RightsCon Tunis 2019

Your finger prints are the new key! - National Digital IDs, experiences from Aadhaar and it’s global effects (SFLC.in - Software Freedom Law Centre, India)

Description: India's Aadhaar project is the world's largest national identity system covering more than a billion people. Under the program, the government collects fingerprints, iris scans, and entire demographic details of citizens. The project was challenged before the apex court of India for violating privacy rights of citizens. The challenge led to one positive outcome – the declaration of the right to privacy and one negative – upholding the constitutional validity of the Aadhaar program. Now, in India, citizens need to provide their Aadhaar card for obtaining government subsidies and filing their tax return documents. Unfortunately, other countries like Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda have also initiated similar national digital identity projects like the Aadhaar. In this session, we will be talking about our work on Aadhaar and privacy in India and how some other countries have started adopting such national identity programs. We will also discuss how such digital ID projects abrogate the privacy rights of people and enable state sponsored and private surveillance en masse. Participants will learn about India's Aadhaar program, the privacy arguments against it, the Indian government's push for enabling telecom and banking companies link citizens Aadhaar cards with their accounts and global effects of the Aadhaar project.

Speaker: Aditi Chaturvedi

When Dating Apps Become A Modus Operandi of Gender Based Violence Online to Strike Activists (SAFEnet/ Southeast Asia Freedom of Expression Network, Indonesia)

Description: How oppositions or haters used dating apps to shock, scare, and demean activists, especially women and non-binary gender? A layered of online harassment happened, from infringement to privacy, to day-to-day harassment involving pleasure-seekers that affects the quality of life of the activists, and in some cases ruins their opportunity to work and earn money. The session will present the issue with the context and complexity on how to deal with it in Indonesia. From the victim being told to find the perpetrator themselves, how the case showed the incapability of police enforcement to deal with sexual harassment and the online/digital modus operandi, to engaging with GBVO victims, online platforms, CSOs, and government reps as to find the best way to prevent or counter the modus operandi.

Speaker: Ellen Kusuma

Data Laundering and Inference Peddling (Center for Democracy & Technology)

Description: This lightning talk will focus on two aspects of corporate assistance to the surveillance state. “Data laundering” is done by data brokers who obtain information from communications service providers that the providers are barred by law from making available to law enforcement entities without proper legal process. Data brokers can share the data with law enforcement officials absent the legal process that would be required if the data was sought directly from the provider. They have “laundered” the data so it can be more easily made available to law enforcement, for a fee. The second, “Inference Peddling,” is the sale by private sector entities to law enforcement, intelligence and border agents of inferences about people (and of tools to make such inferences), such as their likelihood to commit a crime or the likelihood that they would pose a threat to aviation security. Inference peddling can pose a huge risk to human rights because the peddlers of inferences are not held to the same standards as are the governmental entities that purchase those inferences. This lightning talk will put data laundering and inference peddling in the larger context of aiding the rise of the surveillance state.

Speaker: Greg Nojeim

Decentralized Identity - It Changes Everything (Identity Woman)

Description: A new layer of the internet for people and their data is emerging!!! It is based on open standards under development at the W3C and being coordinated by an amazing community of people at big companies and small ones. This lighting talk will give an update on these developments to the RightsCon community and invite them to participate in building this new layer that needs active civil society participation. These two standards Decentralized Identifiers and Verifiable Credentials provide tools for entirely new interactions between people and organizations. They have the power to give people real control over their personal data and digital identities.

Speaker: Kaliya Young