Posted on March 9, 2020
How our buying choices actually change the world
Does making better consumer choices really help save the world?
We get that question a lot, and, of course we think so! For more than 30 years, CREDO’s mission has been to give consumers the opportunity to create positive social change with everyday acts of commerce.
Maeve Higgins, host of the great podcast Mothers of Invention (a podcast we highly recommend!), recently asked that same question in the New York Times after she closed her Chase bank account because Chase and other big banks continue to fund dirty fossil fuel companies that contribute to the climate crisis.
But does one person’s action make an impact? Of course, because there’s power in numbers. As Higgins puts it, “The actions I’m taking are small, but I hope they’re building up….If everybody took action — I mean every single one of us — we would be plain sailing.”
So what can you do to help save the world? Sure, you too can close your big bank account. But you can also drop your current mobile phone company — a company that might be funding the Trump administration and other right-wing causes — and switch to CREDO, the carrier with a conscience that donates nearly $2 million a year to the causes we all care about.
AT&T, for example, has a long history of fighting against our progressive values. The company has proven to be a staunch supporter of corporate greed, Republican politicians and right-wing interests. They’ve donated millions to Donald Trump, contributed to anti-LGBTQ and anti-abortion politicians, laid off workers after receiving massive tax cuts and even helped re-elect a white supremacist to office. (Here are 8 reasons to drop AT&T.)
Likewise, T-Mobile not only hired Donald Trump’s former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, it copied pages from the corporate playbook to curry favor with Trump: Book some rooms at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C. After announcing a $26 billion mega-merger that needed approval by the Trump administration, T-Mobile executives, including its outspoken CEO John Legere, booked at least 38 nights and spent at least $195,000 at Trump’s hotel.
Other mobile carriers may be putting profits above values, but that doesn’t mean you have to. Here at CREDO, we would never attempt to curry favor with Trump or fund right-wing causes. Just the opposite. Every month, we donate to three great progressive nonprofits — groups that are fighting for climate justice, civil rights, reproductive freedom, LGBTQ and women’s rights, economic equality and more.
So yes, you too can make a difference, create progress and do your part to help save the world. Learn more and join us today at CREDOMobile.com.
Posted on March 4, 2020
CREDO Tip: How workers can celebrate Employee Appreciation Day
Today marks Employee Appreciation Day, an unofficial holiday for companies and workplaces to recognize the hard work and dedication of their employees.
Here at CREDO, we’re fortunate to have a team who lives our values everyday and appreciates our work with good pay and morale-building throughout the year, like employee rewards and recognition, company outings and our favorite Cheese Wednesdays and Bagel Fridays.
But for many, especially minimum or sub-minimum wage workers and immigrant and undocumented workers, Employee Appreciation Day is a class privilege and hollow gesture. Wages have stagnated. Labor union membership is declining. Workplace harassment still exists, despite the #MeToo movement. Immigrants live in fear of ICE raids and deportations.
On this Employee Appreciation Day, we’d like to share a couple tips on how you can build a better workplace for you and your co-workers and stand in solidarity with workers who deserve better working conditions.
Be an ethical home employer
Do you hire workers in your home, like house cleaners, home attendants or childcare providers? Be sure to hire and treat your employees ethically by creating a mutually beneficial and supportive work relationship that includes fair pay, clear expectations, paid time off and a safe workplace.
Our allies and grant recipients at the National Domestic Workers Alliance run “Hand in Hand: The Domestic Employers Network” where you can learn more about how to be an ethical employer at home.
Resist racist deportation policies
All immigrants deserve protection, dignity and respect, yet our current administration and its cruel policies are forcing the 11 million undocumented immigrants in this country to live in constant fear of arrest and deportation. DREAMers, who have been eligible for work and deserve a path to citizenship, are constant targets of Donald Trump, who has promised to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, and whose ICE agency threatens to deport them.
Support organizations who fight the Trump administration’s cruel and racist deportation regime and for more just immigration policies, including CREDO grantees Movimiento Cosecha, United We Dream, Detention Watch Network and Mijente.
Support a living wage and better workplace policies
Nearly 2 million workers are earning wages at or below the minimum wage — which has been stuck at $7.25 per hour for more than a decade. That’s hardly a living wage. In fact, adjusted for inflation, the minimum wage is worth 17% less than it was 10 years ago.
