Accountability Atlas

Evidence for protection. Action for accountability.

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🌍 What is Accountability Atlas?

Accountability Atlas is an early-stage, open-source civic-technology project for organizing verified public-interest evidence, documenting civic and humanitarian harm, and supporting lawful, accountable public action.

The project is being built as calm, transparent infrastructure for:

• evidence review;
• documentation standards;
• legal and policy tracking;
• country accountability pages;
• organization directories;
• civic action templates;
• responsible public communication.

Important

Accountability Atlas is not a rage platform, a doxing project, a replacement for humanitarian organizations, or a legal authority.
It is a public-interest technology project focused on careful documentation, lawful action, and human dignity.

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🧭 Mission

To help citizens, researchers, journalists, civil society, and future partners work with evidence responsibly by building open civic infrastructure for:

Area	Purpose
📚 Evidence documentation	Organize source-cited public-interest material
⚖️ Legal and policy tracking	Track court processes, public records, votes, and institutional positions
🏛️ Country accountability	Show what governments and institutions say, do, and fail to do
🧩 Organization directory	List relevant humanitarian, legal, research, and civic actors responsibly
📣 Lawful civic action	Help people contact representatives and act without harassment or incitement
🛡️ Safety and methodology	Protect people, avoid misinformation, and prevent reckless publication

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🎯 Project Focus

The first platform focus is Gaza and the wider regional humanitarian crisis.

The long-term architecture should be modular enough to support other atrocity and humanitarian-crisis contexts where verified documentation, accountability, and lawful civic action are needed.

The initial work centers on creating a clear structure for:

• evidence documentation and source review;
• civic action templates and policy tracking;
• public-interest research workflows;
• country and institution accountability pages;
• humanitarian and legal organization directories;
• contributor onboarding and governance;
• safety, privacy, anti-doxing, and correction policies.

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🚦 Current Status

Accountability Atlas is currently an early-stage open-source initiative.

It is not yet:

• a registered NGO;
• a charity;
• a formal legal entity;
• a humanitarian organization;
• a formal partner of any listed organization.

Organizations, institutions, courts, reports, and public sources may be referenced for research and documentation purposes. Listing or citation does not imply endorsement, partnership, approval, or affiliation.

Note

The current priority is foundation-building: documentation, methodology, governance, public-facing structure, contributor workflows, and the first static MVP.

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🗂️ Repository Contents

This repository contains:

• project planning and product direction;
• methodology and policy documents;
• contribution and governance guidance;
• issue and pull request templates;
• licensing and safety notices.

Key files

File	Purpose
README.md	Project overview
PRD.md	Product requirements and platform vision
CONTRIBUTING.md	How to contribute
CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md	Community behavior rules
SECURITY.md	Responsible security reporting
GOVERNANCE.md	Decision-making and maintainer structure
ROADMAP.md	Planned phases
NOTICE.md	License and material-usage notice

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🧱 Planned MVP

The first MVP should be simple, static, credible, and safe.

/
about
methodology
legal-tracker
countries/belgium
countries/eu
organizations
actions
press
contribute

MVP priorities

Priority	Page / Feature	Goal
1	Home	Explain the project calmly and clearly
2	Methodology	Show how sources are reviewed and classified
3	Legal tracker	Track public legal and institutional processes
4	Belgium page	Create the first country accountability page
5	EU page	Create the first institution-level accountability page
6	Organization directory	List relevant organizations without implying partnership
7	Action hub	Provide lawful civic action templates
8	Contribute page	Invite careful contributors into the project

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🤝 Who We Are Looking For

We are looking for careful contributors, not noise.

This project may be useful for people with experience or interest in:

• frontend development;
• backend and data architecture;
• UX and UI design;
• accessibility;
• civic technology;
• public-interest research;
• legal or human-rights review;
• international humanitarian law research;
• OSINT and source verification;
• data privacy and security;
• documentation;
• communications;
• translation;
• open-source governance.

You do not need to be an expert to help. Small, careful contributions are welcome.

Good first contributions

• improve documentation;
• review wording for clarity and safety;
• design landing page sections;
• create accessible UI components;
• structure country accountability pages;
• improve source methodology;
• translate public project materials;
• review issue descriptions;
• propose safer language;
• help break large roadmap items into small issues.

