The Transparency Reporting Toolkit: Best Practices for Reporting on U.S. Government Requests for User Information

The Transparency Reporting Toolkit is a project by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University and New America’s Open Technology Institute (OTI). Using research on the current state of transparency reporting, the project aims to identify best practices, create a template transparency report, and establish reporting guidelines. These resources will be shared publicly to foster standardization in reporting and provide companies new to reporting with an easy-to-use set of tools essential to crafting their transparency reports. Starting over two years ago, we began conducting interviews with companies about their processes for creating transparency reports in order to identify lessons that could be helpful to companies that had not yet created reports. Building off of that work, in November 2013, the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, in conjunction with the Center for Democracy & Technology, the Open Technology Institute, the Global Network Initiative, and others, convened a dialogue at the University of California, Berkeley with academics, civil society, and representatives from a variety of Internet companies. That meeting was followed by an East Coast convening, hosted by OTI in July 2014, with strong civil society and academic representation. Those dialogues informed these materials

Click to Change: Optimism Despite Online Activism\u27s Unmet Expectations

On May 20, 2012, in response to tweets about blasphemous drawings, Pakistan blocked Twitter for eight hours before the Prime Minister intervened to restore access. During that period, hundreds of Pakistanis visited Herdict, a Harvard University project for tracking Internet censorship and web blockages, and filed numerous inaccessible reports, allowing us to see blockages in real time. Similarly, when China blocked The New York Times in late October 2012, in response to a story about the wealth of Prime Minister Wen Jiabao, Herdict received several inaccessible reports from China for the news site. These events epitomize the importance of projects that track the openness of the Internet. But just as importantly, these events are data points in an experiment. Herdict is premised on the belief that by asking people to complete a small, simple task\u27reporting if they can access a site\u27we can transform individuals into foot soldiers for Internet freedom, even if they do not see themselves as activists. Moreover, by making the task so small, these people can participate without assuming too much personal risk

Click to Change: Optimism Despite Online Activism\u27s Unmet Expectations

On May 20, 2012, in response to tweets about blasphemous drawings, Pakistan blocked Twitter for eight hours before the Prime Minister intervened to restore access. During that period, hundreds of Pakistanis visited Herdict, a Harvard University project for tracking Internet censorship and web blockages, and filed numerous inaccessible reports, allowing us to see blockages in real time. Similarly, when China blocked The New York Times in late October 2012, in response to a story about the wealth of Prime Minister Wen Jiabao, Herdict received several inaccessible reports from China for the news site. These events epitomize the importance of projects that track the openness of the Internet. But just as importantly, these events are data points in an experiment. Herdict is premised on the belief that by asking people to complete a small, simple task\u27reporting if they can access a site\u27we can transform individuals into foot soldiers for Internet freedom, even if they do not see themselves as activists. Moreover, by making the task so small, these people can participate without assuming too much personal risk

The Transparency Reporting Toolkit: Reporting Guide and Template for Reporting U.S. Government Requests for User Information

The Transparency Reporting Toolkit is a joint project by New America’s Open Technology Institute and Harvard University’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society. The purpose of the Toolkit is to make it easier for companies to create better transparency reports about government requests for user data. Similarly, by providing a template and best practices, the Toolkit aims to make it easier for new companies to begin transparency reporting. By following the recommendations in this guide, which are grounded in existing best practices, transparency reports can become more consistent, easier to understand, and more effective

Designing Successful Governance Groups: Lessons for Leaders from Real-World Examples

In January 2015, the Global Network of Internet & Society Research Centers (NoC) published the results of a globally coordinated, independent academic research project exploring multistakeholder governance models. Facilitated by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, the work evaluated a wide range of governance groups with the goal of contributing meaningfully to the current debate around the future of the Internet governance ecosystem. The report, entitled Multistakeholder as Governance Groups: Observations From Case Studies, included twelve case studies of real-world governance structures from around the world and from both inside and outside the sphere of Internet governance. The report also included a synthesis paper, which drew from the case studies lessons that challenged conventional thinking with respect to the formation, operation, and critical success factors of governance groups. Through its work, the Network of Centers hopes to demonstrate new strategies and approaches for academia regarding its roles in research, facilitation and convening, and education in and communication about the Internet age. This ambition includes creating outputs that are useful, actionable, and timely for policymakers and stakeholders. In that spirit, this document is intended to help translate our original report into a form useful for those creating, convening, or leading governance groups. It is our goal that this document can provide an operational starting place for those who wish to learn more about some of the components critical to the success of a governance group. The original report goes into far greater depth on both the details of the case studies and the lessons learned from them, whereas this document highlights only a few of the points most relevant for operationalizing the findings of the full report

Multistakeholder as Governance Groups: Observations from Case Studies

This paper synthesizes a set of twelve case studies of real-world governance structures. Together with the underlying case studies, it is the result of a globally coordinated, independent academic research pilot project by the Global Network of Interdisciplinary Internet & Society Research Centers (NoC). Facilitated by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, this study examines existing multistakeholder governance groups with the goal of informing the evolution of — and current debate around — the future evolution of the Internet governance ecosystem in light of the NETmundial Principles and Roadmap, discussions at the Internet Governance Forum, and the NETmundial Initiative, as well as other forums, panels, and committees. Internet governance is an increasingly complex concept that operates at multiple levels and in different dimensions, making it necessary to have a better understanding of both how multistakeholder governance groups operate and how they best achieve their goals. With this need in mind, at a point where the future of Internet governance is being re-envisioned, this project aims to deepen our understanding of the formation, operation, and critical success factors of governance groups (and even challenge conventional thinking) by studying a geographically diverse set of local, national, and international governance models, components, and mechanisms from within and outside of the sphere of Internet governance, with a focus on lessons learned. The research effort is grounded in a diversity of global perspectives and collaborative research techniques. Adhering to objective and independent academic standards, it aspires to be useful, actionable, and timely for policymakers and stakeholders. More broadly, the Network of Centers seeks to contribute to a more generalized vision and longer-term strategy for academia regarding its roles in research, facilitation and convening, and education in and communication about the Internet age