What’s more, many of these workers endure discrimination based on gender, race and family status. Millions of women — especially those in tipped jobs — experience sexual harassment at a high rate and have unpredictable and unfair work schedules and little or no access to child care.
Stand with these workers and support policies and lawmakers who want to raise wages, improve working conditions, end harassment, fight for racial equity and more. Learn how you can help from our ally and grantee ROC United.
Posted on March 3, 2020
Our February grantees thank you for your support
Each month, CREDO members vote on how we distribute funding to three incredible nonprofits. Those small actions add up – with one click, you can help fund groups fighting for climate justice, peace and women’s rights. In February, over 40,000 CREDO members voted to distribute our monthly donation to 350.org, Peace Action and UltraViolet.
These donations are made possible by CREDO customers and the revenue they generate by using our services. The distribution depends entirely on the votes of CREDO members like you. And for that, our February grant recipients thank you.
350.org
$62,195
“Thank you for supporting 350.org! Passionate CREDO members like you help us stop fossil fuel projects and build a 100% renewable energy future that is just, prosperous, and equitable for all.” – May Boeve, Executive Director
To learn more, visit 350.org.
Peace Action
$36,491
“On behalf of Peace Action, our deepest gratitude for the partnership and support of CREDO members for our organization and for your confidence in our work for a more peaceful and just future. Thank you!” – Kevin Martin, President of Peace Action and Peace Action Education Fund
To learn more, visit peaceaction.org.
UltraViolet
$51,314
“We couldn’t do this without you. CREDO members like you make it possible for UltraViolet to build a diverse feminist community online by creating compelling stories and offering ways to take action to advance gender justice and equity. Thank you!” – Shaunna Thomas, Co-Founder and Executive Director
To learn more, visit weareultraviolet.org.
Now check out the three groups we are funding in March, and cast your vote to help distribute our donations.
CREDO members who use our products are the reason why we are able to make these donations each month. Learn more about CREDO Mobile, the carrier with a conscience.
Posted on March 2, 2020
Vote for Americans for Tax Fairness, Friends of the Earth and NARAL Pro-Choice America this March
Every month, CREDO members vote to distribute our monthly donation to three incredible progressive causes – and every vote makes a difference. This March, you can support groups fighting for economic justice, the environment and climate justice and women’s rights and reproductive freedom by voting to fund Americans for Tax Fairness, Friends of the Earth and NARAL Pro-Choice America.
ATF mobilizes public support for progressive tax reform, so we have the revenue to protect Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid and to make new investments in education, housing, infrastructure, and more to create an economy that works for all.
A grant from CREDO would cover expenses for ATF’s part-time writer, who provides the backbone of the content generation that so many groups depend on, and a chunk of ATF’s email consultant, who makes ATF’s online activism program successful.
Friends of the Earth defends the environment and champions a more healthy and just world. The organization works at the nexus of environmental protection, economic policy and social justice to fundamentally transform the way people and the environment are valued.
Support from CREDO will help Friends of the Earth protect our environment from Trump and his efforts to dismantle essential protections for clean air, water and a healthy climate, uniting with our international federation of partners in 75 countries.
NARAL is powered by its 2.5 million members in all 50 states. The group represents the 7 in 10 Americans who support reproductive freedom and believe every person should be able to make personal decisions about pregnancy free from political interference.
A CREDO grant would allow NARAL to expand its impact, working to protect and expand abortion access across the country, while mobilizing the organization’s members with a comprehensive strategy to drive voter turnout in states critical to 2020.
Your vote this month will determine how we divide our monthly donation among these three progressive groups. Be sure to cast your vote to support one, two or all three by March 31.
CREDO members who use our products and services everyday are the reason we are able to make these donations each month. Learn more about CREDO Mobile and CREDO Energy and join our movement.
Posted on February 25, 2020
CREDO Tip: 5 secure messaging apps to keep your conversations private
“If I’m not breaking the law, why do I care if someone reads my messages? I have nothing to hide.”
We’ve heard a lot of versions of this conversation here at CREDO. And the reality is, even if you’re not doing something illegal, you should care about surveillance.
