Call for Applications: ARTICLE 19 Internet of Rights Fellowship (Global South)

About the IoR Fellowship

• The general goals of the IoR Fellowship are:
  • To protect and promote freedom of expression, freedom of association, privacy, and other human rights in key Internet technical standards and policy bodies.
  • To bridge the knowledge gap in these bodies regarding human rights and their relevance to Internet infrastructure.
  • To support sustained and effective participation of civil society advocates in Internet technical standards and policy bodies.
  • To support and champion the consideration of underrepresented people and communities in decision-making processes within these bodies.
• The Fellowship runs for 12 months, beginning on April 1, 2024. During this year, each fellow will work closely with their mentor—a designated member of A19’s Team Digital. All fellows follow one of three tracks: Censorship, Connectivity, or Datafication.
• Upon selection, fellows work with their A19 mentor to develop a workplan and schedule. The Fellowship is designed to be flexible and dynamic to account for each fellow’s skills, interests, and experience. In line with the workplan, mentors will provide assistance such as advocacy coordination, support during meetings, ad hoc training, and in-depth research collaboration. Mentors will also facilitate fellows’ inclusion in global and regional networks of experts and activists working on digital rights and Internet governance issues, including current and former fellows.
• A cornerstone of this programme is to support fellows’ participation in Internet governance bodies: therefore, all fellows are expected to participate in three Internet technical standards or policy meetings over the course of the year. This participation will be pursuant to the workplan, and meetings will be selected with support from mentors. This aspect of the programme is intended to further develop fellows’ capacities and knowledge in certain fields of Internet infrastructure and human rights. The Fellowship will cover any costs associated with attending these meetings and/or conferences.
• Fellows are expected to commit to an average of eight hours per week engaging in forum-specific discussions, participating in working groups, completing projects and producing monthly progress reports. In return, fellows will receive a monthly honorarium of USD 500 for the duration of their fellowship. In addition, fellows may request an additional fixed “technology allowance” to cover IT costs to improve fellows’ remote meeting participation, on an as-needed basis.

2024-2025 Fellowship Tracks

2024-2025 Fellowship Tracks This year, A19 is soliciting applications for the following tracks:

• Censorship: This track focuses on participation in the development of technical standards and policies that improve resilience to censorship and communications security. IoR fellow(s) may engage in technical discussions related to routing protocols that determine how data moves from source to destination within and across IP-enabled networks, contribute to networking protocols to address vulnerabilities exploited by censors, or work with internet infrastructure providers such as internet registries to address content moderation issues at the DNS level. Fellows may participate in the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), or the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP).
• Connectivity: This track focuses on ensuring all people have choices in how they connect to the internet, particularly local communities dependent on last-mile networking technologies and infrastructure. IoR fellow(s) may advocate for spectrum management standards and policy frameworks that support small, non-profit, and alternative service providers or improve wireless networking standards to better enable community network provision. Fellows may participate in the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 802 working groups or the International Telecommunication Union Radiocommunication Sector (ITU-R).
• Datafication: This track focuses on advocating for human rights in discussions of data-driven infrastructure technologies such as facial recognition, emotion recognition, and other biometric-based systems and the internet of things (IoT). IoR fellow(s) may engage in groups working on the standardisation of specific biometric or “AI” technologies or participate in the development of conformity assessments for the deployment of smart cities infrastructures. Fellows may participate in technical standards developing organisations such as the Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the International Organization for Standardization and International Electrotechnical Commission (ISO/IEC), or the European Committee for Standardization and European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardization (CEN/CENELEC).

Expectations

They are looking for the following qualities:

• Technical competence. While this may include knowledge of and experience in computer networking and protocols, systems design, and architecture, it is recommended but not necessary. They are looking for candidates who are capable of digesting complex or difficult concepts in technical policies or standards and explaining them to a wider audience. Fellows will be expected to build competencies in particular standards processes and consider how to engage with implementers through meetings, interviews, and developing guides to connect the work fellows conduct at the standards level with the needs and challenges of people and communities specifically from the Global South.
• Some prior experience of participating in Internet governance bodies, and/or in-depth knowledge of the Internet governance processes and, where possible, the specific standards or protocols that are relevant to the applicant’s workplan proposal. Examples of broad, intersectional experience include: taking part in public policy consultations on local and/or regional levels regarding universal connectivity and Internet access; engaging in academic research on internet infrastructure and governance as part of undergraduate or graduate studies; engaging in research related projects with country-code top level domains (ccTLDs) or partaking in the ICANN fellowship or NextGen@ICANN Program. They welcome applicants who are familiar with global internet technical standards and policy processes, but do not yet have opportunities to sustain long-term engagement in them. They also recognise that experience can come in many forms and especially encourage early career professionals to apply, even if they haven’t been engaged in this field for very long.
• Strong research, writing, and speaking skills in English. The program will be conducted entirely in English and will require fellows to attend highly technical, fast-paced meetings where English is the working language.
• Demonstrate a clear commitment to protecting and promoting human rights and Internet freedom. Prior experience working with Global South civil society organisations to advance digital rights and internet freedom will be prioritised.
• By the end of the programme, they expect that fellows will be well-equipped to continue their engagement in Internet technical standards and policy bodies following the conclusion of their fellowship. Through their projects, fellows will gain a deeper understanding of Internet governance and Internet infrastructure, they will become part of a wider network of civil society advocates already engaging within these spaces, they will learn how to effectively explain infrastructure technologies and standardisation processes and their relevance to human rights to a wider audience, and how to engage with implementers of these technologies in the real to push for the adoption of rights-respecting technical standards.
• Past projects from the fellowship include:
  • Taking an active role in the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Global Initiative and contributing to the development of the IEEE’s Ethically Aligned Design.
  • Working on censorship resistance and privacy enhancements through networking protocols at the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF).
  • Participating in expert groups on DNS abuse to address content moderation at the DNS level at the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).
  • Scoping case studies of deployed community networks and working with Member States to support the role of community network operators at the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).
• Women, and other individuals that identify as part of underrepresented groups in Internet governance are especially encouraged to apply.

For more information, visit ARTICLE 19.