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Workshop Format. Please click here for a description of available Workshop Session Formats.
Panel
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Duration of proposed workshop
90 minutes
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IGF 2015 subtheme that this workshop falls under
Internet and Human Rights
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Description
In recent years, the potential of big data derived from the Internet and other digital devices to transform targeted advertising, recommender systems, location based services, logistics and other activities in the private sector has come to fruition. Increasingly, parallel applications in development work have emerged, proving the utility of big data for monitoring and measuring social phenomenon including disease outbreaks, food security, or migration. However, the opportunities presented by big data simultaneously raise serious concerns about privacy, especially when it comes to use of personal data. To realize the benefits of “Big Data for Development” it is important to find solutions for how to protect fundamental rights and values, including the right to privacy as recognized by the UDHR and ICCPR. The recent UN Resolutions and June 2013 report of the UN HCHR stressed the importance of considering the risks that uncontrolled use of personal information poses to human rights.
Therefore, this panel will engage multi-sector stakeholders in a dialogue on critical topics related to data protection and privacy to strengthen the overall understanding of how privacy protected analysis of big data along with the assessment of risks and benefits can contribute to sustainable development and humanitarian action. The panelists will offer strategies on how to reduce risks of Human Rights violations in the context of big data for development and also suggest solutions that can be implemented into existing risk mitigation frameworks. This panel will be highly interactive, encouraging active audience participation through preliminary and real-time Q&A sessions.
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Name, stakeholder group, and organizational affiliation of workshop proposal co-organizer(s)
Liudmyla Romanoff
Intergovernmental Organization
United Nations Global Pulse
Anna Lekvall
Government
the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida)
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Has the proposer, or any of the co-organizers, organized an IGF workshop before?
no
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Subject matter #tags that describe the workshop
#dataprivacy #bigdata #humanrights #Data4Dev #digitalrights
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Description of the plan to facilitate discussion amongst speakers, audience members and remote participants
The organizer will communicate with the panelists before the workshop to ensure clear understanding of topics to be discussed during the event. The organizer will also encourage the panelists to introduce their material to the others before the event to ensure meaningful response. The ‘Questions and Answers’ session will be arranged to engage the audience and raise dynamic exchanges between the panelists and audience members. Remote participation will be available through WebEx and Twitter.
Global Pulse will promote the event in advance through all our social networks and invite interested parties to submit comments for the panel to dataprivacy@unglobalpulse.org; Questions will also be accepted in advance and during the session (through an interactive online platform - social media, blog posts and comment forums). All presentation materials (if any) will be made available online prior to the panel. A remote moderator will be managing the discussion, taking questions between online participants and attendees.
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Names and affiliations (stakeholder group, organization) of the participants in the proposed workshop
Rohan Samarajiva, Founding Co-Chair, LirneAsia
Drudeisha Madhub, Data Protection Commissioner, Republic of Mauritius
Natasha Jackson, Head of Content Policy, GSMA
Danilo Doneda, National Consumer Secretariat of the Ministry of Justice of Brazil
Pupilo Lorenzo, Executive Director in the Public & Regulatory Affairs Unit of Telecom Italia
Mila Romanoff, Data Privacy & Legal Specialist United Nations Global Pulse
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Name of in-person Moderator(s)
Marcin de Kaminski, Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) - moderator
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Name of Remote Moderator(s)
Anoush Tatevossian, Strategic Communications & Partnerships Officer, UN Global Pulse at United Nations
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Name of Rapporteur(s)
Marcin de Kaminski
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Description of the proposer's plans for remote participation
Remote participation will be available through WebEx & Twitter, with video/audio/streaming/people calling in and Twitter. To maximize remote participation engagement, we will ensure that panelists' presentation materials (if any) are available online prior to the event for people to access/follow remotely. We will also accept questions through Twitter or email to be posed to the panel. The remote moderator will monitor questions and points of interest raised on remote participation platforms and feed them back to panelists, depending on the relevance, for discussion.
