DRAPAC and APrIGF 2024: Mapping the Current Challenges of Digital Rights in Asia-Pacific
Lembaga Studi dan Advokasi Masyarakat (ELSAM) participated in the Digital Rights Asia-Pacific Forum (DRAPAC) and the Asia-Pacific Regional Internet Governance Forum (APrlGF) on August 18-23 2024. The event, held in Taiwan, brought together civil society groups, journalists, activists, and technology experts from around the world to respond to the growing digital threats in the Asia-Pacific region.
ELSAM's participation in DRAPAC and APrIGF contributed to mapping the impact of emerging technologies in the context of human rights. It strengthens engagement in Asia-Pacific networks and collaborative strategies to improve digital rights protection in the region.
DRAPAC 2024 featured 43 sessions on a wide range of topical issues related to technology and human rights. For example, government digitization and e-governance projects are gaining momentum in the Asia-Pacific region. This has been accompanied by an influx of investment from financial institutions and has attracted the interest of the private sector to do what governments are unable to do effectively. Indonesia is producing so-called super apps, while the Philippines has launched the egovPH app. Similarly, in Taiwan, digitization efforts to deal with the pandemic are a major topic of discussion.
Currently, governments in the region have collected a great deal of data on their citizens to support government functions. But with the massive amount of data being shared and linked across government agencies, the issue of security and privacy of personal information is becoming more relevant. In Indonesia, the government even provides a mechanism for private and public third parties to further use demographic data for authentication purposes.
Thus, it appears that privacy-related risks are still relevant in the Asia-Pacific region, especially in the aftermath of the pandemic. In Taiwan, for example, almost the entire population was affected by data breaches of household registration data. As in similar cases in Indonesia, the government refuses to disclose the list of public and private sectors that have legally accessed the data.
In addition to privacy, DRAPAC and APrIGF also addressed many issues related to gender-based violence online. Several sessions provided a comprehensive overview of Technology Facilitated Gender-Based Violence (TFGBV). Recent cases in the region demonstrated the complexity of the issue, as TFGBV inevitably intersects with emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence. Policy tools and community-based best practices in several Asia-Pacific countries are needed to address these risks.
