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women’s, gender, and perspectives arrow for change in health policies and programmes vol. 22 no. 1 2016

vol. 22 no. 1 2016 issn 1394-4444

Sexuality, Sexual and and Rights, and the

published by the asian-pacific resource & research centre for women editorial 2—6 New Technologies for Safe Safer Nudes! A Sexy Guide to The New Green: Medical Services Digital Security The Landscapes of Digital The Potential Impact of Free Women’s Bodies on Digital Basics on SRHR Advocacy in Battlegrounds: Networks of Bangladesh Information and Support by spotlight 6—27 Pro-choice Activists in Latin America One and the Other: in our own words 28—33 Fighting Online Gender, Romance, Misogyny, Fighting a and the Internet: The resources from the arrow srhr Corporatised Internet Creation of a Non-Binary, knowledge sharing centre 41—44 Non-Binary Person Minding the Data developed in selected arrow resources 44—46 collaboration with Gap: Data Risks and Is Access Real? Disability, Revolutions in Meeting Sexuality, and the Digital definitions 46-48 the Sustainable Space Development Goals factfile 49—55 Quantifying Fertility and monitoring regional and Reproduction through global activities 34—40 Access, Legislation, and Online Mobile Apps: A Critical Freedom of Expression: A Data published with funding support of Overview Security in Contentious Overview Contexts: Exploring Digital Apps, Drones, and Resilience for Organisations editorial and production team 56 iTunes: Opportunities Serving Sexual and Gender and Challenges in Using Minorities 2 arrow for change editorial vol. 22 no. 1 2016

THE NEW GREEN: The Landscapes of Digital Activism

In an episode of the popular American The internet works in a television show Mad Men set in a New York manner inimical to access advertising firm in the 1960s, the of the protagonist, Don Draper, goes for a picnic in and voice: control exists the park. Once the picnic is over, Draper’s wife in the very architecture Betty picks up the picnic blanket and shakes of the systems that we it out, spilling paper napkins, plates, drink believe enable freedom. bottles, and food waste out onto the grass, Harassment, abuse, then folds the blanket and puts it away. She manipulation, exclusion, dusts off her hands and the family gets into their car leaving a littered field behind them. and discrimination— This shocking little detail reminds the viewer of these experiences that the period the show is set in: environmentally we have known and friendly civic behaviours that are commonplace experienced offline find today—like being conscious of littering, eating their twins online. local, or recycling—were once not. The internet is the new green. The sectors are doing something similar for digital environmental rights movement raised technologies. consciousness about our relationship with, and , blocking and filtering, social effects on, the natural environment; and have media, “hashtag activism,” phishing, scams, demonstrated the interrelationships between spam, viruses, online abuse, big data, leaks of actors like states, corporations, communities, personal data, violations, and hacks consumers, and the law in matters of climate have also entered a collective awareness of justice. Activists and advocacy groups in the what it means to be online today. The internet tech-for-change and technology-activism works in a manner inimical to access and voice: control exists in the very architecture of Information technologies the systems that we believe enable freedom. are now part of the Harassment, abuse, manipulation, exclusion, chemistry of activism. and discrimination—these experiences that we The struggle for digital have known and experienced offline find their twins online. Large parts of the internet belong and freedoms entirely to corporations that users have no online are not necessarily control over, though businesses profit from new; they are a continuation users. Governments control the infrastructure of existing political of the internet: electromagnetic spectrum, laws struggles. Movements and governing digital access, publishing policies, activisms for “internet even malicious surveillance software that are sometimes deployed against citizen activists freedom” or “digital access” and journalists. should therefore not be isolated from movements What does this mean for activism, political engagement, and defense? What and collective action in are the relationships and interdependencies other areas such as SRHR. influencing the promises of being online: voice, editorial arrow for change 3 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

visibility, and power? This ARROW for Change …sexual health information Notes & References (AFC) issue on sexual and reproductive health is being censored, and and rights (SRHR) and the internet documents some of these dynamics. nudity is being equated 1 Associated Press, “Indonesia Bans Gay with pornography. Emoji and Stickers from Messaging Apps,” Information technologies are now part of The Guardian, February 12, 2016, http:// www.theguardian.com/world/2016/feb/12/ the chemistry of activism. The struggle for indonesia-bans-gay-emoji-and-stickers- from-messaging-apps. digital sovereignty and freedoms online are a total of 5,034 YouTube videos claimed to be not necessarily new; they are a continuation 2 Transparency Report, https:// “harmful” to youth with no definition of what www.google.com/transparencyreport/ of existing political struggles. Movements and was considered “harmful.”2 removals/government/notes/?hl=en#autho activisms for “internet freedom” or “digital rity=KR&period=all. 3 access” should therefore not be isolated from Online is a project that documents 3 Online Censorship, https:// onlinecensorship.org. movements and collective action in other removal of content by technology corporations that own popular social media platforms— 4 Jessica Anderson, Matthew Stender, areas such as SRHR. This AFC is an attempt to Sarah Myers West, and Jillian C. York, narrativise sites of continuity, connection, and Facebook, Google, Instagram, Twitter, and Unfriending Censorship: Insights from YouTube. The project’s aim is to push for Four Months of Crowdsourced Data potential collaboration. on Social Media Censorship, Electronic transparency in how speech is regulated online Frontier Foundation and Visualising by these corporations. From November 2015 Impact, March 2016, https://s3-us-west-1. amazonaws.com/onlinecensorship/ to March 2016, people submitted 186 reports posts/pdfs/000/000/044/original/ …Facebook, Instagram, of takedowns of their social media content on Onlinecensorship.org_Report_-_31_ March_2016.pdf?2016. Twitter, and YouTube these five platforms. Of these, 89 are related 5 For example, The Guardian recently are also sites of abuse to nudity concerns and primarily on Facebook. analysed over 70 million comments in Some broad themes emerged from Online response to articles posted in a ten-year- and harassment, period and showed how its female, LGBT, which affect women Censorship’s early findings: sexual health and Jewish writers were more regularly information is being censored, and nudity is and consistently harassed online. See and sexual minorities here: Becky Gardiner, Mahana Mansfield, being equated with pornography.4 Ian Anderson, Josh Holder, Daan Louter, disproportionately and Monica Ulmanu, “The Dark Side of At the same time, Facebook, Instagram, Guardian Comments,” The Guardian, April compared to the other 12, 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/ populations online; and Twitter, and YouTube are also sites of abuse technology/2016/apr/12/the-dark-side-of- and harassment, which affect women and guardian-comments. yet these are not regulated sexual minorities disproportionately compared 6 J. Nathan Matias, Amy Johnson, Whitney Erin Boesel, Brian Keegan, Jaclyn Friedman, with quite the same vigour. to the other populations online; and yet and Charlie DeTar, “Reporting, Reviewing, these are not regulated with quite the same and Responding to Harassment on Twitter,” Women, Action, and the Media, May 13, vigour. Through these initiatives and high- 2015. http://womenactionmedia.org/ Speech Acts. A significant dynamic of the profile cases of online harassment, there has twitter-report. internet is the struggle to use it as a platform been a mainstream discussion of its scale 7 See Gender and Tech Resources, “Complete Manual,” https://gendersec. 5 for speech and expression, sexual speech and and effects. In 2014, research by Women, tacticaltech.org/wiki/index.php/Complete_ content in particular. However, States and Action, and Media, in partnership with manual#Counterspeech for an extensive list of feminist counterspeech actions and technology corporations emerge as partners Twitter, demonstrated that in 800 reports of projects. in the regulation of sexual speech and content harassment, 27% were about hate speech, 12% online. For example, as part of a wider about threats of violence, and 22% were to do suppression of LGBT communities, in February with doxxing (uncovering details of the user’s 2016, Indonesia’s Communications Ministry identity and location, and sharing this as an banned gay emoji stickers in messaging incitement to violence offline).6 applications like Line and WhatsApp, as well In the past few years, there have been new as on larger social media platforms.1 Other guides and toolkits to help internet users states in the region, anxious to maintain control mitigate harassment online. These resources through arbitrarily defined notions of “local typically give information and direction on culture,” imposed bans and issued takedown how to manage abusive people and vulnerable notices to social media companies. Between spaces online. There are some initiatives that July and December 2014, for example, the emphasise proactive responses to online Ministry of Gender Equality and Family in South harassment, de-emphasise “protection,” and Korea asked Google to remove or age-restrict focus on claiming freedoms: feminist counter- 4 arrow for change vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References How can we rethink the speech” because they are violent, or incite role of these platforms violence. and companies when they Yet, how should speech and its reception be 8 Zero Trollerance, http://zerotrollerance. regulated? What is the role of technology guru/. take credit for supporting popular uprisings around companies in enabling freedom of opinion 9 Databite No. 60: Caroline Sinders, and expression, as well as freedom to be YouTube video, 1:05:51, posted by “Data & Society Research Institute,” January the world, and yet have no online? Organisations such as APC’s Women’s 26, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/ accountability to their users Programme actively lobby for both the Internet watch?v=eAnXylrfyR8. Forum12 and the Human Rights 10 Blank Noise, http://blog.blanknoise. in the regulation of speech? org/. Council13 to engage with these questions 11 Mick Hume, Trigger Warning: Is the Fear by compiling feminist research and policy 7 of Being Offensive Killing Free Speech? speech such as the Peng! Collective’s Zero advocacy directions. (UK: William Collins, 2015), 128-9. Trollerance campaign8 and Wikipedia’s edit-a- 12 BPF Online Abuse and Gender-Based thons. UX designer Caroline Sinders suggests Private Control and Public Interest. The Violence Against Women, “IGF 2015 Best Practice Forum: Online Abuse and Gender- that experimenting with platform design and question of regulation of content online, and Based Violence Against Women Report,” architecture could enable more user control harassment, leads to questions of public GenderIT.org, January 12, 2016, http:// www.genderit.org/resources/igf-2015-best- over harassment, and enable privacy.9 Blank interest in a privately-controlled internet. A practice-forum-online-abuse-and-gender- Noise marries online and offline actions, leaked internal memo from Facebook revealed based-violence-against-women-report. creating innovative ways to rethink space and that employees asked if the platform had a role 13 APC, “Briefings on Technology-Related 14 Violence against Women for the 29 Human freedom.10 in “preven[ting] President Trump in 2017.” Rights Council Session,” GenderIT.org, Facebook is therefore aware of its power to June 17, 2015, http://www.genderit.org/ Recognising online harassment, particularly resources/briefs-technology-related- curate content to shape public opinion—but violence-against-women-29-human-rights- verbal harassment, raises a difficult and who regulates Facebook in what opinions it council-session. challenging issue: that labeling verbal material decides to shape? In a parallel development, 14 Michael Nunez, “Facebook Employees offensive, upsetting, hurtful, or harmful runs Asked Mark Zuckerberg If They Should the recent revelation that Facebook actively Try to Stop a Donald Trump Presidency,” the risk of limiting someone’s freedom of curates its “Trending Topics” reveals Gizmodo, April 15, 2016, http://gizmodo. opinion and expression. The reasoning goes com/facebook-employees-asked-mark- something fairly banal save for the fact that the zuckerberg-if-they-should-1771012990. that identifying abusive words and language opacity of the company’s workings makes the 15 Nathan Olivares-Giles, “Five Things is entirely subjective, and that subjective news special: online content is moderated and to Know About Facebook’s Trending interpretations cannot be used to police 15 Controversy,” The Wall Street Journal, May curated by people! 10, 2016, http://www.wsj.com/articles/ everyone. Michael Hume notes the culture of five-things-to-know-about-facebooks- “trigger warnings” and “micro-aggressions” There is a powerful role that technology trending-controversy-1462915385. that he thinks limit speech:11 corporations have in shaping this de facto 16 Dana Boyd, “Facebook Must Be public sphere, to which they are increasingly Accountable to the Public,” Data & Society, The notion that words can oppress makes May 13, 2016, http://www.datasociety.net/ expected to be accountable, to some extent output/facebook-must-be-accountable-to- a nonsense of the concept in the present the ways in which news media are.16 How the-public/. and insults the struggles of the past. can we rethink the role of these platforms 17 Report of the Special Rapporteur on Oppression involves the denial of equal the Promotion and Protection of the Right and companies when they take credit for to Freedom of Opinion and Expression, legal and social rights to a group. It does supporting popular uprisings around the 3, from: , “Freedom of not mean somebody being a bit rude or Expression and the Private Sector in the world, and yet have no accountability to Digital Age,” OCHR, http://www.ohchr. making you feel uncomfortable with the their users in the regulation of speech? The org/EN/Issues/FreedomOpinion/Pages/ way they talk…. Words can be weapons in Privatesectorinthedigitalage.aspx. Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Opinion and a battle of ideas or a slanging match. But Expression frames the questions around private words are not literally weapons with which enterprise and its role in securing rights:17 to do violent harm, or magic spells with the power to oppress. In digital environments, important questions about applicable law and the Hume makes it sound like thicker skin is scope of private authority and public required to be on the internet. However, the regulation cannot be avoided. Should reality of being online is that it is not only these private actors have the same about disagreeing about gendered pronouns; responsibilities as public authorities? women who are online and are articulate about Should their responsibilities derive their opinions and views, like journalists and from human rights law, terms of activists, also receive death and rape threats. service, contractual arrangements, or Such threats cannot be considered as “free something else? How should relationships arrow for change 5 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

among corporate actors and States be biases and inaccuracies22 and also enables a Notes & References structured? When faced with pressures range of new services from taxi rentals and to conduct their businesses in ways that menstruation apps to dating sites. Relying interfere with freedom of expression, what heavily on users sharing personal information, 18 Rahul Bhatia, “The Inside Story of steps should private actors take? it promises to make predictions expected to Facebook’s Biggest Setback,” The Guardian, help advertisers, marketers, and governments May 12, 2016, https://www.theguardian. Private enterprise in the technology sector com/technology/2016/may/12/facebook- alike to target products and policies, and to goes beyond creating platforms for speech and free-basics-india-zuckerberg. collect feedback about how these work, or not. expression. Facebook is also a company that 19 Project Loon, “How Loon Flies,” https:// www.google.com/loon/how/. wants to bring to poorer parts One growing market for personal data 20 Anselm Franke, Stephanie Hankey, and of the world, as in the case of Free Basics, comes from the body itself; an example is Marek Tuszynski, eds. “The White Room” a mission they were unable to accomplish18 the quantified self (QS) movement with the in Nervous Systems (Germany: Spector Books, 2016), 361-9. because they violated the principle of net slogan “self-knowledge through numbers,”23 21 “Microchips Biotech, Inc.,” Bill & neutrality, that all content on the internet which relies on tracking sites, applications, Melinda Gates Foundation, http://www. should be treated the same. Other technology and devices such as FitBits. According to gatesfoundation.org/How-We-Work/Quick- Links/Grants-Database/Grants/2014/01/ companies also have similar missionary QS enthusiasts, recording and analysing OPP1068198. intentions. Google has Project Loon, which physiological and physical states can empower 22 Julia Angwin, Jeff Larson, Surya Mattu, aims to partner with telecommunications an individual to make healthy decisions. and Lauren Kirchner, “Machine Bias,” ProPublica, May 23, 2016, https://www. companies in using balloons to bring WiFi However, as Amelia Abreu writes, the propublica.org/article/machine-bias-risk- connectivity.19 However, Google’s acquisitions trendiness of personal quantification, driven assessments-in-criminal-sentencing. since 1999 indicates that it is no more just a primarily by white, middle-class men, suggests 23 Quantified Self, http://quantifiedself. com/. company: its acquisitions extend a “universalising aspect” in the search for 24 Amelia Abreu, “Quantify Everything: A from longevity research labs, to mining the data points. At the same time, the work Dream of a Feminist Data Future,” Model moon.20 Meanwhile, Bill and Melinda Gates has that women do, such as caregiving, remains View Culture, February 24, 2014, https:// modelviewculture.com/pieces/quantify- donated US$11,316,324 to Microchips Biotech invisible despite the computing and technical everything-a-dream-of-a-feminist-data- Inc. to develop a wireless-connected slow- power available in consumer technology future. release contraceptive chip. Clinical trials will be applications.24 25 Personal interview, Maya Ganesh, 7 January 2016. conducted in the “developing world” in 2018.21 Self-quantification apps to monitor 26 Seth Suman, “Putting Knowledge in its Place: Science, Colonialism, and the Post menstruation, fertility, and pregnancy Colonial,” Postcolonial Studies 12, no. 4 …as Amelia Abreu aggregate large amounts of granular, personal (2009), 373-88. writes, the trendiness of data about sleep, appetite, digestion, hair 27 Here’s a good overview of this history: Jane Ussher, Women’s Madness: Misogyny personal quantification, quality, skin quality, motivation levels, or Mental Illness? (Massachusetts: driven primarily by productivity, and so on and so forth. In a University of Massachusetts Press, 1992). white, middle-class men, personal interview, the lead developer of one 28 Amelia Abreu. “Quantify Everything.” suggests a “universalising such app said that his company does not sell personal data; in the interest of science, the aspect” in the search company gives women’s data to American for data points. At the universities citing the significant knowledge same time, the work gap on menstruation and fertility.25 However, that women do, such the developer’s “generous” approach as caregiving, remains suggests an instrumentalisation of women’s invisible despite the bodies. There is an unfortunately long and significant history to the use of women’s computing and technical bodies for scientific inquiry, from how Western power available in scientific knowledge has been co-constituted consumer technology with colonial rule,26 to the development of applications. “cures” for women’s “madness,” such as clitoridectomies and cold showers.27 Quantified Environments. The profitability of Abreu goes on to ask if quantification of this privately-owned internet now comes from everyday life can be a more “messy” space in how effectively commercial applications can which data may be in the hands of those who harness big data. Big data conceals significant create it, and if it has any value in improving 6 arrow for change vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References A politicised perspective on such as the sensitivities of visibility and data use and applications, exposure—what is the tradeoff between knowing, monitoring, and managing and from global progress, and the rights to privacy and 29 UNGlobalPulse aims to make predictions about and understand the feminist perspectives, protection for people? How does the use effects of natural disasters, disease is much needed. of data change how NGOs and states make outbreaks, other social calamities based on scanning and analysing social media claims to achieving targets more or less data. See more here: http://www. authoritatively based on large or small unglobalpulse.org/. the conditions of their lives.28 A politicised data?32 30 Civicus, “DataShift,” http://civicus. perspective on data use and applications, and org/thedatashift/. Things would be simple if one could get off from global feminist perspectives, is much 31 NoCeilings.org, https://noceilings.org. Facebook, if all transnational organising and needed. 32 Tin Geber, “Citizen-Generated Data mobilising could move to sustainable and Going Global: The DataShift Reunion,” The Engine Room, May 10, 2016, https:// Big data is also shaping practices of freedom-friendly autonomous infrastructure www.theengineroom.org/citizen- development, through application across a owned and maintained by activists (some try generated-data-going-global-the-datashift- reunion/. range of civic technology projects, as well as to!), or if users had more agency. We do not 33 For more information, see “Me and the Goals.29,30,31 There always have the choice to opt out, though My Shadow: The Control of Your Data,” is still not enough robust evidence around if different choices can be made, with some https://myshadow.org/. and how “big data for development” affects investment.33 In thinking through how we practices of NGOs and development actors, inhabit the internet, and practice our politics and what its impact will be on individual and activism through it, it is time to consider communities. We can now only ground what how we feel, and enable, responsibility for we think the challenges may be discursively, this shared space.

By Maya Indira Ganesh, Director, Applied Research, Tactical Technology Collective. Twitter: @mayameme.

