Washington, D.C. — The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) is pleased to announce Rwanda’s Carine Kanimba as the first-place winner of the AI Hack for Freedom III, held at NED headquarters on September 24–25.
During the two-day competition, 10 pro-democracy activists from Colombia, Kenya, Nepal, North Macedonia, Rwanda, Tibet, Turkey, Ukraine, Venezuela, and Zimbabwe learned about AI-powered personal assistants and led teams of software developers and designers to create custom solutions to challenges they face as activists. All participants collaborated with technology firm Finite on next-generation AI tools and learned to safely deploy them around the world.
This year’s winners are:
- First Prize ($20,000 in cryptocurrency): Rwanda’s Carine Kanimba, the Secretary General of World Liberty Congress, for “Behind the Jersey,” a centralized online platform that helps sports fans identify authoritarian entities funding their teams and advocate for change.
- Second Prize ($10,000 in cryptocurrency): Turkey’s Kadir Yağız Çetin, the founder and CEO of CDR, for an offline learning platform that gives Afghan women and girls barred from school access to educational materials without requiring an internet connection.
- Third Prize ($6,000 in cryptocurrency): Tibetan-Canadian human rights activist Chemi Lhamo, for an application that securely preserves evidence of harassment even if a user’s phone is stolen or damaged, along with a dashboard that can help activists identify potential threats.
The remaining participants took home $2,000 prizes.
“Freedom’s defenders around the world are under immense pressure. But they also have access to tools that were unimaginable a few years ago,” said NED President and CEO Damon Wilson. “Bringing technologists together with frontline human rights defenders is critical to unlocking the next generation of democratic progress.”
NED supports partners around the world in using “freedom tech” including new AI tools to monitor elections, track corruption and human rights abuses, and play a constructive role in strengthening democratic principles. NED partners are also using emerging technologies to operate under increasing surveillance and counter cyber threats that seek to disrupt their work.
The AI Hack for Freedom III was held in partnership with the Human Rights Foundation (HRF), the AI Freedom Lab at Bitcoin Park, and the University of Maryland’s School of Public Policy.
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NED is a private, nonprofit foundation dedicated to advancing freedom and democracy worldwide. Established in 1983 as part of President Reagan’s vision to foster an “infrastructure of democracy” with a bipartisan Congressional mandate, NED supports grassroots leaders striving for the freedom to think, speak, worship, engage politically, and support their families without fear. It mobilizes key pillars of American democracy, from political parties to business and labor, to support their counterparts abroad through the Core institutes that form the NED family: the International Republican Institute, the National Democratic Institute, the Center for International Private Enterprise, and the Solidarity Center.
