New Digital Safety Portal for Vietnam
In Vietnam, a new digital-safety resource website will help even more civil society groups protect themselves from dangerous cyber-threats—so they can make better, safer use of digital technologies in their daily work.
The Digital Safety Hub (DSH) Vietnam website presents a growing library of self-learning tools for anyone who wants to boost their resilience online. Those include practical guides on everything from protecting accounts to avoiding digital attacks to keeping online conversations secure. An associated Facebook page with 180,000+ followers keeps users engaged and serves up alerts on new digital vulnerabilities, phishing scams and more.
DSH Vietnam is a partnership of The SecDev Foundation and Vietnet-ICT. For more than a year now, the team has been providing no-cost digital-safety training to select civil society organizations (CSOs). That work remains the team’s core mission. Committing to the resource website broadens their reach—to more CSOs as well as individuals. It also supports intake: an interactive survey invites users to recognize their unique vulnerabilities and register for training.
On July 22, DSH Vietnam hosted an official website launch event in Hanoi. This online portal is a pioneering resource in the Vietnamese digital space. And dozens of digital champions and CSO representatives gathered to mark the occasion.
Welcome from Ms. Ngo Minh Trang, Director of Vietnet-ICT.
Participants learn about the portal's digital safety tools.
Cool "swag" keeps DSH Vietnam top-of-mind.
Lots of great one-on-one conversations.
Chatting with Vietnet-ICT and SecDev Foundation reps.
The organizing team poses for a group photo.
Digital resilience, real-world progress
Civil society organizations (CSOs) play a quietly important role in Vietnam’s socio-economic fabric. We see mission-driven groups promoting practical progress on everything from public health to ecological conservation. Others are supporting long-term public-interest research. Still others are advocating for the needs of rural communities, people with disabilities and a whole range of vulnerable populations.
Many of Vietnam’s roughly 500 registered non-profits are small operations with small budgets. Many see how digital technologies can help them boost their efficiency and widen their reach. But these new opportunities come with new digital risks. Whether it’s via ransomware, hacking attacks or phishing scams, data loss and digital harms can threaten operations, staff, partners and beneficiaries. And in borderless cyberspace, digital attacks can come from anywhere.
The good news is that any CSO can significantly and affordably reduce its digital risks. Basic digital safety doesn’t require heavy investment in technical infrastructure. What it requires is a commitment to adopt stronger “digital hygiene” among staff and partners, at a human, behavioural level. This can be difficult without an experienced guide—but that’s where DSH Vietnam comes in.
In 2021, the team invited non-profit Vietnamese CSOs to express their interest in digital safety training. Almost 40 responded within two weeks. Already, 17 prioritized organizations have completed a no-cost six-module training program. As that number grows, Vietnamese civil society will be using digital technologies with more and more confidence. And that means they’ll be getting more done for the people they support.
Visit the site:
Digital Safety Hub Vietnam
(in Vietnamese)
