My interest in technology's intersection withhumn rights stems from a general interest and passion for human rights that I cultivated in the early 2010s, when pro-democracy protests swept the West Asia and North Africa (WANA) region. At the time, I was a volunteer contributor for Global Voices, writing mostly about press and media freedoms, freedom of expression and internet surveillance and censorship.
Since then as access to the internet grew (more than 5.4 billion world-wide users as of 2024) and the use of digital tehcnologies became ubiquitous in many parts of the world (although exclusion and inequalities still persist). In the meantime, human rights risks and challenges in the development and use of technologies by the private sector and governments have continued to emerge and shift as a result of fast paced technological developments.
For more than decade, I have ben researching, writing, and exploring the myriad of ways these developments have been interfering with fundamental human rights including sophsticated and invasive surveillance tech, automation systems that discriminate ad exacerbate existing bises and inequalities, the persistent deployment of internet shudowns despite their illegality and disproportionate impacts, and platforms' harmful policies and systems.
I hold an MA in Media Studies from the University of Amsterdam and a BA in English Studies from the Higher Institute of Human Sciences of Tunis. I wrote my MA thesis on the implications for freedom of expression and information of commercial social media platforms’ content removal policies in compliance with local laws. In the thesis’ case study, I focused on the content removal policies and practices of Facebook and Twitter in Turkey, and their disproportionate impacts on human rights defenders, journalists and independent media. From September 2016 to December 2020, I worked as an editor for Advox, a project by Stichting Global Voices specializing in covering the intersection of technology and human rights in the Global South. Between 2018 and 2020, I also worked as a Research Analyst at Ranking Digital Rights, which works to promote freedom of expression and privacy on the internet by creating global standards and incentives for companies to respect and protect users’ rights to freedom of expression and privacy.
In 2020, I founded Fair Tech to advance the protection of human rights in the developmn and deployment of digital technologies through research, knowledge sharing, and advice to key stakeholders from nonprofits, funders, and companies. Fair Tech's previous clients included AccessNow, Ford Founation, HURIDOCS, International Center for Non-Profit Law (ICNL), Netgain Partnership, SMEX, and Stichting Female Journalists Network.
Our raison d’etre is human rights and we are motivated on a daily basis to protect them. We also do what we preach and treat those we work and collaborate with with respect and fairness.
Our work centers the stories, voices, and experiences of those whose lives and human rights are impacted by digital technologies. We pay particular attention to communities and individuals that have historically been marginalized by actively listening to and collaborating with them.
Through awareness raising and knowledge sharing we seek to inspire others, including students, youth, women, non-techies, and Global Majority people to join the digital rights movement and take action.
We strive to not only uncover and raise awareness of the real-life human rights harms of that governments and companies exacerbate and inflict upon individuals and communities through digital technologies but we also explore the underlying factors that enable those harmful technologies in the first place and (re)think of strategies to challenge them. This includes existing bias in design and algorithmic systems, extractive business models that put profit before human rights, regulations that go against international human rights standards but fails to reign in powerful players in the tech industry, and an increasingly turbulent world shared by geopolitical alliances and interests.
How do we do this?
Through evidence-based research, storytelling, expert advice to nonprofits, funders and companies, and community organizing.