Let’s Talk Responsible Digital: Building Tech Together with Folks Who Need It Most
Hey there! Let’s dive into something super important, something we’ve been pouring our hearts and minds into: making digital tech work *for* everyone, especially those who are often left behind. We’re calling it “Responsible Digital,” and it’s all about co-creating safe, wise, and secure digital tools and interventions alongside vulnerable groups. Think about it – having the skills and knowledge to navigate the online world is crucial for *everyone*, but it becomes absolutely critical when someone’s digital literacy is low, access is limited, and life is already precarious. We’re talking about vulnerable migrants here, folks navigating complex journeys and facing unique challenges.
We’ve been reflecting on our work, using a cool framework called Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI), specifically its operational version, AREA Plus. We applied this lens to two projects where we worked *with* vulnerable groups to build digital stuff aimed at making their lives better. And guess what? Through this process, we realised something was missing, so we added a new ‘sustainability’ piece, evolving AREA Plus into what we’re now calling the AREAS framework. It’s our little contribution to the world of methodology!
This whole journey has been about more than just building apps or websites. It’s about highlighting *how* we work with vulnerable groups, promoting responsible digital practices, and contributing knowledge, especially in contexts like Africa, South East Asia, and South America, which are often less researched than Western settings.
Why “Responsible Digital” Matters, Especially for Vulnerable Folks
So, what exactly *is* Responsible Digital? At its core, it’s about designing and using digital technologies ethically and responsibly. It’s about knowing the risks – cybersecurity threats, harassment, fake news, you name it – and building in safeguards. For vulnerable people, like labour migrants facing exploitation, these risks are amplified. Imagine having limited digital skills, maybe an old, slow phone, and urgent needs that might push you into risky online behaviour. These are the “unintended impacts” we need to anticipate and address.
We’ve seen how new tech, even something as flashy as generative AI, brings this focus on responsible innovation back into the spotlight. But honestly, there’s not a ton of literature out there about doing this responsibly when working with people who have limited digital skills and resources. And the contexts we worked in – South Africa and Nepal – have their own unique flavours of challenges, different from what you might see in Western countries. We’re talking about migration status, intersectional inequalities, low digital literacy, connectivity issues, and socio-cultural discrimination. For undocumented individuals, asylum seekers, or women, the risks can escalate to violence, trafficking, and exploitation. It really underscores the need for interventions that are *tailored* and *protective*.
Our Journey: From Understanding to Co-Creation
Our research wasn’t just academic; it was deeply rooted in practice. We were part of a big project looking at South-South migration. Our piece focused on digital technologies, inequality, and migration. We brought migrants, civil society organisations, tech developers, and researchers together to figure out how digital interventions could tackle migrant-defined inequalities and genuinely improve lives.
We structured our work in three phases. First, we did online surveys to get a lay of the land – how were migrants using tech? Second, we conducted interviews and focus groups, both online and in-person, to really dig into their migration experiences and digital needs. This phase was crucial for understanding the real-world stuff. And third, the exciting part: we *co-created* digital interventions right there in Nepal and South Africa, using all the insights we’d gathered.
In this third phase, we didn’t just show up with ready-made solutions. Nope. We took on the role of facilitators, adopting a local-centric approach. We firmly believe that digital tech can be a force for good *and* harm, that it has unintended consequences, that context is everything, and most importantly, that we *must* work *with* the people affected. Our approach was built on responsible digital practices and ethical considerations from the get-go.
Much of the existing talk about digital tech and migration focuses on how it’s used to manage or even control migrants. There’s a real gap in discussing responsible digital interventions designed specifically to *support* them, not regulate or monitor them. We need a shift towards prioritising migrants’ rights, agency, and digital well-being. And while the benefits of tech for migrants are often highlighted (connecting with family, accessing news), the potential harms – surveillance, inequalities in access and skills – are often overlooked, especially in the South-South migration contexts we focused on.
Governments and big organisations are increasingly using digital identity tech, but often without meaningful consent, raising huge privacy concerns. And while movements like responsible AI are trying to make tech more ethical, they often fall short in the migration context because migrants aren’t included in the decision-making process. Participatory governance, where migrants have a say, is largely missing.
