A disturbing global investigation has uncovered massive private chat networks where men are covertly filming and sharing videos of their sedated partners. Operating across encrypted digital platforms, these communities treat horrific acts of domestic violence as a form of social currency.
As authorities scramble to track the digital footprint left behind by these abusers, experts are left grappling with the deeply unsettling psychological drivers pushing men to broadcast these crimes online.
The Haunting Reality Behind Closed Telegram Groups
The 2024 trial of Dominique Pelicot and 50 other men in a French court completely horrified the world, ending with every single one of them convicted for a decade of drugging and raping his wife Gisèle Pelicot. It is easy to look at a case that monstrous and assume it is a rare anomaly. But the unsettling truth is that this kind of abuse is happening on a scale most people simply do not realise.
Thousands of men all over the world are joining private online groups to share photos and videos of drugged women being abused. Journalists at CNN recently exposed massive networks on the messaging platform Telegram, where thousands of members swap advice alongside video footage of themselves raping and assaulting their own wives and girlfriends.
CNN did an investigation into the world of “sleep porn,” in which men drug their wives and either rape them or allow others to rape them.
— Diana Alastair💚🤍💜 ⚢ ❌❌✡️ (@sappholives83) March 27, 2026
Dominique Pelicot was not a one-off. He’s not even that unusual.
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French authorities opened a criminal probe into the specific website Pelicot used to find strangers to violate his wife. Over the course of the case, investigators discovered a haul of 20,000 photos and videos documenting the assaults, all filmed by the husband himself.
This leaves us with two critical questions: what drives men to commit these acts, and what will it take to put an end to it?
The Global Scale of Exploitation Networks
The revelations from France and the CNN investigation might have stunned the public, but they are far from isolated incidents. Law enforcement and researchers have tracked identical secret forums and messaging circles operating across the UK, Australia, Canada, Ireland, and throughout Europe and Asia.
These findings highlight a deeply entrenched global problem rather than a handful of random incidents. What we are seeing is structured, criminal behaviour driven by online networks that actively encourage this abuse, all taking place on digital platforms that give them the perfect space to operate.
According to a New York Times investigation, some of these online networks based in China have grown to include up to 100,000 members. Similarly, AI Forensics' researchers tracking digital forums across Spain and Italy discovered communities where nearly 25,000 people gathered.
Though the Telegram community exposed by CNN was capped at just over 1,000 members, the reach of the material was far greater, with individual videos racking up upwards of 50,000 views.
The networks exposed in these investigations belong to a larger online subculture known as the manosphere. This digital network brings together influencers, message boards, and group chats that actively spread and reinforce deeply misogynistic views.
Financial Incentives and the Pursuit of Engagement
According to the CNN findings, the underlying formula across these different platforms remains clear: 'while the platforms vary, inside such groups, video is king.' Members gain more attention and higher status within the group by sharing footage that is increasingly extreme, degrading, and high-risk.
To drive user activity, Telegram offers financial perks similar to other digital platforms, allowing participants to accumulate points and climb up competitive leaderboards. The app features its own built-in cryptocurrency, which users can easily cash out or distribute via affiliate links.
Homosocial Bonding and the Need for Male Validation
A study conducted in Australia indicates that revenge is rarely the sole motive when men distribute non-consensual footage online. Instead, the primary driving force for these individuals is a desire to validate their masculinity in front of their male peers.
While data regarding online abusers is still developing, experts analysing these digital spaces note that a distinct male-to-male bonding occurs when users trade footage of their assaults. It brings to mind the words of feminist philosopher Marilyn Frye: 'from women they want devotion, service and sex. Heterosexual male culture is homoerotic; it is man-loving.'
Even though the content shared in these forums revolves entirely around treating women as objects, tearing down their dignity, and rating their bodies, the entire interaction is actually focused on other men. The ultimate goal is to win the respect and approval of their peers, a status achieved through the likes and commentary left on their uploads.
Another common method for building rapport within these networks is actively inviting feedback from fellow users. A study published in a Sage Journal highlighted instances where members openly prompted others for explicit descriptions of violence, asking them to 'describe how you would rape this b****.'
Furthermore, some users order AI-generated adult content—highly realistic but entirely fabricated explicit media—by using nudification tools and various artificial intelligence software.
The vocabulary and actions within these networks are deliberately designed to strip women of their humanity, treating them merely as products for male consumption and gratification while tightening the connections between the male participants. Ultimately, hatred of women acts as the social glue binding these digital groups together.
How App Mechanics Enable Digital Violence
Standard interventions and policies addressing gender-based violence generally isolate the issue, treating it as a series of lone offenders. However, this narrow perspective overlooks the broader social networks, systemic issues, and technological frameworks that actually facilitate and sustain the abuse.
Consider the platform mechanics of Telegram: what makes it such a haven for abusers? The app is built with specific design features that actively facilitate and expand the reach of image-based sexual abuse.
These communities can scale up to 200,000 participants. The platform's end-to-end data encryption ensures user anonymity, which is further protected by lax content moderation. Telegram also permits the sharing of massive media files, including high-resolution video and audio. Crucially, its interactive toolkit—featuring likes, comments, and disappearing messages—helps drive the engagement that sustains these networks.
When these features converge, they create the ideal environment for abusers. The resulting spaces are massive, private, and virtually unregulated, offering perpetrators the perfect shield of anonymity to distribute non-consensual sexual content without consequence.
Shifting Legal Frameworks and Systemic Accountability
Global efforts to combat this exploitation are increasing, highlighted by recent legislative measures like the United States' Take It Down Law—which went into effect this past May—and the work of regulatory watchdogs like Australia's eSafety Commissioner. These initiatives are specifically designed to disrupt the generation and spread of image-based sexual abuse, including the rise of AI-generated explicit deepfakes.
While these legal frameworks typically target individual abusers, recent high-profile actions demonstrate a shift toward systemic accountability. In France, the landmark Pelicot case led to the arrest of the administrators behind the specific website Dominique used to recruit accomplices to assault his wife.
Similarly, Telegram's founder was arrested and charged by French authorities for permitting widespread criminal activity on his platform, including the distribution of child sexual abuse material—a case that remains active within the judicial system.
These high-profile arrests signal a welcome shift in accountability, targeting individual tech executives rather than just their corporations. By taking this approach, the legal system directly penalises the creators of the digital infrastructure that allows this abusive, degrading behaviour to spread and thrive.
