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Concise Guide to Human Rights on the Internet

Second Edition
September 1998

Introduction

Since this guide was first published two years ago, there has been an explosion of human rights information on the World Wide Web (web). Not only have many non-government organizations (NGOs) gotten online and began publishing their materials, but international organizations have begun to make large portions of their materials available online, making research much easier than in the past. Academic and legal journals, moreover, have begun to offer at least some of their articles in the web as well. The growth of the web, however, has also meant that finding the desired materials is likely to be more difficult for those not already acquainted with the major human rights sites. Fortunately, most of the major sites have done a very good job of compiling lists of links to other sites with human rights materials, so that using them as starting points is likely to lead you to the material you seek. Those sites and the other tools described here should help you find you what you need.

This updated guide is an attempt to show you how to begin using the Internet to find human rights information. This guide assumes that you already know how to use the basic Internet tools: e-mail and the web. We will also discuss briefly the issue of privacy online. Please note that the sites and methods discussed here are by no means exhaustive; in addition, given the nature of the Internet, this guide was out-of-date even before we finished writing it.

It is important to understand that while there is a lot of human rights information on the Internet, it only constitutes a small fraction of the information available in the "real world." This means that you will not necessarily find what you are looking for; it may just not be there. Use the Internet as a way to supplement your library or field research, but don't expect to be able to use it as your sole source of information.

Note: This is a "live" document, and minor changes are made when necessary.

Where on the Internet?

The Internet has multiple "spaces" where information is stored and exchanged. In addition to the web, there are mailing lists, where people can exchange information and ideas via e-mail, newsgroups, bulletin-boards accessible to everyone with full-Internet access where useful information and people are sometimes available, chat rooms, where you can meet with friends to discuss issues or drop in to ask questions, and telnet, which provides access to library catalogs and other databases. In addition, much information is still available at ftp (file transfer protocol) and gopher sites; because you can access these sites with most web browsers (software such as Netscape Navigator, Internet Explorer, and Opera, which is used to access the web), we will not discuss these sites independently.

As a general guide, we would recommend that you first look at what's available on the web, or what has been discussed on newsgroups or mailing lists (you can get the archives of many of these on the web as well), before posing questions to either newsgroups or mailing lists - especially about very common subjects.

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