Surreptitious Communication Design Tad Hirsch

Introduction From a social change perspective, the “design for good” (D4G) movement is surprisingly bloodless.1 As sociologists have long observed, changes in social organization—including institutional, cultural, economic, and technological innovation—largely arise from the “clash of values and interests, the tension between what is and what some groups feel ought to be, the conflict between vested interests and new strata and groups demanding their share of power, wealth, and status.”2 Social change seldom involves smooth transitions; rather, it proceeds in fits and starts, often with significant opposition by those who have a vested interest in main- taining the status quo. And yet, the D4G literature barely mentions conflict or opposition. Even when we acknowledge the role that designers can play in adversarial political struggles, we pay remarkably little attention to those on the other side.3 Perhaps this silence results from the tendency of social designers to choose seemingly uncontroversial subjects for their 1 While “design for good” suggests an projects. After all, who would oppose efforts to “improve health,” affiliation with AIGA, I intend the term “transform education,” or “encourage social responsibility”4—other here as a catchall for recent design initiatives with an explicit social change than, perhaps, pharmaceutical companies, teachers’ unions, the intent. I do not make a meaningful consumer electronics industry, and many of our elected leaders? distinction between “design for good,” Or perhaps the tendency of D4G proponents to eschew “design activism,” “design for social mention of opposition reflects something deeper about design change,” “socially engaged design,” practice. Adversaries are notably absent from design discourse or other similar terms. 2 Lewis A. Coser, “Social Conflict and more generally. Although we (and our clients) are often deeply the Theory of Social Change,” The concerned with competition, we generally imagine ourselves rac- British Journal of Sociology 8, no. 3 ing along-side in parallel lanes. We understand that others strive to (1957): 197–207. get the gig, to make the sale, to reach the finish line before we do. 3 The allusion to DiSalvo’s recent book But we generally assume that they aren’t actively trying to trip us is intentional; for all of its merits, up, and that we are entitled to legal recourse if they do. This logic the work is remarkably silent on the issue of opposition. See Carl DiSalvo, makes sense in the marketplace, where competition is carefully Adversarial Design (Cambridge, MA: regulated and policed by the State. It is less clear that the same MIT Press, 2012). assumptions apply to social change work—particularly for projects 4 To borrow a few of the more popular involving contentious social issues. formulations for D4G projects. For a comprehensive list, see http://www. aiga.org/designforgood-get-involved/ (accesed July 24, 2015).

Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 Failing to contend with contention limits our ability to effectively participate in social change. I am not suggesting that D4G hasn’t produced anything meaningful; it clearly has. How- ever, most initiatives seem to fit within a small number of arche- typal forms (like awareness campaigns, educational programs, and design competitions) many of which seem like mirror images of established commercial design practice. In contrast I would suggest that the unique nature of social change work, including the essential fact of opposition, necessitates designing in ways that ultimately may look quite different from what goes on in commercial practice. In this paper, I explore “surreptitious communication design” (SCD), a framework for designing communication systems and campaigns that address contentious political contexts. SCD seeks to create messages that are meaningful for intended recipients, but illegible and/or inaccessible for adversaries. SCD takes as its departure point the recognition that designers who challenge power relations or address contentious political issues must contend with adversaries—actors who seek to undermine projects or harm participants. Borrowing concepts from cryptography and information theory, I discuss how an SCD perspective extends the Shannon/Weaver model of communication that underpins much of traditional design practice. Drawing on real-world examples, I describe the unique challenges that surreptitious communication designers face, and the tactics they use. I then illustrate how an SCD framework shapes design activity by comparing two recent anti-human trafficking projects—one developed from an SCD perspective, the other from a traditional mass communications approach.”