spotlight

ONE AND THE OTHER: Fighting Online Misogyny, Fighting a Corporatised Internet

1 Alex Hern, “Twitter CEO: We Suck In 2015, Twitter underwent intense speculation far less notice. For example, in 2012, at Dealing with Trolls and Abuse,” The Guardian, February 5, 2015, https:// about whether or not the internet’s top source Pakistani feminist Urooj Zia wrote about www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/ of news and commentary could survive its how her Twitter mentions were flooded with feb/05/twitter-ceo-we-suck-dealing-with- trolls-abuse. declining profitability. Many attributed this misogynistic attacks: unpredicted stagnation to what former CEO 2 Caitlin Dewey, “Robin Williams’s ...threats of ‘corrective rape’ because Daughter Zelda Driven off Twitter Dick Costolo called “suck[ing] at dealing with by Vicious Trolls,” The Washington I choose to tweet—just tweet—about abuse and trolls.”1 Post, August 13, 2014, https://www. issues such as childhood sexual abuse, washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/ wp/2014/08/13/robin-williamss- sexual harassment, and other forms of Feminists had been ringing the alarm around daughter-zelda-driven-off-twitter-by- sexualised violence.4 vicious-trolls/. abuse on Twitter for years and the problem 3 Alice Philipson, “Woman Who received attention for women like Zelda The Association for Progressive Campaigned for Jane Austen Bank Note 2 3 Receives Twitter Death Threats,” The Williams in the US and Caroline Criado-Perez Communications (APC) documented 1,126 Telegraph, July 28, 2013, http://www. in the UK. However, women around the world cases of online violence against women telegraph.co.uk/technology/10207231/ 5 Woman-who-campaigned-for-Jane-Austen- have experienced similar gender-based abuse around the world between 2012 and 2014, bank-note-receives-Twitter-death-threats. on Twitter, though their stories have received and the numbers indeed show a systemic html. spotlight arrow for change 7 vol. 22 no. 1 2016 and serious problem. Thirteen percent of the [APC] documented 1,126 Notes & References cases involved physical harm, while a third cases of online violence involved emotional harm. against women around However, when we think about ending the world between 2012 4 Urooj Zia, “She’s Begging to be misogyny that happens specifically on the Raped—Twitterverse for Feminists in and 2014, and the numbers Pakistan!,” GenderIT.org, December internet or via mobile phones, we need to 17, 2012, http://www.genderit.org/ concern ourselves less with the symptoms of indeed show a systemic and feminist-talk/shes-begging-be-raped- twitterverse-feminists-pakistan. the problem (i.e., how the abuse is specific to serious problem. Thirteen 5 Association for Progressive this particular medium), and more with how percent of the cases involved Communications, “Online VAW: we can harness the power of the internet Mapping,” GenderIT.org, n.d., http:// physical harm, while a third www.genderit.org/onlinevaw/mapping/. to tackle misogyny as a pervasive norm of involved emotional harm. 6 Jac sm Kee, Erotics: Exploratory gender power relations. Research on Sexuality and the Internet (Association for Progressive Gender and Online Speech. For women Communications, February 2010), rights and women’s access to the internet is https://www.apc.org/en/system/files/ and queer people, the increased freedom utilised to justify corporate access initiatives Erotics_Exec_Summary.pdf. of speech, facilitated by blogging and social like Free Basics. However, the increase also 7 Internet Relay Chat media, meant talking about things otherwise meant more attractive market size and a race forbidden in the mainstream. The EROTICS to monopolise functions like search engines, research6 in 2009-2011 looked specifically social networking, and content production. at examples of non-normative speech embedded within diverse discussion spaces When online discussion and meeting spaces like chat rooms, mailing lists, and forums. The are monopolised by the private sector, this factor of where the discussions happened poses significant threats to users’ privacy, was critical to shaping the politics of these security, and ability to be anonymous. They discussions themselves. Where users felt become unable to negotiate and decide on confident about their anonymity, they could the design and policies of their chat rooms, express themselves more freely. Where they forums, and groups. Rules of felt confident about their privacy, they could IRC7 rooms, for example, were set by their own opt in to mailing lists and proactively join communities, while rules of Facebook groups communities. They could set up websites are set by the corporation. And because the with information about sex education or safe primary interest of corporations is to gather abortion choices or LGBT meeting points. more data in order to sell more advertising, the These were movements emboldened by a design and policies of these platforms are built new that assumed privacy to extract more and more “real” information and security were built-in characteristics of from users: what they are thinking, doing, the network. buying, with whom, and where. However, today, these movements need A Neo-Liberal Selectivity of Sexual Speech. to wage a struggle for the protection of a When Google chose a rainbow-colored doodle freedom of expression that encompasses non- for the Sochi Olympics, they were expressing normative sexual expression. This includes a corporate interest in LGBT rights. They fighting against government surveillance and took a stand in the debate around hosting censorship that restricts sexual content, but a global sports event in a country with anti- is also increasingly about fighting corporate homosexuality laws. Facebook took a similar hegemony over the shaping of gender and stand in 2015 with its rainbow-colored profile sexuality discourse where the very design photo filters amidst the US Supreme Court of technology is imposed by a neoliberal decision on same-sex marriage. This corporate agenda. declaration—and remember, it is these same corporations that now control most online The Privatisation of Online Forums. interactions and discussion spaces—was clear Internet users grew from a little less than 1 in its legitimising of LGBT speech. billion in 2005 to almost 3.5 billion today. This increase, of course, is a good thing However, unlike the rainbow flag, other forms and access to the internet is certainly a of sexual speech remain less welcome, such feminist issue—particularly when women’s as Instagram’s ban of Rupi Kaur’s photos of 8 arrow for change spotlight vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References women’s periods8 and Facebook’s ban of When Google chose a women’s nipples during the Black Lives Matter9 rainbow-colored doodle nude protest10 in San Francisco. Google is yet to put out a doodle for International Safe for the Sochi Olympics, 8 Alexandra Brodsky, “Instagram Bans Photo for Showing Menstruation,” Abortion Day. they were expressing a Feministing, March 27, 2015, http:// corporate interest in LGBT feministing.com/2015/03/27/instagram- In a similar vein, corporations—which we have bans-photos-for-showing-menstruation/. now established take political stands when rights....However, unlike 9 Erica Schwiegershausen, “Topless they suit them—have done little to support the rainbow flag, other Protesters Rally for Female Victims of Police Brutality,” NY Mag, May 22, 2015, women who face misogynistic threats on their forms of sexual speech http://nymag.com/thecut/2015/05/ platforms. APC’s Ending Violence Against topless-women-protest-police-brutality. remain less welcome, such html. Women Online research11 (2013-2014) reviewed as Instagram’s ban of Rupi 10 BlackOUT Collective, the policies of 22 companies and documented Kaur’s photos of women’s Twitter, May 23, 2015, https:// that none of the terms of services displayed twitter.com/blackoutcollect/ status/602212904205586432. public commitments to human rights standards periods and Facebook’s 11 Association for Progressive nor prohibited threats of physical or sexual ban of women’s nipples Communications, “Online VAW: From violence. However, advocacy on reforming Impunity to Justice,” GenderIT.org, n.d., during the Black Lives http://www.genderit.org/onlinevaw/. corporate policies to regulate gender-based Matter nude protest in 12 Sophie Toupin and Alexandra Hache, discrimination and violence alone is not San Francisco. Google is “Feminist Autonomous Infrastructures,” sufficient to challenge the concession of Global Watch, yet to put out a doodle n.d., https://www.giswatch.org/en/ control of our digital networks to corporations internet-rights/feminist-autonomous- and monopolies. for International Safe infrastructures. Abortion Day. In a similar Shortcuts and Movements. As such, our vein, corporations... struggle to imagine a feminist internet (see Feminist Principles of the Internet 2.0) exists have done little to at various levels. The first is to use new support women who technology for feminist expression, organising, face misogynistic threats and activism that also resists the politics that on their platforms. seek to exclude us from the public space. The second is to resist the takeover of our public spaces by corporate interests. A third is to bashing), even though technology inspires us develop feminist infrastructures, servers, to think of our actions in terms of shortcuts. and operating systems.12 Of course, it is There is no button under File > Settings and important to hold corporations accountable there is no decision taken in Facebook’s for their policies because, yes, if a woman’s boardroom that will fix the problem. video spreads on a social network without There is only the long, laborious work of her consent, she has the right to delete it. transformative real-world organising that We cannot, however, afford to forget that would make patriarchy an obsolete world corporate control of our public online spaces order. When our cultures and societies are will always privilege profit over users’ rights. more just, so too will this justice be reflected There is no shortcut to ending sanctioned in the online domain, which is becoming bigotry (like racism, misogyny, and queer increasingly less separable from Real Life.

By Nadine Moawad, a feminist from Beirut working on the intersections of gender, sex, and technology with the Association for Progressive Communications. Twitter: @nmoawad. spotlight arrow for change 9 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Feminist Principles of the Internet 2.013

Preamble. A feminist internet works individuals to claim, construct, and express Notes & References towards empowering more women and selves, genders, and sexualities. This includes queer persons—in all our diversities—to connecting across territories, demanding fully enjoy our rights, engage in pleasure accountability and transparency, and creating 13 www.feministinternet.org and play, and dismantle patriarchy. This opportunities for sustained feminist movement- integrates our different realities, contexts, building. and specificities—including age, dis|abilities, 2.3 Decision-Making in . sexualities, gender identities and expressions, We believe in challenging the patriarchal socio-economic locations, political and spaces and processes that control internet religious beliefs, ethnic origins, and racial governance, as well as putting more feminists markers. The following key principles are and queers at the decision-making tables. We critical towards realising a feminist internet. want to democratise policy-making affecting 1. Access the internet as well as diffuse ownership of and power in global and local networks. 1.1 Access to the Internet. A feminist internet starts with enabling more women 3. Economy and queer persons to enjoy universal, acceptable, affordable, unconditional, open, 3.1 Alternative Economies. We are committed meaningful, and equal access to the internet. to interrogating the capitalist logic that drives technology towards further privatisation, 1.2 Access to Information. We support and profit, and corporate control. We work to protect unrestricted access to information create alternative forms of economic power relevant to women and queer persons, that are grounded in principles of cooperation, particularly information on sexual and solidarity, commons, environmental reproductive health and rights, pleasure, sustainability, and openness. safe abortion, access to justice, and LGBTIQ issues. This includes diversity in languages, 3.2 Free and Open Source. We are committed abilities, interests, and contexts. to creating and experimenting with technology, including digital safety and security, and using 1.3 Usage of Technology. Women and queer free and libre open source software (FLOSS), persons have the right to code, design, tools, and platforms. Promoting, disseminating, adapt, and critically and sustainably use and sharing knowledge about the use of FLOSS ICTs, and reclaim technology as a platform is central to our praxis. for creativity and expression, as well as to challenge the cultures of sexism and 4. Expression discrimination in all spaces. 4.1 Amplifying Feminist Discourse. We claim 2. Movements and the power of the internet to amplify women’s narratives and lives realities. There is a need to 2.1 Resistances. The internet is a space resist the state, the religious right, and other where social norms are negotiated, extremist forces who monopolise discourses performed, and imposed, often in an of morality, while silencing feminist voices and extension of other spaces shaped by persecuting women’s human rights defenders. patriarchy and heteronormativity. Our struggle for a feminist internet is one that is a 4.2 Freedom of Expression. We defend the continuum of our resistance in other spaces, right to sexual expression as a freedom of public, private, and in-between. expression issue of no less importance than political or religious expression. We strongly 2.2 Transformative Space. The internet is a object to the efforts of state and non-state transformative political space. It facilitates actors to control, practice surveillance, regulate new forms of citizenship that enable and restrict feminist queer expression on the 10 arrow for change spotlight vol. 22 no. 1 2016

internet through technology, legislation or restrict anonymity online. Anonymity violence. We recognise this as part of the larger enables our freedom of expression online, political project of moral policing, censorship, particularly when it comes to breaking and hierarchisation of citizenship and rights. taboos of sexuality and heteronormativity, experimenting with gender identity, and 4.3 Pornography and “Harmful Content.” enabling safety for women and queer We recognise that the issue of pornography persons affected by discrimination. online has to do with agency, consent, power, and labour. We reject simple causal linkages 5.4 Privacy and Data. We support the right made between consumption of pornographic to privacy and to full control over personal content and violence against women. We data and information online at all levels. also reject the umbrella term of “harmful We reject practices by states and private content” labeled to expression on female and companies to use data for profit and to transgender sexuality. We support reclaiming manipulate behavior online. Surveillance and creating alternative erotic content that is the historical tool of patriarchy, used to resists the mainstream patriarchal gaze and control and restrict women’s bodies, speech, locates women and queer persons’ desires at and activism. We pay equal attention to the center. surveillance practices by individuals, the private sector, the state and non-state actors. 5. Agency 5.5 Children and Youth. We call for the 5.1 Consent. We call on the need to build an inclusion of the voices and experiences of ethics and politics of consent into the culture, young people in the decisions made about design, policy, and terms of service of internet safety and security online and promote their platforms. Women’s agency lies in their ability safety, privacy, and access to information. to make informed decisions on what aspects of We recognise children’s right to healthy their public or private lives to share online. emotional and sexual development, which 5.2 Online Violence. We call on all internet includes the and access to stakeholders, including internet users, positive information about sex, gender, and policy makers, and the private sector to sexuality at critical times in their lives. address the issue of online harassment and 5.6 Memory. We have the right to exercise technology-related violence. The attacks, and retain control over our personal history threats, intimidation, and policing experienced and memory on the internet. This includes by women and queers is real, harmful, and being able to access all our personal data alarming, and are part of the broader issue and information online, and to be able to of gender-based violence. It is our collective exercise control over this data, including responsibility to address and end this. knowing who has access to it and under 5.3 Anonymity. We defend the right to what conditions, and the ability to delete it be anonymous and reject all claims to forever.

MINDING THE DATA GAP: Data Risks and Revolutions in Meeting the Sustainable Development Goals

In May 2016, Melinda Gates announced that for women’s and girls’ rights allowed them the Gates Foundation would donate US$80 to “have a voice”; the challenge now was to million to “close the data gap.”1 In an animated make the invisible visible. “Simple things” video, Gates showed that the work done so far like registering births and marriages can help spotlight arrow for change 11 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

identify forced or underage marriages, says large-scale data collection practices in the Notes & References Gates, although others on the ground may US across health, education, employment, differ. Similarly, tracking work and labour insurance, and other industries.7 Recent work in a more granular manner can help identify by Privacy International8 and Oxford Internet 1 Melinda Gates to: https://medium. 9 the often invisible work that women do, and Institute detail concerns about data privacy com/@melindagates/to-close-the- thus challenge wage gaps. She articulates and the surveillance, or “data-veillance,” of gender-gap-we-have-to-close-the-data- gap-e6a36a242657. her vision: “But imagine what more we could marginalised communities that they foster. 2 Ibid. achieve for women and girls if we could “Data-veillance” actually has a long history: it 3 The UN data revolution includes a tailor programmes and policies that meet has been used by governments and colonial range of connected initiatives, many of their specific needs — similar to how Amazon administrations since the late 1800s.10 which entail working with and improving national statistical organisations. For and Netflix give us personalised book and The data collection required for SDG indicators more information, take a look at their film recommendations.”2 The United Nations website: http://www.undatarevolution. may pose risks to the security and human org/catalog/2/. (UN), and Gates, refer to this as a “data rights of the people whose data is collected. 4 UN member states have negotiated revolution.”3 This could affect those who are already 17 Sustainable Development Goals with 169 targets addressing health, The data revolution will have a direct impact discriminated against or who engage in gender, climate, poverty, and more. See: on the monitoring of progress towards behaviours that may be criminalised, including https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/ post2015/transformingourworld. achieving the Sustainable Development Goals people who use drugs, engage in same-sex 5 Target 5.6 is “Ensure universal (SDGs).4 This article focuses on the risks sexual activity, or seek sexual health services. access to sexual and reproductive health associated with the data collection needed to Health data, particularly where it relates to and as agreed in accordance with the Programme of support the monitoring of indicators for the sexual or reproductive health, can be extremely Action of the International Conference SDGs, in particular Goal 5, which addresses sensitive. Some groups, including women on Population and Development and the Beijing Platform for Action and the gender equality, and has diverse targets and girls and sexual minorities, experience outcome documents of their review addressing violence against women, child particular pressures from society, family, and conferences.” marriage, sexual and reproductive health and more. Failure to properly safeguard the data 6 Bellagio Big Data Workshop Participants, Big Data and Positive Social reproductive rights, and economic equality.5 collected may put them at risk. Change in the Developing World: A White It also outlines some recommendations for Paper for Practitioners and Researchers To give an example, when information about (Oxford: Oxford Internet Institute, 2014), SRHR organisations on addressing these accesssed July 1, 2016, http://www. risks. people involved in a health project in Nigeria rockefellerfoundation.org/uploads/files/ that included transgender people and Men c220f1f3-2e9a-4fc6-be6c-45d42849b897- big-data-and.pdf. Data Privacy Risks. There is scholarship Having Sex with Men (MSM) was somehow 7 Seeta Peña Gangadharan, “Data and looking at the potential positive outcomes of shared with law enforcement, some of those Discrimination: Collected Essays,” Open big data in development.6 Examples include involved were forced into hiding. Others Technology Institute, October 27, 2014, accsssed July 1, 2016, https://www. the use of information collected from or had to seek asylum abroad. In another case, newamerica.org/oti/policy-papers/data- shared via mobile phones to describe and during a study of one criminalised population and-discrimination/. predict health needs. in a Middle Eastern nation, law enforcement 8 Privacy International, “Aiding Surveillance,” n.d., retrieved Indicators associated with the SDGs are not from https://privacyinternational. org/?q=node/310. arbitrary metrics with no intrinsic value. 9 Bellagio Big Data Workshop What gets measured is often a key factor in The challenge we face is Participants, Big Data and Positive Social determining what gets done. The indicators Change, 35. to safely manage collected 10 Ibid. are likely to shape the development data: limit who has access landscape for a number of years to come. Additionally, the indicators represent an to the information, and opportunity to measure actual progress, and ensure that it is collected to hold governments accountable. and stored only in ways However, there are concerns around that protect the individuals how implementing these technologies involved. NGOs working on will affect the fragile balance of exposure SRHR are well-positioned and anonymity for people who have been to help ensure that data marginalised in their societies. For example, is collected and stored Data and Discrimination, a collection of with utmost respect for essays, documents the ways in which marginalised communities are affected by privacy and human rights. 12 arrow for change spotlight vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References demanded outright that the project organisers As members of the turn over the data which included sensitive development community, information such as the locations of the homes 11 “Did Anonymous Hack Turkish we must work to make the Hospitals Resulting in Massive Data of participants. These cases involved relatively Breach?,” accessed July 1, 2016, https:// small projects, but new international goals may most of the opportunities www.hackread.com/anonymous-hacks- turkish-medical-institutions/. demand a much larger-scale data collection on and do what we can to 12 “World’s Biggest Data Breaches,” a global basis. reduce the risks. We Information Is Beautiful, accessed July 1, 2016, http://www.informationisbeautiful. The challenge we face is to safely manage cannot afford to miss net/visualizations/worlds-biggest-data- breaches-hacks/. collected data: limit who has access to the the opportunity of 13 DatACT: Data Protection in Anti- information, and ensure that it is collected and experiences of SRHR Trafficking Action, accessed July 1, 2016, stored only in ways that protect the individuals http://www.datact-project.org/en/ NGOs informing the materials/standards.html. involved. NGOs working on SRHR are well- ongoing development 14 Karen Kaiser, “Protecting Respondent positioned to help ensure that data is collected of future good practices Confidentiality in Qualitative Research,” and stored with utmost respect for privacy and Qualitative Health Research 19, no. 11 using technology. (Nov 2009):22 human rights. 1632–1641, accessed July 1, 2016, https:// www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/ Melinda Gates would do well to also discuss PMC2805454/. how exactly Amazon and Netflix get those from the individuals and thereby prevent data 15 Iqra Basharat, Farooque Azam, and personalised recommendations: by collecting collected from being used against them. For Abdul Wahab Muzaffar, “Database Security and Encryption: A Survey and buying vast amounts of personal example, DatAct developed a unique standard Study,” International Journal of information from users’ digital behaviour for data collection and protection based on Applications 47, no. 12 (June 2012): 28-34, https://www.researchgate.net/ across the internet—not just what users think research with sex workers, trafficked people, publication/235992242_Database_ they are telling these companies when signing and migrants.13 Security_and_Encryption_A_Survey_ up for their services. Commercial technology Study. Data collected for the SDGs must be is now running on a business model that trades 16 Responsible Data Forum can be handled using best practices for data accessed at https://responsibledata.io/. in personal data in exchange for advertising collection, use, and storage. This includes 17 Data Shift can be accessed at http:// revenue. It is not clear yet how the personal civicus.org/thedatashift/. collecting information about sensitive topics information of at-risk populations will be anonymously or using only unique identifier safeguarded in the adoption of such practices. codes without names or other obvious In addition to this, recent high-profile security identifying characteristics.14 Encrypting breaches give us ample reason to be skeptical data is also now a critical part of protecting of the security of electronic record systems. A sensitive data online.15 The Data & Society breach here could place women and girls who initiative in the United States has a project seek reproductive services, especially abortion looking at ethical use of social media and or services as seen in Turkey,11 other “born digital” data already in the public at risk. Other recent breaches include: four domain in academic research. The Engine million US federal employees’ personal records Room’s Responsible Data Project16 and the were leaked in 2015; 5.5 million voters’ data partnership with Civicus on The Data Shift are from the Philippines Electoral Commission; 37 useful reference points in this regard.17 million users’ information on Ashley Madison, There could also be an emphasis on impersonal the extra marital affairs site; 4.7 million users indicators for monitoring and measurement, on Snapchat in 2013; 3.9 million on Adult such as:“proportion of countries with laws Friend Finder, the online dating site; and and regulations that guarantee all women 12 more. and adolescents access to sexual and Recommendations. How can SRHR advocates, reproductive health services, information and researchers, and policymakers ensure that education (official records).” This should tell information about their staff and participants is us which nations guarantee access to sexual not used against them? and reproductive health services, and also indirectly confirm the absence of laws that We must anticipate how such information prohibit or restrict access to SRHR services. could be used to harm individuals and groups of people that may be targeted. It is therefore The problem is that while indicators may be imperative to devise ways to separate the data impersonal, the data that generates these spotlight arrow for change 13 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

may not be. Each data point may relate to an in settings, and case studies and Notes & References individual. So how would indicator 5.6.2, “the input from women. proportion of women (aged 15-49) who make their own sexual and reproductive decisions,” As members of the development community, be measured? It could be based on a review we must work to make the most of the 18 Acknowledgments: With additional inputs from Maya Indira Ganesh. of laws and policies, including censorship of opportunities and do what we can to reduce information about sexual and reproductive the risks. We cannot afford to miss the health, which would not reflect the lived opportunity of experiences of SRHR NGOs realities of individual women. Alternatively, it informing the ongoing development of future might be based on surveys, perhaps collected good practices using technology.

