Estimated reading time: 2 minutes
In this article, our Research & Policy Lead, Dr Rebecca Mason, discusses young women’s online safety and our response to Ofcom’s consultation on their draft guidance for tech companies about reducing the risk of harm to women and girls using their platforms.
Content warning: this article includes mentions of online abuse and sexual assault.
At The Young Women’s Movement, we strive to support young women and girls across Scotland, ensuring they are connected to the policy decisions that impact their lives. As Scotland’s national organisation for young women and girls’ leadership and rights, The Young Women’s Movement welcomes the opportunity to respond to Ofcom’s consultation on their draft guidance for tech companies on reducing the risk of harm to women and girls using their platforms.
Every single day, young women and girls worldwide are subject to gender-based violence online. The scale of online abuse against women and girls is devastating: globally, 38 per cent of women have had personal experiences of online violence, while 85 per cent of women who spend time online have witnessed digital violence against other women. In Scotland, a significant number of women have experienced online violence, with one in six reporting such experiences. Young women in Scotland are particularly at risk: this figure increases to 27% among 16–24-year-olds. Statistics and personal testimonies show that violence against young women and girls online is endemic and has serious real-world consequences, including reduced self-esteem, social isolation, and even physical harm.
In our latest Status of Young Women in Scotland report, which engaged with nearly 600 young women and girls from across Scotland, many young women described feeling unsafe online, with some commenting on the rise of bullying and misogynistic harassment and abuse on messaging apps and social media. Through our research and engagement, young women and girls expressed a desire for more proactive efforts from the government to address the growing levels of violence online, particularly the dangers of online misogyny and largely unregulated use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to abuse young women and girls in the digital sphere.
“I just wish the Government would do more to hold social media companies to account, particularly to stop accounts and channels that are spreading violent misogynistic messaging and ideas against women’s equality.” [anonymous survey respondent]
“I find the rise in AI Technology to perpetrate violence against women online deeply scary. I feel like it’s not taken as seriously as it should be.” [discussion group respondent]
Responses from Young Women Leaders
Our Programmes team are currently running Young Women Lead 2025 with 21 young women from across Scotland; they are exploring the rise of artificial intelligence and the importance of online safety for young women and girls. To inform our consultation response, we explored Ofcom’s draft guidance with the group, where they discussed their thoughts around the various proposals. Some young women expressed concerns that the guidance will not lead to any meaningful change, primarily due to a lack of implementation and enforcement of existing laws that seek to tackle violence against women and girls in the real world.
“I have low faith in the law upholding women’s rights and justice because of a lack of implementation and enforcement even for well-established law, e.g. the sexual offences of rape. How do we balance changing law with enforcing current law and regulations?” [participant on our Young Women Lead AI programme]
Ofcom’s proposed guidance
At The Young Women’s Movement, we are concerned that Ofcom is relying on optimistic assumptions that service providers will comply satisfactorily with the proposed guidance, without any robust regulatory enforcement. For example, we are alarmed by Ofcom’s admission that they do not expect ‘all content to be taken down or heavily policed’ by services, and that they ‘consider it right for providers to take a holistic view of the experiences of women and girls online when making decisions about their policies, tools, and features they offer users, and how those choices may impact women and girls’ safety’ (p.5). We worry that this choice of language ultimately exonerates service providers from effectively implementing the guidance, including the good practice steps, in any meaningful way.
Regulation in practice
Regulatory choices are crucial in determining how much impact the guidance will actually have, and how the legislation it covers is implemented in practice. The reality is that it is one thing to say how service providers should operate, and another thing entirely to actually make them do it. Without extensive training, resources and buy in from service providers and platforms, it is difficult to imagine robust action being taken in the vast majority of reported cases of online gender-based harms, let alone systemic change in how service providers operate.
Taking action in the digital sphere
Despite repeated warnings and pleas for legal and political intervention from women’s organisations, activists and lawyers for many years, the digital sphere has largely gone unregulated. This lack of oversight from platforms and regulators has ultimately facilitated a rise in the weaponization of technology and online platforms to attack, stalk and violate women and girls on an international scale. Now is the time to act and take appropriate action to protect women and girls online. Tech companies are in a unique position of power to shift a system that allows misogyny, sexism, and gender-based violence to go unchecked in online spaces to one where young women and girls can feel safe and thrive. At The Young Women’s Movement, we look forward to working with Ofcom in the development of statutory guidance to ensure young women and girls across Scotland are kept safe, both online and offline.
Read our full response to the Ofcom consultation on draft guidance: A safer life online for women and girls.
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