Surreptitious Communication Design Vulnerable social groups, including ethnic and sexual minorities and those involved in subversive or criminal activity, often face opposition by powerful adversaries who seek to disrupt or undermine them. Such groups are under constant surveillance and contin- ual threat of public humiliation and incarceration, and are socially ostracized. Accordingly, such groups often take countermea- sures to defeat surveillance and interdiction programs. Such measures might include the use of coded messages, untraceable communications equipment, and powerful encryption software. These techniques can be effective ways of securing communications between known individuals. However, members of vulnerable social groups also need to communicate with sympathetic

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 audiences whose members are not known. They broadcast (or, 5 J.C.R. Licklider, “Televistas: Looking more precisely, to “narrowcast”5) messages to unknown but well- Ahead Through Side Windows,” in Social Speculations: Visions for our defined audiences of fellow travelers—for example, to organize Time, ed. Richard Kostelanetz (New demonstrations or publicize illicit services. These communications York: Morrow, 1971). are surreptitious, rather than secure. 6 DiSalvo and Faud-Luke provide good Many technically oriented encryption strategies are inap- examples. Although both chronicle propriate for surreptitious communications because they require the emergence of new kinds of design that parties already be known to one another. Instead, surrepti- activism, they are largely concerned with designers who operate in mainstream tious communications often rely on cultural approaches to secrecy, cultural and academic institutions and are employing schemes that are accessible and legible to the like- therefore insulated from the oppositions minded by virtue of their participation in a social group but that faced by socially vulnerable groups. See are out of reach or inscrutable to adversaries. DiSalvo, Adversarial Design and Alastair Faud-Luke, Design Activism: Beautiful Strangeness for a Sustainable World Models of Communication (London: Earthscan, 2009). SCD is predicated on the idea of opposition—the belief that power- 7 Meredith Davis, Graphic Design Theory: ful adversaries seek to disrupt or undermine message flows. This Graphic Design in Context (London: is new territory for design theory, which has largely developed Thames and Hudson, 2012). Despite alongside commercial contexts where legal and institutional its familiarity, the Shannon/Weaver model frameworks protect communications from tampering or disrup- is in some ways an odd proxy for interpersonal communication. As Craig points out, tion. Even recent design scholarship that examine design as a par- the emphasis on message fidelity doesn’t tisan political activity are notably silent on the issue of opposition.6 necessarily jive with lived experience, in As Davis observes, visual communication design is which meaning is co-produced by partici- largely based on Claude Shannon and Norbert Weaver’s mathe- pants. (See Robert T. Craig, “Communica- matical model of communication.7 This model posits messages that tion Theory as a Field,” Communication Theory 9, no. 2 [1999]: 119–61.) Consider are transmitted between senders and receivers through some sort 8 the theory’s provenance: The Shannon/ of (typically electronic) channel. According to the model, the Weaver model was developed to describe designer’s primary concerns are reducing noise and ensuring the flow of information between accurate message conveyance. machines, particularly across telephone, Subsequent theorists have enhanced Shannon and Weaver’s radio, and television networks; see model. For example, Emmert and Donaghy introduce the notion of Claude Shannon, “A Mathematical Theory of Communication,” Bell System Technical “context” to describe the influence that environmental factors play Journal 27 (1948). For better or worse, it in determining how messages are sent, received, and interpreted.9 has sub-sequently been adopted by many However, “context” here is largely understood within the signal/ in the visual communication design com- noise framework; Emmert and Donaghy cite examples such as munity as an accurate depiction of human noisy rooms and postal regulations as factors that impede the flow communication. In so doing, designers have perhaps unwittingly conflated peo- of clear communications. For our purposes, there is a significant ple and machines, transforming a techni- distinction between “noise,” which interferes with communica- cal model into a social one. Through this tions, and “opposition,” which actively disrupts it. move, interpersonal communications Alexander and Smith have proposed a “disinformation are imbued with a “phantom objectivity” model” of communication, which addresses the assumption of that arises from recasting messy relations fidelity that underlies transmission models like Shannon and between people as seemingly rational 10 links between things (see Georg Lukacs, Weaver’s. Drawing on examples from espionage and military his- History & Class Consciousness, trans. tory, Alexander and Smith describe modes of communication Rodney Livingstone (Cambridge MA: MIT whose goal is to mislead, rather than to inform. In so doing, they Press, 1972). introduce notions of adversaries and of intentionally disrupting 8 Claude Elwood Shannon and Warren Weaver, The Mathematical Theory of Communication (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1964).

