Digital Rights Weekly | November 29 - December 3

Fri Dec 3 20:43:04 CET 2021

Hello Digital Rights Defenders!

Here is your weekly update on digital rights around the world for the
week of November 29 - December 3.

### TCU Update ###

Team CommUNITY will be closed from Tuesday, December 21, 2021 to
Sunday January 2nd 2022. We will be back at work from Monday January
3, 2022. We wish all our readers a peaceful and happy time over the
break!

*** Support Us ! ****

If you like this newsletter and benefit from the various community
tools and services we provide, consider donating to us, as you close
down the year.  Help us continue our loved and celebrated diversity,
inclusion and equity work in Internet Freedom. Your donations will
help us support activists, journalists and other digital rights
defenders around the world, including providing them with
psycho-social care and safe spaces for collaborations.

https://www.digitalrights.community/donate

###  Upcoming Virtual TCU Events ###

Dec 9 | Come join our last Glitter Meetup for 2021! GMs will restart
on January 13th 2022.
https://internetfreedomfestival.org/wiki/index.php/Glitter_Meetup

Dec 10 | Lingua Café, Celebrating Human Rights Day!
Lingua Café (LC) is an online language exchange open to anyone who is
interested in improving their language skills - for professional or
personal reasons - and getting to connect with other community members
in the process. This LC's theme will be human rights to celebrate
Human Rights Day!
https://digitalrights.formstack.com/forms/linguacafe_2

Dec 16 | Holidays “Digital Rights” Variety Show
Join us for a holiday variety show to bring in the new year and
celebrate with your digital rights colleagues! Let’s say goodbye to
2021 together, break bread with each other, and enjoy the wonderful
talent found in our community. You can both RSVP and volunteer to
perform here:.
https://digitalrights.formstack.com/forms/varietyshow2021

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### Digital Rights in the Community    ####

1. Apply to the SSRC Just Tech Fellowship

The Social Science Research Council launched its new inaugural
JustTech Fellowship - a 2-year, full-time fellowship offering $100K+
per year. The fellowship is open to a diverse and cross-sector of
researchers and practitioners who are creating a more just, equitable,
and representative technological future. This includes technologists,
policy advocates, community organizers, and others. Fellows will
identify and challenge injustices emerging from new technologies and
identify solutions to advance social, political and economic rights.

Get more details and apply here:
https://www.ssrc.org/programs/just-tech/just-tech-fellowship/

2. Al Jazeera Fellowship for Journalists and Researchers

This fellowship was created to contribute to the development of
high-quality journalism in the Global South and to help journalists
adapt to modern technologies, while simultaneously encouraging
innovation and research. Fellows will have the opportunity to learn
through practical experience within the AL Jazeera Media Network
(AJMN). The fellowship is only open to those from non-Arab countries.
Those from Arab countries may apply to their Arabic Fellowship
Programme.

https://institute.aljazeera.net/en/fellowship#overview

3. Over 110 CSO’s Call on the EU to Address Impact of AI

Over 110 civil society organisations have laid out proposals to make
sure the European Union’s Artificial Intelligence Act addresses the
real-world impacts of the use of artificial intelligence (AI), places
fundamental rights protection front-and-centre, and maintains a broad
definition of AI systems.

https://www.accessnow.org/cms/assets/uploads/2021/11/joint-statement-EU-AIA.pdf

### Digital Rights Resources ###

1. Internet interconnection Infrastructure: Lessons from the Global South

The first internet exchange point (IXP) was launched in Mexico in
2014. An IXP is an internet node, a physical facility where networks
interconnect through commercial agreements to exchange traffic and
routes on the internet. Networks can include ISPs, content providers,
government agencies and other organizations that have an autonomous
system number (ASN) to be uniquely identified on the Internet.
International entities studying broadband development have emphasized
the role of IXPs in improving connectivity rates in “developing”
countries, reducing internet transit prices and internet market
competition. As of April 2019, there were only 600 IXps worldwide.
Ultimately, this impacts people’s ability to access vital information
about health, news and elections, affecting vulnerable groups the
most.

This study offers an examination of the creation and implementation of
the first IXP in Mexico, illustrating, among other things, the complex
negotiations that keep the initiative ongoing after more than six
years of the IXP formation, without delivering the expected results.
The study also shows how data centres, passive infrastructure and ASNs
play a critical role that stand out in a context of lack of
infrastructure in Mexico.

https://policyreview.info/articles/analysis/internet-interconnection-infrastructure-lessons-global-south

2. Assessing Socio-Digital Identity Ecosystems in Africa

Research ICT Africa and the Centre for Internet and Society (Delhi,
India) partnered in 2021 to examine the design, development,
governance, and implementation of evolving socio-digital identity
ecosystems in 10 African countries. The pandemic has increased the
appetite for digital forms of legal identification, and these are fast
becoming more popular and prevalent on the continent, with little
understanding of how they may increase state surveillance of people in
the future.

https://www.africaportal.org/features/series-wrap-assessing-socio-digital-identity-ecosystems-africa

3.  Resources on LGBTQ+ Digital Safety and tackling Online Abuse

The following resources were created during a Fall Bootcamp co-hosted
by PEN America, GLADD, Trans Journalist Association, and The
Association of LGBTQ Journalists. These videos offer training on how
to tackle online abuse.

