ICT

Latin America

OpenNet Initiative -Jehae Kim, Patricio Rojas, Joanna Huey, Kathleen Connors, Stephanie Wang

With the exception of Cuba, systematic technical filtering of the Internet has yet to take hold in Latin America. The regulation of Internet content addresses largely the same concerns and strategies seen in North America and Europe, focusing on combating the spread of child pornography and restricting child access to age-inappropriate material. As Internet usage in Latin America increases, so have defamation, hate speech, copyright, and privacy issues.

The various paths of Internet censorship in Latin America

Derechos Digitales - November 12, 2014

The latest news in Latin America demonstrates that attacks on freedom of expression in the region have many facets and those in power use a variety of tools to curtail critical debate on the Internet. The situations in Mexico, Venezuela and Brazil are just a few examples.

Latin America's Drive for Internet Content Control

Freedom House - October 03, 2013

Recent legislation in Ecuador and high-profile cases in Brazil and Argentina reveal a broader Latin American trend of increasing restrictions on internet freedom.

Over the past 18 months, Latin America has borne witness to a changing legal landscape that directly impacts internet freedom. Constraints have come in varying forms in different countries, yet each affects the scope and depth of the content that can be found online. High-profile cases of intermediary liability—in which internet service providers (ISPs), website hosts, and search engines are held legally, and at times, criminally responsible for user-generated content—have come to the fore in Brazil and Argentina. In Ecuador, the June passage of the Organic Law on Communications set a legal precedent for holding platforms responsible for content posted by users, placing further legal pressure on an environment already under threat.

Examining Internet Freedom in Latin America (EXLILA)

Country report: Colombia

Juan Diego Castañeda and Amalia Toledo - March 2016

Although Colombia has challenges guaranteeing internet access to all its population, the internet has become an essential tool for the development of many activities and the exercise of fundamental rights like freedom of expression and access to knowledge.

Legislation and jurisprudence applicable to the internet have not been systematic, and this has often had major effects on whether the internet will continue to be a free and open tool. The principle of net neutrality, for example, has developed in such a way as to allow the creation of different plans differentiated according to the market, which in practice may lead to counteracting this very principle. Regulations on surveillance of communications, although important for criminal investigation, do not have the necessary judicial checks and balances, and lack a serious analysis of need and proportionality, as in the case of the powers exercised by intelligence agencies. Finally, although systematic internet filtering does not occur, there is a regime for blocking child pornography that pursues an entirely necessary purpose but lacks controls and the possibility to exercise the right to a defence.

The problematic cases included in this report show that there is still a long way to go in enforcing the current regulations on situations occurring on the internet. In one case, an online news commentator was imprisoned and fined for libel. In another, a student is being prosecuted for copyright infringement for sharing on a digital platform some academic material previously published on the internet.

But the most relevant cases have to do with the illegitimate use of surveillance tools. Former officials of the government and security agencies have been convicted for illegally intercepting communications from high court magistrates, opposition leaders and journalists. A campaign adviser in the presidential elections admitted illegally intercepting communications between officials and other actors involved in the peace dialogue with guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Finally, investigations by international organisations have revealed surveillance and hacking systems previously unknown to the general public.

Given this scenario, it is increasingly urgent to enforce international regulations of human rights in digital environments; strengthen legal capacities, especially concerning understanding of the internet; develop and implement models of participation in the construction of policies and standards for the internet, that guarantee the involvement of civil society, academia and the technical community on an equal basis; and promote monitoring by civil society of legislative, judicial and administrative developments affecting the net.

This report will give a rapid overview of current regulations and the most relevant cases – in the courts and the media – affecting positively or negatively the exercise of human rights by Colombian citizens. We will review regulations on net neutrality, cyber crime, child protection, criminal investigation and intelligence activities, data retention and anonymity, emphasising the problems that many of these regulations pose for the protection of fundamental rights. We will also look at some of the most representative court cases or those reported in the media, which will show that there is still a long way to travel towards recognition and protection of the internet as a space for the exercise of rights and freedoms. Finally we will present some recommendations intended to promote the potential for democratisation and the empowerment of citizens through access to and use of the internet
 

Argentina’s Right to be Forgotten

Edward L. Carter - 2013

The twentieth century Argentine author Jorge Luis Borges wrote a fictional short story about a boy named Ireneo Funes who suffered the curse of remembering everything. 1 For Funes, the present was worthless because it was consumed by his memories of the past. One contemporary author has described the lesson of Funes: “Borges suggests that forgetting—that is, forgetting ceaselessly—is essential and necessary for thought and language and literature, for simply being a human being.” 2 The struggle between remembering and forgetting is not unique to Borges or Argentina, but that struggle has manifested itself in Argentina in poignant ways, even outside the writings of Borges. In recent years, the battle has played out in Argentina’s courts in the form of lawsuits by celebrities against the Internet search engines Google and Yahoo.

What are the implications of the right to be forgotten in the Americas?

Derechos Digitales - September 22, 2015

The Internet is a tattoo. All our information, photographs, communications, traces and shadows remain stored for life. Add to this mass surveillance conducted by governments and companies and an essential question arises: Should we have the legal and technical ability to remove certain data that we do not want to exist on the Internet? What implications does this have for the rights to freedom of expression and access to information on-line?

Resilient or in decline?: Current trends in Latin American democracy

Caitlyn Davis - September 29, 2017

On September 29, 2017, the Brookings Institution and the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (International IDEA) co-hosted a full-day workshop convening high-level experts from Latin American embassies, the U.S. government, academia, and civil society to discuss current trends in Latin American democracy as the region enters a super cycle of nine elections in 2017-19. The discussion covered a wide array of important changes including the economic downturn, changing regional and international relationships, upcoming elections, internal structural challenges, civil society, and the impact of a changing media. The summary below highlights the expert participants’ opinions (including data points that they raised for discussion) regarding these themes, the main points of consensus and disagreement, and areas for further study and debate

Are Internet Policy and Technology the Keys to Latin America’s Future?

James Bosworth, Juan Osuna, and Carl Meacham - June 02, 2015

Last week, Brazil’s Minister of State for Science, Technology, and Innovation Aldo Rebelo traveled to Washington, D.C., as part of the preparation for President Dilma Rousseff’s upcoming visit in late June. Minister Rebelo’s visit is a timely reminder that innovation and technological penetration are increasingly important—both in Brazil and throughout Latin America.

The (ongoing) quest for Latin America’s role in internet governance

Center for Global Communication Studies - July 29, 2015

Since the World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) in November 2012, policy experts and scholars have demonstrated a more focused interest in understanding regional variations in internet governance preferences and organizational models. Yet many of these efforts have failed to fully grasp the complexity of a region such as Latin America. Part of the problem lies in the lack of a strong supranational political institution such as the European Union. Latin America is a patchwork quilt of various political and trade agreements, none of which provide a coherent framework for collective action on critical internet governance issues.