The Citizen Lab is proud to participate in the Google Policy Fellowship for the fourth time next summer. In June 2012, a Google Policy fellowship based at the Citizen Lab will be be offered to a student who is passionate about technology and Internet policy. Students from all majors and degree programs are encouraged to apply. Applications are due by February 3, 2012 by midnight Pacific time
The Citizen Lab Google Policy Fellow can engage in projects related to two areas:
Transparency and corporate social responsibility: Governments around the world are increasingly shifting the responsibility to secure, monitor, and regulate cyberspace onto the private sector companies that largely own it. This includes not just governments abroad, but also here in North America. ISPs, telecommunication companies, hosting services, social networking platforms, content portals, and search engines are becoming not only the gatekeepers, but also the police of online public spaces through government requests and intermediary liability. Companies are sometimes forced to choose between shutting down services in a country, or cooperating with a repressive regime. Such choices are increasingly common.
The Citizen Lab is investigating these issues through the OpenNet Transparency Project, which aims to encourage the private sector to share data about government requests they receive, and engage in open dialogue on corporate transparency, and responsibility.
Internet censorship and surveillance: The Citizen Lab engages in a wide number of projects that investigate the technical, political and legal dimensions of Internet censorship, surveillance and other information controls around the world.
Work performed by the Google fellow in this area could include policy and legal analysis and / or technical analysis. Technical analysis involves research and development of software tools, including testing, data analysis, and visualization, related to documenting Internet censorship, and surveillance. Legal and Policy analysis involves evaluation of laws, policies, and norms of Internet censorship, surveillance, in conjunction with data collected by the Citizen Lab and its associated projects
For more information on the fellowship and application procedures visit the Google Policy Fellowship site.