The world recently marked Transgender Day of Remembrance 2024; an annual moment to honor transgender, non-binary, and gender non-conforming people who have been killed, attacked, discriminated against, or abused simply for being themselves. Devastatingly, this kind of violence is on the rise in almost every region of the world, with transgender individuals, as well as the wider LGBTQ+ community, facing increasing threats online and offline.
As an organization that works to defend and extend the digital rights of communities and individuals at risk around the world, Access Now is committed to defending trans rights in the digital age, and to combating tech-enabled abuse of people on the frontlines of this fight. Trans rights are human rights.
When prejudice and bigotry take center stage in public discourse, this impacts marginalized people and groups in very real and concrete ways.
Globally, the international anti-gender rights movement is triggering a wave of repression of LGBTQ+ rights in countries including Uganda, Ghana, and Russia. Laws such as the Anti-Homesexuality Act in Uganda, or the Anti-Gay Propaganda Act in Russia, are endangering LGBTQ+ people and further closing online spaces for organizing and pushing back. The Uganda law has outlawed LGBTQ+ civil society organizations and banned advocacy on LGBTQ+ rights. Its extreme provisions include the death penalty in some circumstances. This dangerous legal environment has already resulted in LGBTQ+ activists getting online threats that reportedly led to physical violence.
In the U.S., following the recent re-election of Donald Trump as president, human rights defenders are bracing for an administration that has vowed to roll back gender-affirming medical care for trans youth, ban any discussion of sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, and sex characteristics (SOGIESC) in schools, and reinstate the ban on transgender military service. We are also already seeing a rise in hate-mongering against trans people and their rights, to which many courageous voices, such as transgender activist and artist Evan Greer, are standing up.
These are not easy problems to solve. For example, the misguided Kids Online Safety Act or Don’t Say Gay legislation in the U.S. could censor, control, and curtail discussion of SOGIESC/ LGBTQ+ issues, even as misinformation, disinformation, and hate speech targeting LGBTQ+ people proliferates online and in the media.
Access Now’s Digital Security Helpline is seeing the direct impact of legal efforts to criminalize LGBTQ+ people’s very existence or to restrict discussions of SOGIESC issues. We are receiving an increased number of requests from LGBTQ+ people concerned for their digital security or facing incidents exposing them to harm. At least 22% of all requests that the Helpline received from LGBTQ+ activists in the last year involved incidents of hateful, dangerous, or violent content. As we note above, in countries with few or no legal protections for LGBTQ+ people, online threats easily escalate to physical violence or harm.
Meanwhile, digital technologies are used to facilitate gender-based violence against trans and LGBTQ+ people broadly, women rights defenders, and marginalized communities. In allowing this kind of abuse, Big Tech has been a helpful ally of authoritarianism.
In the face of these threats, LGBTQ+ activists and the wider human rights community must unite to Fight for the Future, whether by resisting anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ+ movements, including legislative efforts to deny LGBTQ+ people’s very existence, or supporting the people and organizations fighting back. In the past year, the Helpline has seen a significant uptick (+15%) in the number of preemptive or preventive support requests from LGBTQ+ rights organizations, suggesting an increasing awareness of the need to organize collectively and strategically defend LGBTQ+ rights in the digital age. The more people attempt to divide us, the more we must remember that, when it comes to defending human rights for all, our unity is our strength.
Get support to stay safe online
If you are a human rights defender or work for an organization fighting for LGBTQ+ rights, and you are worried about your digital security, the Digital Security Helpline is available to support you 24/7, in nine languages.
To see how you can stay safer online, use our guide for LGBTQ+ activists (focused on Africa) to get tips based on different threat scenarios. PEN America also has a field manual for LGBTQ+ journalists, activists, and artists facing online harassment. WIRED has put together a helpful guide on steps you can take to protect yourself from government surveillance, focused on the U.S. and featuring contributions from Freedom of the Press Foundation. Finally, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has a comprehensive set of guides for surveillance self-defense that includes instructions for using tools like the Signal secure messaging app.