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OTF является небольшим некоммерческой организацией, которая создает технологии уклонения от слежки правительством. Она помогает организациям в поддержку демократии по всему миру.

Председатель совета OTF Карен Корнблю заявила, что данное действие поставит под риск активистов, действующих в странах с репрессивным режимом.

"Они стали более уязвимы" Корнблю передала изданию the Guardian. "С точки зрения США это подрывает базисный инструмент, который мы используем для защиты демократических ценностей и укрытия тех, которые ищут свою свободу за рубежом".

Она добавила, что заморозка средств также означает, что гражданам этих стран будет труднее слышать Голос Америки, главного вещателя USAGM и финансируемые ими станции вроде Радио Свобода Европа и Радио Свобода Азия, так как им будет труднее справиться с методами глушения правительствами названных стран.

Пэк согласился более месяц назад появиться перед комитетом иностранных дел, но потом отменил и проигнорировал повестку из комитета.

The OTF is a small non-profit organisation that develops technologies for evading cyber-surveillance and for circumventing internet and radio blackouts imposed by authoritarian regimes. It provides daily help to pro-democracy movements in installing and maintaining them, with the aim of staying at least one step ahead of the state.

The chair of the OTF board, Karen Kornbluh, said the end of funding from the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM), which Pack has been running since June, would mean that activists living under repressive regimes were at increased risk.

“They are more vulnerable,” Kornbluh told the Guardian. “It means from a US perspective, it’s really undermining this core tool that we have for protecting democratic values and protecting those who are seeking their freedoms overseas.”

She added the freeze also meant that the populations in those countries will find it harder to listen to the Voice of America, the USAGM’s flagship broadcaster, and USAGM-funded stations like Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Radio Free Asia, because it would be more difficult to overcome state jamming methods.

“We have these agencies and we’re kneecapping them,” said Kornbluh, a former US ambassador and now director of the digital innovation and democracy initiative at the German Marshall Fund of the United States.

Pack had agreed over a month ago to appear before the House foreign affairs committee on Thursday, but cancelled with a few days notice and then ignored a committee subpoena to attend.

Since taking over USAGM in June, Pack – an ally of the rightwing ideologue and former Trump adviser Stephen Bannon – purged all the top management and boards of the broadcasters under its control, froze spending, and elevated the profile of pro-administration comment in relation to news.
Voice of America: independence fears after Trump ally purges senior officials
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Kornbluh and former USAGM officials testifying before the foreign affairs committee described a climate of chaos and creeping authoritarianism at the agency that was sapping the credibility of VOA, RFE/RL and other US broadcasters, with consequences for US national security.

They also said Pack was endangering journalists by refusing to renew the visas for foreign journalists working for VOA, leading to their deportation, potentially to countries where they could be at risk.

In some cases, the management has intervened with US immigration and citizenship services to prevent the journalists from securing other visas, and even bought unsolicited tickets home for VOA reporters.

“They want to demonstrate that as many people as possible are returning back to their countries,” one of the affected VOA journalists said. “I feel like we serve his purpose of America First, foreigners out, media are bad. I would never expect that from a democracy.”

Pack claimed to have an administrative meeting on Thursday which meant he could not attend the congressional hearing, but the committee chair, Eliot Engel, noted that the USAGM meeting appeared to have been called long after Pack first agreed to appear in Congress.

Pack’s office has suggested that visas and funds were frozen over security concerns, but Kornbluh denied allegations that OTF staff used Zoom and were careless with computer drives. The Fund staff do not use Zoom and uses for the cloud rather than physical drives for storage, she said.

Last month, OTF took USAGM to court, resulting in the reinstatement of Kornbluh and its president Laura Cunningham, who Pack had sought to purge, but the congressionally-approved funds have still not been unblocked.

Witnesses at Thursday’s hearing said Pack’s motives for hollowing out the agency were unclear. The USAGM did not respond to a request for comment.