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Content type: Long Read
Sports are a huge part of daily life for billions around the world, a fundamental aspect of the rich tapestry of the human experience.Attending a major sporting event can be a formative experience in someone’s life, as a place to share in a communal culture.Increasingly we have seen surveillance, and especially mass surveillance measures, being introduced at sports events impeding the enjoyment particularly of the right to privacy and right to participate in sporting life.When we saw that the…
Content type: News & Analysis
On 15 May 2024, a London Administrative Court handed down its judgment in the case of ADL & Ors v Secretary of State for the Home Department, just two months after another court judgment and a ruling of the UK's data protection authority (ICO). The four Claimants in this latest case (including asylum seekers and survivors of trafficking) were challenging the UK Home Office's policy of placing people released from immigration detention under 24/7 GPS surveillance - either by shackling them…
Content type: Long Read
IntroductionFor years PI has been exposing and advocating against the use of facial recognition technology (FRT) and the grave threats it poses to our rights. This highly invasive technology is paving the way to a dystopian, biometric surveillance state, where everyone is identified and tracked everywhere they go, in real time, as they move through public spaces during their everyday lives. Furthermore, this is taking place within a democratic vacuum, without any specific legislation pertaining…
Content type: Advocacy
The United Nations (UN) Committee on the Convention of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD Committee) has published a damning "Report on follow-up to the inquiry concerning the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" which calls upon the United Kingdom (UK) to take action against the human rights risks posed by the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) for automated decision-making in the social security system in order to decide who can receive benefits. Published in…
Content type: Advocacy
Privacy International (PI) welcomes the opportunity to provide input to the forthcoming report the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related tolerance to the 56th session of Human Rights Council which will examine and analyse the relationship between artificial intelligence (AI) and non-discrimination and racial equality, as well as other international human rights standards.AI applications are becoming a part of everyday life:…
Content type: Advocacy
AI-powered employment practices: PI's response to the ICO's draft recruitment and selection guidance
The volume of data collected and the methods to automate recruitment with AI poses challenges for the privacy and data protection rights of candidates going through the recruitment process.Recruitment is a complex and multi-layered process, and so is the AI technology intended to service this process at one or all stages of it. For instance, an AI-powered CV-screening tool using natural language processing (NLP) methods might collect keyword data on candidates, while an AI-powered video…
Content type: Report
The methodology employed for this report consists primarily of in-depth interviews held with grassroots political workers and representatives of collectives. The researchers interviewed 14 individuals from various social justice causes such as womens’ rights, climate change, transgender rights, students’ rights and the right to universal internet access in Pakistan. The experiences they have shared with the interviewers along with the real-time developments in the country’s law and order…
Content type: News & Analysis
In a significant and forceful decision, on 1 March 2024 the UK's Data Protection Authority found that the UK Government's GPS tagging of migrants arriving to the UK by small boats and other "irregular" routes was unlawful.
