HRDAG Analysis Supports Efforts to Hold Salvadoran Commanders Accountable for 1989 Jesuit Massacre

Almost a quarter century ago, on November 16, 1989, six Jesuit scholars, their housekeeper and her 15-year-old daughter were massacred inside the University of Central America (UCA) in San Salvador, El Salvador. Their chief target was the rector of the country’s leading university. The murders were carried out by members of the elite Atlacatl Battalion, acting on the direct orders of the highest-ranking members of the Salvadoran military. The United Nations–sponsored Truth Commission for El Salvador found that members of the Salvadoran military's high command “gave...the order to kill Father Ignacio Ellacuría and to leave no witnesses.” ...

When It Comes to Human Rights, There Are No Online Security Shortcuts

Deportation Possible for El Salvador’s Gen. García – Supported by HRDAG Analysis

Gen. José Guillermo García, El Salvador’s defense minister from 1979 to 1983, may be deported from Florida to El Salvador because of his involvement in war crimes that occurred under his command. The recommendation comes from a Miami immigration judge, whose decision was supported with expert testimony from Stanford political science professor Terry Karl, who presented extensive statistical analysis of killings, disappearances, kidnappings, torture and other crimes under Gen. García’s watch. The statistical analysis was a joint effort between Professor Karl and Amelia Hoover Green and Patrick Ball of Human Rights Data Analysis Group (HRDAG). ...

HRDAG – 25 Years and Counting

Today is a very special day for all of us at HRDAG. This is, of course, the 68th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights—but this day also marks our 25th year of using statistical science to support the advancement of human rights. It started 25 years ago, in December 1991, in San Salvador, when Patrick Ball was invited to work with the Salvadoran Lutheran Church to design a database to keep track of human rights abuses committed by the military in El Salvador. That work soon migrated to the NGO Human Rights Commission (CDHES). Fueled by thin beer and pupusas, Patrick dove into the deep world of data from human rights testimonies, ...

Remembering Scott Weikart

HRDAG’s core values all have a connection to Scott Weikart, 1951–2023.

‘Bias deep inside the code’: the problem with AI ‘ethics’ in Silicon Valley

Kristian Lum, the lead statistician at the Human Rights Data Analysis Group, and an expert on algorithmic bias, said she hoped Stanford’s stumble made the institution think more deeply about representation.

“This type of oversight makes me worried that their stated commitment to the other important values and goals – like taking seriously creating AI to serve the ‘collective needs of humanity’ – is also empty PR spin and this will be nothing more than a vanity project for those attached to it,” she wrote in an email.

Megan Price Elected Board Member of Tor Project

Today The Tor Project announced that it has elected a new Board of Directors, and among them is HRDAG executive director Megan Price. The Tor Project is a nonprofit advocacy group that promotes online privacy and provides software that helps users opt out of online tracking. Megan and Patrick have long maintained that encryption and privacy are essential for enabling human rights work. Patrick's ideas are described in Monday's FedScoop story about encryption, human rights, and the U.S. State Department. “Human rights groups depend on strong cryptography in order to hold governments accountable," says Patrick. "HRDAG depends on local human ...

String matching for governorate information in unstructured text

code{white-space: pre;} pre:not([class]) { background-color: white; } h1 { font-size: 34px; } h1.title { font-size: 38px; } h2 { font-size: 30px; } h3 { font-size: 24px; } h4 { font-size: 18px; } h5 { font-size: 16px; } h6 { font-size: 12px; } .table th:not([align]) { text-align: left; } .main-container { max-width: 940px; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; } code { color: inherit; background-color: rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.04); } img { max-width:100%; height: auto; } .tabbed-pane { padding-top: 12px; } .html-widget { margin-bottom: 20px; } button.code-foldin...

BJS Report on Arrest-Related Deaths: True Number Likely Much Greater

(This post is co-authored by Patrick Ball and Kristian Lum.) Today the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) released a report on their effort to document “all deaths that occur during the process of arrest in the United States.” The analysis estimates that the Arrest-Related Deaths (ARD) program covers only 34-49% of these deaths. A parallel program by the FBI (the Supplementary Homicide Reports, SHR) is estimated to cover approximately the same proportion of deaths. Even taking into consideration both programs, 28% of all police homicides remain unreported. In order to estimate the total number of homicides that appear on neither the ARD or ...

At Toronto’s Tamil Fest, human rights group seeks data on Sri Lanka’s civil war casualties

Earlier this year, the Canadian Tamil Congress connected with HRDAG to bring its campaign to Toronto’s annual Tamil Fest, one of the largest gatherings of Canada’s Sri Lankan diaspora.

Ravichandradeva, along with a few other volunteers, spent the weekend speaking with festival-goers in Scarborough about the project and encouraging them to come forward with information about deceased or missing loved ones and friends.

