Have you ever been a victim of cyber harassment? Cyber harassment and other forms of distressing experiences can be traumatic to deal with. Trauma can make us feel disconnected and numb but that doesn’t mean that this will last forever.

Cyber harassment can create a negative connotation to one’s self esteem which causes them to doubt their self – worth. It can and does cause people to suffer from severe anxiety and depression. This can hamper with a person’s ability to lead a productive, happy and stable life. It adversely affects a person’s mental and physical health and can be hard to explain to other people what you are going through.

Healing is a choice that you SHOULD make. There is nothing better than having control over your own life and self. So, here are 5 things you can do that can make your healing journey easier:

Be willing to heal

Sometimes it is very hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel, but once you do, there should be no turning back. Healing from something doesn’t happen overnight, but it takes time. While you are on the road to recovery, do not give up, stay firm and know that things will get better and so will you.

Don’t give into isolating

When you’re trying to recover from a trauma, it is important not to completely isolate yourself. While it is necessary to have time alone to recollect your thoughts and emotions, it is also vital to take a break to connect with your family or other relationships that make you feel respected and secure.

Take it easy

When you are in your healing period, know that it is not going to be a straight road always. There will be times when you doubt yourself, when you feel like you won’t be able to live life fully again, but understand that having these feelings are normal. What shouldn’t be normal is when you give up or lose hope. Don’t doubt or beat yourself for having low moments rather be kind to yourself. Believe that this will pass, soon.

Avoid relieving the traumatic incident

Repeatedly thinking about the incident or viewing things that are related to an unfortunate experience can overwhelm you and put you in a negative zone that could make it tough for you to think clearly. It will be hard but always identify your negative thoughts and replace them with something else or distract yourself by doing something productive or talking to someone.

Consider seeking professional help

If you find yourself extremely struggling with your daily routine or have difficulty in carrying out day-to-day tasks then consider getting help from a mental health professional. People who get treatment are more likely to recover soon. Battling trauma requires effort but it is all worth it so you can live a fulfilling life again.

Furthermore, if you are feeling emotional distress or depression, you can always call us on our Cyber Harassment Helpline (0800-39393) which functions from 9 am till 5 pm everyday and we will assist you to the best of our abilities.

Author :  Asma Parvez

Digital Rights Foundation released it’s one-of-a-kind app, “Hamara Internet”. The purpose that the Digital Rights Foundation envisions for this application is to create awareness regarding cyber harassment and educate individuals regarding the law and the precautionary measures they can opt for in case they encounter cyber harassment. The application provides tips and tidbits for online safety to its users and also provides a directory for relevant personnel and contact information of LEAs and organisations such as the FIA, PTA, PCSW and any other relevant resources available for the public. Click here for the link to the application.

Election Monitoring on Social Media

If the 2013 elections introduced digital spaces to the electorate, the 2018 elections were the year digital devices and social media campaigning were at the forefront of electioneering. The team at Digital Rights Foundation was working hard to track issues of technologies in the elections, from use of technologies by the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to the use of social media by political parties. Watch this space as DRF completes its comprehensive report on elections, gender and the internet.

Awareness Raising Sessions with Women Voters

This election season DRF along with its partners Trust for Democratic Education and Accountability conducted a series of 5 sessions with women from varied cross-sections of our society, especially those from the working class. The sessions were conducted with domestic and factory workers from Kot Lakhpat, Youhanabad, Ahmed Town,  Defence and Sundar Industrial Estate. The session covered the processes of CNIC registration, vote registration and the need and importance of voting as well as a general overview of why elections are required in the first place. More than 100 women received these awareness raising sessions.

Seminar on Protecting and Promoting the Electoral Rights of Women

Digital Rights Foundation, along with its partner Trust for Democratic Education and Accountability, held a seminar in Lahore on ‘Protecting and Promoting the Electoral Rights of Women’ on the 21st of July 2018.  The seminars focus was to promote women’s participation in the upcoming general elections and also discuss the challenges women face in politics in Pakistan. Fake news and its impact on hate speech and freedom of expression were also discussed in detail in the seminar in their relation to the electoral process.

Election Day Observation

DRF and its partner Trust for Democratic Education and Accountability handpicked 25 women observers to observe the general elections of 2018 in terms of inclusivity for women, people with disability and transgender people. DRF covered polling stations in nine constituencies in total which were NA 135, NA 134, NA 133, NA 132, NA 131, NA 130, NA 129, NA 126 and NA 125. The observers observed 25 polling stations and the entire polling station from 8 am till 6 pm in which they also saw the proceedings of the political parties and also interviewed voters. Read more..

