2020 Resolution on the right to privacy in the digital age

75th UNGA
2020-12-16

Res­o­lu­tion A/RES/75/176

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Analysis of precedential value

This res­o­lu­tion was adopted by the UN Gen­eral Assem­bly (UNGA) with­out a gen­eral vote in Decem­ber 2020. The UNGA is the pre­em­i­nent gov­ern­ing body of the UN sys­tem and con­sists of all 193 UN Mem­ber States.

Used as precedent

digital health

• “Stress­ing also the need to ensure that national secu­rity and pub­lic health mea­sures, includ­ing the use of tech­nol­ogy to mon­i­tor and con­tain the spread of infec­tious dis­eases, are in full com­pli­ance with the oblig­a­tions of States under inter­na­tional human rights law and adhere to the prin­ci­ples of law­ful­ness, legal­ity, legit­i­macy with regard to the aim pur­sued, neces­sity and pro­por­tion­al­ity and the need to pro­tect human rights, includ­ing the right to pri­vacy, and per­sonal data in the response to health or other emer­gen­cies” (p. 5)

• “Not­ing the impor­tance of pro­tect­ing and respect­ing the right of indi­vid­u­als to pri­vacy when design­ing, devel­op­ing or deploy­ing tech­no­log­i­cal means in response to dis­as­ters, epi­demics and pan­demics, espe­cially the coro­n­avirus dis­ease (COVID -19) pan­demic, includ­ing dig­i­tal expo­sure noti­fi­ca­tion and con­tact trac­ing” (p. 5)

• “Acknowl­edges that the con­cep­tion, design, use, deploy­ment and fur­ther devel­op­ment of new and emerg­ing tech­nolo­gies, such as those that involve arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence, may have an impact on the enjoy­ment of the right to pri­vacy and other human rights, and that the risks to these rights can and should be avoided and min­i­mized by adapt­ing or adopt­ing ade­quate reg­u­la­tion or other appro­pri­ate mech­a­nisms, in accor­dance with applic­a­ble oblig­a­tions under inter­na­tional human rights law, for the con­cep­tion, design, devel­op­ment and deploy­ment of new and emerg­ing tech­nolo­gies, includ­ing arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence, by tak­ing mea­sures to ensure a safe, trans­par­ent, account­able, secure and high qual­ity data infra­struc­ture and by devel­op­ing human rights-based audit­ing mech­a­nisms and redress mech­a­nisms and estab­lish­ing human over­sight” (p. 5)