Tactics and tools for the protection
of Human Rights Defenders

6 September 2011

"This report asks the hard questions about how to protect and empower those who attempt to expose injustices through video. It provides specific recommendations for immediate and future actions that can reduce danger for those risking their lives. This report is an important step to understanding how we can harness the power of video and technology to empower activists to protect and defend human rights. This is the age of transformative technology."
 

PETER GABRIEL
Co-founder, WITNESS

WITNESS’ Cameras Everywhere aims to ensure that the thousands of people using video for human rights can do so as effectively, safely and ethically as possible. This report is based on discussions with over 40 senior experts and practitioners in technology and human rights. It presents a roadmap to emerging trends in policy and practice at the intersection of human rights, technology, social media, and business. Cameras Everywhere goes on to make specific recommendations on how important players in the new human rights landscape can take specific, manageable steps to strengthen the practical and policy environments for human rights video, and other information and communication technologies (ICTs) used for human rights.

KEY CHALLENGES

There are five areas that present the most pressing challenges: Privacy and Safety; Network Vulnerabilities; Information Overload, Authentication and Preservation; Ethics; and Policy.

KEY RECOMMENDATIONS

Long-term and sustainable change for the effective use of video for human rights requires genuine engagement between civil society, business and government to be impactful. We outline several key steps for technology companies and developers, investors, human rights organizations, funders and policy makers.

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