What Singapore’s Online Safety Commission achieved in its first month

Singapore’s Online Safety Commission (OSC) had already received about 200 reports roughly one month after beginning operations on 29 June 2026. Early cases included help for two children whose personal information had been doxed and a survivor whose intimate recording was posted without consent.

That first-month activity offers an early test of Singapore’s new approach: give victims a dedicated statutory route to seek faster relief, while pairing legal remedies with survivor-centred support from organisations such as the SHECARES Centre.

What the OSC did in its first month

The OSC began with responsibility for five types of serious online harm affecting Singapore citizens and residents:

• online harassment, including sexual harassment;
• doxxing;
• online stalking;
• intimate-image abuse; and
• image-based child abuse.

The commission’s early caseload included two children whose personal information had been exposed through doxxing. It also assisted a survivor whose intimate recording had been shared without consent. The available reporting confirms that these cases were part of the early caseload, but does not provide detailed outcomes for each case.

The commission’s significance is not only the number of reports. Under Singapore’s Online Safety (Relief and Accountability) Act, it provides a dedicated avenue for victims to seek timely redress and can direct platforms and relevant online-group administrators to remove harmful content. The framework also allows action against accounts involved in harmful conduct.

One publicly reported example involved a TikTok post that falsely linked a woman to the circumstances surrounding former acting minister Muhammad Faishal Ibrahim’s resignation. The OSC took action after assessing the report and finding that online harmful activity had occurred; the post was subsequently no longer available.

The OSC’s scope is expected to expand progressively beyond its initial five categories to cover the wider set of online harms recognised under the framework.

Why the SHECARES Centre matters alongside the OSC

The OSC is the statutory redress mechanism. The SHECARES Centre serves a complementary role by providing survivor-centred assistance and community support.

That distinction matters because removing a post does not necessarily resolve the wider harm. A survivor may still face threats, fear of further exposure, reputational damage, emotional distress or uncertainty about what to do next. In practice, an effective response may require several forms of help at once:

• accessible reporting and rapid content removal;
• protection of anonymity and personal safety;
• practical guidance on documenting abuse and navigating platforms;
• emotional and mental-health support; and
• legal assistance where appropriate.

The OSC can create accountability and reduce the circulation of harmful material. Support services can help survivors manage the personal consequences that remain after a post, account or recording has been taken down.

What the survey findings reveal about online harm

The demand seen by the OSC is consistent with broader evidence that online harm is widespread in Singapore. Minister for Law Edwin Tong cited SHE findings that 38% of Singaporeans had personally experienced online harm. Among survivors, 36% reported severe effects, including depression, fear for their safety and, in some cases, suicidal ideation.

Earlier SHE research cited by the Ministry of Law also found that 76% of respondents were uncomfortable expressing personal views online on potentially controversial subjects. Women, young people and minorities were identified as especially vulnerable.

The figures point to an important distinction: online safety is not simply a question of whether offensive material remains visible. Harm can affect whether people feel able to participate, speak openly or remain identifiable online.

A separate 2022 survey cited by Singapore’s Ministry of Home Affairs found that 66% of respondents felt safe online, compared with 92% who said they felt safe walking alone at night. Because these figures come from a different survey and year, they should not be treated as a direct update of the SHE findings, but they reinforce the gap between physical and online perceptions of safety.

The gender dimension is clear, but the available data is limited

The supplied SHE evidence indicates that women and female young people can face distinct forms of online harm. In the SHE 2023 research cited by the Ministry, 22% of female youths reported experiencing sexual harassment, compared with 14% across all respondents. The same material said that 52% of respondents aged 15 to 24 had personally experienced online harm, compared with 38% across respondents overall.

These figures do not provide a complete men-versus-women breakdown across every category of abuse. It would therefore be misleading to claim that all online harms affect men and women in the same way—or to assign a precise gender difference to the entire caseload.

The evidence does support a narrower conclusion: gender, age and identity can shape both exposure to online abuse and its consequences. Sexualised harassment, threats and abuse may carry particular safety and reputational risks, while other people may experience different forms of intimidation, humiliation or exclusion.

Tong’s broader policy message

Tong’s argument was that regulation is necessary but cannot solve the problem on its own. The OSC and OSRAA create enforceable routes to relief, but platforms, online-group administrators and users also have responsibilities for the culture they permit and create.

That includes rejecting stereotypes and gender beliefs that normalise misogyny, harassment or violence. If harmful conduct is treated as entertainment, inevitable online behaviour or something victims should simply tolerate, formal remedies will always arrive after damage has occurred.

Singapore’s early experience therefore points to a two-part response:

1. Fast, enforceable intervention: give victims a practical way to seek takedowns, account restrictions and other relief without relying only on informal platform reporting or a lengthy court process.
2. Longer-term prevention and support: challenge harmful gender norms, promote respectful online behaviour and provide survivors with emotional, safety, practical and legal assistance.

The OSC’s first month demonstrates that victims are using the new route. The SHE findings explain why the need extends beyond content moderation: online harm can silence people, undermine their sense of safety and intensify existing inequalities. The lasting measure of the framework will be whether rapid legal action is matched by meaningful support and changes in the behaviour that produce the harm.