A Boston-based nonprofit is planning to use a $35,000 grant from the Knight Foundation to begin developing a system that would notify Internet users when their online activity is being tracked or censored by their government and allow them to circumvent the surveillance.
In addition to alerting Internet users when their activities are being restricted, the Center for Rights in Action says it also plans to offer them alternate ways to access websites blocked by their countries’ governments. Users would receive a link to “mirror” sites, copies of websites that governments are unable to block or track.
“What this could result in is a web that is essentially impossible to censor,” said Evan Greer, campaign manager at the Center for Rights in Action.
Other winners of the Knight Foundation’s latest round of awards include public libraries in New York and Chicago, whose projects aim to increase Internet access and Internet literacy. The Boston-based Tibet Action Institute also won funding; the institute’s Safe Travels Online project seeks to help those in highly-censored Asian communities avoid Internet surveillance and hacking.
The Center for Rights in Action says it is dedicated to preserving freedom of speech and expression on the Internet. The nonprofit was a key organizer behind protests against the Stop Online Piracy Act, helping to launch an Internet blackout in January 2012 that defeated the federal government’s proposed bill. Since then, the Center for Rights has been working towards its vision of “a world where everyone can enjoy the basic freedom to express, create, and connect online.”
The center’s new system is still in the very early stages of development, Greer said. She said $35,000 is just enough money to build a prototype of the project, which the center hopes to develop over a six-month time period in accordance with the grant’s guidelines. The completed prototype would be presented at a demo day for Knight Foundation grantees.
In order for the system to work, the Center for Rights will need to get participation from major websites, including Twitter, Tumblr, Reddit, Imgur, and Wordpress, Greer said. She added that her company hopes governments will eventually stop censorship altogether once they realize how easy it is for users to access anti-censorship tools.
“Really this is about everyone together building an Internet that is the Internet that we want,” said Greer, adding that the new system would focus on both foreign and domestic Internet surveillance. “The Internet that’s about free exchange of information and ideas, an Internet that allows us to organize ourselves, organize protests, dissent, to speak out, and an Internet where we can communicate with our loved ones and our families without fear of governments persecuting us for it.”Source: http://www.commonwealthmagazine.org/News-and-Features/Online-exclusives/2014/Spring/087-Boston-firm-seeks-to-halt-Internet-censorship.aspx
