Today the Human Rights Foundation (HRF) has its most recent round of Bitcoin Development Fund subsidies, according to a press release sent to Bitcoin Magazine.
10 BTC, currently worth $590,000 at the time of writing, will be awarded to 20 different projects around the world that focus on tech education for people living under authoritarian regimes, Bitcoin development conferences, decentralization of mining, and providing more private financial solutions to human rights groups. The primary focus areas for these grants are Latin America, Asia, and Africa.
While the HRF did not disclose how much money each project is specifically receiving, the following 20 projects are the recipients of today’s grant round, worth a total of 10 BTC, or 1 billion satoshis:
African Bitcoinersa community dedicated to onboarding Africans to Bitcoin. Key initiatives include a “Bitcoin for Beginners” course, free Lightning payment routing for merchants, and the ability to purchase airtime and data with Bitcoin. As the continent grapples with political and economic turmoil, Bitcoin can serve as a path to financial sovereignty. Funding will support the production of educational materials and operational costs including salaries, infrastructure, and tools.
Stratospherea Bitcoin Core developer focused on improving the privacy and decentralization of the Bitcoin protocol. Their work includes improving the privacy of peer-to-peer (P2P) networks, reviewing critical pull requests in the libsecp library, and mentoring new talent. Their work is important to protecting users from financial surveillance and censorship by authoritarian regimes. This funding will support their full-time development efforts.
Corala Nostr web client designed to create a social media experience that empowers individuals. Developed by stock offerRecent and planned updates include customizable and shareable feeds, enhanced direct messages for privacy, and the development of encrypted public and private communities. By leveraging Nostr, Coracle could provide a new censorship-resistant communications platform for human rights activists. Funding will support the hiring of a full-time developer.
Portan open-source ecash wallet built to provide better Bitcoin privacy. Harbor was started by the Mutiny team and is now an independent project led by Ben Carman And Paul Molenaar. Harbor spans multiple currencies, is Tor-only, and automates fund management. Financial tools like Harbor can help human rights defenders facing government surveillance by providing strong privacy guarantees. This grant will support the development of Harbor’s 1.0 production release.
The 256 Foundation mission is to make Bitcoin mining free and open, supporting developments in the Bitaxe initiative is the flagship project to achieve that mission. Bitaxe provides an affordable entry point to home mining, offers protection from surveillance in authoritarian regimes, and allows individuals to mine Bitcoin discreetly. Funds will support multiple engineers who build upon and improve Bitaxe with the goal of making the Bitaxe form factor available to more ASIC manufacturers.
Kiveclaira community in the Democratic Republic of Congo that educates individuals about Bitcoin. Led by Glory WanzavalereCo-founder of Africa Bitcoin Conference, Kiveclair organizes monthly meetups, training sessions for activists, journalists and developers, and provides shelter for refugees. The company is also planning its first local conference. The funds will cover the costs of meetups, educational materials, equipment purchases and renting an educational space.
Jeff Gardnera full-time developer focused on bringing end-to-end encryption to Nostr Direct and Group Messages without centralized servers, making them resistant to state intervention. His work is vital to enabling private communication channels for individuals and activists. Funding will support continued development, provide bounties to community contributors, and perform a security audit of the project.
Silencea self-custodial, privacy-focused Bitcoin wallet with built-in Silent Payments. Developed by Louis SingerSilentium can help protect activists’ financial privacy by allowing them to receive Bitcoin donations via unique addresses generated by a static public key. This prevents surveillance regimes from linking transactions to activists’ identities. This grant will support the wallet’s infrastructure, including a full cloud node, web server, and hiring a software developer.
BTC Shule, an educational initiative of Belyï Nobel for it. It provides Burundians with the knowledge and skills to use Bitcoin for uncensored payments under Burundi’s authoritarian regime. The project is structured around three main initiatives: a bilingual (Kirundi and French) educational platform, a physical center to organize meetups, and a Bitcoin support community via Whatsapp and Telegram. The grant will support the development of the digital platform, educational materials, and the construction of the center.
EttaWalletan open-source, self-custodial mobile Lightning wallet from Collin Lovea software developer and co-founder/CTO of Splice Africa. The wallet is designed to improve usability and accessibility. It seeks to challenge the dominance of custodial wallets and empower citizens in the Global South to take full control of their funds. This grant will support further development of the wallet, enhance localization efforts, and foster a growing community of users.
