Putting human rights at the heart of the Information Society
MONTREAL - August 28, 2003 - As governments, business and civil society organizations prepare for the World Summit on the Information Society, scheduled to take place December 10-12, 2003, in Geneva, Rights & Democracy, along with other members of the Summit's Human Rights Caucus, is calling on world leaders to place human rights at the centre of their deliberations.As a contribution to this conference, Rights & Democracy is publishing the essay Pole Star: Human Rights in the Information Society by award-winning author Deborah Hurley. The essay reviews specific challenges and opportunities for human rights posed by the information society - privacy, security, freedom of expression, freedom of movement and association, as well as access to technology and information, intellectual property rights and the right to education.
"If the Summit fails to reaffirm the centrality of human rights in its deliberations," said Jean-Louis Roy, President of Rights & Democracy, "we will have missed an important opportunity to put information and communication technologies at the service of greater global equality, democracy and development. We hope that this essay will help convince governments that human rights are the basic platform upon which the information society should be built. "
Rights & Democracy will join the Washington-based Electronic Privacy Information Centre (EPIC) and London-based Privacy International to launch three publications on information and human rights in Geneva on Friday, September 19, during the last preparatory meeting for the UN Summit. Deborah Hurley and Jean-Louis Roy will be in Geneva for the launch.
Review copies of Pole Star : Human Rights in the Information Society will be available on September 15. The author and the President of Rights & Democracy will also be available for interviews at that time. Click here for a summary of the essay.
Deborah Hurley, recipient of the 2002 Namur Award, served as Director of Harvard University's Information Infrastructure Project, and an official of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. At the OECD, she was responsible for writing the seminal report on information security, drafting, negotiation and adoption of the 1992 OECD Guidelines for the Security of Information Systems, and initiating activities on cryptography policy. She chaired the ITU Workshops on Creating Trust in Critical Network Infrastructures and on Regulatory Implications of Broadband, and the Computers, Freedom and Privacy Conference. Hurley serves on several boards and committees, including for the U.S. State Department, Electronic Privacy Information Center, and American Association for the Advancement of Science.For More Information
Please contact Steve Smith (ext 255) or Louis Moubarak (ext 261) at Rights & Democracy, 514-283-6073.
