Digital Defenders Partnership supports human rights defenders, journalists and activists to improve their digital security and respond to digital attacks.

We offer emergency support including emergency grants of up to 10,000 EUR to respond to urgent situations and in the aftermath of attacks.

We offer sustainable protection support including accompaniment and training through the Digital Integrity Fellowship and sustainable protection grants of between 10,000-50,000 EUR. – CURRENTLY CLOSED

We promote and support collaboration in the field of digital support to human rights defenders through initiatives such as the Rapid Responders Network.

If you want to apply for an emergency grant, you can always reach out to us via email: team@digitaldefenders.org. More information about the emergency grants can be found here

About DDP

The Digital Defenders Partnership (DDP) was initiated in 2012 by the Freedom Online Coalition (FOC) to protect critical Internet users – human rights defenders (HRDs), including activists, bloggers, civil society organisations, journalists, and other users of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) –to defend human rights, and keep the Internet free and open.

Our vision is of an open Internet, free from threats to expression, association, assembly, privacy and other fundamental rights, specifically in repressive and transitional environments.

Our mission is to provide a holistic response to digital threats and create resilient and sustainable networks of support to human rights defenders.

DDP provides grants to human rights defenders and organisations to address urgent digital emergency situations. For example, a website or email being hacked, or the theft or loss of sensitive data and equipment. Longer-term grants are provided to organisations that face threats due to the work they are doing. This grant could cover a training of staff members, internet infrastructure in the office, or setting up secure data storage systems for sensitive files. In addition to the grants, DDP has a Digital Security Fellowship, where organisations around the world receive personalised digital security trainings and support for a sustained period of time. The Rapid Response Network is also coordinated by DDP, through providing financial and logistic assistance to improve the quality and effectiveness of emergency response. Click here for DDP’s strategy for the period 2020-2023.

Scroll down to read more about the scope of these grants, our grant making process and eligibility criteria. If you want to know about future funding opportunities, please send an email to team@digitaldefenders.org.

Incident Emergency Grants

Incident Emergency Funding is designed to respond rapidly to urgent cases of digital threats or attacks against human rights defenders, journalists, activists, or organisations. The funding provided can be up to €10,000 and can be used to cover costs which will directly reduce the risk or impact of a digital attack. The funding covers activities for a maximum of four months, and we aim to respond to requests within two weeks.

If you are interested in applying for Incident Emergency Funding, contact us at team@digitaldefenders.org with the following information:

Your name and your organisation’s name
Details of the threat or attack you face
The goals of the project
Country/countries it takes place in
Aims and details of the planned activities
Duration of the project (maximum four months)
A budget and justification (up to €10,000)
Contact details of two references

Examples of Incident Emergency Funding in the past have included:

DDP supported the provision of digital risk assessment and training workshops to LGBTQI+ human rights defenders in Tanzania following an increase in government and other politicians attacking the community.

Investigative journalists in Southeast Asia received digital security support, as well as equipment replacement and VPNs, via the DDP grant-making mechanism. This collective was investigating and publishing stories on abuses of power by the government and improving their security profile was essential to the continuation of their work.

A black LGBTQI+ activist in Latin America received digital security and psycho-social accompaniment, as well as laptop replacement. The HRD had received violent threats linked to her activism for several years and her work computer was seized by the authorities for an investigation. The grant allowed her to address the psychological stress she faced and continue her activities on a secure device.

DDP supported a project of risk analysis, digital security training and online support on digital rights and digital security issues for activists in a Central American country during a time of political crisis and government repression of civil society.

Given the emerging Covid-19 crisis, DDP is putting money aside to focus in particular on the need for access to infrastructures and software which will support civil society to take its work online in as secure a manner as possible, avoiding the potential pitfalls of dependence on insecure or politically untrustworthy platforms.

We would therefore like to encourage alternative, rights-focused providers of secure software and infrastructure platforms to apply to our Incident Emergency Funding of up to €10,000 to support the development, maintenance, upgrading, and outreaching of these alternatives to civil society. While other types of project will be duly considered, our primary focus will be to support initiatives providing:

Access to secure video and voice communication and conferencing platforms;
Access to VPNs or similar;
Access to radio streaming & broadcasting platforms.
Producing how-tos, guides, and resources aimed at improving accessibility and awareness of best practices regarding the aforementioned tools.

