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Content type: Examples
8 europeans telecoms providers (Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom, Orange,Telefonica, Telecom Italia , Telenor, Telia and A1 Telekom Austria) have agreed to share mobile phone location data with the European Commission to track the spread of the coronavirus.
The Commission said it would use anonymsed data and aggregated mobile phone location to coordinate the tracking of the virus spread. They also announced the data would be deleted after the crisis.
Source: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-…
Content type: News & Analysis
Photo: The European Union
On 2 September 2019, Privacy International, together with 60 other organisations, signed an open letter to the European Parliament to express our deep concern about upcoming EU policy proposals which undermine the EU’s founding values of human rights, peace and disarmament.
Since 2017, the EU has diverted funds towards security research and security capacity-building in countries around the world. The proposal for the EU's next budget (2021-2027) will…
Content type: Report
In December 2018, the National Coalition of Human Rights Defenders-Kenya published a report analysing the needs and concerns of human rights defenders (HRD) in relation to privacy, data protection and communications surveillance.
A summary of their findings is below. Access the full report on their website.
Content type: News & Analysis
Our intervention comes on the back of mounting evidence that the South African state’s surveillance powers have been abused, and so-called “checks & balances” in RICA have failed to protect citizens’ constitutional right to privacy.
Among our core arguments are:
That people have a right to be notified when their communications have been intercepted so that they can take action when they believe their privacy has been unlawfully breached. Currently RICA prevents such notification, unlike…
Content type: News & Analysis
En el 2011 se liquidó el DAS. Las violaciones, excesos y abusos de la inteligencia estatal que comenzaban por la intimidad y terminaban con la vida de los ciudadanos habían producido condenas judiciales a varios exdirectores: claro indicador de que se necesitaba un cambio. Siete años ha tenido el Estado colombiano para ordenar la casa y esta semana someterá sus récords de derechos humanos al examen de los miembros de Naciones Unidas. La evaluación analizará, entre otros…
Content type: News & Analysis
Los frecuentes escándalos sobre el abuso de la vigilancia estatal en actividades de inteligencia, la exagerada obligación legal que tienen las empresas de telefonía de retener los datos de las comunicaciones de sus usuarios por cinco años o la manera como se diluye el concepto de privacidad en el Código de Policía serán parte del examen que se haga en el seno de la ONU sobre la forma como Colombia cumple sus compromisos de derechos humanos.
Dirigido por los Estados y con el auspicio del…
Content type: News & Analysis
In the lead-up to the 30th session of the Universal Periodic Review which took place on 10 May 2018, Fundación Karisma, a partner organisation in the Privacy International Network, joined a coalition of civil society groups in Colombia to raise more awareness about the country's human rights record.
As part of the joint effort, the coalition produced factsheets on various human rights in the Colombian context, including the right to privacy. It is available in both English and Spanish.
Content type: Long Read
To celebrate International Data Privacy Day (28 January), PI and its International Network have shared a full week of stories and research, exploring how countries are addressing data governance in light of innovations in technology and policy, and implications for the security and privacy of individuals.
Content type: Long Read
To celebrate Data Privacy Week, we spent the week discussing privacy and issues related to control, data protection, surveillance, and identity. Join the conversation on Twitter using #dataprivacyweek.
Do you live in a “smart city”? Chances are, you probably do (or at least your city claims to be). But do you know what exactly makes your city “smart”, beyond the marketing term? And what does this have to do with privacy?
Companies and governments will tell you that the more cameras, sensors…
Content type: Long Read
Privacy International is celebrating Data Privacy Week, where we’ll be talking about privacy and issues related to control, data protection, surveillance and identity. Join the conversation on Twitter using #dataprivacyweek.
Exercising the right to privacy extends to the ability of accessing and controlling our data and information, the way it is being handled, by whom, and for what purpose. This right is particularly important when it comes to control of how States perform these activities.…
Content type: News & Analysis
Following the alarming evidence that EU-made electronic surveillance equipment is still being exported to authoritarian countries around the world, we strongly urge all EU member states and institutions to respect their human rights obligations and call on them to prioritise long overdue EU reforms.
We are extremely concerned that little has changed since civil society first recognised the need to modernise current EU rules governing the export of surveillance equipment as far back…
Content type: Advocacy
This stakeholder report is a submission by Privacy International (PI). PI is a human rights organisation that works to advance and promote the right to privacy and government surveillance around the world. Privacy International wishes to bring concerns about the protection and promotion of the right to privacy for consideration in Pakistan’s upcoming review at the 28th session of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review.
Content type: Press release
Please find attached a copy of the briefing along with promotional photographs with the briefing.
Privacy International has today sent top EU and UK Brexit negotiators* a briefing on their vulnerability to potential surveillance by each other, and others. Brexit negotiations are to begin today.
The global privacy rights NGO has highlighted to the negotiators the risk of sophisticated surveillance capabilities being deployed against each other and by others, and provided…
Content type: Report
This investigation focuses on the techniques, tools and culture of Kenyan police and intelligence agencies’ communications surveillance practices. It focuses primarily on the use of surveillance for counterterrorism operations. It contrasts the fiction and reality of how communications content and data is intercepted and how communications data is fed into the cycle of arrests, torture and disappearances.
Communications surveillance is being carried out by Kenyan state actors, essentially…
Content type: Report
This stakeholder report is a submission by Privacy International (PI). PI is a human rights organisation that works to advance and promote the right to privacy and ght surveillance around the world. Privacy International wishes to bring concerns about the protection and promotion of the right to privacy for consideration in Pakistan’s upcoming review at the 28th session of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review.
