Recommendations To CSOs, Human Rights Defenders and Media 1. Actively advocate for and comment on changes to ICT policy, laws and regulations, particularly with regard to human rights impacts. Myanmar is in the process of developing or revising significant parts of the policy framework (such as the Master Plans cited in Recommendation 1 to the Myanmar Government), the laws and important regulations (such as under the 2013 Telecommunications Act, see Recommendations to the Myanmar Government, numbers 2 and 3). The Government staff and consultants working on these areas will be technical experts but potentially unfamiliar with the impacts on human rights of their policy advice. The same is true of Parliamentarians considering draft legislation. Active civil society participation in advocating for and commenting on such changes will be important in ensuring that the final policy, legal and regulatory structure is appropriately balanced to provide for an efficient and effective ICT sector that guarantees protection of data and privacy and contains appropriate human rights safeguards. This should not only engage the limited number of Myanmar CSOs with ICT expertise; CSOs representing other interest groups such as women, ethnic minorities, children and people with disabilities should ensure their views are represented in ICT policy and legislation, since all are actual or potential users of ICT. 2. Hold companies to account on responsible business conduct, including around human rights. There is an active, global discussion worldwide on the responsibility to respect human rights by companies in the ICT sector. 5 Some of these discussions focus on company conduct and others focus on the increasingly complex interplay between companies and governments, in terms of the appropriate limits to government power to request or directly access private data held by companies. Some of the initiatives in the area are multistakeholder, with companies and civil society and sometimes also with government working on solutions together. Many of these resources have been cited throughout this SWIA (see the boxes on International Standards and Guidance, as well as Myanmar initiatives, at the end of each of Chapter 4 and Chapter 5). They provide guidance on what can be expected of companies in the ICT value chain that can be used by CSOs to engage in informed discussions with companies operating in Myanmar. 5 See for example the Business and Human Rights Resources Centre website on information technology and developments concerning companies in the sector. RECOMMENDATIONS TO DEVELOPMENT PARTNERS & HOME GOVERNMENTS 29 Recs