The Global Internet Freedom Consortium (GIFC) was founded primarily by Chinese-born Falun Gong adherents in 2001. Called the “tech division” of Falun Gong, its founders and early collaborators consisted of roughly 50 Falun Gong practitioners who also had skills as expert computer scientists, academics, and engineers sourced after the collapse of the Dot-Com Bubble in the early 2000s. Tao Wang, GIFC operations director has conceded most of this team worked for free due to their spiritual and political beliefs, especially in its early years.
The GIFC includes at least four nonprofit organizations and for-profit companies — Dynamic Internet Technology, Inc. (DIT Inc.), Global Information Freedom, Inc., UltraReach Internet Corporation, and Garden Networks for Freedom of Information Inc. — connected directly to Falun Gong. These organizations received direct support both from the US State Department but also the state foreign media wing, the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM). The GIFC also works with these agencies to deliver billions of messages to skirt foreign governments.
