Building Young Women’s Cyber Safety and Advocacy Skills

Written by Kim Allman | Head of Corporate Responsibility and Public Policy

Gen Blog | Community

For more than a decade, Norton, one of Gen’s leading Cyber Safety brands, has worked with the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGGS) to give girls and young women the tools they need to lead safe, healthy digital lives.

On July 20th, at the WAGGGS Sangam World Centre in Pune, India, Gen celebrated this long running partnership and discussed the importance of building Cyber Safety skills among girls and young women all over the world.

"It was an absolute pleasure to participate in the Surf Smart 2.0 panel event at Sangam. I had the opportunity to meet and interact with some truly inspiring young women who are part of the program focused on Cyber Safety awareness. Sharing my own experiences in the STEM field at Gen was a highlight for me and it was heartening to see such enthusiasm and curiosity among the participants about pursuing careers in STEM. I left the event feeling inspired and hopeful about the future of women in STEM." - Kartiki Gangthade, Associate IT Application Specialist at Gen.

The presentation was part of the Surf Smart 2.0 Programme, a four-day event designed to mark the successes and plan for the future of Surf Smart 2.0. Norton and WAGGGS co-developed this badge-earning programme to empower girls and young women ages 5-25 with the digital knowledge and leadership skills necessary to protect themselves online and make a difference in their communities.

The event brought together representatives of WAGGGS Member Organizations from more than a dozen countries—from Chile to Uganda to Tunisia and beyond—as well as the girls and young women who took part in the Surf Smart Advocacy Fund. Together, along with Kartiki Gangthade, an Associate IT Application Specialist in our Pune office who volunteered to speak at the event, attendees celebrated achievements, shared best practices and envisioned the ways Surf Smart 2.0 can continue to innovate and expand across the globe. At twenty-two years old, Kartiki was able to connect with the girl guides and scouts, inspiring the young women in the room with per personal STEM career journey.

Empowering Young Women to Surf Smart

The Pune event caps a full year of impact built around Surf Smart 2.0. The programme curriculum includes information about common online risks, simple ways to protect digital privacy and how to connect with others in positive ways.

From April 2023 to April 2024, WAGGGS estimates that the programme reached more than 42,000 girls and young women through a variety of activitations, such as:

• 17,816 girls completed the Surf Smart 2.0 programme, earning a badge.
• Because everyone deserves digital safety education, we make the Surf Smart 2.0 curriculum free for all. This year, the Surf Smart 2.0 audiobook and PowerPoint were downloaded more than 15,600 times. 
• WAGGGS Member Organizations directly trained nearly 6,500 volunteer leaders to cascade the programme directly to girls and young women.
• Global events such as Girl Guiding and Girl Scouting Jamborees have reached more than 600 girls and young women. 
• 143 Advocacy Champions/Smart Surfers representing seven countries were trained directly by WAGGGS.

Advocating for a Safer Internet

Throughout 2023 and 2024, WAGGGS went beyond training girls and young women in Cyber Safety and encouraged them to lead the way toward making the internet a better place. Through the Surf Smart Advocacy Fund, WAGGGS enabled young women in 10 countries to create campaigns that advocated for a safer, more accessible and more inclusive internet. Currently, Smart Surfers are implementing 18 advocacy projects at community, regional and national levels.

For example, in addition to working in three community centers and secondary schools, Smart Surfers from the Uganda Girl Guides Association organized a high-profile panel discussion as part of their advocacy campaign. The panel celebrated Safer Internet Day and featured representatives from the Ugandan government and media industry, as well as 12 Advocacy Champions, who spoke about their WAGGGS-funded projects.

One of these projects came from 21-year-old Nankya Sauda, whose project is “Beating Online Addiction.” She spoke about the work she and her team are doing to raise awareness of the effects of internet addiction on mental health and promote counselling. Likewise, Smart Surfers Faith Elizabeth Asuko and Karen Kirabo Byangira shared information about their upcoming advocacy initiative, which speaks to the challenges Ugandan youth face online, on the national television show Good Morning Uganda.

Another team of Smart Surfers, Sophia Nabbale and Ronah Akatukunda, took it one step further. They presented their advocacy campaign, which addressed bridging the intergenerational digital divide and the fight against online violence, during the United Nations Civil Society Conference 2024 in Nairobi, Kenya.

Powering Digital Freedom

A key pillar of our Social Impact strategy is to provide youth, educators, families and vulnerable people with the Cyber Safety skills they need to navigate their digital lives safely and with more confidence. Our partnership with WAGGGS is a mainstay of these efforts, delivering critical tools and training for the next generation of digital citizens. For more information on additional Cyber Safety education partnerships, check out our work with Discovery Education, the National PTA and LifeSmarts.

These grants were awarded from the Gen Foundation, a corporate advised fund of Silicon Valley Community Foundation.