OTF Rapid Response Fund Grant

OTF Rapid Response Fund Grant

Status: ACTIVE
Funder: Open Technology Fund (OTF)
Amount: Up to US $50,000
Last Updated: December 06, 2025

Summary

The OTF Rapid Response Fund Grant provides urgent support for individuals and organizations facing digital emergencies that threaten their free expression. Through direct financial assistance and technical services from trusted partners, it aims to help high-risk individuals like journalists and activists mitigate digital threats. Eligible applicants can receive up to $50,000 to address specific needs, such as digital protection and tools development, ensuring swift and effective responses to oppressive situations.

Overview

The Rapid Response Fund aims to resolve threats in a timely and comprehensive manner for individuals, communities, and organizations whose free expression has recently been repressed. To resolve digital emergencies, OTF offers both direct financial support as well as technical services from trusted partners to high-risk people and organizations, such as bloggers, cyber activists, journalists, and human rights defenders. What we do .Technical Services from Trusted Partners: here Direct Financial SupportIf you have a need that is not sufficiently covered by our service partners and have the capacity to carry out the work yourself, we can provide financial support directly to help prepare for or mitigate digital threats or emergencies.Activities eligible for direct financial support include (but are not limited to): providing circumvention solutions during censorship eventsproviding personal digital protection for online journalists, human rights defenders, NGOs, activists, and bloggersrapid development of tools or translations needed to respond adequately to emergenciesdeveloping centralized, mobile internet applications that can link computers as an independent network (mesh or delay-tolerant networks)and emergency patches Direct financial support awards are typically anywhere from $1 and $50,000 for a period of six months or less, although we can consider applications greater than this amount. Performance-based contracts are signed directly with you, and you’ll receive the funds upon completion of stated objectives, activities, and deliverables (per a schedule outlined in the contract). All payments are made in U.S. dollars.

Eligibility

You can learn more about this opportunity by visiting the funder's website. If you’re an activist, journalist, human rights defender or other high-risk individual or organization facing a clear and time-sensitive digital emergency, then please apply.