September 5th is International Day of Charity, designated on the anniversary of Mother Teresa’s death, as a day that celebrates the role of charity in society. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon of the United Nations characterized charity as “generosity and kindness, with no expectation of financial gain [that] can make profound differences in human well-being.”
At TechSoup Global, we believe that technology is a powerful enabler for social change. With the support of corporate donors like Symantec, we’ve been able to build and scale technology donation programs that benefit charitable organizations worldwide – organizations who, due to lack of resources, are often last in line to benefit from state-of-the-art technology. These organizations play a pivotal role globally in making differences in human well-being, particularly in the areas of health treatment, advocacy, and research. Health charities routinely handle highly sensitive personal information, making them an attractive target to cybercriminals.
One such organization is Colchester Mind, an affiliate of the United Kingdom-based national voluntary organization Mind that works to support and advocate for individuals living with mental illness in the North Essex community. When we asked Colchester Mind to describe the benefit of the donated Symantec Protection Suite seats they were able to obtain through TechSoup Global’s partner Technology Trust, Alex Fairclough (Secretary) said:
"As a local mental health charity it is imperative that we keep our records safe, secure and virus-free. However, as a charity, money is always tight. Thank goodness for the donations from Symantec! Without these we would be struggling to provide enough protected workstations for staff to work effectively. Either that or we would need to spend money that could be used to help continue our much needed local services. This way we don’t need have to make that decision, so thank you very much!"
Symantec’s support makes it possible for Colchester Mind to trust that its data is well-protected, allowing it to do what’s most important: working toward making profound differences in human well-being. On behalf of TechSoup Global and the thousands of organizations worldwide that rely on our partnership to keep their systems safe and secure, we tip our hat this September 5th in recognition of Symantec’s generosity.
Symantec’s Partnership with TechSoup Global:
- Symantec donations have kept 87,003 nonprofits and public libraries’ systems secure since our partnership launched in 2002.
- $279,666 in Symantec grants and in-kind donations to TechSoup Global have enabled us to secure our own IT infrastructure, as well as build and scale a rich array of learning materials for the sector.
- 2,014,993 donated product licenses have been distributed worldwide as of March 31, 2015.
- Symantec’s generosity has saved nonprofits and public libraries $173,422,041 on technology investments.
Allyson Bliss is a Senior Relationship Manager at TechSoup Global