Social media and human rights
Overview
Social media platforms shape how people access information, express themselves and participate in public life, but their design and business models can also cause significant harm.
This collection brings together resources that expose these harms, challenge company practices, and push for greater accountability and transparency.
It signposts to work exploring online abuse and discrimination, the real‑world consequences of platform design and policies, and the role of platforms in enabling serious human rights abuses globally.
Alongside these, you’ll also find links to related collections and tools that show how this work fits into the wider picture of digital rights advocacy.
Resource details
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© Tamara-Jade Kaz / Amnesty International
Explore our work
The resources listed below bring together resources produced by Amnesty International UK’s Politics, Policy and research team.
Each resource exposes the human rights impacts of social media platforms, and our work to drive positive change whilst holding tech companies to account.
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“A Death Sentence For My Father”: Meta’s contribution to human rights abuses in Northern EthiopiaThis report is based on an investigation into Meta’s role in the serious human rights abuses perpetrated against the Tigrayan community between 2020 and 2022.
Reports and publications 30 Oct 2023 -
The Social Atrocity: Meta and the right to remedy for the RohingyaReports and publications 28 Sep 2022 -
Meta: Worker's rights matter!This briefing calls for fair working conditions and trade union rights for subcontracted cleaners at Meta, highlighting the dismissal of a union representative who campaigned against excessive workloads.
Policy briefing 30 Aug 2022 -
Amnesty International UK Submission to the 2026 UK consultation “Growing up in the online world: a national conversation”Amnesty International UK submission exploring social media risks for children and young people, and calling for ‘safety by design’ regulation to protect rights without limiting access.
Submission 26 May 2026 -
Dragged into the rabbit hole: New evidence of TikTok’s risks to children’s mental healthThis follow-up report, presents new evidence that TikTok’s ‘For You’ feed continues to push children and young people engaging with mental health content towards depressive, self‑harm and suicide‑related material.
Reports and publications 20 Oct 2025 -
Driven into Darkness: How TikTok’s ‘For You’ Feed Encourages Self-Harm and Suicidal IdeationThis report explores how TikTok’s design and content targeting systems affect children and young people’s mental health and wellbeing.
Reports and publications 07 Nov 2023 -
“I Feel Exposed”: Caught in TikTok’s Surveillance WebThis report explores how TikTok’s highly personalised ‘For You’ feed, used by millions of children and young people worldwide, is driven by a surveillance‑based business model that puts children’s rights at risk.
Reports and publications 07 Nov 2023 -
UK: Technical explainer on X’s recommender system and the 2024 racist riotsThis technical explainer examines how false claims following the Southport attack spread on X, fuelling racist riots, and finds the platform’s algorithms amplify inflammatory content with harmful human rights consequences.
Reports and publications 06 Aug 2025 -
Twitter Scorecard (2021): Tracking Twitter’s progress in addressing violence and abuse against women online in the United StatesThis follow up report report assesses Twitter’s progress on tackling abuse against women in the United States, finding limited implementation of recommendations and ongoing gaps in transparency and accountability.
Reports and publications 07 Dec 2021 -
Twitter Scorecard (2020): Tracking Twitter’s progress in addressing violence and abuse against women onlineThis scorecard is designed to track Twitter’s global progress in addressing abusive speech against ten indicators, covering transparency, reporting mechanisms, the abuse report review process, and enhanced privacy and security features.
Reports and publications 21 Sep 2020 -
Toxic Twitter: A Toxic Place for WomenThis report examines violence and abuse against women on Twitter, finding widespread harassment and inadequate safeguards that undermine women’s ability to express themselves freely online.
Reports and publications 21 Mar 2018
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