A new study by the United Nations Programme for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), a UN agency charged with working for gender equality and the empowerment of women, has expressed concern over the escalating scale and severity of online violence against women journalists, human rights defenders, and public communicators, warning that digital attacks are increasingly spilling into real-world harm and threatening press freedom and democratic participation worldwide.
The report, titled Tipping Point: The Chilling Escalation of Online Violence Against Women in the Public Sphere, released in December 2025, is based on a global survey of more than 640 women across 119 countries. It finds that nearly 70 per cent of women working in journalism, activism, and human rights have experienced online violence in the course of their work, with women journalists among the most heavily targeted.
Three in four women journalists and media workers surveyed said they had faced online abuse, harassment, or threats, marking a continued rise from levels recorded in a similar global study conducted in 2020. Specifically, 75% of the women journalists surveyed said they have experienced online violence while doing their jobs, up from the 73% who said they experienced online violence in 2020.
More troubling, the report documents a sharp increase in the number of women journalists who link online attacks to offline harm, including physical assault, stalking, and intimidation. While 20% of women journalists linked online attacks to offline abuse in 2020, by 2025, that figure had more than doubled to 42%, showing that digital violence increasingly triggers real-world harm. UN Women warns that this trend underscores the “very real and growing physical risks” associated with digital attacks on women in public life.
The study also highlights the expanding role of artificial intelligence in facilitating abuse. Nearly one in four respondents said they had experienced AI-assisted online violence, including the use of deepfakes and other manipulated content designed to discredit, intimidate, or silence women. Findings show that 24% of all respondents, including human rights defenders, journalists, and writers, reported that they experienced AI-assisted online violence. Among women journalists and media workers, 19% reported experiencing AI-assisted online violence.
Researchers describe online violence as a deliberate strategy to undermine women’s freedom of expression, shrink civic space, and roll back gains in gender equality, particularly in an era marked by rising authoritarianism and networked misogyny. The report notes that such attacks are not “virtual” in impact, but increasingly result in tangible psychological, professional, and physical harm.
Commenting on the findings, Dr Tawfik Jelassi, the Assistant Director-General for Communication and Information, UNESCO, said: “What this study makes painfully clear is that the digital sphere is becoming an ever more dangerous place for women who serve the public by telling the truth. When nearly half of women journalists link online abuse to offline harm, we are facing not only a press-freedom crisis, but a human-rights emergency. We must act decisively to ensure that the online sphere strengthens, rather than threatens, women journalists’ safety and their ability to speak freely.”
On her part, Professor Julie Posetti, Director of the Information Integrity Initiative, and Chair of the Centre for Journalism and Democracy at City St George’s, University of London, commenting on the findings, said, “Impunity for online violence aids and abets impunity for crimes against women journalists. We cannot afford to ignore the shocking escalation in offline attacks, abuse, and harassment experienced by women journalists in connection with online violence. The fact that 42% of the women journalists we surveyed identified this dangerous trajectory proves once and for all that online violence is real world violence.”
The UN Women, therefore, called for urgent action by governments, technology companies, and international institutions, including the development of stronger legal and regulatory frameworks to prevent digital platforms and AI technologies from being weaponised against women journalists and other public actors. The report also stresses the need for better tools to detect, report, and respond to online violence before it escalates offline.
The publication is the first in a series of reports that will further examine intersectional risks and the effectiveness of existing response mechanisms. For advocates of media freedom, the findings reinforce growing concerns that unchecked online abuse, especially against women journalists, poses a serious threat to independent journalism, democratic discourse, and the safety of those who hold power to account worldwide.
