The United Nations has revealed that about 75 per cent of women and girls that use the Internet have experienced one form of online violence or the other.
The UN report released by the United Nations Broadband Commission said that almost three quarters of women online had been exposed to some form of cyber violence.
It therefore urged governments and industry to work harder and more effectively together to protect the growing number of women and girls who were victims of online threats and harassment.
The report noted that despite the rapidly growing number of women experiencing online violence, only 26 per cent of law enforcement agencies in the 86 countries surveyed were taking appropriate action.
Entitled ‘Combating online violence against women and girls: A worldwide wake-up call’, the report was released on Thursday at an event at the United Nations Headquarters in New York by the commission’s Working Group on Gender.
Working Group members included representatives from the tech sector and the civil society hoped the report would mobilise the public and private sectors to establish concrete strategies aimed at stemming the rising tide of online violence against women.
Without concerted global action to curb the various forms of online violence, an unprecedented surge of ‘cyber violence against women and girls’ could become rampant and significantly impede the uptake of broadband by women everywhere, the report stated.
It noted that cyber violence against women and girls already exists in many forms, including online harassment, public shaming, the desire to inflict physical harm, s3xual assaults, murders and induced suicides.
The rapid spread of the Internet means that effective legal and social controls of online anti-social and criminal behaviours continue to be an immense challenge, the report said, adding that in the age of the social Internet and mobile access, cyber violence can strike at any time, and can relentlessly follow its targets everywhere they go.
International Telecommunication Union Secretary-General, Houlin Zhao, who serves as co-Vice Chair of the Broadband Commission, said failure to address and solve cyber violence could significantly impede the uptake of broadband services by girls and women worldwide.
He added, “The net is an amazing resource for personal empowerment, and we need to ensure that as many girls and women as possible benefit from the amazing possibilities it offers.”
The United Nations Broadband Commission found out that:
• An estimated 73 per cent of women have already been exposed to, or have experienced, some form of online violence.
• Women in the age range of 18 to 24 are uniquely likely to experience stalking and s3xual harassment in addition to physical threats.
• Nine million women in the European Union’s 28 countries alone have experienced online violence as young as 15 years old.
• One in five female Internet users live in countries where harassment and abuse of women online is extremely unlikely to be punished.
• In many countries, women are reluctant to report their victimisation for fear of social repercussions.
• Cyber violence against women and girls puts a premium on emotional bandwidth, personal and workplace time, financial resources and missed wages.
The report presented a set of key recommendations, proposing a global framework based on three actions – sensitisation, safeguards and sanctions.