During the event, held as part of the Commission on the Status of Women, the world’s biggest gender equality conference, delegates from the region outlined the many forms of digital violence, warned of the chilling effect that online harassment and discrimination are having on women’s participation in political life and shared some of the most effective ways to create safe digital spaces for women.
Marcela Hernández is the co-founder of the Latin-American network of Digital Defenders, an organization promoting comprehensive legislation to address and punish digital violence.
“Currently we have documented more than 700 policies by different government entities throughout Mexico, including police, prosecutors’ offices and courts to counter digital violence. In the Attorney General’s Office of Mexico City, there is even a specialized agency to prosecute crimes of digital violence.
I remember the first time I knew of a girl who committed suicide because of a video of her being sexually abused was circulated online. Even though I didn’t know her, it marked me. I knew at that moment that more things like this were going to happen.
When a new technology reaches the mass market, it is used time and time again as a tool to commit violence against women, to subordinate and objectify us. When artificial intelligence became widespread in 2024, there were immediately cases of boys in universities and schools in different parts of the world taking images of their classmates to create sexually explicit material, without their consent.
This is why we need to appropriate technology ourselves; women creating online tools for the benefit of other women”.
These interviews have been translated from Spanish and edited for clarity and length.