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8THE STATE OF THE WORLD’S GIRLS 2020Warning: This report contains descriptions of sexual violence and abuse.IntroductionThis year’s Plan International’s annual State of theWorld’s Girls report is based on research conductedacross 31 countries with over 14,000 girls and youngwomen. It aims at uncovering and understanding girls’and young women’s experiences of being online onsocial media platforms: what platforms do they use,what drives their usage, what is their experience ofharassment, who are the perpetrators and what is theimpact of harassment on them and on their continuedusage of social media platforms?In 2018, the State of the World’s Girls Report – Unsafein the City – was based on research across fivevery different cities documenting girls’ experiences– frightening and pervasive – of street harassment.Two years later, while the focus has moved to onlineharassment, the stories are little different. Theharassment may not be face to face but it is invasive,often frightening and it curtails girls’ freedom in similarways.Girls are targeted online just because they are youngand female, and if they are politically outspoken,disabled, Black or identify as LGBTIQ , it getsworse. Harassment ranges from being put down foryour opinions, to being threatened with violence, tobeing besieged by unwanted pornographic images.Like street harassment it is unremitting, oftenpsychologically damaging and can lead to actualphysical harm.There are many definitions of online gender-basedharassment but for this research, the following hasbeen used: “action by one or more people that harmsothers based on their sexual or gender identity or byenforcing harmful gender norms. This action is carriedout using the internet and/or mobile technology andincludes stalking, bullying, sex-based harassment,defamation, hate speech, exploitation and gendertrolling.”1To all the girls and young women taking part in theresearch social media is an important part of their lives.They use it for activism, for entertainment, for educationand for keeping in touch with friends and family.“Actually, social media is very important thesedays, and I often keep using it for three to fourhours a day.”Young woman, 18, Nepal“It plays an essential part in my daily life, andalso to communicate and to keep contact withmy friends and family.”Young woman, Myanmar, age unknownDuring the COVID-19 pandemic being online hasbecome increasingly important: a lifeline for thoseoften isolated at home and an important tool as youngpeople struggle to keep up with their education and stayconnected to the wider world.Internet access, and safety online, is fundamentally ahuman rights issue and an important indicator of genderequality. Social media platforms can afford girls andyoung women a space for debate, an opportunity tomake their voices heard, but increasingly, as they speakout, they are threatened and demeaned. The misogynygirls experience on our streets, must not be allowedto characterise their experiences online: harassmentmust not limit girls’ and young women’s ability to takeadvantage of all the opportunities social media has tooffer. Their voices, the issues they care about, are indanger of being drowned out by abuse, their activismimpeded and their confidence drained by systematicbullying. None of this is acknowledged and neitherplatforms nor perpetrators are held to account.

FREE TO BE ONLINE?9Whose space, what freedom?MethodologyFreedom of speech is frequently quoted as anoverriding consideration in terms of how the web andsocial media platforms are regulated. Often nobodywill take responsibility for the misinformation, abuse,or harassment which is part of the online environment.Perpetrators who would be subject to laws offlinecarry on with impunity, and frequently an empoweringanonymity, online.This year’s report is based on two strands of datacollection and data analysis. The quantitative data wascollected in 22 countries and the qualitative data involvedin-depth interviews with 18 young female activists from16 countries.Freedom can be complicated: whose rights are beingprioritised and whose voices are silenced? A systemthat was designed for us all, to connect us, andprovide us with information is in danger of becominga platform for the already powerful and a force whichin the words of the founder of the World Wide Web is“anti-human”.2“The web is for everyone and collectively wehold the power to change it. It won’t be easy.But if we dream a little and work a lot, we canget the web we want.”3Tim Berners-Lee, founder of theWorld Wide WebIn 2017 increasing levels of internet hate speech,harassment and fake news led to Germany adoptingthe ‘Act to Improve Enforcement of the Law in SocialNetworks,’ otherwise known as the ‘NetzDG’ Law. Itrequires social media platforms like Twitter, Redditand Facebook to remove hate speech and othercontroversial or offensive content within 24 hours.Failure to remove banned content can lead to finesof up to 50 million. Social media platforms aretherefore complying – for example, Facebook hastwo deletion centres in Germany and employs 1200workers to monitor content.4 In June 20205 the law wasamended to require stronger accountability by socialmedia companies and also criminal provisions forperpetrators. The new amendments now bind socialmedia companies – in addition to deleting posts within24 hours – to report criminal content to the GermanFederal Criminal Police Office. It is an effective butcontroversial law which has come under much scrutinyon the basis that it restricts freedom of speech.61. Quantitative data: data was collected using a closedquestion survey with 16 questions that asked girlsabout their social media use, their experience of onlineharassment, the consequences of online harassmentand possible solutions to it. The survey was administeredonline and via computer-assisted telephone interviewsby two survey firms selecting respondents from a prearranged pool. Respondents were girls and youngwomen between the age of 15-25.Overall, there were 14,071 interviews across 22countries: Australia, Benin, Brazil, Canada, Colombia,Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Germany, Ghana, Guinea,India, Indonesia, Japan, Kenya, Netherlands, Nigeria,Norway, Philippines, Spain, Thailand, USA, Zambia.2. Qualitative data: data was collected over a three-week period between March and April through KeyInformant Interviews (KIIs). The interviews took between35 minutes to an hour and were conducted via calls onSkype and WhatsApp. The questionnaire was structuredinto four sections with between four to six questions ineach, using the same headings as in the quantitativesurvey. All questions were open-ended and intended tobe explorative, offering the girls the opportunity to give asmuch or little information as they felt comfortable with.The interviewees were a varied group of young femaleactivists with intersectional characteristics. Overall, interviews were conducted with 18 girls aged between 15-24years old from 16 countries around the world: Canada,Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guinea, Indonesia, Malawi,Myanmar, Nepal, Peru, Philippines, South Sudan, Spain,Sudan, Tanzania and USA.In line with ethics and safeguarding proceduresqualitative interviews were conducted by two members ofPlan International staff. Information sheets were providedahead of time, and informed consent and assent,for girls under 18, were given prior to the interviews;verbal consent was also given to record the interviews.Anonymity and confidentiality were ensured throughoutthe data collection, analysis and write up process.English was the primary language used, followed bySpanish and French.

