Prof Miriam Fernández -Knowledge Media Institute, The Open University
This event took place on Tuesday 11 November 2025 at 11:30
While online spaces have become central to social interaction, they remain profoundly unsafe for many. Women and girls, in particular, continue to face disproportionate risks from technology-facilitated violence, including harassment, stalking, deepfake pornography, and algorithmic discrimination. In this talk, I summarise existing efforts by the OU’s Centre for Protecting Women Online. I explore how current technologies, from social media platforms and generative AI tools to IoT devices, perpetuate and amplify gender-based harms. I will discuss some of the initiatives and research efforts aimed at tackling these issues, as well as the technical, social, and legal challenges that continue to hinder meaningful protection for women and girls worldwide.
We are also inviting top experts in AI and Knowledge Technologies to discuss major socio-technological topics with an audience that comprises both members of the Knowledge Media Institute, as well as the wider staff at The Open University. Differently from our seminar series, these events follow a Q&A format.
