[LINK] Open Letter to the United Nations

[stephen at melbpc.org.au]

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH

Open Letter from International Human Rights & Privacy Rights Organizations: 

"The United Nations General Assembly Must Uphold Individuals' Right to 
Privacy"

November 20, 2013

To All Member States of the United Nations General Assembly

Dear Ambassador,

The right to privacy is central to who we are as humans and is enshrined in 
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on 
Civil and Political Rights. It protects us from unwarranted intrusions into 
our daily lives, allows us to speak freely without fear of retribution, and 
helps keep our personal information, including health records, political 
affiliations, sexual orientation, and familial histories, safe.

Indiscriminate mass surveillance, which tramples individuals’ right to 
privacy and undermines the social contract we all have with the State, must 
come to end immediately.

That is why we welcome efforts at the United Nations to adopt a resolution 
on “The right to privacy in the digital age.” 

Should it be adopted, the resolution, introduced by Brazil and Germany, 
would be the first major statement by the UN on privacy in 25 years. 

A strong resolution would crucially reiterate the importance of protecting 
privacy and free expression in the face of technological advancements and 
encroaching State power. It would also build on the strong stance taken by 
the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, and the UN Special 
Rapporteur on freedom of opinion and expression, Frank La Rue, in recent 
months, as well as the International Principles on the Application of Human 
Rights to Communications Surveillance, an initiative supported by 300 
organizations from around the world.

As negotiations continue on this draft resolution, we are deeply concerned 
that the countries representing the “Five Eyes” surveillance alliance — the 
United States, Canada, New Zealand, Australia and the United Kingdom — have 
sought to weaken the resolution at the risk of undercutting their own 
longstanding public commitment to privacy and free expression. 

In discussion of the draft resolution, we urge these countries and the 
entire General Assembly to protect the right to privacy and take into 
account these basic points:

Privacy is intrinsically linked to freedom of expression and many other 
rights:

* The mere existence of domestic legislation is not all that is required to 
make surveillance lawful under international law;

* Indiscriminate mass surveillance is never legitimate as intrusions on 
privacy must always be genuinely necessary and proportionate;

* When States conduct extraterritorial surveillance, thereby exerting 
control over the privacy and rights of persons, they have obligations to 
respect privacy and related rights beyond the limits of their own borders;

Privacy is also interfered with even when metadata and other third party 
communications are intercepted and collected.

We call upon all States meeting at the UN General Assembly this week to 
take a stand against indiscriminate mass surveillance, interception and 
data collection, both at home and abroad; to support the draft resolution, 
and to uphold the right of all individuals to use information and 
communication technologies such as the internet without fear of unwarranted 
interference.

This is a critical moment for the protection of privacy around the world.

Signed:

Access
Amnesty International
Electronic Frontier Foundation
Human Rights Watch
Privacy International 


Source: http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/11/20/open-letter-international-human-
rights-and-privacy-rights-organizations-united-natio

Resolution: 
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4juH_L6eTeIQVBrZTFuY2RBb1k/edit

Message sent using MelbPC WebMail Server