8 Dictating the Internet: I. Background The internet is the world’s most powerful medium of communication. For much of the world’s population, it is a primary means of receiving and sending communication at a distance and participating in public life. People exercise their human rights and fundamental freedoms as much online as they do offline.3 As of April 2019, 58 percent of the world’s population were using the internet and 45 percent were active users of social media platforms.4 As more and more people turn to online platforms to exercise their rights to freedom of expression, opinion and information, it is essential that States discharge their obligations to protect and fulfil human rights in the online sphere.5 This includes taking steps to regulate the conduct of certain private actors, such as telecommunications providers and social media platforms, that mediate and regulate digital access and information flows online. These private companies themselves must also respect and protect these rights. From a human rights perspective, the internet can serve as a doubleedged sword. People now enjoy unprecedented access to information and a powerful new means to exercise freedom of expression. At the same time, abusive expression in the form of hate speech or information inciting violence and the spread of disinformation6 or propaganda7 (which can interfere with the rights to information, opinion and privacy) have increased, in ways that 3 4 5 6 7 Miniwatts Marketing Group, ‘Internet Growth Statistics’, 9 May 2019, Available at: https://www. internetworldstats.com/emarketing.htm; UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, 6 April 2018, A/HRC/38/35, para 1. International Telecommunications Union, ‘ITU releases 2018 global and regional ICT estimates’, 7 December 2018, Available at: https://www.itu.int/en/mediacentre/Pages/2018-PR40.aspx; Simon Kemp, ‘The State of Digital in 2019: All the Numbers You Need to Know’, We Are Social, 25 April 2019, Available at: https://wearesocial.com/blog/2019/04/the-state-of-digital-in-april-2019-allthe-numbers-you-need-to-know See Report of the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, 30 March 2017, A/HRC/35/22 (‘A/HRC/35/22’), paras 1, 3; Report of the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, 6 April 2018, A/HRC/38/35 (‘A/HRC/38/35’), para 1. This paper adopts the definition of “disinformation” as “false information knowingly shared to cause harm”, in contrast with “misinformation” as when “false information is shared, but no harm is meant”. This is the categorization put forth by Wardle and Derakhshan, which was adopted by a study commissioned by the European Parliament on the impact of disinformation and strategic political propaganda disseminated through online social media sites on the functioning of the rule of law, democracy and fundamental rights. See Policy Department for Citizens’ Rights and Constitutional Affairs, ‘Disinformation and propaganda – impact on the functioning of the rule of law in the EU and its Member States’, February 2019 (‘European Parliament, February 2019’), p. 26, Available at: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2019/608864/ IPOL_STU(2019)608864_EN.pdf, referring to Wardle, C. and Derakhshan H., ‘Information disorder: Toward an interdisciplinary framework’, Council of Europe, 2017, p.21. This report notes that “propaganda” can generally be defined as the “art of influencing, manipulating, controlling, promoting, changing, inducing, or securing the acceptance of opinions, attitudes, action, or behaviour”, as observed by European Parliament, February 2019, p. 26, referring to Martin, J., ‘Definition of propaganda in “International Propaganda: Its Legal and Diplomatic Control”’, University of Minnesota Press, 1958, p. 10.