Ushahidi, which means ‘testimony’ in Swahili, was initially a website with roots in the collaboration of Kenyan citizen journalists mapping reports of violence in Kenya ater the elections at the beginning of 2008. It mapped incidents of violence and peace eforts throughout the country based on reports submited via the internet and mobile phones. Ushahidi has since developed into a non-proit technology company that specialises in developing free and open source sotware for information collection, visualisation and interactive mapping in order to “democratise information, increase transparency and lower the barriers for individuals to share their stories.” 1 Ushahidi has been used ater the earthquake in Haiti and the loods in Pakistan, and is being used in North Africa. In 2008 when Ushahidi mapping sotware was deployed in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), it was the irst time that a population living in a crisis zone was invited to report incidents of violence to be collated into an online map. People on the ground could submit a report directly to the online map by either logging onto the website or sending a text directly to the site. Ater moderation by the Ushahidi team, the reports appeared on the website as incident data organised Ushahidi is an interactive mapping tool for use in crisis situations, which humanitarian workers can use to help them target assistance. What Ushahidi can do to track displacement Galya B Ruffer