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Background paper
background paper
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Agenda
Moderated discussion, followed by audience Q&A, with expert panelists:
- Rohan Samarajiva, Founding Co-Chair, LirneAsia
- Drudeisha Madhub, Data Protection Commissioner, Republic of Mauritius
- Natasha Jackson, Head of Content Policy, GSMA
- Danilo Doneda, National Consumer Secretariat of the Ministry of Justice of Brazil
- Pupilo Lorenzo, Executive Director in the Public & Regulatory Affairs Unit of Telecom Italia
- Mila Romanoff, Data Privacy & Legal Specialist United Nations Global Pulse
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Key Issues raised (1 sentence per issue):
- Adopting a clear and uniform regulatory framework for the collection and use of big data for development and humanitarian purposes
- Acknowledgment and reduction of very wide technological gaps and technological infrastructure between countries, for the implementation of minimum standards for using big data for development and humanitarian purposes – such as the development of strong guidelines and methodologies on data anonymization
- More sustainable models for private and public sector data-sharing partnerships, are required in order to accelerate the use of big data for development and humanitarian purposes
- The risks and opportunities of using big data for development and humanitarian action
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Please describe the discussions that took place during the workshop session (3 paragraphs):
Big data has tremendous potential applications for development and humanitarian purposes - for example, for monitoring and measuring social phenomenon including disease outbreaks, food security, or migration. However, the opportunities presented by big data simultaneously raise serious concerns about privacy, especially when it comes to use of personal data. To realize the benefits of “Big Data for Development” it is important to find solutions for how to protect fundamental rights and values, including the right to privacy as recognized by the UDHR and ICCPR. The recent UN Resolutions and June 2013 report of the UN HCHR stressed the importance of considering the risks that uncontrolled use of personal information poses to human rights.
This workshop engaged participants from multiple sectors from various regions of the world in a dialogue on critical topics related to data protection and privacy to strengthen the overall understanding of how privacy protected analysis of big data, along with the assessment of risks and benefits, could contribute to sustainable development and humanitarian action. The panelists shared examples of how big data has been used in research and applications to date, and offered strategies on how to risks to privacy could be reduced.
Questions were raised related to importance of transparency and security; establishment of global big data framework or regulation; risk – benefit approach to using big data; movement of data across boarders; importance of consent and data accuracy; retention of telecom data by telecommunication companies.
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If there were presentations during the workshop session, please provide a 1-paragraph summary for each presentation:
Mila Romanoff from the United Nations Global Pulse described big data as a new resource that could complement more traditional statistics and information sources to advance sustainable development and humanitarian missions. She posed a question with regard to the necessity of establishing policies and regulatory frameworks that would promote and protect the right to privacy within the context of big data. Among the challenges presented by the use of Big Data, Mrs. Romanoff mentioned the fragmented regulatory landscape, the issue of obtaining consent (especially in emergency situations) and also the issue of data repurposing. Mrs. Romanoff also shared “big data for development” examples and projects undertaken by UN Global Pulse and explained how privacy risks are assessed and mitigated in Global Pulse projects. In particular, she pointed to the development of a Privacy Risk Assessment, and the Global Pulse Data Privacy Advisory Group. She also stressed that for the purposes of development and humanitarian projects it is not always necessary to have individual level data. Community level data is, in fact, enough in most circumstances. Finally, she invited panelists to not only consider the risks of using Big Data but also the risks of not using this resource and missing opportunities for accelerating development, or responding to humanitarian crises. To conclude, she advocated in favor of building trust among different stakeholders by ensuring an inclusive and transparent dialogue on issues of data collection and use.
Rohan Samarajiva – founding chair the Sri Lanka based policy think tank LirneAsia – presented applications of mobile phone data for development, and shared a few specific examples from the work of his organization. Mr. Samarajiva pointed out that in the geography where he comes from, data derived from mobile phone use is the most important source of information that could be used to assist those in need. He raised the issue of the tremendous technology gap that exists today between countries as well as the need to use relevant data such as mobile network data in development efforts (such as for traffic management and city development). Mr. Samarajiva also pointed to the harms that big data can pose, including such as marginalization harms of not being included in the data sets at all and therefore being ignored by public policy. Mr. Samarajiva suggested that there is no need for establishing global regulation on big data. He pointed out the need to collaborate with data suppliers to reduce privacy risks, reduce transaction costs of sharing the data, and simplify the process of collecting, sharing and using data.
Natasha Jackson from GSMA illustrated the opportunities offered by using big data for development by describing several projects involving the use of mobile data to better understand the spread of diseases. She insisted on the importance of developing privacy protective tools such as mobile privacy principles and app privacy policies like those adopted by GSMA. Ms. Jackson underlined the crucial importance of setting guidelines upfront, before the beginning of any projects to both mitigate the privacy risks and reassure local governments involved on the projects. The lack of laws and regulations pertaining to the use of big data for development purposes was pointed out as a major disincentive for mobile operators to use this data for public interest goals. Ms. Jackson also noted that one of the fundamental principles of GSMA is that data never leaves the premises of a telecommunications company. She advocated for the adoption of data protection regulations and laws that would dissipate any ambiguities on the use of big data for development and incentivize private actors and public actors to benefit fully from the opportunities offered by big data.
