Press Release
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On Wednesday, 14/6/2023, the Egyptian Coalition for Human Rights and Development issues its report “Digital Violence against Women: Its Manifestation and Ways of Protection”, which addresses digital violence against women through several axes such as:
- Definition of electronic or digital violence against women,
- Forms of digital violence against women,
- Features and types of digital violence,
- Factors have led to the spread of digital violence against women,
- Factors of the increasing prevalence of digital violence against women,
- Impacts of digital violence on women and their rights,
- Examples of some Egyptian women who were subjected to digital violence
- Some Egyptian and international efforts made to confront digital violence,
- Recommendations
Digital violence against women is one of the most widespread human rights violations worldwide and one of the most serious types of violence women have recently faced as the Internet develops, for which women are particularly vulnerable to social media sites, resulting in physical, sexual or mental harm or suffering to women, and its means and tools vary over time.
The report noted that digital violence takes many forms of (penetration, spoofing, harassment, employment, distribution of fake materials, inadmissible access/ control, manipulation of information, surveillance and tracing, racist discourse, threat, non-consensual sharing of private information, extortion, vilification, violation and sexual exploitation associated with technology, attack on channels of communication, and ignoring or omitting regulators).
The report also noted that digital violence against women and girls occurs in almost every region, country and context, and the root causes are not any culture, tradition or custom, but broader structural problems, social norms, deep-rooted beliefs and behaviors that shape gender and power.
The report included a set of recommendations:
- The need for full confidentiality towards girls who have been extorted by dealing with them with the principle of confidentiality in order to preserve their reputation. This will lead to encouraging victims not to obscure extortion methods, to resort to the security agencies responsible for arresting the extortion and to bring it to justice.
- Acting websites and social media pages as awareness-raising and mediator in the event of violence, bullying and blackmail to communicate the situation with the competent authority or protection institutions to communicate with specialists on forms of cyber-violence.
- Operationalizing existing laws to rise to the extent that they can be used as prevention and deterrence to deal with such crimes, and limit their gravity and deter perpetrators.
- Formal and social institutions should be responsible for directing and sensitizing girls about the dangers and negatives of networking networks and crimes through which they are conducted and for warning of behaviors and practices that may enable some to extort.
- The implementation of counselling programs in schools for the personal protection of female students aimed at the security use of the Internet as well as their awareness of how to protect themselves from the kinds of extortion that can occur to them.
- Raising awareness in society and organizing awareness-raising activities on women’s human rights and violence against women by media institutions with support and funding from the Government.
- Conduct detailed reports on statistics and cases of cyber-violence and what laws and controls may prevent or limit the phenomenon.
- Awareness tweeting campaigns through Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, whether by organizations or individuals who tweet with intense content and time.
- The establishment of specialized courts for women’s information offences in general.
- Work documentary to simulate the phenomenon on the ground due to the prevalence and importance of short video.