By Melissa Ditmore, Consultant specialising in issues of gender, development, health, and human rights. : [email protected]

QUANTIFYING FERTILITY AND REPRODUCTION THROUGH MOBILE APPS: A Critical Overview

Fertility awareness methods have been consider this as an initial effort to explore the 1 See the writings of Deborah Lupton, or Tamara Slayton, Reclaiming the known and practised by women since role of women’s health applications in shaping Menstrual Matrix: Evolving Feminine antiquity, and were widely used in the 20th the quantification of women’s bodies. Wisdom: A Workbook (Petaluma, CA: Menstrual Health Foundation, 1990). century until hormonal birth control methods Selecting the Apps. In researching these For more about menstrual activism, suppressing or controlling menstruation were see Chris Bobel, “From Convenience to applications, we were faced with the difficult Hazard: A Short History of the Emergence developed. Historically, monitoring fertility task of sampling the many apps available. The of the Menstrual Activism Movement, expanded on the personal knowledge of 1971–1992,” Health Care for Women following criteria informed our selection: International 29, no. 7 (July 2008): one’s cycle and body, and has therefore been 738-754. encouraged by some menstruation activists •• Apps that were available on Google Play 2 This article uses the words “fertility” as a way to better understand and live their (Android) and App Store (iOS); and “cycle” to refer to menstruation, as well as ovulation and fertility monitoring. cyclic nature in a positive way.1 •• Apps that people around us mentioned that 3 A study in 2016 identified 225 Mobile applications can now take on the they were using; menstrual tracking apps in the Apple store. It also indicated that menstrual role of monitoring a woman’s cycle2 and are cycle monitoring apps were the fourth •• Apps that were being written about in amongst the most popular health applications most popular health apps on the app mainstream technology publications; store and the second popular among in app stores.3 This article reports on a adolescent women. (Moglia Nguyen, et preliminary investigation into mobile fertility •• Apps with a hardware component; al., “Evaluation of Smartphone Menstrual Cycle Tracking Applications Using and and reproduction apps in terms of the data Adapted Applications Scoring System,” •• Apps that tracked different aspects of they collect, and analyses of what this means Obstetrics and Gynecology 127, no. the cycle (see the three types of apps we 6 (Jun 2016): 1153-60, doi: 10.1097/ for women’s health and rights in the context AOG.0000000000001444.) identified below), including some that are of quantified societies. There has been no still in development; and previous attempt—known to us—to study women tracking apps in such a manner. We •• Apps that were used internationally. 14 arrow for change spotlight vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References Based on these inclusion criteria, we identified …that knowledge three types of apps to research: about women’s bodies •• Fertility apps that determine fertile days for belongs to science is a 4 Baby Center exists on Free Basics women by tracking the menstrual cycle and problematic idea, one (Facebook’s free internet platform) and indicating most fertile times; provides information to low income and that instrumentalises ‘low education’ communities that have no access to the internet or information •• Pregnancy apps that monitor physiological women’s bodies, and about health. states, habits, mood, foetal movements, and that has an unfortunately 5 Users provide some data voluntarily heart rates, and that intend to promote a (for instance weight, sexual history, long history. sleeping and eating habits) but do not healthy and safe pregnancy and birth; and necessarily know what happens with it (for instance, whether it is sent to third •• Menstruation apps that allow users to •• Background Information: How and where parties). Although this information is track menstrual flow, provide reminders, stipulated in the privacy policy, including it was developed, by whom, and the legal the use of data that is not consciously and monitor gynecological health in order and policy environments around data given away, like the metadata, most to identify abnormalities, infections, and users do not read privacy policies and are protection in those locations; therefore usually unaware of all the data potential risks. they give away. •• Business Model (How is the data used?): We also decided that including apps offering a A list of potential data points that a user hardware component is significant in exploring knowingly, and unknowingly, submits; and how companies track and collect data directly from women’s bodies. Apps such as Kindara •• Data Collection and Privacy Policies: (starting shipment in fall of 2016) and the First What the company says is done with the Response Bluetooth Pregnancy Test, and some data submitted. menstruation apps are just a few applications The complete list of data collected about that rely on hardware elements. these apps can be viewed in the table The applications we selected are the following: accompanying this article. Baby Center, Clue, First Response, Glow, What We Found. The amount of data and Kindara, Looncup, my.Flow, NextGen Jane, metadata collected by these applications5 has Ovia, and Trackle.4 allowed for the quantification of women’s Investigating the Apps. Once the apps were bodies on a scale not evident anywhere selected, we asked three sets of questions of before. We found that some of these them that would allow us to map the context of applications collected data on the private their production, functioning, and data re-use aspects of a woman’s life, such as sexual and sharing. intercourse, eating, drinking, smoking habits, mood, and work productivity. Others used hardware to get instant readings directly from The amount of data a woman’s body, including blood quality. and metadata collected At a time where data privacy has become a by these applications mainstream discussion, these applications are has allowed for the collecting data at a high rate and sharing it with mostly invisible third parties. This raises quantification of concerns particularly when the data is shared women’s bodies on a scale with medical clinics and research centres. not evident anywhere It is the general claim by these companies that before... At a time the gathering of data about menstrual cycles where data privacy has would enable scientific progress and empower become a mainstream women. Clue, for example, says that their discussion, these data is not sold to third parties, and that it is, applications are collecting instead, given to public health researchers at data at a high rate and Ivy League universities in the United States: “Your anonymous cycle data may be used sharing it with mostly when Clue collaborates with clinical and invisible third parties. academic researchers. Clue may publish spotlight arrow for change 15 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

…what [does] this mass algorithms running these apps but found Notes & References little data. The lack of transparency about quantification of a algorithms and their role in women’s health women’s bodies [mean] and cycle monitoring apps, including those 6 The Clue Privacy Policy can be found for the creation of new claiming they can be used as a hormone-free here: https://www.helloclue.com/ normals, new standards contraception, raises an alarming issue that we privacy.html. argue needs to be further studied. We need to 7 “The term ‘algorithm’ refers to any for reproductive and computer code that carries out a set of gynecological indicators better understand how these algorithms dictate instructions. Algorithms are essential what information women consume about their to the way process data. Theoretically speaking, they are encoded based only on those bodies. procedures which transform data women who have access based on specific calculations.” “Ethics Data from millions of women who are using of Algorithms,” Centre for Internet to these apps, and those and Human Rights, https://cihr.eu/ who bother to use them[?] these apps are used to develop a ‘normal’ eoa2015web/. standard of healthy female cycles, drawing 8 Ben Williamson, “Algorithmic Skin: on the data of the users—mostly American Health-Tracking Technologies, Personal Analytics, and the Biopedagogies the results of academic, clinical, or internal and European white women. This leads to of Digitised Health and Physical the significant question of what this mass Education,” Sport, Education and research in the form of data visualisations or Society 20, no. 1: 133-151, doi: text findings.”6 quantification of women’s bodies means for 10.1080/13573322.2014.962494. the creation of new normals, of new standards 9 Acknowledgment: With inputs from Implicit in this is the assumption that these for reproductive and gynecological indicators Maya Ganesh. centres will know what to do with the data, based only on those women who have access as opposed to some other organisation to these apps, and those who bother to use elsewhere in the world. Additionally, that them. knowledge about women’s bodies belongs to science is a problematic idea, one that The details of the apps are available on instrumentalises women’s bodies, and company websites and in media articles, that has an unfortunately long history. The including data sites. Other questions are harder involvement of medical advisory boards, or to find answers to, but do need to be explored clinics and researchers, is a key element that from a feminist perspective such as, how and needs to be further scrutinised. We question if intimate forms of quantification shape the how the data will be used by the researchers relationship with the body, how do we come and clinics and what their output is. to perceive and accept it, how do we deal with its changes and breakdowns, and the kinds Beyond the data collection and sharing, we of control we (or others) gain or lose. Finally, are concerned with the algorithms7 being do these technologies put more agency and employed to process the data collected control back in women’s power, or do they through these apps. As Ben Williamson persist in distancing us from knowing our writes: “The algorithms installed in health bodies and ourselves? tracking devices act to translate physiological signals recorded from the body into data, presented as numbers and visualisations, that …do these technologies enable this kind of bodily self-governing to put more agency take place.”8 and control back in women’s power, or That governance of the information presented to women as a result of do they persist in algorithmic processing can transform the way distancing us from women relate to their health. Subsequently, knowing our bodies we searched for information about the and ourselves?

By Vanessa Rizk and Dalia Othman, Project Coordinators, Tactical Technology Collective. : [email protected] and [email protected] 16 arrow for change spotlight vol. 22 no. 1 2016 Have Any Hardware Hardware Component? Does the App No No Yes No App Was Launched The Year the the Year The The site was launched in 1997. 2013 Unclear 2013 apps, apps, verified).] (these are not [Some of the data is provided by the How Many Users? company and some some and company Download numbers numbers Download available by Google Google by available Company Company claims to reach million 45 parents a with month over 300 moms million worldwide the using app. mobile to According Play, Google it has 5 to 10 users.million Google On 100,000Play: 500,000 to users. For the and ovulation fertility there are 1 to users million 5 Play. Google on pregnancy The tracker has to 100,000 users. 500,000 Is the App Available in? Available What Language Language What English and and English other four languages and English other four languages (German, French, Spanish, Danish) English, French English 10

Based? Company Where Is the USA, with international is offices. It member a of company Johnson & Johnson. Berlin, Germany USA, Canada San Francisco, and USA Shanghai, China

Profile? What Is the Team Majority of the management team is female. health All information approved is by the Baby Medical Center Advisory Board. Three of the founders four are men. They are entrepreneurs, physicist, a tech and specialists. unclear is It from the site who the management is. However, they are a product of Church & Inc. Dwight women’s Some health are part of the team. The head of and marketing partnerships women. are the Both Chairperson are CEO and men, and the the is Chair head of HVF on rely that data as the core of all products. their Others? How Different Is This App from They are available on Free Basics in a number of countries. The health service provides women to information stage-based about babies. and pregnancy timed provide also They throughout advice expert the different stages of baby’s the and pregnancy first year. the simplify” “helps It complex but existing long to use calendar method. A pregnancy test that connects with the mobile That bluetooth. via app way results are recorded securely on the app. There are two unique Glow. about concepts Glow the have they First, allows that Trust First people to pay $50 for 10 months during the trial period and if the become not does woman First Glow pregnant, supports the couple in IVF treatment. The second is male tracks also it that fertility and boasts to be the only app that does so on the market. It is unclear how the tracking is done. Table 1. Apps Information Background the About Table What Does the App Do? Baby Center is an that organisation information provides pregnancy, fertility, on children. raising and They have two mobile pregnancy on one apps, and the baby’s first raising on another year, children. and toddlers Digital version of the fertility awareness method calendar of tracking one’s cycle. Claims to be scientific.” “beautifully An app that tracks cycle menstrual the and indicates when a also fertile. It is woman pregnancy a includes test. developed has Glow four different apps to track a woman’s cycle, and pregnancy, fertility, development baby’s the year. first the within applications are The Apple’s on available Google and Store App Play. Baby App x x Menstruation App Menstruation x x x App Pregnancy Pregnancy x x App Fertility Fertility Monitoring Monitoring x x x x App This is linked to the data and privacy laws regulations company abides by. Some countries have stricter than others. 10 Baby Center (My Pregnancy & Baby app) Today Clue First Response Glow spotlight arrow for change 17 vol. 22 no. 1 2016 Have Any Hardware Hardware Component? Does the App Yes Yes Yes App Was Launched The Year the the Year The Beta testing; hardware start will shipping in Fall of 2016. 2015 (cup produced in 2016) 2015 verified).] (these are not [Some of the data is provided by the How Many Users? company and some some and company Download numbers numbers Download available by Google Google by available On Google Google On are there Play, to 100,000 users. 500,000 Kickstarter onlycampaign No users yet Is the App Available in? Available What Language Language What English Unclear— in app development Unclear— in app development 10 Based? Company Where Is the Denver, USA Denver, USA California, USA Profile? What Is the Team The co-founder co-founder The female. is However, she is no longer part of the The company. management team has an number equal of men and women. The advisors many include enterpreneurs, fertility and experts, medical one doctor. It is not clear but one of the is co-founders woman. a Very young (official team website linked to LinkedIn their just profiles), graduated from Berkeley. Half are women. Others? How Different Is This App from The unique element is thermometer the that is connected to the charts that application fertility. cup menstrual The that nudge a by indicates it needs to be emptied, and it enables women to and volume the analyse blood. their of colour The company plans to develop a feature to track ovulation. communicates tampon The with bluetooth via women so that they don’t of again ashamed feel on bloodstains having of because clothes their tampon their changing too late. measures the blood blood the measures What Does the App Do? Kindara is a fertility a Kindara is that application also uses an oral that thermometer is in sync with the application. Their goal is to provide women with accurate based information on the fertility chart system. smartThe menstrual cup flow and tells when the cup is full by a nudge bluetooth sending by or user’s the to messages also It phone. mobile blood the analyses colour and volume during menstruations, as well as analyses the cycle. woman’s monitor tampon A linked by bluetooth phone mobile their to periods their during tells the users when is tampon their “solution a as full, menstruation for It mortification.” the predicts also menstruation quantity and the number of days last. period will the Baby App Menstruation App Menstruation x x App Pregnancy Pregnancy App Fertility Fertility Monitoring Monitoring x App Kindara Looncup my.Flow 18 arrow for change spotlight vol. 22 no. 1 2016 Have Any Hardware Hardware Component? Does the App Yes No, but it possible is connect to wearable a fitness device to the account. vaginal Yes, thermometer. App Was Launched The Year the the Year The 2014 Pregnancy app— September 2013. Fertility app—2014. verified).] (these are not [Some of the data is provided by the How Many Users? company and some some and company Download numbers numbers Download available by Google Google by available Still in in Still development. company The claims to have users. million 3 Play Google 500,000 has million 1 to of downloads ovulation the period and while app, are there between 500,000 million 1 to for downloads pregnancy the app. The app is sold with the hardware. There is no on information Play. Google Is the App Available in? Available What Language Language What English only English only English German 10 Based? Based? Company Where Is the USA USA Boston, Germany Profile? What Is the Team Biology and Biology and business. One of the founders two is a woman. Most of the of members scientific the board advisory are men. website The claims to have scientists doctors and in the team, including Harvard scientists fertility and The experts. majority of members team women. are founder One is a woman. Profile of the includes team business IT and backgrounds. Others? How Different Is This App from The app would monitor the the monitor would app The blood the test and body on a daily basis, instead of doing yearly check ups at the doctors or a laboratory. fertilityThe claims app traditional exceed to fertility like methods the charting of because algorithm the of accuracy also which developed, works in the case of irregular periods. The sends app pregnancy alerts to women when dangerous potentially recorded. are symptoms Both apps enable users to (e.g., goals personal set habits, eating sleeping, weight). thermometer, vaginal The worn every night by the inner the measures users, continuously. temperature It is meant to be much than accurate more thermometers external and used as an effective or method, contraception fertility method.a What Does the App Do? The product will female the monitor measure and body including things many STIs, rates, hormone endometriosis, iron cervical deficiency, metabolism/ cancer, TSH, vitamin D diabetes, deficiency, acid folic and among deficiency, others. calculator Ovulation and period tracker conceive user “helps up to 3x The faster.” sends app pregnancy dangerous when alerts symptoms are tracked. provides also It women to information pregnancy. the about The app measures the temperature vaginal every night and the determines cycle. menstrual It can be used as a method. contraception Baby App Menstruation App Menstruation The tampon tampon The the monitors body female analyses and during blood menstruations. However, it is unclear still and how it whether analyses also during blood the rest of the month. App Pregnancy Pregnancy x App Fertility Fertility Monitoring Monitoring x x App NextGen Jane Ovia - fertility and pregnancy apps) (2 Trackle spotlight arrow for change 19 vol. 22 no. 1 2016 Specific? of the Data and Data Storage? Anything Is There Any Text Dealing with the Security Yes The data can be stored in the device (without an account), or on Clue servers (with an account). Account data is stored separately from cycle data. Password stored using one-way encryption. The cycle data is stored separately from the personal data. Usage data is stored on third party services provided by Google and Localytics. The privacy policy is not very detailed; it does not mention cookies, nor to which third parties the data may be transmitted. Yes Displayed? Is Targeted Advertisement Advertisement Yes, withYes, an opt to option out No butYes, can opt out of some of the services Yes Terms of a Privacy Privacy a Services? Policy and and Policy Do They Have Yes (detailed one) Yes Yes Yes Is the Doctors? Insurance Insurance Information Shared with with Shared Companies or or Companies Not specified No Yes, to doctors Not specified Health Health Facilities/ Is the Data Specialists? Shared with with Shared Reproductive Reproductive Labs/Medical Not specified Yes it is Yes shared with party third researchers, potentially laboratories Not specified Table 2. Data Is the Business How Model: Used? Table Data Shared ? With Whom Is the Marketers, Marketers, employees, law contractors, enforcement, party third and platforms and Academic clinical research Marketers, researchers, clinics, service credit provides, and bureaus, providers mobile shares Glow and aggregated data anonymous thirdto parties, employees, vendors, affiliates, partners, and enforcement law requested. when It is unclear who parties third the are.

Model? a Unique Unique a Business Business Do They Have They sell They sell products, ads for products, and are part of a larger company. It is possible useto the without app account. an They sell the hardware component. Premium services. pay Users receive to further information analysis and their on health. Receive Receive Do They (Source: (Source: or Venture Capitalists? Capitalists? Foundations Foundations CrunchBase) Funding from from Funding They are part of larger a company. Yes, $10 million. They are product a of a larger company. Yes, $24 million. https://www.crunchbase.com Fee? Offer the Services for for Services Free or for a Does the App Free Free Unclear; app is sold the with hardware Free App Notes and References Notes 11 Crunchbase, Baby Baby Center (My Pregnancy Baby & app) Today Clue First Response Glow 20 arrow for change spotlight vol. 22 no. 1 2016 Specific? of the Data and Data Storage? Anything Is There Any Text Dealing with the Security Yes No; no website No No information No -raises-3-2m-to-help-even-more-women-make-even-more-babies/. -health-insurer-wants-to-know-exactly-when-you-get-pregnant. Displayed? Is Targeted Advertisement Advertisement Yes, butYes, can opt out No information No information Yes No information Terms of a Privacy Privacy a Services? Policy and and Policy Do They Have Yes No Yes Yes No 13 Is the Doctors? Insurance Insurance Information Shared with with Shared Companies or or Companies http://www.betaboston.com/news/2015/05/22/ovuline Researchers No information No information No information Yes, if opted for; insurance companies are pushing for it Not clear http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-05-26/your , May 22, 2015, Health Health Facilities/ Is the Data Specialists? Shared with with Shared Reproductive Reproductive Labs/Medical Yes it is Yes shared with party third researchers, potentially laboratories No information No information No information Yes Not clear , May 27, 2015, Beta Boston Bloomberg Data Shared ? With Whom Is the clinical research, medical facilities parties partner with the user’s insurance provider, doctors, health or specialists” With enabling enabling With service such as use of website or website host, forums public (based on the users postings), enforcement, law partythird that involve purchases information No information No No information and Academic “- journalists- third other - - the user’s - if opted for: Not clear

Model? a Unique Unique a Business Business Do They Have Selling the Selling the hardware component No information No information No information Premium service, subscription service Yes 12 Receive Receive Do They or Venture Capitalists? Foundations Foundations Funding from from Funding They have received investments from venture capitalists Kickstarter campaign than More $100,000 seed funding $2.32 million Yes, at least $3 million Yes Fee? Offer the Services for for Services Free or for a Does the App Free No information No information No information Free Free Janelle Nanos, “Ovuline Raises $3.2M to Help Even More Women Make Babies,” John Tozzi, “Your Health Insurer Wants to Know Exactly When You Get Pregnant,” App Notes and References Notes 12 13 Kindara Looncup my.Flow NextGen Jane Ovia Trackle spotlight arrow for change 21 vol. 22 no. 1 2016 Due Date Yes No information No information No information Yes No information Cervical Fluid Cervical Yes Yes Yes Yes Unclear No information No information Yes No information Tobacco Tobacco (Including (Including Cigarette/ Alcohol and and Alcohol Drinking and and Drinking Eating Habits Habits Eating Consumption) Yes No Yes No information No information No information Yes No information Number of of Number Hours Slept Hours Yes No Yes Yes No information No information No information Yes No information

Analysis Blood Quantity/ Blood No No No No information No information No information No

Cycle Information Yes Yes Yes Yes No information No information No information Yes Yes Body Body Temperature Yes No Yes Yes No No information No information Yes Yes 20 Private Private Mood) (E.g., Sexual Sexual (E.g., Intercourse, Information Information Hours of Sleep, Sleep, of Hours Yes No Yes Yes Yes No information No information No information Yes No information 19 App Usage App Yes Yes, even when using the app without an account Yes Yes Yes No information No information No information Yes No information Table 3. Data Privacy and Collection Table Policies 18 Platforms Third Party Party Third (Social Media) (Social Yes, but not Yes, but not necessary No information in the privacy policy Yes Yes Yes No information No information No information Yes No information 17 Trackers Third Party Party Third Cookies and and Cookies Yes and blocks Yes and blocks Do Not Track add-ons No information Yes, but can opt out of Google Analytics Yes Yes No information No information No information Yes No information 16 Payment Payment Information Yes No Yes Yes Yes No information No information No information Yes No information 14

Personal Personal 15 Information Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes No information No information Yes Yes No information

Data Are Collected? Are Data What Other Types of Metadata without Clue using If the account, an cycle data is only stored in the device. also can Clue provide a backup. Quantity of blood, colour of blood informationNo available using “When website: the activities, metadata, preferences, data. transational When using the personal app: information, information shared media, social with health reproductive info, daily health and tracking, activity aggregate information.” and Temperature, users from input mail and mobile number, gender, age, or birthdate. Certain apps may request further information such as Personal Information: Information that would identify you as an individual, such your name, communication channels e mail and mobile number, gender, age, or birthdate. Certain apps may request further information When there is not enough information available (app and website still in development), but the app description goals let us assume that answer to question will very probably be YES, we highlight box. It remains our assumption. Payment Information: The user will have to provide credit or debit information, including banking details which also includes a ddress, zip code, and cv number. Cookies: Cookies are small pieces of data or a simple text file sent from the website and stored in user’s web browser. The y collect type browser, login details, pages visited, page layout, font size, more. Be aware third party Third Party Platforms: This is information the app requests when logging through third party platforms such as Facebook, Twitte r, Google, and/ or Apple Health kit of Google Fit. That can include profile details, contacts, photos, pages App Usage: usage includes any information on a user’s behaviour the app, e.g., content viewed, clicks, length of time sp ent pages, transaction details, and others. Private information is about a person’s sexual history and relationships, mood, hobbies, among others. App Notes and References Notes 14 occupation, zip code, and social security number. 15 16 17 trackers. 18 liked, among others. 19 20 Baby Center (My (My Center Baby & Pregnancy app) Today Baby Clue Response First Pro Pregnancy Test Glow Kindara Looncup my.Flow Jane NextGen Ovia Trackle 22 arrow for change spotlight vol. 22 no. 1 2016 APPS, DRONES, AND ITUNES: Opportunities and Challenges in Using New Technologies for Safe Medical Abortion Services

Notes & References Each year, approximately 21.6 million women services to make sure women actually have worldwide still undergo an unsafe abortion. access to medical . This results in an estimated 47,000 deaths, Women on Waves. Women on Waves is a largely amongst the most vulnerable women, Dutch women’s rights organisation that for the such as the poor, the unmarried, and the 1 Iqbal Shah and Elisabeth past 15 years has used various strategies, tools, Ahman, “Unsafe Abortion: Global young women.1,2 and Regional Incidence, Trends, and technologies to ensure that women have Consequences, and Challenges,” The has been recognised information about and access to safe medical Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology Canada 31, no. 12 (Dec 2009): 1149- in numerous international human rights abortion. These include ship campaigns, safe 58, https://www.researchgate.net/ treaties.3,4 Access to health services without abortion hotlines, telemedicine, scientific publication/41087785_Unsafe_Abortion_ Global_and_Regional_Incidence_Trends_ discrimination, including safe abortion research, and, beginning in 2015, an app and Consequences_and_Challenges. services, is an essential component of even drones. 2 World Health Organization, “Unsafe the rights to health and equality under Abortion Incidence and Mortality: Global Women on Waves is most known for its “ship and Regional Levels in 2008 and Trends international law.5,6,7,8,9 during 1990-2008” (2012), http://apps. campaigns” to countries where abortion is who.int/iris/bitstream/10665/75173/1/ Medical abortion is widely regarded as having illegal. After taking women on board in local WHO_RHR_12.01_eng.pdf. significantly improved access to safe abortion. harbours, the specially-equipped ship sails 3 United Nations Commission on Economic, Social, and , It is safe and effective, with few serious to international waters where it can provide “General Comment No. 14. The Right complications and success rates of 98%.10 legal and safe medical abortion services. On to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health,” UN doc E/C.12/2000/4 at Research has shown that the administration the invitation of local women’s organisations, para. 12 (Aug. 11, 2000). International of medical abortion by women themselves Women on Waves had set sail to Ireland Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, Dec. 16, 1966, 993 in settings with restrictive abortion laws has (2001), Poland (2003), Portugal (2004), U.N.T.S. 3, (entered into force Jan. 3, led to decreased morbidity and mortality in (2008), and Morocco (2012), which created 1976). countries where abortion is illegal.11 public interest and media coverage around the 4 Dorothy Shaw, “Abortion and world. In Portugal, the campaign catalysed the Post-abortion Care—Volume II” Clinical This article tells the story of how Women Obstetrics & Gynaecology 24, no. 5 legalisation of abortion in February 2007. (October 2010): 633–646. on Waves and Women on Web12 are 5 United Nations Commission using the advances of new technology in Since 2008, Women on Waves has also on the Elimination of All Forms of communication and advocacy campaigns initiated safe abortion hotlines and trained Discrimination Against Women, “General Recommendation No. 24: Women and to break taboos around abortion, to raise women’s organisations in Africa, Asia, and Health,” UN Doc. A/54/38/Rev.1 at awareness about the consequences of illegal South America. Using mobile phones, the local paras. 11, 14, 23 (1999). abortion, and at the same time to provide women’s organisations provide women with 6 Ibid., note 6. unwanted pregnancies with information about 7 United Nations, Programme of Action of the International Conference the most effective use of misoprostol to induce on Population and Development, para. Research has shown a safe abortion. 8.25.1, accessed February 1, 2014, http:// www.un.org/popin/icpd/conference/ that the administration offeng/poa.html. of medical abortion by Providing information about misoprostol for 8 “Preventable Maternal Mortality . abortion falls under the right to freedom of and Morbidity and Human Rights.” women themselves in information, which is protected by several Human Rights Council Eleventh Session Resolution, accessed February 1, 2014, settings with restrictive human rights agreements and by the http://ap.ohchr.org/documents/E/HRC/ constitution in most countries.13 resolutions/A_HRC_RES_11_8.pdf. abortion laws has led to decreased morbidity and Women on Web. The internet is a primary mortality in countries health information source, especially for where abortion is illegal. individuals who lack access to traditional spotlight arrow for change 23 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

