source: NETPOL

first published: 14 June 2024

Image Credit: Pong at www.FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Today sees the launch of Netpol Solidarity, a series of new resources for movements, organisations and individual campaigners concerned about the increasing impact of surveillance on their rights to protest and organise.

Each resource is accessible, focuses on key information rather than thousands of words of guidance and is designed primarily for campaigners to access on their phones.

It covers many of the common questions Netpol is asked for advice and guidance on. We intend to keep working with protest movements to provide information on new and emerging challenges.

This project emerged from workshops at Netpol’s Movement Gathering in November 2023, which involved organisers from different campaigns and legal support groups covering Scotland, Wales and England.

What Netpol Solidarity covers

The resource is divided into three areas:

• surveillance at protests (for individuals seeking to resist police surveillance when taking part in a demonstration).
• developing a security culture (aimed at helping groups understand and resist police surveillance and also deal with media intrusion).
• understanding police tactics (on the ideas and tactics underpinning police surveillance on campaigners).

The threat of intrusive police surveillance is, in Netpol’s experience, often overlooked by protest movements, even though intelligence-gathering has long been recognised as having a potential “chilling effect” on whether people feel able to go out and demonstrate.

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