We also noticed that many well-intentioned digital initiatives for migrants fail because they don’t truly understand what migrants need. Dedicated “migrant apps” aren’t widely used; people stick to familiar platforms like WhatsApp and Facebook. This tells us we need a deeper understanding of their actual preferences and needs. Our research also highlighted the digital risks vulnerable migrants face – scams, data theft, even trafficking for young people – often against a backdrop of poor digital skills and urgent needs that make them underestimate the danger. Limited skills also prevent them from accessing essential services.
Responsible Digital, as we see it, isn’t just about safety and security (though those are huge!). It’s also about digital well-being, critical thinking, and digital citizenship. It requires both individual awareness and collective effort to create a positive online environment for everyone. But the literature often misses how to design and deploy these interventions responsibly for marginalised communities. Responsible Digital gives us a framework to look at both the development and evaluation, engaging stakeholders to ensure relevance and reduce value tensions.
Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) is a big concept covering lots of fields, aiming to make research and innovation serve the public interest and involve affected stakeholders. The AREA Plus framework (Anticipation, Reflection, Engagement, Action) is a popular way to operationalise RRI. Anticipation is about thinking ahead about impacts. Reflection is about constantly assessing what’s happening. Engagement is about bringing diverse voices in. Action is about adapting based on new insights. We chose this framework because it’s widely used and provides a structured way to look at social and ethical stuff, but we felt it needed more practical application shown. Our work demonstrates how it can be used in a real-world scenario.
Digital interventions are messy and context-dependent, with lots of competing interests. RRI/AREA Plus helps create a dialogue between stakeholders. It’s especially useful in contexts of precariousness and vulnerability, where mistakes can have serious negative impacts.
Our Research-Practice in Action: Nepal and South Africa
Let’s talk specifics. Our three-phase research kicked off with surveys in six countries, giving us a broad picture of migrant tech use. Phase two involved deep-dive interviews and focus groups in Nepal and South Africa, adapting our methods (online vs. in-person) based on local realities and the pandemic. This mix of quantitative and qualitative data gave us a rich foundation. Phase three, the focus of this paper, was all about implementing digital interventions, co-created with migrants and local tech developers.
We focused our interventions in Nepal and South Africa. Nepal is a major country of departure, with many migrants in difficult, dirty, and dangerous jobs. South Africa is a key destination, hosting diverse migrants, many in irregular situations and low-skilled work, facing significant insecurity and xenophobia. Our earlier work highlighted that *responsibility* had to be central to any interventions for vulnerable migrants.
While we had a responsible digital approach all along, we used the AREA Plus framework *after* our intervention phase to reflect on what we did and analyse it. This allowed us to share lessons learned. We used the framework’s questions to examine everything – field notes, learning materials, videos made by migrants, reflections on methods, discussions with participants and stakeholders.
In Nepal, our work started by understanding the challenges faced by Nepali migrants and their families, particularly those in Malaysia. Due to COVID, initial interviews were online. Then, we worked extensively on the ground with a wide range of partners: migrant organisations (focusing on both male and female migrants, returnees, and aspiring migrants), local tech organisations, government agencies involved in pre-departure orientation, and international organisations. Bringing all these folks together was crucial for a comprehensive approach. We organised a sandpit event that connected many stakeholders who had never met before – a valuable outcome in itself!
Through workshops and discussions, we explored migrants’ challenges with digital tech. This led to two main proposals from the participants: (i) a one-stop-shop web platform with verified information for migrants and their families, and (ii) training resources on safe, wise, and secure digital tech use. We co-designed these resources, making them free and open, available in multiple Nepali languages. We even tried to get the government to include elements in their pre-departure training and facilitated collaboration with radio broadcasters for public service messages.
Our approach in South Africa was different, partly because of our lead author’s extensive prior experience there. We collaborated with respected NGOs providing training and legal support (Scalabrini Centre of Cape Town) and outreach (Adonis Musati Project), as well as academic institutions (UCT, UNISA) and local organisations like MAGSA. Crucially, we worked alongside *migrant researchers* who deeply understood the community’s challenges.