With an authoritarian in the White House — who has every tool of mass surveillance at his disposal — all bets are off. Even if you’re not Muslim or an undocumented immigrant, or have family in another country, or are a Black Lives Matter activist or an investigative journalist, or just an ally of progressive causes, you should care.
Let’s ask this: Would you let the government place cameras or listening devices in your home? That’s the equivalent of digital mass surveillance. And we know that the government, with help from major telecom companies like AT&T — considered the NSA’s “most trusted partner” — has been engaging in illegal mass surveillance operations.
That’s why we think it’s probably a good idea to consider protecting the communications on your phone if you share some of these concerns. Here are a few apps you can use.
Signal
The best messaging apps use end-to-end encryption, a method of encoding the message so that only the sender and the recipient can read it, even if the data were intercepted en route. And Signal’s end-to-end encryption is one of the best: its engine is open source, which means the code is continuously reviewed for bugs and loopholes. It’s sort of the Linux of the secure-messaging world. Signal is supported by grants and donations, which means the app has no ads, no affiliate marketing, and no tracking. Its security platform is used by WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger.
Signal is free and its interface is refreshingly simple. A great feature is the ability to set a timer on messages so they disappear or “self-destruct” after a period of time. Signal is the favorite messaging app of Edward Snowden, who knows a thing or two about security. And when WhatsApp co-founder Brian Acton quit Facebook in protest against Facebook’s plan to put ads on WhatsApp, he joined Signal.
Here are two tutorials for using Signal from our ally and grantee recipient the Electronic Frontier Foundation:
Install Signal for iOS or Android.
WhatsApp is the most popular messaging app in the world, used by over 1.5 billion people every day. It’s free and available to Android and iOS users. It provides end-to-end encryption by default – you don’t have to turn it on, it’s always there. You can back-up your messages to Google Drive if you choose, so you can restore them on a new Android device.
WhatsApp is, however, owned by Facebook, which has a disturbingly poor record on privacy. Facebook also had planned to monetize WhatsApp with advertising, raising significant privacy concerns for an encrypted messaging service, but recently scrapped those plans for now.
You can download WhatsApp here for iOS and Android.
Wickr
Like Signal, Wickr is another open source messaging app with end-to-end encryption that allows you to set up self-destructing messages and group chat rooms for secure collaboration.
Unlike Signal, you don’t need a phone number to register, which could have some benefits, especially if you want to communicate with the public in a secure way without having to publish your phone number. The company also claims to not have the keys to decrypt your private messages so once your messages are deleted, law enforcement, the government not the company can retrieve them.
Install Wickr for iOS and Android.
Telegram
Telegram is a cloud-based app, which brings advantages and disadvantages. On the upside, it delivers messages very quickly (faster than any other secure-messaging app, it claims) and allows you to share an unlimited number of photos, videos and files, including .doc, .zip and .mp3 – up to 1.5 GB each.
On the downside, cloud storage means Telegram does not offer end-to-end encryption by default. To get it, you have to turn on Secret Chats in the app’s settings. All Secret Chats are device-specific and never enter the Telegram cloud. Messages in Secret Chats cannot be forwarded, and when you delete messages on your end of the conversation, they will also be deleted at the receiver’s end.
Telegram’s code is open source. It’s free, serves no ads and does not push in-app purchases.
Get Telegram for iOS and Android.
Viber
Viber, which is used by close to 1 billion people, is used in over 190 countries and provides end-to-end encryption by default. It’s free and available to Android and iOS users. Viber does come with ads and in-app purchases. It also leans toward the young user, offering a large library of stickers (some free, some not) directly on the interface. Which is cool if you’re a sticker fan but distracting if you’re not.
In addition to its Secret Chats feature (which makes messages disappear after a set time), Viber also lets you manually delete messages you’ve sent – from your own phone and also from the phones of the people you’ve sent it to. The company is owned by Japanese e-commerce and internet giant Rakuten and based in Luxembourg.
Get Viber for iOS and Android.
CREDO Mobile and Privacy
Here at CREDO, we take privacy very seriously. Respecting our customers’ privacy rights is a core mission of our company, we have a long history of fighting for it — and we’ve consistently been recognized for it.
