Polish Femicide Map

What Is the Purpose of the Polish Femicide Map?

The goal of the Polish Femicide Map is to fill the existing gap in data on gender-related killings of women — the femicide gender gap.
The map is an interactive tool structured in the form of case cards. Each card is based on femicide case monitoring and provides information about the circumstances of the crime.
Together, these entries make it possible to illustrate the estimated scale and characteristics of femicide in Poland.

How Are Data on Femicide Collected in Poland?

In Poland, data on femicide-related crimes are gathered by the police, district courts, and public prosecutor’s offices.
The Central Statistical Office (GUS) also maintains its own records.
As a result, discrepancies often occur — a phenomenon known as the statistical slide — when the same act is classified differently by various institutions.
Unfortunately, there is still no central body responsible for coordinating data collection and information exchange between agencies.

What Is the Golden Rule of 3R in Monitoring Femicide?

The Golden Rule of 3R stands for Research, Register, and Remember — a framework introduced by data scientist Catherine D’Ignazio in her book Data Feminism.
She describes digital and AI tools that support the mapping, identification, and classification of femicide cases.

1️⃣ Research – “Find”

The first step, research, involves broad mapping of femicide cases — setting alerts, tracking sources, and verifying the accuracy of reported incidents.
Mapping is a time-consuming process because it requires precision and care to ensure that no case is overlooked or duplicated.

2️⃣ Register – “Record”

The second step, register, refers to documenting a case on the Map, including the criminal circumstances, legal classification, and type of femicide (femicide type verification).
Cases are categorized according to established methodologies, most often those of UNODC or EIGE.

3️⃣ Remember – “Commemorate”

The final step, remember, emphasizes remembrance and tribute — honoring the woman who was killed and her loved ones (femicide victim tribute).
This phase is not about sensationalism or macabre detail, but about fostering reflection through socially conscious storytelling, art, and public awareness — and by calling on authorities to act.

What Is Data Feminism?

Data feminism promotes a critical reflection on how data are collected, categorized, and presented. It seeks to reduce the marginalization of groups that have traditionally been ignored or underrepresented. A central goal of this approach is to shift the way we think about data — ensuring that data serve social justice by including the perspectives of people and communities previously left out of dominant narratives.

In the context of femicide monitoring, data feminism underscores the importance of recognizing fatal cases of violence against women and building databases that enable the measurement of this crime — and, consequently, facilitate prevention. This is the essence of restorative and transformative femicide data science.

What Are the Main Challenges in Monitoring Femicide?

• Missing data due to underrecording and underreporting of cases
• Media bias and selective framing
• Contradictory information or the spread of deepfakes
• Limited human resources and research capacity
• Emotional burden associated with long-term exposure to traumatic cases

How Can the FemTech Sector Support Femicide Mapping?

Feminist Digital Technologies — or FemTechs — designed for data collection can play a crucial role in supporting activists and NGOs that run femicide observatories independently, without state or institutional support. These tools can assist in data monitoring, visualization, and information sharing, strengthening accountability and transparency in documenting gender-related killings of women.

The First Polish Virtual Database on Femicide

We are proud to present the first Polish virtual database dedicated to femicide cases. In maintaining it, we remain deeply aware that behind every number stands a woman who lost her life to violence.
Through this project, we restore their names and identities, showing that these were women who aspired to live lives free from violence.
We also include information about the perpetrators and, where possible, images of the victims — always with respect and dignity.

While building the Polish Femicide Map, we do not rely on sensationalism or shock value. There are no grim counters or symbolic candles. Instead, we promote responsible, empathetic, and inclusive storytelling about femicide.
This is what we call remembrance through agency — honoring victims by restoring their personhood and visibility.

Our aim is for these databases to serve, in the future, as credible resources for public authorities, institutions, and organizations responsible for preventing violence against women.

We map, name, and count – yet we remain aware that each case represents a woman’s life taken by violence — a reminder that femicide cannot be reduced to numbers alone.