Signatories to
the Geneva
Declaration commit to, and call on
multilateral organizations, governments, and the private
sector to, among others:
- Implement an immediate
moratorium on the export, sale, transfer, servicing, and use
of targeted digital surveillance technologies until rigorous
human rights safeguards are put in place; - Establish
a legal and policy framework that makes the acquisition of
surveillance tools subject to robust public oversight,
consultation, and control; - Hold companies developing
and distributing these technologies accountable for their
failure to respect human rights; - Publicly report any
detected misuse of cybersurveillance products and services
resulting in human rights violations; and - Ensure
that digital transformation works for, not against,
democracy and human rights.
“Governments’
reckless use of spyware is nothing less than abuse,” said
Rand Hammoud, Surveillance Campaigner at Access
Now. “And it must be addressed as such. Today,
through the Geneva Declaration, the international
community has laid out in black and white the concrete
commitments that authorities must make to ensure human
rights are at the core of any and all digital
transformations.”
The Declaration officially
launched today, September 29, 2022 at the
UN Human Rights Council’s 51st session side event
Spyware: A Threat to Human Rights and Democracy
organized by Access Now and the Government of Catalonia, in
Geneva, Switzerland. This event featured opening remarks
from Clément N. Voule, the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom
of Peaceful Assembly and of Association.
Read the Geneva
Declaration.
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