Tag: Internet Governance

Net neutrality gets at the heart of many of the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, whose 65th anniversary we celebrate today. While freedom of expression and access to information are often mentioned in the same breath as net neutrality, net neutrality also has an important privacy component. Recently proposed legislation in the EU offers the opportunity to enshrine net neutrality into law, potentially adding important protections for user communications.

On the 65th anniversary of the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the celebration of UN Human Rights day, we would like to take this opportunity to reflect upon the importance of privacy and data protection as key pillars of healthy societies.

Today, Access is joining a day of action in the United State calling for reform of the U.S. Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) — the law known for giving the U.S. government the ability to access your email and documents in the cloud without a warrant. ECPA is one of the internet’s most outdated laws: it was passed in 1986, before most people even had access to the internet.

Swedish telco TeliaSonera is taking further steps to remedy its involvement in corrupt business deals in Uzbekistan, most recently by Monday’s ousting of four senior executives.

Today the U.N. General Assembly took a critical first step in addressing mass surveillance as a human rights violations with the passage of a resolution recognizing the right to privacy in the digital age.

As negotiations at the United Nations General Assembly over the right to privacy in the digital age grow heated, Access, together with Amnesty International, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Human Rights Watch, and Privacy International have written a letter to members of the General Assembly urging them to “take a stand against indiscriminate practices such as mass surveillance, interception, and data collection, both at home and abroad”.

Ecuador is set to finish a major revision to its Criminal Code on Friday, and it’s not looking good for user rights. Even as the country’s president, Rafael Correa, has been outspoken in criticizing NSA surveillance, the Ecuadorean Assembly is charging ahead with a requirement that all internet service providers spy on their customers, in violation of the country’s Constitution and international law.

The 8th annual U.N. Internet Governance Forum wrapped up late last month in Bali, Indonesia. This year’s official main theme was “Building Bridges – Enhancing Multi-stakeholder Cooperation for Growth and Sustainable Development”; however, mass online surveillance and a recently announced 2014 world summit on internet governance dominated many discussions at the IGF.

The United Nations is the site of the latest diplomatic response to revelations of mass surveillance by the United States and its allies. Today at the General Assembly, Brazil and Germany formally introduced their draft resolution on “The Right to Privacy in the Digital Age.”

Since last year, Access has been working to raise the profile of net neutrality and stop network discrimination in Europe. As result of this work, today Access has launched its policy paper on “Net neutrality: Ending Network Discrimination in Europe”.