Project ”Tackling gender based cyberviolence among adolescent girls and young women” (TRACeD) launched

The Centre for Social Informatics (CSI) launched the "TRACeD" project in March, within the CERV-2021-DAPHNE call for proposals. The project aims to combat gender-based cyber violence against adolescent girls and young women.

Advances in technology have transformed and expanded the ways in which sexual violence is perpetrated. Cyber-violence against women and girls (VAWG), as all forms of violence, hampers the full realization of gender equality. Specific needs are well enshrined in multiple reports of the European Commission and include the need for tailored and practical training to teachers, parents, children and students, on safe internet, need for coordinated, multidisciplinary response to the needs of Cyber VAWG victims and the need for a support and early prevention mechanism.

The proposed action addresses these exact needs, though an interdisciplinary approach that aims to develop a tailored, intersectional methodology, which will be multi-agent, cross-cutting and participatory; and subsequently pilot this methodology in the participating countries, Greece, Italy, Slovenia and Cyprus. Specifically, the action proposes to undertake evidence-based assessment of the training needs of teachers, parents, professionals, girls and female students, and provide high-quality, interdisciplinary training to 400 teachers, 400 parents, 480 girls, 480 female students, on safe internet, human rights, sex education, privacy and data protection;  create a network of focal points within schools, to collect and record incidents of online violence against girls.

One of the goals of the project is to develop, pilot, and operate the TRACeD Platform, envisaged as an interactive and multi-functional online platform - simultaneously an education tool for students, teachers and parents, and a victim support mechanism which will be supported by a multidisciplinary team, the cyber guardians. The project’s intervention will be disseminated through targeted multimedia material such as podcasts, talking head videos and documentary. The project is supported by the Slovenian Ministry of Education and the Hellenic Ombudsman for children.