Inside Baseball: Demystifying online abuse against people who
areLGBTQ+: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_j0nz-NYY0
Online Abuse Self-Defense Training:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jx15QVOp7sI
Hands-On Anti-Doxing, Anti-Hacking Workshop:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qqd8yhgnUxk

### Digital Rights in the Wider World ###

1. FBI Document Says the Feds Can Get Your WhatsApp Data in Real Time

In a previously unreported FBI document obtained by Rolling Stone, the
bureau claims that it’s particularly easy to harvest data from
Facebook’s WhatsApp and Apple’s iMessage services, as long as the FBI
has a warrant or subpoena. This includes a wellspring of private users
data such as  real-time information about a user and their activities,
address-book contracts for a targeted users, as well as other WhatsApp
users who have the targeted individual in their contacts. The FBI
document raises no questions about the apps’ abilities to keep out
hackers and snoops-for-hire, but does describe how law-enforcement
agencies have multiple legal pathways to extract sensitive user data
from popular secure messaging tools.

Law enforcement having this level of access to our private data makes
citizens vulnerable to them, giving them an incredible amount of power
over us. It means our private conversations are not private at all,
encouraging self-censorship. In addition, most citizens fail to
understand the consequence of these capabilities, because of the
complexity involved.  However, John Oliver, after presenting
government surveillance issues in a more simplified manner on his 2015
program (essentially, asking citizens if they feel that the government
should have access to their “dick pic”), all those surveyed
overwhelmingly felt that it was a violation of government power.

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/whatsapp-imessage-facebook-apple-fbi-privacy-1261816/

John Oliver’s Surveillance Episode (2015)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XEVlyP4_11M

2. Ex-Googler, Timnit Gebru, Starts Her Own AI Research Center

One year ago Google artificial intelligence researcher Timnit Gebru
tweeted, “I was fired” and ignited a controversy over the freedom of
employees to question the impact of their company’s technology. Last
thursday, she launched a new research institute to ask questions about
responsible use of artificial intelligence that Gebru says Google and
other tech companies wont ask.

The new institution, named Distributed Artificial Intelligence
Research (DAIR), aims to be more inclusive than most AI labs—which
skew white, Western, and male—and to recruit people from parts of the
world rarely represented in the tech industry.  It's work will focus
on demonstrating uses for AI unlikely to be developed elsewhere and on
understanding and responding to technology's effects on society.

https://www.wired.com/story/ex-googler-timnit-gebru-starts-ai-research-center/

3. The Facebook Papers: Saudi and Egyptian Companies Involved in
Domestic Worker Trafficking Network

In internal investigations last year, Facebook documented how its
platforms were being used by a Saudi recruitment agency in
collaboration with an Egyptian marketing company to facilitate a labor
trafficking network in the Middle East that exploits women to work as
maids, according to documents obtained by Mada Masr.

https://www.madamasr.com/en/2021/11/29/feature/politics/the-facebook-papers-saudi-and-egyptian-companies-involved-in-domestic-worker-trafficking-network/

4. India Using Cyber-Volunteers to Silence Critical Voice

The suspension of hundreds of accounts that were critical of the
government has come shortly after the launch of a cybercrime
volunteers programme by India’s MInistry of Home Affairs. The Ministry
asked volunteers to flag content that is critical of the government as
being “unlawful”, or “anti-national”. For activists, journalists and
others critical of the government, it has become harder to distinguish
between trolls, the governing Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP)
information technology cell, and the cyber-volunteers – estimated to
number in the hundreds.In doing this, not only is India’s government
censoring legitimate dissent, it is also using India’s people to spy
on each other.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/11/29/india-cyber-volunteers-surveillance-censorship-internet-social-media

5. Another Porn Site Says Banks Forced It to Stop Paying Sex Workers

AVN Stars, a platform where sex workers can sell porn clips, announced
on Wednesday that it will no longer allow creators to monetize their
content on the site beginning January 1.- discrimination from banks
forced the decision. While the sex industry is one of the oldest in
the world, people’s discomfort with talking about sex mean that
discussions about the rights of sex workers are often taboo.
Importantly, sex workers’ own views are often ignored in such
discussions.  According to sex worker, Nikki Kit, people are neither
willing to admit that they watch or pay for porn, nor that they
believe sex workers deserve to be paid for their work.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/jgmm9g/avn-stars-porn-site-monetized-content-banks

