Resourcing Resilience in the Digital Age
Date:
Picture this: A 20-year-old girl logs into her social media account after school, only to be bombarded by a flood of hateful comments, unsolicited explicit messages and threats.
She is not alone. A staggering 58% of women and girls aged 15-25 have experienced online harassment, a statistic that underscores the pervasive and insidious nature of digital violence against women and girls (DVAWG).[1] This modern form of abuse transcends borders, affecting women and girls in every corner of the globe. It manifests in countless ways— from cyberstalking, doxxing, non-consensual sharing of intimate images, hate speech, to sextortion and silent grooming and recruitment through gaming and chat platforms.
But women's rights and civil society organizations (WROs/CSOs) are refusing to let the digital space become another frontier of fear for women and girls. They are adapting, innovating, and reclaiming online spaces as platforms of empowerment, not persecution.
Intersecting Identities, Layered Harms
Across continents, grantee partners of the UN Trust Fund report the same underlying truth: digital violence is not a separate phenomenon. It sits on the same continuum as offline abuse – rooted in control, discrimination, and impunity.
In Tajikistan, intimate-partner stalking and coerced sharing of images expose how patriarchal power extends through mobile phones as much as through households. In Ethiopia, women’s personal photos are stolen and posted to explicit platforms as acts of punishment or humiliation.
WROs highlight how digital violence compounds existing inequalities. From Lebanon to Armenia, from Kenya to Palestine, the surge in DVAWG is targeting individuals for their gender and often intersecting with other forms of discrimination.
“Indigenous, Afro-Peruvian, women with disabilities, lesbian and trans women, among others, face historical and structural discrimination in multiple spheres, but in digital environment, they face a combination of sexism, racism, ableism, and lesbophobia/transphobia, generating greater severity and impact.”, said Susana Chavez, Advocacy Director from PROMSEX, Peru.
In El Salvador and Armenia, activists defending LGBTQ+ and disability rights describe how online hate amplifies the same misogyny, ableism, and transphobia they face offline.
“This violence not only seeks to silence them, but also to expel them from the digital spaces where they participate, express their opinions, or promote rights.”, said Bianka Rodrigez, Director of COMCAVIS TRANS, El Salvador.
Digital violence is further exposing women and girls to more violence and simultaneously silencing them from reporting such violence or seeking help, even when the trauma of online abuse translates directly into offline consequences: social isolation and ostracism, job loss, severe mental distress, and sexual exploitation.
Civil Society-Led Innovation in Action
Throughout 30 years of supporting WROs/CSOs, the UN Trust Fund has witnessed first-hand the nimbleness and remarkable ability to effectively respond and adapt to crises and emerging forms of violence to meet the needs of survivors and staff.
In Kenya, Maisha Girls Safe House trains young survivors to recognize online grooming and scams, turning fear into digital resilience.
In the Occupied Palestinian Territories, RWDS works with community leaders — including men and religious figures — and the Cybercrime Unit to address cyberbullying and blackmail, framing digital safety as a matter of family and community wellbeing. Agate NGO in Armenia ensuring women with disabilities can access online protection and reporting mechanisms that are truly inclusive.
The Price and the Resolve
For women human rights defenders, the threats are daily and grave. 73% of women journalists have experienced online violence in the course of their work.[2]
UN Trust Fund grantee partners’ personal emails and websites are constantly hacked and spammed with false accusations and threats, because they defend women’s rights to make their own decisions, to exposing human trafficking networks, to reclaiming public spaces for LBTQ+ women and girls.
“The goal was clear: to intimidate [us], delegitimize [our] voice and send a message of fear to all trans people who speak out.”, Bianka recalled, “We activated our internal protocol, documented every attack, requested international support, and publicly demanded accountability from digital platforms.”
Safe Online Spaces are Possible
Ending technology-facilitated violence against women and girls starts with standing with those already leading the way. Women’s rights and civil society organizations are designing survivor-centered solutions, transforming policy, and reclaiming digital spaces for empowerment. Investing in their work means investing in equality — and in a safe digital world where every woman and girl can live, speak, and lead without fear.
*Note: Multiple terms are used to describe how digital technologies have enabled new forms and patterns of violence against women and girls, which is increasingly being experienced across the online-offline continuum, including technology-facilitated gender-based violence/violence against women and girls, or digital violence. In this article, we are using Digital Violence against Women and Girls (DVAWG);
[1] UN Women. “Creating safe digital spaces free of trolls, doxing, and hate speech”. 28 June 2024
[2] https://unric.org/en/how-technology-facilitated-gender-based-violence-impacts-women-and-girls/