Global Data Law and Decolonisation
Anywhere on earth with an internet connection, AI systems can be accessed from the cloud, and teams from different countries can work together to develop AI models, relying on many datasets from across the planet and cutting edge machine learning techniques. (Engler, 2022)
This global nature of AI can perpetuate ongoing marginalisation and exploitation of the people behind the data that machine learning relies on. Data protection laws vary per country, and in the U.S., per state, making it difficult for businesses who are trying to do the right thing (Barber, 2021), while simultaneously creating targets, mostly in the under-protected ‘Global South,’ for large corporations to mine data freely and gain power (Couldry & Mejias, 2021), keeping inequality strong. What can we do about this? Is the development of a Global Data Law the answer?
As the US and the EU work to try to align on data protection (Engler, 2022), there is a small call for a re-enlivening of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) in the digital sphere. (Mejias, 2020) The NAM is an anti-colonial/anti-imperialist movement consisting of 120 countries currently, which are not aligned with any major world powers. It was founded in 1961 to oppose military blocs in the Cold War, and hasn’t yet been adopted for opposing data colonialism, however, some say it should. (Reddy & Soni, 2021) I love this idea, because we are working with a plethora of cultures which have variant value systems, and aligning with Big government and corporate powers is not beneficial across the board; in fact, it can be quite harmful. When approaching the idea of global data law, we must support the rights of people who are the most marginalised. “What we need is a Non-Aligned Technologies Movement (NATM), an alliance not necessarily of nations, but of multiple actors already working towards the same goals, coming together to declare their non-alignment with the US and China.” (Mejias, 2020) Mejias calls for NATM to be more society and community driven than from state powers, which makes it all the more viable for the current situation.
Central to this approach to global data law is the concept of decolonization. If we are not careful, neo-colonialism will lead to yet another stage of capitalism that is fueled by data. That is why it is essential to involve Indigenous and marginalised peoples, not at the margins but at the centre of debates on global standards for law and data, or else efforts to decolonize will only reinforce colonialism. (Couldry & Mejias, 2021)
This is tricky. Colonialism and neo-colonialism are strong systems which feed imperial powers, whether they be government or corporate. At the end of the day, ‘good business’ wins out over what is actually good for everyone involved. This fundamentally needs to change.
What is Global Data Law?
Global data law is an area of great tension, for it is necessary to regulate and protect sensitive data from around the world, whether people live in the EU under protection of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), in other countries with strong data protection laws, or in areas with less data protection. Creating a “one-size fits all” system of global data laws will not work in our diverse world with varying tolerances for oversight and surveillance.
The GDPR is being used as a model for data protection, but it only protects the privacy for EU citizens, no matter where in the world the data is used. (Reddy & Soni, 2021, p.8) Compliance with the GDPR is a must, requiring complete transformation in the way organisations collect, process, store, share and wipe personal data securely, or face exorbitant fines in the tens of millions of dollars. (DLA Piper, 2022) Several other countries have developed specific data protection laws in the last few years, splattered across the world, such as in Canada and Brazil, however the protections vary greatly.
We can also consider the UN recommendations, such as to move away from data ownership and towards data stewardship for data collectors, meanwhile protecting privacy and ensuring self-determination of peoples’ own data. (The UN, 2022) They stress that there is a need to protect basic rights of peoples’ data not being used or sold without permission and in ways that could cause undue harm, with respect to what this means across cultures.
The UN Roadmap for Digital Cooperation highlights:
-global digital cooperation
-digital trust and security
-digital human rights
-human and institutional capacity building
-an inclusive digital economy and society
However, what we are seeing in global data law is governments developing their own systems unilaterally, making compliance complicated. For example, in the first years of the GDPR, thousands of online newspapers in the US simply decided to block users from the EU rather than face compliance risks. (Freuler, 2020) (South, 2018) Those in the EU were not able to access information previously available to them. Businesses that rely on customers from the EU had to trade off the risk of the compliance liability to the loss of income.
Global data law is indeed complex, and to complicate matters further, next we will briefly dive deeper into the Digital Non-Alignment movement.
Situating the Digital Non-Aligned Movement
The original Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) was formed by leaders of many countries, mainly from the Global South, which sought a political space to counter central powers through coordinated solidarity and exercise strategic autonomy, resisting control from the US and the USSR during the Cold War. (Reddy & Soni, 2021) (Freuler, 2020) Now, in the digital age, there is a call to recentre on the NAM in the digital realms to protect against not only government powers, but Big Tech as well. (Freuler, 2020)
A Non-Aligned Technologies movement would empower civil societies across the globe to act in consort to meet their shared objectives while putting pressure on their respective governments to change the way they deal with Big Tech. The primary goal of NATM would be to transition from technologies that are against the interest of society to technologies that are in the interest of society. (Mejias, 2020)
Current members of the Non-Aligned Movement are in dark blue. The light-blue colour denotes countries with observer-status.
By Maxronneland - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map_of_NAM_Members_and_Observer_states.svg, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=105867196
“NAM must once again come together to ensure the free flow of technology and data, while simultaneously guaranteeing protection to the sovereign interests of nations.” (Reddy & Soni, 2021, p.4)
This is incredibly valid, and countries represented within the NAM need to have a voice in this discussion about global data law. The US, China, the EU, and other wealthy nations should not be solely responsible for regulating open data and sovereignty globally. However, sovereignty is not just for states, which is why Indigenous Data Sovereignty (ID-SOV) should also be used for guiding global data law towards decolonization: if we are going to decolonize, we must centre on the rights of those who have been the most colonised.
