The Democracy + Tech Initiative creates policy practices that align global stakeholders toward tech and governance that reinforces, rather than undermines, open societies. It builds on the DFRLab’s established track record and leadership in the open-source field, empowering global communities to promote transparency and accountability online and around the world. The Initiative examines how the tech that connects and informs people is funded, built, and governed, and how that affects the viability of rights-respecting and democratic societies around the world.
Connective technologies are ubiquitous in modern life, and the ways in which governments use, promote, and regulate them is central to the global order. As many nations embrace an increasingly forceful authoritarian approach to these issues, the need for a powerful, coherent, and actionable democratic approach has never been greater.
The Democracy + Tech Initiative is designed to:
- Center human rights and democracy in tech and policy debates;
- Shape what happens next by looking beyond the current tech and democracy flash points;
- Ensure decisions about global tech include equities and stakeholders around the world;
- Connect and align siloed communities and issues in government, industry, and civil society; and
- Elevate a new generation of diverse leaders with crosscutting expertise to shape policy and industry outcomes.
Leadership
Nonresident fellows
The Democracy + Tech Initiative is supported by a world class cohort of nonresident fellows with crosscutting expertise, all dedicated to the mission of ensuring a more equitable and rights-respecting world. They are the embodiment of the Initiative’s approach, driving insight and action from a combined community of leaders representing the experience and sectors required to create change. They include AI experts, human rights advocates, scholars on China, former government officials and diplomats, leaders in companies seeking to address online harms, and former tech executives.
Related publications
An introduction to the Freedom Online Coalition
The Freedom Online Coalition (FOC) is comprised of thirty-four member countries committed to advancing Internet freedom and human rights online.
The White House’s new deputy cyber director: Tech’s challenges are society’s challenges
Camille Stewart Gloster, the inaugural deputy national cyber director for technology and ecosystem security, spoke at the DFRLab’s 360/StratCom about her newly created office’s ambitious agenda to address a wide scope of cyber challenges.
The call for coordinated action for a free, open, and interoperable internet
The DFRLab, as part of its annual 360/StratCom event, convened a discussion about the FOC, including the need to coordinate action to protect a free, open, secure, and interoperable internet.
Written testimony of DFRLab’s Rose Jackson at Senate hearing on disrupting dangerous algorithms
Delivered before the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation Subcommittee on Communications, Media, and Broadband.
I Worked at Facebook. It’s Not Ready for This Year’s Election Wave.
An op-ed in the New York Times from Nonresident Senior Fellow Katie Harbath on the global challenges Facebook, and their parent company Meta, will face going into election season 2022.
FAST THINKING: Trump’s post-Facebook future
The verdict: Back to you, Facebook. The company’s Oversight Board ruled Wednesday that former US President Donald Trump will remain banned from the platform for encouraging the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol.
Deciphering Disinformation in Africa
Disinformation operations in Africa are hidden in discretely coordinated social media campaigns. Rose Jackson joins CSIS’s podcast: Into Africa to discuss he importance of people-to-people engagement in responding to disinformation.
Op-ed: Democracy, technology, and the new coronavirus
COVID-19 has the potential to be malware for democracy. Becoming aware of those realities will help us better protect the system.
Op-Ed: Government of India introduces drastic new internet rules
New rules for online intermediaries, social media companies, and media sites present a serious challenge to India’s democracy
FAST THINKING: A glimpse into our digital future at the latest tech hearing on Capitol Hill
It’s become so regular an occurrence these days that you’d be forgiven if you missed it entirely: On Thursday, the CEOs of Facebook, Twitter, and Google headed to the US Congress (virtually, of course) to testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
Op-Ed: Myanmar’s connectivity curse
How the country’s most precious commodity, internet and social media access, is being co-opted by the military.
FAST THINKING: What’s next for the insurrectionists?
The riot at the Capitol was conceived in plain sight, as we reported last week. For weeks on far-right networks across the web, extremists discussed their plans for violence. Is it happening again? Experts at our Digital Forensic Research Lab have been monitoring the chatter.
FAST THINKING: How the Capitol riot was coordinated online
The mob that broke into the US Capitol yesterday was aided significantly by online coordination and planning. The team at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab has conducted exhaustive research into how that happened, combing through social media and other networks frequented by the far right. Let’s break down what they found.
What the Natanz explosion signaled to Iran’s disinformation apparatus
By using fictitious front groups to impede attribution, the attackers turned one of the Iranian regime’s own disinformation tactics against it.
Related events
360/Open Summit: The World in Motion
The DFRLab hosts 360/Open Summit: The World in Motion on June 22-25 online.
A conversation with Katherine Maher
Former Wikimedia CEO Katherine Maher discusses her experience leading one of the world’s largest and most trusted platforms, and the launch of the DFRLab’s new Democracy + Tech Initiative.
Fireside chat | A conversation with Representative Tom Malinowski
A fireside chat with Congressman Malinowski on the ways technology has changed the struggle for human rights, his tenure leading the State Department’s Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor bureau, and his efforts in Congress to make tech more accountable and democratic.
US Paris Tech Challenge
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