Access Now.org is a non-profit

Non-profit organization

Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...

, human rights

Human rights

Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...

, public policy

Public policy

Public policy as government action is generally the principled guide to action taken by the administrative or executive branches of the state with regard to a class of issues in a manner consistent with law and institutional customs. In general, the foundation is the pertinent national and...

 and advocacy group

Advocacy group

Advocacy groups use various forms of advocacy to influence public opinion and/or policy; they have played and continue to play an important part in the development of political and social systems...

 dedicated to giving technical support to digital activists and civil society groups while writing and advocating for policy positions which support an open and neutral Internet. Founded in reaction to the contested Iranian elections in 2009, Access has organized numerous campaigns to protect Internet freedoms and the use of the Internet as a tool for political organization. In lieu of being on the ground with activists, Access seeks to protect their community and communications online. While much of what Access does is in alignment with the United States' with the goals of the U.S. State Department, which "sees Internet freedom as critical to America's longstanding promotion of democracy abroad", it remains one of the few U.S. based digital rights organizations which does not receive state funding "because they want to remain independent and protect contacts in countries where taking foreign money is a crime."

History

Access was founded by Brett Solomon and Cameran Ashraf in 2009, after the contested Iranian presidential election of that year. During the protests that followed this election, Access played a noted role in disseminating the video footage which came out of Iran.