The decision comes as a result of Privacy International's complaint filed in August 2022 against the GPS tagging policy, which alleged widespread and significant breaches of privacy and data protection law. Our complaint relied extensively on anonymous testimonies of…
Content type: Advocacy
Privacy International had suggested the Human Rights Committee consider the following recommendations for the UK government:Review and reform the IPA 2016 to ensure its compliance with Article 17 of the ICCPR, including by removing the powers of bulk surveillance;Abandon efforts to undermine the limited safeguards of the IPA 2016 through the proposed Investigatory Powers Amendment Bill;Refrain from taking any measures that undermine or limit the availability of encrypted communications or other…
Content type: Advocacy
Privacy International (PI), Big Brother Watch (BBW), StopWatch, CopWatch, Defend Digital Me, Liberty and Statewatch have written to Home Secretary James Cleverly to raise concerns over the danger posed to UK society by Facial Recognition Technology (FRT).In a letter sent on 18 January 2024, the signatories raised concerns over the escalating use of FRT and warned the Home Secretary that "The indiscriminate use of this dystopian biometric technology to identify people in public spaces is a form…
Content type: Press release
Today the European Court of Human Rights held the United Kingdom accountable for its digital spying, even when that spying affects people outside of the UK’s borders.In this case, Mr Wieder and Mr Guarnieri, both researchers who work on information security and privacy, challenged the lack of access to redress mechanisms for alleged breaches to their rights to privacy and freedom of expression by UK intelligence agencies before the European Court of Human Rights.Mr Wieder and Mr Guarnieri…
Content type: Advocacy
Our submission focussed on the evolving impacts of (i) automated decision-making, (ii) the digitisation of social protection programmes, (iii) sensitive data-processing and (iv) assistive technologies in the experiences and rights of people with disabilities.We called on the OHCHR to:Examine the impact that growing digitisation and the use of new and emerging technologies across sectors has upon the rights of persons with disabilities;Urge states to ensure that the deployment of digital…
Content type: Examples
A US federal judge has ruled in the case Ogiltree v. Cleveland State University that "room scans", the common requirement in remotely proctored exams to provide a 360-degree scan of the area in which students are taking tests, are an unreasonable search under the Fourth Amendment. Often these areas are personal residences and/or private spaces. The ruling is not binding on other courts, but any student wishing to push back against room scans can cite it.https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/08/…
Content type: Examples
In a report, the Privacy Coimmissioner of Canada has said that online proctoring tools used to conduct remote exams fail to get sufficiently free, clear, and individual consent from students. Besides this overreach, the report identifies factors that may trigger false alerts and errors in the biometric tools incorporated into the software. The report ends by calling for reflection on how to identify uses of AI that should be prohibited.https://www.biometricupdate.com/202211/online-proctoring-…
Content type: Examples
In a preliminary ruling, the administrative court of Montreuil suspended the use of algorithmic e-proctoring software called TestWe after students at the Institute of Distant Study of the University of Paris 8 brought a legal case, assisted by La Quadrature du Net. The plaintiffs argued that the software failed to comply with GDPR because the software failed to comply with data minimisation standards and its visual and audio surveillance was disproportionate to the intended purpose. A final…
Content type: Examples
During a remotely proctored online exam, a number of students on the Bar Professional Training Course urinated in bottles and buckets and wore adult diapers rather than risk the possibility that their exam would be terminated if they left their screens long enough to go to the toilet. The Bar Standards Board responded to the story by saying that students are warned in advance that they will not be able to leave the room during an online exam and that they should take the exam in a test centre…
Content type: Report
End-to-end encryption (E2EE) contributes significantly to security and privacy. For that reason, PI has long been in favour of the deployment of robust E2EE.Encryption is a way of securing digital communications using mathematical algorithms that protect the content of a communication while in transmission or storage. It has become essential to our modern digital communications, from personal emails to bank transactions. End-to-end encryption is a form of encryption that is even more private.…
Content type: Guide step
DNS level content blocking prevents your device from connecting to known domains that will serve you unwanted ads and track you across all different apps and browsers on your device.
DNS or 'Domain Name System' is basically the 'phone book for the internet'. On the internet, all your requests to access websites are routed to IP addresses. Since IP addresses are sets of numbers and hard to remember, we usually address hosts by their much easier to remember host-name (e.g. privacyinternational.…
Content type: Guide step
Ad Blockers aim to prevent your browser from connecting to Ad servers and loading ads on webpages you are visiting. They can also block some parts of webpages that likely display ads. Blocking ads and connections to ad servers can help minimise the amount of data that the Adtech industry collects about you for targeted advertising.
Warning: Using an ad-blocker may cause some pages to display incorrectly or not at all. This guide also shows how you can modify the Ad Blocker's behaviour to allow…
Content type: Guide step
uBlock Origin (que no debe confundirse con uBlock, que es un proyecto diferente) es un bloqueador de anuncios independiente y de código abierto que utiliza una lista depurada de servidores, y evita que tu navegador se conecte a estos servidores para mostrarte anuncios.
