# Using Machine Learning to Enhance the Detection of Obfuscated Abusive Words in Swahili: A Focus on Child Safety

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.13455 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.13455/

## Key facts

- No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 6 of its 26 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 13 Feb 2026.

## Builds on (most cited first, 6 of 6)

- [Unsupervised Cross-lingual Representation Learning at Scale](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1911.02116/) (2019)
- [Automated Hate Speech Detection and the Problem of Offensive Language](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1703.04009/) (2017)
- [Participatory Research for Low-resourced Machine Translation: A Case Study in African Languages](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.02353/) (2020)
- [Zero-shot cross-lingual transfer language selection using linguistic similarity](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2301.13720/) (2023)
- [Multilingual Sentiment Analysis: An RNN-Based Framework for Limited Data](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1806.04511/) (2018)
- [Cyberbullying Detection for Low-resource Languages and Dialects: Review of the State of the Art](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.15745/) (2023)

## Abstract (arXiv)

The rise of digital technology has dramatically increased the potential for cyberbullying and online abuse, necessitating enhanced measures for detection and prevention, especially among children. This study focuses on detecting abusive obfuscated language in Swahili, a low-resource language that poses unique challenges due to its limited linguistic resources and technological support. Swahili is chosen due to its popularity and being the most widely spoken language in Africa, with over 16 million native speakers and upwards of 100 million speakers in total, spanning regions in East Africa and some parts of the Middle East. We employed machine learning models including Support Vector Machines (SVM), Logistic Regression, and Decision Trees, optimized through rigorous parameter tuning and techniques like Synthetic Minority Over-sampling Technique (SMOTE) to handle data imbalance. Our analysis revealed that, while these models perform well in high-dimensional textual data, our dataset's small size and imbalance limit our findings' generalizability. Precision, recall, and F1 scores were thoroughly analyzed, highlighting the nuanced performance of each model in detecting obfuscated language. This research contributes to the broader discourse on ensuring safer online environments for children, advocating for expanded datasets and advanced machine-learning techniques to improve the effectiveness of cyberbullying detection systems. Future work will focus on enhancing data robustness, exploring transfer learning, and integrating multimodal data to create more comprehensive and culturally sensitive detection mechanisms.