The internet is a primary comparable with results reported in studies Notes & References on medication abortion in outpatient health information 14 source, especially for settings. individuals who lack access Access to Safe Abortion through the 9 United Nations Right of Everyone to Internet: Fighting Censorship. In the last the Enjoyment of the Highest Attainable to traditional sources of Standard of Physical and Mental Health, few years, there has been an exponential A/66/254, accessed February 1, 2014, health information, require growth in the number of websites offering http://www.un.org/News/Press/ docs/2011/gashc4018.doc.htm. confidential and timely medical abortions online. Some of these 10 World Health Organization, Safe access to information, online initiatives are spam, and some deliver Abortion: Technical and Policy the real medicines. Thus, the main challenge Guidance for Health Systems, and seek services outside 2nd edition (Geneva: WHO, 2012), of their communities. for women is to find reliable sources, but http://apps.who.int/iris/bitst this is frustrated by . In ream/10665/70914/1/9789241548434_ eng.pdf. a country like Saudi Arabia, for example, sources of health information, require 11 Joanna N. Erdman, “Harm Reduction, access to the Women on Web website is confidential and timely access to information, Human Rights, and Access to Information blocked. on Safe Abortion,” International Journal and seek services outside of their of Gynecology and Obstetrics 118, no. 1 communities. In response to the many emails Moreover, organisations that mediate (2012): 83–86. with requests for help from women all over access to internet and online services like 12 Women on Waves can be accessed at http://www.womenonwaves.org the world, Women on Web was initiated 10 Facebook, Google, and iTunes also create while Women on Web is at http://www. years ago. obstacles. In 2008, for instance, Women on womenonweb.org. Waves received notice that Google would no 13 United Nations, “Article 19 of the Women who need access to safe medical Universal Declaration of Human Rights,” longer accept ads that promote “abortion accessed at http://www.un.org/en/ abortion can have an online consultation services,” which include, but are not limited universal-declaration-human-rights/. on the Women on Web website. If there are to, abortion clinics and abortion counselors. 14 Rebecca J. Gomperts, et al., “Using no contraindications, the doctor provides Telemedicine for Termination of The Women on Waves’ advertisement was Pregnancy with Mifepristone and the women with a medical abortion by mail. subsequently removed. Additionally, in Misoprostol in Settings Where There Women are requested to make a voluntary Is No Access to Safe Services,” BJOG: January 2012, Facebook removed the profile An International Journal of Obstetrics donation to cover the costs of the service, picture of Dr. Rebecca Gomperts, director and Gynaecology 115, no. 9 (Aug 2008): but if a woman has no financial means, she 1171-5. of Women on Waves, which contains will always receive help. The doctors are information about how women can safely supported by a multilingual helpdesk who do abortions themselves using misoprostol. answer almost 100,000 emails per year in 15 After filing a complaint, the picture was different languages. posted again. Women on Web has supported more than The most recent example is the rejection of 45,000 women obtaining access to safe the Safe Abortion App on the iTunes store. medical abortions. Thousands of women have posted their abortion stories on the “I had an abortion” …the main challenge part of the website. By sharing their stories, for women is to find women help to break the taboo and support reliable sources, but this other women who need an abortion. is frustrated by internet A woman from Egypt writes, “I was censorship. In a country traumatised at first, [but] relieved when like Saudi Arabia, for I knew it’s all over and felt that I have been granted a new life.” example, access to the Women on Web website A woman from Indonesia says, “No is blocked. Moreover, matter how uneasy that was for me, I am certain that this was the good thing organisations that mediate to do.” access to internet and online services like Scientific research by Women on Web demonstrates that outcomes of services Facebook, Google, and provided through telemedicine are iTunes also create obstacles. 24 arrow for change spotlight vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References In 2014, Women on Waves and Women on While the drones were crossing the German/ Web made an app that gives country- and Polish border, the German Police intervened. language-specific information about unwanted The drone pilots were able to safely land pregnancy and medical abortions for women the drones at the Polish side, and two Polish 15 The Women on Waves app can be found here: https://play.google. and health workers around the world. The women were able to take the abortion pills. com/store/apps/details?id=org. app demonstrates, through an animated film, However, the German police confiscated womenonwaves.app, while it can also be accessed through iTunes here: https:// how to carry out a medical abortion with the drone controllers and personal , as itunes.apple.com/us/app/safe-abortion/ misoprostol, and offers online consultations they claimed that there was a violation of id983610139?mt=8. with Women on Web. pharmaceutical regulations. 16 “Abortion Drone; First Flight to Poland,” Women on Waves, http://www. Only after filing an appeal was the app The abortion drone campaign was a womenonwaves.org/en/page/5636/ abortion-drone--first-flight-to-poland. released, a year after it was first submitted collaboration between Women on Waves 17 Kate Knibbs, “Abortion Drone Is to iTunes. Women and healthcare providers and the local Polish women’s organisations.16 the Best Drone,” http://gizmodo. can now download the app in the Google Play The campaign’s popularity soared on Twitter com/abortion-drone-is-the-best- drone-1713388194. Store and iTunes.15 Within a year, the app has and Facebook, and was covered by more had between 1,000 and 5,000 installs from than 200 news outlets around the world, the Google Play Store and received a 4.3 star from BBC to Newsweek, and from Poland rating (out of 5 possible stars). and Germany to Korea, Japan, and Turkey. Gizmodo wrote: “Abortion drone is the best drone.”17 New technologies have a After the flight to Poland, the abortion drone great potential to advance made its way to Northern Ireland a year later women’s human rights, on June 21, 2016. A collaboration between but also pose challenges Alliance for Choice, Rosa, Labour Alternative, and demand a persistent the Abortion Rights Campaign, and Women navigation of restrictive on Waves, the action was an act of solidarity between women in the north and the south guidelines and policies to highlight the violation of human rights from governments and caused by laws criminalising abortion in both companies that mediate the north and south of Ireland except in very the access to these limited circumstances. More abortion drones new technologies. will be launched in the near future. Conclusion. New technologies have a great potential to advance women’s human rights, The Abortion Drone. Drones are small aerial but also pose challenges and demand a vehicles that can be remotely controlled and persistent navigation of restrictive guidelines used for a number of purposes, including aerial and policies from governments and photography or delivery of packages. companies that mediate the access to these Thanks to recent improvements in the range new technologies. We have to keep finding and flight time of drones, Women on Waves new and creative applications of technology, finally launched the “abortion drone” in June and the activist tech community could 2015. The abortion drone departed from support our efforts with other ways to get Germany and delivered abortion pills at the information and resources across distances opposite side of the river in Slubice, Poland. and borders.

By Rebecca Gomperts, Founder and Director, Women on Waves and Women on Web, the Netherlands. Email: [email protected]. Twitter: @rebeccagomperts. spotlight arrow for change 25 vol. 22 no. 1 2016 THE POTENTIAL IMPACT OF FREE BASICS ON SRHR ADVOCACY IN BANGLADESH

Technology can, and is, playing a big role in …it seems clear that there is Notes & References supporting sexual and reproductive health relatively low connectivity in and rights (SRHR) advocacy in Bangladesh. the country, combined with Be it through community radio to reach rural high mobile penetration. communities, mobile applications, or SMS- 1 Bangladesh Telecommunication based information services, there are many Based on other studies Regulatory Commission, “Internet Subscribers in Bangladesh December, initiatives taking advantage of technology on access to the internet, 2015,” accessed June 15, 2016, http:// to amplify their reach and their message. www.btrc.gov.bd/content/internet- this low connectivity subscribers-bangladesh-december-2015. However, there is one tool that might will undoubtedly 2 “World Development Report 2016: drastically change the way that people who disproportionately affect Digital Dividends,” The World Bank, have never yet connected to the internet accessed June 15, 2016, http://www. women living in poor areas. worldbank.org/en/publication/ have their first contact: Free Basics, a wdr2016. platform offered by Facebook, with the goal 3 GSMA Intelligence, “Country of “connecting the unconnected.” This article their goal is “bringing internet access and the Overview: Bangladesh,” August 2014, benefits of connectivity to the two-thirds of the https://www.gsmaintelligence.com/ will explore how Free Basics might affect research/?file=140820-bangladesh. 5 SRHR advocacy and education within the world that doesn’t have them.” pdf&download. Bangladeshi context. They want to do this by partnering with mobile 4 Web Foundation, “New Report: Women’s Rights Online,” October 21, In Bangladesh, statistics vary widely around operators in certain countries—including 2015, http://webfoundation.org/2015/10/ new-report-womens-rights-online/. the number of people who have access to Bangladesh—to provide access to certain websites and services, without cost to the user. 5 Internet.org, “Our Mission,” accessed the internet. According to the regulatory June 15, 2016, https://info.internet.org/ agency of the Bangladeshi government, as This kind of practice is known as “zero-rating,” en/mission/. of December 2015, 54 million people had and means that someone using the Free Basics 6 Mark Zuckerberg, “Free Basics application would be able to access certain Protects ,” The Times of internet access, including those accessing India, December 28, 2015, http://blogs. via mobiles.1 However, according to a report websites without having a data subscription, timesofindia.indiatimes.com/toi-edit- page/free-basics-protects-net-neutrality/. published in January 2016 by the World Bank,2 or pay any more than they usually would. nearly 148 million people in Bangladesh are Especially in rural areas, this is likely resulting what they classify as “currently offline”—that in Free Basics being the very first contact that is, without high speed internet access, which millions of people may have with the internet. discounts slower, mobile access to internet. Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg says that it Unlike other emerging markets, though, is a “stepping stone” to the broader internet. 6 Bangladesh has a relatively high level of Writing in the Times of India, Zuckerberg says: mobile penetration, even in rural areas.3 More than 35 operators have launched Despite the discrepancies in actual figures, Free Basics and 15 million people have it seems clear that there is relatively low come online. And half the people who use connectivity in the country, combined Free Basics to go online for the first time with high mobile penetration. Based on pay to access the full internet within 30 other studies on access to the internet, days...Free Basics is a bridge to the full this low connectivity will undoubtedly internet and digital equality. disproportionately affect women living in poor areas.4 Zuckerberg also argues that access to a limited section of the internet is better than no access Free Basics is aiming to reach this population: at all, saying that without an initiative like Free the “digitally unconnected.” In their words, Basics, poor people are worse off, missing out 26 arrow for change spotlight vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References on key benefits that are associated with access Free Basics in Bangladesh. At the time of to the internet. Free Basics’ launch in Bangladesh in mid-2015, content and services from 26 organisations9 Net Neutrality Violations. However, while were included, including three which focus zero-rated applications like Free Basics provide specifically on the health sector: Health Prior a concrete way of access to some websites and 7 Save the Internet, http://www. 21, Maya, and Mobile Alliance for Maternal savetheinternet.in/. internet services, it violates a principle known Action (MAMA).10 8 For a more in-depth analysis and as net neutrality, which advocates that all of background to the campaign, go here: Rahul Bhatia, “The Inside Story of the internet is the same and should be treated Of these three, Maya and MAMA look at SRHR Facebook’s Biggest Setback,” The as such. Abiding by net neutrality principles issues. In Bangladesh, MAMA—whose work in Guardian, May 23, 2016, https://www. theguardian.com/technology/2016/ would mean providing free access to all of the Bangladesh is done under the programmatic may/12/facebook-free-basics-india- internet, rather than just a tiny section, as zero- name of Aponjon, meaning “dear friend”— zuckerberg. rated applications such as Free Basics propose. uses simple mobile phones, or “feature 9 Apps included: Facebook; Facebook Messenger; Bikroy.com (marketplace); When Free Basics was first proposed in India, phones” as its method of transmitting AccuWeather; Bdjobs; Bing; under the earlier brand, Internet.org, the information. In their model, new or expectant Crticalink; DAI; ask.com; Wattpad; Wikipedia; MAMA; Maya.com.bd; platform offered access to the internet through mothers sign up to the service, giving their Amardesh E-Shop; ESPN Cricinfo; 36 bookmarked sites, one weather app, three due date or their child’s birth date, and the Sondhan; Prime Minister’s Office Website; Cabinet Division; Ministry of women’s issues sites, and the search engine mother receives weekly messages “timed to Agriculture; Ministry of Primary and Bing. And Facebook, of course. the stage of pregnancy or the age of their Mass Education; Shikkhok; bdnews24. 11 com; Prothom Alo; Social Blood; newborn.” HealthPrior21.com; UNICEF. [W]hile zero-rated The other SRHR-focused service provided 10 Mobile Alliance for Maternal Action, http://www. applications like Free Basics through Free Basics is Maya Apa, an mobilemamaalliance.org/. provide a concrete way of application through which users can ask 11 Kirsten Gagnaire, “MAMA medical questions and have them answered Bangladesh—Connecting Health access to some websites and Information and Services to Mothers internet services, it violates within 48 hours by medical or legal Through Mobiles,” USAID, April 11, professionals. Users of the Android application 2012, https://blog.usaid.gov/2012/04/ mama-bangladesh-connecting-health- a principle known as net and the website—i.e., the versions which are information-and-health-services-to- neutrality, which advocates not offered on Free Basics, are coming largely mothers/. from urban areas, rather than rural. 12 Maliha Mohsin, “Up Close and that all of the internet is the Personal with Naripokkho,” The same and should be treated Daily Star, April 25, 2014, http:// Both Aponjon and Maya Apa were relatively www.thedailystar.net/up-close-and- as such. Abiding by net already well-established prior to partnering personal-with-naripokkho-21441. neutrality principles would with Free Basics, and Shahana Siddiqui, Head mean providing free access of Content and Communications for Maya, to all of the internet, rather says that the user base coming through the than just a tiny section… Free Basics app has a notably lower level of education to their usual users, visible through the style of questions they are receiving Because of this violation of net neutrality, through the application. For the Maya Apa digital rights activists in many countries, team, getting their service offered on Free notably India, have been campaigning against Basics has allowed them a bigger reach to Free Basics. Though it has been launched in rural areas than they previously had. Bangladesh without any regulatory hitches, just next door in India, campaigners mobilised a It should be noted that other SRHR advocacy huge movement of people to speak up against organisations in Bangladesh, like Naripokkho, Free Basics plans,7 which led to zero-rating which has been working for over 30 years,12 applications being banned by their regulatory reach similarly rural areas without the agency.8 use of technology, focusing on in-person “sensitisation” workshops regarding Digital rights campaigners say that zero-rated reproductive health and rights. Samia platforms like Free Basics would create a Afrin, Assistant Coordinator at Naripokkho, multi-tiered Internet—essentially providing described how they spread information by better, faster, more open access for those who speaking in person to groups of up to 25- can afford it, with restrictions for those who 30 women, encouraging these women to cannot. Free Basics essentially means “poor continue to share the information that they internet, for poor people”—and they say that receive with their own personal networks. this simply is not good enough. spotlight arrow for change 27 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

What Does This Mean for Sexual Rights needs to happen in order for SRHR advocacy Notes & References Advocates? For those who need to get to take advantage of the increased reach access to information that might still be that digital technologies could offer. Rural considered taboo in their culture, the internet populations could be reached through multiple holds a lot of potential, and in Bangladesh, a channels—digital, inter-personal, and through lot of SRHR advocacy falls in this category— broadcast media. Access to information is a 13 Internet.org, “Free Basics Platform,” https://info.internet.org/en/story/ like information on sexual rights and vital tool of SRHR advocacy, but without the platform/. sexuality, for example. necessary open internet infrastructure, digital technologies will not contribute to increasing However, despite advertising content to the this access. contrary, applications like Free Basics, run by companies with vested business interests, are not “the internet.” As of February 2016, An affordable and open Free Basics have stated “anybody can add internet for all, regardless their website to the Free Basics platform, of living conditions or so long as they abide by our participation income, would be the guidelines.”13 The fact remains, though, that it is up to them to decide how to implement best solution, and this those guidelines, and that they might change needs to happen in order at any time. for SRHR advocacy to Unlike with the actual “open web,” where take advantage of the anybody can create a website or content to increased reach that digital put online, in this case, if, for some reason technologies could offer. the corporation behind Free Basics does not agree with the content or website, they can decide to remove it. In the context of SRHR, Free Basics as it currently stands is something it might mean, for example, that people of a wolf in sheep’s clothing: however much accessing new information might receive Facebook and Zuckerberg advocate for it, Free a certain perspective on a certain health Basics is not a gateway to the Internet; it is a question, without any way to verify that gateway to their business-focused, closed, and information; or that certain content is given controlled platform. SRHR advocates need to more priority over others. be aware of this risk, especially when it comes to establishing partnerships to spread SRHR From a feminist perspective, this limitation information via digital technologies. Within the of information is unacceptable. The bigger picture, offering limited information to current set-up of zero-rated applications a select group of people does not contribute to directly contrasts with the approach of SRHR goals, and in fact, could do more harm SRHR advocacy in working towards better than good—for example, providing information understanding of SRHR issues from a full only about certain SRHR issues without lifecycle approach, for everyone. necessary context. Given the sensitivity and historical treatment Access to information is a vital tool of SRHR of sexual rights and reproductive health advocacy, and access to the internet could be issues online within Bangladesh, it is critically an amplifying force in that, especially within important that if zero-rated platforms are a country like Bangladesh with high levels offered, that they are open and run by more of mobile penetration. Net neutrality and neutral parties, rather than simply by one equal access for all to the open internet is a company with a demonstrated business prerequisite for this, and the SRHR community interest and strategy. standing and strategising with digital rights Conclusion. An affordable and open internet advocates to campaign for this could well for all, regardless of living conditions or provide useful new angles for collective action income, would be the best solution, and this in reaching a goal that is crucial for us all.

By Zara Rahman, feminist, researcher, and information activist. Email: [email protected]. Twitter: @zararah. 28 arrow for change in our own words vol. 22 no. 1 2016 GENDER, ROMANCE, AND THE INTERNET: The Creation of a Non-Binary, Non-Binary Person

I am a transwoman. and Kothis are also clubbed into this group, although they are all distinct. This is a statement that I have only recently embraced and owned. For years, growing However, to the large majority of “us” up in a conservative family in a conservative who have been brought up to believe that city, I’ve sought to distance myself from gender can only be binary (masculine or transgender people, the most visible set of feminine) and that the sex organ determines them at least—the Aravanis of Tamil Nadu, or gender (penis=male=masculine, and the Hijras of North India. vagina=female=feminine), transwomen are simply “men in dresses.” Labels are often ways in which humans create the Other, create a them who is not an us. Publicly available information reinforces You are either with us—all that is familiar and these stereotypes. Any number of stories one comfortable and safe—or you are with them—all heard of from friends, colleagues, and both that is strange, different, potentially harming. on and off the internet, played on themes You are with us, or you are against us. Labels of the entrapped man, one who, in “good come with their stigma, beaten and sharpened faith,” approached a woman only to be over the years into powerful blades that can “deceived,” that she was, in fact, a he. The cut you up. Hijras I encountered on the streets and on the trains put on a theatre of gender, playing In this essay, I look at how I came to adopt oversexualised, oversexed women desperate labels such as transwoman, lesbian, and others, for male company. after initially rejecting them. I further attempt to explore the granular identities within such The medical and mental health industries labels and the communities around them. have their own sets of labels and identities: Second, I discuss how the internet helped me, transsexual, transvestite, pseudo- and others in similar communities, refine their hermaphrodite, autogynephile. Meanwhile, labels or reject them altogether. mainstream and fetish pornography co- opted these experiences into stereotypes of They Call Us Different Names. In the global a “shemale,” and were putting out newer battle against the HIV and AIDS epidemic, words: tranny, t-girl, and more—terms that knowledge about the modes of its transmission perpetuated harmful clichés and further stigma. resulted in the creation of a system of “key populations” or “target groups” that were considered to be most at risk of contracting Labels are often ways in the virus because of their sexual, social, and which humans create cultural practices. Identifying these groups and the Other, create a them their risk made it possible to channel money who is not an us. You are and programmes to manage the spread of the disease. either with us—all that is familiar and comfortable One such category is MSM-TG: Men having Sex and safe—or you are with with Men, and transgender people. While the term transgender itself is inclusive of other, them—all that is strange, more diverse identities, in the world of HIV and different, potentially AIDS prevention, TG stands almost exclusively harming. You are with us, for transgender women. Aravanis, Hijras, or you are against us. in our own words arrow for change 29 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