Observership of Election Campaign

DRF with its partner Trust for Democratic Education and Accountability attended 16 corner meetings/jalsas/rallies of different political parties of the country. The team observed the campaigning process of 8 women candidates and 8 national assembly candidates to see how inclusive these public spaces and these meetings are for women.

DRF and Bolo Bhi called for digital accessibility during General Elections 2018

Digital Rights Foundation and Bolo Bhi released a press statement calling the the caretaker government of Pakistan to ensure mobile and digital accessibility, protection of freedom of speech, and the right to association as citizens exercise their democratic and civic duties on July 25, 2018. Read more...

DRF condemns the online attacks against Asma Sherazi

Digital Rights Foundation and Network of Women Journalists for Digital Rights condemns the social media attacks against Asma Shirazi, a seasoned journalist with years of service to the electronic media, and extends its unfettered support to her. Ms. Shirazi is made victim of online harassment based on a video where she is heard informing former Prime Minister Mian Nawaz Sharif of reasons why his previously recorded interview will not be aired, during a telephonic conversation while he is in-flight from Abu Dhabi to Lahore. Read the full statement, here

Network of women journalist continue to share articles and blogs

Members of DRF's Network of Women Journalists for Digital Rights continued to share articles and blogs on digital rights issues which can be found on the Hamara Internet website here. This is part of DRF's initiative to record women journalists' voices, particularly relating to digital rights and security issues.

As July was the month the General Elections of Pakistan were scheduled, Network members wrote extensively on the issues faced by politicians on digital media, online harassment of women journalists, the use of social media platforms for election campaigning and the freedom of speech vs hate speech conundrum.

Workshop on online safety and activism at the Women’s Collective, July 2nd, 2018

DRF was invited to be part of the Women's Collective Summer Internship Program 2018. The DRF team delivered a workshop on digital security and safety with reference to issues of harassment and online participation.

Workshop for Lawyers on Digital Rights

On July 4th 2018, DRF conducted a workshop which was held for Lawyers in Lahore, focusing on creating awareness about the legal landscape that governs digital platforms. Around 34 lawyers attended the comprehensive training session, where specifically designed toolkits was given to lawyers to guide them on how they can make online spaces safe for themselves by adopting various tools and resources available to them.

  

 

 

 

 

Online Safe Spaces for Journalists at Superior University

DRF held a session at Superior University with students of Mass Communication on July 12th 2018. Around 65 students attended the awareness raising session where they were encouraged to keep themselves secure online. In the second half of the session they were given digital security training and were also provided with CDs, which included security toolkits and a guidebook on digital security.

Workshop at FMH College of Medicine & Dentistry

DRF conducted a workshop on harassment, digital rights, gender and online feminisms at FMH College of Medicine & Dentistry for students on 26th July 2018. The discussion was participatory and rich in nature, with students bringing up issues of contemporary feminism.

Hamara Internet ‘Our Right to Safe Online Spaces’ session in Superior University

DRF along with it’s partners FNF conducted a session on data protection and privacy titled, ‘Our Right to Safe Online Spaces’ in Superior University with 129 students. The session focused on the need of a data protection law in Pakistan and how to tackle cyber harassment according to the existing legislation in the country.

Release of Urdu translation of Freedom on the Internet Report 2017

Digital Rights Foundation translated the Freedom on the Net 2017 (FOTN 2017) report in Urdu for wider readership. The translated report can be found here [PDF]. This translation of FOTN2017 was possible with the support of vpnMentor. VpnMentor was created in order to offer users a really honest, committed and helpful tool when navigating VPNs and web privacy.

Follow their work here: https://www.vpnmentor.com/

Freedom House released the Freedom on the Net (FoTN) report for the year 2017 which assesses internet freedom in 65 countries, accounting for 87 percent of internet users worldwide. The report primarily focuses on developments that occurred between June 2016 and May 2017.

DRF gets featured in Harvard Cyberlaw Clinic’s blog

With support from the Cyberlaw Clinic, DRF submitted a policy brief to the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication while the initial drafting of the Personal Data Protection Bill was underway. The blog explains the importance of the bill and that through engagement with various stakeholders, there is hope of having an even more effective piece of legislation.

DRF at Decentralized Web Summit

Our ED Nighat Dad spoke at the the ‘Decentralized Web Summit’ at the panel titled "Stories from the Field—A View of the Internet from the Global South" where she talked about the impact of the first of it’s kind cyber harassment helpline and the implications of cyber harassment on women in Pakistan.

