Social media (SoMe), a byproduct of the information and communication technology (ICT) revolution, has impacted human life beyond imagination. It has encroached upon the privacy of individuals and is an entrenched, pervasive tool capable of overturning a regime. SoMe has its own pros and cons. It has also divided people into two classes: the creators and the receivers or users of those SoMe platforms. Those having technical know-how and resources have become the creators, and those lacking both prerequisites have turned into users. The developed countries have reaped the benefits from SoMe, while the poor countries like Nepal have benefited less from and lost more to SoMe platforms.
The brighter part is that SoMe has connected people from around the world, including those living in remote villages in Nepal. But the darker side is that opportunities come with social and financial costs. The social consequences are long-lasting and perilous. The much-hyped boon of connectivity has an equally disturbing reality. It has connected people living poles apart and estranged people living under one roof. The impact is intangible, but the cost is irrecoverable.
Alarming part
In Nepal's context, where people have merely become consumers of SoMe platforms, disadvantages outweigh advantages. SoMe-related crimes are rising, which were unheard of just a decade ago. The most alarming part is that the state and non-state actors’ efforts to contain SoMe-related crimes have not been so effective. Based on the recent data available, a five-year timeline covering 2021 to 2025 has been taken as a reporting period. According to Facts of Nepal, which mines data from government agencies, the popular SoMe platform Facebook/Messenger tops the list of crimes committed by abusing it. The Facebook/Messenger-related crimes rose from 2021 to 2023 with 4,114 cases registered in 2021, and 5,492 in 2022, culminating in a staggering number of cases of 14,603 in 2023.
TikTok is the second biggest contributor to SoMe-related crimes. The number of offenses that occurred via the video-sharing site stands at 131; 501; 1,027; 1,598 and 6,069 over the five years, respectively. The third is WhatsApp. A total of 69; 205; 826; 1,968 and 2,720 crimes were committed using this site in the reporting years in sequence, which has gone up sharply in recent years. Other SoMe platforms misused to commit crimes, from petty ones to big financial scams, include Viber, Imo, YouTube, X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, website hacking, email, online payment systems (eSewa as recorded in the report), and others. The total number of crimes related to those platforms was 4,751; 6,948; 18,138 and 19,563 in the five-year reporting period, respectively.
There has been a phenomenal growth in the use of mobile phones in Nepal over a decade. According to the Economic Survey 2025/26, by mid-March 2026, there are over 30 million telephone users in Nepal, including cellular mobile phone users. Nepal Telecom Authority (NTA) data shows that the number of people using data/internet provided by NEA-licensed internet service providers is north of 40 million by mid-March 2026. The rising use of mobile phones, coupled with wider internet coverage, has given rise to the use and misuse of SoMe.
Increased access to SoMe has fueled online financial scams. Facts of Nepal reports that financial scams committed using online payment systems have grown steadily over the past five years. Crimes related to payments committed through eSewa, an online payment platform, alone were 50 in 2021; 137 in 2022; 348 in 2023; 430 in 2024; and 745 in 2025. SoMe has been misused to take revenge, harass, and bully people. The perpetrators are mostly male, and the victims are mostly female, followed by gender and sexual minorities. It appears that there is a contradictory but corresponding relationship between the rising SoMe-related crimes. On the one hand, people have become aware of a legal provision that penalises wrongdoers and have increasingly been reporting such cases to the police.
Consequences
On the other hand, those SoMe misusers who commit crimes seem unaware of the consequences of their misconduct. A few years ago, a boy from Nuwakot district posted a message on his Facebook wall about the availability of turtle hatchlings. He didn’t know that it was illegal to keep turtles. So, the two sides - low level of digital literacy and growing level of awareness of reporting scams - coexist. The ease of creating fake accounts also prompts idiots to harass or cheat people, taking advantage of loopholes in technology. And perhaps we lack the technology and expertise to trace such perpetrators. This is why the crimes related to SoMe have been rising continuously.
Another contributing factor is extremely low institutional capacity. The Cyber Bureau of Nepal Police, the only law-enforcing agency, remains quite neglected by the state in terms of strengthening its institutional capacity. According to available data, by August 2024, there are 106 personnel in the central Cyber Bureau, with just 28 assigned to the IT department. The government should recruit more personnel, equip them, and train them in new technologies to prevent crimes. Merge the Armed Police Force with Nepal Police to strengthen its capacity. How can 28 officials investigate cybercrimes that have been rising steadily? The wrongdoers are always one step ahead of the police. How can the government formed on the promise of improving governance afford to ignore the capacity of the authority entrusted with public safety?
(Sedhai is a freelance writer.)
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