Leading the fight against online harm

Who we are

The Online Harms Foundation implements the UN-supported public-private partnership Tech Against Terrorism in partnership with the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT). In 2020 we relaunched as the Online Harms Foundation in order to broaden the practical support we offer to smaller tech platforms to include countering the terrorist use of the internet, child sexual abuse material (CSAM), hate speech, online scams, and disinformation whilst respecting human rights.

Through our work in implementing Tech Against Terrorism since 2017 we have pioneered an effective public-private partnership model that brings together experts from the tech community, academic, civil society, and government to provide practical support to platforms.

The Online Harms Foundation currently receives no funding for its own work, however Tech Against Terrorism is funded by Public Safety Canada (for the development of the Terrorist Content Analytics Platform – the TCAP), by the GIFCT to provide free Mentorship services to smaller tech platforms in need of support to tackle terrorist use of their services, and by other platforms on ad hoc basis to provide Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) expertise.

Our preference is to receive 50:50 funding from the public and private sectors to reinforce the principle of independence and reinforce the importance of public-private partnerships as recognised by the UN Security Council. The GIFCT is backed by Facebook, Microsoft, Google, Twitter, Amazon, and others. Previously we have received funding from the Government of Switzerland, the Republic of Korea, and the Government of Spain.

Why this matters

Every minute, around 210,000 photos are shared on Facebook, 360,000 Tweets are posted on Twitter and over 10,000 messages are delivered on Telegram. The overwhelming majority of this content is benign, but some bad actors seek to exploit the open nature of the internet by posting harmful or illegal material. That represents a serious threat to all of us. The dangers of online harms are immense, widespread and cause lasting damage. The exploitation of the online space represents a challenge to society which needs to be tackled urgently and decisively in a way that upholds the rule of law and is practicable for the tech sector. The tech industry, regulators, government and the public need to work together to tackle it. Our hope is that the foundation will play a major role in doing so over the coming months and years.