Flash Drives For Freedom: Your Old USB Drives Can Help Overthrow Dictatorships

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Information beats propaganda. Information can overthrow dictatorships. Your old USB drives have the power to bring information and knowledge where it matters most. Introducing “Flash Drives For Freedom.”

There are countries that are so secluded that they don’t have access to information. I’m not talking secret, or highly sensitive documents, just general information: Wikipedia articles, news, movies, documentaries. Nothing. One of those countries is North Korea, under the dictatorship of Kim Jong-un.

And information is power. Information beats propaganda, information can overthrow dictatorships. In North Korea, defectors have been organizing efforts to smuggle information from outside the country. And believe it or not, USB drives are the main form of sharing information there.

Information beats propaganda. Information can overthrow dictatorships. Your old USB drives have the power to bring information and knowledge where it matters most. #FlashDrivesForFreedom

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But just like everything, USB drives cost money. So, the Human Rights Foundation, Forum 280, and USB Memory Direct created “Flash Drives for Freedom,” an organization in charge of collecting all those old USB drives we don’t even use anymore. Drives are then prepared and loaded with information, ebooks, movies, and an offline Korean Wikipedia, before being smuggled into the country.

The results have been incredible: 125,000 USB drives donated, 50 million hours of reading material disseminated, and an estimated 1.3 million North Koreans reached by end of 2018.

If you want to get involved and/or donate USB drives, check out the “Flash Drive for Freedom” website.

If you don’t own any USB drive, or if yours contain your life’s work, you can still help. Tweet #FlashDrivesforFreedom to @usbmemorydirect and the good folks over at USB Memory Direct will donate a flash drive to the cause on your behalf.