In 2021, the World Wide Web Foundation hosted a first-of-its-kind Technology Policy Design Lab, a series of human centred policy design workshops for diverse stakeholders to co-create solutions to online gender-based violence (OGBV).

Following the workshops, Facebook (now Meta), Google, TikTok and Twitter made public commitments to tackle gender abuse on their platforms, announced at the UN Generation Equality Forum, with a specific focus on building better ways for women to curate their safety online and implementing improvements to reporting systems.

One year later, the World Wide Web Foundation, together with Glitch, Social Finance, and in collaboration with feminist technology and data rights organizations around the world, reviewed progress made by the tech companies and Web Foundation, and re-convened to discuss experiences and ambitions for the sector’s collective work in building a web free from OGBV.

Through interviews and workshops with 70+ stakeholders across 30+ countries, as well as desk research, the collaboration identifies progress made but also demonstrates key barriers and diagnoses the need for a global accountability mechanism to stop OGBV that centers the voices and experiences of marginalized communities and minoritized genders who are most impacted.

We advocate for the establishment of an infrastructure for regular, ongoing engagement between tech platforms and civil society organizations (CSOs) to co-create policy and product changes and increase accountability for change, initiated by the Web Foundation.

Explore more of the report below.

What progress have the tech companies made on their commitments? Read more >>

• Featuring the following case studies:
  • Tweets That Chill: Analyzing Online Violence Against Women in Politics in Indonesia, Colombia, and Kenya
  • Stop NCII – a tool to detect and block the sharing of intimate images online
  • TikTok Deadnaming Policy
  • Google Jigsaw Harassment Manager Tool

What’s needed for greater accountability? Read more >>

What’s the state of online gender-based violence in the Global South? Read more >>

Background reading >>

The Web Foundation is committed to working in partnership with organizations across the globe and wants to acknowledge the commitment and effort contributed by a large range of stakeholders. In particular, we would like to acknowledge the engagement of global civil society organizations, tech companies, facilitators, and report contributors. 

The collaboration of organizations and individuals who contributed to the writing of this report included Katherine Townsend, World Wide Web Foundation; Gabriela de Oliveira & Hilary Watson, Glitch; Manon Desert & Luisa Braig, Social Finance; Paulina Ibarra, Fundacion Multitudes; Marianne Diaz, Access Now; Juliet Nanfuka, Collaboration on International ICT Policy for East and Southern Africa; and Marwa Azelmat, RNW Media.