However, to me, the most worrying implication in Syria, including how her father, her hero, Notes & References of this clubbing together of homosexual men stood up to the militia seeking to arrest her. and transgender women was the implicit Later, after her alleged “abduction,” doubts assumption that both sets of people were began circulating as to her identity, and it was attracted solely to “other” men. Are human revealed that Tom MacMaster was the “real” 1 Wikipedia, “A Gay Girl in Damascus,” http//en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Gay_ beings only defined by their romantic and person behind Amina. Girl_In_Damascus. sexual attraction? Is identity, therefore, 2 SecondLife, secondlife.com Even before then, I was already constructing determined externally? an identity, I was building up Nadja whose As a transwoman who was (and perhaps still aspirations, dreams, and hopes were entirely is) struggling with my gender identity and my mine. However, her face, body, life, and sexual orientation, these labels and stereotypes history, were an amalgam of fact and fiction, created severe anxiety and doubt in my mind. culled from friends’ lives, from books, and Was I, in the throes of sexual attraction to from every image resource I could find on the women, a man then? Was I “normal” after internet. Like Amina, my Nadja too needed all? Was my desire for, and attraction to the photographs, needed plausible truths and girls in the school then, and to the co-workers believable lies in the construction of identity. and friends later, a playing out of “natural” Chat friends needed a picture of me, to help “masculine” desire? As a teenager, and as a them sustain the fiction of my life. Yahoo young adult, I struggled with this sameness, Profiles and Groups needed biographies and this affiliation to the gender I was assigned to. hometowns and schools studied in to present At the same time, I was terrified of the social a complete person, a “true” person. So I ostracisation that I saw meted out to Aravanis “stole” images freely, not worrying at all about and Hijras, and I avoided acknowledging, even , consent, privacy, and authenticity. to myself, that I might have more in common As an Indian, I studiously avoided sending my with them than with the boys of my school. friends pictures of white women. I found an I not only felt fear and shame in adopting image closest to my dark brown skin, and used these labels for myself, but also felt the labels all available tools to make it as “authentically themselves were inadequate, incomplete. south Indian” as possible. As Nadja learnt, and as Amina too discovered, photographs that It would take me a lot of exploration, and were closest to the identity one constructs help a lot of problematic terminologies sourced sustain the deception. from the Internet, to finally arrive at a label I felt comfortable in: a non-binary, non-binary This deception, this half-lie, half-truth, was woman. easy in the early Internet. It was expected too, perhaps. You could be who you claimed to be, It Happened Online... I am a transwoman. It and no probing would be necessary. This was is my truth. But the basis of this truth is a lie. essential for some of us who were expressing The vocabulary I have now, to describe myself desires and opinions that had little offline, “real as a transwoman, as a non-binary woman, is world” support. This was plausible deniability, a gift of the Internet. In the mid to late 1990s, a cloak to hide under. accessing a still-new world-wide-web via a dialup connection, I discovered Yahoo! Chat. Years later, I discovered Second Life,2 a On chat room after chat room, I presented multiplayer game that allows users to create a myself as a girl—a girl who was attracted to virtual world. Avatars—digital selves—interact other girls. with each other, exploring ideas of what makes humans, what it means to be a man or a Amina Abdallah, the “Gay Girl in Damascus,”1 woman, what it means to desire other men and was not born till much later. A character, a other women with no “real world” rules to play false persona created by Tom MacMaster in by. For me, it became more than a game, more 2011, Amina portrayed herself as a lesbian in than an addiction. It became an existence. a Syria going through uprisings and revolts. Although as a persona Amina had existed on On Second Life, I created a me that was more various chat forums and networking sites me than I could be. The Nadja of Yahoo Chat from 2006, it wasn’t until the Arab Spring was slowly becoming the Nadika that I am that she gained a large following. Through a today. As someone who struggled with her own blog, Amina “reported” on events shaping up body and how it was perceived, the women 30 arrow for change in our own words vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Social media and queer and anxieties over my gender. Would a forums online and offline woman accept the me I wanted to be, without are spaces to add layers questioning her own likes and preferences? and depth to my identity, I was unaware, till recently, of lesbian-only allowing me to tie my dating spaces. Now there are options—Brenda, LesPark, Her, and many more. OkCupid and various lives and loves Tinder allow one to limit visibility, allow one together into a coherent to be discovered by people of only certain narrative. Having learnt genders. to be more aware of Would a transwoman be allowed into these my privileges and my spaces? My identity, as a lesbian transwoman, oppression, and having was genuine. But would my physical body, my an outlet to broadcast my voice, belie this? politics and my personal In a web series called Her Story, the life, I am now able to tell protagonist (and in real life one of the writers the world all about me. I am of the show), Jen Richards, as Vi, falls in love Nadika. I am a non-binary, with a queer, lesbian-identified woman, Allie. non-binary person. In a beautiful scene, Vi explains why, for her, having relationships with men is easier than with women. Vi happens to be transgender, and she therefore feels her femininity, her I pretended to be and the avatars I created womanhood, is not questioned when she became necessary crutches. A body shaped sleeps with and has sexual relations with men. for, and by, the Internet. Next to their body, Vi is obviously feminine. As a boy questioning gender, and as a But, even in a coffee shop, in a casual setting, transwoman, I experienced desire and Vi unconsciously debates her womanhood rejection. I experienced crushes and when talking to Allie. unrequited, unprofessed love. The question Set in Los Angeles, California, the lives of Vi, I asked myself: are transwomen exclusively Allie, Paige, and their friends would seem very attracted to, and seek sexual relationships different to the lives of a lot of transgender solely with men? Would someone like me—who people—especially transwomen—in India, and felt a deep attraction to women, both romantic elsewhere in Asia. However, as a transgender and sexual—therefore be “still” a man, even woman deeply attracted to other women, though I felt deeply uncomfortable with being this scene struck a chord with me all the way one? across the cultural divide. Like Vi, like other While there were forums and chatrooms transwomen I know, I have had to constantly dedicated to homosexual desire and attraction, reinforce my gender and sexuality to potential and while terms like Lesbian, Gay, and partners. Bisexual were not unfamiliar, perceptions and In recent months, I have found acceptance and understanding were limited by the filters of community. Social media and queer forums one’s own society and peers. Therefore, only online and offline are spaces to add layers and a “born girl,” a GG—genetic girl—could be a depth to my identity, allowing me to tie my lesbian. “Men” like me, could only be sissies, various lives and loves together into a coherent gay men in dresses. I had to navigate further narrative. Having learnt to be more aware of pools of perversion and illicit desire to find the my privileges and my oppression, and having perfect label for me. an outlet to broadcast my politics and my Still unsure of my gender, “still” a man, I personal life, I am now able to tell the world all worried about the best time to disclose to about me. I am Nadika. I am a non-binary, non- the person I was chatting with, my doubts binary person.

By Nadika Nadja, a non-binary, non-binary person from Chennai, currently based in Bangalore, who writes and edits for a living. Twitter: @nadjanadika. in our own words arrow for change 31 vol. 22 no. 1 2016 IS ACCESS REAL? Disability, Sexuality, and the Digital Space

My mother doesn’t allow me to use sign with respect to sexuality and reproductive Notes & References language on the road, because she doesn’t health and rights. want people to know that I can’t hear. The environment is such that infrastructure, 1 Michigan Disability Rights Carrying a white cane doesn’t look systems, and processes are far from being Commission, Models of Disability, accessed May 26, 2016, http://www. dignified. sensitive to the needs of the disabled, and a copower.org/leadership/models-of- medical and charitable approach to disability disability. These are experiences that many people with 2 “TV Actor Sonal Vengurlekar Writes disabilities have said and can identify with. an Open Letter to Margarita with a More often than not, persons with disabilities …there is a clearly marked Straw’s Director Shonali Bose,” India Today, April 24, 2015, accessed May 24, (PWD) and especially women with disabilities hierarchy of needs that 2016, http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/ (WWD) are forced to feel shame around their tv-actor-sonal-vengurlekar-writes-an- the able-bodied world open-letter-to-margarita-with-a-straws- bodies, their minds, and their identity. In this thrusts on the disabled; director-shonali-bose/1/432008.html. environment, the relationship of PWD with sexuality and sexual needs their own bodies and the assistive technologies (which, in many cases, are a matter of survival of the PWD are at the very and independence, a need, and an enabler in bottom….What everyone the true sense) becomes very complex. forgets perhaps is that What happens when societal stigma, familial persons with disabilities are pressure, and internalised prejudice restrains more than just scrabbling the woman from embracing the piece of for food, clothing, and technology—the wheelchair, the hearing aid, treatment; they are the white cane—they need? What happens battling for inclusion when technology—like digital technologies—that which means the right to is supposed to liberate us from our bodies, are in fact rigged from the start? be human in every sense.

In this essay, I write about how as a disability is still prominent.1 WWD are considered as a rights activist I have discovered and negotiated burden and changes in this way of thinking, different layers around what “access” means though growing gradually, are few and far between. Understandably, the focus is on More often than not, access to health systems, education, and persons with disabilities employment, but there is a clearly marked hierarchy of needs that the able-bodied world (PWD) and especially thrusts on the disabled; sexuality and sexual women with disabilities needs of the PWD are at the very bottom.2 (WWD) are forced to My aunt sat me down one day and started feel shame around their sharing her concerns for the marriage of bodies, their minds, my siblings. She discussed each of their and their identity. In preferences, likes, dislikes, and crushes this environment, the with me. Out of us sisters, she only forgot relationship of PWD with one person—that was me. their own bodies and the — A wheelchair user from Pakistan assistive technologies… Assumptions around PWD’s asexuality and becomes very complex. incapability to engage or desire intimacy and 32 arrow for change in our own words vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References romance got me started on my work. Little When an app or a website did I know that as a young, disabled activist is launched, do we ever sit talking about disability and sexuality, I would experience strong reactions, not only from back and see whether it 3 TARSHI, Sexuality and Disability in the the nondisabled community, where women’s meets with the accessibility Indian Context (New Delhi: TARSHI, 2010), accessed May 24, 2016, http://www.tarshi. sexuality is still hushed, and a deeper silence guidelines created to make net/downloads/Sexuality_and_Disability_ thrives around that of WWD; but also from in_the_Indian_Context.pdf. platforms accessible for the disabled community, who thought that my 4 This project was developed and persons across disabilities? implemented by Point of View with support work was superfluous at best and a complete of Crea; both are feminist organisations in non-issue at worst.3 What everyone forgets India. It can be accessed at http://www. sexualityanddisability.org. perhaps is that persons with disabilities are much more difficult than men with disabilities 5 “Web Content Accessibility Guidelines more than just scrabbling for food, clothing, to express their desire for a partner; if it was (WCAG) Overview,” Web Accessibility and treatment; they are battling for inclusion expressed at all, it was only within the language Initiative, accessed May 26, 2016, https:// www.w3.org/WAI/intro/wcag. which means the right to be human in every of matrimony. Moreover, according to a few, 6 To find out more about Point of View, go sense. dating was too western a concept for them. to: http://pointofview.org/. 7 Barbara Faye Waxman Fiduccia, “Sexual To start with, I researched and co-authored Marriage is the inevitable future that is Imagery of Physically Disabled Women: Sexuality and Disability,4 an online resource imagined for Indian women by their Erotic? Perverse? Sexist?” Sexuality and Disability 17, no. 3 (1999): 277-282. that busted the strong myths around the and communities. Indian women are expected 8 Tom Shakespeare, Kath Gillespie-Sells, asexuality of WWD, and offered WWD to epitomise beauty and perfection; anything and Dominic Davies, The Sexual Politics more nuanced information and practical that is different from the “normal” impacts of Disability: Untold Desires (UK: Burns & Oates, 1996). advice on understanding their own bodies, their existence, place in society, and sexuality, possibilities, and opportunities for eventually, their chances of finding a suitable relationships, safety, violence, and abuse. The partner. Parents are worried about daughters process of developing this project gave me who are too fat, too thin, too tall, too dark, the opportunity to understand and reflect on and of course, those who are visibly disabled. how the digital world could help alleviate the This non-acceptance harms all women, and exclusion that WWD face in terms of access when you have a disability, not being allowed to unprejudiced information, and that too in to accept or acknowledge your disability and accessible formats. labouring under the prejudice that surrounds it can be devastating.7 Bias Hardwired in Accessible Systems. When an app or a website is launched, do Matrimonial (i.e., matchmaking) sites are we ever sit back and see whether it meets very popular in India, but there is bias against with the accessibility guidelines created to disabled people built into the very architecture make platforms accessible for persons across of these sites—because they are built into disabilities?5 I registered on Truly—Madly, a society. You have categorisations on the basis dating app in India, and the option to express of caste, education, physical attributes, but interest in a person is inaccessible with the also one on disability. Of course then you can voice-over technology that I use. While I work, set search filters. Given the existing levels of live, and socialise independently, experiences prejudice against PWD, it is not surprising that with dating apps indicate that I should hire a one ends up being filtered out by the non- personal assistant to help negotiate a dating disabled world.8 So, as a PWD, I might have app! access to these matrimonial portals, but is the access real? At Point of View,6 we started a study of dating apps for disabled people. We found On some websites, the disability categorisation out that the combination of gendered and is taken to another level. Bharat Matrimony, cultural filters has had an impact on users a mainstream matchmaking website, copies of these technologies for relationships and the user’s profile on to their “exclusively the accessibility of these platforms. First, for disabled” portal, Ability Matrimony. It it was extremely difficult to find WWD who is possible they think they are being helpful used dating apps, as compared to men with and giving you two bites of the same apple. disabilities. When WWD were reached and Consequently, the user is registered on a site asked why they did not use dating apps, the that she never signed up for. However, when reactions were not unexpected. They found it the profile is moved to Ability Matrimony, the in our own words arrow for change 33 vol. 22 no. 1 2016 user’s information and personal contact details Just as women are suddenly become public, after being hidden battling for equality and and regulated on the main parent portal, Bharat Matrimony. Of course she is disabled, why safety in online spaces, would she need security and privacy?! PWD are similarly struggling to establish I strongly believe that the issue of a special portal for disabled people only is equivalent the need for accessibility to offline confinement or institutionalisation of websites and content where choices are heavily guarded and in digital spaces, similar access to the outside world is regulated. to the struggle with Specialised dating apps or marriage websites inaccessible physical basically imply that PWD can’t match their infrastructure. likes, interests, wavelengths, desires, and attractions with a non-disabled person. Yet at the same time, many PWD are happy with What followed then were a lot of exchanges— this arrangement, because they know that angered, in denial, strong—but the dynamics in segregated platforms are, in some senses, the group shifted, if only a little. The women where we are treated with more equality by know that there is empowerment in speaking prospective partners, unlike the integrated up and solidarity, and the men know that platforms that reflect society’s reductionist women do have a voice. It is not easy to take attitude around disability. Just what everyone spaces that are accessible, and to share them forgets is that every individual is just a TAB—a with others. What these disagreements and temporarily-abled—body! arguments have done for the group is that they have made it more comfortable for many to Making Spaces for Different Voices. Gender bring up sexual and reproductive health and differences and inequalities and disability rights discussions and information to the group intersect to create online environments that without the fear of formal reprimand, and mirror offline ones. by those who monitor the space socially and On one of the email lists for PWD, a good laterally. discussion was going on between the men Gender differences and inequalities about accessibility of daily-use technology. and disability intersect to create online The thread went on forever, and then moved environments that mirror offline ones. into the territory of shaving pubic hair. At this point, some female members expressed Technology has enabled and empowered their discomfort. No heed was paid to the people who cannot access spaces physically, small voices of protest, and so I decided to or who find it challenging to communicate, step in and remind them about the nature of to find their social interactions and access to the list but also about making some space for information online. Just as women are battling discussions of women’s sexuality and daily for equality and safety in online spaces, PWD needs—which frankly shocked the group a bit. are similarly struggling to establish the need for accessibility of websites and content in digital spaces, similar to the struggle with inaccessible Just what everyone physical infrastructure. The digital space offers forgets is that every hopes of changing access for disabled persons; individual is just a TAB—a until then, it is a twin battle for persons with temporarily-abled—body! disability.

By Nidhi Goyal, Programme Director, Sexuality and Disability, Point of View, Mumbai, India. Twitter: @saysnidhigoyal. 34 arrow for change monitoring regional and global activities vol. 22 no. 1 2016

SECURITY IN CONTENTIOUS CONTEXTS: Exploring Digital Resilience for Organisations Serving Sexual and Gender Minorities

Notes & References People with diverse sexualities and gender The intention of LGBTI and identities are both stigmatised and often allied social media pages to criminalised in Asia. In Southeast Asia alone, five out of 11 countries criminalise same-sex be safer spaces, for example, acts.1 is often threatened with the presence of comments 1 Aengus Carroll and Lucas Paoli In response, B-Change launched Connecting Itaborahy, State Sponsored Homophobia the Dots, a strategy focused on supporting attacking LGBTI people.... 2015: A World Survey of Laws: Criminalisation, Protection and Recognition sexual and gender minority youth in Asian [R]eporting mechanisms of Same-Sex Love (Geneva: International countries by using technology. Part of this Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex built to protect social Association, May 2015), 28. strategy was the 2015 launch of BE—a peer media users from online 2 United Nations Educational Scientific support web platform that serves as a safer abuse are also used to and Cultural Organisation, From Insult to space where young lesbian, gay, bisexual, Inclusion (Paris: United Nations Educational maliciously report posted Scientific and Cultural Organisation, 2015), transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) people http://apo.org.au/node/60996,26. in Asia can find resources, connect with LGBTI-friendly resources. 3 Full video recording, short clips, supportive communities, and get help in and notes from the webinar can be accessed at http://www.b-change. accessing services. digital issues are not limited only to technical org/news/2015/10/28/understanding- concerns but also reflect issues that we deal cyberbullying. This article discusses some of the learnings with offline. In a 2015 report, From Insult to of the organisation since launching BE. The Inclusion, UNESCO links online and offline discussion is focused on digital security issues harassment and suggests that these should be and some suggestions for organisations whose tackled as interconnected issues.2 work includes online components. For LGBTI people, much harassment is linked Dealing with online security issues is not to stigmatisation by social, religious, and exclusive to web-based service providers like political groups. Shortly after BE launched in B-Change. Online and offline spaces have May 2015, there was a targeted digital attack been increasingly converging, which makes that attempted to prevent users from accessing online presence necessary for practically every its services. The landing page was replaced organisation. Our knowledge of the internet is by an image suggesting a connection to constantly evolving and we begin to see how fundamentalist and extremist groups. Online and offline spaces Growing extremism in online spaces was have been increasingly discussed in a cyberbullying webinar that B-Change conducted in 2015 featuring converging, which representatives from organisations working on makes online presence rights and welfare of LGBTI groups in Southeast necessary for practically Asia. Participants of the webinar discussed every organisation. Our their experiences with online attacks which knowledge of the internet limited their ability to distribute important is constantly evolving and content.3 The intention of LGBTI and allied social media pages to be safer spaces, for we begin to see how digital example, is often threatened with the presence issues are not limited only of comments attacking LGBTI people. Pink to technical concerns but Dot—a Singapore-based movement fighting for also reflect issues that the freedom to love—shared their struggle with we deal with offline. finding a balance between allowing free speech monitoring regional and global activities arrow for change 35 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

in their social media pages, while keeping it a to employ the help of external security Notes & References safer space by removing hateful comments. partners to maintain the health and security They also shared how reporting mechanisms of the online infrastructure. B-Change built to protect social media users from online sought out online security experts during abuse are also used to maliciously report a time of need, but it is better to identify 4 Access Tactical Technology Collective’s posted LGBTI-friendly resources. Often, these connections to technical support before Security In-A-Box website at http://www. securityinabox.org. resources are falsely flagged as containing any actual issue arises. Tactical Technology 5 Find out more about the Dignity for pornography or nudity, to which the immediate Collective is a non-profit organisation that All programme at https://freedomhouse. response by site administrators is usually provides technical help to activist groups. org/program/dignity-all-lgbti-assistance- program. to remove the materials. Pink Dot’s main Their website, Security In-A-Box, is an campaign consultant one day found that his excellent digital security resource for human Facebook account was disabled and Pink Dot’s rights defenders.4 campaign video was taken down due to these 2. Digital security is an organisational false reports. issue. Resilience can only be achieved if it becomes a concern of everyone in Digital resilience is an the organisation. In the case of B-Change important area that can where activities are web-based, each team often be overlooked in member has different access points to the organisations, and thus technological infrastructures. Each of these we must consciously access points is a security risk and also an opportunity for defense. It is crucial that include building it in our team members acknowledge their role in plans and strategies. maintaining security by taking accountability over their accesses and remaining vigilant of In Indonesia, false reporting is used by threats. fundamentalists to have LGBTI-friendly 3. Investing in digital security is an ongoing websites taken down by the Ministry of process. Investing in comprehensive Communications and Information Technology. digital security protocols is worthwhile, Ardhanary Institute, a Jakarta-based lesbian, and considering the dynamic nature of bisexual, and transgender (LBT) women’s technology, it should be a continuous organisation, shared how their sites have been process that also constantly reinvents itself taken down several times due to false reports to stay abreast in digital safety. Security taking advantage of Indonesia’s policy aimed processes should be regularly updated and towards protecting children from adult content. members of the organisation should always Similar to false reporting in social media, be informed with latest developments on Ardhanary Institute’s websites were reported security issues. To tie up digital security to contain pornography and nudity. All these with a more holistic idea of security for various forms of online attacks derail efforts to human rights defenders, support for security support LGBTI communities. trainings and creation of security plans are As a group supporting LGBTI youth, B-Change’s available through ’s Dignity responsibility to make the organisation resilient for All programme.5 to digital attacks extends to our duty to protect Safety and security have always been complex users of our platforms—from web service to issues. Having to tread them both offline and social media. Below are three key points that online—an environment with which we still B-Change has learned so far in the early stages have limited understanding—makes it even of its journey in online service provision. more challenging. Digital resilience is an 1. Technical bases should be covered. important area that can often be overlooked in Prepare by backing up assets and having organisations, and thus we must consciously a reliable recovery plan. It is also crucial include building it in our plans and strategies.

