“The methodology, the way of thinking about human rights, digital rights, and corporate accountability—RDR has left an indelible mark that’s going to continue to evolve through all kinds of research. It’s had a huge impact on how investors think about these issues. No matter how RDR evolves from here, it’s going to live on in really interesting ways. The impact is going to continue to spread in ways that will be hard to predict.”
“For 10 years, with our rigorous research and reputable rankings, Ranking Digital Rights has successfully challenged the world’s most powerful digital platforms and telecom companies to uphold their commitments to respect and promote human rights. Nearly every company we rank has engaged with us and/or amended policies to meet the standards we’ve set. Not only that, our indicators and research methods are being integrated into benchmarks being developed by intergovernmental agencies, industry groups, civil society advocates, and impact investors globally. As we turn 10, RDR has become a digital public good, an accessible and essential tool in the fight to realize an internet that supports and sustains human rights.”
“It’s really helpful to be able to engage with a partner that really knows the digital rights issues at play substantively, that understands the industry landscape and the nuances of new technological developments, and that knows the key areas upon which to push companies.
As an investor leading different corporate engagements across various ESG issues including digital rights issues, RDR is that expert that we need to be able to complement our own expertise, to be able to make informed and confident asks of companies.”
“I really like the way in which RDR is acting as a decentralized research know-how hub or a toolbox. By doing so, RDR has enabled our organization, Media Diversity Institute, to carry out research, which we would otherwise never have the know-how to do properly. And by doing this, RDR has created a multiplication effect, by reaching far and broad and leaving a profound effect on the digital rights research space, which is hard to overstate. The open approach of RDR is in many ways revolutionary. It democratizes research capacity, instead of keeping it like an elite knowledge for the select few.”
“RDR’s impact on digital right space is massive. What you do, in a very comprehensive and systematic way, is create a great tool for monitoring and for accountability of Big Tech and telecommunication companies. And what I really appreciate about RDR is the very complex and comprehensive, but yet in another way very straightforward, methodology that allows us to follow the work of all these different actors that you analyze. It is a good way for both researchers, but also “ordinary” end users, to learn about the way these systems work.”
“With RDR, we were able to evaluate and assess the current state of digital rights in our countries and determine the important steps we need to take in order to improve the digital rights practices of the private sector. It was really convenient to work with RDR because of, first of all, the methodology and standards they are putting and, secondly, the expertise they were able to provide us with during the entire RDR research process.”
“RDR’s Index has been a useful source of assistance in identifying areas for improvement and greater transparency in terms of the policies and agreements made with users. Yahoo has always taken RDR’s feedback seriously and attempted to act on that feedback in terms of amendments to our company policies and practice.”
“The scientific rigour with which the RDR team analyses company activities and substantiates their findings is simply impressive. RDR’s Corporate Accountability Index has helped us a lot in benchmarking and improving our policies and management systems, thus contributing to our common objective of promoting human rights in general and privacy and freedom of expression in particular.”
“The digital rights space is a contested space due to the absence of universally shared approaches, as market and human rights approaches tend to clash. The RDR methodology appreciates these nuances and while considerate of the commercial dimensions of, for instance, telecommunication companies, reinforces the rights dimensions as incorporated in global human rights standards and conventions.”
“RDR and its team provides in-depth ICT company analysis as well as tech and human rights expertise that allows investors to assess the human rights performance of their ICT portfolio companies and to develop strategies to engage and hold companies accountable on real and potential digital rights risks.
With detailed and comparative data on each company’s digital rights performance, investors are able to call out where a company’s peers/competitors and/or the sector as a whole is doing better. This helps to drive the individual ICT company and the ICT sector as a whole to higher standards of respect for the digital rights of users and society.”
“RDR’s impact is so powerful. The steady existence of such rigorous monitoring and external accountability has an enormous impact even as tech companies continue to fail to prioritize public safety in their products. Having a watchdog like RDR means that there is a respected force of outside accountability so that companies are to a greater degree pressed to be attentive to all of these concerns.”
“In Consent of the Networked, Rebecca MacKinnon issued a powerful call to action: for civil society to hold companies as well as governments accountable for respecting free expression, privacy, and other human rights online. RDR was founded to answer that call, going beyond the scope of peer organizations like GNI to scrutinize company behavior beyond responses to government demands.”
“RDR’s Corporate Accountability Index Methodology has been a key tool for shedding light on corporate practices around the world. Tech giants outside Silicon Valley are sometimes overlooked in the focus on Big Tech. RDR’s global approach means that the big players that impact human rights are all brought under scrutiny.”
“The Ranking Digital Rights 2022 Telco Giants Scorecards are comprehensive and exhaustive. RDR does a great job at presenting detailed digital rights benchmark components at the issuer level. The information is presented in a way that makes it very easy for investors to understand and advocate for digital rights. The benchmark is truly global and therefore includes many large, impactful emerging markets issuers.
RDR’s team is highly approachable and willing to educate and support investors to drive change and improve digital rights globally.”