Nighat Dad’s interview gets featured on Hivos website

Hivos, an organization inspired by humanist values and founded in 1968, featured DRF’s Executive Director, Nighat Dad’s interview on their website. Ms. Dad talked about DRF’s work and the journey that led to the formation of this organization. She also shared the online security tips she uses to stay away from the trolls. To read the full story follow the link.

Cyber Harassment Helpline in report by RSF on ‘Online harassment of journalists: the trolls attack’

In a report, “Online harassment of journalists: the trolls attack”, Reporters sans frontières / Reporters Without Borders / RSF voices concern about the scale of a new threat to press freedom, the mass harassment of journalists online. To read more about the cyber harassment helpline and the findings of the report follow the link.

 

What is a safe city?
The answer to this question is not uniform; in fact it varies according to who you ask.
In a focus group conducted by Digital Rights Foundation in May of last year, consisting of women rights activists from across Pakistan, the answer meant imagining a city that was not only safe for women, in terms of their physical safety, but also welcoming for women and non-binary individuals in its architecture and facilities. Women expressed feeling like anomalies when they use public transport, or simply step outside in public spaces.
In another focus group last year, we posed the same question to lawyers and digital rights activists, and they imagined a city without arbitrary roadblocks by law enforcement agencies and over-policing.
Women from lower classes interestingly stipulated economic issues and affordable housing as issues of safety; since there is a clear nexus between safety of a locality and housing prices. Women, outside the exclusive club of the upper and upper middle classes, are often denied access to safe housing simply because they cannot afford it. In conducting a campaign for launch of our report on safe cities, we spoke  to individuals around Lahore who imagined a city that was green, walkable, accessible for disabled persons and animal-friendly.

It is important to deconstruct the concept safe city from the bottom-up because the definition is often imposed onto citizens from above, i.e. state institutions. The central question guiding Digital Rights Foundation’s (DRF) situational analysis of the Punjab Safe Cities Authority (PSCA) and its work has been an inquiry into the government’s vision of what a safe city looks like and whether that maps onto the vision citizens hold?

Digital Rights Foundation’s report aims to map and understand the nature and scope of the Punjab government’s Safe Cities project from a human rights perspective. The first phase of the safe cities project was completed in January 2018 with the aim of improving urban policing through ICTs, which saw the installation of 8000 CCTV cameras throughout the provincial capital of Punjab, Lahore, at the whooping cost of twelve billion rupees.

 

The underlying impulse of the safe cities project has been to ensure safety through digitization of existing policing structures. As we note in the report that “[o]n the surface this is a benign project that seeks to simply digitize and update state machinery to make urban policing more efficient. Nevertheless, the introduction of new technologies does not mark a complete break from the past, rather is a continuation of same policing tactics that were a mainstay of the past.”

 

We have categorized the project neither as an urban planning scheme, nor an e-government initiative. Instead, the Punjab Safe City Project concerns itself primarily with modernizing policing and “policing culture”. The logic there is that our cities would be safer if only they were better policed. Taken at face value, the project aims to eliminate the “thana culture”, a pejorative word used to describe the prevalent abuse of power in the policing system. The modern policing system, aided by technology seeks to bring in transparency, speed and reduce human intervention for corruption. Our report assesses whether the infusion of technology lays to rest these systemic issues within the policing system.

 

According to our findings, the Authority suffers from many of the same problems that it claims to eschew. There is very little accountability and transparency for the Authority and its operations. Several requests for interviews with its officials were denied on the basis of secrecy. Furthermore, given the scope and ambit of surveillance powers exercised by the Authority, there are no laws or policies regarding data protection.  Bizarrely enough the Safe Cities Authority has been engaging in issues of digital spaces without any legislative mandate.

 

The operations of the Authority have ensured that safety is guaranteed for large scale events and holidays, where activities can be monitored, controlled and limited. The safety model has not trickled down in terms of everyday crime or reduction of harassment for women in public spaces. Digital Rights Foundation’s report recommends policy interventions in order to make the Authority more accountable and transparent, however ultimately the success of the project depends on matching its conception of safety with that of its beneficiaries: the citizens of the city it seeks to police.

 

Our report titled “Punjab Government’s Safe Cities Project: Safer City or Over Policing?” can be found here.

August 8, 2018

The Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunications (MOIT) has put forth it’s draft Personal Data Protection Bill, 2018. Digital Rights Foundation (DRF) welcomed the move to invite comments and feedback from experts, civil society and the general public. Pursuant to the invitation for feedback, Digital Rights Foundation and Privacy International have submitted their joint comments regarding the Personal Data Protection Bill 2018.

