Ushahidi Manages Crowd-Sourced Reports in Crises

Online resource uses blogs, SMS, and emails from citizens to track and map international crises in real time

Ushahidi is a crisis response communication system that takes messages from anyone via SMS, web, or email and displays them on a map, allowing the public to track the development of crises in real time. Originally created as a website mashup of google maps and citizen reports during the 2008 Kenyan riots, Ushahidi has since evolved into a comprehensive global crisis communication management platform that will soon be free and open-source. Development focuses on Africa, where mobiles are ubiquitous and accessible, even while other infrastructure is not. Compatibility with smartphones is now underway.

Ushahidi’s next challenge is solving the problem of information overload, particularly that which happens in the first three hours of a crisis. The service currently utilizes a crowd-sourced filter that rates reporters and reports to give readers a better sense of what information they can trust.

Trend Impact: Already used by NGOs and the news agency Al Jhazeera, Ushahidi not only offers an alternative and broader source of real-time news in crises, but it also goes some way toward systemizing crowd-sourced data overload.

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Ushahidi

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