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 information flows. This promising development highlights the importance of looking at communication acts that occur outside the relatively tame arena of corporate communications. I build on their work by considering non-military communications and focusing on visual rather than purely textual communications strategies.

An Expanded Scope Considering opposition as a design factor significantly expands the scope of design activity. “Scope” here refers to the limits of designers’ responsibilities. To define the scope of design is to define which knowledge and activities “count” and which ones are “out of bounds” or irrelevant. Adding adversaries to the mix expands designers’ responsibility. All of the considerations of traditional communication design—that is, crafting messages that are clear, effective, and compelling for a given audience—are still in play. However, surreptitious communication designers also contend with avoiding detection and comprehension by adversaries. Designers must analyze adversaries’ capabilities and also must consider the risks faced by those who participate in communication. They must determine the likelihood that an adversary will intercept and understand the communication, and the likely outcomes for participants if they do. Traditional communication designers do have to contend with risk. However, commercial design projects typically conceive risk in terms of wasted resources and missed opportunities or, more seriously, as the potential to generate bad publicity, damage a brand, or provoke litigation. In other words, commercial communication design is often more concerned with risks to clients than to audiences. In contrast, surreptitious communications designers are deeply concerned with risks faced by all participants. The stakes are heightened by the power relations implicit in SCD projects, which typically are undertaken by and for socially vulnerable pop- ulations. Participating in SCD projects might lead to harassment, imprisonment, and physical harm, and so designers take great care to understand and mitigate risks to all parties. Following the first principle of bioethics, the surreptitious communications designer’s responsibility is to “first, do no harm.”

Strategies: Obfuscation and Ephemerality

9 Philip Emmert and William C. Donaghy, With their expanded scope, surreptitious communications design- Human Communication: Elements and ers use design strategies to mitigate the risks posed by opposition. Contexts (Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley Chief among these strategies is obfuscation—deliberately making Longman, 1981). messages difficult to detect and interpret by adversaries. 10 James Alexander and Jonathan Smith, “Disinformation: A Taxonomy,” IEEE Security and Privacy 9, no. 1 (2011): 58–63.

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 Obfuscation is a core principle of cryptography, the art of coded communications. For the most part, modern cryptography relies on advanced mathematics to encode messages in ways that are very difficult for unauthorized parties to interpret. Surreptitious communications designers might use encryption protocols and software, particularly to secure communications with collaborators. However, these tools are primarily intended to protect messages between known parties, and they typically require an explicit exchange of keys to establish secure communications. They are of limited utility for narrowcasting or for offline use. In these situations, designers devise new, often startlingly low-tech means of obfuscation that deliver messages to intended audiences while bypassing adversaries. Another strategy surreptitious communications designers use is ephemerality. Surreptitious communications designers engage in a sort of cat-and-mouse game with powerful adversaries who monitor their activities and actively try to thwart their efforts.11 They must continually devise innovative communications techniques that undermine established surveillance regimes and be ready to abandon them once the opposition catches on (as inev- itably happens).

Tactics: Coding and Cloaking Surreptitious communication design strategies like obfuscation and ephemerality are enacted through a variety of high- and low- tech means. Two common tactics of SCD are coding and cloaking, which deal with the design of messages and of communications channels, respectively.

Coding (Message Design) Coding involves converting the content of messages from one symbolic system to another, in order to convey a secret meaning. Simple coding schemes involve replacing letters of the alphabet with numbers (e.g., A = 1, B = 2, C = 3, and so on). Many people regularly employ easy-to-use, but quite technically and mathemat- ically sophisticated, means of encrypting electronic communications. For example, email messages and online financial transactions are often encrypted using the hypertext transfer protocol secure (HTTPS) protocol. Non-technical, culturally based means of coding messages are also quite common. Many subcultures use specialized jargon to demonstrate membership. The famously colorful phrase- ology of short-order cooks is a well-known example, as is various youth cultures’ use of slang. However, our interest here is in com- municative modes that express membership in a subculture, and 11 In the art world, this approach has been are simultaneously and intentionally opaque to outsiders. For called “tactical media.” See Rita Raley, Tactical Media (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2009).

