The “Charter of Barcelona for the Rights of Citizens in the Digital Era” (#BarcelonaDigitalRights) was presented this morning at the Barcelona Bar Association (ICAB) as one of the central events of the II Digital Law World Congress, which is celebrated today and tomorrow.
ICAB presents the “Charter of Barcelona for the Rights of Citizens in the Digital Era” endorsed by universities and entities of the civil society.
Those responsible for publicly presenting the “Charter of Barcelona for the Rights of Citizens in the Digital Era” have been Rodolfo Tesone, member of the Governing Board of ICAB and president of the ICAB Digital Transformation Commission, Francisco Bonatti, member of the Digital Transformation Commission and responsible for the writing team of the Charter, together with the ‘project partners’:
Department of Digital Policies and Public Administration of the Generalitat, Barcelona City Council, Universitat de Barcelona, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Universitat Politècnica de Barcelona- Barcelona-Tech, Cardenal Herrera University, European Law Faculties Association, Barcelona Supercomputing Center, Institute of Law and Technology, Institute of Political and Social Sciences, Madrid Bar Association, ENATIC (Asociación de expertos nacionales de la Abogacía TIC); Internet users Association, Catalan Association of Democratic jurists (ACJD), Spanish Association for the Advancement of Information Security (ISMS Forum Spain), Xarxa de Comunicació local, Spanish Association of Compliance, Commission for Digital Transformation of Law, Law Section for Information and Comunication Technologies of ICAB; Intellectual Property Rights and Image Rights Section of ICAB; Reporters Without Borders; Ibero-American Federation of Law and Computing Associations (FIADI); lawyers and experts in ICT, among others).
The drafting of the Charter is a transversal and international project, driven and led by the President of the Barcelona Bar Association, Mª Eugenia Gay, and the president of ENATIC and Member of the Governing Board of ICAB, Rodolfo Tesone, with the aim of laying the foundations for a global agreement that allows the preservation of human rights while being compatible with the impact that the evolution of technologies has had over the last years in today’s society, since a new scenario has been drawn up in which the current legal systems can present insufficient answers to the demands of citizens.
For this reason, the Barcelona Bar Association, who has historically led the legal demands of the society to achieve progress, made an open call to universities, scientific centers, economic life entities, experts in Digital Law, with the objective of launching a working group to begin the process of drafting the “Charter of Barcelona for the Rights of Citizens in the Digital Era”.
In the elaboration of this text, it was marked as a principle, on the one hand, to guarantee the respect for essential human rights and the democratic principles of society, taking into account that the unstoppable technological advance in which society is immersed and the widespread use of ICT by citizens has revealed new dangers for people that have to be be preserved, especially in areas as essential as the right to privacy, or the Right to honor. On the other hand, to ensure that the technological evolution and its impact on society keeps the human being and its essential rights in the epicenter.
What rights does the “Charter of Barcelona for the rights of citizens in the Digital Era” compile?
The result of this work is the Charter that has been made public today and emphasizes rights such as: the right to digital identity; right of digital citizenship; Right to privacy and confidentiality in the digital environment; right to be forgotten and to digital memory; right to the protection of personal data; Right to freedom of thought, speech and information in the digital environment; right to education and digital training; Right to freedom of enterprise and technological development; Right to equality and prohibition of discrimination against the use of technologies; right of asylum; right to the protection of minors, people with functional diversity and other vulnerable groups; right to the protection of working people in technological environments; right to the protection of consumers and users in digital environments; Right to effective protection in digital conflicts, among others. The ICAB wants to state that the ‘Charter’ presented today is not a closed document. Contributions will continue to be received in what regards the writing and at the same time, the number of ‘project partners’ will continue to be expanded, especially in the international arena. This “Charter” aims to make Barcelona the world capital of digital rights.
Why did we choose the name of “Barcelona Charter”?
The importance of the city of Barcelona, its undeniable legal tradition, its ability to innovate, create, and respond to global challenges, its current consideration as a ‘hub’ in technology research and ‘cluster’ of technological digital businesses of world importance, and with a historical path in defense of the rights of people, lead us to vindicate the name of this document: “Charter of Barcelona for the Rights of the Citizens in the Digital Era”.
You can check all the information on the “Charter of Barcelona for the Rights of the Citizens in the Digital Era” at http://digitalrightsbarcelona.org