Tor relay operator associations to support higher network reliability and performance as recommended by the Tor Project. Funding will enable relay operator associations to deploy nodes that improve the stability and reliability of onion services and increase the network’s resilience to DOS attacks. Tor is vital to human rights activists, as are Bitcoin and Lightning nodes that run onion services.
Rikto Xonghotia Bitcoin education initiative led by Anurag Saikia, Basanta Goswami, and Pallab Goswami. The project aims to create a Bitcoin circular economy in the state of Assam (a region characterized by underdevelopment) and offers online Bitcoin education in Assamese. It also plans to set up a physical Bitcoin center in the town of Titabar. This grant will support teacher salaries, development of the center, and acquisition of Bitcoin nodes and mining equipment to stimulate local economic growth.
Yes Bitcoin Haitia grassroots organization led by Val, Papouche, and Armand. It aims to empower Haitians living in political and financial turmoil with Bitcoin. As a new project, it will proceed in phases: first, project leaders will complete the Bitcoin Diploma course offered by The core; then they translate educational materials into Haitian Creole and organize workshops. The funding will support the salaries of project leaders, the purchase of equipment and the production of educational materials.
Bitcoin Indonesiaan educational initiative led by Dimas, Marius, Keypleb, and Diana. It focuses on building an educational platform in Bahasa Indonesia (local language), growing the local Bitcoin community, and connecting Indonesian talent with Bitcoin-related businesses to boost career opportunities. It has also successfully hosted the country’s largest Bitcoin conference. This grant will support content creation, community outreach, and operational costs.
Bitcoin++a Bitcoin-only developer conference series organized by software developers and educators Lisa Neigut. The conference features long talks and workshops for developers eager to delve into the complexities of Bitcoin technology. Held in cities including Mexico City, Buenos Aires, and Austin, Bitcoin++ has explored key topics such as scripts, mempool, and soon eCash. Funds will cover travel expenses for developers from authoritarian countries to attend the upcoming Bitcoin++ mints ecash conference in Berlin.
TABConfa Bitcoin conference organized by Michael Tidwell in Atlanta, GA. The mission is to create a forum for protocol and application developers to debate and collaborate on Bitcoin. Through collaborative workshops and interactive activities, participants can share their insights, knowledge, and experience to advance Bitcoin development and innovation. Funds will be used to cover conference costs and travel expenses for developers who require financial assistance.
Baltic honey badgerThe world’s first non-profit, Bitcoin-only conference hosted by Wait, waitWith its cypherpunk roots, the conference aims to stimulate discussions about technologies that support financial freedom, security, and privacy, particularly for those in authoritarian regimes. Funding will cover travel expenses for activists and human rights defenders to deepen their knowledge of Bitcoin as a human rights tool.
LaBitconf And Decentralizetwo annual conferences in Argentina. LaBitconf, hosted by Rodolfo Andragnesis the longest-running Bitcoin conference in Latin America. Funds cover travel expenses for software developers and keynote speakers. Descentralizar, a one-day event held in three cities across the country, offers debates, workshops, and networking opportunities for attendees. Funds also cover travel expenses and conference equipment. Given Argentina’s ongoing economic challenges, these conferences offer Argentinians the chance to explore Bitcoin as a tool for financial freedom.
Satsconfthe largest Bitcoin-only conference in South America. Held in São Paulo, Brazil’s economic hub, Satsconf connects the local community with global thought leaders including macroeconomists, veteran Bitcoin educators, freedom activists, and developers shaping the future of Bitcoin. Funds will cover speaker travel, event logistics, and the hackathon.
Solidarity Summit: Standing with Political Prisoners, an event in Vienna organized by Hager Eissa which unites former political prisoners, human rights activists and others to address the challenges faced by political prisoners. The Summit promotes dialogue, advocacy and support for political prisoners worldwide and serves as a catalyst for change. HRF support will help add a financial freedom component to the program. A documentary will also be produced to further highlight these issues. Funds will cover venue and event logistics, program development, speaker fees and film production.
The HRF is a nonpartisan, nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization that promotes and protects human rights worldwide, with a focus on closed societies. The HRF continues to raise support for the Bitcoin Development Fundand interested donors can find more information on how to donate bitcoin hereApplications for subsidy support from the HRF can be submitted here.