RAJA ALTHAIBANI
Strategic Advisory in Media, Technology, and Information Systems
Raja Althaibani is a strategist and advisor working at the intersection of media, technology, and institutional systems. Her work focuses on information integrity, digital evidence, online harms, and narrative systems across the Middle East, North Africa (MENA), and global contexts.
She advises organizations, media institutions, and leadership teams on how to operate, adapt, and make decisions under pressure in rapidly evolving information environments.
Languages: English, Arabic
Base: Istanbul, Turkey; New York, United States
2024 Inaugural Peabody Global Impact Award recipient
For nearly two decades, I have worked at the intersection of evidence, media, and technology, examining how they shape reporting, public narrative, accountability, and policy during crises and structural change. My work helps move frontline knowledge and decentralized field practice into the center of institutional strategy, policy, and everyday decision-making.
I advise leaders, practitioners, journalists, and public-interest communities navigating high-stakes information environments. My focus is not only on responding to harm, but on helping institutions and networks anticipate change, strengthen judgment, and build systems that are more credible, adaptive, and fit for current conditions. My work specializes in:
information integrity and media systems
digital evidence and documentation ecosystems
online harms, extremism, and platform dynamics
narrative strategy and public communication
institutional adaptation and decision systems
crisis response and operational strategy
A core part of my practice is building future-ready, globally inclusive communities of practice. I create pathways for emerging expertise to move beyond closed silos and into the institutions, policies, and public-interest environments they are meant to strengthen. By doing so, I help equip the next generation of practitioners with the knowledge, skills, and judgment required to operate under pressure and respond to rapid change.
Previously, I spent more than a decade at WITNESS advancing crisis-response models, capacity-building programs, and documentation strategies across MENA / SWANA and other high-risk contexts. That work informed media practice, policy engagement, and accountability efforts related to Syria, Palestine, Yemen, Sudan, Iraq, and Lebanon, among others.
Today, my work centers on strategic advisory, field-shaping initiatives, and public-facing analysis that support leaders, journalists, institutions, and communities of practice grappling with the political realities of technology, evidence, media, and power. I have also expanded into independent writing, strategic advisory, critical analysis of media and platform systems, and new forms of cultural and narrative work. This includes writing on media environment and practice, online harms, narrative power, and platform incentive structures, as well as broader work on how truth, evidence, and representation are changing in an AI-shaped media environment.
Through ventures such as Arab Hyphenated, I also extend this work into the cultural sphere, using identity, storytelling, and narrative strategy to challenge one-dimensional representations and expand the space for more layered, socially rooted forms of belonging and public imagination.
MY TRAJECTORY
My approach is rooted in a unique trajectory: shifting from formal criminal justice training into the first generation of citizen journalism and new media field documentation, working at scale before the practice was formalized. This transition from the frontlines to systems design allows me to close the distance between theory and practice—designing approaches that break gatekeeping, redistribute capability, and enable meaningful innovation that works in the real world, not just on paper.
MY MISSION
My overall mission is to work at the intersection of power, emerging technology, and institutional adaptation to guide systems toward greater equity. I focus on de-gatekeeping the human rights movement by shifting decision-making power away from large international institutions and into the hands of grassroots communities and independent truth-tellers. My goal is to empower individuals to recognize their own narrative agency and take an active role in shaping the political and social systems that affect their lives. The mission of my venture, Arab Hyphenated, is to transform fashion into a vehicle for cultural connection, identity, and justice.
WHAT I DO
STRATEGIC ADVISORY
I advise on media systems, technology, information integrity, digital evidence, crisis response, online harms, and accountability. My work has included helping organizations, practitioners, and cross-sector teams navigate documentation strategy, evidence preservation, platform harms, and emerging technology challenges.
DIGITAL EVIDENCE & ACCOUNTABILITY
I have worked extensively on how video, open-source information, and digital documentation can support justice, advocacy, and legal accountability. This includes practical methods for filming, preserving, verifying, archiving, and ethically using visual evidence in high-risk contexts.
TECH POLICY & PLATFORM ACCOUNTABILITY
My work has included advising on content moderation, community-guidelines issues, evidence preservation, documentation safety, platform bias, synthetic media, and the risks that automated systems pose to human rights documentation and public-interest evidence.
TRAINING & CAPACITY BUILDING
I have designed, led, contributed to, and supported trainings, workshops, lectures, and public educational resources for journalists, human rights defenders, investigators, lawyers, activists, and cross-disciplinary practitioners.
MEDIA ANALYSIS AND PUBLIC WRITING & ENGAGEMENTS
I write and speak on media systems, online harms, digital trust, extremism, narrative power, testimony, and the changing relationship between technology, truth, and accountability.
