There is much debate on the impact of technology, and in particular, social media on children. Intergovernmental organisations, including the UN and the Council of Europe, are in midst of determining guidelines on children's rights in relation to the digital environment. As technology evolves faster than ever, digital rights activists gathered in Brussels earlier this week for a Privacy Camp on technology and activism.

This year, the Privacy Camp, a gathering organised by European Digital Rights in Brussels, focused on children’s right to privacy — not only as users of digital services, but as the activists of today.

Sharing their stories of activism, two young volunteer activists from Fridays for Future Germany shared their approach to gathering children’s support for strikes to demand government action against climate change. The Fridays for Future activists raised the challenges of moderating chat groups, removing hate speech, pornography, and other dangerous content in order for children to focus on mobilising and activism. Whatsapp, often used by such groups, does not allow filtering of content before it is posted. The activists raised their concern that police are not taking them seriously when they reach out for support. 

The Fridays for Future movement uses social media, especially Instagram, to raise awareness and mobilise young people to take to the streets every Friday. Their use of social media channels raised concern among digital activists, who pointed out the limited privacy protections of such channels, and their ignorance of the specific needs of children’s rights. 

Surveillance of children 

Every child is a potential extremist under school surveillance measures. Police are monitoring #FridaysForFuture climate protests. Children’s data is being massively collected and used for profiling purposes. Climate activists are being put in preventive detention. In this context, the panel offered examples of situations where children’s surveillance is having a chilling effect on children and families. In the UK, a programme set to counter violent extremism monitors children's use of keywords in schools and reports them to authorities. Over 20,000 keywords could alert authorities, despite children and families having no such awareness of this surveillance programme. As a result, children searching for toy guns were brought to the authorities. Another child searching for ‘black rhinos’ was believed to be interested in gangs. The data gathered on these children has even been registered in the criminal intelligence database.

In another instance, data from the UK national register of pupils was being shared with the Home Office to identify foreign and undocumented families. Liberty, a UK based human rights organisation, ran an awareness campaign among students and families to empower them not to complete such surveys. The lack of definitions and transparency around such programmes demonstrates the illegality of these actions, and the potential danger of children’s data being misused to great disadvantage to them and their families. Jen Persson, Director of DefendDigitalMe, urges civil society actors to start questioning schools on the collection, storage, and processing of children’s data. She also pointed out the commercial interests of software companies gathering such data and using it to monitor and assess behaviour.

Gloria Gonzalez Fuster, Research Professor at VUB Brussels, reminded digital activists that they cannot claim to be activists for privacy and data rights for all if they don’t fight for children’s rights as data subjects. The right to ask for your own data, as a child, must be simpler, she added. The urge to protect children due to their vulnerability should not lead to greater surveillance. 

Article 8 of the EU General Data Protection Regulation addresses the rules for processing data when children are data subjects, and the need for parental consent. Professor Fuster pointed out that companies avoid engaging with these rules by claiming that their products, though originally child-focused, are meant for adults. 

With video cameras being installed in schools (eg. in Italy, the UK and other countries), and growing interest in the use of facial recognition, there is often no or limited consideration of children’s rights as data subjects and the implications for their mental health (peer shaming, etc.). For this reason, more research is needed in this field to ensure technology is regulated and children’s rights are upheld. 

Digital resilience of civil society

There were other panel discussions on topics ranging from digital resilience of civil society in the face of attacks from individuals and authoritarian governments, to the situation of journalism in Southeast Europe. These sessions raised the need to prioritise sharing knowledge and tools among civil society in order to deal with digital restrictions, attacks and slowdowns aimed to limit civil society. The gender dimension was also raised, as women and girls are seen to be more at risk of online attacks. 

Background resources:

Council of Europe developed guidelines to respect, protect and fulfil the rights of the child in the digital environment.

The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child is reflecting on a draft General Comment on children's rights in relation to digital environment

 

Childhub

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