“The idea is to collect thorough, scientifically rigorous numbers on the total casualties in the war and present them as a non-partisan, independent organization,” said Michelle Dukich, a data consultant with HRDAG.

El problema del asesinato a líderes es más grave de lo que se piensa

Una investigación de Dejusticia y Human Rights Data Analysis Group asegura que en Colombia hay un subregistro de los asesinatos de líderes sociales que se han perpetrado en Colombia. Al analizar las diferentes cifras de homicidios que han publicado diversas organizaciones desde 2016, se llegó a la conclusión que la problemática es mayor de lo que se cree.

Timor-Leste FAQs

How do you know that there are more conflict-related deaths than have been reported to the Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation (CAVR, by its Portuguese acronym)? Where did the method of multiple systems estimation come from? If you didn't have access to the whole population, how do you know how representative these data are of the entire population? i.e. How do you control for bias? What are the total conflict-related mortality numbers? How many people were killed and disappeared between 1974 and 1999? And how many people died due to hunger and illness? What is the margin of error associated with these results? What is ...

Indirect Sampling to Measure Conflict Violence: Trade-offs in the Pursuit of Data That Are Good, Cheap, and Fast

Romesh Silva and Megan Price. “Indirect Sampling to Measure Conflict Violence: Trade-offs in the Pursuit of Data That Are Good, Cheap, and Fast.” Journal of the American Medical Association. 306(5):547-548. 2011. © 2011 JAMA. All rights reserved.

Privacy Policy

Mailing List Subscription We use Mailchimp to help us keep track of community members who want to stay informed about what HRDAG is doing and thinking. If you self-subscribe to our list, we will never share your contact information. We will never subscribe anyone who does not explicitly agree to a subscription. Over the course of a year, we mail quarterly letters and fundraising letters, as well as one or two updates as events demand. If, during the course of a fundraising campaign, you make a donation, we will do our best to remove you from the remainder of fundraising mailings that year. We may use your contact information to invite you to ...

Data-Driven Efforts to Address Racial Inequality

From the article: “As we seek to advance the responsible use of data for racial injustice, we encourage individuals and organizations to support and build upon efforts already underway.” HRDAG is listed in the Data Driven Activism and Advocacy category.

On ensuring a higher level of data quality when documenting human rights violations to support research into the origins and cause of human rights violations

Romesh Silva. “On ensuring a higher level of data quality when documenting human rights violations to support research into the origins and cause of human rights violations.” ASA Proceedings of the Joint Statistical Meetings, the International Biometric Society (ENAR and WNAR), the Institute of Mathematical Statistics, and the Statistical Society of Canada. August, 2002.

Learning a Modular, Auditable and Reproducible Workflow

The modular nature of the workflow and use of Git allowed us to work on different parts of the project from across the country.

Coders Bare Invasion Death Count

How Coder Cornered Milosevic

To Combat Human Rights Abuses, California Company Looks to Computer Code

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HRDAG Analysis Supports Efforts to Hold Salvadoran Commanders Accountable for 1989 Jesuit Massacre

When It Comes to Human Rights, There Are No Online Security Shortcuts

Deportation Possible for El Salvador’s Gen. García – Supported by HRDAG Analysis

HRDAG – 25 Years and Counting

Remembering Scott Weikart

‘Bias deep inside the code’: the problem with AI ‘ethics’ in Silicon Valley

Megan Price Elected Board Member of Tor Project

String matching for governorate information in unstructured text

BJS Report on Arrest-Related Deaths: True Number Likely Much Greater

At Toronto’s Tamil Fest, human rights group seeks data on Sri Lanka’s civil war casualties

El problema del asesinato a líderes es más grave de lo que se piensa

Timor-Leste FAQs

Indirect Sampling to Measure Conflict Violence: Trade-offs in the Pursuit of Data That Are Good, Cheap, and Fast

Privacy Policy

Data-Driven Efforts to Address Racial Inequality

On ensuring a higher level of data quality when documenting human rights violations to support research into the origins and cause of human rights violations

Learning a Modular, Auditable and Reproducible Workflow

Coders Bare Invasion Death Count

How Coder Cornered Milosevic

To Combat Human Rights Abuses, California Company Looks to Computer Code

Our work has been used by truth commissions, international criminal tribunals, and non-governmental human rights organizations. We have worked with partners on projects on five continents.

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HRDAG

Selected projects

Stay informed about our work

Our work has been used by truth commissions, international criminal tribunals, and non-governmental human rights organizations. We have worked with partners on projects on five continents. Donate

HRDAG

Selected projects

Stay informed about our work

Our work has been used by truth commissions, international criminal tribunals, and non-governmental human rights organizations. We have worked with partners on projects on five continents.

Donate