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Struggles for a global Internet constitution: protecting global communication structures against surveillance measures

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 June 2016

ANDREAS FISCHER-LESCANO
ANDREAS FISCHER-LESCANO*
Affiliation:
University of Bremen, Law Department, Universitätsallee GW1, D-28359 Bremen
*
†Email: [email protected]
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Abstract:

In 2014, the UN Human Rights Committee published its Concluding Observations on the United States’ fourth periodic report on the progress of the implementation of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (UN Doc CCPR/C/SR/3061), in which also the US surveillance practices are criticised. The Committee’s insistence on the right to privacy and its exterritorial effect is an important first step, but it is not comprehensive, as by remaining within the individual rights framework the UN Human Rights Committee fails to sufficiently take into account the systemic challenges in play. Developing a constitution of the Internet would necessitate not only protecting individual fundamental rights against state interference, but protecting communicative spheres by guaranteeing institutional autonomies and subjecting all social spheres to democratic control; this also requires opening up spaces for a critical public, including whistleblowers, and establishing a right to cryptography – a crucial refraction in the polycentric panoptic schema.

Keywords

encryptioninstitutional human rightssurveillancesystems theorywhistleblowing
Type
Research Article
Information
Global Constitutionalism , Volume 5 , Issue 2 , July 2016 , pp. 145 - 172
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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Footnotes

*

Translation into English by Nora Markard.

References

1 Systems theory, as developed by Niklas Luhmann, assumes that world society is irrevocably differentiated into functional systems, such as the political system, the economic system, the religious system, etc. Each follows its own functional logic, seeking to maximise the interests it promotes. Humans and nature form the environment of this society of systems. See N Luhmann, Introduction to Systems Theory (Cambridge and Malden, MA, Polity Press, 2013). For an overview of the author’s critical theory approach to systems theory, see A Fischer-Lescano, ‘Critical Systems Theory’ (2012) 38 Philosophy and Social Criticism 3–23; A Fischer-Lescano, ‘A “just and non-violent force”? Critique of Law in World Society’ (2015) 26 Law & Critique 267–80.

2 G Greenwald, No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA, and the U.S. Surveillance State (Macmillan, New York, NY, 2014) 90ff.

3 See, e.g., L Backer, ‘Global Panopticism: States, Corporations, and the Governance Effects of Monitoring Regimes’ (2008) 15 Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies 101; Simonsen, K-M, ‘Global Panopticism: On the Eye of Power in Modern Surveillance Society and Post-Orwellian Self-Surveillance and Sousveillance-Strategies in Modern Art’ in Dahlberg, L (ed), Visualizing Law and Authority. Essays on Legal Aesthetics (De Gruyter, Berlin, 2012) 232.Google Scholar

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6 Ibid 202–3.

7 M Foucault, ‘The Eye of Power’, Semiotext(e)’s Schizo-culture issue III (1978) 2, 6–19. Asked whether those subjected to surveillance should usurp the central tower, Foucault answered: ‘Yes, provided that this is not the end of the operation. Do you believe that things would be much better if the inmates seized control of the panopticon and occupied the tower, rather than the guards?’ Ibid, 19 (trans. Mark Seem).

8 N Luhmann, Political Theory in the Welfare State (De Gruyter, Berlin, 1990) (trans. J Bednarz, Jr, orig. 1981) 31, emphases omitted; on the polycentric Internet governance see S Taekema, ‘Crossroads in New Media, Identity and Law. Fragments and Continuities of Law and ICT: A Pragmatist Approach to Understanding Legal Pluralism’ in W de Been, P Arora, M Hildebrandt (eds), Crossroads in New Media Identity and Law: The Shape of Diversity to Come (Palgrave Macmillan, New York, NY, 2015) 80.

9 See also CJEU, judgment of 6 October 2015, Case C-362/14 – Maximillian Schrems v Data Protection Commissioner, ECLI:EU:C:2015:650, clarifying the responsibilities of EU organs to protect against surveillance practices in the context of Facebook communication.