Unlike other carriers like AT&T and T-Mobile, who sell their customers’ private data for profit – your data is not for sale at CREDO. No amount of money will ever change that. We were the first carrier to issue a transparency report in 2014 and we now issue quarterly transparency reports detailing requests by the government for customer data.
Learn more about how CREDO fights for our customers’ privacy rights.
Posted on February 19, 2020
CREDO Tip: What is dark mode — and should you use it?
If you’re like most of us here at CREDO, you probably use your phone or tablet a lot. In fact, the average American uses their mobile devices almost 4 hours a day!
With all that use, we can develop eye strain, loss of sleep, reduced productivity and a drained battery. What if there were a mode on your phone to reduce all of those?
While we wish there were a magic way to cure all our phone ailments, we *are* able to adjust and possibly improve our experience with built-in features found right inside the settings of our phones or tablets.
Enter “dark mode.” You may have heard of it; you may even be reading this in dark mode right now.
So what is dark mode, will it enhance your experience on your device, and should you try it out? Here’s a quick explainer.
What is dark mode?
As you may have guessed, dark mode is setting that darkens your display and user interface on your device and in many apps, inverting the background and text colors from dark text on a light background to light text on a dark background.
Here’s an example from the Twitter app on an iPhone:
Dark mode now comes as an option natively with Apple’s iOS 13 and Google’s Android 10. Many popular apps, including Chrome, Instagram and Twitter, also support dark mode. The Verge keeps a running list of apps that support dark mode.
Why use dark mode?
According to the big tech companies, dark mode is helpful in a number of ways, including:
- Making it easier to stay focused
- Improving visibility for people with low vision or have sensitivity to bright light
- Reducing eye strain especially in low light conditions
- Improving battery life, especially for devices with OLED and AMOLED screens (which include most newer devices made by popular manufacturers)
- It looks pretty cool.
There’s plenty of anecdotal evidence to back up most of these claims, however many experts have recently called into question whether dark mode can really reduce eye strain. VICE’s “Dark Mode Isn’t ‘Easier on the Eyes’ for Everybody” and Wired’s “Dark mode isn’t as good for your eyes as you believe” explain why the claim may be a bit of folklore. (We think you should try it out for yourself, though!)
Does dark mode help with sleep?
It’s complicated.
Studies have shown that the blue light emitted from screens can negatively affect circadian rhythms and make falling asleep more difficult. For years, Android and iOS devices have included a “night shift” or “night mode” that imparts a warmer, orange-yellow hue, reducing cooler, blue light from screens, presumably to help sleep.
But a recent study from the University of Manchester in the U.K. suggests just the opposite. Researchers found that the body may actually use the “dim and blue appearance of twilight” to signal sleep, and features on our phones could be sending us mixed messages.
How about dark mode, then? The American Academy of Ophthalmology suggests that it’s probably a good idea to use dark mode — which is generally darker than a “night shift” mode — combined with reduced screen time at night to improve sleep.
How to enable dark mode on your device
Ready to give dark mode a try? Here’s how to turn it on:
Apple iOS and iPadOS devices (version 13 or above)
There are three ways to turn on dark mode from your Apple device
- If you use Siri, simply say
- “Hey Siri, turn on dark mode,” or
- “Siri, turn on dark appearance.”
- To enable dark mode from the Control Center:
- Swipe down from the top right corner of the device (or swipe up from the bottom on older devices)
- Touch and hold the brightness control
- Toggle dark mode on or off
- To enable dark mode from Settings:
- Go to Settings, then to Display & Brightness.
- Select “Dark” to turn on dark mode.
Google Android devices (version 9 or higher)
- Go to the Settings app
- Tap Display
- Toggle “Dark Theme” on or off
Posted on February 12, 2020
CREDO Tip: How to be a better LGBTQ ally
For many of us, we consider ourselves allies (or members! or both!) of the LGBTQ community. We love and support our friends and family who do — or do not — identify in the community. We support inclusive policies and lawmakers who fight for justice and equality. We lift up the stories and voices of trans, non-binary and genderqueer people.
But what does it really mean to be an ally? We all know it goes beyond wearing a rainbow pin and marching at Pride events. It means listening, making space and having respect. It also means understanding your own biases and, for straight allies, checking your heteronormativity at the door. It means publicly standing up for LGBTQ people, especially trans people and people of color.