By Ira Briones, Research, B-Change Insights, and Thilaga Sulathireh, Programmes, B-Change Foundation. Emails: [email protected], [email protected]. 36 arrow for change monitoring regional and global activities vol. 22 no. 1 2016

SAFER NUDES! A Sexy Guide to Digital Security

Notes & References Some say that the internet has turned ​​ …making selfies and nudes privacy into an outdated idea. However, can be an opportunity to we still see people who challenge gender empower people beyond normativity being targets of revenge porn, as well as offline and online the mere reproduction of 1 Natasha Felizi, personal communication bullying. Most of the time, these attacks sexy pictures of women with author when asked to provide a few take advantage of the amount of data words about her text on the Safer Nudes already in mainstream guide. we leave as footprints when we use the and . It can 2 See “Os Virais de 2015: O Ano do Manda internet. The ideas of caring about our be used as a way to know Nudes,” http://www.brasilbriefing.com.br/ privacy and sending nudes may seem videos/2015/12/Os-virais-de-2015-O-ano- yourself, connect with do-manda-nudes-.html#ixzz4DSORmInx. contradictory, but they are not. Privacy is Also “Manda Nudes (Send Nudes),” 2015, the power to choose who has access to other people, and represent Know Your Meme, http://knowyourmeme. com/memes/manda-nudes-send-nudes. our personal information and under what yourself in your own terms. 3 Julia Barbon and Mateus Luiz de Souza, circumstances. In an online environment, “;) Eu Curto: Internautas Mandam Fotos it is deeply related to the choices of the Sensuais para Aumentar Autoestima e Motivated by the recurring leaks of celebrities’ Reduzir Distâncias,” Folha de S.Paulo, May communication technologies we use. 10, 2015, http://arte.folha.uol.com.br/ nudes, many media platforms have published tec/2015/manda-nudes/curto.html. — The Authors their warnings about the risks of sharing nudes. 4 Forum, “I Like How You Guys BEG for The vast majority of them suggest, more or less Girls to Post Nudes, but When They Do, The Internet is not a global village. explicitly, that the only safe way to send nudes They’re Attention Whores,” IGN.com, July It is a white picket fenced pretty 22, 2009, http://www.ign.com/boards/ would be to not to send them at all.7 threads/i-like-how-you-guys-beg-for-girls- neighbourhood with ghettos and no go to-post-nudes-but-when-they-do-theyre- zones. The power dynamics at play URL For Coding Rights, a women-led organisation attention-whores.182890800/. today are similar to the ones at play IRL. addressing digital rights, such as the right 5 Keka Demétrio, “Nudez de Pessoas Gordas Incomoda?” Tempo de Mulher, to privacy and freedom of expression, this — Fannie Sosa1 http://www.tempodemulher.com.br/ was unreasonable. It overlooked the fact that variedades/noticias/nudez-de-pessoas- gordas-incomoda_. The expression “Send Nudes!” went viral in people, including teenagers, would not stop 6 Justin Trudeau Asks Us to “TWERK 2015 in Brazil.2 The common perception of doing it and advising them to stop would be Diligently,” YouTube video, 0:21, posted by nudes is that they are taken by young girls with repressive and result in an illusion of changed The Capital Voice, May 17, 2016, https:// www.youtube.com/watch?v=IX1NwSA0XYA low self-esteem, pressured by some boyfriend behaviour. and Big Freedia—Duffy (Official Music or her social3 network, and that eventually she Video), YouTube video, 3:06, posted As in offline spaces, it is not possible to be by TheQueenDivaTV, September 13, will be the target of slut shaming, exposure, 100% safe online. Digital security is not a 2013, https://www.youtube.com/ or online violence. Nudies are understood as watch?v=HJBnNziI5wk. one-size-fits-all formula. There is no button to something you just should not do. If you are 7 Natasha Vargas-Cooper, “How to press, box to tick, or device to activate that will Protect Your Nude Selfies from Vengeful a woman who deliberately sends it, you are mitigate all possible security vulnerabilities. Ex-Boyfriends and Trolls,” Broadly, May an attention whore.4 If you are fat, trans, or 26, 2016, https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/ However, there are ways to mitigate your risks article/how-to-protect-your-nude-selfies- anyone who is beyond the traditional standards according to what you are communicating, from-vengeful-ex-boyfriends-and-trolls; of what is visible in the mainstream media, you Sally Weale, “Sexting Becoming ‘the to whom, and how. The most important thing Norm’ for Teens, Warn Child Protection are labeled as ugly, disgusting, or a freak.5 Experts,” The Guardian, November in digital security is to understand what you 10, 2015, http://www.theguardian. However, as it happens with social phenomena are doing and what the risks are in a given com/society/2015/nov/10/sexting- 6 becoming-the-norm-for-teens-warn-child- appropriated (not created) by pop culture, situation. protection-experts; and Caitlin Dewey, making selfies and nudes can be an opportunity “A Guide to Safe Sexting: How to Send With that in mind, the sexy guide to digital to empower people beyond the mere Nude Photos without Ruining Your Life, security provides some information about how Career and Reputation,” The Washington reproduction of sexy pictures of women Post, July 11, 2014, https://www. digital communications work to enable nude already in mainstream and digital media. It can washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/ lovers to understand and be able to minimise wp/2014/07/11/a-guide-to-safe-sexting- be used as a way to know yourself, connect how-to-send-nude-photos-without-ruining- the digital traces that they leave behind when with other people, and represent yourself in your-life-career-and-reputation/. sharing pictures online, as well as to diminish your own terms. the risk of exposure of such content. monitoring regional and global activities arrow for change 37 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

As security of tools change over time, apps security considerations, when exchanging Notes & References recommendations are secondary. This pictures. holistic way of thinking should lead to the We believe this approach towards understanding of the importance of practices, communications is a powerful way of thinking such as implementing strong passwords in 8 When encryption is end-to-end, no third to protect our right of self-determination and party can access the cryptographic keys your devices and apps; using apps that use needed to decrypt and eavesdrop on the autonomy over the control of our bodies and end-to-end encryption8; blocking screen shots; conversation. self in online communications. using self-destructing messages that are erased from both servers and devices; encrypting You can download the guide here: http://www. your devices; and deleting files, among other codingrights.org/pt/manda-nudes/

By Natasha Felizi, Researcher & Project Manager; Joana Varon, Researcher & Founder-Director; Fernanda Shirakawa, Digital Security Trainer & Researcher, Coding Rights; and Raquel Rennó, Art, urban studies & technology researcher, & professor (UFRB, UOC/IN3). Emails: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], & [email protected].

WOMEN’S BODIES ON DIGITAL BATTLEGROUNDS: Networks of Information and Support by Pro-choice Activists in Latin America1

I was educated in the idea that women jail sentences of up to ten years in prison. In 1 Acknowledgments: This research would have not been possible without should be silent, so the fact that now I can Honduras, the government has banned any the solidarity networks and complicities dare to say what I really feel has made me policy or programme related to emergency taking place among different feminists in Latin America. We would like to specially feel very free. contraception. So far, though, it is not illegal thank Intui, Joana, the members of the in any other Latin American country to publish awesome cyberfeminist list, our anonymous — Bertha, the grandmother blogger2 testimonials, and the activists who have SRHR information. taken the time to answer our questions: Claudia Anzorena, Ketty Scheider, Lucia Table 1 presents the geographic and legislative Eganas, and Patricia Irene Fanjul. This article analyses the use of information characteristics of the nine testimonials we have 2 W Radio “¿Cómo y Cuándo and communications technologies (ICTs) by gathered for this study, and lists the type of Surgió el Blog ‘Abuela-Abuela’?,” August 29, 2015, http://wradio. pro-choice activists and Women Human Rights ICTs they are using. The interviews consisted of com.mx/programa/2015/08/29/ Defenders (WHRDs) from Latin America. It four questions around their perception of the audios/1440869400_911963.html. shows that technological practices enable main risks they were facing, advantages and 3 According to the Gender Equality Observatory for Latin America and the networks of information and support, and risks associated with their use of ICTs, current Caribbean (ECLAC), only three of 19 create new kinds of risks and vulnerabilities needs for moving their activism forward, and countries in the region—Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Uruguay—as well as Mexico online. other resources or documentation they wanted City (Federal District) in Mexico, allow to share with this inquiry. legal abortion under any condition. Five The interviews conducted for this research countries completely forbid abortion (Chile, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, 3 revealed that the legislations in place, and the , Social Honduras, and Nicaragua). In the 11 civic struggles for the advancement of sexual Stigmatisation, and Criminalisation. remaining countries, legal abortion can only take place under specific circumstances. and reproductive health and rights (SRHR), Confronted with the absence of legal, safe, See Observatorio de Igualdad de Genero, are felt as highly unstable. For instance, in and/or publicly funded conditions within http://www.cepal.org/oig/. Brazil, there is an extremely worrisome bill which to access abortions, women in Latin proposed4 that intend to forbid the production America have created and engaged in networks and sharing of information about abortion with of information and support that generally 38 arrow for change monitoring regional and global activities vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References Table 1. Characteristics of Testimonials

Country and ICTs Used Abortion Legislation Number of 4 See bill here: Comissao de Constituicao Testimonials e Justica e de Cidadania, http://www2. camara.leg.br/proposicoesWeb/prop_most rarintegra;jsessionid=B9C94B89D09282 Argentina (3) Mobile phones, chat on Abortion is only allowed to protect 5E08192AF42999B2B0.proposicoesWeb commercial social media women’s physical health and life, or if 2?codteor=1402444&filename=Parecer- CCJC-21-10-2015. platforms, websites, and pregnancy is caused by rape. 5 For instance, a recent report from information portals Colombia which is part of a global report indicates that women are mostly using the Brazil (1) Commercial social media Abortion is only allowed to protect internet for entertainment and connecting to their peers and familiars, and much less platforms, screenings, women’s physical health and life, or if for looking for education and employment gatherings for organising pregnancy is caused by rape. opportunities, finding information about health and sexuality, or about their rights awareness raising, and debates and how to defend them. See Fundacion Karisma, “¿Cómo Usan la Web las Chile (2) Phone hotlines, mobile phones, Abortion is forbidden on all grounds. Mujeres? Conozca el Informe ‘Derechos de las Mujeres en Línea,” December 21, mailing lists, and emails 2015, https://karisma.org.co/como-usan- la-web-las-mujeres-conozca-el-informe- Honduras (1) Mobile phones, social Abortion is forbidden on all grounds. derechos-de-las-mujeres-en-linea/. See also the global report from Web We Want: networks, group chats Foundation, “Women’s Rights Online: Translating Access into Mexico (1) Skype, mobile phones, Abortion is legal in Mexico City, but Empowerment,” October 20, 2015, http:// webfoundation.org/about/research/ websites, and information it is only allowed in the rest of the womens-rights-online-2015/. portals country to protect women’s physical health and life, or if pregnancy is caused by rape.

Nicaragua (1) Mobile phones, WhatsApp, Abortion is forbidden on all grounds. Facebook groups, and chat

work in two ways. On the one hand, groups cases are not well understood, or are felt as raise awareness, remove stereotypes about inevitable and “part of the game” of using abortions, advance women’s rights, and create ICTs. impact at a political level by seeking the Even though the region is still characterised by legalisation or decriminalisation of abortion. low levels of digital literacy (more so among They work intensively in producing useful women in rural areas), there is an increase in information and ensure that these can be the rates of connectivity of urban population accessed by their audiences, allies, and other largely through the use of smartphones. This progressive social agents. On the other hand, trend has enabled more women to get online. groups and networks also provide direct However, very often their first experience of support to women, either by providing them being online happens on social media platforms with misoprostol or accompanying them that can be both non-secure in terms of the before, during, and after the abortion. It visibility of personal information or even should be noted that for many groups, those abusive. They have little orientation on how to objectives can overlap. take advantage of the internet and its positive Latin American women have found the internet benefits, as well as protect themselves from its to be a space where they can share their most negative consequences.5 intimate and private feelings, connect with There is an increase in violence against women abroad, create networks of support, activists and WHRDs involved with feminism or and organise politically in order to defend their sexual and reproductive rights. This violence basic human rights in societies strongly shaped is expressed as hate speech, or harassment by patriarchal values. However, they also online, on , discussion forums, or social recognise how much the use of ICTs comes media platforms. Surveillance, harassment, with new vulnerabilities and risks that in some and stalking that are enabled or amplified by monitoring regional and global activities arrow for change 39 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

ICTs are routinely taking place through identity For us the paradox is: Notes & References theft, blackmailing, doxxing (broadcasting an protect yourself until you individual’s identity and location information without consent online), smear campaigns, can’t communicate any 6 Nad Ro and Mestruadora are part of censoring, takedowns of content, through more, or become visible the contemporary Mexican lesbofeminist individual or mob rape, and death threats. until you are unprotected. movement. In the past years this movement has increased its activity both in social Examples are the documented cases of “Nad — Doulagem de Guerillha media and in the streets. In social media Ro” and “Menstruadora”6 who have been platforms, they are being constantly attacked, to the point where in 2014, harassed with hate speech or threatened with failed to reach beyond this because there was they were threatened with being “burnt death. The same has happened in less well- alive”and subjected to “corrective no criminal prosecution possible as they were rape.” See Nadia Rosso and Luisa documented cases, such as when members only providing information and counselling.” Velázquez Herrera, “[Análisis] Misoginia of pro-choice groups are targeted by pro-life en Redes, Apología del Feminicidio y Another interview from Mexico reported that Machos Infiltrados,” DJovenes, March activists on Facebook. they had faced intrusion and Denial of Services 3, 2015, http://djovenes.org/archivo/ analisis-misoginia-en-redes-apologia-del- According to our interviews, online attacks are (DoS) attacks9 against specific websites and feminicidio-y-machos-infiltrados/. Also being carried out by relatives and partners, information portals.10 “La Sangrona,” Catalina Pordios, May 20, 2015, https://catalinapordios.com/tag/ anti-choice or hate groups, organised crime, menstruadora/. Navigating between Visibility, Anonymity, and governments. There is extensive literature 7 “Vigilancia y derechos Humanos,” and Secrecy. Interviewees were aware of the regarding Latin American governments’ Electronic Frontier Foundation, https:// fact that their “misinformed” or “inexpert” use www.eff.org/es/issues/surveillance-human- practices in relation to the monitoring and rights. of ICTs could likely increase the risks they were surveillance of their citizens’ communications.7 8 “Marisol Macías,” Wikipedia, facing. They also explained that, in general, Similarly, the use of ICTs by narcotics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marisol_ their awareness of the existence of methods Mac%C3%ADas. trafficker gangs and cartels to track down their and tools to mitigate or even overcome those 9 “In computing, a denial-of-service (DoS) adversaries has also been documented. For attack is an attempt to make a machine risks did not translate into engaging in safer instance, there are some reported cases of or network resource unavailable to its communication practices among themselves, intended users, such as to temporarily or Mexican women murdered by drug traffickers indefinitely interrupt or suspend services of much less with the women they were who were apparently made visible through a host connected to the Internet.” “Denial- supporting. of-service attack,” Wikipedia, https:// their exposure in social networking platforms.8 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial-of-service_ This was mainly because they lacked support attack. In countries like Argentina, pro-choice activists and resources (e.g., time, money, learning 10 May First/People Link, “Fund Abortion felt that as long as the networks of support, Now Website Targeted by Denial of Service opportunities, and training). As put by one Attack,” Linksunten.Indymedia.org, July 30, and women’s access to abortion, remained interviewee from Chile: “When a woman 2015, https://linksunten.indymedia.org/en/ under the radar, they are safer. The main node/149841. needs to have an abortion, the last thing she attacks they have detected take place when 11 For instance, meet.jitsi vs. Skype, worries about is how she can encrypt emails Firefox vs. Internet Explorer, Cryptocat vs. there are activities that attract public attention or navigate the internet with Tor.” In the same Facebook chat, secure mails vs. corporate on pro-choice arguments and/or there is a mails, Suresport or Signal vs. WhatsApp. way, the pro-choice group from Brazil raised requirement for support and/or resources from the flag that many women who have limited public institutions. internet access need to organise face-to-face However, the strong context of social meetings and screening within community- stigmatisation of pro-choice positions can also based organisations in order to share lead to different forms of attacks. In Argentina, information. there are public escraches: anti-choice groups This situation points at the dilemma of learning who gather information about women who to use safer tools to communicate among the had legal abortion, or pro-choice activists network of pro-choice activists. At the same and their allies, and share those in the public time, they have to undertake new activities domain in order to shame or prosecute them. in order to engage with their target audience There have also been reports of attacks on and through selected safer spaces and safer closing down of places where legal abortions tools that can be as easily accessible and were conducted; and harassment of specific appropriated as the commercial and more doctors in order to pressure them to stop unsafe ones they are currently using.11 performing abortions. In Chile, one respondent noted that “when the abortion hotline was Another challenge deals with the need to reach launched in 2009, their spokespersons faced maximum visibility for accurate information surveillance, harassment, and illegal intrusion around safe abortion and women’s right to of their phones and email. However, they decide over their bodies, and at the same time 40 arrow for change monitoring regional and global activities vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References to make it happen within a context of relative reputation that provides you with trusted and or strong clandestinity. Many interviewees solidarity networks, and at the same time, underlined how complex it was to combine reduce as much as possible the amount of their clandestine endeavours and their choice personal identifiable information that can lead 12 “Time-traveling Robots from the Future,” Vimeo video, 02:25, posted whether or not to remain anonymous. One an adversary to profile, identify, track, and shut by Singularity University, April 8, 2015, interviewee explained, for instance, that you down. https://vimeo.com/124461176. she was fired from her job because of her 13 Metadata is data about your data, When applied to pro-choice activities that personal pro-choice opinions and postings in including how and when you created it, take place online and in the real world, the where you stored or sent it, when and her Facebook personal page. For testimonies where you got online to upload it, and best mitigation measures will likely take place coming from Honduras or Nicaragua, the only more. Most metadata is information that is in safest and more autonomous uses of ICT needed for the basic infrastructure of our option was anonymity. However, in other digital systems to work correctly. in order to publish, share, move information, contexts, many pro-choice activists have coordinate and communicate, and defend become trapped into displaying a visible and against spying and stalking. Hopefully, they will traceable persona, and in many case, they be implemented within a security perspective believe that anonymity is incompatible with that also engages with their physical integrity, defending freedom of expression and opinion, self-care, and psychosocial well-being, and or feel that their online activism must be a provides them with a good understanding of mirror image of their offline activism. the evolving dimensions of privacy and the Another possible layer of risk lies in the politics of data in order to navigate among phenomenon of the “time travel robots,”12 in spyware and utilise other specific apps and which information and metadata13 that are seen platforms that could enhance their safety today as innocuous and not sensitive could online and in real-life situations. become highly problematic in the future if More concretely, there would also be a need new type of businesses, legal frameworks, and to develop specific training and resources criminalisation dynamics took place. so that pro-choice activists can learn how to This risk analysis points at the need to learn explore the deep web anonymously and receive how to remain vocal and visible, maintain a purchased materials in a safe way. There is also a great need for awareness and educational materials that are non text-based, using other [The best mitigation formats and distribution channels to reach out more effectively to undereducated women, measures will hopefully… women with disabilities, and allies living in be] implemented within urban, rural, and remote areas. There is a need a security perspective to support researches and initiatives that can that also engages with create more data and evidence regarding the [activists’] physical impact on women’s mental and physical health integrity, self-care, and of prohibition policies, in countries that do not aggregate data about women morbidity due to psychosocial well-being, unsafe abortions or unwanted pregnancy. and provides them with a good understanding of Finally, more transboundary networks of solidarity should be formed to support the the evolving dimensions technological needs for hosting, mirroring, of privacy and the and distributing contents tackling the current politics of data… situation in Latin American countries.

By Alexandra Hache, Project Coordinator, Tactical Technology Collective, and Mayeli Sanchez Martinez, Accion Directa Autogestiva. Emails: [email protected] and [email protected]. resources arrow for change 41 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

RESOURCES FROM THE ARROW SRHR KNOWLEDGE SHARING CENTRE

ARROW’s SRHR Knowledge Sharing Centre hosts a Shah, Nishant, Puthiya Purayil Sneha, and Sumandro special collection of resources on gender, women’s Chattapadhyay, eds. Digital Activism in Asia Reader. rights, and sexual and reproductive health and rights UK: Meson Press, 2015. http://meson.press/wp- (SRHR). It aims to make critical information on these content/uploads/2015/08/9783957960511-Digital- topics accessible to all. To contact the resource centre, Activism-Asia-Reader.pdf. write to [email protected] or [email protected]. This reader is a compilation of crowd-sourced digital tools, theoretical concepts, policy questions, Internet, Sexuality, and Rights case studies, and political analyses, identified by Finlay, Alan, ed. Global Information Society Watch changemakers in their own practices of digital activism 2015: Sexual Rights and the Internet. USA: APC & in Asia. Hivos, 2015. http://www.giswatch.org/sites/default/ files/gw2015-full-report.pdf. Sexuality Education and Discourses on Sexuality in a Digital Age This comprehensive report produced by Open Societies, Hivos, and Association for Progressive Berry, Chris, Fran Martin, and Audrey Yue. Mobile Communications (APC) adds to the existing discourses Cultures: New Media in Queer Asia. Durham: Duke on how the internet has enabled young people to get University Press, 2003. sexual education by augmenting their access to online This collection of essays provides a snapshot of the resources, how violence and discrimination in the queer cultures in Asia in the age of new media. It offline and online spaces are interlinked, and how the explores how access to mobile technology and the internet has paved the way for the expansion of spaces internet has augmented opportunities for public for collective activism. Through case studies and discourses on sexualities, gender roles, and global country reports, this study also examines the increased and indigenous queer cultures. It also offers a case threats of online surveillance, assaults on human rights against the argument about internet-facilitated “sexual defenders, and the emergence of alternative online imperialism.” economies. Collins, Rebecca L., Steven C. Martino, and Rebecca Kee, Jac sm, ed. ://Erotics—Sex, Rights and the Shaw Rand. “Influence of New Media on Adolescent Internet. South Africa: APC, 2011. https://www.apc. Sexual Health: Evidence and Opportunities.” ASPE. org/en/system/files/EROTICS.pdf. April 2011. https://aspe.hhs.gov/basic-report/ This exploratory research report examines the existing influence-new-media-adolescent-sexual-health- landscape of sexual and internet rights in Brazil, India, evidence-and-opportunities. Lebanon, South Africa, and the USA. It also explores This report examines nine interventions implemented the value that internet brings in the exercise of rights through new media (SMS and internet) to improve by people of diverse sexualities. The report outlines adolescents’ attitudes towards sexual risks. It provides various forms of challenges, threats, and restrictions evidence on the effectiveness and influence of new to the exchange of information and dialogue online and media, and also discusses variables that should be the actors involved. It also identifies key questions for considered while strategising for future interventions. future research in this area. 42 arrow for change resources vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Daneback, Kristian. “Love and Sexuality on the and legislations that women can use against the Internet.” Doctoral dissertation, Goteborg University, perpetrators of VAW in digital spaces. The research 2006. https://gupea.ub.gu.se/handle/2077/10169. series also explores the redressal mechanisms on popular social media websites, including Facebook, This paper provides a comprehensive quantitative and Twitter, and YouTube, as well as domestic legal qualitative analysis of user trends, usage, information- remedies in seven countries—i.e., Bosnia-Herzegovina, seeking patterns, and other arenas that constitute the Colombia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, landscape of sexuality on the internet. It also studies Mexico, Pakistan, and the Philippines. the generational differences and how it affects the ways users engage with different actors in the sexuality Comninos, Alex, and Gareth Seneque. “Cyber landscape on the internet and attempts to find linkages Security, Civil Society and Vulnerability in an Age of between informants’ behaviors online and offline. Communications Surveillance.” Global Information Society Watch, 2014. https://giswatch.org/en/ Access to the Internet—Socioeconomic and Gender communications-surveillance/cyber-security-civil- Divide society-and-vulnerability-age-communications-sur.

