Search
Content type: Report
17th November 2014
In societies that are in the process of transition towards democracy, democratic control of intelligence organisations is both an indispensable requirement and a pressing need. In many cases, the most serious human rights violations committed by dictatorial governments were intrinsically linked to draconian surveillance and control systems. Systematic spying on trade unions, students and dissident groups was a common feature of 20th-century dictatorships. The persistent violation of citizens’…
Content type: News & Analysis
21st February 2014
Political activist and university lecturer Tadesse Kersmo believed that he was free from intrusive surveillance when he was granted political asylum in the UK. Instead, he was likely subject to more surveillance than ever. His case underlines the borderless nature of advanced surveillance technologies and why it represents such a massive problem.
In the past, those fleeing conflict or persecution could reasonably expect a degree of respite if they managed to escape their circumstances. However…
Content type: News & Analysis
14th July 2014
From Monday 14 to Friday 18 July, the British intelligence agencies and the Ministers responsible for them will be under the spotlight in an historic case to determine whether GCHQ's mass communications surveillance activities are a violation of Britain's human rights obligations.
Privacy International, along with Amnesty International, Liberty, the American Civil Liberties Union, Pakistani organisation Bytes for All and others, have brought the case before the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (…
Content type: News & Analysis
21st May 2014
While the initial disclosures by Edward Snowden revealed how US authorities are conducting mass surveillance on the world's communications, further reporting by the Guardian newspaper uncovered that UK intelligence services were just as involved in this global spying apparatus. Faced with the prospect of further public scrutiny and accountability, the UK Government gave the Guardian newspaper an ultimatum: hand over the classified documents or destroy them.
The Guardian decided that having the…
Content type: News & Analysis
10th June 2014
In the coming year, the elections to be held in Nigeria, Indonesia, Turkey, Ethiopia, Mexico, and Tunisia will be closely watched. Not only will the international community be monitoring the elections, but domestic governments could be monitoring their own citizens at the ballot box.
When courageous citizens brave uncertain political and societal contexts to exercise one of their fundamental human rights - the right to vote - they will rely on another fundamental human right - privacy. Privacy…
Content type: News & Analysis
25th November 2014
The United Nations today adopted an important resolution reaffirming the right to privacy in the digital age, condemning unlawful government mass surveillance and calling on member States to review their legislation and policies to ensure that they are in line with human rights law.
Despite efforts by the United States, the “Five Eyes” surveillance alliance, and other states to weaken its language, the resolution reflects some of the important findings contained in the UN High Commissioner for…
Content type: News & Analysis
16th July 2014
Today’s report on the right to privacy in the digital age by the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights, commissioned by the General Assembly in December 2013, marks an historic turning point in the international discourse around privacy and surveillance.
Privacy International believes the report will dramatically change the international conversation on the implications of surveillance and intelligence for human rights. Most importantly, it puts beyond doubt that the very existence of mass…
Content type: News & Analysis
1st April 2014
In response to a consultation being undertaken by the UN in accordance with December’s General Assembly resolution on the right to privacy in the digital age, Privacy International today called on the United Nations to recognise that mass surveillance is incompatible with human rights.
The submission to the Office of the High Commissioner to Human Rights confronts some of the biggest challenges to the right to privacy in the digital age, debunks some of the justifications put forth by the Five…
Content type: Press release
16th June 2014
Britain’s top counter-terrorism official has been forced to reveal a secret Government policy justifying the mass surveillance of every Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Google user in the UK.