Turning to Indigenous Data Sovereignty to Inform Global Data Law
Indigenous Peoples’ focus on self-determination is continuously burdened with the implications of data collected and used against them. The UN Declaration of the Rights of Indiginous Peoples (UNDRIP) states that the authority to control Indigenous cultural heritage (i.e. Indigenous data: their languages, knowledge, practices, technologies, natural resources and territories) should belong to Indigenous communities. (Carroll et al. 2020) It proves to be extremely difficult to break free from colonial and neo-colonial structures of power imbalances however; this is exactly what must be the focus in order to decolonise data practices and data law.
We are up against a long history of extraction and exploitation of value through data, representing a new form of resource appropriation that could be compared to the historical colonial land-grab, where not only land and resources but human bodies and labour were seized, often very violently. The lack of upfront violence in today’s data colonialism doesn’t negate its danger. “The absence of physical violence in today’s data colonialism merely confirms the multiplicity of means by which dispossession can, as before, unfold.” (Couldry & Mejias, 2021)
Contemporary data relations are laced with unquestionable racism (Couldry & Mejias, 2021), along with intersectional discrimination against all those considered marginalised, which is why we turn next to a report that addresses these issues directly, with a focus on surveillance and criminalization via data in the US.
Highlighting Technologies for Liberation
I love this report, titled Technologies for Liberation, which arose from the need to better understand the disproportionate impact of surveillance and criminalization of Queer, Trans, Two-Spirit, Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (QT2SBIPOC) communities and provide a resource for these communities to push back and protect themselves at all levels, from the state-endorsed to the corporate-led. (Neves & Srivastava, 2020) Technologies for Liberation aims to decolonise at a grassroots, community level, focusing on organisers and movement technologists which visualise demilitarised, community-driven technologies that support movements of liberation. This is transformative justice at work, centering on safety and shifting power to communities. (Neves & Srivastava, 2020) This is the bottom-up influence on data protection that we need to be turning towards to inform global data law that won’t leave people on the margins.
Conclusion
There are endless areas that need consideration when discussing global data law and decolonisation. We have already touched on a few areas and highlighted movements such as the digital NAM, ID-SOV, and Technologies for Liberation, after introducing the GDPR and the UN recommendations. This article has discussed potential avenues for solutions, including organisational principles and values which are key to this discussion. There are large power imbalances that need to be addressed and deeply rooted systems that need to be reimagined, and we must start with listening to the voices who have been the most silenced, and guiding everyone involved to do the right thing.
“The time has come for us to develop a set of basic principles on which countries can agree so that consumers worldwide are protected and businesses know what is required of them in any geography.” (Barber, 2021)
Resources
Barber, D. (2021, October 2). Navigating data privacy legislation in a global society. TechCrunch. Retrieved March 26, 2022, from https://techcrunch.com/2021/10/02/navigating-data-privacy-legislation-in-a-global-society/
DLA Piper. (2022). EU General Data Protection Regulation - key changes: DLA Piper Global Law Firm. DLA Piper. Retrieved April 8, 2022, from https://www.dlapiper.com/en/asiapacific/focus/eu-data-protection-regulation/key-changes/
Nick Couldry & Ulises Ali Mejias (2021): The decolonial turn in data and technology research: what is at stake and where is it heading?, Information, Communication & Society, DOI: 10.1080/1369118X.2021.1986102
Engler, A. (2022, March 9). The EU and U.S. are starting to align on AI Regulation. Brookings. Retrieved March 26, 2022, from https://www-brookings-edu.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.brookings.edu/blog/techtank/2022/02/01/the-eu-and-u-s-are-starting-to-align-on-ai-regulation/amp/
Freuler, J. O. (2020, June 27). The case for a Digital non-aligned Movement. openDemocracy. Retrieved March 26, 2022, from https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/oureconomy/case-digital-non-aligned-movement/
Mejias, U. A. (2020, September 8). To fight data colonialism, we need a non-aligned Tech Movement. Science and Technology | Al Jazeera. Retrieved April 7, 2022, from https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2020/9/8/to-fight-data-colonialism-we-need-a-non-aligned-tech-movement
Neves, B. S., & Srivastava, M. (2020). Technologies for Liberation. Technologies for Liberation: Toward abolionist futures. Retrieved March 26, 2022, from https://www.astraeafoundation.org/FundAbolitionTech/
Reddy, L., & Soni, A. (2021, September). Is there space for a Digital Non-Aligned Movement? - HCSS.NL. New Conditions and Constellations in Cyber . Retrieved April 2, 2022, from https://hcss.nl/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Is-There-Space-for-a-Digital-Non-Aligned-Movement.pdf
South, J. (2018, August 7). More than 1,000 U.S. news sites are still unavailable in Europe, two months after GDPR took effect. Nieman Lab. Retrieved April 3, 2022, from https://www.niemanlab.org/2018/08/more-than-1000-u-s-news-sites-are-still-unavailable-in-europe-two-months-after-gdpr-took-effect/
The UN. (2022). UN secretary-General's Data Strategy. United Nations. Retrieved April 3, 2022, from https://www.un.org/en/content/datastrategy/index.shtml