Privacy as human right

At the software giant’s conference in 2018, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella implored the industry to rethink the way its products worked because the dangers of how technology could be used to invade privacy had become so clear. He came up with a telling observation: ‘We need to ask ourselves not only what computers can do, but what computers should do.’ Two years down the line, Nadella reiterated to a concerned audience at Davos that data privacy ought to be treated as a human right. Why not ensure that it was used with consent, he seemed to be thinking aloud, ‘so the consumer could benefit along with the advertiser’.

Big Tech has been facing increasing global scrutiny as it becomes all-pervasive, and governments struggle to keep pace. Configuring consumer choices, electoral decisions, the fake news factory, the power and reach of the data industry is exponential, and potentially hugely dangerous. Europe’s new General Data Protection Regulation that sets stringent privacy standards for any company doing business in the EU has come in for praise, but there have been concerns raised over regulations elsewhere. What if the State, for instance, simply takes over from where the tech industry left and makes it a policy to not only snoop on citizens, but also influence choices? Who guards the guardian?

When Nadella passionately talks of putting in place ethical standards around Artificial Intelligence, his vision of ‘data dignity’ needs affirmation not only from his peers, but also nation-states. A regulatory consensus on what is allowed and what is not — much like the way the world deals with proliferation of nukes — seems like one way forward. If access to Internet is a fundamental right, as ruled by the Supreme Court in the context of the ban in Jammu and Kashmir, an assurance of cyber security and privacy should be a natural corollary. Every Indian is a stakeholder, ‘privacy as a human right’ needs to become an issue of intense public debate.