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 example, gangs and other crime syndicates whom police closely monitor have long used distinctive vocabularies that render their communications inscrutable. Coding is also a well-established trope of visual communications. Hobo signs are a familiar example, as are the esoteric iconography of prison tattoos, freemasonry, and outlaw biker gangs.

Cloaking (Channel Selection) While coding is concerned with making messages harder to interpret, cloaking typically manipulates communication channels to make messages harder to detect. A number of recent projects have used cloaking techniques to protect individuals’ identities in online communications. Tor, for example, cloaks users’ IP addresses by making all HTTP requests appear to originate from a small number of machines. The AdNau- seum and TrackMeNot browser plug-ins generate bogus queries to search engines and advertisers, effectively generating electronic “chaff” that masks a user’s actual Internet activity.12 Benjamin Grosser’s ScareMail automatically inserts terrorism-related words and phrases into email signatures to defeat National Security Agency (NSA) email surveillance programs. In a more speculative vein, SCIpher embeds secret messages into auto-generated academic conference calls, and Spammic hides messages in fictitious spam messages.13 Heather Dewey-Hagborg, Aurelia Moser, Alison Burtch, and Adam Harvey’s DNA Spoofing encourages people to share lipstick, nail clippings, and used chewing gum to defeat potential DNA surveillance. Each of these programs and projects are examples of steg- 12 See Finn Burton and Helen Nissenbaum, anography: the art or practice of concealing messages within other, “Vernacular Resistance to Data Collec- tion and Analysis: A Political Theory of innocuous messages. Another approach to cloaking is to situate Obfuscation,” First Monday 16, no. 5 messages in out-of-the-way places where they are unlikely to be (2011). See also Finn Brunton and Helen seen by adversaries. This technique is commonly used when the Nissenbaum, “Political and Ethical Per- desired recipients of a message cannot be relied on to interpret spectives on Data Obfuscation,” in Pri- a coded message successfully. In these cases, messages are sent vacy, Due Process and the Computational “in the clear” but rely on obscure channels. For example, alterna- Turn: The Philosophy of Law Meets the Philosophy of Technology, ed. Mireille tive and underground media has long provided ephemeral forums Hildebrandt and Katja de Vries (Abing- where illicit communications can take place out of authorities’ don, Oxon, [England]; New York: Rout- sight. Examples range from pirate radio stations and underground ledge, 2013). newspapers, to computer bulletin board systems (BBS) and hacked 13 For the former, see http://pdos.csail.mit. corporate voicemail systems, to the deep web. A similarly rich tra- edu/scigen/scipher.html (accessed July 24, 2015), and for the latter, see http:// dition uses women’s bathroom graffiti as a medium for women “to 14 www.spammimic.com/ (accessed July discuss their concerns relatively free of male interlocutors.” 24, 2015). This approach was ingeniously employed in a series 14 Melissa R. Meade, “Latrinalia: Language, of Spanish bus shelter ads that used lenticular printing to embed Gender, Place,” in Understanding Graffiti: anti-violence messages in Spanish bus shelters. Hidden aspects— Multidisciplinary Studies from Prehistory bruises superimposed over the child’s face and a message to the Present, ed. Troy Lovata and Eliza- beth Olton (Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press, forthcoming).

