We’ve seen the power of social networking in Egypt and Iran while China is constantly ensuring that they’re keeping the World out of their World Wide Web.
What happens when a protester or activist’s phone is taken by the authorities?
Are those in the protester’s address book put at risk?
This is exactly what the U.S. State Department asked and now they have an answer.
In the near future, a “panic button” will be made available. It’s a special app that erases the phone’s address book and sends an emergency alert to other activists.
The United States had budgeted some $50 million since 2008 to promote new technologies for social activists, focusing both on “circumvention” technology to help them work around government-imposed firewalls and on new strategies to protect their own communications and data from government intrusion.
Is the U.S. State Department pulling strings around the world via social networking?
The United States has funded training for some 5,000 activists around the world on the new technologies — and some sessions have turned up unnerving surprises.
Has social media become as valuable as nuclear warheads in the 1980s?
Ideas are powerful.
[via Huffington Post]
[…] The U.S. State Department is working on a Panic Button app for protesters? That’s just weird. Cool, but […]