HuriSearch

To collaborate in the fight against human rights violations such as covert arrests, torture, and death squad killings, governments and activists need accurate, timely information about these crimes. Thanks to support from IDRC, they can turn to HuriSearch. HuriSearch is the first and only comprehensive Web search engine specializing in human rights. Operating in 77 languages, it lets users tap into millions of web pages published by some 5,000 human rights groups. It is just one resource in a set of information tools designed and made publicly available by the international human rights network HURIDOCS (Human Rights Information and Documentation Systems, http://www.huridocs.org/). HURIDOCS was founded during the 1980s. Over the years IDRC has funded several of its initiatives. A Canadian information specialist and rights advocate, Judith Dueck, helped develop HuriSearch. “It looks at the websites of even very small organizations,” she says. “Content from these sites would never be found by a large search engine like Google. But they can be found by ours.”