Advancing Gender Equality in the Digital Public Sphere: Tackling Online Violence and AI-Discrimination – WS 04 2026

Digital technologies are reshaping European societies, creating opportunities to advance gender equality by expanding access, participation, and empowerment for women, girls and diverse groups. At the same time, online and technology-facilitated violence is a growing cross-border threat to democracy, human rights, and gender equality, as digital tools can amplify and reinforce structural inequalities, including online and offline violence, discrimination, and exclusion.

This session examines how effective measures and regulatory frameworks – such as the Council of Europe’s standards such as its recently adopted Recommendation on accountability for technology-facilitated violence against women and girls, and its monitoring mechanism GREVIO as well as the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA) – combined with best practices and multistakeholder cooperation, can address online violence, prevent AI-driven discrimination, and harness digital technologies to protect fundamental rights and advance gender equality in the digital public sphere.