linguistic:translation, quality:corruption
Ultrasurf, Freegate, the Open Technology Fund, and whistleblower allegations

In the early 2000s, Falun Gong adherents in the United States developed Ultrasurf and Freegate, freeware intended to circumvent Chinese government internet censorship. According to NPR:

A Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society report on the circumvention landscape in 2007 found Ultrasurf’s performance to be “the best of any tool tested in filtering countries, the only tool to display okay speed for both image heavy and simple, text oriented sites." A Wired article described Ultrasurf as "one of the most important free-speech tools on the Internet, used by millions from China to Saudi Arabia."

Beyond China, Freegate gained popularity among Iranian protesters soon after its Farsi version was introduced in July 2008. During the Green Movement protests surrounding the 2009 election, its servers were overwhelmed by Iranian Internet users.

In 2010, the US State Department under the Obama administration offered a $1.5 million grant to the Global Internet Freedom Consortium founded by Falun Gong adherents that developed Ultrasurf and Freegate, drawing opposition from the Chinese government. A 2011 Center for a New American Security report recognized the need for the US government to fund high-performing technologies like Ultrasurf and Freegate, despite the stress it might cause on the U.S.-China relationship, but recommended the US government diversify the technologies it funds.

In recent years, Ultrasurf has been a major point of contention in large part because it is not open source, meaning that it cannot be reviewed by outside engineers for vulnerabilities and back doors. Additionally, as reported by The Verge, since the 2000s, the software has drawn criticism "for its content filtering (which blocks pornography) and its ability to surveil user traffic, which is often impossible by design in competing tools".

Although it receives public funding, both its creators and owners have rejected attempts at allowing outside parties to review its effectiveness and utility. A 2020 audit by the U.S. State Department concluded that "censoring Ultrasurf nation-wide would have been trivial for a moderate-budget adversary".

After conservative documentary filmmaker Michael Pack was appointed CEO of the U.S. Agency for Global Media during the Trump administration in 2020, Pack tied up $19 million in federal funds from other projects for the Ultrasurf project. Numerous other projects, including other secure communication projects, lost funding during this period. Ultrasoft eventually received $249,000 of the allotted funds. Once receiving funding, only "four people abroad used it to access Voice of America and Radio Free Asia, a key purpose for its subsidy" during December 2020 and January 2021.

Two days before U.S. President Joe Biden 's 2021 inauguration, Pack appointed a columnist from the Epoch Times to the board of directors for the networks his agency oversaw. This columnist had claimed the January 6 insurrection was a " false flag operation". During his eight months in office, Pack regularly appeared in the Epoch Times, where he also discussed Ultrasurf.

As of 2020, Pack, along with other USAGM officials he did not fire during his time there, faced a criminal inquiry in response to whistleblower allegations that the "concerted effort to divert funds to the Falun Gong software Ultrasurf was a criminal conspiracy".