Time
    Wednesday, 8th December, 2021 (08:30 UTC) - Wednesday, 8th December, 2021 (09:30 UTC)
    Room
    Ballroom C
    Issue(s)

    Inclusion, rights and stakeholder roles and responsibilities: What are/should be the responsibilities of governments, businesses, the technical community, civil society, the academic and research sector and community-based actors with regard to digital inclusion and respect for human rights, and what is needed for them to fulfil these in an efficient and effective manner?
    Promoting equitable development and preventing harm: How can we make use of digital technologies to promote more equitable and peaceful societies that are inclusive, resilient and sustainable? How can we make sure that digital technologies are not developed and used for harmful purposes? What values and norms should guide the development and use of technologies to enable this?

    Other - 60 Min
    Format description: Hybrid format with both physical and online attendance.

    Description

    As people get online, they are encouraged or even forced to share significant amounts of personal information. What happens when this data is collated? And what happens when this data gets into the wrong hands? This can have very real effects offline, putting individuals’ lives in danger.

    Large corporations and government bodies, while digitising their services for more data-driven societies, violate also (whether deliberate or not) citizens' digital rights by surveilling them, criminalising citizens based on their (digital) data, and/or sharing their data and violating their right to privacy. In face of such a deep systemic digital rights violation, what can be done? 

    In this live recording of one of our podcast episodes of “Digital Rights Explored. Local Fights, Global Perspectives,” we will talk about digital data collection by governments taking a wrong turn. Our expert from Myanmar, Annie Zaman, will share with us the situation from the ground where citizens face checkpoints where their digital devices are being checked by military, and they can be arrested for the slightest indications of "rebellion", like photos of protests, texts on social media etc. We will hear from a young woman who had been arrested because she had photos on her phone of the protests. What can be done in closed societies and dictatorships- to enhance digital security? 

    Our second expert Osama Manzar will explore the effects of intrusive digital ID systems, such as the Aadhar system in India. What can be done to make this ID system more privacy enhancing and inclusive? Shruti Trikanad shares the research results and recommendations of the research by the Center for Internet Society. But we will also bring a global expert on the topic of government surveillance and ID systems - Edin Omanovic - the advocacy director from Privacy International. Edin's work revolves around exposing and challenging abuses of power by governments and corporations. Our questions will cover, but not be limited to: How can policy, spanning both privacy and education, help us to reduce this danger and protect our digital citizens? What kind of regulations need to be put in place to protect our rights, and what actions can regular citizens take in order to safeguard their personal information?

    Follow our Digital Rights Podcast on most Podcast platforms. Link to Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5lqkvmC4lK6637oZ59oJsw

    Biographies of our speakers

    Osama Manzar 

    Osama Manzar is a global leader on the mission of eradicating information poverty from India and the global south using digital tools through an organisation he co-founded in 2002 - the Digital Empowerment Foundation.

    With over 25 years of experience, Osama has worked in the areas of journalism, new media, software enterprise before he established DEF to digitally empower the masses (so far 20 million directly) with a footprint of 1000 locations and 9000+ digital foot soldiers across 130 districts in 24 States.

    Osama Manzar has travelled to more than 10,000 villages across India and 50 countries and specialises in advising digital models for underserved communities. 

    Osama is a member of MILEN - Media and Information Literacy Expert Network - the organisation behind this Podcast. 

    Annie Zaman

    Annie has a first-hand experience of how in closed societies and dictatorships- digital security can be closely related to one’s physical security. She has been working on the ground in Myanmar as a journalist throughout the Coup. Since recently she is working from outside of Myanmar coordinating her work there, since the situation on the ground has become too dangerous for journalists. Annie has helped citizens of Myanmar and journalists 

    working there by providing digital security training, a safe space, and other. She is the Co-founder of Myanmar Media Support. The website is only for internal consumption — not public due to safety concerns

    Annie’s professional background lies in the field of freedom of expression, safety and security of journalists and humanitarian aid workers over the last 15 years. Managed teams and newsrooms in crisis situations (Pakistan-Afghanistan-Myanmar); worked in two continents, 5 countries and in 3 languages.

    Shruti Trikanad

    Shruti is a programme officer at the Centre for Internet and Society. At CIS, she works primarily on issues concerning Digital ID, as part of which she studied the biometric ID systems of several countries, and wrote extensively about its legal and societal implications, and how they have been assessed by courts around the world. As part of this research, she drafted a framework to evaluate the legitimacy of digital ID systems, and is now working with Research ICT Africa to apply these to ID systems in 10 African countries. Shruti is an India-qualified lawyer, having completed her undergraduate law studies and bachelor's of arts in economics and political science from Gujarat National Law University, India.

    Edin Omanovic

    Edin is Advocacy Director at Privacy International, a London-based NGO which exposes and challenges abuses of power by governments and corporations. His work focuses on the proliferation of surveillance around the world and the industry and governments which drive it. Edin has worked with partners around the world to reveal unlawful government surveillance and advocates for changes to protect people at national and multinational levels. He was previously a researcher at the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute where he focused on preventing illicit trafficking.

    Our live podcast session will make use of the fishbowl method. On-site, we will have our star moderator, Alexandre Amaral, who will sit in the centre of the fishbowl, together with onsite podcast speakers. The online speakers will be shown on a split-screen for onsite participants to see. There will be one free seat in the middle of the fishbowl so that onsite attendees will be able to join the podcast at set stages to contribute and ask questions to the podcasters. A facilitator on site will coordinate this. All guests in the fishbowl will be shown via video for online participants to see. Online guests will also be able to request an “online seat” in the fishbowl to join the conversation, which will be coordinated by our online facilitator. Our podcast moderator will also react to comments and questions placed in our online chat forum that our online facilitator will help to moderate. The online and onsite facilitators will be in contact to ensure that things run seamlessly.

     

    Organizers

    Podcast Digital Rights Explored: Local Fights, Global Perspectives 
    Media and Information Literacy Expert Network (MILEN)
    Alexandre Amaral, Media and Information Literacy Expert Network (MILEN) Ena Omerovic, Media and Information Literacy Expert Network (MILEN) Supported by Deutsche Welle Akademie, Hanna Hempel (rapporteur)

    Speakers

    Qurratulain Zaman 

    Edin Omanovic

    Shruti Trikanad

    Osama Manzar 

    Onsite Moderator

    Alexandre Bianquini do Amaral

    Online Moderator

    Ena Omerovic (MILEN)

    Rapporteur

    Hanna Hempel (Deutsche Welle Akademie)

    SDGs

    4.6
    16. Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions
    16.10
    16.6
    16.b

    Targets: 16.6

    In the digital world, the development of new technologies is so fast that we cannot keep track of the diverse digital architectures and policy implications. There needs to be increased transparency about what these systems bring with them in terms of privacy to citizens. Digital institutions and corporations need to be fully transparent.

    16.b

    By tackling the issues related to privacy, digital and human rights, our session will allow decision-makers to recalibrate digital laws and policies, and work towards a world where technological data will not be taken advantage of to discriminate against individuals based on their personal information.

    16.10: Our discussion will explore how we can ensure that universal access to online information does not compromise individuals’ privacy and safety.

    4.6: Media and information literacy and knowledge of digital rights are very much part of this goal. We see these are integral to the solutions for data privacy and safety online and will explore them in our discussion.