A number of organisations (RiseUp, the Autonomic Cooperative) provide for the internet infrastructure needs of activist groups. These organisations espouse using FOSS software on non-corporate clouds. This is out of concern for activists.
This concern is well founded. In 2021, for example, Google helped imprison an Indian Climate Activist using Google Docs for their organising needs. Said differently, proprietary software on (or off) corporate clouds are risky to trust.
Though the international conspiracy case appears to be falling apart, Ravi’s arrest has spotlighted a different kind of collusion, this one between the increasingly oppressive and anti-democratic Hindutva nationalist government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Silicon Valley companies whose tools and platforms have become the primary means for government forces to incite hatred against vulnerable minorities and critics – and for police to ensnare peaceful activists like Ravi in a high-tech digital web.
It opens a question: have any studies been undertaken that gauge the security of these activist internet infrastructures in a panoramic way, examining the common security limitations of different groups? If dark forces went after activist stacks, what could they reasonably inflict?