Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence: A Growing Threat
As our world becomes increasingly digital, so too do the spaces and means for perpetrating gender-based violence. We are witnessing a rise in the weaponizing of technology and online platforms to attack women and girls on the basis of their gender. This violence infiltrates homes and bedrooms, workspaces and schools. It has no limits or geographical boundaries. It can even start online and escalate to physical spaces, or vice-versa, creating a dangerous continuum of online-offline abuse that can end in the most extreme forms of violence, including femicide.
Technology-facilitated gender-based violence takes many forms, including sextortion (blackmail by threatening to publish sexual information, photos or videos); image-based abuse (sharing intimate photos without consent); doxxing (publishing private personal information); cyberbullying; online gender and sexual harassment; cyberstalking; online grooming for sexual assault; hacking; hate speech; online impersonation; and using technology to locate survivors of abuse in order to inflict further violence, among many others. (Click here for a glossary of digital-violence terms.) It carries significant health, safety, political and economic consequences for women and girls, for their families and communities, and for society as a whole. As women and girls self-censor to prevent technology-facilitated gender-based violence, their voices are silenced and democracies suffer.
UNFPA tackles technology-facilitated gender-based violence through a global programme called Making All Spaces Safe. This initiative is providing survivors with the response services they need, when and where they need it, including social, health and justice responses. The programme also works to prevent TFGBV from occurring in the first place – through targeted laws and policies, enhancing digital literacy and working to ensure that technology is designed with safety and privacy as core components.
We also work to raise awareness of this evolving form of violence to empower survivors and to advocate for increased accountability and regulation — including through our interactive feature The Virtual Is Real and our bodyright campaign.
In addition, UNFPA is supporting key partnerships globally and nationally to accelerate initiatives that address technology-facilitated gender-based violence. This includes work with the eSafety Commissioner of Australia and other governments, civil society organizations and other development partners to galvanize global action to prioritize online safety for women and girls in all their diversity. UNFPA also leads the Steering Committee for the Global Partnership for Action on Gender-Based Online Harassment and Abuse, alongside UN Women, UNICEF and the Association for Progressive Communications.
Technology is not the enemy. In fact, it can be pivotal to advancing gender equality through opening up opportunities for sustainable development, economic growth and access to life-saving services, education and knowledge. It gives a voice to those often gone unheard. However, to harness this power to progress women’s human rights, it is imperative that we prevent technology from being misused as a tool of subjugation and violence.
Updated 25 November 2024