Nota: En el mercado hay muchos bloqueadores de anuncios y puedes ensayar alternativas. Al utilizar un bloqueador de anuncios independiente, de código abierto y gratuito, es más probable que evites usar productos con conflictos…
Content type: Guide step
Ad Blockers aim to prevent your browser from connecting to Ad servers and loading ads on webpages you are visiting. They can also block some parts of webpages that likely display ads. Blocking ads and connections to ad servers can help minimise the amount of data that the Adtech industry collects about you for targeted advertising.
Warning: Using an ad-blocker may cause some pages to display incorrectly or not at all. This guide also shows how you can modify the Ad Blocker's behaviour to allow…
Content type: Guide step
Privacy Badger es una extensión para el navegador que bloquea los anuncios y los rastreadores para evitar que las empresas rastreen tus actividades en línea. Esta extensión lleva una lista actualizada de los rastreadores que detecta mediante pruebas automatizadas (que se hacen a través de servidores especializados y no desde tu computador) y periódicamente envía la lista actualizada a tu navegador. De este modo, cada vez que detecta nuevos servidores de anuncios (por ejemplo, si una nueva…
Content type: Guide step
Online trackers are small bits of code embedded directly into a website's main code which collect data points about you and your browsing activity. This may include the pages you visit, how long you spend on them, where you scroll and the links you click on. On top of the online advertising industry, there are other actors that can potentially make use of trackers to track your online activity, including governments and/or law enforcement agencies.
There are extensions you can add to your…
Content type: Guide step
Online trackers are small bits of code embedded directly into a website's main code which collect data points about you and your browsing activity. This may include the pages you visit, how long you spend on them, where you scroll and the links you click on. On top of the online advertising industry, there are other actors that can potentially make use of trackers to track your online activity, including governments and/or law enforcement agencies.
There are extensions you can add to your…
Content type: Guide step
Privacy Badger es una extensión para el navegador que bloquea los anuncios y los rastreadores para evitar que las empresas rastreen tus actividades en línea. Esta extensión lleva una lista actualizada de los rastreadores que detecta mediante pruebas automatizadas (que se hacen a través de servidores especializados y no desde tu computador) y periódicamente envía la lista actualizada a tu navegador. De este modo, cada vez que detecta nuevos servidores de anuncios (por ejemplo, si una nueva…
Content type: Guide step
Online trackers are small bits of code embedded directly into a website's main code which collect data points about you and your browsing activity. This may include the pages you visit, how long you spend on them, where you scroll and the links you click on. On top of the online advertising industry, there are other actors that can potentially make use of trackers to track your online activity, including governments and/or law enforcement agencies.
There are extensions you can add to your…
Content type: Guide step
Blokada es un bloqueador de anuncios que actúa como una VPN para bloquear el tráfico no deseado con base en hostnames (urls). Esto evita que las aplicaciones ejecutándose en tu dispositivo carguen anuncios y datos maliciosos.
Instalación
Para instalar Blokada, visita su página en la Play Store y haz clic en Instalar (Fig. 1).
Content type: Guide step
DNS level content blocking prevents your device from connecting to known domains that will serve you unwanted ads and track you across all different apps and browsers on your device.
DNS or 'Domain Name System' is basically the 'phone book for the internet'. On the internet, all your requests to access websites are routed to IP addresses. Since IP addresses are sets of numbers and hard to remember, we usually address hosts by their much easier to remember host-name (e.g. privacyinternational.…
Content type: Guide step
The Advertising ID is a unique identifier offered by the Android Operating System that advertisers might use to uniquely identify you. It facilitates the creating of a profile by advertisers or data brokers that can later be used for advertisement targeting or other purposes.
Opt out of targeted advertising
We have written before about the risks that targeted advertisements pose in regards to your digital privacy.
To opt out of targeted ads, open the Settings app and go to Privacy > Ads and…