28 Dictating the Internet: Challenges in protecting the right to privacy have dramatically increased in the digital era, as “the Internet has become both ubiquitous and increasingly intimate”.70 In December 2013, the UN General Assembly adopted resolution 68/167 which noted that accelerated developments in ICT had expanded the capacity of States, private corporations, and other non-State actors to collate, surveil and intercept data in a manner that infringes upon the right to privacy and other rights, and affirmed that States were obliged under international human rights law to prevent violations committed in the context of digital communications.71 International legal principles apply equally to privacy online as offline. In September 2013, the Necessary and Proportionate International Principles on the Application of Human Rights to Communications Surveillance (‘Necessary and Proportionate Principles’) was launched at the UN Human Rights Council, which reaffirmed that international legal principles of legality, legitimacy, necessity and proportionality were equally relevant and enforceable within the context of the digital environment, particularly with respect to communications surveillance technologies and techniques.72 These principles, developed through broad consultations between privacy, security, human rights and digital rights experts across the world, were adopted by more than 400 organizations globally. A final version was adopted in May 2014. Standards governing the right to privacy online continue to evolve. In 2015, the UN Human Rights Council appointed the first UN Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy within the digital context, who in 2018, reported to the Council that while progress had been made with respect to international standards on surveillance, further development was required.73 At the same time, the Special Rapporteur observed that more efforts were required to “explore the intersection of privacy and security and State behaviour in cyberspace … in a determined attempt to develop a more comprehensive legal framework for the Internet”.74 70 71 72 73 74 A/HRC/27/37, para 1. A/RES/68/167. Necessary and Proportionate International Principles on the Application of Human Rights to Communications Surveillance, May 2014, Available at: https://necessaryandproportionate.org/ principles; The ICJ is also a signatory to these Principles. In his 2014 report following on from resolution 68/167, the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights referred to the Necessary and Proportionate Principles, reiterating that the “overarching principles of legality, necessity and proportionality” apply to limitations on the right to privacy online. See A/HRC/27/37, para 23. Report of the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy, A/HRC/37/62, 25 October 2018 (‘A/ HRC/37/62’), Available at: https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G18/324/47/PDF/ G1832447.pdf?OpenElement A/HRC/37/62, paras 129 to 131.