FIELD REPORTING, DOCUMENTATION, AND STORY TELLING
My background includes frontline journalism, photography/video documentation, and citizen reporting during the Arab uprisings, especially in Yemen, as well as later work on visual documentation, testimony, and the role of images in advocacy, memory, and justice.
PROFESSIONAL IMPACT & REGIONAL EXPERTISE (2011–2025)
KEY METRICS
1,100+ Media, Legal, and Human Rights Practitioners Trained
75+ Professional Trainings Conducted
200+ Speaking Engagements & Public Events
12+ Crisis & Rapid Responses
Multilingual Expert – Delivering work and training in 2 languages with deep regional fluency (Arabic and English)
MENA REGIONAL FOOTPRINT
Extensive on-the-ground experience and specialized resource development across the Middle East and North Africa, including:
North Africa: Sudan, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Morocco, Western Sahara, Algeria
Levant: Palestine, Israel, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan
Gulf & Peninsula: Yemen, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, and Iran
Selected Work & Representative Contributions
Creator and co-creator of a large library of interdisciplinary resources and training materials: guides, methodologies, tip sheets, technical, subject matter (and region-specific) training curricula for practitioners worldwide. Available in Arabic and English, and many other languages.
DIGITAL EVIDENCE & ACCOUNTABILITY
Video as Evidence Field Guide (Co-developer / Contributor / Co-creator) – The foundational manual for activists and lawyers on using video to secure justice.
Video as Evidence in the Media: Jurisprudence Report (Contributor / Facilitator) – Analysis of visual media in legal proceedings. [View Interview with Pilnet].
Berkeley Protocol on Digital Open Source Investigations (Peer Reviewer) – The first global standard for digital evidence collection.
ICC Forum & Cyber Evidence (ICC Expert & Contributor) – Expert opinions on international debates regarding cyber evidence in criminal law.
Justice and Accountability for SGBV (Contributor) – Specialized WITNESS guidance on video for legal cases involving sexual and gender-based violence.
CRISIS RESPONSE & REGIONAL DOCUMENTATION
Gaza Media Resources Platform (Co-Lead, and Creator) – Rapid-response hub for verification and safety tools for documenters in Gaza.
Perpetrator Video in MENA(Creator / Expert) – Research on the ethical and evidentiary challenges of footage captured by abusers.
Filming the Aftermath of Aerial Attacks (Creator / Lead Expert) – Field guidance for documenting munitions and structural damage. Guides, tip sheets, and training materials.
Trapped in the Gulf: Exposing Migrant Abuse (Creator / Lead Expert) – Investigative series on the kafala system and migrant rights.
Regional Documentation Guides (Creator / Lead Expert) – Archiving resources and curricula tailored for the MENA region.
FIELD GUIDES & PRACTITIONER RESOURCES
Activists’ Guide to Archiving Video (Coordinator / Contributor) – Region-specific curricula for long-term digital preservation.
How to Film Protests (Co-creator) – Video series on safe documentation techniques in high-risk environments.
Well-being & Vicarious Trauma (Creator / Expert) – Ethics-focused support for researchers working with graphic imagery.
Digital Safety & Anti-Doxxing (Co-creator)) – Protection resources for human rights defenders against surveillance.
WITNESS Tip Sheets (Creator / Co-creator) – Actionable technical guidance for human rights documenters globally.
SPEAKING, TRAININGS, AND CONVENINGS
Areas of public speaking and teaching
Digital evidence and accountability
Information integrity
Media systems and narrative power
Technology policy and platform accountability
Human rights documentation
Open-source investigations
Online harms and radicalization
Eyewitness and perpetrator video
Crisis reporting and documentation ethics
MENA media and rights issues
Dedication
This work is dedicated to the men and women who carried responsibility before us, often without recognition, formal power, or written record, so others could inherit, build, and endure.
In particular, it honors my grandfather, Al-Thaly, an elder in my family lineage and a tribal mediator in Yemen. Though illiterate, he spent decades preventing conflict between tribes and community members, upholding integrity, restraint, and accountability in contexts where state systems often failed to maintain peace or cohesion.
When formal structures fractured, responsibility did not disappear. It emerged, reclaimed by those who truly own it, and those most equipped to carry it.
That lineage shapes how I understand authority, trust, strategy, perseverance, and true impact today. True authority does not rest in titles, institutional polish, or branding. It rests in judgment, credibility, and stewardship.
The most durable systems are not the ones that appear strongest; they are the ones sustained by people capable of responsibility when it matters, for the people it truly matters to.
This work carries that legacy forward: honoring those who practiced responsibility without reward, for the collective, and preparing those who will inherit strained systems to do the same.
With integrity. Thank you, Jadu. الله يرحمك
*** Work spans strategic advisory, training and capacity, information and media, and digital evidence systems, online harms and AI