Civil society organisations, humanitarian aid agencies and independent media organisations frequently send staff to work in complex security environments. But many small organisations in particular do not have the necessary knowledge, experience or procedures to keep their people safe in such contexts.

In response, Open Briefing is today publishing a set of 20 good practice standards for travel security. While the emphasis is on ensuring the physical safety and security of staff during travel, the Minimum Operating Travel Security Standards (MOTSS) are built on the concept of ‘holistic security’, which also promotes digital security and wellbeing and resilience.

MOTSS is published under a Creative Commons licence. The standards can be freely adapted by non-profit organisations wishing to develop their own travel security procedures or used as the basis for non-commercial travel security apps and tools. An example of this is Frontline Travel, a free app that we are also launching today for freelance journalists and independent media organisations travelling or working in high-risk environments.

The Minimum Operating Travel Security Standards are available to view or download now at https://motss.org/.

MOTSS and Frontline Travel continue the ‘(Em)powered by Open Briefing’ series that we introduced two weeks ago with the Holistic Security Toolkit. They cement our commitment to producing multilingual tools to help under-resourced civil society organisations and activists ensure their own safety and security.

This project was possible thanks to the support of the National Endowment for Democracy and Oak Foundation.