Indigenous Peoples Day: Tribes and Technology

“Internet Access is a human right. Yet nearly one third of Indigenous people living on Tribal lands do not have access to fixed broadband services.” – MuralNet

Check out these important initiatives from Native peoples where tech, digital access and climate change meet 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

MuralNet is an Oakland nonprofit that works with Native nations to design, build, and control their Internet access future. In partnership with Cisco, they are launching a Sustainable Tribal Networks program. Their website is a great resource to understand the both the challenges Tribes face and self-deployment initiatives, plus includes ways to partner.

Tribal Digital Village Network provides wireless broadband service to San Diego’s Tribal and Rural Communities and has connected 14 Tribes in SoCal to Pacific Wave, an international internet exchange.

The federal Tribal Priority Window for 2.5GHz is an opportunity for Tribes in rural areas to directly access unassigned internet spectrum over their Tribal lands. 157 applications were accepted a few weeks ago and are under review, approvals hopefully starting Nov 2. Follow here.

The Indigenous Connectivity Summit from The Internet Society just took place Oct 5-9 – watch the videos! Indigenous leaders, community members, community network operators, Internet service providers, researchers and policy makers gathered to further internet connectivity for Indigenous communities.

And, on climate change: The 2019 Climate Adaptation Plan of the La Jolla Band of the Luiseño Indians is a collaboration with Climate Science Alliance, and weaves Native knowledge and learning from elders together with climate science in a plan that is rooted in tribal resilience.

[Photos from MuralNet]