A group of three women, who have each been targeted and harassed by cyber mobs, have put together a useful guide about online safety. Speak Up and Stay Safe(r) is a guide to protecting yourself from online harassment. The creators describe it as “the guide we wish had already existed when the attacks on us began.” Further description includes:
This guide is for anyone who fears they might be targeted, or who is already under attack, for speaking their mind online, but is especially designed for women, people of color, trans and genderqueer people, and everyone else whose existing oppressions are made worse by digital violence.
The guide includes best security practices for social media, email, online gaming, website platforms, and ensuring privacy of personal information online. It also has best practices for documenting and reporting harassment. In addition, it discusses how to care for yourself emotionally during an online attack.
At the top of the guide are three steps that a person who is feeling overwhelmed by an online attack can begin with. Set up two step verification. Create unique, complex, passwords. Remove potential doxxing information. Each step has a link attached that can quickly give more details about what to do and how to do it.
The creators of Speak Up and Stay Safe(r) are: Jaclyn Friedman, Anita Sarkeesian, and Renee Bracey Sherman. Jaclyn Friedman is the founder and former executive director of Women, Action & the Media (WAM!). She was also the architect of WAM!s Twitter Harassment Reporting Demonstration Project and leader of the #FBrape campaign to apply Facebook’s hate-speech ban to content that promoted gender-based violence.
Anita Sarkeesian is a media critic and the creator of Feminist Frequency, a video webseries that explores the misrepresentation of women in pop culture narratives. Her work focuses on deconstructing stereotypes, patterns, and tropes associated with women in popular culture, and also on highlighting the targeted harassment of women in online and gaming spaces.
Renee Bracey Sherman a reproductive justice activist. She is the author of “Saying Abortion Aloud: Research and Recommendations for Public Abortion Storytellers and Organizations”. She is also a writer with Echoing ida and a board member at NARAL Pro-Choice America.