Virtual Violation of Human Rights with Special emphasis on Rights

Violated on Social Media and Online Platforms

Introduction
At present - when most information is spread and carried on in a digital form, when
communication technologies such as smart phones and free internet access ubiquity have
become part of daily life, when commerce, health and financial services, education and
entertainment, social platforms and infrastructures are provided online and in real-time -
contemporary life is increasingly moving in the direction of becoming a “transparent society”.
The advent of technology has led to an unprecedented emphasis on data and information. As
human interactions increasingly go online, privacy is a primary concern. The amount of data
we generate online and its vulnerability to misuse creates a new challenge for the legal and
regulatory framework. On one hand where this information technology has made access to
information extremely easy and readily available at any point of time, its harmful effects in the
form of unnecessary surveillance, data theft, interception of communication etc on the other
hand cannot be ignored. The technological advancement in storage, retrieval, analysis, and
transmission of information (specially the personal information of individuals) has definitely
increased the concerns about violations of privacy.
To get in-depth knowledge as to right to privacy and its implication in the digital age it is
important, first, to understand the meaning of the term ‘privacy’. Legally speaking, the term
“privacy” as such has not been defined anywhere in strict sense. The Merriam Webster
dictionary defines “privacy” as freedom from unauthorized intrusion. Privacy can be
conceptualized as an information space attached to an individual. The content of this space is
personal information. Privacy rights can be understood as rights to control the flow of
information in and out of this private zone. Considering its importance in one’s life the same
has been defined as human right enjoyed by every human by virtue of his existence as a human.
The Supreme Court of India has time and again considered privacy as an essential element of
personal liberty5 which is a crucial human right for the holistic development of human
personality. According protection to one’s privacy and respecting the right to privacy is a
counterbalance against the State’s power extending upon the lives of its citizens.

Right to Privacy as Human Right

Broadly speaking human rights may be regarded as those fundamental and inalienable rights
which are essential for life as human being. It is crystal clear that these rights are not something
which are specially created and then awarded to any individual rather these rights are those
rights which are inherent in any individual by virtue of he being a ‘human’. State simply
recognizes these rights. These rights are possessed by every human being irrespective of his
nationality, race, color, caste, religion, gender etc. After witnessing gross violations of human
rights during world war-II, in order to reaffirm faith in the fundamental human rights, dignity
and worth of the human person, the world community gathered to resolve and device a
mechanism to ensure protection of human rights. When the same was being done regard to the
aspects of privacy was given. Article 12 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)
is evidence of the same which accords protection to right to privacy as a human right. The said
article reads thus, No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family,
home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right
to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.
The aforesaid provision seeks to create a legal regime in the international order that casts an
obligation upon States to protect physical and communication privacy. Further this position
seeks to encompass various facets of human interaction and conduct. These facets include the
right to reputation and familial privacy that are the foundation of dignity essential element of
right to life and personal liberty. The arbitrary intrusion with one’s personal liberty is extremely
dangerous not only to the right of privacy but also to the realization of various other human
rights as right to privacy is the fountain head of other human rights. If one is not allowed the
personal space, the intimate space which he shares with himself it is futile to provide protection
to all other human rights. While freedom of expression is fundamental to diverse cultural
expression, creativity and innovation as well as the development of one’s personality through
self-expression, the right to privacy is essential to ensuring individuals’ autonomy, facilitating
the development of their sense of self and enabling them to forge relationships with others. We
live in a world where to have a life worth living mere food, clothing and shelter is not enough
to meet the standards. Education, health care facilities and privacy do play a major role.
The Supreme Court of India in Justice K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of India has recognized right
to privacy as fundamental right under Article 21 of the Constitution of India. Right to privacy
has always been considered an intrinsic part of individual’s life and personal liberty. In earlier
times privacy was essentially related to physical/bodily privacy where rules and regulations
were aimed to provide protection against any kind of intrusion into one’s privacy physically.
Today, in the backdrop of ubiquitous presence of internet, the right to privacy has come to be
understood as multifaceted right meaning thereby that privacy is no more concerned with the
physical aspect only it includes within its ambit the communication privacy and information
privacy as well. This digital age has given multidimensional sphere to the concept of privacy
protection.