Alliance for Affordable Internet. “The 2015-16 Cyber security is becoming increasingly important Affordability Report.” A4AI.org, n.d. http://a4ai.org/ to internet users including stakeholders like civil affordability-report/report/2015/. society, human rights defenders, and activists as they The Alliance for Affordable Internet’s report on Internet become more vulnerable to hack attacks and malware Affordability looks at the policies, investments, and attacks. At the same time, states are employing “cyber infrastructures in place that drive progress towards commands” under the guise of “cyber security” to more accessible and affordable internet. The report increase and strengthen their surveillance capacities. also examines the gender gap with regards to access These technologies are often used to monitor civil to the internet and the “cost to connect” for women. society organisations and to target human rights Lastly, it recommends policy changes to support and defenders and activists which is also a violation of augment women’s effective participation in a growing their rights. This report asks for a radical change in the digital society. discourses around cyber security to ensure that state agencies and corporate units do not violate human “Women’s Rights Online: Translating Access into rights and privacy under the guise of cyber security. Empowerment.” World Wide Web Foundation, October 20, 2015. http://webfoundation.org/about/ Henry, Nicola and Anastasia Powell. “Beyond the research/womens-rights-online-2015/. ‘Sext’: Technology-facilitated Sexual Violence and Harassment against Adult Women.” Australian & New This study by World Wide Web Foundation explores Zealand Journal of Criminology 48, no. 1 (2014): 104- the extent of the gender gap in access to the internet 18. in order to understand the empowering potential of information and communications technology (ICT) Distribution and exchange of sexual images in online as tools against poverty and gender inequality. The spaces in the context of harassment and intimate research provides insights on the gender divide in violence is an emerging trend. This paper examines this accessibility to the internet as a reflection of societal trend and argues that technology-facilitated sexual/ disparities and the interlinkages between the realities intimate violence—such as revenge-porn and non- of offline and online spaces. It also considers the consensual making and exchange of sexual images—is barriers and challenges that must be resolved to often looked at as an issue of victim’s naiveté and not address this gender divide. as a case of violence against women. It also argues that criminal law fails to adequately capture the harm done Being Safe Online by technology-enabled VAW, sexual harassment, and coercion. Association for Progressive Communications. “Online VAW: From Impunity to Justice.” GenderIT.org, Maltzahn, Kathleen. “Digital Dangers: Information n.d. http://www.genderit.org/onlinevaw/. and Communications Technologies and Trafficking in This pioneer research series—conducted under “Take Women.” APC Issue Papers. August 2006. http://www. Back the Tech” campaign—examines the patterns genderit.org/sites/default/upload/digital_dangers_ of violence against women (VAW) in online spaces, EN_1.pdf. its emotional, physical, and psychological impact This report examines the case study of non-consensual on women, and the various redressal mechanisms making of sexually-explicit videos and its distribution resources arrow for change 43 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

through the internet to understand the role technology “Internet Monitor Dashboard.” https://dashboard. plays in virtual trafficking of female bodies. It also thenetmonitor.org/. explores the concept of trafficking of women’s Internet Monitor aims to study the “means, bodies/images in a virtual world, how recruitment mechanisms, and extent of Internet content controls for trafficking is facilitated and/or promoted through and Internet activity around the world” to help new media, and what interventions could be taken to advocates, policy makers, and researchers get a better address these emerging threats. understanding of the internet landscape, its actors, and Nyst, Carly. “Towards Internet Intermediary stakeholders. Internet Monitor is a project of Berkman Responsibility.” GenderIT.org, November 26, 2013. Centre for Internet & Society at Harvard University. http://www.genderit.org/feminist-talk/towards- “Me and My Shadow.” MyShadow.org. https:// internet-intermediary-responsibility. myshadow.org/about. Responses to technology-facilitated and technology- This website helps individuals understand the concept enabled VAW are often defined by the assumptions of digital tracking and its usages. It also provides a about the nature of violence and the conflicts between simple how-to guide to control your digital data traces. addressing VAW and protecting the freedom of expression. This article explores the responsibilities “Why We Post?” https://www.ucl.ac.uk/why-we-post. of intermediaries to address technology-enabled and “Why We Post” is an anthropological study of uses technology-facilitated VAW to ensure that the internet and consequent impacts of social media. A series of remains a safe space for women. three books—open access and free to download—has also been released under this project. How the World Tools for Activists and Human Rights Defenders Changed Social Media provides a summary of key findings of the research project conducted in eight Association for Progressive Communications. countries. It is followed by Social Media in an English “Digital Security First Aid Kit for Human Rights Village and Social Media in Southeast Turkey. Defenders (Second Edition).” APC.org, n.d. https:// www.apc.org/en/irhr/digital-security-first-aid-kit. “Women’s Rights Campaigning—Info-activism Toolkit.” https://womensrights.informationactivism. This is developed by activists for activists to help org/en/about-toolkit. human rights defenders (HRDs) become more secure in the digital landscape. This easy-to-use and simple kit This toolkit provides a guide for women’s rights provides guidance to mitigate security issues that might activists, NGOs, and civil societies around the world put the integrity and privacy of HRD’s communications to digital tools for advocacy and campaigning. This mechanisms under risk. (Summary is adapted from the was produced by Tactical Technology Collective in introduction page of the kit.) collaboration with CREA.

OTHER RESOURCES

Booysen, Tarryn. “Building Women’s Access to Justice: Garcia, Liza S., and Florence Y. Manikan. Gender Technology-related VAW in Law and Corporate Policy.” Violence on the Internet: The Philippine Experience. GenderIT.org, January 10, 2015. http://www.genderit. Report. http://www.genderit.org/sites/default/ org/feminist-talk/building-women-s-access-justice- upload/monograph_finalz.pdf. technology-related-vaw-law-and-corporate-policy. Tactical Technology Collective. “Gender and Tech Datta, Bishaka. “Tangled, Like Wool: Sex, Sexuality Resources.” https://gendersec.tacticaltech.org/wiki/ and the Internet in India.” GenderIT.org. http://www. index.php/Main_Page. genderit.org/articles/tangled-wool-sex-sexuality-and- internet-india. 44 arrow for change resources vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Kee, Jac sm. “Cultivating Violence through Have Sex with Men: A Mixed-Methods Study.” Archives Technology? Exploring the Connection between of Sexual Behavior 40, no. 2 (2010): 289-300. http:// Internet Communication Technologies (ICT) and www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20182787. Violence against Women (VAW).” Technical paper. APC Nwagwu, Williams E. “The Internet as a Source of Women’s Networking Support Programme. April 16, Reproductive Health Information among Adolescent 2005. http://www.genderit.org/sites/default/upload/ Girls in an Urban City in Nigeria.” BMC Public VAW_ICT_EN.pdf. Health 7, no. 1 (2007): 354. http://bmcpublichealth. Kunnuji, Michael. “Risk-bearing Sexuality within the biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2458-7-354. Context of Internet Use among Young People in Lagos Security In-a-box: Tools and Tactics for Digital Metropolis.”45 Inkanyiso: Journal of Humanities and Security.” https://securityinabox.org/en. Social Sciences, no. 2 (2011). http://www.ajol.info/ index.php/ijhss/article/view/74135. Sonenstein, Freya. “The Internet, Teenagers, and Sexual Health Information: A Cautionary Tale.” McLean, Nyx. “Considering the Internet as Enabling Israel Journal of Health Policy Research 1, no. Queer Publics/Counter Publics.” GenderIT.org, 1 (2012): 39. https://ijhpr.biomedcentral.com/ August 19, 2015. http://www.genderit.org/resources/ articles/10.1186/2045-4015-1-39. considering-internet-enabling-queer-publics-counter- publics. UNDP, UNFPA, WHO, and World Bank Special Programme of Research, Development and Research Mitchell, Mia. “The Digital Gender Gap: Training in Human Reproduction (HRP). “The Unleashing the Value of the Internet for Women.” Internet Is an Effective Means of Providing Sex and Kennedy School Review, April 30, 2015. http:// Reproductive Health Education to Young People in harvardkennedyschoolreview.com/the-digital-gender- Shanghai, China.” (Social Science Research Policy gap-unleashing-the-value-of-the-internet-for-women-2/. Briefs WHO/RHR/HRP/06.16). 2006. http://www.who. Mustanski, Brian, Tom Lyons, and Steve C. Garcia. int/reproductivehealth/publications/adolescence/ “Internet Use and Sexual Health of Young Men Who policy_brief_internet/en/.

Compiled by Samreen Shahbaz, Programme Officer, ARROW. Email: [email protected].

SELECTED ARROW RESOURCES Aside from ARROW for Change, which is produced in English and translated strategically in various Asia-Pacific and global languages, ARROW also develops cutting-edge publications. Below are key ARROW publications from the past five years. All resources from 1993 to the present can be downloaded at http://arrow.org.my/publications-overview/.

2014-2016 Various Authors. Country Profile Series on Universal Access to Sexual and Reproductive Various Authors. Call for Action to Integrate Health. Available for Bangladesh, Cambodia, SRHR into the Post-2015 Agenda. Available for China, India, Indonesia, Lao PDR (also available Africa, Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, in Lao), Malaysia, Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan, Lao PDR (in English and Lao), Pakistan, Latin Philippines, and Sri Lanka (available in English, America and the Caribbean (in English and Sinhala, and Tamil). Spanish). resources arrow for change 45 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Various Authors. Country Profile Series on Racherla, Sai Jyothirmai and Nurgul Universal Access to Sexual and Reproductive Dzhanaeva. Country Profile on the Status of Rights. Available for Cambodia, China, India, Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights: Indonesia, Lao PDR (also available in Lao), Kyrgyz Republic. (Also available in Russian.) Malaysia, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Ravindran, TK Sundari. What It Takes: Lanka, and Thailand. Addressing Poverty and Achieving Food Sovereignty, Food Security, and Universal 2016 Access to SRHR. ARROW. Myanmar/Burma Country Study; Turagabeci, Paulini and Bronwyn Tilbury. Breaking Barriers: Advocating SRHR. Pacific Young People’s SRHR Factsheet. ARROW. Stories of Change: Sharing Success Woods, Zonibel. Identifying Opportunities Stories of Women’s Health and Rights for Action on Climate Change and Sexual and Advocacy Partnership – South Asia. Reproductive Health and Rights in Bangladesh, Various Authors. Advocacy Brief on Climate Indonesia and the Philippines. Change and SRHR. Available for Bangladesh, Indonesia (in English and Bahasa Indonesia), 2013 Lao PDR, Malaysia, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, ARROW. (2nd ed.). Sex & Rights: The Status of and the Philippines. Young People’s Sexual & Reproductive Health Various Authors. Scoping Study on Climate & Rights in Southeast Asia. Change and SRHR. Available for Bangladesh, Ravindran, TK Sundari. An Advocates’ Guide: Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Nepal, Pakistan, Strategic Indicators for Universal Access to and the Philippines. Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights. 2015 Thanenthiran, Sivananthi, Sai Jyothirmai Racherla, and Suloshini Jahanath. Reclaiming Varma, Ambika with Kumar Das. Sexuality: and Redefining Rights: ICPD+20 Status of SRHR Critical to Addressing Poverty and Food in Asia-Pacific. Insecurity. Various Authors. Reclaiming & Redefining 2014 Rights—Setting the Adolescent and Young People SRHR Agenda beyond ICPD+20. ARROW. Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights in the Post-2015 Agenda: Taking Their 2012 Rightful Place. (Avail. in Bangla, Hindi & Tamil) ARROW. Thematic Papers Presented at the ARROW. Sexual and Reproductive Health “Beyond ICPD and MDGs: NGOs Strategising and Rights beyond 2014: Opportunities and for Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights Challenges. in Asia-Pacific Region” and “Opportunities for NGOs at National, Regional and International ARROW. Setting the Adolescent and Young Levels in the Asia-Pacific Region in the Lead-up People SRHR Agenda beyond ICPD+20. to 2014: NGO-UNFPA Dialogue for Strategic ARROW. ICPD+20 Asia Youth Factsheet. Engagement.” ARROW. Fulfilling Women’s Right to Continuum ARROW. The Essences of an Innovative of Quality Care. Programme for Young People in South East Asia. ARROW. ARROW Resource Kit on Leadership and Management. ARROW. Proceedings of the Regional Meetings “Beyond ICPD and MDGs: NGOs Strategising ARWC & ARROW. Our Stories, One Journey: for Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights The Travelling Journal on Sexual and in Asia-Pacific Region” and “Opportunities for Reproductive Health and Rights. NGOs at National, Regional and International Awin, Narimah. Taking a Broader View: Levels in the Asia-Pacific Region in the Lead-up Addressing Maternal Health in the Context of to 2014: NGO-UNFPA Dialogue for Strategic Food and Nutrition Security and Poverty. Engagement.” 46 arrow for change resources vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References ARROW. Leadership Experiences of Young Marin, Maria Lourdes S. International Women in South East Asia: Reflections on Labour Migration, Gender, and Sexual and Advancing Young People’s SRHR Agenda. Reproductive Health and Rights in East Asia, Southeast Asia and the Pacific. ARROW. Kuala Lumpur Call to Action: Beyond ICPD and MDGs. Raghuram, Shobha. Reclaiming & Redefining Rights—Thematic Studies Series 5: Poverty, ARROW & World Diabetes Foundation (WDF). Food Security, Sexual and Reproductive Health Diabetes: A Missing Link to Achieving Sexual and Rights—Integrating and Reinforcing State and Reproductive Health in the Asia-Pacific Responsibilities, Integrating Societal Action. Region. DEFINITIONS

1 Office of the Special Rapporteur Access: “The principle of universal access phenomenon, and particularly datasets for Freedom of Expression, and the Inter-American Commission on Human refers to the need to guarantee connectivity that can be linked, merged and analysed in Rights, “Freedom of Expression and the and access to the Internet infrastructure combination…. [I]t may be more relevant Internet,” 2013, 7-8, accessed July 11, 2016, http://www.oas.org/en/iachr/ and other ICT services that is universal, to define big data as involving a process of expression/docs/reports/2014_04_08_ ubiquitous, equitable, truly affordable, and of analysis that characterises the data involved as Internet_ENG%20_WEB.pdf. adequate quality, all throughout the State’s big, rather than as a particular size of product. 2 “Big Data,” IT Glossary, accessed July 11, 2016, http://www.gartner.com/ territory…” This means, amongst others, Thus big data could be seen more as a verb it-glossary/big-data/. putting in “measures that ensure that price than a noun, and more as a process than an 3 Jennifer Dutcher, “What Is Big structures are inclusive in order to facilitate object.”5,6 Data?,” September 3, 2014, accessed July 11, 2016, https://datascience. access; that connectivity extends throughout berkeley.edu/what-is-big-data/. the States territory, in order to effectively Censorship vis-à-vis Right to Freedom 4 See an infographic of big data here: promote access for rural users and marginal of Expression and Right to Information: http://www.ibmbigdatahub.com/ “The Universal Declaration on Human Rights infographic/four-vs-big-data. communities; that communities have access to (UDHR)7 and the International Covenant on 5 Bellagio Big Data Workshop information technology and communications Participants, “Big Data and Positive centers and other options for public access; Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) guarantee Social Change in the Developing World: the right to freedom of expression, both in A White Paper for Practitioners and and that efforts for training and education are Researchers” (Oxford: Oxford Internet reinforced, especially for poor, rural and older Article 19. Freedom of expression is not only Institute, 2014), accessed July 11, 2016, important in its own right but is also essential https://www.rockefellerfoundation. segments of the population. Universal access 8 org/app/uploads/Big-Data-and-Positive- also places a priority on ensuring equitable if other human rights are to be achieved.” Social-Change-in-the-Developing-World. Article 19 of UDHR says: “Everyone has the pdf. access when it comes to gender, as well as right to freedom of opinion and expression; 6 For a short video explaining what inclusive access for disabled individuals and/ big data is, refer to: “Big Data,” Privacy or individuals belonging to marginalised this right includes freedom to hold opinions International, accessed July 11, 2016, 1 without interference and to seek, receive and https://privacyinternational.org/ communities.” node/572. impart information and ideas through any 9 7 United Nations, “Universal Big Data: The corporate definition is “high- media and regardless of frontiers.” “The Declaration of Human Rights,” accessed right to freedom of expression belongs to July 11, 2016, http://www.un.org/en/ volume, high-velocity and/or high-variety universal-declaration-human-rights/. information assets that demand cost-effective, everyone. No distinctions are permitted on 8 “Freedom of Expression,” Article 19, innovative forms of information processing the basis of someone’s level of education, accessed July 11, 2016, https://www. race, colour, sex, language, religion, political article19.org/pages/en/freedom-of- that enable enhanced insight, decision making, expression.html. and process automation.”2 However, “others or other opinion, national or social origin, 10 9 United Nations, “Universal argue that it’s not the size of data that counts, , birth or any other status.” [Editors: Declaration of Human Rights.” but the tools being used or the insights that Other bases for non-discrimination are age, 10 “Freedom of Expression,” Article 19. can be drawn from the dataset.”3 A fourth V— disability, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender veracity—to refer to the uncertainty of data identity and expression, health status, and has also been added as a dimension.4 Some citizenship and migration status, amongst activists, practitioners, and researchers looking others.] at using big data for positive social change “The right to impart information and ideas proposes a redefinition as follows: “[Big data] is the most obvious aspect of freedom of refers to digital datasets of unprecedented expression. It is the right to tell others what size in relation to a particular question or one thinks or knows in private or via the definitions arrow for change 47 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

media. But freedom of expression serves on combating sexual violence, sharing Notes & References a larger purpose. It enables every person knowledge and information on sexuality to access as wide a range of information and building communities such as for the and viewpoints as possible. Known as LGBTIQ communities where homosexuality is the right to information, this includes: prohibited by law or culture, and expressing 11 “Freedom of Expression,” Article 19. reading newspapers, listening to public one’s own sexuality on one’s own terms. 12 APC, “Media Brief from the APC: Censorship, Sexuality and the Internet,” debates, watching the television, surfing the However, often, these are also regulated and accessed July 11, 2016, https://www.apc. internet, and accessing information held by censored, resulting in “banning and blocking org/en/node/10262. public authorities. The right to information of sites by governments—directly or through 13 Ibid. has emerged as a new right, distinct but the encouragement of blacklists censorship of 14 For an easy-to-understand video on how internet filtering works, see: “How Internet inseparable from the right to freedom of material by internet service providers (ISPs)— Filtering Works,” accessed July 11, 2016, expression.”11 who take down content that goes against https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAUH 5MbXc94&feature=youtu.be. their ‘terms of use’; over-reliance on technical However, freedom of expression can be 15 William H. Dutton, Anna Dopatka, solutions like content filtering by key word— Michael Hills, Ginette Law, and Victoria limited. One way is through censorship, which which notoriously fail to distinguish between Nash. Freedom of Connection, Freedom is “the use of power by the State or other of Expression: The Changing Legal and different types of sexual content, such as those Regulatory Ecology Shaping the Internet entity to control the freedom of expression. mentioned above; technical blunders—leaving (Paris: UNESCO, 2011), 84, accessed July Censorship is any intent to prohibit access to 11, 2016, http://unesdoc.unesco.org/ swathes of the population unable to use the images/0019/001915/191594e.pdf. information, viewpoints or diverse forms of internet; and governments and groups using 16 APC, “Media Brief from the APC.” expression.”12 moral arguments to approve censorship.”17 17 Ibid. Some forms of online censorship are content regulation, filtering, and website blocking: It must be noted that Content regulation is “the ways the free flow “the principal reason of information on the internet is controlled. Regulation takes many forms and is imposed by [for censorship] cited by different people—governments (e.g., through governments across all laws), the private sector (e.g., through ‘terms geopolitical spectrums of use’ and contractual agreements), the has been sex—or ‘harmful technical community (e.g., through standards sexual content.’” There are and protocols), and individuals (e.g., through 13 a variety of sexual content installation of filtering software on PCs).” available online that cannot In internet filtering,14 “a government, an ISP, be considered ‘harmful,’ a company, or a parent can install software, including information about either on a personal computer at home or on a server in an organisation that restricts content sexual health, information to users. A filter can screen particular words, on reproductive health and email addresses, websites, or other addresses contraception, sexuality and be used, for example, if a country wishes education for young people, to prevent users within its borders from seeing networks on combating a particular news site online.”15 sexual violence, sharing Website blocking “works by blocking a knowledge and information computer access to a particular internet on sexuality and building address. The user may receive a ‘Site not 16 communities such as for found’ message.” the LGBTIQ communities It must be noted that “the principal reason where homosexuality [for censorship] cited by governments is prohibited by law or across all geopolitical spectrums has been sex—or ‘harmful sexual content.’” There are culture, and expressing a variety of sexual content available online one’s own sexuality on that cannot be considered ‘harmful,’ including one’s own terms. However, information about sexual health, information often, these are also on reproductive health and contraception, regulated and censored... sexuality education for young people, networks 48 arrow for change vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References “The position in international law can be major international and regional human summarised as follows: Although the right rights instruments,” including Article 12 to freedom of expression does not require of the the United Nations Declaration of an absolute ban on prior censorship, this Human Rights (UDHR) 1948, Article 17 of the should be a highly exceptional measure, taken International Covenant on Civil and Political 18 “Censorship, Violence & Press only when a publication threatens grave Rights (ICCPR) 1966, Article 14 of the United Freedom,” Article 19, accessed July 11, 2016, https://www.article19.org/pages/en/ harm, such as loss of life or serious harm to Nations Convention on Migrant Workers, censorship-violence-press-freedom-more. health, safety, or the environment. An article Article 16 of the UN Convention on the Rights html. deemed defamatory, blasphemous, obscene of the Child, Article 10 of the African Charter 19 William H. Dutton, et al., Freedom of Connection, Freedom of Expression, page or overly critical of the government would on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, 84. Freedom of Connection, Freedom of rarely if ever meet this threshold. Moreover, Article 4 of the African Union Principles on Expression, 84. a system whereby media content must be Freedom of Expression (the right of access 20 “Governance and ,” Article 19, accessed July 11, 2016, https://www. officially cleared before it can be released to information), Article 11 of the American article19.org/pages/en/governance- would be unacceptable; its harm to freedom Convention on Human Rights, Article 5 of the democracy.html. of expression would plainly far outweigh the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties 21 “Net Neutrality,” Wikipedia, accessed July 11, 2016, https://en.wikipedia.org/ benefit to its goals.”18 of Man, Articles 16 and 21 of the Arab Charter wiki/Net_neutrality. on Human Rights, Article 21 of the ASEAN Internet Governance: “The development 22 “Net Neutrality: What You Need to Know Human Rights Declaration, and Article 8 of the Now,” Save the Internet, accessed July 11, and application by governments, the private 2016, http://www.savetheinternet.com/ European Convention on Human Rights. “Over sector, and civil society of shared principles net-neutrality-what-you-need-know-now. 130 countries have constitutional statements and rules that shape the evolution and use 23 To easily understand why net neutrality regarding the protection of privacy, in every is important, see: “A Guide to an Open of the Internet.”19 “Essential to democracy Internet,” accessed July 11, 2016, http:// region of the world.” www.theopeninter.net/. and governance are open debate, the sharing 24 “What Is Privacy,” Privacy International, of ideas, and the opportunity to take part in “An important element of the right to privacy accessed July 11, 2016, https:// decisionmaking.”20 is the right to protection of personal data. privacyinternational.org/node/54. While the right to data protection can be 25 To understand what is privacy and why Net Neutrality: “[T]he principle that Internet inferred from the general right to privacy, some it is so important, see this video: “What Is service providers and governments should Privacy?,” accessed July 11, 2016, https:// international and regional instruments also privacyinternational.org/node/568. treat all data on the Internet the same, not stipulate a more specific right to protection of discriminating or charging differentially by personal data, including: the OECD’s Guidelines user, content, site, platform, application, on the Protection of Privacy and Transborder type of attached equipment, or mode of Flows of Personal Data, the Council of Europe communication.”21 Net neutrality is key to Convention 108 for the Protection of Individuals having an open internet. “It means that with Regard to the Automatic Processing of Internet service providers should provide us Personal Data, a number of European Union with open networks—and should not block Directives and its pending Regulation, and the or discriminate against any applications or European Union Charter of Fundamental Rights, content that ride over those networks. Just as the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) your phone company shouldn’t decide who you Privacy Framework 2004, and the Economic can call and what you say on that call, your ISP Community of West African States has a shouldn’t be concerned with the content you Supplementary Act on data protection from view or post online. Without Net Neutrality, 2010. Over 100 countries now have some form cable and phone companies could carve the of privacy and data protection law.” Internet into fast and slow lanes. An ISP could slow down its competitors’ content or block And yet, in today’s technological world, political opinions it disagreed with. ISPs could “Increasingly institutions are subjecting people charge extra fees to the few content companies to surveillance, and excluding us from being that could afford to pay for preferential involved in decisions about how our lives are treatment—relegating everyone else to a slower interfered with, our information processed, our tier of service.”22,23 bodies scrutinised, our possessions searched… [I]n order for individuals to participate in Privacy and Data Privacy:24,25 “Privacy is the modern world, developments in laws a qualified, fundamental human right. The and technologies must strengthen and not right to privacy is articulated in all of the undermine the ability to freely enjoy this right.”

