Megan Price Elected Board Member of Tor Project
Today The Tor Project announced that it has elected a new Board of Directors, and among them is HRDAG executive director Megan Price. The Tor Project is a nonprofit advocacy group that promotes online privacy and provides software that helps users opt out of online tracking.
Megan and Patrick have long maintained that encryption and privacy are essential for enabling human rights work. Patrick’s ideas are described in Monday’s FedScoop story about encryption, human rights, and the U.S. State Department.
“Human rights groups depend on strong cryptography in order to hold governments accountable,” says Patrick. “HRDAG depends on local human rights groups in Syria, Guatemala, and in the U.S. for the data we use to make statistical arguments about the perpetrators of mass violence. Tor is a crucial piece of activists’ security toolkit, and I am enthusiastic that Megan will play a leadership role in strengthening the Tor community.”
Megan is in excellent company, as fellow board members include Matt Blaze, a cryptographer and associate professor at the University of Pennsylvania; Cindy Cohn, executive director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation; Gabriella Coleman, an anthropologist at McGill University who writes about online activism; Linus Nordberg, an internet privacy activist; and Bruce Schneier, a security expert.
“Tor provides critical tools for the human rights community,” says Megan. “Patrick and I are very happy to be bringing the two organizations closer together and I’m honored to be working with this amazing group of people.”
For more on The Tor Project, the controversy leading to the sweep of the board, and the organization’s new leadership, see the story in The New York Times.