10 NM Richards, ‘The Dangers of Surveillance’ (2013) 126 Harvard Law Review 1934, 1958.

11 W Hoffmann-Riem, ‘Freiheitsschutz in den globalen Kommunikationsinfrastrukturen’ (2014) 69 Juristenzeitung 53, 53.

12 A Müller-Maguhn, L Poitras, M Rosenbach, M Sontheimer and C Grothoff, ‘Treasure Map: The NSA Breach of Telekom and Other German Firms’ Spiegel Online International, 14 September 2014.

13 R Booth, ‘Facebook Reveals News Feed Experiment to Control Emotions’, The Guardian, 30 June 2014.

14 See, with further references, R Lewis, God Is Watching, and So Am I: The Theology of Surveillance, 27 April 2012, available at <http://flowtv.org/2012/04/god-is-watching>, accessed 2 February 2016.

15 L Ohno-Machado, ‘Health surveillance using the internet and other sources of information’ 3 (2013) Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association 403.

16 On this concept, see B Buzan, O Wæver and J de Wilde, Security: A New Framework for Analysis (Lynne Rienner, Boulder, CO and London, 1998).

17 Lanier, J, Who Owns the Future? (2nd edn, Simon & Schuster, New York, NY, 2014) 198.Google Scholar

18 BC Han levels this polycentricity when he sees the ‘biopolitical disciplinary society’ replaced by the ‘psycho-political transparency society’; BC Han, Im Schwarm: Ansichten des Digitalen (Matthes & Seitz Berlin, 2013) 98.

19 N Luhmann, Gesellschaftsstruktur und Semantik, vol 2 (Suhrkamp, Frankfurt, 1993) 80.

20 See the Proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data (General Data Protection Regulation) which shall enter into force in 2018 see European Council, Press Release 18.12.2015, ‘EU data protection reform: Council confirms agreement with the European Parliament’, available at <http://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2015/12/18-data-protection/>, accessed 2 February 2016.

21 CJEU, judgment of 13 May 2014, Case C-131/12 – Google Spain, ECLI: EU:C:2014:317.

22 CCPR, Concluding Observations on the Fourth State Report of the United States of America, 110th Meeting, 26 March 2014, UN Doc CCPR/C/SR/3061, para 22. The state report dates from 30 December 2011. Along with the Government’s response from 3 July 2013 to the Committee’s list of questions, including on the NSA complex, the report is available from the US Department of State at <http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/c16069.htm>, accessed 2 February 2016.

23 From the political sphere, see also UN General Assembly Resolution 68/167, The Right to Privacy in the Digital Age, 18 October 2013, UN Doc A/RES/68/167; see also the Report of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, The Right to Privacy in the Digital Age, 30 June 2014, UN Doc A/HRC/27/37.

24 999 UNTS 171.

25 A Liese, ‘Epistula (non) erubescit. Das Staatenberichtsverfahren als Instrument internationaler Rechtsdurchsetzung’ (2006) 81(1) Die Friedens-Warte. Journal for International Politics and Organization 51–9.

26 Shadow Reports on the Fourth State Report of the United States can be found at the Center for Constitutional Rights, CCR (<http://www.ccrjustice.org/iccpr>, accessed 2 February 2016) or the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU (<https://www.aclu.org/human-rights/faq-covenant-civil-political-rights-iccpr>, accessed 2 February 2016).

27 For a sceptical view, see S Schmahl, ‘Effektiver Rechtsschutz gegen Überwachungsmaßnahmen ausländischer Geheimdienste?’ (2014) 69 Juristenzeitung 220, 222.

28 W Benjamin, ‘Critique of Violence’ (1920/21) in P Demetz (ed), Reflections. Essays, Aphorisms, Autobiographical Writings translated by E Jephcott (Schocken Books, New York, NY, 1986) 277, 293.

29 For suggestions on optimising this, see U Davy, ‘Welche rechtlichen Grundregeln müssen für einen wirksamen Menschenrechtsschutz gelten? Eine rechtswissenschaftliche Betrachtung’ in C Gusy (ed), Grundrechtsmonitoring: Chancen und Grenzen außergerichtlichen Menschenrechtsschutzes (Nomos, Baden-Baden, 2011) 238, 257–8, who rightly opposes the ‘master narrative’ of the superiority of judicial versus reporting procedures. In particular, expanding the duty to consider the jurisprudence of the monitoring bodies could increase the position of the bodies in domestic law – see L Viellechner, ‘Responsive Legal Pluralism: The Emergence of Transnational Conflicts Law’ (2015) 6 Transnational Legal Theory 312–32.

