Digital Rights Foundation's 9th annual national privacy conference concludes.
ISLAMABAD -- Digital Rights Foundation (DRF) hosted its 9th annual National Privacy Conference on Saturday.
The conference brought together experts from different fields to discuss this year's theme of the conference, 'People and Privacy', shedding light on the all-encompassing nature of privacy rights and violations that we experience in different strands of society.
The welcome address was delivered by Zainab Durrani, Project Manager of DRF's Data Privacy Portfolio. She highlighted the importance of privacy considerations in everyday life and the need for privacy-centric and human rights-friendly regulations in the country.
Nighat Dad, Executive Director of DRF, noted that the 'DRF's annual conference on privacy has become an institution that hosts cutting-edge discussions regarding privacy, grounds them in the Pakistani context, and provides a space by bringing together the leading experts in the country.'
The keynote address was delivered by Angbeen Mirza, a legal academic and an assistant professor at the Shaikh Ahmad Hassan School of Law (SAHSOL), LUMS. Angbeen stated that Article 14 of the Constitution guarantees our privacy, however it is important to operationalize it through a law that protects our right to privacy. Angbeen shared that 'the Personal Data Protection Bill has yet to be presented as a law, a law that has become even more important in light of rapid digitization in a post-Covid world.'
The first panel 'People on Privacy' included transgender activist Jannat Ali, journalist Amel Ghani, and Barrister Jannat Kalyar. The panel highlighted the importance of privacy in social movements from a people's perspective and the need for popularizing privacy and making it more accessible to the masses. Barrister Jannat Kalyar on the panel said, 'We need to place the human in the entire framework of privacy, focusing on human dignity when individuals are not discriminated against because of their class, caste, race, or religion, and this dignity is guaranteed to us in the Constitution.'
Jannat Ali highlighted that proposed amendments to the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act, 2018 seek to violate the privacy of the trans community by subjecting them to intrusive medical examinations. She urged the audience to 'stand with the community at this time, rather than trying to work for us.'
After the panel a debate took place on the topic: 'This house believes that privacy is a western concept'. The lively debate was led by two...
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