Technology and the Deterioration of Right to Privacy

Anali Pravnog fakulteta u Beogradu, 2014

LLM theses, 2003

2017

The right to privacy in the digital age generates new challenges for the international jurisdiction. The following article deals with such challenges. Therefore it firstly defines the term of privacy in general and presents an international legal framework. With whisteblower Snowden a huge political discourse was initiated and the article gives insights into its further development. In 2015 the Human Rights Council for the first time announced a special rapporteur on the right to privacy. However, the discourse is not only taking place on a political level, also civil society organizations advocate more stringent regulations and prosecutions against violations of the right to privacy. Moreover the importance of the technology sector becomes clear. Companies like Microsoft are increasingly taking responsibility to protect digital media against unjustified data misuse, surveillance, collection and storage. But whereas the IT sector is developing very quickly, legislative processes do ...

Journal of Human Rights Practice, 2017

Human Rights Council Twenty-seventh session Agenda items 2 and 3 Annual report of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and reports of the Office of the High Commissioner and the Secretary-General Promotion and protection of all human rights, civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights, including the right to development The right to privacy in the digital age Report of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Summary In its resolution 68/167, the General Assembly requested the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights to submit a report on the protection and promotion of the right to privacy in the context of domestic and extraterritorial surveillance and/or the interception of digital communications and the collection of personal data, including on a mass scale, to the Human Rights Council at its twenty-seventh session and to the General Assembly at its sixty-ninth session, with views and recommendations, to be considered by Member States. The present report is submitted pursuant to that request. The Office of the High Commissioner will also submit the report to the General Assembly at its sixty-ninth session, pursuant to the request of the Assembly.

Journal of Siberian Federal University. Humanities & Social Sciences, 2020

The article considers the legality of mass surveillance and protection of personal data in the context of the international human rights law and the right to respect for private life. Special attention is paid to the protection of data on the Internet, where the personal data of billions of people are stored. The author emphasizes that mass surveillance and technology that allows the storage and processing of the data of millions of people pose a serious threat to the right to privacy guaranteed by Article 8 of the ECHR of 1950. Few companies comply with the human rights principles in their operations by providing user data in response to requests from public services. In this regard, States must prove that any interference with the personal integrity of an individual is necessary and proportionate to address a particular security threat. Mandatory data storage, where telephone companies and Internet service providers are required to store metadata about their users’ communications ...

Studia prawnicze. Rozprawy i materiały, 1 (34), pp. 13-30., 2024

The paper is aimed at defending the following three claims: (1) that the objective value of privacy may change in time (as its significance is relative to concrete social context); (2) that in the contemporary world, in which the state’s and global corporations power to intrude upon our liberty, especially upon its variety called informational privacy, has become due to technological developments particularly strong, the need for protection of privacy has become especially urgent (given our attachment to the axiological fundamentals of liberal democracies), and therefore its objective value is very high; and (3) that in spite of this high objective value of privacy, it does not correspond to its subjective valuation by the ‘typical’ citizen of contemporary liberal democracies, who, if Byung-Chul Han’s picture of our society as ‘the burnout one’ is correct, has become mentally exhausted by overstimulation and overachievement, and for whom, consequently, the central value has become flatly understood happiness (as material comfort and security), rather than liberty and its constitutive part, which is the right to privacy.

Journal of Business and Social Review in Emerging Economies

Purpose: This article is aimed to analyze the different Philosophical and legal perspectives of privacy in the United States with reference to a few landmark cases in the U.S. My debate will cover different situations, views, and laws in the US, the EU, and Pakistan (to some extent) to critically view present and ongoing violations (now mostly agreed with opinion) of the right to privacy. W. A. Parents and others on the definition of privacy and Louis D Brandeis on a political and legal ideal of privacy have been talked about. Approach: prior research studies and existing literature was examined regarding privacy. Findings: Privacy is acknowledged as a human rights issue, but it constitutes a real problem when the values and objectives behind privacy are different. Contemporary issues of unlimited surveillance and data collection to battle terrorism by law enforcement agencies and governments are particularly alarming to invade the right.

Studies of the Central European Professors’ Network

Globalex, NYU School of Law, USA, 2022

After the invention of computers in the 19th century and the Internet in the late 1960s, the vast majority of our work is done online. The dependence on online platforms has increased over the years, and people have begun using diverse online platforms for various purposes, including learning, business, entertainment, socialization, etc. The growing advancement in information and communication technology (ICT) has brought a radical transformation in the communicating process making life easier, faster, and smarter. This landscape also poses tremendous challenges to privacy, as numerous actors collect, store, and share our personal data with numerous third parties, mostly without our knowledge. Over the last couple of decades, the collection, retention, use, and transfer of personal data have become rampant chiefly by government agencies and businesses. To indicate governments’ aptitude toward data processing, George Orwell once warned in his dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four that Big Brother (government authorities) is always watching you. This trend of government-sponsored data processing has increased significantly over time, especially, after September 11, 2001. While business’s data processing has also become evident by new business models that are mostly grounded on personal data. In course of time, the personal data market has become global due to the constant increase of the access and use of the Internet. Eventually, personal data has evolved as the main fuel of the 4th Industrial Revolution era. In such an atmosphere, ordinary citizens, being private individuals, or consumers desire to have adequate legal protections for their privacy rights. Thus, the worldwide debate on privacy concerns has become apparent. Keeping this in mind, this article aims to explore some basic aspects of privacy, including the meaning, value, historical development, challenges, and legal protections as ensured in international, regional, and national legal frameworks.

Protecting the Genetic Self from Biometric Threats

This chapter examines not only the history of the term privacy but also its international recognition as a fully protected right. Given the wide array of definitions of privacy, it can be said that the term seeks its identity. Depending on time and space, this right has had various traits, beyond the obstacles of a strict definition. The aspects or features of the term are those that lead to the necessity of its international recognition and protection, especially in the present digital and technological environment, where its foundation is reconsidered and internationally protected in an effective way.