30 In this sense A von Bogdandy and I Venzke, ‘In Whose Name? An Investigation of International Courts’ Public Authority and Its Democratic Justification’ (2012) 23 European Journal of International Law 1, 7–41.

31 J Derrida, ‘On Cosmopolitanism’ in On Cosmopolitanism and Forgiveness (Routledge, London and New York, NY, 2001); N Luhmann, ‘Inklusion und Exklusion’ in Luhmann, Soziologische Aufklärung, 6: Die Soziologie und der Mensch (VS Verlag, Wiesbaden, 1995) 237; S Marks, ‘Law and the Production of Superfluity’ (2011) 2(1) Transnational Legal Theory 1; GC Spivak, ‘Righting Wrongs’ (2004) (2/3) 103 The South Atlantic Quarterly 523; B de Sousa Santos and C Rodríguez-Garavito, ‘Law, Politics and the Subaltern in Counter-Hegemonic Globalisation’ in de Sousa Santos and Rodríguez-Garavito (eds), Law and Globalization from Below. Towards a Cosmopolitan Legality (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2005) 1.

32 Joseph, S and Castan, M, The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights: Cases, Materials, and Commentary (3rd edn, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2013) para 4.11ff.Google Scholar

33 On the extraterritorial applicability of human rights generally, see ICJ, Legal Consequences of the Construction of a Wall in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Advisory Opinion, 9 July 2004, ICJ Rep 2004, 136, at para 107ff; on the ICCPR specifically, see, e.g., CCPR, Lopez Burgos v Uruguay, 29 July 1981, Case No 52/1979, UN Doc A/36/40, paras 12.2–3.

34 CCPR, General Comment No 31, 29 March 2004, UN Doc CCPR/C/21/Rev.1/Add.13, para 10.

35 ECtHR, judgment of 7 July 2011, Al-Skeini v United Kingdom, App No 55 721/07, [2011] ECHR 1093, para 133ff.

36 A Peters, ‘Surveillance without Borders: The Unlawfulness of the NSA Panopticon, Part 2, 4 November 2013, available at <http://www.ejiltalk.org/surveillance-without-borders-the-unlawfulness-of-the-nsa-panopticon-part-ii/>, accessed 2 February 2016, but see S Talmon, ‘Der Begriff der “Hoheitsgewalt” in Zeiten der Überwachung des Internet- und Telekommunikationsverkehrs durch ausländische Nachrichtendienste’ (2014) 69 Juristenzeitung 783–7.

37 The Permanent Mission of the United States of America to the Office of the United Nations, Follow-up Response to the Recommendations of the Human Rights Committee, 31 March 2015, No 038-15, para 33.

38 CCPR, Concluding Observations on the US, see (n 22) para 22.

39 Concerning the exterritorial application of human rights obligations in cases of mass surveillance see also United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, ‘The Right to Privacy in the Digital Age’ see (n 23) para 31ff; Council of Europe Commissioner of Human Rights, ‘The Rule of Law in the Internet and in the Wider Digital World’, Issue Paper by D Korff, December 2014, 48ff; Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Committee on Legal Affairs, Report: ‘Mass Surveillance’, Rapporteur P Omtzigt, 18 March 2015, Doc 13734, 29ff; insisting on the physical effect of surveillance and on the exterritorial dimension of human rights obligations M Milanovic, ‘Human Rights Treaties and Foreign Surveillance: Privacy in the Digital Age’ (2015) 56(1) Harvard International Law Journal 81.

40 United States of America, National report submitted in accordance with para 5 of the annex to Human Rights Council resolution 16/21, 13 February 2015, A/HRC/WG.6/22/USA/1.

