The Role of Internet Consumption on the Witnessing of Online Harms

By Goh Zhang Hao, Gulizar Haciyakupoglu, Edson C. Tandoc Jr

This policy report investigates how gender, daily Internet activities, and the use of Internet-enabled devices, can impact one’s frequency of witnessing online harms. Building on a national survey conducted in Singapore in December 2022 by the Centre for Information Integrity and the Internet, this study suggests that men engage in daily Internet activities and use Internet-enabled devices more frequently than women. This partly explains why men witness more online harms than women. The policy report calls for further studies into the relationship between online harms witnessing and perpetration, along with greater attention to gender-based differences, when studying and drafting policies on online harms and emerging online threats.

Singapore: S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Centre Of Excellence For National Security, 2024. 20p.