- Backing Up Phone Media Without Internet or a Computer This post is part of a series on Documenting During Internet Shutdowns. Also available in Arabic, Spanish and Bahasa Indonesia. With contributions by Arul Prakkash Last reviewed: 31 January 2020 Backup is key to ensuring your data and documentation are not accidentally deleted, corrupted, or lost if your device is confiscated. During an internet shutdown or slowdown, […]
- File Sharing and Communication During an Internet Shutdown This post is part of a series on Documenting During Internet Shutdowns. With contributions by Arul Prakkash. Also available in Arabic, Spanish and Bahasa Indonesia. Last reviewed: 31 January 2020 Embed from Getty Images The ongoing internet shutdown and crackdown in Kashmir, the longest internet shutdown ever imposed in a democracy, has had a catastrophic impact on […]
- How to Back Up WhatsApp By Yvonne Ng and Gabi Ivens Published on: 25 January 2019 The messaging platform WhatsApp has 1.5 billion users worldwide and is increasingly being used as a tool to organize, mobilize, as well as to share important human rights content. This tutorial, put together by WITNESS, helps you decide whether you should use WhatsApp’s built-in […]
- How to export content from WhatsApp By Yvonne Ng and Gabi Ivens Published on: 18 December 2018 The messaging platform WhatsApp has 1.5 billion users worldwide and is increasingly being used as a tool to organize, mobilize, as well as to share important human rights content. This tutorial, put together by WITNESS, walks you through how to download and export your […]
- Occupying Dhaka Inspiring widespread activism on social media, a nation-wide youth-led movement for road safety emerged across Bangladesh and in cyberspace, as students in Dhaka drove the city to a standstill.
- The Hunt for Digital Evidence of the Rohingya Genocide In documenting historical records of destruction or grievous danger to a peoples over time, digital trails are a human rights crusader’s best–sometimes most accurate–source of evidence. And yet at the same time, such data can fall into the wrong hands, putting the lives of the persecuted, and those fighting for their rights, at grave risk. […]
- Video Evidence and the Case for the Rohingya How eyewitness video and digital evidence verification work together to corroborate violence and destruction in Burma.
- Recording Resistance We interviewed British filmmaker Max Stahl about his role in documenting and preserving footage of the Santa Cruz Massacre, and how his visual account helped propel Timor-Leste back into the world spotlight.
- Four Ways to Save Live Video Broadcasts You shouldn't necessarily rely on the platforms and apps you are using to live stream to save your content, whether you're broadcasting from Facebook or Periscope. We share tips for alternative saving methods.
- Digitizing WITNESS Videotapes Through a Community Partnership Digitizing videotape collections can be a lot of work, but it can be made more manageable by selecting and prioritizing, doing what you can in-house, and collaborating and sharing resources within a community.
- Ethical Wednesdays: Archives and Our Ethical Guidelines for Using Eyewitness Videos As archives start to collect, provide access to, and present social media collections, many ethical issues arise that need to be addressed.
- Community-Based Approaches to Archives From the Black Lives Matter Movement Archivist Yvonne Ng discusses new initiatives out of Ferguson, Baltimore and Cleveland to collect and preserve records of police abuse and protest movements.
- The (Unexpected) Emotional Impact of Archiving Should more be done to prepare archivists for the unexpected emotional impact of working with human rights media?
- WITNESS Talks to Patrick Otim of the Refugee Law Project about Video Archiving The Refugee Law Project (RLP) is a human rights organization in Uganda that recently undertook a video archiving project with the help of the Activist’s Guide to Archiving Video. Patrick Otim talks to WITNESS about RLP's experience with archiving, the difficulties RLP faced, and why it is such an important project.
- What is Video Metadata? Our New Video Explains A new video from WITNESS explains the basics -- how video metadata is created, why it’s valuable, and what risks and benefits activists might need to balance.
Archiving Human Rights
Posts from the WITNESS Media Archive whose mission is to collect, document, preserve and provide access to audiovisual human rights media in the support of advocacy, prosecution of justice, truthtelling and the historical record.
These posts are devoted to news of our activities and work, and to discussion of topics relevant to it, including human rights archives and documentation, audiovisual archiving, social issue documentary, the social justice responsibilities of archives and archivists, etc.
Posts are written by Grace Lile, Director of Operations; Yvonne Ng, Archivist; and occasional other contributors.