Toxic platforms, broken planet: Online abuse of environmental defenders
Of 204 land/environmental defenders surveyed, 92% had experienced online abuse or harassment tied to their work, with real-world safety and silencing effects.
Executive summary
AI-generatedThis summary was generated by AI from the original report to make it easier to scan and cite. It is not a substitute for the source — read the original above.
Global Witness conducted what it described as its first global survey of land and environmental defenders' experiences of online abuse, gathering responses from roughly 200 advocates across multiple continents between November 2024 and March 2025. The survey asked participants about the platforms where abuse occurred and whether online harassment translated into offline harm.
The survey found that 92% of respondents had experienced some form of online abuse or harassment connected to their advocacy work, ranging from public social media attacks to doxxing and cyberattacks. Facebook was cited by 62% of respondents as the site of the worst abuse, followed by X at 37%, WhatsApp at 36%, and Instagram at 26%, with 82% of those abused reporting it occurred on at least one Meta platform. Among defenders who had also experienced offline harm, 75% believed the online abuse had directly or partly contributed to it.
Global Witness concluded that platform-hosted abuse is producing a chilling effect on environmental and land-rights activism, driving lost productivity and, in some cases, withdrawal from advocacy altogether.
Think this summary is wrong? Contact us.