How do you take your PC and smartphone back into your own hands? Technological Sovereignity: a must-read if you want to think critically about your digital consumption and switch to alternatives.

Everybody knows the sovereignty of a country, but have you already heard of technological sovereignty? Taking the technology back into your own hands and not leave it to large companies that make big money with your data. Well, the movement around technological sovereignty does not stand still.

Independent platforms are set up throughout the world by digital activists. They support each other in developing their own technology, software and applications. The movement for technological sovereignty builds on, among other things, previous movements for free software, copyleft, etc.

Whether it is for activists campaigning in undemocratic countries or for women who are looking for abortion opportunities in countries where it is forbidden, environmental activists who develop their own tools to measure pollution in their city or municipality, etc.

There is also Calafou, an activist hacker collective, located in an old textile colony in the heart of Catalonia. The collective was established years ago and focuses mainly on free technology. Both software and hardware. Their philosophy is: technology is a basic need and should not be based on commercial interests.

Calafou hacklab

Several times a year they organize open days where hackers from all over Europe come together to exchange ideas and propose new applications. They just released a new book on technological sovereignty. Hackers from different countries cooperated in the making of it. It is a kind of ethical manual for the Free Tech movement.

What does technological sovereignty mean exactly?

What they have started to do is to analyze the definition of food sovereignty, as defined by the peasant movement Via Campesina. They have replaced the word food with technology. And the word farmer with developers and creators. By replacing these terms they got a workable definition.

Then the collective started to wonder whether there are movements in the world that work or move in that logic, namely the creation of ethical and open source technology from the bottom up. Technology that is both local and ecological as well as social and viable.

I always assumed that information technology was only developed by institutes, military personnel and large companies, but most technology was first developed by citizens and collectives. And was then commercialized and privatized by the companies. Just think of cryptography, open source software, the first radio satellite, the personal computer, etc...

Technological sovereignty is on the one hand recuperating the memories of how civil society has developed technology to solve certain problems with which it has to contend. It is something that our society has been doing since time immemorial.

And on the other hand, technological sovereignty has been developed by the people, for the people. Or as Audrey Lord said: The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House.

The book offers concrete applicable tech information

The goal of Calafou has always been to be very didactic, even for people who have little knowledge about the theme. Everyone uses technology, but we live in a world where there is hardly any room for a critical approach to technology. What is this technology that I use? Where does it come from? What impact does it have and what alternatives are there? That should normally be part of the basic training.

The book mainly lets people speak who also develop or program. The developers and makers map the existing initiatives and try to explain in a didactic way what potential there is and why we need it.

They have tried to go deeper into the specific characteristics of technological sovereignty. This is because most initiatives relating to technological sovereignty are faced with similar problems. It are often structures that are precarious and rely on volunteers. It only works if the people who use these tools also contribute to maintenance, which creates a very virtual community. But you also see that most people are used to using those tools for free. In the tech environment, awareness is not yet there to contribute to the technology you use.

Another problem in the open source community that they encounter is the invisibility of the many existing initiatives. And also the fact that everyone works in their own corner. There are few networks and collaborations. And there is also the search for sustainable economic models for open source collectives. Interesting examples are the Hacklabs from which more and more tech cooperatives are growing. These are important for the development and sustainability of the community.

Tools for whistleblowers and encryption. There's something for everybody.

The book is written from the voices of people and collectives from the community. Why they do it, their obstacles, successes, etc...

This book is mainly about the characteristics of both the low-tech and high-tech initiatives. As well as tech that is bound territory. There is a chapter on how the indigenous population in Oaxaca developed their own mobile telephone system in cooperation with hackers with very low rates. Because the private companies were not interested in offering their services there. The system was copied in other places such as Colombia.

You will also find a reflection of the Italian Ippolita. A movement that has written many books about the privatization of the internet. They ask themselves the question about the gamification of communication in our apps, with the aim of keeping people longer in the app. How can we get out of that kind of loops?

Another chapter is about platforms developed by citizens where citizens can leak corruption and abuse of power. There is also an entire chapter on encryption of communication and privacy and the 'de-Googlefying' of the internet. Where projects like Framasoft are a good example. As well as the network of decentralized servers like Chatton.

Suppose I want to think critically about my digital consumption and switch to alternatives. How do I start?

The question you have to ask yourself is always: from who is this technology and why can you use it for free?

For example, Google is problematic because it is not a single service, but more than 30 services that collect information about you from another angle. From your mailcommuniction, your GPS, your calendar, your search results, Google docs, etc...

You can start with small steps. Find another mail provider than google, or use another search engine. For example, Framasoft Degooglefy internet offers 30 services that are analogous to the Google services. But they will not misuse your data for commercial purposes.

There are many small changes that we can do without much technical knowledge, for example switching from WhatsApp to Telegram or Wire. It is also important that you don’t do it alone, but together with some close friends. Or start groups where people can meet regularly and discuss the alternative tools.

The gap between the open source community and the mainstream has never been so great. This is mainly because we have completely lost control of our PC. In the past we installed everything ourselves. People now no longer have access to their software. Some people do not even know how to download and install a program. That is precisely the goal of the whole movement, that people become aware of it and take their PC or smarthpone back into their own hands.

Therefore this book is a must-read.

The book Technological Sovereignity is online available in English for free.