Stanford University

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Kathleen Reen discusses Internet security and safe computing

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Kathleen Reen, vice president for Asia and New Media programs at Internews, delivered the Feb. 9 Liberation Technology Seminar on the topic of "Strategies and Support for a Global Open Internet." Internews is an international non-profit organization, which pushes the boundaries of independent journalism, empowering media and providing uncensored news and information worldwide. The organization works with independent media outlets to make tools from the bleeding edge of human rights activism more widely available.

In her talk, Reen stressed that the problem of digital safety has become mainstream. Issues of Internet security, including malware and phishing expeditions, have infiltrated civil society. In response, Internews has created tech leaderships to teach the basics of safe computing, and to encourage awareness and participation. Internews has teamed up with ad agencies to make security tools available in countries experiencing heavy Internet censorship. Reen's talk highlighted the importance of investing in development platforms and data integrity to keep these tools effective and safe.

Reen then turned to the American experience of the Internet. The question of how much the U.S. government will continue to control the Internet is hotly debated. Alternative theories for Internet governance have been submitted to the U.N., some advocating for separate, nationally led Internets. Reen called attention to the extreme vulnerability of the American experience of the Internet, including the ability to earn livelihood online and to access uncensored data. Reen encouraged the audience to engage in these critical discussions to think twice about aspects of the American Internet experience that are unique and in peril.

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Tanja Aitamurto

Encina Hall
616 Serra Street
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

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Tanja Aitamurto was a visiting researcher at the Program on Liberation Technology at the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law at Stanford University. In her PhD project she examined how collective intelligence, whether harvested by crowdsourcing, co-creation or open innovation, impacts incumbent processes in journalism, public policy making and design process. Her work has been published in several academic publications, such as the New Media and Society. Related to her studies, she advises the Government and the Parliament of Finland about Open Government principles, for example about how open data and crowdsourcing can serve democratic processes. Aitamurto now works as a postdoctoral fellow at the Brown Institute for Media Innovation at Stanford.

Aitamurto has previously studied at the Center for Design Research and at the Innovation Journalism Program at Stanford University. She is a PhD Student at the Center for Journalism, Media and Communication Research at Tampere University in Finland, and she holds a Master’s Degree in Public Policy, and a Master of Arts in Humanities. Prior to returning to academia, she made a career in journalism in Finland specializing in foreign affairs, reporting in countries such as Afghanistan, Angola and Uganda. She has also taught journalism at the University of Zambia, in Lusaka, and worked at the Namibia Press Agency, Windhoek.

She also actively participates in the developments she is studying; she crowdfunded a reporting and research trip to Egypt in 2011 to investigate crowdsourcing in public deliberation. She also practices social entrepreneurship in the Virtual SafeBox (http://designinglibtech.tumblr.com/), a project, which sprang from Designing Liberation Technologies class at Stanford. Tanja blogs on the Huffington Post and writes about her research at PBS MediaShift. More about Tanja’s work at www.tanjaaitamurto.com and on Twitter @tanjaaita.

 

 

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