Dr. Danilo Doneda from the National Consumer Secretariat of the Ministry of Justice of Brazil shared a perspective on Brazilian data protection law. He acknowledged the issue of the lack of clear regulations framing big data use for public interest, and the difficulty for both private and public actors to comply with the legal framework in the context of secondary data use for public interest. Dr. Doneda pointed out that there is currently a lack of purpose specification in the Brazilian Data related regulations. He also pointed to the Big Data draft regulation currently pending in Brazil, and the principle of legitimate interest for using big data and an exception for using consent when it comes to using personal data for public interest. Dr. Danilo Doneda highlighted the major role that data subjects’ consent should play within big data regulations.
Pupilo Lorenzo, Executive Director in the Public & Regulatory Affairs Unit of Telecom Italia, brought to light the growing importance of big data by mentioning Telecom Italia’s recent open innovation competition that connected big data controllers with academics and professionals to explore utilization of mobile data in research. From Pupilo Lorenzo’s point of view, big data presents a great opportunity to make cities more resilient and improve their governance. He proposed that there be three distinct categories of data (personal data, common interest data, and data that can be offered for open monetization) that each should be submitted to different regulations. Data from the first category should follow the rules of data protection that each company has developing, while common interest data (for example) should be anonymized and made available for research and experimentation because it allows for the development new services. He proposed that a third category of data can be offered for open monetization because there is a market for that, as long as there are clear rules to use.
Drudeisha Madhub, Data Protection Commissioner from the Republic of Mauritius, highlighted the need to consider data quality and to distinguish reliable data from non-reliable data. The Commissioner also pointed out the need to adopt preventive and predictive techniques to allow the detection of risks in the use of big data. Another point of her presentation dealt with the difficulty of relying on users’ informed consent when collecting big data since most secondary uses of data have not yet been imagined. Therefore, she advocated in favor of a different privacy framework that instead of relying too heavily on users ‘consent’ would make big data controllers more accountable for mishandling data. This increased accountability would be facilitated through the use of privacy impact assessments (PIA).
Questions from the audience pertained to cross-borders data transfer, the risks of de-anonymization, the need for transparency in the data collection and use.
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Please describe any participant suggestions regarding the way forward/ potential next steps/ key takeaways (3 paragraphs):
The opportunities presented by big data for development and humanitarian purposes are vast, however, the risks and challenges are serious.
The panel seemed to lean towards the need for adopting a clear and uniform regulatory framework for the collection and use of big data for development and humanitarian purposes. This should not be done without the involvement of various stakeholders and experts with different backgrounds (lawyers, policy-makers, humanitarian and development experts, data scientists, technologists, researchers etc.)
The panel called for the acknowledgment and reduction of very wide technological gaps and technological infrastructure between countries, and called for the implementation of minimum standards for using big data for development and humanitarian purposes – such as the development of strong guidelines and methodologies on data anonymization.
Some panelists discussed that more sustainable models for private and public sector data-sharing partnerships are required in order to accelerate the use of big data for development and humanitarian purposes.
Increasing transparency, enhancing security safeguards and building awareness among communities that are using big data has its risks but above all, these risks could be dealt with by applying proper privacy and data security safeguards. This will build trust within communities, which is the key for any projects involving data to be successful.
Both the risks and opportunities of using big data for development and humanitarian action should be considered taking into account through a ‘risk, harm and utility’ approach. Risks of big data use should be assessed in proportion to the risks and harm that could be caused by non-use of the data in a specific context.
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Estimate the overall number of the participants present at the session:
90 - 95
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Estimate the overall number of women present at the session:
About half of the participants were women
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To what extent did the session discuss gender equality and/or women’s empowerment?
It was not seen as related to the session’s theme and was not raised
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If the session addressed issues related to gender equality and/or women’s empowerment, please provide a brief summary of the discussion:
Moderator tried to provide extra opportunities for women to participate and ensured that the conversation was gender balanced. In particular, moderator stressed the importance of women's participation in big data conversations.
The panel had an equal amount of men and women – 3 women and 3 men. Remote moderator was also a woman.
The panel was also geographically balanced.
Gender equality was not addressed as a specific topic in the panel discussion.
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