Sam Gregory needs your mobile phone and your eyes. The majority of people in the world now carry and use devices with cameras in their pockets and these can be used to help others – as long as they are taught to use them properly.
The director of WITNESS supports and trains activists and citizens around the world to help document human rights abuses and excessive use of police power.
"People do film what they see but often it doesn't make the slightest bit of difference," he tells the WIRED2016 conference in London. While thousands of hours of video are captured people often don't know what to do with it. Knowing what to film and how to release it are issues Gregory often comes across.
Another of the many problems those documenting abuses face is identification. If a person caught up in a situation could be identified, they could be persecuted, Gregory says. Thus WITNESS develops its own tools to solve problems and urges technology companies to build user-friendly tools into their own platforms. For example: YouTube's face blurring tool.
Not everyone can be on the ground to document protests and rights abuses. Gregory says: "We can all be witnesses with the combination of skills, tools, collaboration and smart thinking".
The solution? Distant witnesses. People who are watching live streams online from afar can help as much as those on the ground. One project WITNESS has developed this summer is Mobil-Eyes Us. The work tries to build on online activism in a way that connects people to the issues they care about.
Gregory says that by creating distributed networks, using live and immersive technologies, and tapping into a wider network of people that can watch something when it is happening and needed, everyone can help document rights abuses.
Elsewhere, Witness helps to source and verify eyewitness videos that have been recorded.
"We identify critical situations and teach those affected by them the basics of video production, safe and ethical filming techniques, and advocacy strategies," WITNESS says on its website.
In November 2005 Gregory launched The Human Rights channel on YouTube. Content on the channel has helped to show police abuse in the US and helps to provide advice for activists, journalists and documenters on filming at protests and more.
He also edited the Video for Change: A Guide For Advocacy and Activism book that was published in 2005 and acted as a manual for human rights and video campaigning. Despite all the work Gregory has done, it is some of the little things that have meant the most.
"What sustains people in long-term movements, is the small victories,” he told Popular Science in July 2016. "You have to think about the power of moments of joy".
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