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 Figure 1 directing victims of child abuse to call a hotline number—were ANAR Foundation’s lenticular printing only visible to a viewpoint lower than 4’3” high, thus ensuring campaign (Anar Foundation). that child victims of domestic abuse might see without their par- ents’ or guardians’ knowledge (see Figure 1).15 A related tradition appropriates commercial communications channels for illicit purposes. Prostitution services’ use of classified advertising websites, like Craigslist and Backpage, has been widely reported. To provide a somewhat less well-known (and perhaps more uplifting) example, the advocacy group Great- fire and the Chinese language edition of the New York Times for several years have used the software developer source code control service, Github, to bypass Chinese government censors, believing that blocking Github would impose significant costs on 15 David Kiefaber, “Child-Abuse Ad Uses the Chinese technology industry.16 In a vivid example of the cat- Lenticular Printing to Send Kids a Secret Message That Adults Can’t See,” and-mouse dynamic of surreptitious communications, this appro- Adweek (May 6, 2013), http://www. priation prompted a massive distributed denial of service (DDoS) adweek.com/adfreak/child-abuse- attack on Github by agents believed to be acting on behalf of the ad-uses-lenticular-printing-send-kids- Chinese authorities.17 secret-message-adults-cant-see-149197 (accessed July 24, 2015). Two Anti-Human Trafficking Campaigns 16 For the former, see https://github.com/ greatfire/wiki (accessed June 2, 2015). To illustrate surreptitious communication design in practice, For the latter, see https://github.com/cn- let us consider two recent projects. Both were undertaken in nytimes/mirrors (accessed June 2, 2015). Seattle, WA, at roughly the same time, and both were concerned 17 Robert Hackett, “Github Triumphant Over with human trafficking. However, each began with different goals Its ‘Largest Ever’ Cyber Pummeling,” and assumptions, leading to different design strategies, tactics, Fortune (April 3, 2015), http://fortune. com/2015/04/03/github-ddos-china/ and outcomes. (accessed June 2, 2015).

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 Figure 2 Background: Human Trafficking LHST campaign advertisement (King County Human trafficking refers to the illegal trading of human beings Department of Public Health). for forced or compulsory labor.18 Human trafficking is most commonly associated with prostitution and sexual exploitation, but it also occurs in industrial, agricultural, and domestic labor. Although precise figures are difficult to come by, United Nations estimates 20.9 million victims globally, of which 75% are women and girls.19 Human trafficking has been of particular concern in the state of Washington. Because of its international border, abun- dance of ports, vast rural areas, and large numbers of agricultural workers, Washington is considered one of the most heavily trafficked states in the United States.20 The state has moved aggres- sively to combat trafficking in recent years. Washington was the first U.S. state to pass a law criminalizing human trafficking, and it continues to have the most stringent laws in the country.21

Example 1: Let’s Stop Human Trafficking In January 2013, the City of Seattle unveiled an advertising cam- 18 International Labor Organization, “Forced Labour Convention, C29,” June 28, 1930. paign intended to “raise awareness” of human trafficking in Seat- 19 United Nations Office on Drugs and tle.22 Based on a campaign developed by Grey Advertising for New Crime, Global Report on Trafficking in York City, the Seattle program, “Let’s Stop Human Trafficking” Persons: 2012 (Vienna: United Nations (LSHT), consisted of print advertisements installed on billboards Office on Drugs and Crime, 2012). and buses around the city. Ads were produced in 6 different lan- 20 Office of Crime Victims Advocacy, “Washington State Task Force Against guages, and displayed on approximately 200 Seattle buses. Featur- the Trafficking of Persons Report to the ing bold graphics and forceful copy, the ads described common Legislature” (Olympia, WA: Washington examples of human trafficking and directed viewers to “Help Stop State Department of Community, Trade & Human Trafficking” by calling the national human trafficking hot- Economic Development, 2008). line number. The ads also pointed viewers to a website where they 21 Washington State Office of the Attorney could learn about trafficking, be directed to local service providers, General, “Human Trafficking,” http:// www.atg.wa.gov/human-trafficking and download promotional materials (see Figure 2). (accessed July 24, 2015). 22 “Mayor McGinn and County Councilmem- Example 2: Pivot ber Dunn Announce Anti-Trafficking Cam- Around the same time, students and faculty at the University paign,” http://mayormcginn.seattle.gov/ of Washington created Pivot, an information sheet printed on mayor-mcginn-and-county-councilmem- ber-dunn-announce-anti-trafficking-cam- water-soluble paper and inserted into nondescript menstrual pads paign/ (accessed July 24, 2015).

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 Figure 3 Water-soluble inserts hidden in nondescript sanitary pad packages (Tad Hirsch).