This Valentines Day, when Love is Love is Love, we wanted to share a few tips on practicing allyship with LGBTQ communities, adapted from the UC Davis LGBTQIA Resource Center.
- Use the pronouns and name that someone wants to use. If you don’t know, ask them! Politely correct others if they use the wrong pronoun or name. Include your preferred pronouns in your social media profiles.
- Recognize the difference between sexual orientation and gender. Trans people, just like cisgender people (those who generally identify as their birth-assigned sex), can be straight, gay, bisexual, asexual, etc.
- Be respectful of trans people’s bodies and stories. Don’t ask about surgery, hormones, sexual preferences, or any other incredibly personal aspects of their lives. But do listen if they want to share their stories with you.
- Gender isn’t binary — i.e. boy/girl, man/woman. Don’t assume trans people or others in the LGBTQ community identify as one or the other.
- Learn inclusive terminology. Here’s a great glossary of terms from the National LGBTQ Task Force.
- If you are cisgender, understand and identify your prejudices and biases. Popular culture, the news media and even friends and family can be very heteronormative (the idea, belief or assumption that gender binary and heterosexuality is the norm) and can reinforce those biases.
- Be aware of the physical spaces your LGBTQ friends may prefer or require. Think ahead if your trans friends feel more comfortable at inclusive spaces or public places with all-gender restrooms. If you run an event, be sure to designate gender-neutral bathrooms. Ensure “women-only” spaces for trans women.
- Advocate for better policies for the LGBTQ community — at the federal and local levels. Support lawmakers who stand up for equality and LGBTQ rights.
- Spend your dollars with LGBTQ-friendly businesses and avoid those who are not allies. Check out #GrabYourWallet as a good place to start.
- Or, join us at CREDO Mobile — we’ve donated more than $6 million to progressive groups, like the Transgender Law Center the the National LGBTQ Task Force, who are fighting for LGBTQ rights every day.
For more tips, check out LGBTQIA Ally Tips from the LGBTQIA Resource Center at UC Davis.
Posted on February 7, 2020
Wondering how CREDO gives donates each month?
Here at CREDO, we were created with a mission to fund progressive causes, like civil rights, climate justice and LGBTQ equality, today and all year long –— and we’ve been doing just that for more than 30 years.
We always get the question: How is CREDO able to donate millions to progressive nonprofits like Planned Parenthood, Friends of the Earth, the ACLU and so many others?
The answer is it’s our members. Because of CREDO members who use our CREDO Mobile, CREDO Energy, CREDO Long Distance and Working Assets Credit Card products every day, we can make an incredible impact on the progressive movement. CREDO members are the reason we contribute $1 million every year – and have donated more than $94 million since our founding – to amazing progressive nonprofit groups doing incredible work.
Here’s how our donations program works:
- All year long, CREDO members who use one of our products or services – CREDO Mobile, CREDO Long Distance, CREDO Energy or the Working Assets Credit Card – fund the CREDO Donations program with their phone, long distance, energy and credit card bills.
- Each month, CREDO meets as a company to vote for which three nonprofit groups will be on the ballot to receive the next month’s donations. Just like our members, everyone who works at CREDO shares a passion for our progressive work and takes the act of voting on each month’s slate very seriously. You can nominate a group too, just visit our CREDO Donations site.
- We ask all of our members to help decide who gets how much each month. We send the donations ballot to CREDO members, activists and supporters, and they vote for the group (or groups) they’d most like to see funded. The votes of CREDO members carry more weight. The vote of a member with one CREDO product or service counts twice. The vote of a member with two CREDO products or services counts three times, and so on.
Our donations are only possible because of our members who vote with their wallets and choose a company that shares their progressive values. Our loyal CREDO members have helped us donate more than $1.7 million in 2019 and over $88 million since 1985.
You can help us choose how to distribute this month’s donation to three great groups! Click here to cast your vote today.
So thank you, CREDO members, for making these donations possible. Not a member yet? Want to join a company that isn’t afraid to stand up for your values and gives millions to progressive causes? Check out CREDO Mobile and CREDO Energy and make the switch!
