News and Research articles on WorldThis issue brings together a selection of articles presented in the Communication Policy and Technology section of the IAMCR conference in 2018.
Is Bitcoin a fair and reliable currency? Contrary to what its proponents might hope, Bitcoin is far from fulfilling their expectations.
Marianne Franklin is Professor of Global Media & Politics, convenor of the MA in Global Media and Transnational Communications at Goldsmiths, University of London. We interviewed her in advance of the five year anniversary celebration of our journal.
This special issue brings together the best policy-oriented papers presented at the 2017 Association of Internet Researchers (AoIR) conference in Tartu, Estonia.
This paper examines three historical imaginaries associated with encryption, considering how they are intertwined in contemporary policy debates.
With widespread smart contract implementation on the horizon, there is much conversation about how to regulate this new technology. Noting the failure of contract law to address the inequities of standardised contracts in the digital environment can help prevent them from being codified further into smart contracts.
Big crisis data presuppose the ongoing calculation and valuation of (transient) events, producing both singular and networked events and actors.
This paper explores how four approaches to cyber security are constructed, motivated and justified by different values such as privacy, economic order and national security and what this means for the actors involved.
In reaction to the Cambridge Analytica controversy, Facebook has recently announced a substantial tightening of access restrictions to the APIs of Facebook, Instagram, and other platforms it owns. Researchers at leading international research organisations are deeply concerned about collateral impacts of the new API access rules. Here is why.
This essay argues that we have anxieties about micro-targeting because we have anxieties about democracy itself.
This paper discusses resolution of the contested meanings of inclusiveness, accountability and transparency in trade policymaking.
While the internet routing system serves as kind of a nervous system, it is far from automated. Still to this day, network engineers turn to chat rooms and mailing lists to manufacture internet connectivity.
Cyberspace governance struggles with three accountability challenges, the problem of many hands, the profusion of issue areas, as well as the hybridity and malleability of institutional arrangements. In order to address and mitigate these challenges, accountability relationships need to be consciously reframed and discursively constructed.
The campaign against Israel’s biometric database demonstrates how civil society can advocate for privacy even when “privacy is dead”.
The importance of personal data for the digital economy accentuates a problematic information asymmetry between consumers and the data-driven market players. An increased consumer protection would have to deal with the lack of transparency of this black-box setup and a flawed use of consent as regulatory model. The consumer protection needs to be improved in practice, in its implementation, not only in its policy.
The rapid development of the Internet of Things - or IoT - affects the protection of privacy in profound ways. Eduardo Magrani argues in favour of a shift from privacy protection to the idea a “right to non-tracking”.
Internet users need a cyber security mindset, argues William H. Dutton. This paper seeks to explain the concept of a security ‘mindset’ and its social significance.
Do ICANN’s policies and operations have an impact on human rights? Civil society engagement in the organisation seeks to inscribe human rights in internet infrastructure.
Internet intermediaries unilaterally define their terms of service (ToS) and enforce them privately by shaping the architectures of the networks and platforms under their control. Based on empirical evidence, Belli and Venturini argue that ToS and their implementation affect users’ rights.
The UN General Assembly’s Third Committee adoption on 21 November of a new resolution on the right to privacy in the digital age comes as timely and crucial for protecting the right to privacy in light of new challenges.