(see Figure 3). Developed with the Washington Anti-Trafficking Resource Network (WARN), a coalition of organizations that provides direct services to human trafficking victims, Pivot’s goal was to assist trafficked women in leaving exploitative situations. The sheet provides narrative descriptions of domestic, agricultural, and sex trafficking in a comic-strip format and is printed in several languages. It also includes a perforated tab disguised to look like a fortune-cookie insert, which features the telephone number for the National Human Trafficking Resource Center (NHTRC) hotline. The NHTRC hotline is a 24/7 telephone service that connects call- ers with information and resources. In Washington State, victims who call the NHTRC hotline are forwarded to WARN, which connects them to crucial services, including housing, medical care, attorneys, and counseling. WARN promises to provide services to victims anywhere in Washington State within 24 hours. Pivot is distributed by outreach workers, including the nurses and medical personnel who are often the primary or sole point of contact between victims and service agencies.23 Potential victims are handed the generic-looking sanitary pad. Victims are encouraged to detach the hotline number, which can be inconspic- uously carried in a pocket or handbag. The remainder of the insert is safely flushed down the toilet (see Figure 4).

Comparison These two projects, undertaken at the same time, in the same place, and addressing the same topic, represent two very different approaches to communication design. The first example takes a familiar, mass communication approach. The second embodies an SCD perspective.

23 Donna Sabella, “The Role of the Nurse in Combating Human Trafficking,” The American Journal of Nursing 111, no. 2 (2011): 28–37.

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 Figure 4 Tear-away tab featuring the NHTRC hotline number, disguised as a fortune-cookie insert (Tad Hirsch).

Goals and Assumptions The LSHT campaign was a consciousness-raising initiative intended to bring attention to human trafficking as a matter of public concern across a wide swath of Seattle residents. It focused on what Somali Mam—an anti-human trafficking celebrity who consulted on the original New York campaign—calls “the demand side” of human trafficking: Western consumers of trafficked labor, including prostitution and domestic work. The campaign was predicated on a belief that the market for trafficked persons is enabled by consumer ignorance. Therefore, the reasoning goes, informing the public about the realities of human trafficking leads to a decrease in demand and enhances law enforcement efforts through increased public scrutiny. The emphasis on law enforcement and on soliciting the public to help rescue victims by providing information about trafficked persons to the police is a common trope of anti-human 24 King County TV, “New Human Trafficking trafficking (AHT) campaigns. Also common are pronouncements Campaign,” January 11, 2013, https:// like the ones made by Seattle city officials at the news conference www.youtube.com/channel/UCmsDL- announcing the LSHT campaign that “we can all help… by being 2CRIMtE1I6-eZqEx4g (accessed July 24, vigilant” and “when we see something, we must say something.”24 2015). 25 Kathleen Morris, Program Director, Although well intentioned, the emphasis on vigilance and Washington Anti-Trafficking Response reporting suspicious activity to the authorities is at odds with rec- Network (WARN), Interview by author, ommendations of local service providers, who emphasize the cen- May 15, 2012. tral role that trafficked persons play in extricating themselves from 26 See, e.g., Laura Agustín, “The Soft Side captivity. Simply put, most victims aren’t rescued. They escape. of Imperialism: Kristof and the Rescue Kathleen Morris, of WARN, describes the idea of police officers Industry,” Counterpunch (January 25, 2012), http://www.counterpunch.org/ kicking down brothel doors and liberating victims “a fantasy” that 2012/01/25/the-soft-side-of-imperialism/ is both exceedingly rare and largely ineffective because victims (accessed July 24, 2015); and Becky who are neither emotionally nor psychologically prepared to Owens-Bullard, “Take off the Cape: Why change their lives tend to return to their captors.25 Other anti- Using the Word ‘Rescue’ is Harmful to human trafficking analysts and service providers share Morris’s Anti-Trafficking Efforts,” http://www. ccasa.org/take-off-the-cape/ (accessed critique of the law-enforcement model in general, and the use of 26 June 3, 2015). “rescue” language in particular.

