As part of Milton Keynes Tech Week 2025, The Centre for Protecting Women Online proposes an engaging and interdisciplinary event focused on the development of responsible technologies and artificial intelligence to safeguard women and girls in online spaces. The event will be held at The Open University and is designed to connect students, researchers, tech professionals, educators, and members of the public.

Event Description

This session will explore how we can harness innovation to tackle gendered online harms through an integrated lens of law, human behaviour, technology, ethics, and policing. Drawing on the work of The Centre for Protecting Women Online, the event will feature short talks, panels, and interactive discussions with researchers, partners and the audience. The event will showcase interdisciplinary research, current challenges in the online environment, and real-world efforts to create safer, more inclusive digital platforms. Through this, we aim to raise awareness among diverse audiences about how pro-social and accountable tech development can shape the future of online safety. A core feature of the session will be intergenerational engagement. We plan to invite both young people and adults, including participants from Milton Keynes College (a CPWO partner), to learn from one another and reflect on the distinct and overlapping digital challenges they face. By bringing together voices across age groups and sectors, the event will encourage mutual learning and a deeper understanding of how responsible innovation must be informed by lived experiences.

For further enquiries please contact: protecting-women-online@open.ac.uk

Panel Members

Meet your Panel Members:

Professor Olga Jurasz

Olga Jurasz is a Professor of Law and Director of the Centre for Protecting Women Online. Her research expertise is law and policy responses to violence against women and feminist approaches to governance of online spaces. Professor Jurasz is a leading voice in the field of law & violence against women. She published her research widely, including two books: Online Misogyny as a Hate Crime: A Challenge for Legal Regulation (Routledge 2019) and Violence Against Women, Hate and Law: Perspectives from Contemporary Scotland (2022). Professor Jurasz's expertise has been used by governments, international organisations and third sector organisations to influence changes in law and policy in areas of (online) violence against women, criminal law, online communications and State obligations concerning violence against women.

Professor Rose Capdevila

Rose Capdevila is a Professor of Psychology and stream co-lead (Human Behaviour) for the Centre. Her research focuses on gender and digital spaces. She was an international collaborator for the European funded SeGReVUni project on gender related violence in universities. She is currently also coinvestigator on the Gender Equitable Interactions Online (GEiO) - a four nation European funded project. Rose co-edits the book series 'Feminist Companions to Psychology' and is co-editor of the award-winning 'Handbook of International Feminisms: Perspectives on Psychology, Women, Culture, and Rights' (2011) and Palgrave Handbook of Power, Gender, and Psychology (2023). She has been co-editor of the journal 'Feminism & Psychology' and past chair of the 'Psychology of Women & Equalities Section of the British Psychological Society'.

Professor Arosha Bandara

Arosha Bandara is a Professor of Software Engineering at The Open University whose research and teaching focuses on software engineering for adaptive systems. He has a particular interest in techniques for building adaptive security and privacy mechanisms for ubiquitous, Internet of Things systems. He has led research on adaptive systems as a PI and Co-I on multiple projects funded by the EPSRC, ERC, and Qatar National Research Foundation, working in application domains including healthcare and policing. He is a member of the steering group for the OU’s Centre for Policing Research and Learning and is currently Associate Dean and Director of STEM Research.

Dr. Keely Duddin

Keely Duddin is a Lecturer in Policing Practice and Organisation, a Policing stream lead and a Chartered Psychologist. Holding a PhD in Health Psychology, she specialises in research that can be implemented into practice, with a focus on well-being, mental health, women's and working parents' rights, and suicide prevention. Formerly the Head of Research for a UK police force and a Special Constable in a domestic violence unit, she continues to collaborate with police forces to enhance practices and foster research and knowledge exchange with police organisations and external partners. Her work bridges academia and practical application, focusing on protecting women and underrepresented groups and improving police practices to better support and protect the public.

Register for the event