The new Ugandan app tackling online abuse against women

The game is a bid to educate women across Africa on digital safety and abuse, which has reportedly worsened in recent years.

‘The digital gender gap, lack of opportunities for women, patriarchy, misogyny, and cultural practices [mean] women across Africa tend to have lower digital literacy skills,’ explains Pollicy founder and director Neema Iyer.

This digital illiteracy, she says, makes them more susceptible for threats such as ‘online violence, surveillance, and stalking.’

Despite more and more users online due to the pandemic, digital safety is often missing from education curriculums and training is largely targeted at human rights defenders or journalists in Africa.

A study found that in 5 countries, 29% of respondents did not know where to find information on online safety, and 80% said their only measures to secure their online safety was frequently changing their passwords.

Harassment of minorities is common online, and although Uganda has many organisations focused on online abuse against women, there is still a huge gap.

As well as women, digital safety organisation HER Internet says that it is Black, Indigenous and people of colour, LGBTQ people, sex workers, and people with disabilities face higher rates of incidence and orchestrated attacks targeting their identities.

Digital Safe-Tea aims to tackle this by giving women across Uganda and Africa more control over their digital presence and shows them how to act against online abuse.

Uganda isn’t the only country trying to tackle online abuse against women; part of the UK government’s new safety measures following Sarah Everard’s murder includes a plan to tackle cyber-flashing and a petition has been launched in India to include digital safety training in school curriculums across the country.

In June, the Internet Watch Foundation launched a new app to help teens report cases of revenge porn, or attempts in order to prevent their intimate photos from being shared online

Online attacks are difficult to deal with, and these measures intend to hand back power to users.

If these issues have affected you, there are resources and organisations  available to help.