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 The Pivot project, in contrast, was shaped by close collabora- tion with local service providers who privileged communicating directly with victims over mass media campaigns. Its goal was to help trafficked women escape from their exploiters. The project was shaped by close understanding of victims’ experience and perspective, including the high degree of surveillance under which trafficked women typically live and the central role that these women play in extricating themselves from captivity. Pivot was also informed by a belief that victims don’t simply need to have their “awareness raised” about trafficking but have very specific information requirements. In particular, victims often don’t recognize their situations as “trafficking” and may not know that they are entitled to legal protection. In some cases, trafficked persons might feel compromised because their captivity involves participation in other forms of illegal activity, including prostitution. In other cases, victims might come from countries with weak human rights protections, or they might be culturally predisposed to distrust law enforcement and other government agencies. Vic- tim-oriented messaging must help victims recognize their status and their rights, and provide specific guidance on getting help when they are ready to attempt escape.

Strategies and Tactics To engage a large number of Seattle residents, the LSHT campaign strategy involved crafting easily understood, impactful messages that were placed in highly visible locations. The designers’ primary concern was to ensure reliable and accurate message conveyance. This goal was achieved with bold graphic language and simple declarative sentences. Brief, unambiguous messages were plastered across the city in a half- dozen different languages. Viewers who encountered these messages were likely to notice and understand them. The LSHT campaign was clearly informed by a deep understanding of communication design and contemporary American media culture. The development of slick advertisements and punchy radio and web video spots featuring activist narration was very much in keeping with contemporary media practices. The campaign clearly drew on Grey Advertising’s expertise in content creation and on Somaly Mam’s success in publicizing AHT messages through appearances on daytime television and profiles in The New York Times. LHST designers also appear to have been concerned with publicly positioning sponsoring agencies as taking an active role in combatting human trafficking. The prominence of sponsors’ logos and a well-orchestrated press conference announcing the campaign suggest the importance to sponsors of being seen as engaged in the “fight” against human trafficking and may have influenced their decision to donate services and resources to the

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 cause. (Grey New York provided pro bono design services; billboards and airtime were donated by Clear Channel Outdoor and Clear Channel Communications.) Brand management can easily be seen as a component of the LSHT campaign. Pivot also used simple graphics and text, provided in an easy-to-digest format and translated into various languages. However, Pivot’s design was also intended to confound its adversaries—namely, perpetrators of human trafficking. To avoid interception or detection of the message by captors, Pivot’s designers relied on an SCD model and used the techniques of obfuscation already outlined. Messages were cloaked in sealed, generic packages of menstrual pads. Hotline numbers were coded to look like fortune cookie inserts so their true meaning would be inscrutable to captors. While Pivot’s designers were concerned with cost effec- tiveness, these considerations were overshadowed by worries about victims’ safety. Human trafficking occurs in a context of extreme surveillance and control. Captors typically isolate victims from the outside world and vigilantly monitor their movements, actions, and communications. Accordingly, few opportunities exist to present victims with rescue information without captors’ awareness or interception. In addition, a significant lag time can separate when a victim encounters rescue information (e.g., by seeing a bill- board or bus ad) and when she is able to act on it. Accordingly, care was taken to ensure that messages were relevant to and compre- hensible by victims, and that they could be carried and used as discretely as possible. The Pivot project involved designing effective messages and inventing a new communication channel, for distributing them, which necessitated creating new supply and distribution chains. Developing this channel required Pivot’s designers to forge new partnerships. To realize the project, designers had to invent new supply and distribution chains. On the supply side, this design involved researching and sourcing water-soluble paper and nego- tiating with menstrual pad packaging companies. On the demand side, designers worked with frontline responders, including social service providers and medical personnel, to understand how a new product like Pivot might fit into existing practices. These part- ners’ knowledge was crucial in shaping the project; for example, the decision to employ sanitary pads rather than, say, tampons, was motivated in part by learning that Ob/Gyn nurses routinely hand out pads in their clinics.

