IT for Change at RightsCon Online 2020

IT for Change at RightsCon Online 2020
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Rising to the challenges of a global pandemic, the RightsCon Summit Series will be hosting its ninth edition on an online platform from July 27-31, 2020.

Like every year, the summit will bring together business leaders, policy makers, technologists, advocates, academics, government representatives, and journalists from around the world to address issues at the intersection of human rights and technology.

IT for Change will be co-hosting three online sessions and participating in three others at RightsCon Online 2020.

1. Digital ID and personal data empowerment: Key tools for human rights and SDG achievement in the digital domain

Monday, July 27, 2020 16:30 - 17:30 UTC

Parminder Jeet Singh will be a speaker at this session co-hosted by MyData Global and the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. The session, facilitated by Teemu Ropponen and Sille Sepp, will discuss the interconnections between digital identity, data protection, human rights, and the States’ efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

2. Going Co-op: A platform model for workers in the South

Tuesday, July 28, 2020 13:15 - 14:15 UTC

IT for Change will co-host this panel with the International Labor Organization (ILO). Anita Gurumurthy, Nathan Schneider, Simel Esim, and Sofia Scasserra will discuss the potential and challenges of getting locally situated innovation off the ground.The panel will attempt to answer the question –  what does it take to build truly viable and resilient models of platform economy that maximize social and collective interests?

3. Claiming the data building block for the digital commons

Wednesday, July 29, 2020 11:30 - 12:30 UTC

IT for Change will co-host this session with the New Economics Foundation. Duncan McCann will be in conversation with Nandini Chami, John Wunderlich, and Annemarie Naylor about the frameworks around data and how it can better serve the idea of a digital commons.

4. Localizing algorithms in trans-global tech: Development impacts of AI in local economic contexts

Wednesday, July 29, 2020 12:45 - 13:45 UTC

IT for Change will co-host this panel with Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES). Deborah James will be in conversation with Deepti Bharthur, Kevin Donovan, and Jamila Venturini about the developmental impact of AI on local economies in the Global South. The panel will attempt to analyze how AI innovation can work for the benefit of all actors, specifically how ‘AI for All’ can work for a human-based economy.

5. Instantiating Data Stewardship: Use cases, accountability and governance

Wednesday, July 29, 2020 12:45 - 13:45 UTC

Parminder Jeet Singh will be a speaker at this session co-hosted by Aapti Institute and Algorithm Watch. The panel, facilitated by Astha Kapoor and Anouk Ruhaak, will discuss data stewardship and related issues, including its applicability in creating a new social contract for data; its effectiveness as an antitrust measure; unlocking health data for research through data stewardship; and using data stewardships, especially trusts, to empower workers.

6. Workers are also the product. Let's include them in data governance

Friday, July 31, 2020 14:00 - 15:00 UTC

Anita Gurumurthy will be a speaker at this session, hosted by Open Society Foundations (OSF) and facilitated by Bama Athreya. The session will invite data sovereignty and labor movement activists to discuss and build common strategies to tackle the global platform corporations. The output of this session will be a visual systems map to be shared with all participants, for future collaborative action.

For more details about RightsCon Online click here. To attend the sessions, please log in to the RightsCon Online platform.