Again, the interventions were co-created based on migrants’ stated needs: (i) training in video making skills and (ii) educational resources for safe, wise, and secure digital tech use. We worked with migrants from 11 African countries, reflecting South Africa’s diversity. We prioritised direct, face-to-face engagement post-COVID, conducting every phase *with* the migrants, while keeping local organisations in the loop. This gave us firsthand understanding and informed collective decision-making.
Workshops over two years helped migrants identify activities, co-create processes, and make decisions. They actively engaged in video production, facilitating workshops for others, and creating new learning materials, ensuring they were relevant to their realities. They truly shaped the initiatives. In both countries, responsible digital use was a central theme throughout all activities. We adapted our approach based on their concerns; for instance, migrants in one case adapted learning material to include trafficking risks for girls. We also planned for sustainability by connecting diverse stakeholders who could continue the work.
Facing the Hurdles: Challenges Along the Way
Of course, it wasn’t all smooth sailing. We hit two main challenges:
- Balancing bottom-up co-creation with the need for organisational support. Working directly with participants gave them ownership, which is fantastic. But without strong organisational backing, managing resources and strategic decisions could be tricky. In Nepal, the migrant information portal involved multiple organisations, which was great for diverse input but slowed things down. In South Africa, working directly with migrants reached diverse voices but made monitoring harder. Sometimes, partnering with organisations for sustainability means you can’t be *entirely* bottom-up.
- Securing post-project funding for monitoring and evaluation. So many grants don’t cover this crucial phase! Without funds to track long-term impact, it’s hard to assess how well the interventions are really working and to keep the collaboration going. Luckily, we managed to get some follow-on funding, allowing us to stay connected and examine impact, which is pretty rare.
Reflecting with AREA Plus (and Beyond!)
Using the AREA Plus framework to reflect on our interventions was super insightful. We looked at Anticipation, Reflection, Engagement, and Action through the lens of our co-creation activities. Our approach was all about working *with* migrants and stakeholders in their context. Migrants prioritised information sharing, while we, as facilitators, focused on highlighting and mitigating potential harms. The co-creation process, guided by responsible digital principles, naturally led to integrating safe, wise, and secure tech use.
We anticipated the importance of digital risks, but we wanted this to emerge from the migrants themselves, so they’d own the solution. This approach of facilitation and co-creation involved a constant cycle of action and reflection, getting feedback through forms, videos, and chats. The fact that migrants decided to make videos and radio messages about digital safety showed our concerns were valid and their ownership was real. We saw that co-creation, done with care, attentiveness, balanced power, and a willingness to teach and learn, really supports responsible digital practices.
However, looking back, we could have been more systematic with our formal monitoring, evaluation, and learning (MEL) processes from the start, involving stakeholders directly. While we did MEL, getting migrants to reflect on their own progress without our guidance was tough – maybe due to time, focus on delivery, or lack of experience. Still, our reflections opened doors for dissemination and new partnerships (like in Brazil!). We’ve also created opportunities to go back and evaluate the long-term impact.
We prioritised relationships between local migrant organisations, tech developers, and researchers to ensure interventions weren’t imposed from outside. Responsible digital principles grew from our attention to each context’s specific needs. We built core teams in each country and facilitated wider networks. Lack of dedicated on-site managers was a challenge for coordination, though. Maintaining strong relationships with partners throughout the project (and beyond!) was essential for ensuring they could continue the work.
Our co-design was flexible, adapting to context and emerging needs to build ownership and sustainability. This meant we, the researchers, had to really listen and be ready to challenge our own assumptions. Prioritising migrants’ wants while considering potential harms was a constant balancing act. Thinking about the practicalities and resources needed for vulnerable groups to participate long-term, especially after funding ends, is crucial.
Introducing AREAS: Adding Sustainability to the Mix
This brings us to our big takeaway: while AREA Plus is great, it felt like it was missing a crucial piece – *sustainability*. In the context of responsible digital interventions with vulnerable groups, sustainability isn’t just a nice-to-have; it’s absolutely essential. It needs to be thought about from day one because it impacts the long-term value and integrity of the work.