Other People’s Politics The LSHT and Pivot projects proceeded from very different assumptions and were based on different models of communication, which led to very different results. LSHT proceeded from a model of communication that, like much of commercial design

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 practice, was more or less in line with Shannon and Weaver’s model and was primarily concerned with ensuring effective transmission of messages between senders and receivers. Meanwhile, Pivot proceeded from a model of surreptitious communications that was largely concerned with thwarting adversaries. The key distinction between these models is the extent to which they contend with third parties that are unwanted or unintended participants—a central concern for SCD. Less apparent, perhaps, is the extent to which third parties influence everyday communications. We regularly modulate both the form and content of communications in deference to unintended audiences. For example, we lower our voices in libraries and movie theaters so as not to disturb our neighbors; we avoid explicitly vulgar language in the presence of children and religious figures. Third parties constrain communication. This is often in deference to “good man- ners.” In other cases, the constraint is a matter of suppression, of actively inhibiting communication. In either way, recognizing these restrictions is to acknowledge the power dynamics that per- meate social relations—the political dimension of communication. The fact that one model ignores the politics of communication while another fixates on it is no accident; rather, it reflects the specific social contexts in which these models developed.27 Theo- ries like Shannon and Weaver’s overlook politics because they arise in commercial environments, where social issues are largely cast as financial concerns. Questions of who has the right and the ability—the privilege—to communicate are of course deeply political, but in the commercial realm they become economic. The right to send and receive messages is guaranteed to anyone with the means to purchase the necessary equipment, bandwidth, creative talent, and so forth. The market might foster competition, but it generally does not brook opposition; accordingly, communication theories that arise in commercial contexts have much to say about efficacy but are silent on the issue of third parties. In the advocacy realm, of course, questions of privilege are often precisely what is at stake. Social justice campaigns often center on securing the rights of the marginalized to speak and to be heard, despite opposition or prevailing social convention. The models of communication that emerge in activist contexts are thus centrally interested in political concerns and contending with opposition. As an activist practice, SCD is centrally concerned with creating opportunities for vulnerable people to communicate. 27 In Craig’s terms, “theories of communi- Unlike commercial communications design, SCD doesn’t assume cation, because they are historically and privilege; rather, it actively works to create it. culturally rooted and reflexive, have practical implications, including political ones.” See Robert T. Craig. “Communica- tion Theory as a Field,” Communication Theory 9, no. 2 (1999): 119–61.

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Downloaded from http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/DESI_a_00383 by guest on 02 October 2021 Conclusion: Revisiting D4G Models matter. They influence how designers think about their expertise, delineating which concerns are relevant and which ones are out of bounds in addressing a given problem. Often implicit, models nonetheless determine the scope of design problems and thus shape design activity and outcomes. Models are also transient. Although they arise in response to particular historical and social circumstances, they can move from one context to another. I have argued that this transience is what happened with the LSHT campaign: a communication model that evolved in a commercial environment was brought to bear on a social problem. This sort of intellectual transience is rampant throughout the burgeoning D4G movement, as growing numbers of designers bring their talents to bear on real-world social issues, including human rights, social justice, and political empowerment. This claim should not be a controversial one. Indeed, the application of “design thinking” and related professional design practices to noncommercial endeavors is a widely acknowledged and often cele- brated aspect of the D4G movement. And to good effect: many nonprofit organizations certainly have benefited and can benefit from the expertise that professional designers offer. However, we should recognize that professional designers don’t simply offer a set of practical skills; they also embody a particular worldview—a set of assumptions about how the world works, about what designers can and cannot do, and about what ultimately constitutes “good” design. This worldview, this model of design practice, offers a set of principles and practices that have enabled designers to thrive in the commercial world. It also might have much to offer the nonprofit sector. But we should acknowledge its limitations. Advocacy and social justice campaigns differ from commercial advertising and corporate communications in ways that can be both subtle and profound. Corporate design in this context has its limits, and approaches to communication design must be developed that are native to nonprofit and advocacy work. Discovering new approaches to design requires that we pay attention. As the D4G movement continues to grow, as designers continue to expand their work in noncommercial realms, we will do well to attend to the ways that these contexts do and don’t fit established models of communication. By acknowledging these limits, we discover new ways of thinking and making and, ultimately, contributing to the ongoing evolution of our field.

Acknowledgements Many thanks to the Pivot design team: Mike Fretto, Kari Gaynor, Josh Nelson, Adriel Rollins, and Melanie Wang.

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