Zim partnership secured to roll out digital security tools
Code for Africa partners with Zimbabwe’s Centre for Innovation & Technology to encourage adoption of digital security tools
By Sean Ndlovu, CITE
The mass protests that rocked Zimbabwe on January 14 led to the government shutting down internet services in an attempt to quell the violence and destruction of property.
The shutdown not only affected communication and business, but also media organisations.
Media and civil society organisations had to resort to limited sms communications to disseminate information during the blackout, but could not share it quickly.
This shutdown has highlighted the dangers media practitioners face when exposed to such environments and how to remain operational when there is an internet blackout.
This has prompted the need to train media personnel and members of civil society organisations on how to use VPNs (virtual private networks) and how to be safe online.
CITE in Zimbabwe and Code for Africa have partnered to make Outline from Jigsaw available to news organisations and CSOs. It means VPN can be rolled out on their own servers to connect to the internet and keep communication private and safe.
Organisations can set up their own server in a few minutes without the need for a tech savvy person around.
As part of this partnership, CITE will also host in-house training for newsrooms and CSOs on best practices to stay safe online. This training initiative will empower 600 journalists and CSOs in Zimbabwe — specifically in Harare and Bulawayo. During these sessions, participants will be taught how to use a number of tools to protect their identity, assets and technology.
Code for Africa’s Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) will be used in the trainings, which offers journalists and CSOs free access and participation in the digital security module as this allow for the courses to be available to a large pool of participants.
The trainings are being tailored for each newsrooms/civic society organisation after conducting a basic risk assessment or threat modelling for each organisation.
Do you need help with digital security? ANCIR offers a helpline, technical resources, and sharing best practices with newsrooms and human rights activists for free. If you’d like to get access to these and more, sign up here to be considered for our digital security support.
The African Network of Centers for Investigative Reporting (ANCIR) is an association of the continent’s best investigative newsrooms, ranging from large traditional media to small specialist units.
ANCIR works to strengthen African investigative journalism by improving the techniques, expertise, the tools used in muckraking newsrooms. This includes providing member newsrooms with the world’s best encryption and semantic analysis technologies, to forensic research support (through the Investigative Dashboard), legal services, and seed grants for cross-border collaboration.
ANCIR is incubated by and receives technical support from Code for Africa.
The Centre for Innovation & Technology in Zimbabwe believes in African Innovation and that discovering the innovation opportunities is the first step in our process. We provide an open community space, an incubator that is vibrant and enables a collaborative environment for innovators and startups to think through their ideas, and develop their solutions, so as to turn these opportunities into meaningful products, services, and businesses.