Sustainable Protection Funding – Currently closed

Sustainable protection funding is designed to support medium- or long-term efforts to improve the digital security and overall security of organisations, collectives or media houses. The funding provided can be up to €50,000 and can be used to cover costs related to the development of resilient strategies for information management and digital security within organisations. This can include costs related to the acquisition of hardware, software, training, coaching and the development of policies within organisations. Organisations who themselves provide support on digital security to activists, human rights defenders, journalists or other organisations can also apply for Sustainable Protection Funding.

If you want to apply for Sustainable Protection Funding, send an email to team@digitaldefenders.org with the following information:

Your name and your organisation’s name
Details of the threat or attack you face
The goals of the project
Country/countries it takes place in
Aims and details of the planned activities
Duration of the project (maximum one year)
A budget and justification (up to €50,000)
Contact details of two references

Examples of Sustainable Protection Funding in the past have included:

DDP supported the establishment of the Digital Security Lab Ukraine’s “Digital Security Hub”, a virtual hub which enables Ukrainian civil society to apply rapidly for digital security support.The Hub provides “same day” or “next day” direct help to civil society organisations, independent media, journalists and activists who need help. This hub provides such services as website protection, organisational security support, securing accounts and messengers, training and technical assistance.

DDP provided funding to an international organisation to assess the use of malware and the infection of human rights activists and journalists’ phones with this malware in one West African country. A related digital security training on how to improve secure communications was also provided to local human rights defenders.

DDP supported the Digital Rights Foundation (DRF) and their cyber harassment helpline that allows people, largely women, to seek support for incidences of online violence and harassment.

DDP supported the establishment of temporary mobile satellite centers to bypass Internet shutdowns in two cities located near conflict zones in one Middle Eastern country, thus allowing the sharing of information on the human rights situation locally with the outside world.

Digital First Aid Kit

In collaboration with partner organisations from the Rapid Response Network and CiviCERT, we have developed the Digital First Aid Kit, a self-assessment tool to advise and guide you on what to do if you face digital threats. Check out the Digital First Aid Kit here.

Digital Integrity Fellowship

The Digital Integrity Fellowship offers support, training and accompaniment to human rights organisations and collectives in the development of sustainable capacities for information management and digital security. Our team of seven digital security fellows offers tailored accompaniment for between six and eighteen months to organisations in internet repressive environments, helping them to map the improvements they need to make, and working with internal staff or members to ensure they can build a sustainable set of practices and tools to ensure the organisation’s data is well protected. Fellows work with a holistic vision of protection, where necessary collaborating with partners focused on organisational protection, physical security and psycho-social well-being, to ensure that the accompaniment is carried out in a manner that contributes to the well-being of the collective.

Creative Commons

As we believe in a free and open Internet, this Fellowship is based on a Creative Commons, whereby any institute or organisation is free to use the format of this fellowship and we encourage others to re-use and publish our information.

If you have interest to apply as an organisation for the fellowship, and undergo a security transition, please send an email to: digitalintegrity@hivos.org. In your email, explain the following:

name of the organisation
foundation year
aim and scope of the activities you/your organisation is doing
number of staff
contact details

Digital First Aid Kit

This Kit offers a set of self-diagnostic tools for human rights defenders, activists and journalists facing attacks themselves, and provides guidelines to assist a person under threat.

Organizations

Click here to find a list of useful organizations in the field of digital security.

Tools

Click here to find a list of practical tools, such as links to programs that provide secure messaging, password managers, circumvent censorship and anti-virus software.

Research

The latest researches on technology, censorship and surveillance can be found by clicking here. If there is anything missing, let us know at ddp@hivos.org

Digital First Aid Kit

The Digital First Aid Kit

The Digital First Aid Kit is a collaborative effort of EFF, Global Voices, Hivos & the Digital Defenders Partnership, Front Line Defenders, Internews, Freedom House, Access Now, Qurium, CIRCL, IWPR, Open Technology Fund and individual security experts who are working in the field of digital security and rapid response.

It aims to provide preliminary support for people facing the most common types of digital threats. The Kit offers a set of self-diagnostic tools for human rights defenders, bloggers, activists and journalists facing attacks themselves, as well as providing guidelines for digital first responders to assist a person under threat.

The Kit begins with ways to establish secure communication when you or a contact is facing a digital threat and want to reach out for support. The Kit then moves on to sections on account hijacking, seizure of devices, malware infections and DDoS attacks. Each section begins with a series of questions about you, your devices and your situation. These questions will guide you through a self-assessment or help a first responder to better understand the challenges you are facing. It then lays out initial steps to understand and potentially fix the problems. The steps should also help you or a first responder to recognise when to request help from a specialist.

