Two Years After Snowden: Where are we Now, and Where are we Going?
March 5, 2015
"What would US Surveillance Reform Look Like, and Do We Need it?"
12:10 pm
Discussion with Robert S. Litt, General Counsel to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence & Jameel Jaffer, Deputy Legal Director,ACLU. As part of our Privacy in the Digital Age series, the Human Rights Institute is pleased to invite you to a lunchtime exchange between Robert Litt and Jameel Jaffer focusing on the significance of the Snowden revelations, judicial and legislative oversight of the NSA, legal challenges to NSA surveillance, and the current debate about surveillance reform.
Moderator: Sarah Cleveland, Columbia Law School.
A roundtable discussion with representatives of privacy and civil liberties groups from around the world regarding the impact of the Snowden revelations on the current global conversation on privacy and data surveillance.
Introduction: Sarah Knuckey, Columbia Law School
Moderator: Aryeh Neier, President Emeritus, Open Society Foundations
Paneliststs:
Joana Varon, Antivigilancia (Brazil)
Stefánia Kapronczay, Hungarian Civil Liberties Union
Stefan Heumann, Stiftung Neue Verantwortung (Germany)
Carly Nyst, Privacy International (UK)
Neema Singh Guliani, ACLU (US)
Ambassador Antonio de Aguiar Patriota (Permanent Representative of Brazil to the UN)
Co-sponsored by the Human Rights Institute and the Roger Hertog Program on National Security Law, the ACLU, and the International Network of Civil Liberties Organizations.
"Privacy in the Digital Age: the View from Beyond the U.S." a talk with Michael Drury, BCL Burton Copeland & Gus Hosein, Privacy International
November 18, 2014
In part two of our Privacy in the Digital Age series, with Michael Drury, former Director for Legal Affairs at the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), the United Kingdom's intelligence service, and Gus Hosein, Executive Director of Privacy International, London, discuss national security, data surveillance and privacy issues outside the U.S.
Now a partner at BCL Burton Copeland, while at CGHQ, Mr. Drury was responsible for the full range of legal issues relating to intelligence interception and surveillance, and was responsible in part for the drafting of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (RIPA). He also ensured that GCHQ's actions and systems met the standards required under the Human Rights Act 1998. Privacy International is a UK based NGO that engages in advocacy, litigation and research to promote and protect privacy laws and investigate government surveillance. Mr. Hosein has acted as an external evaluator for UNHCR and advised the UN Special Rapporteur on Terrorism and Human Rights and other international organizations.
Co-sponsored by the Bringing Human Rights Home Lawyers' Network, the Human Rights Institute, the National Security Law Society and the Roger Hertog Program on Law & National Security.
"Human Rights Treaties & Foreign Surveillance: Privacy in the Digital Age" Marko Milanovic, University of Nottingham School of Law
October 27, 2014
The Human Rights Institute and the Roger Hertog Program on Law & National Security and the National Security Law Society held a lunch-time discussion with Marko Milanovic of the University of Nottingham School of Law on Privacy in the Digital Age. The 2013 revelations by Edward Snowden of the scope and magnitude of electronic surveillance run by the US National Security Agency (NSA) and some of its partners, including UK and Australian signals intelligence agencies, have provoked intense and ongoing public debate regarding the proper limits of such intelligence activities. Privacy activists decry such programs, especially those involving the mass collection of the data or communications of ordinary individuals across the globe, arguing that they create an inhibiting surveillance climate that diminshes basic freedoms, while the government officials justify them as being necessary for the prevention of terrorism.
This talk looked at how the legality of such programs would be debated and assessed within the framework of international human rights law, and specifically under the major human rights treaties to which the 'Five Eyes' and other states with sophisticated technological capabilities are parties. In the wake of the UN General Assembly's 2013 resolution on the right to privacy in the digital age, it can be expected that electronic surveillance and related activities will remain on the agenda of UN bodies for years to come, especially since the political relevance of the topic shows no signs of abating.