Google and sister company, Jigsaw – an incubator within Alphabet that builds technology to tackle some of the toughest global security challenges, have launched a set of tools that are aimed to safe guard Kenyan media from digital attacks during this election period.
The tools, dubbed “Protect Your Election”, are designed to safeguard news agencies, human rights groups and election monitoring sites from online threats such as denial of service (DDoS) attacks, phishing, online censorship and hacking attempts.
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The Protect Your Election suite was launched on Tuesday in Nairobi. Among the tools launched was “Project Shield” which provides free DDoS protection to news sites, human rights groups, and election monitoring sites. Project Shield also offers digital defenses for individuals, including Password Alert – a Chrome extension that helps protect against phishing attacks by alerting you if a website is trying to steal your Google password.
The second tool launched was a Two-Step Verification tool that will not only provide an extra layer of security to user’s accounts but also includes uProxy, which is an extension for Chrome and Firefox web browsers that allows users to access the Internet via a web proxy, with the intension of allowing users to get a more secure access to the Internet without being monitored, and a virtual private network (VPN) that will be available for organizations. These are meant to be used in the case the government decides to censor social media.
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Speaking during the launch, Google Kenya Country Manager, Charles Murito said, “Everyone has a right to a full and credible story. The free Google tools are designed to safeguard publishers, news organizations, human rights groups and election monitoring sites from digital attacks during the election period.”
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