Council of Europe at the Internet Governance Forum 2019
25-29 November 2019, Berlin
#IGF2019
Digital technologies can greatly facilitate the exercise and enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms, boost participatory and democratic processes, and facilitate social and commercial activities. But also, they carry with them challenges that require prompt and balanced solutions.
The Council of Europe engages in setting standards, promoting the rule of law and fostering multi-stakeholder dialogue to ensure a sustainable, people-centred and human rights-based approach to the challenges of the digital environment.
Pre-Event #30 AI and discrimination
– whose problem is it?
25 November, 09:00 - 12:30
Watch the live-webcast
In the public and private sector, AI-enabled decisions are made in many key areas of life – recruitment, admission to universities, credit, insurance, eligibility for pension payments, housing assistance, or unemployment benefits, predictive policing, judicial decisions and many more. While AI can have discriminatory effects when based on biased prior human decisions, there is a deficit of awareness among the law enforcement and monitoring bodies and the general public. The event will present the challenges and risks around the implementation of AI algorithms, the pros and cons of transparency and the ways to manage it in an optimal way, how to guarantee explicability - so users will understand how the algorithm works, how to secure the transparent process of its creation to make sure that it would not discriminate.
OF #19 Human rights and digital platforms – contradiction in terms?
26 November, 10:45 - 11:45
With the digital transition that we are witnessing, businesses and human rights interrelate more and more. In line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, digital platforms should respect the human rights of their users and affected parties in all their actions. This open forum will discuss to what extent these principles are abided in relation to the use of digital technologies. While considering the interdependence of all human rights, the open forum will focus specifically on the rights to privacy and to data protection, as enshrined in the Council of Europe modernised Convention 108, which are among those that are the most affected. It will examine the different ways in which they are impacted by the functioning of digital platforms, their business models and practices, and will look at the respective roles of businesses and state actors in the protection of these rights.
WS #288 Solutions for law enforcement to access data across borders
Co-organised by the CoE and CCIA
26 November, 11:30 - 13:00
What are the policy and legal implications of unilateral assertions of state jurisdiction for users, companies and state actors? How do we reconcile the obligations of criminal justice authorities and users’ rights? Responses to these and other questions are currently being developed by different organisations and in different fora. Negotiation of a 2 nd Additional Protocol to the Budapest Convention aims to bring a breakthrough in terms of an effective criminal justice response with human rights and rule of law safeguards. The workshop is to feed into these processes and offer an opportunity for multiple stakeholders to share their views.
WS #177 Tackling hate speech online: ensuring human rights for all
Co-organised by the CoE and FRA
27 November, 11:30 - 13:00
The encounter of Illegal content online is a distressing but common phenomenon today. Discussions are underway at the national, regional and international level – at political, societal and company level – about how best to tackle illegal content. This workshop will examine the viability of identified solutions, assessing their sustainability, proportionality, comprehensiveness and accountability towards all affected parties. The debate will contribute to ensuring that human rights considerations are hardwired into policy debates by identifying some of the key elements that any regulatory regime must take into account. Participants will gain insight into existing instruments to address illegal online content, including incitement to violence, and learn about the roles that different actors can play in the process.
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OF #13 Human Rights & AI Wrongs: Who Is Responsible?
Co-organised by the CoE and FRA
27 November, 15:00 - 16:00
The emergence of advanced digital technologies and AI is accompanied by rising public anxiety regarding their potentially damaging effects for individuals, for vulnerable groups and for society more generally. If we are to take human rights seriously in a globally connected digital age, we cannot allow the power of our advanced digital technologies and systems to be accrued and exercised without responsibility. This open forum will discuss different methods to ensure that responsibility for the possible risks, harms and wrongs arising from the operation of advanced digital technologies are duly allocated.
Know more about the Council of Europe's work on Artificial Intelligence
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Cornelia Kutterer (Microsoft) on more regulation required with respect to the online environment
Joe McNamee on the design, development and deployment of AI tools
Clara Neppel on AI and human rights
Matthias Kettemann on tackling hate speech online
Fernanda Teixeira Taubemblatt on the second additional Protocol to the Budapest Convention on cybercrime
Alexander Seger on the Council of Europe Budapest Convention
Jan Kleijssen on the Council of Europe paticipation at the Internet Governance Forum 2019
Charlotte Altenhöner-Dion on “Tackling hate speech online – ensuring Human Rights for all”
Alexander Seger on "Solutions for law enforcement to access data across borders"
Elena Dodonova on “Human Rights and AI wrongs – who is responsible?”
Peter Kimpian on “Human rights and digital platforms"
Human rights impacts of algorithmic systems
Artificial Intelligence and data protection
Council of Europe standards on cybercrime
Ad Hoc Committee on Artificial Intelligence (CAHAI)