Posted on February 5, 2020
CREDO Tip: 3 Political Documentaries to Stream on Netflix Right Now
As election season heats up, the first votes of 2020 have been cast, and politics is in the air. It’s an exciting time, because we’re that much closer to one of the most consequential elections of our lives.
But if the 24 hour news cycle isn’t your cup of tea — and you still need your political fix — we’ve got you covered. From courageous and progressive female candidates to propaganda in our news feeds to mass incarceration, we’ve picked out three political documentaries streaming right now on Netflix for your next binge session.
Knock Down The House (2019)
2018 was another year of the woman. A record 529 women ran for Congress, many of whom were inspired to run in the wake of the election two years prior, when a misogynist entered the White House. Knock Down the House, directed by Rachel Lears, features four female progressive candidates — with a focus on now-Rep. Alexandria Ocazio-Cortez — who took on the establishment, following them through their campaigns and up to election night, and beyond. 2020 could again shape up to be another year of the female candidate, so this one is worth a watch.
Watch it streaming on Netflix here.
The Great Hack (2019)
If you’ve ever felt like your devices are listening to you — then serve you up eerily similar ads — you’re not alone. Technology companies and data brokers are constantly harvesting our private information for profit, and they’re playing an ever growing role to influence our behaviors, including at the ballot box. The Great Hack, produced and directed by Jehane Noujaim and Karim Amer, examines how now-defunct Cambridge Analytica, the data firm backed by major Republican billionaire mega-donor Robert Mercer, harvested Facebook data of millions of Americans and Brits to feed them propaganda.
As election security bills to protect our democracy languish in Mitch McConnell’s Senate, the possibility of history repeating itself could become reality, so we recommend checking this out to know what we could be up against again.
Check it out streaming on Netflix here.
13th (2016)
More than 150 years ago, the 13th Amendment was ratified, cementing the abolishment of slavery in our nation’s most important governing document. But disturbingly, there remains one notable and ominous loophole: salvery and involuntary servitude were abolished “except as a punishment for crime.” Immediately post-Civil War, this exception was exploited, and, as director Ava DuVernay, widely known for her work on Selma, examines, is still being employed today.
Shocking as well as tear-jerking, DuVernay’s 13th lays bare the systemic racism in our criminal justice system, from Jim Crow through today’s crisis of Black mass incarceration. As the New York Times lays out 13th‘s overarching argument, “The United States did not just criminalize a select group of black people. It criminalized black people as a whole, a process that, in addition to destroying untold lives, effectively transferred the guilt for slavery from the people who perpetuated it to the very people who suffered through it.”
Now streaming on Netflix here.
Posted on February 4, 2020
Our January grantees thank you for your support
Each month, CREDO members vote on how we distribute funding to three incredible nonprofits. Those small actions add up – with one click, you can help fund groups fighting for racial and social justice, voting rights and women’s rights. In January, over 38,000 CREDO members voted to distribute our monthly donation to Black Alliance for Just Immigration, Brennan Center for Justice and Women’s March.
These donations are made possible by CREDO customers and the revenue they generate by using our services. The distribution depends entirely on the votes of CREDO members like you. And for that, our January grant recipients thank you.
Black Alliance for Just Immigration
$42,821
“BAJI’s movement has greatly benefited from CREDO’s commitment to racial, social and economic justice. Our deepest gratitude for standing with BAJI and supporting our work, we are in this fight together.” – Nana Gyamfi, Executive Director
To learn more, visit baji.org.
Brennan Center for Justice
$54,727
“The Brennan Center for Justice is grateful to CREDO members like you – and your commitment to make sure our elections are free, fair and secure. Thanks for joining us to protect voting rights, secure our elections, and ensure that every voice counts.” -Michael Waldman, Executive Director
To learn more, visit brennancenter.org.
Women’s March
$52,452
“Thank you to CREDO and CREDO members who support the work of so many organizations with your actions and resources. The future that we are working for, one where freedom is for everyone, no exceptions, is more possible with your support.” – Rachel Carmona, Executive Director
To learn more, visit womensmarch.com.
Now check out the three groups we are funding in February, and cast your vote to help distribute our donations.
CREDO members who use our products are the reason why we are able to make these donations each month. Learn more about CREDO Mobile, the carrier with a conscience.