Compiled by Maria Melinda Ando, Senior Programme Officer, Asian-Pacific Resource and Research Centre for Women (ARROW). Email: [email protected]. Twitter: @MalynAndo. factfile arrow for change 49 vol. 22 no. 1 2016 Access, Legislation, and Online Freedom of Expression: A Data Overview

This edition’s FactFile will combine tables, countries face when accessing information Notes & References numbers, graphics, and text that will answer online about sexual health and sexuality. the question: Do young people in the Asia and The data available in this factfile allows readers the Pacific region up to the age of 25 have to examine the intersections between online access to comprehensive information about 1 “Pakistan Blocks Access to Teen Sex-Ed access and sexuality education, which helps Site,” The Express Tribune, March 20, 2012, sex, sexuality, and sexual health online and via explore different mechanisms needed to http://tribune.com.pk/story/352222/ mobile phones? pakistan-blocks-access-to-sex-ed-site/. provide a safe and private online space for the 2 “Vietnam,” Threatened Voices, accessed We have compiled data from 10 countries youth that are increasingly resorting to the March 21, 2016, http://threatened. within the region: Bangladesh, China, India, internet to find information. globalvoicesonline.org/bloggers/vietnam. Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Pakistan, the 3 “Vietnam,” Freedom House, accessed The data addresses the commonly-held March 21, 2016, https://freedomhouse.org/ Philippines, South Korea (Republic of Korea), report/freedom-net/2015/vietnam. belief that access to the internet gives young and Vietnam (see Table 1). The data focuses on people information about sexuality and sexual the following areas: health, particularly in countries where social •• Access to information through technical taboos and strict regulations are in place. infrastructure: This includes internet and Access to the internet and mobile devices has mobile penetration in addition to 3G and 4G had an impact on how the youth across the access. It also includes data about internet globe can obtain information about sex and users under the age of 25 in each country. sexuality. This, in theory, can make it easier to circumvent social restrictions around this sensitive topic. While young people in a number of countries in However, our data indicates that general restrictions from governments on content and the Asia and the Pacific infrastructure can restrict access to particular region enjoy high access content. While young people in a number of rate to the internet, their countries in the Asia and the Pacific region access to information enjoy high access rate to the internet, their on sexual health and access to information on sexual health and sexuality can be restricted sexuality can be restricted by government policies. Content restrictions, alongside by government policies. government surveillance and educational policies, can put into question what young •• Freedom of expression: This looks at people have access to. cases of filtering and censorship in various Such is the case in Pakistan where laws countries, including regulation around online banning pornographic sites meant that a sex content and a country’s laws on user data education site directed towards teenagers was privacy or lack thereof. blocked as well.1 Vietnam has national policies •• Policy and regulation around SRHR: This that promote education on sexual health offers information on each country’s and HIV; however, their extreme restriction laws and policies regarding sex/sexuality on online content and threats to bloggers,2 education, abortion, and sexual orientation. including their low “Freedom on the Net”3 rating, can translate into a severe limitation of The countries selected offer diversity in access to information accessed online. connectivity and infrastructure, government control, and policies towards sexual education. It is noteworthy that majority of the countries This diversity highlights the different challenges featured in this FactFile (with the exception of the young people in Asia and the Pacific South Korea and Malaysia) have educational 50 arrow for change factfile vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References policies that include specific references to online, one which inhibits content, particularly sex education and/or education about HIV.4 content that is viewed as offensive or a taboo. Nevertheless, a country’s national policies on On the other hand, the data reveals the sex education are not necessarily reflective of Philippines and Japan to be exemplary what SRHR information the youth under the age countries, both having a significantly high of 25 can access online; more so when country 4 “Review of Policies and Strategies to rate of internet access, have passed data Implement and Scale up Sexuality Education policies on sexual health do not match those of in Asia and the Pacific,” UNESCO, accessed privacy laws, and the Philippines have passed the educational policies. As a result, a thorough March 22, 2016, http://unesdoc.unesco. policies on sexuality education as well. org/images/0021/002150/215091e.pdf. and updated study of a country’s policies on Taking this information into account, it is 5 ARROW, “Sexual and sexual health rights, such as those referenced in Reproductive Rights Indicators,” important to further explore the ways that ARROW’s SRHR Database of Indicators,5 would n.d., http://www.srhrdatabase. SRHR organisations cater to young people org/?p=indicators&content=SEXUAL-AND- benefit advocacy groups in their work to increase REPRODUTIVE-RIGHTS. in countries where they enjoy a free and access to SRHR content online and to protect 6 “Freedom on the Net 2015,” Freedom safe online environment to access SRHR those who access it, particularly young people. House, https://freedomhouse.org/report/ information. This includes exploring the freedom-net/freedom-net-2015. All countries examined here maintain a variety platforms used to spread information, the type 7 Glenn Greenwald, “New Study Shows Mass Surveillance Breeds Meekness, of restrictions on online content, and in of information being accessed, and how young Fear and Self-Censorship,” The Intercept, particular, restrictions over sexual content such people interact with it. April 28, 2016, https://theintercept. com/2016/04/28/new-study-shows-mass- as pornography. Censoring online content via surveillance-breeds-meekness-fear-and-self- filtering or surveillance, takedown requests, censorship/. …it is important to further and the laws that ban pornography are 8 Dave Smith, “Internet Blackout in Malaysia: Netizens Protest Evidence Act significant enough to highly restrict information explore the ways that SRHR Amendment S114A,” International Business related to sexual health and sexuality in certain organisations cater to young Times, accessed March 20, 2016, http:// www.ibtimes.com/internet-blackout- countries across Asia and the Pacific, as in the people in countries where malaysia-netizens-protest-evidence-act- above-mentioned case in Pakistan. amendment-s114a-743134. they enjoy a free and safe 9 Scott Oliver, “Catching Up with Countries such as China, India, Pakistan, and online environment to Malaysia’s Renegade Sex Bloggers,” Vice, accessed June 7, 2016, https://www.vice. Vietnam lack user data privacy laws, which in access SRHR information. com/read/catching-up-with-malaysias- many cases enable government surveillance.6 fugitive-sex-blogger-777. This includes exploring the Considered as an erosion of digital freedom, platforms used to spread many recent studies have drawn a link information, the type of between the role state mass surveillance plays on citizen’s self-censorship and access to information being accessed, information.7 As a result, the lack of privacy and how young people and data privacy laws can lead to citizens interact with it. In countries avoiding sites or information that might be where surveillance considered controversial by both society and and censorship is more the governments. common, it is imperative The data also reveals country examples, such for women’s rights, youth, as Bangladesh, where citizens are entitled and SRHR organisations to privacy but have no particular law that to create safe spaces online addresses data privacy. The resulting absence within the legal framework can pose a risk just as they do offline. to people’s online privacy. Malaysia, on the other hand, passed data privacy laws in 2010, In countries where surveillance and censorship but holds bloggers and sites responsible for is more common, it is imperative for women’s the content they post.8 With a Malaysian rights, youth, and SRHR organisations to create ban on pornography and content around safe spaces online just as they do offline. It sexuality, bloggers and content providers is also under these circumstances that tech may be prosecuted for content interpreted by companies can play a supportive role by the government as pornographic or sexual in providing privacy and protection for their nature.9 The obscurity in data privacy laws, users. These spaces will allow young people to adding to the corporate, state, and societal access accurate information on SRHR and for surveillance, can lead to a hostile environment self-expression.

By Dalia Othman, Project Coordinator, Tactical Technology Collective. Email: [email protected]. factfile arrow for change 51 vol. 22 no. 1 2016 Vietnam 52% 4% 3 5 Million 143 155.9 24.90% NA 81.00% No 76 South Korea South 85.7% 93% 109 (2015) 4 Million 57.1 112.2 28% 71.40% NA No 34

Philippines 43.5 % 1% 360 4 Million 118.6 118.8 42.50% 3.30% NA Yes 27 Pakistan 17.8% 0% 50 (2014) 9 Million 127.9 66.7 15.20% 0.80% NA Yes 69 Malaysia 68.6% 27% 2 8 Million 42.5 143.8 53.10% 10.90% 73.00% No 43 Japan 91.1% 83% 12 5 Million 173.3 133.9 40.10% 57.40% 15.00% No 22 Indonesia

20.4 % 2% 300 7 Million 327.9 125.1 34.50% 1.50% 77.00% Yes 42 India 34.8% 3% 10 major ISPS 129 amongst 12 Billion 1 76.7 13.30% 0.10% 37% (2013) Yes* 40 Table 1. Access Information, to SRHR, LegislationTable on in 10 Expression Asian Online Freedom of and Countries China 52.2% 20% 20 3 Billion 1.3 95.6 34.5% 23.20% 30.00% No 88 Bangladesh 13.2% NA 61 (2014) 8 Million 133 82.3 10.40% 0.50% NA Yes 51 17 14 16 18 10 15 19 13 12 11 20 3G 4G free Mobile Mobile Mobile Mobile Countries Adoption Broadband Broadband Providers Percentage Percentage Operators Freedom on on Freedom Population FreeBasics Connections Connections as % of Total the Internet the the Internet the the Net (2015 Connected to to Connected to Connected of Population Population of Connections Connections Connections Percentage of most free and Countries that that Countries 100 being least least being 100 Youth under 25 Internet Service Have Facebook’s Facebook’s Have report) —0 being * India had FreeBasics until it was banned by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of (TRAI). 52 arrow for change factfile vol. 22 no. 1 2016 Vietnam 31 Vietnam Internet (VNNIC), Center Ministry of and Information MinistryCulture, of Public Security, and the Ministry of Sports, and Culture, tracks that Tourism and explicit sexually violent content Yes No. There have been FinFisher reports of software. NA 36 30 South Korea South Korea Communications Commission Yes Yes. The Personal Information Act. Protection 6 (The content is linked online to gaming.) 29 Philippines National National Telecommunications Commission, and Information Communication Office, Technology Computer National the and Center, Telecommunications Office (Cybersex)Yes 2012 Yes. “A Privacy Data established Act for parameters collectionthe of financial personal information and an privacy independent regulator.” NA Pakistan

28 35 Pakistan Pakistan Telecommunication (PTA) Authority Yes Surveillance No. is Pakistan in issue an (FinFisher). NA Malaysia 27 Malaysian Malaysian Communications Multimedia and Commission under (MCMC) Ministrythe of Information, Communications, Cultureand Yes Yes. The Malaysian Data Personal Protection Act of 2010. NA 26 Japan Management and and Management Coordination Agency Law bans child pornography Yes. There is some protection of data. NA Indonesia 25 Ministry of Ministry of Communication Information and Technology Indonesia and Telecommunication Body Regulatory (BRTI) Yes Some. NA 24 India 34 The Ministry of Communications Information and and Technology Telecom the Regulatory India of Authority (TRAI) child Prohibits pornography; attempts to block sites pornography have been met with a backlash SurveillanceNo. under permitted is and Telegraph the the IT Acts. 15,155 China 23 Several including including Several Council State Office,Information SIIO, and Central Internet Security Information and Group Leading Yes No. Many laws undermine data such privacy real-name as creating policy, etc. backdoors, Facebook (Note: 5 is blocked in China.) 22 Bangladesh The Bangladesh Bangladesh The Telecommunication Regulatory (BTRC) Commission Yes According Article to 43 of the country’s constitution, Bangladesh its recognises right citizens’ and privacy to correspondence. However, there is privacy specific no protection data or Bangladesh. in law NA 21 32 33 Online Online 2015) Policy Content Content Bodies Internet Internet Facebook Facebook Countries Protection Protection Regulatory Regulatory (first half of Restrictions Restrictions Law Banning Data Privacy Pornography factfile arrow for change 53 vol. 22 no. 1 2016 Vietnam 1 Decriminalised Allowed on all legal grounds Yes Yes South Korea South 141 Decriminalised Allowed on all legal grounds No No Philippines 1 Decriminalised Allowed save to a woman’s life Yes Yes

Pakistan

0 Criminalised Allowed save to a woman’s life; to preserve a woman’s physical health; to preserve a woman’s health mental Yes Yes

Malaysia 1 Criminalised Allowed save to a woman’s life; to preserve a woman’s physical health; to preserve a woman’s health mental No No

Japan 93 Decriminalised Allowed save to the life of the woman; preserve to health; physical in case of rape or incest; or in case of social or economic reasons Unclear Unclear Indonesia

8 criminalised, Not but with exceptions certainto areas Islamic follow that Sharia Law Allowed save to a woman’s life; in case of rape or incest No Yes India 227 Criminalised Allowed save to a woman’s life; preserveto a physicalwoman’s preserve to health; a woman’s mental health; in case of incest; or rape because of foetal impairment; for social or economic reasons Yes Yes China

Decriminalised Allowed on all grounds legal Yes Yes 9 Bangladesh 0 Criminalised Allowed save to a woman’s life Yes No 38 37 41 40 39 Total Sector Sector Law on Law on Includes Includes National a Specific Specific a Education Countries Takedown Takedown Abortion Education about HIV about Requests to to Requests Education in Government Government Google (first (first Google Reference to to Reference half of 2015) Strategies that Include Specific Specific Include Laws or Policies Homosexuality Reference Sex to 54 arrow for change factfile vol. 22 no. 1 2016 49 Vietnam In 2012, Vietnam Internet the passed Law Censorship (Decree The 72). law restricts content posted online by users or bloggers on social media; it all requires that also companies foreign the with comply government on take request.down South Korea South 48 Philippines The PhilippinesThe more enjoys in freedom terms of blocked content online. similar However, Southto Korea, the government has sought to adultery the block Ashley website Madison. 47 Pakistan Banning Banning sites, pornography requested PTA the of blocking the Scarleteen, a site that offers sex education for teenagers. 46 Malaysia Malaysian netizens netizens Malaysian an organised internet Blackout day in 2012 to protest the Evidence Act which amendment places any host of online content liable for the content that is their on posted site. This threatens the safety of bloggers or hosts of online content deemed is that the by problematic state. Japan 45 Indonesia Indonesia passed a a passed Indonesia law that bans online in pornography 2008. In 2012, the Ministry Indonesian Communications of the requested banning of the Gay International Human Lesbian and Commission Rights website for containing pornography. 44 India According to the the to According India’s Index, governing bodies control that the internet extreme practise on censorship levels. multiple Much of the content is linked to and/ pornography extreme speech. or However, the rate of takedown and requests alarming is filtering raises and about questions access Indians’ informationto online. ht tps:// . One China 43 China is known to “Great the deploy filter to Firewall” online censor and content. and sites For a better idea of the rate of sites blocked in refer please China, ProPublica’sto project: projects. propublica.org/ firewall is study case Chinese when pulled authorities web- gay-themed a drama offline in 2016. 42 Bangladesh Bangladesh has has Bangladesh moved censor to sites of number a social including media platforms Facebook. as such censorship vast The of online content including pornographic can content result in a severe of limitation SRHR information online. Cases of Countries written out) written Filtering (partly (partly Filtering arrow for change 55 vol. 22 no. 1 2016

Notes & References

10 “Internet Users,” Internet Live Stats, 27 “Over 1,000 Porn Sites Barred in 40 “UNESCO, Review of Policies and accessed March 22, 2016, http://www. Malaysia, Minister Says,” The Malay Mail Strategies to Implement and Scale up internetlivestats.com/internet-users/. Online, November 10, 2015, accessed July Sexuality Education in Asia and the Pacific 4, 2016, http://www.themalaymailonline. (Bangkok: UNESCO, 2012), accessed March 11 “Broadband Connections,” Internet com/malaysia/article/over-1000-porn- 21, 2016, http://unesdoc.unesco.org/ Monitor Dashboard, accessed March 21, sites-barred-in-malaysia-minister-says. images/0021/002150/215091e.pdf. 2016, https://dashboard.thenetmonitor.org. 28 Ashley Cowburn, “Porn Sites Targeted 41 Ibid. 12 “Freedom on the Net 2015,” Freedom in Major Crackdown by Pakistan House. 42 Damaris Colhoun, “Social Media Authorities,” The Independent, January 26, Censorship in Bangladesh Hints at Long- 13 “Mobile Operators,” GSMA Intelligence, 2016, accessed July 4, 2016, http://www. Term Problems for Publishers,” Columbia accessed March 21, 2016, https://www. independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/ Journalism Review, December 2, 2015, gsmaintelligence.com/. pakistan-launches-major-pornography- accessed July 4, 2016, http://www.cjr.org/ crackdown-and-provides-list-of-400000- 14 “Mobile Connections Per Country,” analysis/bangladesh_social_media.php. adult-websites-to-be-a6834176.html. GSMA Intelligence, accessed March 21, 43 Lilian Lin and Chang Chen, “China’s 2016, https://www.gsmaintelligence.com/. 29 “Philippines Outlaws Cybersex and ‘Cam Censors Take Another Gay-Themed Girls,’” BBC News, September 20, 2012, 15 “Mobile Connections,” Internet Monitor Web Drama Offline,”The Wall Street accessed July 4, 2016, http://www.bbc. Dashboard, accessed March 21, 2016, Journal, February 24, 2016, accessed com/news/technology-19659801. https://dashboard.thenetmonitor.org. July 4, 2016, http://blogs.wsj.com/ 30 Tim Worstall, “South Korea Attempts chinarealtime/2016/02/24/chinas-censors- 16 “3G Connections,” Internet Monitor to Ban Online Porn: Emptying the Ocean take-another-gay-themed-web-drama- Dashboard, accessed March 21, 2016, with a Bucket,” Forbes, December 10, offline/. https://dashboard.thenetmonitor.org. 2012, accessed July 4, 2016, http://www. 44 Melody Patry, “India: Digital Freedom 17 “4G Connections,” Internet Monitor forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2012/12/10/ Under Threat? Online Censorship,” Index, Dashboard, accessed March 21, 2016, south-korea-attempts-to-ban-online-porn- November 21, 2013, accessed July 4, https://dashboard.thenetmonitor.org. emptying-the-ocean-with-a-bucket. 2016, https://www.indexoncensorship. 18 “Statistics and Market Data,” Statista, 31 “Internet Filtering in Vietnam in 2005- org/2013/11/india-online-report-freedom- accessed March 28, 2016, https://www. 2006: A Country Study,” The Open Net expression-digital-freedom-1/. statista.com. Initiative, accessed July 4, 2016, https:// 45 “Indonesia Labels LGBT Rights opennet.net/studies/vietnam. 19 “Where We’ve Launched,” Internet.org, Advocacy Site Pornographic,” OutRight March 23, 2016, https://info.internet.org/ 32 “Freedom on the Net 2015,” Freedom Action International, February 7, 2012, en/story/where-weve-launched/. House. accessed July 4, 2016, https://www. outrightinternational.org/content/iglhrc- 20 “Freedom on the Net 2015: Table of 33 “Government Requests Report 2015,” website-banned. Country Scores,” Freedom House, accessed Facebook, accessed March 24, 2016, March 21, 2016, https://freedomhouse.org/ https://govtrequests.facebook.com/. 46 Dave Smith, “Internet Blackout in report/freedom-net-2015/table-country- Malaysia: Netizens Protest Evidence 34 David Cohen, “Facebook: Government scores. Act Amendment S114A,” International Content Restriction Requests Double Business Times, August 14, 2012, accessed 21 “Freedom on the Net 2015,” Freedom in First Half of 2015,” Social Times, July 4, 2016, http://www.ibtimes.com/ House. November 12, 2015, accessed July internet-blackout-malaysia-netizens-protest- 4, 2016, http://www.adweek.com/ 22 Shahzeb Jillani, “Bangladesh Cabinet evidence-act-amendment-s114a-743134. socialtimes/global-government-requests- Approves Anti-Pornography Law,” BBC report-1h-2015/629857. 47 “Pakistan Blocks Access to Teen Sex-Ed News, January 2, 2012, accessed July 4, Site,” The Express Tribune, March 20, 2012, 2016, http://www.bbc.com/news/world- 35 Sajjad Haider, “10-Fold Increase accessed July 4, 2016, http://tribune.com. asia-16385812. in Facebook Content Restrictions for pk/story/352222/pakistan-blocks-access- Pakistan,” Dawn, November 5, 2014, 23 Christopher Beam, “They Know It When to-sex-ed-site/. accessed July 4, 2016, http://www.dawn. They See It: Is All Pornography Banned in com/news/1142431. 48 AFP, “Philippines Seeks to Block Ashley China?” Slate, June 24, 2009, accessed July Madison Adultery Website,” Yahoo News, 4, 2016, http://www.slate.com/articles/ 36 Jeff Grubb, “South Korea Blocks All November 30, 2014, accessed July 4, 2016, news_and_politics/explainer/2009/06/ Facebook Games as Part of a Government http://www.ibtimes.com/internet-blackout- they_know_it_when_they_see_it.html. Crackdown,” Venture Beat, September malaysia-netizens-protest-evidence-act- 2, 2014, accessed July 4, 2016, http:// 24 Nadia Khomami, “India Lifts Ban on amendment-s114a-743134. venturebeat.com/2014/09/02/south-korea- Internet Pornography after Criticism,” The blocks-all-facebook-games-as-part-of-a- 49 Eva Galperin and Maira Sutton, Guardian, August 5, 2015, accessed July government-crackdown/. “Vietnam’s Internet Censorship Bill Goes 4, 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/ Into Effect,” Electronic Frontier Foundation, culture/2015/aug/05/india-lifts-ban-on- 37 “Google Transparency Report 2015,” September 10, 2013, accessed July 4, 2016, internet-pornography-after-criticisms. Google, accessed March 24, 2016, https:// https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2013/09/ www.google.com/transparencyreport/ 25 “Indonesia Bans Tumblr over Porn,” BBC vietnams-internet-censorship-bill-goes- removals/government/?hl=en. News, February 17, 2016, accessed July 4, effect. 2016, http://www.bbc.com/news/world- 38 Aengus Carroll and Lucas Paoli asia-35594617. Itaborahy, A World Survey of Laws: Criminalisation, Protection and Recognition 26 Caroline Mortimer, “Japan Finally of Same-Sex Love (Geneva; ILGA, May Enforces Ban on Possession of Child Sex 2015), accessed July 4, 2016, http://old. Abuse Images,” The Independent, July ilga.org/Statehomophobia/ILGA_State_ 16, 2015, accessed July 4, 2016, http:// Sponsored_Homophobia_2015.pdf. www.independent.co.uk/news/world/ asia/japan-to-enforce-ban-on-posession- 39 ARROW, “Sexual and Reproductive of-child-pornography-a-year-after- Health and Rights: Database of passing-it-10392397.html. Indicators,” accessed March 24, 2016, http://www.srhrdatabase. org/?p=indicators&content=SEXUAL-AND- REPRODUTIVE-RIGHTS. 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