iSIGURT.al – The National Platform for Safer Internet in Albania, for the first time since 2015, on the occasion of the Safer Internet Day, published two national reports, one on child online safety and the other on hate speech against girls and women for the period 2018-2023. The reports lead to concern that digital space is not only safe for children, but also for girls and women, who are the main victims of hate speech and sexual violence online.
Tirana, 7 February 2024 – On the occasion of the Safer Internet Day, iSIGURT.al – the National Platform for Safer Internet in Albania, held this morning, during the 9th National Forum “United for Safety in our Digital Space” made public the findings and recommendations of its two reports: The Annual Report on Child Internet Safety and the Report “Abandoned” – a National Report on Online Hate Speech against Girls and Women in Albania for the period 2018-2023.
The National Report on Child Internet Safety presented several disturbing findings such as the following:
- Compared to last year, there is a 160 per cent increase in incidents reported by and for children in iSIGURT. At least 20 incidents are reported online by children each month.
- About 62 per cent of all incidents reported in iSIGURT.al are done by girls, and about 34 per cent by boys. For the first time, girls are reporting almost twice as many incidents as boys.
- The age group who reports incidents continues to be led by adolescents aged 15-18, followed by those in the 18-30 and 11-14 age groups.
- Tik-tok and Instagram are the two platforms that children reported online incidents most frequently, with 47 and 27 percent of cases, compared to the other platforms.
- Online bullying is the most commonly reported incident by children and adolescents, in about 35 per cent of cases, followed in 21 per cent of cases by hate speech and 15 per cent blackmail and threats online. Online sexual violence and exploitation has moved into fourth place, while up to last year was the main reported incident by children and adolescents.
While the Report on Online Hate Speech against Girls and Women in Albania, shared these main findings:
- Almost 46 percent of incidents reported to iSIGURT between 2018-2023 were made by women and girls. In 2023, they account for almost 60% of all reported incidents.
- The main age group reporting online hate speech is 14-17 years old, followed by 18-24.
- Almost half of all incidents were reported by women and girls residing in central Albania, while the percentage of those in the north still remains low. Tirana, Durres, Fieri and Korça have reported the highest number of incidents;
- Direct hate speech remains the main incident reported by girls and women, followed by threats and bullying used for the purposes of inciting hatred. In 11 cases, material containing sexual violence against children has been used to incite hatred towards girls. Revenge-porn was reported only in one case against a well-known public person, while on at least three occasions CSAM videos of young girls have been used to exploit their vulnerability for sexual exploitation of groups of boys and men.
- The main platforms where hate speech incidents have been reported are Instagram and Tiktok, followed in third place by Albanian-language platforms.
Both Reports in Albanian and English will be made public and available at iISIGURT.al website.
For more, contact:
iSIGURT.al