10THE STATE OF THE WORLD’S GIRLS 2020Setting the scene“We believe that theinternet is a public goodand should be used,managed and governed assuch For children, theinternet is a means, atool,a crosscutting mechanismto the realisation of allother rights.”World Wide Web Foundation7Internet use is on the rise and social media platformsprovide ever increasing ways of staying connected. Thefuture is certainly digital. 2019 was a landmark year: halfof the world had begun to participate online; the 30thanniversary of the World Wide Web was celebrated; andit was estimated that there were 21.7 billion connecteddevices, with over 74,500 GB of data being sent over theinternet every single second.8 As of April 2020, there are4.57 billion active internet users and 3.76 billion activesocial media users with the global online penetrationrate being 59 per cent. Despite this global increase,access remains a problem in many countries, and nine ofout the ten countries with the lowest internet penetrationare in Africa.9 Regionally, Northern Europe ranks firstwith a 95 per cent internet penetration rate amongthe population. The countries with the highest internetpenetration rate worldwide are the UAE, Denmark andSouth Korea.10The World Wide Web went live two years after theadoption of the UN Convention on the Rights of theChild in 1989 and a whole 12 years after the adoptionof the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms ofDiscrimination Against Women. The two human rightsframeworks which provide protection to girls and youngwomen – safeguarding their basic rights and allowingfor their participation in all aspects of their lives – weredrafted at a time when the online world did not exist.Even though the two treaties were drafted so that theirapplication is broad enough for, and pertinent to, mostsituations, the international human rights communitywas, in effect, playing catch-up.11 By 2014, when theUN Convention on the Rights Of the Child held itsDay of General Discussion on Children’s Rights andDigital Media, it was clear that children’s rights withindigital media needed some attention. Among the manyrecommendations which ranged from regular monitoring

FREE TO BE ONLINE?of human rights laws and policies to ensure theywere keeping up with social changes to providingsupport for children developing digital skills was onethat acknowledged the need to: “[i]ntensify effortsto ensure the effective elimination of all forms ofdiscrimination against girls and address genderstereotypes and social norms that limit girls’access and use of technology, including throughawareness-raising programmes.”12The issue of girls’ rights and gender discriminationwas clearly recognised but in 2014 the discussionwas focused more on access than safety. However,progress was made in 2017 when the Committeeon the Elimination of Discrimination against Women(CEDAW) adopted a General Recommendationrecognising that gender-based violence happens in‘all spaces and spheres of human interaction’,including ‘technology-mediated environments,such as contemporary forms of violence occurringin the internet and digital spaces’.13 The GeneralRecommendation explicitly mentions girls and requiresstates to criminalise and sanction all forms of genderbased violence wherever they occur: specificallygender-based violence which violates women’s andgirls’ physical, sexual and psychological integrity,14as well as ensuring that survivors of gender-basedviolence have access to justice.15Unfortunately, these efforts have not, at national levelin countries, resulted in focussed and appropriateremedies for girls and young women who are subjectto online harassment. Most of the laws designedto regulate the internet are aimed at transactional,financial and e-commerce matters. Where laws doattempt to tackle harassment, many are outdated andineffectual.1611What is online violence againstwomen and girls?The Broadband Commission defines online violenceagainst women and girls to include hate speech,hacking or intercepting private communications,identity theft, online stalking and uttering threats.17The Commission notes that it can entail convincinga target to end their lives (counselling suicide oradvocating genocide), as well as facilitating otherforms of violence against girls and women includingtrafficking and the sex trade. It also includes activitiessuch as trolling, cyber-bulling, e-bile, revenge porn andsexting.18 Clearly, online abuse, in all its many forms,is not carried out solely against women and girls. But,in a world characterised by ongoing gender inequality,women and girls are particularly vulnerable to it. A 2020 global survey of young people’s experienceof online abuse and harassment was conducted byThe World Wide Web Foundation and the WorldAssociation of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts.The survey found that 52 per cent of young womenand girls have experienced online abuse, includingthreatening messages, sexual harassment and thesharing of private images without consent; 64 percent of all respondents know someone who hasexperienced harassment, abuse or violence andyoung people’s top concern is the sharing of privateimages, videos or messages without their consent –30 per cent said it is what worries them most.19 Amnesty International conducted qualitative andquantitative research about women’s experienceson social media platforms including the scale, natureand impact of violence and abuse directed towardswomen on Twitter, with a particular focus on theUnited Kingdom and the United States of America.