Content type: Report
This investigation looks at how surveillance is being conducted in Thailand. The first part of the investigation focuses on the ties between telecommunication companies and the state, and the second part of the investigation focuses on attacks conducted in order to attempt to circumvent encryption.
Content type: Press release
Today, Privacy International, together with five internet and communications providers from around the world, have lodged an application before the European Court of Human Rights to challenge the British Government's use of bulk hacking abroad. Until we brought our original case at the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT) in 2014, the Government had never admitted that it engaged in hacking. Now we are learning for the first time how far-reaching the Government's global hacking capabilities are…
Content type: News & Analysis
After the adoption of the EU General Data Protection Regulation, the Data Protection Directive for Law Enforcement Agencies, the EU-US Privacy Shield, your understandable EU privacy policy fatigue is excused.
But when a coalition of tech and telecom industries calls for a relatively obscure EU directive to be repealed, it may unintentionally trigger an atypical Streisand effect: if companies, which often so cavalier to individuals’ privacy, want to get rid of the EU e-privacy…
Content type: Press release
This week in Geneva, the UN Human Rights Committee will examine the Argentina’s compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), an international treaty which places obligations on signatories to guarantee human rights such as the right to privacy.
This review, by a body of independent experts charged with monitoring compliance with the ICCPR, comes at a critical time for Argentina laws and policies on privacy and surveillance.
Recent years have seen…
Content type: Press release
Esta semana en Ginebra, el Comité de Derechos Humanos de la ONU examinará el cumplimiento de la Argentina con el Pacto Internacional de Derechos Civiles y Políticos (PIDCP), un tratado internacional que establece obligaciones a los firmantes para garantizar los derechos humanos, como el derecho a la privacidad.
Este examen, por un grupo de expertos independientes encargados de vigilar el cumplimiento del PIDCP, llega en un momento crítico para las leyes y políticas de la Argentina sobre la…
Content type: News & Analysis
In 2015 the United Nations' human rights mechanisms significantly increased their capacity to monitor and assess states' compliance with their obligations around the right to privacy. Notably, the Human Rights Council established the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy, filling a significant gap in the international human rights protection system. Meanwhile, the Human Rights Committee put surveillance laws and practices in a range of countries under close scrutiny, making…
Content type: News & Analysis
Sometimes it takes an unexpected stranger to remind you what you have, and what you are at risk of losing. Roman Zakharov, a Russian publisher who challenged Russia’s surveillance legislation, is that stranger for many Brits and Europeans. The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights judgement on Friday 4 December 2015 was remarkable, not because it tore up the rule book on the jurisprudence surrounding state surveillance in the Council of Europe, but because it followed…
Content type: News & Analysis
This guest post was written by Nighat Dad and Adnan Chaudhry of Digital Rights Foundation.
It is the role of the state to protect its citizens from threats to their life and liberty. But in protecting its citizens, the state’s own aims cannot be counterproductive and erode the security found in rights like privacy and freedom of expression that are vital to a democratic system.
However, it has too often been the case that governments will pursue and enact legislation that provides more…
Content type: News & Analysis
This is a guest piece. It does not necessarily reflect the views or position of Privacy International.
In 1997, plans for a Civil Identification Registry (RIC) were signed into law in Brazil, promising to unify the 27 regional identification registries into a centralized federal one by 2020. The law, which was only enacted in 2010, continues to face obstacles to its implementation, but in 2014 there was a renewed wave of support for the project from the Ministry of Justice…
Content type: News & Analysis
Today the Grand Chamber of the Court of Justice of the European Union ruled that mass surveillance is in violation of the right to privacy and that a legal system that provides no legal redress against interference with someone's privacy falls short of EU human rights standards.
The Court was seized following a complaint initiated by Mr Schrems to the Irish Data Protection Commissioner about the transfer of his Facebook data from Ireland to the US under the now defunct “…
Content type: News & Analysis
Over a dozen international companies are supplying powerful communications surveillance technology in Colombia, according to a Privacy International investigation released today featuring original documentation. Over the past few decades, companies primarily from Israel, the US, and the UK have worked with Colombian partners to expand the Government's surveillance capacities. This is despite evidence that the Government is undertaking unlawful surveillance of Colombians.
The…
Content type: News & Analysis
“We always assume we are being watched. It is part of our understanding,” explained Father Alberto. The clergyman knows what it's like to live under surveillance. Father Alberto is Executive Secretary of the Inter-ecclesiastical Commission for Justice and Peace in Colombia, which supports displaced and conflict-affected communities in their struggle for justice. The CIJP also works in the restive Urabá region, where they document and litigate on the links between neo-paramilitary groups,…
Content type: News & Analysis
Every government seems to want to spy in Pakistan. The US' National Security Agency (NSA) tapped the fibre optic cables landing in Karachi, among others, and used 55 million phone records harvested from Pakistani telecommunications providers for an analysis exercise. The United Kingdom's Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) had a store of SIM keys from Mobilink and Telenor networks, two of the country's biggest providers.
But the Pakistani government, specifically the…
Content type: News & Analysis
On July 6th, the company Hacking Team was hacked: over 400GB of administrative documents, source code and emails are now available for download.
Documents from the hack confirm once again the claims made in our report Their Eyes on Me, the Moroccan intelligence services made use of Hacking Team's spyware 'Remote Control System' to target those whom they perceive as their opponents. The documents show the two intelligence agencies in the country have been renewing their contracts and…