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Regional multi-stakeholder strategies to eradicate gender-based digital violence

September 24, 2026 | Activity

Panel of five women seated at a blue-draped table with microphones and nameplates, a camera on a stand behind, and a large screen showing a speaker—at an OEA event.
Photo Credit: Juan Manuel Herrera/OAS

Digital violence against women poses a growing challenge for democracies. Ensuring that digital environments are safe spaces for participation, expression, and the exercise of rights is a challenge shared by a variety of actors, including governments, parliaments, experts, advocates, civil society organizations, and internet intermediaries. The goal is to promote inclusive digital governance, based on active participation, shared responsibility, and co-regulation among multiple stakeholders.

Addressing this phenomenon is particularly complex because the digital environment is constantly and rapidly evolving, as are the various forms that technology-enabled violence takes. Harassment and bullying, coordinated attacks, hate speech, disinformation campaigns, deepfakes, threats, and nonconsensual sharing of personal information are just a few examples.

Given the importance of continued work to prevent, address, punish, and eradicate digital violence against women – and the need to strengthen regulatory, institutional, and cooperation frameworks to achieve these objectives – ParlAmericas participated in the high-level public event “Toward the Effective Implementation of the Inter-American Model Law to Prevent, Punish, and Eradicate Digital Violence Against Women: Participatory Development of the Practical Guide for Internet Intermediaries,” co-organized by the Follow-up Mechanism for the Belém do Pará Convention (OAS-MESECVI) and UN Women in Washington, D.C.

During her presentation, the Honourable Representative Catherine Juvinao of Colombia, Vice President for South America of the ParlAmericas Open Parliament Network, addressed the challenges of translating the standards of the Inter-American Model Law into national legislation. She also emphasized that gender-based digital violence has particularly severe effects on women involved in politics, as it not only violates their individual rights but also seeks to discourage their presence and leadership in decision-making spaces. Panel participants discussed the real-life effects and consequences of digital violence, generating emotional costs, damaging reputations, and threatening personal safety – all of which can limit women’s public participation, affect their performance in their roles, and deter other women from becoming involved in public life.

In her remarks, Representative Juvinao highlighted the importance of establishing frameworks for regional cooperation and emphasized the role of parliaments as plural spaces for decision-making. She further underscored the role of ParlAmericas as a platform for facilitating and promoting parliamentary dialogue on this issue in the region.

The discussion featured the participation of women leaders from governments and international organizations, including Luz Patricia Mejía Guerrero, Technical Secretary of MESECVI, and Alejandra Mora Mora, Secretary of the Inter-American Commission of Women (CIM-OAS), as well as experts, representatives of civil society, and internet intermediaries. The Model Law was highlighted as a regulatory, political, and educational tool that can guide legislative reform, the design of public policies, and prompt action by justice systems. Cooperation among states, the shared responsibility of the private sector, and the strengthening of institutional and community capacities were emphasized as essential to protecting and guaranteeing the right of all women and girls to a life free from violence, including in digital environments.

Photo Credit: Juan Manuel Herrera/OAS