Internet rights

There is a need to balance the use of technology with human rights in response to the pandemic. Otherwise, we might risk losing the rights and freedoms we had steadily gained over many years.

The Lebanese government announced on 12 March that Ogero, the national internet service provider (ISP), will double the speed and capacity for users until the end of April, but it did not clarify whether the decision includes other privately owned ISPs.

We at EngageMedia have been busy ensuring the safety of our staff and affiliates in the countries we work in: Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, and Australia. This has included closing our offices and shifting to a fully remote setup, which fortunately has mostly been our default since we began in 2005. 

Access to the internet and ICTs can often be about creating and finding surprising opportunities and uses. If women are familiar with smartphones and able to use them, then this is one way of ensuring that the next generation of girls are also able to access and adopt technology.

APC’s priorities at this HRC session include gender and privacy online, freedom of religion or belief, and the criminalisation of human rights defenders, journalists and digital security and tech expertise, as well as highlighting violations of internet rights in countries like India and Myanmar.

The African Declaration on Internet Rights and Freedoms (AfDec) Coalition has set 2020 as the year for robust advocacy for an open and free internet as well as strategic promotion of online human rights in Africa.

A group of human rights activists and organisations from Southeast Asia are calling to stop the attacks on democracy and media activists, as well as other individuals-at-risk, for their expression online. 

Human rights norms and standards integrate gender and development, and are respected and promoted in internet and ICT policy, governance, development and practice. This is a compendium of the highlights from APC's Annual Report for 2018.