Mozilla Foundation Incubator: Democracy x AI

12 month funding and support project for technologists developing AI tools and technologies to help protect, promote and strengthen democracy around the globe.

The Mozilla Foundation is running the Democracy x AI Cohort for 12 months across 2026/27 to support technologists who are building AI systems that strengthen democratic practice – specifically tools and technologies that go beyond education and outreach and employ AI to actively protect and promote democracy, and fundamentally improve democracy around the globe.

The programme is aimed at technologists building working technologies with demonstrated traction – eg those that have moved beyond the prototype stage and have been adopted for use, even if by a small community. Democracy x AI is a Build Cohort that focuses on developing concepts, improving product quality, clarifying user needs, building a foundation for sustainable growth, and connecting with potential supporters.

In particular, the Foundation is seeking:

• Systems that help people access quality information and that ensure diverse voices can be heard.
• Technologies that make government and institutional decision-making visible, trackable, and accountable to the people affected by those decisions.
• Technologies that protect and expand civic space where people can organise, engage, and build movements without fear of surveillance or repression.

Projects should leverage AI as a core capability and make it essential to achieving democratic impact at scale, across communities, or in ways that weren’t previously possible. The Foundation has a particular interest in AI that helps build a better future by strengthening democratic practice around the world.

Applications are invited in three categories:

1. Enable Better Information

Democracy requires shared reality and supporting technologies that help people assess information quality and that ensure diverse voices can be heard.

Projects in this category could include:

• Systems that diversify information flows and help communities identify and amplify reliable sources through collective verification, reducing dependence on extractive platform monopolies.
• Tools that enable trustworthy summaries of civic information and news.
• Information verification tools that work at scale across languages and contexts, enabling hybrid AI-human approaches or collective verification.
• Tools that reveal algorithmic influence and help people understand how their information is being shaped and filtered.
• Identity verification systems that prevent bots and fake accounts while protecting privacy.
• Platforms that facilitate consensus-building across a divided public including the design of bridge-building algorithms.
• Conversational spaces that go beyond mere “Twitter clones” to bake democratic values into the design of technology and underlying protocols.

Indicators of success for this category could include:

• Communities have access to trustworthy information they can verify themselves.
• People can identify manipulation and propaganda.
• Diverse voices are heard.
• Users understand how algorithms shape what they see and have agency to change it.

2. Build Institutional Transparency and Accountability

Democracy requires transparency about how power operates. Supporting technologies should make government and institutional decision-making visible, trackable, and accountable to the people affected by those decisions.

Projects in this category could include:

• Government transparency systems that track decision-making and make it accessible – monitoring legislation, documenting how officials use authority, translating bureaucratic processes into plain language, and making parliamentary records searchable.
• Public data infrastructure that makes government and corporate data accessible, analysable, and actionable for advocacy and monitoring.
• Accountability mechanisms that connect government actions to their impacts on communities, showing how legislation affects populations, tracking promises against decisions, revealing conflicts of interest.
• Deliberation platforms that help diverse communities discuss complex issues, build consensus, and navigate trade-offs at scale.
• Participatory decision-making tools that integrate public input directly into governance decisions, budgeting, and resource allocation.
• Community input systems that translate public voices into actionable insights for policymakers.

Indicators of success for this category include:

• Citizens can track how power is used and hold decision-makers accountable.
• Government data is accessible to the people, and it is machine-readable and actionable for advocacy.
• Public officials operate with meaningful transparency about their decision-making.
• Communities have real influence over decisions affecting them.
• Diverse voices participate in deliberation that shapes outcomes.

3. Protect and Expand Civic Space

Democracy requires spaces where people can organise, engage, and build movements without fear of surveillance or repression. Technologies are required that defend these spaces and expand access to civic participation for communities under threat.

Projects under this category could include:

• Systems that protect freedom of expression and association in digital spaces while reducing coordinated harassment and abuse.
• Privacy-preserving coordination tools that enable secure communication and organising for activists and communities under threat.
• Technologies that empower citizens to resist propaganda, polarization, and authoritarian control of information.
• Surveillance resistance infrastructure that helps communities maintain digital autonomy and defend the digital public sphere from authoritarian misuse.
• Tools that expand access to civic education and resources for marginalized communities.

Indicators of success for this category include:

• Organisers and activists can coordinate safely despite surveillance or repression.
• Marginalized communities can participate in civic life without exposing themselves to harm.
• Communities maintain digital autonomy and resist authoritarian control.
• Civic spaces remain open for organising, even under hostile conditions.

Success for this cohort means projects achieve viability, communities experience democratic improvements, and the broader ecosystem shifts to support these alternatives. 

Funding body	Mozilla Foundation
Maximum value	50,000 USD
Reference ID	S28482
Category	Economic and Social Research Science and Technology
Fund or call	Fund