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🛠️ How to Contribute

Start here:

1. Read README.md, CONTRIBUTING.md, CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md, and SECURITY.md.
2. Review the project roadmap and methodology documents.
3. Look for issues labeled good first issue, documentation, design, research, or help wanted.
4. Open a pull request with a focused change.
5. Keep discussion calm, factual, and respectful.

Warning

Do not upload sensitive evidence, private testimony, personal data, identifying media, leaked materials, or confidential partner information to this repository.

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📣 Outreach and Collaboration

Accountability Atlas is open to collaboration with:

• developers;
• designers;
• researchers;
• writers;
• translators;
• security reviewers;
• legal and human-rights reviewers;
• civic-tech contributors;
• communications contributors.

At this stage, we are especially interested in:

• technical review of the first MVP direction;
• design review of the landing page and visual identity;
• review of the evidence methodology;
• review of legal and safety language;
• help creating the first country accountability page structures;
• help turning the roadmap into small, buildable issues.

If you are part of an organization, NGO, newsroom, research group, civic-tech community, or academic project and want to give feedback, please open an issue or contact the project maintainers.

Caution

We do not claim partnership, endorsement, approval, or affiliation with any organization unless that relationship has been confirmed in writing.

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🛡️ Safety Principles

The project follows these principles:

Principle	Meaning
Accuracy before speed	Publish carefully, not impulsively
Protection before publication	Avoid exposing people to harm
Evidence before opinion	Separate sources, claims, and interpretation
Consent before exposure	Do not publish sensitive material recklessly
Accountability without dehumanization	Focus on responsibility, not hatred
Lawful action only	No harassment, threats, or incitement
No doxing	Do not target private individuals
No sensitive uploads	Do not submit witness material without a reviewed secure process

Important

When in doubt, do not publish.

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🚫 What This Project Will Not Do

Accountability Atlas will not:

• encourage violence, harassment, or intimidation;
• publish doxing material;
• target private individuals;
• treat unverified social media content as verified evidence;
• claim false partnerships;
• collect sensitive witness material before a reviewed secure process exists;
• handle donations on behalf of organizations without legal and financial review;
• provide legal advice.

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🧪 Source and Evidence Approach

The project should clearly distinguish between different kinds of sources.

Source type	Example use
Court records	Legal tracker and procedural status
UN / humanitarian reports	Situation summaries and humanitarian context
Human-rights NGO reports	Legal and factual analysis
Investigative journalism	Corroborated reporting and context
OSINT material	Leads requiring verification
Social media posts	Unverified leads unless independently verified
User submissions	Not accepted until secure review process exists

Verification states may include:

Lead
Preserved
Corroborated
Verified
Disputed
Corrected
Withdrawn

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🧾 Recommended Reading Order

If you are new to the project, start here:

1. PRD.md
2. docs/methodology.md
3. docs/source-policy.md
4. docs/legal-language-policy.md
5. docs/ethics-and-safety.md
6. CONTRIBUTING.md
7. ROADMAP.md

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🧑‍💻 Maintainer Notes

Until a wider maintainer team exists:

• keep main protected where possible;
• use pull requests for changes;
• keep sensitive work outside the public repo;
• do not give unknown contributors write/admin access;
• use issues for transparent public tasks;
• use private channels for legal, security, or sensitive partner discussions.

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📬 Contact

Project contact details will be added here.

For now, contributors can use:

• GitHub Issues for public project discussion;
• Pull Requests for proposed changes;
• Security reporting instructions in SECURITY.md.

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📜 License

This repository uses a dual-license model:

• Software source code: AGPL-3.0-or-later
• Documentation and written project content: CC BY-SA 4.0

Brand assets, third-party materials, evidence, testimony, witness submissions, images, videos, partner-provided materials, and sensitive source material are not covered by these licenses unless explicitly stated.

See NOTICE.md and the LICENSES/ folder for details.

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🕊️ Closing Principle

Be smaller than you want to appear, but more reliable than people expect!

Accountability Atlas earns trust through calm language, transparent methodology, careful contributors, public corrections, and a strict commitment to human dignity.