International Organisation: Best Practice Guidance for Data Protection in Counter-Terrorism
The client was a large International Organisation related to counter terrorism.
As globally, digitalisation continues to accelerate, State authorities and private corporations are increasingly engaged in the large-scale processing and analysis of personal data. This includes sensitive information that is intimately related to identity, such as biometric data, and myriad data points that connect individuals to the digital world, facilitating communication, commerce, service provision, public administration and participation in civic life. The development of ever more sophisticated means of processing and analysing this data – increasingly underpinned by artificial intelligence – is transforming the relationship between data subjects and data controllers.
Counter-terrorism can have a significant impact on the rights to privacy and data protection. As the UN Human Rights Council has noted, the “increase in the capacity and complexity of computer hardware and software combined with the substantial expansion in the funding for, and prominence of, State counter-terrorism programmes has led to the development of a wide range of sophisticated surveillance technologies either directed at, or suitable for, counter-terrorism purposes.”
AWO was asked by a large International Organisation to create a Best Practice Guidance for Data Protection in Counter-Terrorism.
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The tension between data protection and counter-terrorism
A lack of applicable rules in relation to the processing of personal data for the prevention, investigation, detection, and prosecution of criminal offences by authorities, which includes highly sensitive personal data, creates significant risks for data subjects and data controllers alike. Data protection requirements are fundamental to maintaining public trust and support for counter-terrorism efforts.
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The importance of data subject rights
While data protection law generally gives States and law enforcement authorities broad scope to restrict or deny the exercise of data subjects rights, these restrictions should be designed narrowly in accordance with the principles of necessity and proportionality and should not result in blanket exemptions.
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The impact of new technologies
Widespread concern about the development of new technologies such as real-time facial recognition and other sophisticated forms of surveillance has sparked a global debate about the use of AI and how it should be regulated.
The guidance draws on international norms and standards and regional and national good practices concerning the collection, processing, storage and sharing of data used for counter-terrorism purposes. It is based on the growing global consensus on the principles and minimum standards that should govern the processing of personal data by States, businesses, and other private actors, reflected in regional treaties and guidance applicable across the majority of nations.
This work will support States’ efforts to anchor their counter-terrorism activities in robust data protection frameworks and to facilitate effective international cooperation on this basis.