Berkeley students attend Amnesty International summit in Mexico City
The Human Rights Investigations Lab was invited to an annual summit held by Amnesty International’s Digital Verification Corps (DVC), which we helped launch in 2016. Our Lab has worked closely with the DVC since its conception, taking on projects verifying human rights abuses in Syria, Yemen, Afghanistan, Sudan, and beyond. DVC student leaders Madeline (Maddi) Wong, Danilo Gleichmann, Sofia Schnurer, and Yaas Farzanefar represented Berkeley's Lab. At this year's summit, students had an opportunity to attend sessions on innovative investigation techniques, ethics in digital open source investigations, and more. HRC's Lab Director Stephanie Croft taught one session on vessel tracking, and another on corporate investigations. The summit lasted from September 19–21, and was hosted at the Iberoamericana Universidad campus. Students in attendance hailed from Iberoamericana Universidad, University of Essex, University of Cambridge, and U.C. Berkeley. Unfortunately, visa complications prevented the DVC cohort from the University of Pretoria to join in person. This was the first summit held since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic. Berkeley students Madeline (Maddi) Wong, Danilo Gleichmann, Sofia Schnurer, and Yaas Farzanefar c-authored a blog about their experience, Tools and Takeaways from the 2022 Amnesty International Digital Verification Corps Summit, published at #Verified Magazine from the Human Rights Center. Berkeley DVC student Yaas Farzanefar co-authored a blog posted by Amnesty International's Citizen Evidence Lab, Organising Open Source Volunteers: Student Lessons from Coordinating the Digital Verification Corps.