The Bill put forward by the MOIT envisions a data protection regime that takes a comprehensive, federal approach to data privacy. The Bill consists of 43 sections and the preamble states its purpose as “to provide for the processing, obtaining, holding, usage and disclosure of data relating to individuals while respecting the rights, freedoms and dignity of natural persons with special regard to their right to privacy, secrecy and personal identity and for matters connected therewith and ancillary thereto”.

The Bill protects two types of data: 1) personal data and 2) sensitive personal data. The processing of personal data can only be done where there is consent of the data subject and notice has been given. In the case of sensitive personal data, explicit consent and along the requirement of necessity are required to collect, process, store and share sensitive personal data. We posit, however, that the definitions of personal data and sensitive personal data are limited in their scope as the former is confined to commercial transactions, whereas the latter does not include within its ambit biometric and genetic data. These definitional limitations essentially mean that government bodies and data held for non-commercial purposes are not governed by the Bill. Given the vast amount of citizens’ data held by the government and its various bodies, this limitations leaves the Bill inadequate in its goal of protecting the privacy of Pakistani citizens.

The Bill confers several rights on citizens, termed as “data subjects”, including the right of notice, access, correction, updation and erasure. It also compels data controllers to put in place security measures to guard against loss, misuse and unauthorized disclosure of personal data; and failure to do so can result in a fine of upto one million rupees. While these are welcome steps, we would urge the Ministry to review some of exceptions to these rights as they are vaguely worded and cast the net of exceptions wide enough to render some of these rights ineffective. We also request the government to define consent widely to ensure that it is explicit, free, informed, proactive, specific and withdrawable.

The Bill also creates a National Commission for Personal Data Protection (NCPDP) which consists of three members belonging to the judiciary, the field of computer science/telecommunications and civil society each.

Generally the Bill does not guarantee protection of personal data of local data subjects when it is held or processed outside the country. This jurisdictional confusion can effectively result in an inability of Pakistani users to control their data once it leaves the borders of Pakistan. Furthermore, the Bill vests wide powers in the Federal Government to make exceptions to the Act and draft Rules, without any effective limits on its delegated powers.

We appreciate that civil society and the general public were given the opportunity to provide their feedback on the Bill and we look forward to engaging in the next steps of the legislative process. Digital Rights Foundation hopes that an inclusive, transparent and well-defined consultative process is laid out by the in-coming government that takes into account meaningful engagement with civil society which is important to ensure that the subsequent Act safeguards the rights of citizens and results in the actualisation of the fundamental right to privacy as enshrined in Article 14 of the Constitution.

The Ministry’s draft Bill can be found here.

Digital Rights Foundation and Privacy International’s submission can be found here [PDF].

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This statement is written by Shmyla Khan for the Digital Rights Foundation. For comments or information, email her at shmyla@digitalrightsfoundation.pk or tweet at @shmyla

Digital Rights Foundation translated the Freedom on the Net 2017 (FOTN 2017) report in Urdu for wider readership. The translated report can be found here [PDF]

This translation of FOTN2017 was possible with the support of vpnMentor.
vpnMentor was created in order to offer users a really honest, committed and helpful tool when navigating VPNs and web privacy. Follow their work here: https://www.vpnmentor.com/

Freedom House released the Freedom on the Net (FoTN) report for the year 2017 which assesses internet freedom in 65 countries, accounting for 87 percent of internet users worldwide. The report primarily focuses on developments that occurred between June 2016 and May 2017.

Meticulously researched by Digital Rights Foundation and research analysts at Freedom House, the FoTN 2017 report for Pakistan is an attempt to collate and evaluate the state-level violations of user rights, internet freedom, and implementation of censorship in Pakistan. The report ranks Pakistan “Not Free” for the sixth consecutive year. Here are some of the key findings from the Freedom on the Net Report 2017 with regards to Pakistan:

- Mobile internet service was shut down for more than a year in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, starting in June 2016

- The Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act enacted in August 2016 introduced stronger censorship and surveillance powers with inadequate oversight

- A teenager was arrested for allegedly “liking” a blasphemous post on Facebook in September 2016; a court awarded the death penalty in a separate Facebook blasphemy case in June 2017

- Five bloggers known for criticizing authorities and religious militancy were abducted in January 2017; one later said a government institution had detained and tortured him. The fifth was still missing in late 2017

- Social media personality Qandeel Baloch was murdered by her brother in July 2016 for videos she shared on Facebook; separately in April 2017, journalism student Mashal Khan was killed by a mob who accused him of online blasphemy

- Hackers stepped up attempts to target government critics, attacking a major media website

The report further notes that the Internet Freedom Status for the year 2017 has in fact worsened for Pakistan from that in 2016. With the ranking of 18 out of 25 for Obstacles to Access for 2016, the bar sits at 19 for the year 2017; and Violations of User Rights which sat at 31 out of 40 for the year 2016, it’s now at 32. The overall ranking for Pakistan closes at 71 out of 100 (100 being the worst) for this year, two points down from last year’s ranking - declaring Pakistan “Not Free” for yet another year.

