The High Court has suspended Kenya’s biometric ID programme until a comprehensive legal framework on digital ID is developed.  This followed a petition by civil society groups and the national human rights institution on grounds that the programme violated the privacy of Kenyans. They also raised concerns that minorities and border communities who did not [...]

124 French civil society organisations, including la Quadrature du net, have released a joint letter calling for the ban of facial recognition for law enforcement. This letter invites political candidates to the upcoming local elections in France to join this cause and take into account the lack of proportionality of these techniques and their great [...]

In a speech before the UN General Assembly, the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres spoke about the “four horsemen in our midst’ that pose a threat to the global future. Amongst the ‘four horsemen’ is the ‘dark side of the digital world’ which includes job displacement provoked by automation, misuse of cyberspace by terrorists, cybercrime, and [...]

The 5th Arab Internet Governance Forum (ArabIGF-V) took place in Cairo on 22-23 January 2020. It was organised by ESCWA and the League of Arab States, in co-operation with the National Telecom Regulatory Authority of Egypt – the Arab IGF Secretariat since 2012, and was hosted by the Arab Administrative Development Organization (ARADO) at its [...]

The UN special advocate of the Secretary-General of the United Nations for Inclusive Financing for Development, Queen Maxima will attend the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos this month. She will hold meetings with various stakeholders from government and fintech providers to discuss improving access to financial services. Together with the Dutch Prime Minister, they [...]

According to the Wall Street Journal, a judge from the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia has ordered Facebook and the US government to file written responses by January 24th  to civil society groups, critical of the settlement agreed by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and Facebook after the Cambridge Analytica scandal. The [...]

According to the civil society group EPIC, Facebook has admitted that it can determine a user's location even after the user has disabled location services. The statement came in response to a letter sent by two US Senators Josh Hawley and Chris Coons. This statement emerged while EPIC is challenging the proposed 2019 FTC settlement [...]

Two events were organised by the Information and Telecommunication Union (ITU) on the role of emerging technologies in promoting information and communication technology (ICT) for accessibility. The first event, Accessible America on 20-22 November 2019 in Quito, Ecuador. Focused on the role of artificial intelligence (AI) to provide persons with disabilities unbiased access to digital [...]

 The civil society group NOYB has filed three GDPR complaints with the CNIL, the French data protection authority. These complaints identify privacy violations from three companies (CDiscount, Allociné and Vanity Fair), for turning a rejection of cookies by users into a “fake consent”. Despite users rejecting” cookies, these webpages have sent digital signals to tracking [...]

One year after the French president Macron called for the Internet of Trust, the coalition of signatories is growing. Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne, France’s Minister of State attached to the Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, announced that the Paris Call ‘has nearly tripled to more than 1,000 and now includes 74 nations; more than 350 international, [...]