Sustainability usually covers economic, social, environmental, and institutional aspects. Our focus was on making co-created interventions economically viable beyond the project, potentially influencing institutions and culture, while ensuring social responsibility long-term. The intervention activities we did, and then analysed with AREA Plus, really highlighted this gap. It led us to add a new ‘Sustain’ dimension, creating the AREAS framework.
Adding ‘Sustainability’ isn’t just changing a letter; it’s a normative statement. The messy reality of keeping things going after the funding stops *should* be a core factor in all research and practice interventions, especially digital ones for vulnerable groups. Including it as a core element ensures it’s not an afterthought but central to the process, product, purpose, and people dimensions at every stage.
For the ‘process’, sustainability means addressing funding for monitoring and evaluation upfront. For the ‘product’, it means setting realistic expectations and continuously monitoring outcomes, including unintended ones, so interventions can be revised. Safe, wise, and secure digital use was central here because digital tech can cause harm. For the ‘purpose’, it’s about aligning competing interests for social good and being adaptable. We prioritised the collective approach, which was inclusive but less stable long-term as individual organisations pursued new funding. But we’ve stayed in touch to support continuity. For the ‘people’, bottom-up approaches boost inclusivity but need organisational support for sustainability. We balanced working *with* migrants with support from local organisations.
We’ve added questions to the AREAS framework to guide reflection on this new sustainability dimension, based on our experiences – both what worked well and what we wished we could have done perfectly.
Wrapping Up: Lessons Learned and Moving Forward
Our research showed that migrants use tech differently, don’t really use apps made *for* them by others, have limited knowledge of smartphone potential, and often underestimate digital risks. Literature on this from Africa, Asia, and South America is sparse, so our work provided deeper insights. We constantly refined our activities based on findings and input, ensuring our approach was responsive.
While we had a responsible digital perspective from the start, introducing the AREA Plus framework *at the end* was for analysis. Had we used a formal framework like AREAS from the outset, it might have structured the co-design more explicitly, potentially strengthening results and the framework itself. But we prioritised being migrant-led and didn’t want to impose an external structure. We now suggest using AREAS from the beginning to create a virtuous cycle of co-creation and responsible digital principles.
Practical constraints like time and resources limited our reach initially, but the ongoing commitment of some team members, enabled by new funding, has allowed us to continue engaging stakeholders and support sustainability. This kind of follow-up is rare and highlights the need for dedicated funding for post-project evaluation and impact amplification.
Our contribution to knowledge is applying RRI/AREA Plus in a sensitive, non-Western context, offering reflections on digital responsibility among vulnerable groups. While these frameworks are valuable, working in resource-constrained settings with vulnerable people demands a sensitive approach, constantly weighing the potential for harm. Sometimes, you might even need to be brave enough to call off interventions if they risk creating or worsening digital risks and inequalities.
Where responsible, socially desirable interventions *are* possible, sustainability is key, especially with limited resources. That’s why we extended AREA Plus to AREAS, adding sustainability across all stages and dimensions, with questions to guide reflection and action. Our work stresses preventing harm, even unintentional, and protecting participants from risks like data breaches, harassment, and trafficking. Vulnerable folks, including migrants and their families with limited literacy or basic devices, face unique online challenges. Researchers *must* recognise these and actively mitigate risks. Ethical considerations, clear communication, protecting data, identifying threats, adapting methods, and networking with community organisations all boost social desirability and sustainability.
Methodologically, we recommend co-design and flexibility from the start to optimise resources and meet evolving needs. We also suggest including training in safe, wise, and secure digital tech use not just for participants, but for researchers and practitioners too. All the cybersecurity materials we developed are freely available for this purpose.
Since our project ended, we’ve kept building on the data, networks, and expertise. The cybersecurity resources we created have been adapted in other countries and languages through additional funding, like in Brazil, tailoring advice for communities in ‘nas periferias’ (peri-urban areas). We also saw the urgent need for small NGOs in South Africa to improve their basic cybersecurity and developed a guide for them.
By anticipating, reflecting, engaging, acting, and focusing on *sustainability* (AREAS), our ongoing work aims to mitigate digital risks for vulnerable groups, helping them leverage the opportunities digital technologies offer safely and wisely. It’s a continuous journey, and we’re committed to walking it alongside the communities we serve.
Source: Springer