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### Grants, Fellowships, & Awards ###

The following opportunities are open to individual digital rights
defenders and to organizations. If you would like us to include a
grant, fellowship or award, please email details to
team at digitalrights.community
https://internetfreedomfestival.org/wiki/index.php/Fundraising_Opportunities

Al Jazeera Fellowship
Deadline: 7 December 2021
https://institute.aljazeera.net/en/fellowship#overview

Grant opportunities
Digital Freedom Fund
Deadline: 24 January - 1 March 2022
https://digitalfreedomfund.org/grants/

Internet Freedom Fund
Open Technology Fund
Deadline: Rolling Basis
https://www.opentech.fund/funds/internet-freedom-fund/

Rapid Response Fund
Open Tech Fund
Deadline: Rolling Basis
https://www.opentech.fund/funds/rapid-response-fund/

Rapid Response Fund
Derechos Digitales
Deadline: Rolling Basis
https://www.derechosdigitales.org/sobre-el-fondo-de-respuesta-rapida/

Urgent Action Fund for Women's Human Rights
Deadline: Rolling Basis
https://urgentactionfund.org/

JustTech Fellowship
The Social Science Research Council
Deadline: 2 January 2021

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### Global Events Calendar ###

APAC DNS Forum 2022 First Pre-Event Webinar
September 2021 - February 2022
https://apacdnsforum.my/
Internet Governance Forum 2021
16-10 December, 2021
Katowice, Poland
https://www.intgovforum.org/multilingual/content/igf-202

Lingua Café, Celebrating Human Rights Day!
10 December
10am EDT / 3pm UTC
https://digitalrights.formstack.com/forms/linguacafe_2

Holidays “Digital Rights” Variety Show
16 December
9am EDT / 2pm UTC
https://digitalrights.formstack.com/forms/varietyshow2021

Glitter Meetup
Every Thursday
9am EDT | 2pm UTC | 10pm UTC+8
Mattermost - IFF Square Channel
https://internetfreedomfestival.org/wiki/index.php/Glitter_Meetup

Check out a list of our virtual events here:
https://internetfreedomfestival.org/wiki/index.php/Calendar_of_Events

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### NEW Job Opportunities  ###

Below is a short-list of jobs sent to us in the last week.

You can view the complete list of jobs on the Team CommUNITY Job Board
at: https://www.digitalrights.community/job-board

If you know someone who may be a fit for any one of these jobs, please
forward them this email. Or better yet, have them sign up to receive
more jobs each week:
https://www.digitalrights.community/weekly-newsletter

✎ Junior Business Analyst (Contract) | Wikimedia Foundation
+ Remote
https://grnh.se/93823f0c1us

✎ Project Officer (Contract) | Wikimedia Foundation
+ Remote
https://grnh.se/c62de9271us

✎ Program Manager (Contract) | Wikimedia Foundation
+ Remote
https://grnh.se/0f40c6701us

✎ Al Jazeera Fellowship | Al Jazeera
+ Remote and at Al Jazeera Headquarters
https://institute.aljazeera.net/en/fellowship#overview

✎ Senior Analyst, Global Data & Insights | Wikimedia Foundation
+ Remote
https://boards.greenhouse.io/wikimedia/jobs/3692103?gh_src=a844e6761us

✎ Analyst, Community Data & Evaluation | Wikimedia Foundation
+ Remote
https://boards.greenhouse.io/wikimedia/jobs/3691754?gh_src=70881f4d1us

✎ Senior Financial Analyst | Access Now
+ NYC or Washington, DC, USA
http://accessnow.bamboohr.com/jobs/view.php?id=95&source=aWQ9MjA%3D

✎ Data Engineer | Wikimedia Foundation
+ Remote
https://boards.greenhouse.io/wikimedia/jobs/3698173?gh_src=751057bd1us

✎ Android Developer | LEAP Encryption Access Project
+ Remote
https://leap.se/post/2021_11_28_work_to_do/

✎ Iran Cyber Dialogue Community Coordinator | ASL19
+ Remote
https://asl19.org/en/join-us/icd-community-coordinator/

✎ Program Manager | PEN America
+ New York, USA
https://pen.org/digital-safety-online-abuse-defense-program-manager/

✎ iOS Developer | LEAP Encryption Access Project
+ Remote
https://leap.se/post/2021_11_28_work_to_do/

✎ Go Application Developer | LEAP Encryption Access Project
+ Remote
https://leap.se/post/2021_11_28_work_to_do/

✎ Technology Law and Policy Fellow | Wikimedia Foundation
+ Remote
https://boards.greenhouse.io/wikimedia/jobs/3689514?gh_src=141cf67f1us

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Team CommUNITY at ARTICLE 19
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