This disturbing policy was made public due to a legal challenge brought by Privacy International, Liberty, Amnesty International, the American Civil Liberties Union, Pakistani organisation Bytes for All, and five other national civil liberties organisations[fn]Canadian Civil Liberties Association, Egyptian…
Content type: News & Analysis
3rd June 2014
3 June 2014
The following article written by Carly Nyst, Privacy International's Legal Director, originially appeared on the Future Tense blog on Slate:
The news that the CIA is no longer using vaccination programs as a front for spying operations may come as a relief to many humanitarian workers. Yet their fears should not be completely assuaged, because the CIA’s activities—which undoubtedly threatened the safety of humanitarian workers and those they seek to help—pale in comparison to the…
Content type: News & Analysis
29th December 2014
Going into 2014, there were high hopes for advancing privacy protections and to finally have the debate around surveillance we've been clamouring for. Privacy was even Dictionary.com's word of the year in 2013. Europe was on the edge of passing new strong privacy laws, despite protests from industry and governments. Parliaments in Canada and the United Kingdom had pushed back against expanding surveillance laws. Transparency reports were beginning to shine a more comprehensive picture on…
Content type: News & Analysis
9th January 2014
UK parliamentary select committees are charged with overseeing the work of government in relation to particular topical issues or the work of particular departments. When it comes to UK Government policy on arms, it’s the Committees on Arms Export Controls (CAEC) that's responsible: a conglomeration of four select committees made up of serving Members of Parliament that collects evidence and conducts an inquiry into developments in export control policy and the preceding years’ exports of…
Content type: Long Read
27th August 2014
Bad analogies about surveillance technology pervade newspaper reports, politicians’ speeches, and legal arguments. While it’s natural to want simple explanations to understand complex technology, it does us a disservice when governments, the media, or the courts mislead us through analogies that are inadequate. It is even worse if these analogies are used as a basis for policy change.
Privacy International’s legal challenge against GCHQ’s mass surveillance rests on the capability of the judges…
Content type: News & Analysis
24th February 2014
In Geneva this week, an expert seminar will be held at the Human Rights Council on the right to privacy. To inform these discussions and debates, Privacy International is releasing our report, The State of Privacy 2014, which identifies recent accomplishments from around the world, and highlights significant challenges ahead for this right.
To read the full report, go here.
Promoting and defending the right to privacy in national and international policy discourses is always an interesting…
Content type: Advocacy
23rd June 2014
This stakeholder report is a submission by Privacy International (PI). PI is a human rights organisation that works to advance and promote the right to privacy and fight surveillance around the world. PI wishes to bring concerns about the protection and promotion of the right to privacy in Turkey before the Human Rights Council for consideration in Turkey’s upcoming review.
Content type: Advocacy
23rd June 2014
This stakeholder report is a submission by Privacy International (PI), Jonction and Stat View International. Privacy International is a human rights organisation that works to advance and promote the right to privacy and fight surveillance around the world. Jonction is a human rights organisation based in Dakar, Senegal, which aims to promote sustainable and equitable development as well as human rights across Africa but particularly in Senegal. Stat View International is a research-based…
Content type: Advocacy
23rd June 2014
This stakeholder report is a submission by Privacy International (PI). PI is a human rights organisation that works to advance and promote the right to privacy and fight surveillance around the world. PI wishes to bring concerns about the protection and promotion of the right to privacy in Sweden before the Human Rights Council for consideration in Sweden’s upcoming Universal Periodic Review.
Content type: Advocacy
23rd June 2014
This stakeholder report is a submission by Privacy International (PI) and the National Coalition of Human Rights Defenders in Kenya (NCHRD-K). PI is a human rights organisation that works to advance and promote the right to privacy around the world. NCHRD-K is a non-governmental organisation registered as a Trust in Kenya. It was established to strengthen the work of human rights defenders (HRDs) in the country by reducing their vulnerability to the risk of persecution and by enhancing their…
Content type: Advocacy
23rd March 2014
This stakeholder is a submission by Privacy International (PI), the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR), the Association for Freedom of Thought and Expression (AFTE), and Association for Progressive Communication (APC). Together PI, EIPR, AFTE and APC wish to bring their concerns about the protection and promotion of the right to privacy in Egypt before the Human Rights Council for consideration in Egypt’s upcoming review.
Content type: News & Analysis
6th November 2014
The past year has been an important one for the right to privacy. Privacy was Dictionary.com’s word of the year in 2013. Human Rights Watch called it “The Right Whose Time Has Come (again).”
However, privacy has not received enough attention in the international bodies that are meant to ensure our human rights are protected: there has been no major statement on privacy by a United Nations human rights body since 1988.
