Tech-tonic shift in human rights accountability
Center for Democracy and Technology hosted a working group on tech standards and human rights
We brought in an array of civil society experts to talk about what they’re doing to build the field of public interest technologists shaping standards and internet governance processes.
Public interest technologists play a crucial role in shaping global internet standards, as these standards fundamentally govern how the internet operates and evolves. By influencing these standards, technologists can advocate for privacy, accessibility, and freedom of expression, which are vital for a democratic and equitable digital landscape. Their expertise and perspectives are essential in confronting challenges like the digital divide, surveillance, and censorship, thus ensuring that technological advancements serve the greater good and protect individual rights on a global scale.
These challenges and opportunities occur in dozens of consequential standards development organizations at the regional and global level, each with their own complex ecosystem of expertise, documentation and working methods.
You can watch the panel here: https://youtu.be/EcouwZHLfqA
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(So many) links of interest
- Several UN Special Rapporteurs speak out against use of AI to commit war crimes against Gaza https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2024/04/gaza-un-experts-deplore-use-purported-ai-commit-domicide-gaza-call
- Taiwan is slated to host both the Asia-Pacific region IGF and its own national IGF this year https://ap.rigf.asia
- A new report is out that documents "Insights from Outline VPN Providers" https://okthanks.com/blog/2024/4/9/growing-with-the-people
- SMEX mapped tech companies’ cloud expansion in the Gulf and how human rights are implicated https://smex.org/mapping-tech-companies-cloud-expansion-in-the-gulf-and-its-human-rights-implications
- Trade agreements! The less visible side of the battle for digital human rights https://www.derechosdigitales.org/23448/the-less-visible-side-of-the-battle-for-digital-rights-and-sovereignty
- Esra'a al Shafei writes about the dangers of metadata in messengers https://simplex.chat/blog/20240416-dangers-of-metadata-in-messengers.html
- Job opening with Data for Black Lives: Movement Scientist https://d4bl.org/movement-scientist-fellowship-open-call
- Apply before 10 May for the next Splintercon in Brussels https://splintercon.net/call-for-papers/
- The Splintercon Montreal report is out and it's an excellent guide to the current state of censorship, shutdowns and how to circumvent them https://splintercon.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/splintercon23_conference_report.pdf
- The Re-Imagining Cryptography and Privacy Workshop schedule is up and 2-3 May is looking very good! https://recapworkshop.online/
UN Report Calls for New Era for Digital Governance in which Tech Standards Respect Human Rights
Published on the IETF's blog. You can view the original here: https://www.ietf.org/blog/un-report-calls-for-new-era-for-digital-governance
In a major milestone in the movement to consider human rights impacts of technology, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights details the obstacles and opportunities posed by technical standards setting to the enjoyment of human rights in a new report.
The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) is a pivotal part of the United Nations (UN) system dedicated to promoting and protecting the human rights guaranteed under international law. The UN system, and the human rights and international humanitarian law frameworks, underpin global governance and international cooperation. International standards setting bodies, both multilateral ones like the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and multistakeholder ones like the IETF, are all exercises in cooperative global governance of the Internet and digital technology.
This new report follows a years-long consultation process that kicked off at the Internet Governance Forum 2022 in Addis Ababa with a session jointly hosted by the Center for Democracy and Technology–my employer–and the OHCHR. This event was followed by a period during which written submissions were accepted and to which the Internet Architecture Board (IAB) contributed. Lastly there was a day-long session at the UN Human Rights Council Room XX in Geneva, Switzerland where stakeholders from the human rights and emerging technology fields, including me, Mirja Kulehwind and Lars Eggert, then IAB Chair and IETF Chair, respectively, were invited to deliver our views directly to the human rights community.
The OHCHR report “provides a set of recommendations for the effective integration of human rights considerations into technical standard-setting processes.” It advises governments to abstain from endorsing standards that could potentially infringe on human rights and stresses the importance of conducting thorough consultations with all stakeholders, emphasizing the inclusion of human rights experts in these discussions. Furthermore, the report highlights the necessity for standard-setting organizations to be open, transparent, and inclusive, ensuring their operations align with human rights standards. It also calls on governments to maintain their human rights obligations when delegating regulatory functions to standard-setting bodies and to support civil society's capacity to contribute effectively and independently to standard-setting processes. This approach underscores the pivotal role of governments in ensuring that the development and implementation of technical standards are conducted with a steadfast commitment to upholding human rights.
Some of these recommendations are directly informed by the IAB’s submission to the OHCHR consultation. In its submission, the IAB noted “[e]stablished IETF standards in areas such as ensuring confidentiality for Internet communications, including TLS (RFC 8446)... QUIC (RFC 9000)… DNS over HTTPS (RFC 8484). Securing communication and designing an Internet that is foremost addressing the interest of the users (RFC 8890) are goals that align the mission of the IETF standards process to develop high qualitative specifications that make the Internet work better for human rights.”
In reference to how SDOs have made human rights a priority for their work, the report says, “upholding human rights within and through standard-setting cannot stop there. It requires that standard-setting organizations fully commit to the application of international human rights law, standards and principles, using human rights methodologies, and to being accountable for implementing that commitment.”
The OHCHR report underscores the importance the human rights community plays in lending expertise to technical bodies. It envisions members of the human rights community as competent and engaged stakeholders in standards development, alleviating the need for standards bodies to develop this competency in a silo.
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