What happens when digital spaces become tools of surveillance, censorship, and control? For women human rights defenders (WHRDs) in Brazil, Ecuador, India, the Philippines, Uganda and Tanzania, this is not a hypothetical, it’s a daily reality. 

APC’s upcoming research, “Online Challenges, Offline Realities: A Feminist Analysis of WHRDs’ Digital Experiences,” explores how digital authoritarianism is accelerating across these six countries, and how WHRDs are targeted at the intersection of gender, power, and technology. From doxxing and smear campaigns to arrests and threats of violence, WHRDs face coordinated attacks aimed at silencing dissent and reinforcing patriarchal norms. 

This research draws from a feminist holistic protection framework to map how digital repression is deeply connected to offline violence, and how state and corporate actors are complicit. Surveillance laws, cybercrime regulations, content moderation failures, and extractive tech practices all converge to create hostile environments for WHRDs, particularly those from Indigenous, rural, and marginalised communities. 

Key insights from the research highlight how gender, sexuality, and race are weaponised in online attacks; how digital violence often escalates to physical threats; how legal systems are used to criminalise dissent, and how big tech and state surveillance tools facilitate unrestrained repression. This research emphasises on the need for gender-sensitive cybersecurity laws, urgent response systems, and platform accountability, especially from companies like Meta and Twitter. 

Despite escalating risks, WHRDs continue to resist, adapt, and organise. This research provides timely analysis for committing to feminist digital rights and holistic protection. 

Online Challenges, Offline Realities will be published soon as part of APC’s Safety for Voices Initiative. Stay tuned.