The humanitarian association Télécoms sans frontières (TSF) provides connections Wireless emergency free admissions to Ukrainian refugees. It also collaborates with various NGOs that help people close to the front lines of the conflict in order to provide them with equipment.
For 24 years, the French organization Telecoms without borders intervenes in all major international crises. It dispatched its teams of technicians on the spot just a few days after the start of the Russian offensive in Ukraine. The fear of the NGO was that the telecommunications networks broadcasting the Internet and telephony would be destroyed, saturated or rendered unusable by acts of sabotage or hacking.
In this context of #war, many families find themselves separated. Communication remains the only possible link for those, often women and children, fleeing to neighboring countries. It is why TSF is providing telecom support to refugees and humanitarian organisations. #Ukraine pic.twitter.com/7q3ZsI2rG0
– Telecoms Without Borders (TSF) (@TSF_Intl) March 18, 2022
But Ukraine is resisting and its telecommunications networks are holding up thanks to the mobilization of local operators who tirelessly watch over their integrity, but also with the help of international solidarity. Private operators such as T-Mobile, Orange and Play, for example, provide mobile Sim cards that include data capacity so that Ukrainian refugees can obtain information on the Web and social networks. They also have the option of making calls for free.
A mobilization at the borders
NGOs such as Télécoms sans frontières, which now has eight people on this battlefield, are also on the move. They are divided between Poland, Romania, Moldova and Ukraine. ” We have several areas of intervention “, specifies William Natta, director of communication at Télécoms sans frontières at RFI. ” We started with Poland to assess the situation and needs of refugees arriving in different countries and also to coordinate with other humanitarian actors in order to best respond to this crisis caused by the war. We then deployed in Moldova, Romania and Ukraine, following the urgency of the connectivity needs that we could meet. We carried out several operations, in particular for Wifi connections in the buses which left from the cities of Ukraine to Bucharest in Romania by transporting many refugees leaving their country. We provide this connectivity in the buses to help them stay in touch with their loved ones, but also to find information on their future destination so that they can rebuild their lives. In addition, we have equipped Ukrainian humanitarian NGOs and the town hall of Odessa with satellite communication equipment, should the city’s local network be cut off due to the war. »
Technological aid that may involve risks
Télécoms sans frontières is also present in the Lviv region in western Ukraine, which, until now relatively spared by the Russian forces, is seeing the conflict getting closer day by day. The organization provides satellite phones to the Ukrainian NGO Vostok-SOS, which provides medical and food supplies to help the populations of the region. Télécoms sans frontières is also taking the opportunity to deploy emergency satellite links in the white areas where there are many villages which were not yet covered before the war.
But this use of satellite connections involves risks, warns TSF, the signals emitted by the devices are immediately visible and locatable. They can easily turn you into a target and the instructions given by the NGO to their users are to send messages as short as possible and to move immediately after they are broadcast.
