[FoME] Internet Governance, Surveillance & Human Rights

[Christoph Dietz]

Travel guide to the digital world: surveillance and international
standards
By Michael Karanicolas
London: Global Partners Digital, 2014, 98 p.
http://www.gp-digital.org/publication/travel-guide-to-the-digital-world-surveillance-and-international-standards/

The internet has enabled an unprecedented ability to monitor and track
people and information flows as highlighted in the 2013 revelations by
Edward Snowden about online surveillance carried out by the United
States’ National Security Agency. The revelations have kicked off
debates across the world about the correct balance between citizen
privacy and national security in the context of the internet. In the
face of this shifting landscape it is critical for human rights
activists to understand how internet surveillance works, and what
privacy and anonymity really mean in a digital world.
 
State of evidence: the economic impact of a human rights-based
internet
By Daniel Kennedy
London: Global Partners Digital, 2014, 30 p.
http://www.gp-digital.org/publication/economic-impact-of-a-human-rights-internet/

This paper takes four key policy issues for protecting human rights
online - net neutrality; an absence of arbitrary online filtering and
blocking; an absence of arbitrary surveillance; and protecting
intermediaries from liability for user-generated content. For each
policy area it summarises the theoretical economic arguments for
adopting a human rights-respecting position, and then attempts to
collate any empirical data that exists to back up those arguments. In
doing so, the paper aims to assist human rights defenders to develop
persuasive arguments that they can use with policy-makers, and to
highlight areas where more research and evidence is needed. 
 
Deciphering Russia: Russia’s perspectives on internet policy and
governance
By Daniel Kennedy
London: Global Partners Digital, 2013, 18 p.
http://www.gp-digital.org/publication/deciphering-russia-russias-perspectives-on-internet-policy-and-governance/

In the last few years, Russia has become an important player in the
international internet governance debate, pushing for a governance model
that is state-centric, hierarchical and based on the inviolability of
state sovereignty. Russia has not only articulated an alternative model
at forums like the World Conference on International Telecommunications
(WCIT), it has formed alliances with states such as China and Saudi
Arabia, who share its vision. Russia’s views on internet governance
stem from security concerns about the potential of independent
information to harm its state and society, as well as from a normative
aversion to what it views as US domination of internet governance.
Russia favours the UN and particularly ITU as the organisation best
suited for ultimately settling questions of governance.

More titles: http://www.gp-digital.org/publications/