivering accountability at the scale that violence is occurring, writes Sarah Rosenberg.

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Photo by Ayrus Hill on Unsplash

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Content advice: the following article contains discussions of sexual violence and abuse content.

CNN’s exposé of a global “rape academy” of men sharing tactics to drug and sexually assault women has been met with shock.

But these men, these networks, are not outliers.

As a victim survivor who spent three years suffering through the legal system to seek ‘justice’, I see them for what they are: a warning.

Using encrypted chats and fringe forums, these online communities sprawl the globe. Sickeningly, for users the thrill of the abuse lies not only in the act itself, but in the group dynamic surrounding it.

The case against Dominique Pelicot and his co-abusers drew global attention to this form of tech-enabled abuse. Psychologist Annabelle Montagne, who assessed half of the men convicted in that trial, has described these networks as a kind of “rape academy,” where a sense of “brotherhood” emerges.

What this investigation makes clear is that shutting down one platform does not end the behaviour, it simply forces it to evolve and shift elsewhere.

In Australia, reports of abusive content, particularly online, have surged in recent years, increasing anywhere from 41% to over 960% depending on the platform and jurisdiction. At the same time, 92% of people who experience sexual violence never report to police.

And why would they? The re-traumatisation caused by the legal system is well-documented, as are its low success rates.

But it’s clear that sexual abuse is no longer operating as isolated incidents. It is crowdsourced, coordinated across platforms and countries. It is also faster, more easily distributed, and more adaptive than the systems meant to contain it.

That is the divide: harm is accelerating while accountability stalls.

Governments tend to explain this as a problem of under-reporting. That victim survivors don’t feel confident enough to come forward. That if they would only disclose to a police officer, that officer would do their job and justice would ensue. But that explanation doesn’t hold up, particularly when it comes to intimate partner violence. Because the issue is not whether harm is seen. It is what happens when it is. And too often, the answer is, not enough.

We have built a system that is structurally incapable of delivering accountability at the scale that violence is occurring, and we continue to place the burden of that failure on the people it is least equipped to carry.

Responsibility for sexual violence is split across platforms, regulators, police, prosecutors and courts. Each has a role. None has full responsibility.

So when something goes wrong, there is no single point of accountability. Only a series of partial responses shaped by inconsistent standards, fragmented again across jurisdictions, and determined by the resources, priorities and interpretation of each actor. But the victim gets the blame.

At scale, accountability is off the cards. Siloed frameworks create gaps where harmful behaviour and content persist, shifting between platforms, jurisdictions and legal thresholds, always remaining partially obscured by fragmented regulation.

And for victim survivors watching from the sidelines - or silently seeing their own stories reflected in the news, every reaction to a headline becomes another calculation: is it worth coming forward at all?

This is where we find ourselves, mistaking victim survivor disengagement for apathy when it’s a rational response to a system that doesn’t deliver. A system that has consistently demonstrated that visibility does not guarantee action, evidence does not guarantee consequence, and participation does not guarantee protection.

What comes next must be built with the clarity that victim-survivors already have: survival should not depend on navigating a system designed to exhaust them. Anything less simply repeats the harm.

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About the author

Sarah Rosenberg

Sarah Rosenberg is the Executive Director of With You We Can and a nationally recognised advocate for justice system reform. Since 2023, she has led the effort to advance independent legal representation for victims of sexual violence through policy and media, driving pilot implementation across the country.