Developing Principles to Protect Human Rights Online
After a year of research and exploration to develop a set of governing principles that will help to protect and advance free expression and privacy on the Net, the process was recently made public. This ongoing collaboration involves an international group of corporations, academic institutions, investors and rights advocates – leaders, all. Together, we plan not only to develop the principles, but to establish implementation procedures, accountability measures, and a means for ongoing improvement of the approach.
Berkman Center Executive Director, John Palfrey applauded the convergence of the three independent efforts that formed the current group. "We are proud to have worked with our colleagues on the OpenNet Initiative, UC-Berkeley (Xiao Qiang, Deirdre Mulligan, Roxanna Altholz), the University of St. Gallen (Urs Gasser), and the Oxford Internet Institute (Jonathan Zittrain), and others, as participants in earlier iterations of this process, which we called the OpenNet Consensus," he wrote.
continued...
Aron Cramer, CEO of Business for Social Responsibility, which serves as a facilitator of the combined process said, “This important dialogue reflects a shared commitment to maximize the information available via the internet on the basis of global principles protecting free expression and privacy.” He added, “This dialogue could prove a key step in unlocking the communications potential of the internet.”
With many of the participants gathering at the invitation of the US Department of State recently, the full group met again last week in
With plans to complete the process in 2007, all participants are optimistic that their hard work will produce a quantifiable and realistic approach to protecting and preserving fundamental human rights – recognizing, of course, that this is just one step on the long and winding path of protecting the Net.