In Exile from Family and Friends

Nikola Jovanovic was a senior in high school in 1999 when his prom was canceled. The reason: NATO planes bombed his hometown of Pec in Kosovo. Shortly afterward Jovanovic fled to Belgrade, where he now works for an Austrian bank, and he recently caught up with old classmates on Facebook. For many refugees who, like Jovanovic, resettled in relatively wealthy circumstances, social-networking sites have been a boon for finding lost friends and family members.

Now social-networking technologies are being fashioned to reach refugees who aren't part of the Facebook set—tens of millions of internally displaced people and millions of international refugees, including roughly 1.5 million children separated from their parents. In recent years, several refugee groups have had success with Web 2.0 technologies customized to specific populations. They've also used the tools to monitor crises and manage the settlement of new refugees.

Last year the United Nations' refugee agency, in collaboration with Google, began attaching satellite maps, pictures, videos, and on-the-ground oral accounts to images on Google Earth. The result is an elaborate picture of -refugee hot spots that has served as a logistical tool for NGOs and a resource to Internet—connected refugees. Dubbed Google Earth Outreach, it allows exiles and humanitarian workers to locate U.N. refugee camps on a map, better understand the impact that refugee flows have on nearby countries, and help the U.N. plan logistics.

The Crisis in Darfur project, launched in 2007, has also created a layered map. It includes detailed information on 1,600 of the 2,000-plus villages in the Darfur region that have been razed or emptied, or that are severely damaged. The map links to eyewitness testimonials from survivors and various experts, in audio and video form, allowing exiles to discover what life is like for some of the 2.5 million displaced people from the region.

A big challenge in getting many refugees to make use of the services is fear: those who have fled massacres or authorities who spy and torture tend to be reluctant to make themselves known online. In some cases, they are even afraid to contact family members back home because it could leave those loved ones vulnerable to reprisals. To help them, the Danish nonprofit Refugees United has put together a database (refunite.org) especially for refugees who don't want to include their names or any other sensitive information. Searches can use nicknames, code words, scars, birthmarks, tattoos, or any other marker that might serve as a personal clue. "It is about sharing information with people who are not normally sitting in social networks," says Christopher Mikkelsen, who created the organization with his brother David.

Because many refugees still do not have access to computers or the Internet, Refugees United has begun pilot programs to place computer terminals amid large refugee populations in Egypt and Brazil. Hundreds of refugees have already logged their profiles onto a secure system; the organization aims to get 25,000 people into its database by year's end. The group is also working to adapt its database to cell phones, which are far more accessible in refugee circles. High-tech socializing is getting a global reach.

© 2009