Published on: April 24, 2025 Updated 2 times since publishing
In an age where technology shapes activism, connection, and oppression alike, Mohammed Al-Maskati stands at the frontlines of digital rights defense. As a Digital Security Helpline Director at Access Now, he’s part of a global movement working to safeguard the internet as a tool for liberation—not control. In this interview for SafetyDetectives, Mohammed shares how Access Now evolved from an emergency response team during the 2009 Iranian elections to a worldwide force defending online freedom, supporting activists, and confronting surveillance, shutdowns, and censorship.
Can you provide an overview of Access Now’s mission and how the organization has evolved since its founding in 2009?
Access Now was founded at a critical moment, during the 2009 Iranian elections. It was a time of hope, and where the power of technology-enabled millions of people to come together online to advocate, organize, and protest for change at a time when the government was undermining human rights including blocking internet access. Access Now began as an emergency response team of technologists working to help people get back online, and help ensure their safe communications. This event acted as our blueprint for how we would continue our mission to defend and advance the digital rights of people and communities at risk, as well as an insight into how technology would become intertwined with the fight for social justice and human rights globally. Today, our role and remit is much bigger but at our core, we are still activists who are seeking to ensure technology is used for good.
Our mission is more critical than ever with the rapid evolution of technology. We see governments continue to routinely invest in the tools to surveil and control civil society, activists, and human rights defenders, and powerful companies are only too happy to develop the technologies they require to achieve this. We’ve also seen social media platforms, once heralded as potentially liberatory, change their policies and practices overnight, often leaving many at risk of human rights abuses. And worryingly, civil society and those on the frontline continue to have comparably fewer resources than the public and private sectors to defend themselves against digital attacks.
This is why we have to make sure that tech is as accessible as possible and not just the remit of a few select experts — a skillset and language that social movements can confidently use and leverage in favor of justice and equality. At the Digital Security Helpline, in particular, we work to provide guidance and advice to address emerging digital security incidents, but also to build long-term capacity so that citizens, journalists, and human rights defenders worldwide are better prepared and more resilient.
What are some of the key digital rights issues Access Now focuses on, and how do you address challenges like internet shutdowns and government surveillance?
Surveillance is definitely a top concern as this largely undermines human rights around the world. The use of spyware, for example, is a grave violation of people’s privacy, and the fact that it has become a common tool to surveil and control activists and journalists creates a chilling effect. The Digital Security Helpline has investigated several spyware attacks that target human rights defenders, in places like Eastern Europe and the Middle East. Our team works with the victims to regain control of their information, but also to expose this violation of their rights to seek accountability.
We have also documented an increasing number of digital rights violations against people in situations of conflict and fragility around the world —including the deployment of AI as a tool of war. As the affected communities also largely depend on internet access for safety and survival, so we work to support them directly in navigating the digital “iron curtain” often imposed by their own governments. We also document this weaponization of connectivity through campaigns like #KeepItOn.
How does Access Now’s Digital Security Helpline support activists, journalists, and human rights defenders globally?
The short answer is: we don’t do it alone.
We prioritize collaboration with local partners because this helps us better understand how technology actually affects people’s ability to enjoy their human rights, or how precisely it exacerbates existing power imbalances and inequalities — disproportionately affecting marginalized groups. Our policy work in this space varies by region, but we focus on convening and supporting local coalitions, documenting the impact of new technologies, and elevating the data and analysis from the affected communities to key decision and policy-making spaces.
This type of collaborative work also helps us adapt our ability to share our guidance and expertise directly to communities, by informing how we adapt the tools to make sure we can reach those most in need. Incident handlers in the Digital Security Helpline come from a variety of backgrounds and countries and they also have substantive experience as part of social movements, so while they can provide technical assistance on issues of digital security, they also have the knowledge and sensibility to what activists need as they seek for assistance.
The Helpline’s team also partners with other organizations in our networks —including the Computer Incident Response Center for Civil Society (CiviCERT) —, by sharing information and knowledge to mutually improve our capacity to support civil society. We bet on supporting and empowering local help desks because they are also best placed to support communities with context-relevant support — in their own language.
Could you elaborate on the significance of the RightsCon summit and its impact on global digital rights discussions?
RightsCon has always been an important space to convene leaders from civil society, private sector, governments, academics, and more to join forces and strategize to build a more free and open digital world. With participants from over 150 countries, RightsCon also allows Access Now and its partners to come together and strengthen collaboration.
This last gathering in Taiwan, in February 2025, was especially important to reconnect, as the digital rights community faces a number of mounting threats — not least the impact of the Trump administration’s drastic decision to halt funding for foreign aid and digital rights initiatives, which will leave civil society increasingly under-resourced and exposed to digital attacks. The ability to literally come together and listen to each other’s concerns and ideas is essential for a response based on solidarity, and to spark the much necessary creativity to overcome these trying times.
At RightsCon as in other activist conferences and gatherings throughout the year, the Helpline and partners also organize Digital Safety Clinics. These Clinics give participants a chance to connect with us and get support onsite, bringing us closer to them and creating a safe environment for questions, even if support can then move on to remote for longer follow-up.
With a presence in multiple countries, how does Access Now collaborate with local communities to promote digital rights and open internet policies?
Access Now prides itself on being a grassroots-to-global organization, so in addition to the Helpline and RightsCon, our grants program provides flexible funding to grassroots and frontline organizations fighting for digital rights.
We also have several innovative campaigns including #KeepItOn, which fights to end internet shutdowns and partners with more than 334 national, international, regional, and local organizations in what has become the world’s leading coalition pushing for an end to internet shutdowns globally.