Right to Privacy in Digital Age-the Potential Threats

The Internet has opened new channels of communication and self-expression… Countless
individuals use message boards, date matching sites, interactive social networks, blog hosting
services and video sharing websites to make themselves and their ideas visible to the world.
While such intermediaries enable the user-driven digital age, they also create new legal
problems.
In contemporary society, information technology occupies the zenith position in everyone’s
daily life. Every single day every person wittingly or unwittingly generates large amounts of
sensitive personal data while navigating through the World Wide Web. The protection of
privacy of people’s lives has never been more vulnerable. The digital medium has invariably
increased usage of internet in various contexts like online searches, shopping, consumer
activity, smartphone use, social media etc which results in generation of huge amount of data.
In this respect, digital technology has created a symbiotic relationship of sorts. It enables us to
access and share information for our own benefit. At the same time, the data we generate is of
immense value to the public and private entities that facilitate and control our digital
interactions. While this has the potential to produce great benefits and improve social
outcomes, it also poses risks to our fundamental human rights. The surveillance and collection
of vast amounts of personal information and meta-data, and the processing of such data using
new analytical techniques, has major implications for our right to privacy and our right to be
free from discrimination. The United Nations General Assembly in 2014 adopted a Resolution
68/167 relating to the right to privacy in digital age wherein it has clearly acknowledged the
concern over increasing issues of eroding privacy protection in this technologically advanced
world. The relevant portion of the preamble reads thus, Noting that the rapid pace of
technological development enables individuals all over the world to use new information and
communication technologies and at the same time enhances the capacity of governments,
companies and individuals to undertake surveillance, interception and data collection, which
may violate or abuse human rights, in particular the right to privacy, as set out in article 12 of
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and article 17 of the International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights, and is therefore an issue of increasing concern.
Considering the potential threats in the form of communication surveillance, its interception,
data theft, unauthorized personal data access, trans-border flow of data etc the UN has affirmed
that the same rights that people have offline must also be protected online, including the right
to privacy. The digital medium poses a number of threats to the unbridled enjoyment of right
to privacy in the form of following:
• Communication surveillance
• Data theft
• Trans-border flow of data
• Breach of confidentiality
• Electronic voyeurism
• Unlawful access
• Data retention
• Big data issues etc.
In the context of digital medium apart from surveillance of communication, interception and
data retention containing personal information which renders person to vulnerability threats to
social media privacy are also rampant. “social media”, also known as “social networking”, is
the term used to describe any type of social interaction using technology (primarily the Internet,
but also including modern smartphone and PDA innovations) with some combination of words,
photos, video, and /or audio. The popularity of social networking sites such as Facebook,
Twitter, Instagram to name a few is not hidden from anybody. The craze with which the people
specially the younger generation are found glued to these social networking sites one would
not be wrong to term the craze as addiction. These social networking sites usually set a
particular default privacy setting which allow maximum access unless these are actively
changed. This approach places a large number of users at risk given the fact that user is not
effectively informed of the implications of failing to actively change settings. Since these sites
social networking sites allow its users to upload photos, videos, make comments, express
views, build an online network, and share views, opinions and information with each other
privacy concerns creeps in the context as well. These photos, videos etc if not secured actively
by changing privacy settings are prone to misuse by the notorious element actively present
online.
Apart from ignorance or no effective information as to change of privacy settings on the part
of users to actively change the settings there are cases where these so called privacy settings
are available in such a complex fashion that it is some time beyond understanding of a common
man specially one’s from non-computer background to change the settings and protect their
data on social networking site from being unauthorizedly accessed.
Another important privacy concern is that of retention of data for usually long periods. Some
sites on internet are built with default settings to retain users’ data where such retention could
be for certain period of time or in perpetuity. Such unauthorized data retention is quite
dangerous especially in those cases where such data pertains to personal information of the
user putting his privacy at peril. The major reason for the proliferation of these social
networking privacy issues is due to the generation of massive information from these sites
which can easily be misused if there exists a slight lacuna in the system managing these sites.

