News and Analysis

N&A, Long Reads, Press Release

News & Analysis

Through An App, Darkly: How Companies Construct Our Financial Identity

Privacy International is celebrating Data Privacy Week, where we’ll be talking about privacy and issues related to control, data protection, surveillance and identity. Join the conversation on Twitter using #dataprivacyweek. If you were looking for a loan, what kind of information would you be happy

Long Read

Data and Control: Protecting Rights, Protecting People

To celebrate International Data Privacy Day (28 January), PI and its International Network have shared a full week of stories and research, exploring how countries are addressing data governance in light of innovations in technology and policy, and implications for the security and privacy of

Long Read

Watching The Watchers: Accessing and Challenging Control Over Our Data

Privacy International is celebrating Data Privacy Week, where we’ll be talking about privacy and issues related to control, data protection, surveillance and identity. Join the conversation on Twitter using #dataprivacyweek. Exercising the right to privacy extends to the ability of accessing and

News & Analysis

Data Protection Day 2018: A Global Perspective To Privacy

It has been almost 40 years since the Council of Europe’s Convention 108 for the Protection of Individuals with regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data was signed. The Convention was the first binding treaty dealing with privacy and data protection that recognised the necessity to “reconcile

News & Analysis

Right to privacy at the UN in 2017 - Don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing

2017 begun with a progressive Human Rights Council resolution on the right to privacy in the digital age, noting that profiling of individuals may lead to discrimination. It ended with a Security Council resolution on counter-terrorism, calling for profiling of all air travellers and widespread

News & Analysis

The road to surveillance is paved with good intentions – and warning signs

15 November 2013 The following is an excerpt from a Comment originally published by The Guardian, written by Privacy International's Head of Advocacy, Carly Nyst: From databases to mobile phone apps and SMS systems, GPS tracking and humanitarian drones to biometric registration, new technologies are

News & Analysis

The promise, and problems, of mobile phones in the developing world

13 October 2013 The following is an excerpt from a guest article which appeared on openDemocracy, written by Privacy International's Research Officer, Anna Crowe: Humanitarian actors often forsake the right to privacy in favour of promoting programmes utilising phones to deliver services, either

Long Read

Invisible Manipulation: 10 ways our data is being used against us

The era where we were in control of the data on our own computers has been replaced with devices containing sensors we cannot control, storing data we cannot access, in operating systems we cannot monitor, in environments where our rights are rendered meaningless. Soon the default will shift from us

News & Analysis

Why We Need Collective Redress For Data Protection

This post was written by Chair Emeritus of PI’s Board of Trustees, Anna Fielder. The UK Data Protection Bill is currently making its way through the genteel debates of the House of Lords. We at Privacy International welcome its stated intent to provide a holistic regime for the protection of

News & Analysis

VMception

This post was written by PI Technologist Ed Geraghty. At the very heart of ThornSec’s design is that we assume our security will fail. There is nothing perfect on this earth (except kittens). The entire point is to fail well. For charities and NGOs that are fragile, poorly resourced, and often at

News & Analysis

Business As Usual? How Western Data Analytics Companies Are Peddling Fear In Fragile Democracies

This post was written by PI Policy Officer Lucy Purdon. In 1956, US Presidential hopeful Adlai Stevenson remarked that the hardest part of any political campaign is how to win without proving you are unworthy of winning. Political campaigning has always been a messy affair and now the online space

News & Analysis

What We Collect (And Why We Collect It)

This is a piece that we drafted in 2018 but is now outdated. We have updated it in and incorporated it into our 2021 privacy policy.

News & Analysis

Forthcoming research investigates whether biometric voter register was misappropriated for political campaigns in Kenya

This brief was written by the Centre for Intellectual Property and Information Technology (CIPIT) of Strathmore University in Kenya. CIPIT is currently investigating how the privacy of Kenyan citizens was affected by the use of biometric data during the just concluded 2017 general and repeat elections.

Long Read

Texas Media Company Hired By Trump Created Kenyan President's Viral 'Anonymous' Attack Campaign Against Rival, New Investigation Reveals

The battle for Kenyan voters’ allegiance in the 2017 Presidential election was fought on social media and the blogosphere. Paid advertisements for two mysterious, anonymous sites in particular started to dominate Google searches for dozens of election-related terms in the months leading up to the

Long Read

Government Hacking and Surveillance: 10 Necessary Safeguards

Introduction Why We Are So Concerned about Government Hacking for Surveillance Scope of Our Safeguards 1. Legality 2. Security and Integrity of Systems 3. Necessity and Proportionality 4. Judicial Authorisation 5. Integrity of information 6. Notification 7. Destruction and Return of Data 8

Press release

Press Release: Texas Media Company Hired By Trump Is Behind Kenyan President's Viral 'Anonymous' Attack Campaign Against Rival, New Investigation Reveals

A new investigation published today by Privacy International reveals the role of an American data-based digital advertising company in the highly divisive online re-election campaign of Kenyan president Uhuru Kenyatta. In the run-up to Kenya's presidential election in August 2017, paid