73 Per Cent Of Women Journalists Experience Online Abuse, Harassment - UNESCO

The United Nations has stated that the issue of online aggression is spreading offline with possibly fatal results.

According to a global survey conducted by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), 73% of female journalists encounter abuse, harassment, threats, and attacks online.

At a workshop to welcome attendees to the Global Media and Information Literacy Week in Abuja, Tawfik Jelassi, assistant director-general of Communication and Information, UNESCO revealed that a global survey conducted by UNESCO find out that female journalists on several occasions are met with harassment, threats and even attacked online because of their views and opinions in the line of their work. 

According to Jelassi, the issue of online violence is spreading offline, with possibly fatal results.

He stated specifically that 20% of female journalists and media professionals were the targets of offline abuse and attacks that were thought to be related to the online violence they had encountered.

The goal of literacy week, according to Jelassi, was to raise awareness among online information consumers that the world needed to take quick action before further escalations. 

He claimed that the majority of people in every nation rely on digital platforms as their main information source today.

"They shared their experiences in this, and the struggle is the same, whether they were from America, northern Europe, Asia, or North Africa.

“Seventy-eight per cent of Brazilians take WhatsApp as a primary source of information and these are contents that are not verified,” he said.

The UNESCO official emphasized the importance of educating the public on how to use knowledge for the common good and providing guidance against hate speech and online bullying.

He stated that specialists would engage in several sessions throughout the week to discover solutions to the global crisis.

Jelassi expressed gratitude to President Muhammadu Buhari, the Nigerian people, and the government for agreeing to host the event for a week.

Lai Mohammed, the minister of information and culture, had earlier welcomed visitors to the nation.