You can find the complete Digital First Aid Kit through this link.

The Digital First Aid Kit it is a work in progress and if there are things that need to be added, comments or questions regarding any of the sections please go to Github.

Find a printable version of the Digital First Aid Kit here.

Organisations

Here you can find a list of several organisations active in the field of digital security.

Access Now

Article 19

Citizen Lab

Committee to Project Journalists

Electronic Frontier Foundation

The Engine Room

Digital Defenders Partnership

Freedom House

Front Line Defenders

Internews

Media Legal Defence Initiative

Protection International

Reporters Without Borders

Tactical Technology Collective

VirtualRoad Initiative

Tools

Computer software and online browsing:

Alkasir is a computer program that works with proxy servers to allow users to circumvent censorship of URLs in countries where there is censorship of political content.

Amber is an open source tool for websites to provide their visitors persistent routes to information. It automatically preserves a snapshot of every page linked to on a website, giving visitors a fallback option if links become inaccessible.

Avast! is a free, full-featured anti-virus program that detects and removes malware and viruses from a home or personal computer.

CCleaner is a tool that can permanently delete browser history, cookies, other temporary files, as well as free disk space, limiting the ways in which hostile or malicious parties can monitor or infect a personal computer.

Prey Anti-Theft is a useful cross-platform and open source device tracking tool.

Psiphon is a circumvention tool from Psiphon Inc. that utilizes VPN, SSH and HTTP Proxy technology to provide you with uncensored access to Internet content.

Prism-break is a website that offers many safer open-source alternatives to commonly used proprietary software to enable users to mitigate the NSA surveillance and PRISM program.

Tor is a program for serving Tor and related files over SMTP

Telephone:

CSipSimple is a tool to make secure calls with.

Open Whisper Systems: free, worldwide, encrypted phonecalls for iPhone

RedPhone provides end-to-end encryption for your calls, securing your conversations so that nobody can listen in.

Signal provides end-to-end encrypted instant messaging. Signal is free and open source, enabling anyone to verify its security by auditing the code.

SilentCircle is a secure mobile communication solution for iOS and Android that includes voice, text, video, file transfers and more.

Surespot: a secure mobile messaging app that uses exceptional end-to-end encryption for every text, image and voice message returning your right to privacy.

Wire: HD quality calls, private and group chats with inline photos, music and video. Secure and perfectly synced across your devices.

Secure communication:

Gibberbot is a secure messaging chat client that works with Facebook Chat, Google Chat and several others. Developed by the Guardian Project.

HTTPS Everywhere is a secure browser application that automatically changes the communications protocol to encrypted http secure for any website that supports it. It was developed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Available for Firefox and Chrome.

Jitsi is a cross-platform, free and open-source program which supports Instant Messaging (IM), voice and video chat over the Internet.

Obscuracam is a photo and video application for Android that may be used to visually anonymize (pixelate) the faces of people in the photo or video. It was developped by the Guardian Project.

PGP is a data encryption and decryption tool that provides privacy and authentication for data communication such as texts, e-mails and files sent by e-mail.

Riseup is a secure e-mail client for people and groups working on liberatory social change, providing a relatively safe means of e-mail communication for them.

Thunderbird is a free and open source email client for receiving, sending and storing emails

Password and storage managers:

Keepass is a handy password manager that enables users to keep all their passwords in one securely encrypted database, which is locked with one master key.

Keysync is a software that syncs your trusted programs

Truecrypt is a file encryption tool that may encrypt sensitive data into entire partions, storage devices (such as a USB drive) or virtual disks that look like ordinary files.

Research

Find below a short list of interesting researches if you want to know more about digital threats, censorship and surveillance.

Ben Wagner, 2012, Exporting Censorship and Surveillance Technology

European Parliament, 2014: Risks and opportunities raised by the current generation of network services and applications.

Freedom House, 2014: Freedom on the Net

Giswatch, 2014: Communication surveillance in the digital age

European Parliament, 2014: Risks and opportunities raised by the current generation of network services and applications.

Nada Akl, 2014, Mapping Digital Threats in the Middle East and North Africa

UNESCO, 2015: Building digital safety for journalism: a survey of selected issues.

By email

team@digitaldefenders.org

Use our public key to send encrypted emails

Twitter: @DigiDefenders

By snail mail

Hivos
Attn. Digital Defenders Partnership
Raamweg 16
2596 HL Den Haag
the Netherlands