Hackers for Charity is actively driving skills development in impoverished communities in East Africa.
The non-profit organisation recently participated at the ITWeb Security Summit, where it received a portion from every Expo ticket sold at the event.
Hackers for Charity is building computer labs as well as providing IT-oriented skills programmes and food-for-work schemes to communities living in developing countries in East Africa.
Johnny Long, also known as ihackstuff, a computer security expert, author, and public speaker, leads the organisation. In June 2009, he and his family relocated to Uganda to focus on providing skills to poor communities.
Sensepost security consultant Dominic White has been contributing to the South African operations for the foundation. He explains Hackers for Charity is primarily funded by the local and international hacker community and benefits from donations made by the general public.
“The money gets invested into building Internet cafes in Uganda, where Hackers for Charity provides training for disadvantaged youth. However, one of the biggest challenges is bandwidth as Internet is unreliable,” explains White.
He explains that hackers have generally earned a bad reputation in the industry as cyber criminals, but this is not always the case. White points out that hackers are mainly researchers and making a positive impact on the industry.
He adds that Informer, a fund-raising effort for the organisation, provides exclusive content to subscribers for $54; which is invested into food programmes in East Africa and building IT skills training workshops.
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