Alex Gladstein, Chief Strategy Officer for the Human Rights Foundation (HRF)<\/a>, the organization that puts on the Oslo Freedom Forum, kicked off the day by discussing why Bitcoin is essential in a human rights context. He then read two pertinent passages from Lyn Alden\u2019s book Broken Money: Why Our Financial System Is Failing Us And How We Can Make It Better<\/em><\/a> before inviting the author, an esteemed macroeconomic analyst, to the stage.<\/p>\n Alden provided a brief overview of monetary history before making the point that Bitcoin gives anyone anywhere in the world access to a free and open financial system. She also pointed out that Bitcoin, now 15 years old, has matured and has become easier to use and is also quite liquid, aspects of the network and asset that make it better suited for a human rights context than it was in its earlier days.<\/p>\n Hadiya Masieh<\/a>, founder of the Groundswell Project<\/a>, an organization that works to foster tolerance and empathy amongst diverse communities, then took the stage to present her talk entitled \u201cHow Bitcoin Can Fund Counter-Terrorism.\u201d She highlighted how she\u2019s taught Somali women how to use bitcoin to fundraise for political campaigns for female political candidates in the country.<\/p>\n Noble Nyangoma<\/a>, CEO of the Bitcoin Innovation Hub<\/a>, spoke soon after Masieh, discussing the work she does with refugees in Uganda, many of whom are not yet Ugandan citizens and therefore cannot open bank accounts in the country. She stressed that Bitcoin is essential for these refugees.<\/p>\n \u201cWith Bitcoin, no one is going to ask you \u2018Where is your national ID?\u2019\u201d said Nyangoma.<\/p>\n One of the most moving talks of the day came from Farida Nabourema<\/a>, a Togolese activist and Executive Director of the African Bitcoin Conference<\/a>. She shared a harrowing account of how she once needed an emergency surgery in Ghana and almost didn\u2019t receive it because she didn\u2019t have enough money in the local currency on her at the time of the surgery to pay for it.<\/p>\n She did, however, have enough funds in her home country\u2019s currency to make the payment, but the hospital wouldn\u2019t accept it. The point she was making was that Africa is divided financially by the many different currencies on the continent, none of which can be used across borders.<\/p>\n She explained that Bitcoin fixes this, as it helps create a world \u2014 especially in Africa \u2014 in which the situation she experienced in that Ghanaian hospital could have been avoided.<\/p>\n Before the lunch break, Ben Perrin, better known as BTC Sessions<\/a>, gave a presentation on how to use bitcoin in a high-fee environment, and Alex Li<\/a>, a member of the HRF team, announced the 10 winners of of it Bitcoin Development fund grants<\/a> for software developers who create tools that add to privacy on the Lightning Network, build decentralized communications and provide technological tools to human rights defenders.<\/p>\n In the afternoon, Sparrow Wallet<\/a> developer Craig Raw detailed a number of practical ways to use Bitcoin more privately, while Lorraine Marcel, founder of Bitcoin DADA<\/a>, a virtual Bitcoin education platform and community for African women, shared stories of how Bitcoin is catalyzing notable changes in her students and in those her organization serves.<\/p>\n \u201cBefore Bitcoin I could not really see a true way of getting financial freedom or independence for me or my sisters back at home,\u201d said Marcel during her presentation.<\/p>\n She went on to share that the organization also uses bitcoin as a fundraising tool to help fund an initiative that provides feminine hygiene products and educational materials to female students in Kibera, one of the biggest urban slums in Africa.<\/p>\n Calle, an anonymous software developer who created the Cashu<\/a> protocol,\u00a0an ecash protocol that offers more transactional privacy\u00a0with Bitcoin<\/a>, provided an overview of how ecash works and how the privacy it provides can benefit activists.<\/p>\n Toward the middle of the afternoon session, Christian Keroles<\/a>, Director of Financial Freedom at HRF, interviewed\u00a0Luthando Ndabambi<\/a>, Community Leader at Bitcoin Ekasi<\/a>, a circular Bitcoin economy located in a South African township. Ndamambi told Keroles that before bitcoin, he and many others in his community had no means of saving, which led them to not thinking much about their future.<\/p>\n \u201cI tell people in my township, \u2018When you think about Bitcoin, think about saving for your kids,\u2019\u201d said Ndabambi.<\/p>\n Soon after, Peter McCormack, host of the What Bitcoin Did <\/em>podcast, sat down with Mike Brock, head of TBD<\/a> at Block, and Anna Chekhovich, CFO at Alexey Navalny\u2019s Anti-Corruption Foundation<\/a> and HRF Non-Profit Bitcoin Adoption Lead. The three discussed how Bitcoin can help preserving democracy as well as the effects of the crackdown on privacy-focused Bitcoin wallets in the US<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cFor us to receive donations, we [have to] provide our donors with high-level security tools for payments,\u201d explained Chekhovich.<\/p>\n \u201cIf there is a tiny chance that your personal data is going to be leaked to the government and they will put you [in] jail, of course you will not make a donation. That is why privacy tools are crucial, and at the Anti-Corruption Foundation, we are very concerned about that. We try to do everything we can in order to provide safety to our donors,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we are deprived of these privacy tools we will not be able to accept bitcoin donations, because we cannot put our donors at such a huge risk.\u201d<\/p>\n Dulce Villarreal, CEO and founder of Librer\u00eda de Satoshi<\/a> (Library of Satoshi), a Bitcoin hub that provides Bitcoin educational materials and classes as well as financial support for Bitcoin developer students, stated that she\u2019s concerned about the fact that more than 50 million people live under dictatorships in Latin America and that central bank digital currencies (CBDC<\/a>) will only further enable autocratic leaders on the continent.<\/p>\n Therefore, she\u2019s on a mission to make Bitcoin ubiquitous by helping to train people from around the world to work on and support Bitcoin.<\/p>\n \u201cOur mission is to make Bitcoin technical training accessible in your own language,\u201d said Villarreal. \u201cAt Librer\u00eda de Satoshi, our goal is to foster the next generation of Bitcoin contributors, entrepreneurs, educators.\u201d<\/p>\n The day concluded with a fireside chat with Jack Mallers, founder and CEO of Strike<\/a>, and Matt Odell, Managing Partner at Ten31<\/a> and co-founder of OpenSats<\/a>. The two discussed the importance of profitable Bitcoin businesses contributing to open-source developers, much like the way that Strike announced it would be donating $100,000 to the OpenCash Association<\/a>, a non-profit that supports such developers, founded by the aforementioned Calle.<\/p>\n \u201cThrough my work with HRF and coming here, there is a duty that I have to make sure Bitcoin is successful, although not maybe in my shareholders\u2019 [or] in my corporation\u2019s immediate interest,\u201d explained Mallers. \u201cThat\u2019s part of the game theory that makes the whole project work. And so no matter your role, we\u2019re all on the same team. If Bitcoin is better, we\u2019re all better off for it.\u201d<\/p>\n Strong words to end a conference that featured the voices of so many who have gone above and beyond to ensure that we are all in fact better off because of Bitcoin.<\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/.image\/c_fit%2Ch_800%2Cw_1200\/MjA2OTY4NDg0MzkzOTE5OTcx\/img_7141.jpg\")
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