The general elections of 2018 are fast approaching. What has changed since the last time voters cast their ballots five years ago in 2013? The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has upgraded the electoral process via some vital technological improvements with the aim of fostering greater civic engagement, educational reforms and transparency in the reporting process.

The first among these developments has been the “Click ECP mobile app”, launched on December 7, 2017 and available through the Google Play Store, which handily compiles information related to several facets of the electoral process, from casting the ballot box to checking CNIC registration. All the information available on its website has been conveniently packed into this application which Android users can now access easily. However questions of accessibility persist as the application does not have an Urdu version and is only available in English.

The application offers information about the ECP’s new technological innovations such as the Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) and Biometric Verification Machine (BVM). According to the app, ECP has recently purchased 100 EVM devices for pilot testing to check the feasibility and reliability of the devices in the electoral process of Pakistan. The new Election Act 2017 has legally sanctioned for pilot testing of the devices in the by-elections. The app also shows a video tutorial of how the device works. Similarly for the BVM, ECP has recently purchased 150 BVM devices for pilot testing. The machines were tested at 39 polling stations in the NA-120 by-elections. In light of this pilot project, ECP will lay down the future plan of usage of BVMs. The app also features a step by step video guide to how the BVM works. The feasibility of EVM machines has been challenged on several grounds including transparency, digital security risks and the heavy price-tag.

The ECP will also use an innovative approach to relay the results of the General Elections 2018, utilizing the Results Transmission System (RTS) in which an Android-based application will be used to transmit results in real time. ECP will be providing the Presiding Officers at each polling station with smartphones containing the required application which will have the GPS system installed in order to trace down the location of the presiding officer. They will be responsible for counting the votes and after counting them, they will take the picture of the total number of votes and upload them on that application. The ECP has already conducted tests of the new system at the by-elections in NA-4 Peshawar and PS-114 Karachi constituencies. It has been planned that the Presiding Officers (PO) will enter the polling results in the app which then transmits the data to the ECP servers in real time. The application uses GPS to record the location of the result and generates a timestamp of the upload. According to the ECP, this should enhance the transparency and discourage unofficial and premature announcements by the electronic and social media. In case of internet unavailability in a particular area, the picture taken through that application which will be uploaded once the device is connected to the internet. After they have uploaded the pictures, Returning Officers and ECP will be able to check them for the verification of data. Presiding officers will be asked questions if they change their location at the time of uploading picture or they do not upload the correct data on the same location. This time ECP is trying to take all the precautionary measures that are possible in order to prevent any form of lag or mishap. However, given the unavailability of internet infrastructure in certain parts of the country, this method of data collection will not be feasible everywhere.

According to newspaper reports, the ECP has collaborated with NADRA,PTA, and several telecom operators to make the operations seamless. It is important to highlight, however, that issues of digital security have been neglected by the ECP, and that the potential for electronic tampering and hacking exists given the relaying of results will be solely technology-based at select polling booths.

Finally, the ECP is bound to publish election-related data on its website as well which is stipulated in various sections of the Election Act 2017. The ECP’s website details its efforts to promote fair and free elections. The download section offers several different forms required during the electoral process, from the affidavit to be filed with the nomination form, to the Postal Ballot Form in both Urdu and English. The website also helps political candidates by offering the declaration of assets form. However, there is room for improvement in the ECP’s efforts as the candidate lists are incomplete and at times the names of nominees are ineligible.

However, despite these advancements, the monitoring of election campaigns as mandated by law, does not account for social media as the preferred method of electronic political advertisement. With regard to the harassment of female candidates, who are routinely subjected to derogatory statements on social media such as Facebook and Twitter, the ECP offers no protection. The ECP also does not contain any guidelines in its Code of Conduct for discouraging defamatory campaigns against rival opponents on social media, thus making it unclear whether the use of unwelcoming or abusive language online against political candidates is covered by the legislation. Twitter is especially susceptible to such campaigns where teams of social media activists and trolls routinely exploit trending hashtags in order to vilify political opponents or to promote their own political party and candidates. Such engineering of the electoral process via the influence of social media on voters, which cannot be understated in the era of Facebook’s dilemma with fake news, has the potential to disrupt the transparency and freedom of the electoral process this year.

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Co-authored by Asthar Haideri and Sualeha Khalid for the Digital Rights Foundation.