12THE STATE OF THE WORLD’S GIRLS 2020The study demonstrated that the nature of theabuse included direct or indirect threats of physicalor sexual violence, discriminatory abuse targetingone or more aspects of a woman’s identity, targetedharassment, and privacy violations such as doxing20or sharing sexual or intimate images of a womanwithout her consent.21 A 2018 study of the persistence of misogyny citesnumerous examples of online harassment againstwomen: 76 per cent of Australian women under30 report having been harassed online; in the US,young women are disproportionately the targets ofsevere sexual harassment and stalking online; inPakistan, online harassment of women is “generallyaccepted as a routine part of Pakistani women’sdaily lives.” Traditional media has played a rolein amplifying or even being the catalyst for onlineharassment – when a reboot of the Ghostbustersmovie starring an all-female leading cast wasreleased in summer 2016, the only leading Blackcast member, was forced to leave Twitter temporarilyafter trolls harassed her with pornography, threats,and racist messages.22 A survey published by the Broadband Commissionin 2015 references a number of studies todemonstrate the prevalence of online harassmentagainst women and girls. It points out that womenaged 18 to 24 are at a heightened risk of beingexposed to every kind of online violence and theyare “uniquely likely to experience stalking and sexualharassment.” To underscore this, reference is madeto research in the EU which shows that, from theage of 15, 18 per cent of women have experienceda form of serious internet violence – about 9 millionwomen.23Social media platforms do not own the contentposted and do not feel responsible for it but there areincreasing calls to say they should be. 24 Managingharmful content may be difficult but it is not impossible25and the companies who own the platforms have boththe economic resources and the technological skills todo this.It is an issue that has not had enough attention,particularly with regard to the vulnerabilities of girls andyoung women. Being online offers many opportunities:for many young people it is an integral part of their livesand can contribute positively to their wellbeing. But theyalso report negative impacts on their self-esteem, theiroverall happiness and their ability to benefit from theopportunities that social media has to offer.26 There isstill much to understand about online harassment: whois targeted and why, who are the perpetrators, whatis the nature of the abuse and importantly, what is itseffect on girls?This year’s State of the World’s Girls Report looksat these questions in the context of human rights andachieving gender equality. It focuses on the experiencesof girls and young women and amplifies their voices asthey tell their stories; listening to the solutions they haveto offer.

FREE TO BE ONLINE?13Equal Measures 2030gender equality andinternet accesson gender equality might suggest. There arealso countries – Germany, USA, Thailand andIndonesia for example – that fall short on women’saccess/use of internet; their ranking lags behindthat for overall gender equality. While this rankingrefers to women’s internet use, other data showthat the biggest gender gaps in internet accessare found in India, Benin, Guinea, Ghana andNigeria.28Equal Measures 2030 was founded in 2016 by agroup of cross sector partners to fuel progresstowards gender equality by making sure girls’and women’s movements, advocates anddecision makers have easy-to-use data andevidence to guide efforts to reach the SustainableDevelopment Goals (SDGs) by 2030 and to leaveno one behind.Amongst the countries with the highest ratesof internet use among women, the share ofadolescents has grown and stabilised over time.For example, in Norway and the Netherlands,more than 95 per cent of the entire populationhave been online in the last 3 months.29 In thesecountries, universal access to and use of internetand social media is likely to facilitate formal andinformal guidance for girls and young womenin negotiating the risks inherent in using socialmedia.https://www.equalmeasures2030.org/The 22 countries in the survey represent a wide rangeof contexts relative to the status of girls and womenthat are relevant for understanding online harassment.For example, the chart below underscores thedifferences in global measures of gender equality,covering countries with the highest scores in the SDGGender Equality Index, such as N

Girls Report is freedom online - but it reveals the opposite. Rather than free and empowered to express themselves online, girls are all too often harassed, abused and driven from online spaces. With communities now in COVID-19 lockdown and close to 700 million girls out of school, girls are spending more time than ever at home and on the .