LocationsBridging Hemispheres: UNDP and Korean National Police Agency Forging South-South and Triangular Cooperation to Combat Technology-facilitated Gender-based Violence in Latin America
June 29, 2026
As digital spaces rapidly evolve, technology-facilitated gender-based violence (TFGBV) and cybercrimes have escalated into critical global threats that disproportionately target, silence and exclude women and girls from public life, ultimately undermining the democracy. Addressing these cross-border digital threats is a matter of advancing gender equality, human rights, and inclusive digital governance.
To confront this challenge, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Korean National Police Agency (KNPA) co-organized a five-day Expert Mission in Montevideo, Uruguay, from 8 to 12 June 2026. Featuring three-day Knowledge-sharing Workshop and Regional Dialogue on Addressing TFGBV, this mission built upon successful previous exchanges in 2024. It marked a significant expansion of the strategic partnership into Latin America, bringing together rule of law actors to build survivor-centered, gender-responsive and tech-savvy security institutions, equipped to respond to the challenges of the digital sphere.
A Growing Global Coalition for Gender Responsive Digital Justice
At the core of this initiative is the global project, "Police Support for Effective Prevention and Response to Cybercrimes and Gender-based Violence and Harassment," funded by the KNPA. Pivoting from localized pilots toward systemic institutional transformation, the project's current phase has expanded to 12 partner countries aiming for transformation by 2027.
The Expert Mission put the power of South-South and Triangular Cooperation (SSTC) on full display. Far from a simple bilateral exchange, the hybrid workshop and dialogue became vibrant global convening points for specialized personnel, gender experts, and cyber investigators from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Ghana, Maldives, Mexico, Pakistan, Sierra Leone, and Uruguay. Drawing over 50 in-person delegates and over 200 virtual participants in Montevideo alone, the events reflected a growing global recognition that TFGBV is a systemic barrier to gender equality and democratic participation.
Trauma-Informed Cyber Investigations
Led by KNPA experts, the three-day workshop delivered practical, hands-on capacity building, grounded in gender-responsive policing. The thematic tracks addressed critical operational hurdles faced by police forces, including:
- Whole-of-Society Response: Tracked the evolution of TFGBV in Korea, outlining how public awareness, legal reforms, and the National Center for Digital Sexual Crime Response (NCDSCR) coordinated cross-sectoral referral pathways.
- Survivor-Centered Policing: Shared institutional frameworks for building community trust, handling complaints sensitively, and utilizing tools like the Electronic Cybercrime Report & Management System.
- Advanced Cyber Investigations Techniques: Participants practiced advanced investigation methods transferred from the KNPA, including how to track perpetrators across anonymous networks, and preserve an intact digital chain of custody, using AI-powered tools, alongside open-source intelligence platforms.
To anchor these concepts, the delegation conducted field visits to the Uruguay National Police Unified Command Directorate and Specialized Police Unit for Domestic and Gender-based Violence (Station No. 4) to observe how frontline officers handle digital evidence and support victims-survivors.
The ROK-Latin America Dialogue: Forging a Regional Roadmap
Held on the third day of the mission, the ROK-Latin America and the Caribbean Dialogue on Addressing TFGBV positioned digital violence not merely as an isolated law enforcement issue, but as a systemic threat to gender equality, civic trust and democratic governance—intersecting with other forms of gender-based violence.
This framing aligns with UNDP’s broader strategic vision. Digital transformation is one of the three accelerators of the UNDP Strategic Plan 2026–2029, serving as a lever to drive structural change and advance sustainable, resilient development. Similarly, the newly approved UNDP Gender Equality Strategy 2026-2029 emphasizes that digital transformation—particularly that driven by artificial intelligence—is increasingly reshaping how power is distributed, how economies function, and how decisions are made.
Within this context, the UNDP Democracy and Development Report 2026 identifies TFGBV as a phenomenon that erodes democratic trust, restricts women’s political and public participation, and deepens structural inequalities that inclusive development seeks to overcome.
The Dialogue bridged the technical expertise of the ROK with pioneering regional models in Latin America, including:
- Mexico's federal codification of the 'Ley Olimpia' recognizes digital violence as a crime and affirms women’s rights to digital safety. Supported by tools like eMonitor+, it highlights the engagement of women-led civil society, such as the Latin American Network of Digital Women Defenders, contributing survivor-centred grassroots experiences.
- Argentina's Polo Integral de la Mujer serves as a premier "one-stop" institutional model combining investigators, legal aid, and psychologists under one physical roof, influenced by Korea’s Sunflower Centers.
- Brazil's Justiça 4.0 program demonstrates how data system interoperability and AI governance can flag digital warning signs before they escalate into severe offline physical harm.
These examples demonstrate that addressing TFGBV requires not only technology, but political will, gender expertise, and sustained institutional commitment.
Strengthened Partnerships and Way Forward
The expert mission concluded with strategic momentum and clear, actionable outputs that pave the way for deepened cross-regional collaboration to embed gender equality into institutional practice:
- Institutionalizing Knowledge: Law enforcement and judicial actors enhanced their technical capacities, equipping them with survivor-centered methodologies and practical cyber investigation tools to improve future investigations and survivor protection.
- Localized Technical Toolkits: Core KNPA technical training modules were translated and adapted into Spanish.
- Inter-Regional and Multi-Stakeholder Cooperation Framework: The mission connected law enforcement, the judiciary, human rights institutions and civil society, laying groundwork for long-term institutional channels. This synergy set the stage for cross-border cooperation, providing a replicable South-South model to share coordinated, survivor-centered responses to TFGBV.
By centering gender equality and survivors’ voices, and by bringing together diverse nations to share challenges, technical innovations, and structural successes, the UNDP-KNPA partnership has reinforced that digital safety and rights know no borders. The lessons captured in Montevideo will continue to guide global policy, proving that an agile, whole-of-society, and survivor-centered approach is the definitive way forward to guarantee gender justice in the digital age.
