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Content type: News & Analysis
Just a few weeks ago, thousands of Argentinians had their privacy rights violated when the country’s electoral registration roll, which had been made available online, experienced a major leak of personal data following the presidential election.
Despite some early warnings on the weaknesses of the system, the government did nothing to fix the situation, allowing serious technical flaws in an online system to persist and refusing to respond to the crisis, further…
Content type: News & Analysis
Through the Aiding Privacy project, Privacy International is promoting the development of international standards around data protection in the humanitarian and development fields and working with relevant organisations to make this happen.
A new contribution towards this goal, Protecting Beneficiary Privacy: Principles and operational standards for the secure use of personal data in cash and e-transfer programmes, was released last week by the Cash Learning Partnership (CaLP) and…
Content type: News & Analysis
The Zimbabwean government extended its reach into the private lives of its citizens this week by promulgating a new law establishing a central database of information about all mobile telephone users in the country. The Statutory Instrument 142 of 2013 on Postal and Telecommunications (Subscriber Registration) Regulations 2013, gazetted last Friday, raises new challenges to the already embattled rights to privacy and free expression in Zimbabwe, increasing the potential that the…
Content type: News & Analysis
Privacy International this week submitted stakeholder reports to the United Nations Human Rights Council1 about the human rights records of China, Senegal and Mexico. The reports, prepared in preparation with our partners in the respective countries, analyse the extent to which the right to privacy is respected and protected, and detail instances of privacy violations.
The stakeholder reports will inform the questions asked by members of the Human Rights Council when China, Senegal and…
Content type: News & Analysis
Trade has often been a positive driver in encouraging countries to adopt data protection laws, to ensure compliance and ability to conduct business with the European Union and other privacy-respecting partners. However, when free trade agreements are negotiated in secret and influenced by powerful business interests, the result is a severe watering down of existing privacy protections.
There is a high risk of this happening in the free trade negotiations between the European Union…
Content type: News & Analysis
The long-awaited release by Microsoft today of data about the number of law enforcement requests received and complied with by the company represents an important step forward in the ongoing challenge of understanding the scale of government access to communications information.
The data, the first set released by Microsoft, reveals that it received 70,665 requests for communications content and data in 2012, pertaining to 122,015 users or accounts. Communciations data was disclosed…
Content type: Advocacy
This stakeholder report is a joint submission by Privacy International (PI) and the Law and Technology Centre of the University of Hong Kong (HKU). PI is a human rights organisation that works to advance the right to privacy and fight surveillance around the world. PI has been working with HKU to conduct research and policy engagement on privacy and data protection issues in China and Hong Kong since 2009. Together, PI and HKU wish to bring concerns about the protection and promotion of the…
Content type: Advocacy
This stakeholder report is submitted jointly by Privacy International (PI), a human rights organisation that works to advance and promote the right to privacy and fight surveillance around the world. PI wishes to bring concerns about the protection and promotion of the right to privacy in Mexico before the Human Rights Council for consideration in Mexico’s upcoming review.
Content type: Advocacy
This stakeholder is a submission by Privacy International (PI) and Jonction Senegal. PI is a human rights organisation that works to advance and promote the right to privacy and fight surveillance around the world. Jonction Senegal is a human rights organisation based in Dakar, which aims to promote sustainable and equitable development and human rights both in Africa in general and in Senegal in particular. Together PI and Jonction Senegal wish to bring concerns about the protection and…
Content type: News & Analysis
We are the raw material of the new economy. Data about all of us is being prospected for, mined, refined and traded...and most of us don’t even know about it.
Every time we go online, we add to a personal digital footprint that’s interconnected across multiple service providers, and enrich massive caches of personal data that identify us, whether we have explicitly authenticated or not.
That may make you feel somewhat uneasy. It's pretty hard to manage your digital footprint if you can't even…
Content type: News & Analysis
Court Of Appeal Tells UK Government That Criminal Records Bureau Checks System Breaches Human Rights
Yesterday the Court of Appeal delivered its judgment in the case of R (on the application of T) v Chief Constable of Greater Manchester & Others concerning the operation of the criminal records check system. The court was considering three cases that hinged on the same question: whether or not the blanket requirement on those applying for jobs involving contact with children and vulnerable adults (approximately four million people each year) to disclose all past convictions,…