Online abuse and extremism disproportionately target marginalised populations, particularly people of colour, women and transgender and non‐binary people. The core argument of this report focuses on the intersecting failure of Preventing and Counter Violent Extremism (P/CVE) policies and cybersecurity policies to centre the experiences and needs of victims and survivors of online extremism and abuse. In failing to do so, technology companies and states also fail to combat extremism.

The practice of online abuse is gendered and racialised in its design and works to assert dominance through male supremacist logic. Online abuse is often used by extremist groups such as the far right, jihadist groups and misogynist incels. Yet online abuse is not seen as a ‘threat of value’ in cybersecurity policies. Additionally, the discipline of terrorism studies has failed to engage with the intersection of racism and misogyny properly. Consequently, we fail to centre marginalised victims in our responses to extremism and abuse.