One crucial step to protect privacy, and address how the technical and…
Content type: News & Analysis
25th November 2014
In the last two days multiple security vendors, newspapers and experts have weighed in on the existence of the “Regin" malware, among the most sophisticated ever discovered, and its possible origins at GCHQ and the NSA. The Intercept has now confirmed Regin was the malware found on infected internal computer systems and email servers at Belgacom, the Belgian telecommunications company. Last year, documents leaked by Edward Snowden established that it was GCHQ that had committed the attack on…
Content type: News & Analysis
21st July 2014
The following is an excerpt from an op-ed that appeared in the Daily Telegraph written by Carly Nyst, Legal Director of Privacy International:
One of the most shocking discoveries from Edward Snowden's disclosures was that GCHQ, the British intelligence agency, is tapping undersea cables to harvest the communications of people from all around the world. This top-secret programme, nicknamed Tempora, sucks up petabytes of data from tapped cables off the coast of Cornwall and is capable of…
Content type: News & Analysis
4th November 2014
As privacy and free expression advocates hail the demise of the Data Retention Directive at the hands of the European Court of Justice, one large question is looming in the midst of celebration.
Now what?
More specifically, what will be its impact of the national laws of the European Union countries? What steps should EU governments be taking to ensure the Court’s decision is given effect? What are the implications for communications service providers who have been collecting and storing…
Content type: News & Analysis
16th February 2014
After suffering years of persistent harassment, violence, and surveillance at the hands of his oppressive government, Tadesse Kersmo had enough. Tired of living under constant monitoring, Tadesse and his wife escaped Ethiopia, where they had been politically active for years, and were granted asylum in the United Kingdom in 2009.
It was only a few years later that they discovered that this escape was an illusion, and that they had been followed from Ethiopia to England. He may have left his…
Content type: News & Analysis
5th March 2014
Facing intense scrutiny from a Swiss government inquiry into the human rights impact of the commercial surveillance trade, companies have packed up and are no longer attempting to export their spying technology from Switzerland.
Speaking with St. Galler Tagblatt, one of Switzerland’s largest German-language daily newspapers, government spokeswoman Marie Avet confirmed that the companies have cancelled export applications for surveillance technology - including all applications for the export of…
Content type: News & Analysis
2nd July 2014
We have learnt a lot in the last year about the dirty games GCHQ and NSA are playing to infiltrate the networks, tools and technologies we all use to communicate. This includes forcing companies to handover their customers’ data under secret orders, and secretly tapping fibre optic cablesbetween the same companies’ data centers.
Not content with that, we know now GCHQ are targeting companies systems administrators, exploiting the routers and switches in their networks to spy on us all,…
Content type: News & Analysis
30th January 2014
Over the past half year, Privacy International has been investigating the sale of surveillance technology made by South African company VASTech to Libya and what role the government had in promoting and developing the system. Unfortunately, the government has been slow to respond to our questions and has offered only vague answers. This has done little to ease our concerns about the part they played in the development and export of mass surveillance technology to a military regime with a…
Content type: Long Read
29th November 2014
Many people imagine intelligence sharing to be a practice whereby men in trench coats silently slide manilla envelopes containing anonymous tip-offs or intelligence reports marked TOP SECRET across tables in smoke-filled rooms.
While such practices certainly exist, they represent only a tiny slice of intelligence sharing activities, and are vastly overshadowed by the massive exchange of bulk unanlysed (raw) intelligence data that takes place between the UK and its Five Eyes allies. It is this…
Content type: News & Analysis
15th August 2014
The publishing of materials from a support server belonging to surveillance-industry giant Gamma International has provided a trove of information for technologists, security researchers and activists. This has given the world a direct insight into a tight-knit industry, which demands secrecy for themselves and their clients, but ultimately assists in the violation human rights of ordinary people without care or reproach.
Now for the first time, there is solid confirmation of Gamma's…
Content type: Press release
28th October 2014
Britain's intelligence services do not need a warrant to receive unlimited bulk intelligence from the NSA and other foreign agencies, and can keep this data on a massive searchable database for up to two years, according to secret internal policies revealed today by human rights organisations.
Details of previously unknown internal policies, which GCHQ was forced to reveal during legal proceedings challenging their surveillance practices in the wake of the Snowden revelations, reveal that…