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Access Now 17 December 2020 | 10:00 am
As we mark the 10th anniversary of the Arab Spring,
we, the undersigned activists, journalists, and human rights organizations, have come together to voice our frustration and dismay at how platform policies and content moderation procedures all too often lead to the silencing and erasure of critical voices from marginalized and oppressed communities across the Middle East and North Africa.
The Arab Spring is historic for many reasons, and one of its outstanding legacies is how activists and citizens have used social media to push for political change and social justice, cementing the internet as an essential enabler of human rights in the digital age.
Many in the U.S. have spent 2020 debating the problems of content moderation on social media platforms, misinformation and disinformation, and the perceived censorship of political views. But globally, this issue has been in the spotlight for a decade.
This year is the tenth anniversary of what became known as the Arab Spring , in which activists and citizens across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) used social media to document the conditions in which they lived, to push for political change and social justice, and to draw the world s attention to their movement. For many, it was the first time they had seen how the Internet could have a role to play in pushing for human rights across the world. Emerging social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube all basked in the reflected glory of press coverage that centered their part in the protests: often to the exclusion of those who were actually on the streets. The years after the uprisings failed to live up
12 January 2021
What is the trajectory of judicial discourse on digital rights in South Asia? Are the laws being used to protect people’s rights and freedoms or are they used to stifle self-expression and open discourse? A new report,
The report was developed by the Association for Progressive Communications (APC) under the CYRILLA project. The report looked into a workbook of cases and decisions available at the CYRILLA database and analysed the content of the orders. Cases were divided into three categories: access, privacy and freedom of expression.
The aim of the report was to develop documentation that can be used by policy experts, digital rights defenders and lawyers to identify and compare jurisprudence on the issues discussed. Ultimately, it is hoped that this document enables advocacy for improvements in digital rights guarantees based on progressive judicial pronouncements in other jurisdictions and that collaborations are made possible. This report is not meant to e
Swedish computer expert and human rights defender Ola Bini speaks during an interview in Quito, Ecuador, 22 June 2019, after an Ecuador court ordered his release, CRISTINA VEGA/AFP via Getty Images Ola Bini is a computer expert and human rights defender recognized worldwide, who is facing a political-judicial process in Ecuador since April 2019. Ecuadorian and international civil society organizations set up a mission to observe the preparatory hearing and trial evaluation of December 3rd, 2020.
This statement was originally published on article19.org on 2 December 2020.
Ola Bini is a computer expert and human rights defender recognized worldwide, who is facing a political-judicial process in Ecuador since