For decades, the global community has prioritized combating violence against women and girls, developing protection mechanisms and prevention frameworks informed by extensive research and policy initiatives. Despite these sustained efforts, violence against women and girls continues to persist, growing increasingly complex and brutal. It now spans both private and public spheres, targeting women of all ages and abilities, and has expanded into digital spaces where technology is increasingly weaponized to facilitate abuse, sometimes amounting to concealed or indirect harm.
This growing trend raises urgent questions about whether technology is being used against women to intensify violence, presenting societies with unprecedented challenges. The impacts of technology-facilitated violence now extend beyond traditional forms, demanding deeper analysis to assess whether its negative effects outweigh its benefits. UNDP has long focused on reducing violence through context-specific, evidence-based approaches, emphasizing multidimensional analysis rather than imported, one-size-fits-all models.
In December 2025, UNDP Iraq convened a dialogue with seventeen Iraqi women activists working directly with women and girls. The discussion highlighted the economic costs of violence, the integration of protection measures into empowerment programs for displaced women, and the need for both formal and informal protective mechanisms. Monitoring and documenting cases of violence were also emphasized as critical measures to strengthen responses.
Technology-facilitated violence against women and girls—acts committed, enabled, or incited through smartphones, social media, email, and other digital platforms—has emerged as one of the most widespread forms of violation today. It produces profound social and psychological consequences, affecting women across all regions. Global evidence indicates that 38% of women have personally experienced this form of violence, while 85% have witnessed it, with the highest exposure reported in the Middle East, Latin America, and Africa. Girls face compounded risks, often encountering digital violence early and hesitating to report it due to fear of blame, punishment, or lack of protective mechanisms.
The manifestations of technology-facilitated violence include blackmail, stalking, identity theft, misuse of personal images, and digital sexual harassment, far beyond insults or defamatory rumors. Despite growing digital risks, most countries lack clear legal provisions to address these crimes, leaving gaps that enable perpetrators to act with impunity. Some Latin American countries have made progress by criminalizing or explicitly including digital violence within existing legislation.
In the absence of comprehensive legal frameworks, innovative solutions are essential. These include developing institutional mechanisms to respond rapidly to digital abuse, creating specialized reporting platforms such as Iraq’s Ameen system, and integrating digital violence within broader domestic violence laws. Legal reform must be paired with sustained awareness-raising and behavioral change campaigns to ensure effectiveness.
Regional and international frameworks provide further opportunities to strengthen protections, including the Arab Convention on Combating Information Technology Crimes, the Arab Declaration on Combating All Forms of Violence against Women and Girls, and the Regional Executive Plan for the Protection of Arab Women from 2015 to 2030. Leveraging these instruments can help create more comprehensive, responsive, and future-oriented approaches to address the growing challenge of technology-facilitated violence against women and girls.
