Workshop 13 - Cybercrime and human rights: the case of the freedom of expression

In recent years, most countries around the world have undertaken legislative reforms on cybercrime and electronic. In a number of countries, legislation on cybercrime includes provisions criminalising the “dissemination of false information”, “offensive messages”, “causing annoyance”, “spreading of rumours” and other conduct. In some instances, such provisions appear to be vague and overly broad, and raise concerns of whether such restrictions to the freedom of expression are consistent with human rights and rule of law requirements. Protecting the freedom of expression in the context of fight against cybercrime is a matter of criminal justice, thus many principles and rules applicable to protection of free speech and opinions in traditional criminal cases would also apply to expressions online. The aim of the workshop is to discuss how Courts address freedom of expression in the regional context of Africa, share practical examples and generate an overall discussion on the relevance to the matters related to freedom of expression.