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Content type: Advocacy
12th April 2022
As part of the first public consultation with the WHO Intergovernmental Negotiating Body to draft and negotiate a WHO convention, agreement or other international instrument on pandemic prevention, preparedness and response, Privacy International delivered the following statement:
In line with WHO's commitment to a human rights-based approach to health, Privacy International believes the following elements procedural and substantive elements must be included:
Open, inclusive and multi-…
Content type: Long Read
10th November 2021
For over 20 years with the start of the first use of ICTs in the 1990s, we have seen a digital revolution in the health sector. The Covid-19 pandemic significantly accelerated the digitalisation of the health sector, and it illustrates how fast this uptake can be and what opportunities can emerge; but also, importantly, the risks that it involves.
As we've said many times before, whilst technologies can be part of the solution to tackle some socio-economic and political challenges facing our…
Content type: Long Read
8th November 2021
Table of contents
Introduction
The Right to Health
A rights-based approach to providing access to healthcare
What does regulation and governance of data look like in the health sector?
Digital Health
Types of digital initiatives in the health sector
A general lack of a human rights approach to digital health
Why the "digital" makes it all that little bit more complicated
Tech industry and health data exploitation
Why the drive for digital
Introduction
Like in many…
Content type: Long Read
15th September 2021
Image found here.
Founded in 1959, Bounty UK Limited markets itself as an information service for pregnant women and new mothers. Prior to the pandemic, it was best known for distributing “Bounty packs” of free samples of baby products to pregnant women at midwife appointments, to new mothers on maternity wards in the UK and through its digital presence via its website and app. Bounty representatives also sold new born photography packages to new mothers at the hospital bedside. Bounty entered…
Content type: Advocacy
9th August 2021
On 6 August 2021, the World Health Organisation (WHO) published its technical specifications and implementation guidance for “Digital Documentation of COVID-19 Certificates: Vaccination Status” (DDCC:VS) following months of consultations. As governments around the world are deploying their own Covid-19 certificates, guidance from the global health agency was expected to set a global approach, and one that prioritises public health. As such, we would expect the WHO to identify what these…
Content type: Long Read
21st September 2020
An edited version of this article was originally published on the EDRi website in September 2020.
Introduction
Monopolies, mergers and acquisitions, anti-trust laws. These may seem like tangential or irrelevant issues for privacy and digital rights organisations. But having run our first public petition opposing a big tech merger, we wanted to set out why we think this is an important frontier for people's rights across Europe and indeed across the world.
In June, Google notified the…
Content type: Advocacy
24th July 2020
Introduction
In February 2020, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) commenced an investigation into the proposed acquisition of Fitbit by Google, which was originally announced in November 2019.
In March 2020, we made a submission to the ACCC, arguing that the acquisition would very likely have onerous implications for both consumers and markets. We asked the Australian regulator to apply strict scrutiny and not let hisory once again repeat itself. We concluded that the…
Content type: Call to Action
18th June 2020
Google wants to know everything about you.
It already holds a massive trove of data about you, but by announcing its plans to acquire the health and fitness tracker company Fitbit, it now clearly wants to get its hands on your health too. We don’t think any company should be allowed to accumulate this much intimate information about you. This is why we’re trying to stop its merger with Fitbit.
Google and Fitbit need the European Commission’s approval before they can merge. The merger would…
Content type: Long Read
19th May 2020
Covid Apps are on their way to a phone near you. Is it another case of tech-solutionism or a key tool in our healthcare response to the pandemic? It’s fair to say that nobody quite knows just yet.
We’ve been tracking these apps since the early days. We’ve been monitoring Apple and Google closely, have been involved in the UK’s app process, our partners in Chile and Peru have been tracking their governments’ apps, and more.
Of course privacy concerns arise. But only a simplistic analysis would…
Content type: Long Read
6th May 2020
On 12 April 2020, citing confidential documents, the Guardian reported Palantir would be involved in a Covid-19 data project which "includes large volumes of data pertaining to individuals, including protected health information, Covid-19 test results, the contents of people’s calls to the NHS health advice line 111 and clinical information about those in intensive care".
It cited a Whitehall source "alarmed at the “unprecedented” amounts of confidential health information being swept up in the…
Content type: Advocacy
23rd April 2020
Background
In February 2020, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) commenced an investigation into the proposed acquisition of Fitbit by Google, which was originally announced in November 2019.
Google, whose parent company, Alphabet, in 2018, generated 85% of its $136.22 billion in revenue from delivering targeted advertisements, has a past of competition law infringements in the European Union. Fitbit is a company that produces and sells health tracking technologies and…
Content type: Long Read
24th February 2020
This piece was written by Aayush Rathi and Ambika Tandon, who are policy officers at the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) in India. The piece was originally published on the website Economic Policy Weekly India here.
In order to bring out certain conceptual and procedural problems with health monitoring in the Indian context, this article posits health monitoring as surveillance and not merely as a “data problem.” Casting a critical feminist lens, the historicity of surveillance practices…