Social Media: A Tool for Human Rights Awareness

It has already been discussed as to how this digitalization has daunting effects upon the
realization of right to privacy, the discussion would not be complete without reflecting upon
the encouraging efforts made by social media in creating awareness about human rights among
masses. Social media can serve as a powerful platform in launching various human rights
campaigning at a large scale. It can be used as a strong medium for expressing people’s opinion
in this digital age. On Feb 18, 2011, a week after the overthrow of the twenty-eight-year
authoritarian regime of President Hosini Mubarak, the Egyptian government-owned
newspaper, Al-Ahram, reported that an Egyptian father, Jamal Ibrahim, had named his
newborn daughter, “facebook Jamil Ibrahim”, to commemorate the unprecedented role the
networked social medium played in the Egyptian Revolution. The role played by the social
media in mobilizing masses to demand a change of authoritarian regime is remarkable.
Further, it has been time and again said by the Supreme Court of India that the crucial human
right in the form of freedom of speech and expression includes the freedom of propagation of
ideas; to publish and circulate one’s ideas and opinions and the social media, today, is the best
platform to afford such opportunity. With millions of users, social media can easily be resorted
to propagate one’s ideas and opinions with masses. It has not only helped in circulation of
views and ideas to condemn human rights violations but has also helped in creating human
rights awareness among people and has triggered many campaigns to shun human rights
violations. Sometimes single expression of idea on social media has become the voice of many
voiceless in the world. There is also profound plurality and diversity in thought, opinion and
expression in online participation. Social media also constitute spaces of community sharing
extensive cultural contents, and are often explicitly used as platforms for education: teaching,
distributing, exploring. In this sense, social media also contribute to the formation of human
beings as competent members of a community, by supporting them in gaining critical
intellectual capacities to participate in the political and cultural spaces of their online and
offline communities.
Further, social media platforms are cultural spaces on their own and contribute to the expansion
and development of a whole extension of meanings, languages, artistic expressions, remix
activities of cultural products ranging from irony to criticism, from common places to
vanguard. Several scholars explain that the culture of sharing, the practices of crowd sourcing
and the forms of collective production are generating new forms of literacy, new forms of
knowledge and ultimately new forms of solidarity, social awareness and reflexivity. This
corresponds to the right of members to freely participate in the cultural life of the community.
Social media, mobile communications and digital networks etc. are being successfully used for
human rights awareness in first and second world countries. It can be used for promotion of
human rights even in third world countries which face issues of poor formal education,
communication gap, governments’ passivity etc. Social media can be used to educate people
as to their right, how to complain in case of human right abuse, authority to be approached,
remedies available and so on. Similarly, to organize people and events, communications can
be shared effectively and quickly through social media. This can also serve for close monitoring
of human right compliance from authorities. Social media is a good platform for citizens’
journalism through blog, Facebook, YouTube etc. to promote human rights and legal awareness
by social networking. Human right activists such as Wael Abbas (Egypt), Wen Yunchao
(China), Andreas Harsono (Indonesia), Rosebell's (Uganda), Aung San Thar (Myanmar),
Kwon Eun Kyoung ( Korea), Henda Chennaoui (Unisia) are few to name to show how blogs
and online articles can sensitize people on human rights. Alongside, it brings more transparency
in governance and human right administration. Social media also creates deterrence in the mind
of people since any human right violation may be recorded and shared online; this fear
considerably reduces crime in the society and also helps to bring the culprit to book.

Conclusion
The advancement of technology with the omnipresence of internet has both pros and cons. On
one hand it poses potent threats to the realization of human right of right to privacy in the form
of surveillance of communication, interception and data retention containing personal
information which renders person to vulnerability. Privacy issues are the biggest concern in the
world of social networking. Social networking sites are often used for nefarious purposes like
cyber-bullying, cyber-stalking-invading into someone’s privacy violating the right thereof. The
cases pertaining to unauthorized access to data and the misuse of such illegally retrieved data
or information are rampant posing serious threats to privacy concerns in digital age. However,
on the other hand, the social media can potentially be used as a platform in fostering the
realization and protection of human rights by creating awareness among the masses. If used
prudently, social media can open innovative vistas of discourse on human rights, create an
interconnected environment and bring great difference in the protection, promotion and
enforcement of human rights.