Recording of Live seminar on “ICT and Protection: Can Information and Communication Technology Enhance Humanitarian Action?”

ICT4Peace in the Media, Activities, Policy Research ICT, Advisory ICT, Capacity Building ICT, Publications, Reports, Foundation, UN Crisis Information Management Strategy (CIMS), Strategic Input into UN peacekeeping, peacebuilding and humanitarian operations, New media for crisis management and peacebuilding

15. May 2010

Click here to access an MP3 recording of Sanjana Hattotuwa’s submission to the web seminar ICT and Protection: Can Information and Communication Technology Enhance Humanitarian Action?, organised by the Humanitarian Law and Policy Forum at Harvard University and held on 12 May 2010. Sanjana is a Special Advisor to the ICT4Peace Foundation.

This Live Seminar examined questions and challenges pertaining to the development, use and effects of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) in humanitarian activities. Increasingly used by humanitarian professionals in situations of emergency, armed conflicts and disasters, ICT has emerged as a component of effective and sustainable delivery of humanitarian relief. Yet ICT remains relatively under-theorized and utilized differently across contexts. Against the background of the increased use of ICT in humanitarian activities, this Live Seminar will address the following questions:

How have technological innovations including crisis mapping, early warning, and crisis informatics shaped the roles and responsibilities of humanitarian professionals?
In what ways has ICT affected the selection, collection, and dissemination of conflict-related information?
What metrics are available to discern the scope and significance of ICT’s effects on coordinating humanitarian aid delivery?
How has ICT transformed institutions providing humanitarian relief?