- Video sebagai Bukti: Pedang Bermata Dua dan Kekuatan Suara Komunitas di Papua Read the English version here. Blog ini ditulis oleh Yerry Niko Borang, dengan kontribusi dari tim WITNESS Asia-Pasifik. Pada 17 Oktober 2024, sekelompok pembuat film, dan aktivis pembela hak asasi manusia, mayoritas dari Papua, yang beragam berkumpul secara daring untuk mengikuti webinar yang diselenggarakan oleh WITNESS berjudul “Pengarsipan Video Hak Asasi Manusia: Paradoks Bukti dan […]
- Video as Evidence in West Papua: A Double-Edged Sword and Why Community Voices Matter On October 17, 2024, WITNESS hosted a webinar, "Human Rights Video Archiving: Paradox and Impunity in West Papua" exploring the challenges of using video evidence in the fight for human rights justice in Papua. The discussion covered how video documentation, despite its powerful potential, often faces manipulation, impunity, and digital security risks. Featuring activists like Bernard Koten and Raka Sudisman, the webinar highlighted the importance of community-led documentation, secure archiving, and ongoing solidarity for justice
- From Oral Traditions to Digital Archives Archiving in Africa has become crucial in both preserving the past and empowering the future in many different ways and regions. Video stands as one of the most potent tools for storytelling and documenting human rights violations, as it captures the voices and images of affected communities, vividly telling the story of their pain, struggles, and enduring hopes in the face of injustice.
- Cataloging Tools for Human Rights Video Archiving Written by Ines Aisengart Menezes and Yvonne Ng At WITNESS, one common question we hear from partners and community-based human rights video practitioners that we support on archiving is “What database tool should I use to manage my videos?”. It’s a tricky question, because there isn’t one single correct answer. Usually, our reply is, “It […]
- Findings from our global survey of archiving needs and practices Written by Ines Aisengart Menezes and Yvonne Ng A key part of WITNESS’s work is to help activists archive and preserve their videos so that they can be used to advance human rights, now and in the future. Over the years, we have consistently heard from partners and peers that archiving is a major gap […]
- Fortifying the Truth in the Age of Synthetic Media and Generative AI Written by Raquel Vazquez Llorente, Jacobo Castellanos, and Nkem Agunwa. In March 2023, WITNESS hosted in Nairobi, Kenya, over 20 journalists, fact-checkers, technologists, policy advocates, creators, human rights defenders and community activists from six African countries: Uganda, Kenya, Ghana, South Africa, Nigeria and Zambia. In our two-day workshop, we discussed threats and opportunities that generative AI […]
- Use Video in the Fight for Earth Justice Written by Dalila Mujagic and Meghana Bahar. This post is dedicated to our ancestors, human and other-than-human, who remind us that to constantly re-root ourselves into the soil is to decolonize justice. We honor the wildness of Mother Earth whom the ancients strove to eternally water. In their memory, we continue the fight for Earth […]
- Stop Violence Against Defenders of Indigenous People Those of us who subscribe to and are members of various community media collectives in Abya Yala, gathered in the network CORAL (Colectivxs Reunidos de América Latina), express our concern and outrage over the recent acts of violence that occurred in the sister Republic of Ecuador and the null protection of the State for those who […]
- Supporting Survivors of Gender-Based Violence: Documenting Evidence Join us on International Women’s Day 2022 as we continue to spotlight our newest Video as Evidence guide ‘Using Video to Support Justice and Accountability for Survivors of Sexual and Gender-Based Violence’, along with many other resources that will assist you to safely and ethically document evidence of SGBV crimes for deeper justice and accountability. […]
- فهم “المصدر” في التحقيقات مفتوحة المصدر نشرت لأول مرة في Open Global Rights بالإنجليزية، والإسبانية، والعربية في ٢١ يناير ٢٠٢١ كتبت : Libby McAvoy عندما يظهر مقطع فيديو به درجة صادمة من العنف وينتشر على نطاق واسع على الإنترنت، مثل مقاطع فيديو قوات الأمن في العراق وهي تطلق “عبوات غاز مسيل للدموع تصيب رؤوس” المتظاهرين، فإن المحققين مفتوحي المصدر يمشطون المقطع باستخدام تقنيات مثل بحوث السوشيال ميديا […]
- The Power of Video in 2020: Police Brutality in Africa Author: Loui Mainga In 2020, debate on increased visibility of police abuse gathered momentum in Africa following their heavy-handedness under the guise of enforcing COVID-19-related restrictions and much later, the #EndSARS protest movement in Nigeria. Given the pivotal role social media is playing in exposing and bringing heightened awareness to police abuse, a number of […]
- Centering the “source” in open source investigation Author: Libby McAvoy This article first appeared on Open Global Rights in English, Spanish, and Arabic on January 21, 2021. When a viral video of shocking violence crops up online—such as videos of security forces in Iraq firing “head-splitting tear gas grenades” at protestors—open source investigators comb through the footage with techniques like sophisticated social media research and geolocation to verify […]
- Archivists’ Victory over Overbroad Copyright Claim A joint statement from Human Rights Watch, Mnemonic, and WITNESS, with lead authoring by Deborah Brown, Senior Researcher and Advocate on Digital Rights, and Gabriela Ivens, Head of Open Source Research, at Human Rights Watch. November 25, 2020 A decision by GitHub, a leading software development platform, to reinstate a popular free software tool for downloading videos, […]
- Making Your Metadata Matter, Part 2 We’re pleased to welcome guest bloggers Wendy Betts and Raquel Vazquez Llorente here to share their insights on documentation apps and metadata for legal purposes. Wendy Betts is the Director of eyeWitness to Atrocities, an organization that combines legal and technological expertise to aid investigations and promote accountability for international crimes. Raquel Vazquez Llorente is […]
- Making Your Metadata Matter Metadata plays a crucial role in authenticating and verifying human rights footage for external audiences. When you are assessing which documentation app to use, it is important you fully understand the metadata collected by the app. This blog outlines the questions we recommend you ask.
