Privacy International

🆕 In a significant and forceful decision, the Information Commissioner's Office found that the UK Home Office’s GPS tagging of migrants arriving to the UK by small boats and other “irregular” routes was unlawful. Immigration authorities in the UK and elsewhere have been abusing migrants’ privacy in a bid to exercise performative power and control over a vulnerable population. Since January 2021, the Home Office has been placing migrants released on immigration bail under GPS ankle tagging, subjecting them to 24/7 surveillance. This results in vast amounts of highly sensitive, sometimes intimate, data being collected by immigration authorities. This policy was expanded to people arriving on small boats in 2022, in spite of efficacy, well-being and human rights concerns. We filed a complaint in August 2022 with the ICO alleging widespread and significant breaches of privacy and data protection law. Our complaint relied extensively on anonymous testimonies of individuals who recounted the debilitating impact that tagging was having on their private and family life, as well as physical and mental health. These were clients of Bail for Immigration Detainees (BID), Public Law Project, Duncan Lewis Solicitors Ltd., and Wilsons Solicitors London. The ICO concluded its investigation of our complaint, finding that the Expansion Pilot was unlawful, as it failed to comply with data protection law in a number of ways. It also issued a warning to the Home Office regarding all future data protection compliance of the whole GPS tagging scheme. Of huge significance, it found that the Home Office had failed to assess the systemic necessity and proportionality of tracking people’s 24/7 location, and additionally failed to take into account the fact that these may be people in vulnerable situations. A running thread seemed to emerge over the years throughout the Home Office’s policy, evident in the relentless deployment of invasive surveillance against migrants, signalling a further step in their criminalisation: migrants don’t deserve the same human rights and protections as British citizens. Today’s decision is a powerful reminder that migrants have the same data protection rights as everyone else. And a serious warning to immigration authorities in the UK and elsewhere, who have been abusing migrants’ privacy to exercise performative power and control, that they are not above the law. This isn’t the end, as data protection law is only a piece of the puzzle against absurd, racialised, costly and harmful anti-migrant policies. We are still awaiting judgment in two court cases. This is a significant win for all those who were subject to this vindictive, costly and cruel policy. It must be abandoned. Read our more detailed analysis: https://lnkd.in/gyidRdjY #privacy #surveillance #migration #humanrights

Join us tomorrow at 4pm BST for the workshop “Social Media Intelligence Gathering as a tool of repression and how to regulate for the protection of human rights”, where we will present alongside Fundación Karisma & SMEX as part of he Palestine Digital Activism Forum #PDAF2024 organised annually by 7amleh - The Arab Center for the Advancement of Social Media. This session aims to increase awareness of the use of social media intelligence (SOCMINT) and expose how governments and private companies are deploying this extremely intrusive technology to target human rights defenders, journalists and political opponents. The session will also facilitate understanding of the gaps in adequate regulation and legislative frameworks governing the use of SOCMINT and aim to inspire participants to identify opportunities for advocacy to ensure a rights-based approach to digital initiatives which considers the fulfillment of the right to privacy as well as other fundamental rights. The session will aim to generate a discussion on advocacy strategies to ensure there is more transparency about the use of such practices, and to call for a curtailment of avenues for social media monitoring. 🔎 More info: https://lnkd.in/e44iukMy 📌 Reserve your seat: https://cutt.ly/KetgRXdS

Join us at the Palestine Digital Activism Forum 2024 - “Artificial Intelligence (AI): Revolutionary Promises & Discriminatory Realities” to explore the role of AI in the context of war, and its impact on digital rights. Browse the forum’s agenda and register now for virtual attendance: https://cutt.ly/KetgRXdS #PDAF2024 7amleh - The Arab Center for the Advancement of Social Media

This week we are attending the Seventy-seventh World Health Assembly as part of our work on health with the Digital Health and Rights Project (DHRP). 📣 Find out DHRP’s key advocacy asks for the World Health Assembly #WHA77 --> https://lnkd.in/erqasSGY 🗓 Join us online or in-person tomorrow, Wednesday, 29 May 2024 at 3pm CET, alongside representatives from civil society, community-led organisations, the World Health Organisation, the UN Office of the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights for a side event on: Achieving UHC through an inclusive and rights-based digital transformation. More details --> https://lnkd.in/dxm4BsGW #WHA77 #DigitaHealth #HumanRights #PrivacyMatters

2024 is a big year for sports fans. Increasingly we have seen mass surveillance measures being introduced at sports events, impeding the enjoyment of the right to privacy and right to participate in sporting life. Read our blog: #sports #surveillance

