Reality Hackers. Technology, wit, and hacker culture fuse in an electrified movement for digital freedom. Meet the activists who make and break technology to ensure free speech and private communication for political dissidents, and to combat global censorship. This film gives a behind-the-scenes look at those who are sometimes characterized as outlaws, but who may be the vanguard defenders of freedom for all. Partially shot at DEF CON 19, the film shows the real people behind the headlines as they navigate the complexities of modern geo-political struggles. Featuring over eight DEF CON speakers, multiple CCC participants, and members of the German Pirate Party, Reality Hackers is an intimate portrait of characters who use technology to alter the world.
Rebecca Wexler is a documentary filmmaker and Fellow at Yale University Law School. She co-founded and taught the Yale Visual Law Project, which applies documentary filmmaking as an analytic form of knowledge production in the law. Rebecca holds an M.Phil in the history and philosophy of science from Cambridge University, where she studied on a Gates-Cambridge fellowship. She holds a B.A. from Harvard College. She has worked as Associate Producer and Researcher on documentaries distributed by PBS American Experience, HBO, VH1, and PBS/WETA, and has Directed and Produced films for the Yale Art Gallery, La Maison EuropÈene de la Photographie, the Long Wharf Theatre, and the Provincetown International Film Festival. Paul Sanderson has won over 30 national awards, including nine CINE Golden Eagles. The Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. has honored Mr. Sanderson by placing one of his films in its permanent collection. His programs have appeared on NBC, PBS, The Discovery Channel, A&E Network, The History Channel and CNBC. His films have premiered at Radio City Music Hall, Lincoln Center, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the American Museum of Natural History and the Smithsonian.