but McAtee is currently working on a more formal proposal for a small fleet of drones for use in the provision of humanitarian aid. Under his leadership,
smartphone app to more efficiently report security incidents — information that can be pulled into their revamped database and combined with other data to create detailed, “military quality” maps. McAtee started by inviting IT and an underutilized in-house geographic information system team into security efforts for the organization, which delivers health care services and training in 36 countries — some of which top the list of most dangerous contexts for aid workers. “Going through this process has been both comical and educational,” he said. Such a heavy emphasis on — and such enthusiasm for — technology’s role in security isn’t shared by all international NGOs operating in fragile contexts. Several INGO security directors and others in the sector swatted the topic away and focused instead on well-known strategies like face-to-face interaction in conversations with Devex. Other attempts at talking tech led to the brick wall of a question: “With what money?” In some contexts, tech will simply never be the answer to increased aid worker security or efficiency, some in the industry told Devex. But in other situations, security leaders might need to make more room for tech’s potential. Still too far removed? “Tech is not the solution. Is it going to get us closer to people so they understand us better?” asked Anthony Dalziel, head of the security and crisis management support unit at the International Committee of the Red Cross. “If you’re behind a bunker, you turn to tech because you want proximity to people. But we need to be creating a face-to-face connection with all parties to conflict.” Dalziel is far from alone in this idea. Accusations abound that the tech sector — those working on IT solutions or mobile apps, for example — are still often too far removed from contexts like Afghanistan and, perhaps fairly, that tech will never be a replacement for the core of what keeps aid workers safe today: Proximity to the local community, a real and practiced sense of impartiality and solid programming.