As part of our work on health we work collectively with the Digital Health and Rights Project (DHRP) which brings together international social scientists, human rights lawyers, health advocates, and networks of people living with HIV, to conduct research and advocate for rights-based digital governance in Colombia, Ghana, Kenya, Vietnam, and globally. We will be at the 77th World Health Assembly (WHA) advocating for a rights-based approach to the adoption on new technologies in health. At the WHA, DHRP are co-hosting a side event with DTH-Lab on "Achieving Universal Health Coverage through an inclusive and rights-based digital transformation". We will be speaking on the panel alongside representatives from the World Health Organisation, the UN Office of the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights and other civil society and community-led organisations. You can register for online attendance via this link: https://lnkd.in/dbrxhr_a or if you prefer attending in person, you can express your interest through this form: https://lnkd.in/dxm4BsGW 🗓 29 May 2024 🕒 14:00 BST | 15:00 CET

🚨 Registration for the Palestine Digital Activism Forum 2024 (PDAF) ends on 28 May. Don’t miss the chance to attend the forum’s virtual activities on the 4th and 5th of June! 📌 Reserve your seat now: https://cutt.ly/KetgRXdS #PDAF2024 7amleh - The Arab Center for the Advancement of Social Media

On Wednesday, a UK court dealt the third legal blow in just 3 months to the country’s policy of GPS tagging of migrants, subjecting them to 24/7 surveillance. What happened? The first was on 1 March, the UK’s data protection authority (ICO) found the policy of GPS tagging asylum seekers arriving to the UK unlawful under data protection laws, and issued a formal warning to the Home Office for all future compliance of GPS tagging. The second on 12 March, the Upper Tribunal (Immigration & Asylum Chamber) ruled in the case of Mark Nelson, a car mechanic and father of five, that his GPS tagging had been unlawful for over a year. The third came on Wednesday. The judgment is another significant vindication for those who brought the claims and for their rights. These are people who have been through all kinds of harshness (they are asylum seekers, undocumented, or survivors of trafficking). The UK Home Office had placed them under 24/7 surveillance, either by shackling them with GPS ankle tags or by requiring them to carry GPS-enabled devices that vibrate at random times requiring urgent fingerprint scans to ensure they are actually carrying the device. They are a 26-year old Portuguese national, a 36-year old Jamaican survivor of modern slavery with learning difficulties, a 25-year old Sudanese survivor of torture and trafficking, and a 59-year old Nigerian survivor of FGM who now has four children inc. two British citizens. They sued the Home Office for having breached public principles and their human rights. And won on many counts. Beyond the great wins for the individual Claimants that this judgment represents, it also exposed the multiple failings in the administration of GPS tagging that plague a cruel, vindictive and unnecessary policy. Nothing short of a complete withdrawal of the policy will satisfy the UK’s human rights obligations. The considerable time and resources spent on it must be replaced with safe, humane and legal routes to migration. https://lnkd.in/ek-Z8s_9

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The UK's record on civic and political rights was recently examined by the UN Human Rights Committee. 🇺🇳 TL;DR, it was appalling. ☠️ In particular, they called out the cruel policy of GPS tagging migrants. The report covered a LOT of issues - all the bad things the UK does with people's rights and freedoms. They found GPS tracking of migrants so concerning they dedicated space amidst all those other issues to criticise it and to recommend urgent changes. GPS tracking of migrants is a practice used by countries that are notorious for their vindictive mistreatment of migrants. The UN Human Rights Committee already a few months ago called out the US for using GPS surveillance of migrants. The UK places people released from immigration detention under 24/7 GPS surveillance through ankle tags or portable devices that vibrate 5 times a day, requiring urgent fingerprint scans. It's been experienced as a form of "psychological torture". The UN's concerns are an important recognition of what we and others have said ever since the start of this policy - it's harmful, an abuse of immigration enforcement powers, unnecessary, and just plain cruel. It's also an important brick in the wall of evidence mounting on the legal implications of subjecting migrants to lesser human rights protections and to performative, populist policies. A couple of months ago, the UK's data protection authority found a plethora of legal failures in the policy, in particular a complete lack of assessment of the impact GPS tagging could have on people and on their rights and freedoms. A UK court also found someone had been unlawfully tagged for over a year - amongst others because immigration authorities fail to regularly check that tagging someone is necessary and proportionate. You'd expect such an intrusive and harmful (and costly!) practice to be strictly justified and effective. Time and again UK immigration authorities have shown they just. don't. care. This UN conclusion will help us and others argue with full force that this policy must be dropped, and provide people subjected to human rights violations with redress. https://lnkd.in/eq5rsAB7