CSOs call for accountability after DUBAWA report on Telegram’s regulatory failures

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Simbiat Bakare

Nigerian Civil society organisation, Citizens’ Gavel, has called on Telegram to strengthen its regulatory framework for accountability, following DUBAWA’s investigation. 

DUBAWA’s report, published on June 3, 2026, uncovered 86 Telegram prostitution groups promoting misinformation, operating an online brothel, and using women’s leaked nude images as advertising materials.

Reacting to DUBAWA’s report, Rita Odafe-Ofarn, the Citizens’ Gavel Lead for TF-SGBV Response Unit, said, “It is a matter of grave concern that a platform with a billion monthly active users, which positions itself as secure, has so permitted its privacy features to be misused that it has effectively become a fertile infrastructure for organised sexual exploitation.” 

Citizens’ Gavel stated that they have noticed a similar pattern of Technology-Facilitated Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (TF-SGBV) through their work SGBV response arm, Gbami.

Consequently, they instituted a Fundamental Rights Enforcement action before the Federal High Court of Nigeria against Telegram “over the platform’s lax content moderation guardrails and sustained failure to protect Nigerian users from sexual exploitation and the non-consensual distribution of intimate images.”

The organisation further calls on other stakeholders, including the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), to exercise their regulatory authority and issue Telegram formal compliance notices for its failure to protect Nigerian users adequately. 

They urged the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP) to hasten the investigation and prosecution of individuals who manage Telegram groups and use them to recruit, traffic, or exploit women for commercial sexual exploitation online.

Similarly, DOHS Cares Foundation, a group fighting to end sexual and gender-based violence in Nigeria, called on NAPTIP to prosecute predatory Telegram admins to protect the victims. 

DOHS reacting to the report on X wrote, “This report shows that the Telegram group admins are exploitative and actively into sex trafficking of young people. @naptipnigeria must ensure the prosecution of these admins to protect the victims who have had their images shared on platforms despite non-authorisation.”