We center regional and local organizations; they are at the forefront of all our interventions. By enabling local and regional partners to lead the work, GIF supports local actors to build stronger networks with peer organizations in their regions and around the world, gain technical expertise from international organizations, and share lessons learned to transfer specialized skills that are disproportionately held at the global level.
All over the world, journalists, civil society organizations (CSOs), activists, and civilians take a leap of faith every time they get online. We entrust our personally identifiable information to be stored indefinitely online and in the hands of strangers. Our digital footprint is easily trackable, and our data could be used by authoritarian regimes, hackers, scammers, or other malicious groups to silence dissent, control access to information, or cause physical, financial, or psychological harm.
Through the GIF project, organizations around the world are supported to protect their communities against these harms and actively work to ensure that the Internet becomes a secure and accessible tool for all. We believe in the power of a global Internet and the need for all users to have a voice in shaping it.
GIF creates a unique opportunity to provide systematic, coherent support to leading regional IF organizations, not only to address local and regional needs, but to collaborate with each other and with international experts in a sustained, proactive process with ongoing learning aimed at influencing global norms and identifying best practices, rather than supporting one-off activities. No existing initiative offers a similar pathway for creating a truly global IF coalition that can unite expertise in digital safety and Internet policy, and pursue a specific, proactive IF agenda.
GIF activities equip independent media and civil society actors to address digital risks and security challenges; make use of well-known digital security and hygiene practices; and advance a policy agenda to preserve the open Internet. Regional and local convenings will improve the reach and impact of activities by uniting a broader range of local stakeholders and providing them with technical expertise and trainings from GIF INGO partners as well as RPs. GIF strategies within each region will weave digital safety and Internet governance priorities into a coherent approach that is contextualized to the local policy and safety environments.
In our first three years, we had significant achievements: we trained 3,533 individuals in digital security and 1,123 in digital rights, conducted 140 SAFETAG audits, organized 107 events to exchange knowledge on Internet freedom issues, and supported 94 CSOs in advocacy with governance bodies.