41 See among others the critical statements on the US practice concerning mass surveillance by Azerbaijan (para 293), Costa Rica (para 294), Kenya (295), Liechtenstein (296), Germany (303) and Turkey (307) in Human Rights Council, ‘Report of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review – United States of America, 20 July 2015, A/HRC/30/12; see also the summary prepared by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in accordance with para 15(c) of the annex to Human Rights Council resolution 5/1 and para 5 of the annex to Council resolution 16/21. United States of America, A/HRC/WG.6/22/USA/3, 16 February 2015, para 58: ‘JS36 indicated that the US Government has been secretly sweeping up digital communications and personal data around the world with little oversight from either the judiciary or legislature, and recommended that the US respect the privacy of individuals outside its territorial borders. HRW made a similar recommendation. JS15 stated that the US authorities, on a daily basis, are intercepting the private communications and other personal electronic data of hundreds of millions people across the globe. JS15 recommended that the US discontinue all indiscriminate interception, retention, use and dissemination of individuals’ private communications both within and outside US territory and jurisdiction.’; cf the stereotype answer of the US: ‘We support these recommendations insofar as they recommend respect for ICCPR Article 17, which applies to individuals within a state’s territory and subject to its jurisdiction’ (Report of the Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review, United States of America, ‘Views on conclusions and/or recommendations, voluntary commitments and replies presented by the State under review’, 14 September 2015, A/HRC/30/12/Add.1, para 14).

42 See the response of the US Government to the CCPR’s list of questions, at (n 22) para 119; generally on the security argument, see already ECtHR, judgment of 6 September 1978, App No 5029/71 – Klass and ors. v Germany, [1978] ECHR 4.

43 M Nowak, UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, (2nd edn, NP Engel Publishers, Kehl, Strasbourg and Arlington, TX, 2005) art 4, paras 12ff.

44 CCPR, General Comment No 29, 31 August 2001, UN Doc CCPR/C/Rev.1/Add.11, paras 2ff.

45 GA Sinha, ‘NSA Surveillance Since 9/11 and the Human Right to Privacy’ (2013) 59 Loyola Law Review 861, 904.

46 This is not exclusive. Further potentially affected human rights include the rights to freedom of expression, to liberty, to health, to work, to the highest attainable standard of living, and to equality and non-discrimination, see C Kent, L McGregor, D Murray and A Shaheed, ‘Embedding Human Rights in Internet Governance’ (3 November 2015) EJIL Talk, see <www.ejiltalk.org>, accessed 2 February 2016; insisting on the implications of the non-discrimination see also United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Report on ‘The Right to Privacy in the Digital Age’, at (n 23) para 35ff.

47 For the protection of privacy in the framework of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, see European Court of Human Rights, Grand Chamber, Judgment of December 4 2015, Zakharov v Russia (47143/06).

48 CCPR, General Comment No 16, 8 April 1988, UN Doc HRI/GEN/1/Rev.9, para 8; see also the Report on surveillance of communication of the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, La Rue, 17 April 2013, UN Doc A/HRC/23/40.

49 On the cumulative character of the requirement, see Joseph and Castan (n 32) paras 16, 10ff.

50 CCPR, GC No 16, see (n 48) para 4; therefore it is unclear which legal gap the initiative identifies that seeks to modify the ICCPR by way of amendment or addition.

51 CCPR, Concluding Observations on the US, see (n 22) para 22: ‘The State party should: (a) take all necessary measures to ensure that its surveillance activities, both within and outside the United States, conform to its obligations under the Covenant, including article 17; in particular, measures should be taken to ensure that any interference with the right to privacy complies with the principles of legality, proportionality and necessity regardless of the nationality or location of individuals whose communications are under direct surveillance; (b) ensure that any interference with the right to privacy, family, home or correspondence be authorized by laws that (i) are publicly accessible; (ii) contain provisions that ensure that collection of, access to and use of communications data are tailored to specific legitimate aims; (iii) are sufficiently precise specifying in detail the precise circumstances in which any such interference may be permitted; the procedures for authorizing; the categories of persons who may be placed under surveillance; limits on the duration of surveillance; procedures for the use and storage of the data collected; and (iv) provide for effective safeguards against abuse; (c) reform the current system of oversight over surveillance activities to ensure its effectiveness, including by providing for judicial involvement in authorization or monitoring of surveillance measures, and considering to establish strong and independent oversight mandates with a view to prevent abuses; (d) refrain from imposing mandatory retention of data by third parties; (e) ensure that affected persons have access to effective remedies in cases of abuse.’

52 In addition, using embassies as surveillance posts is incompatible with the principle of sovereign equality of states under art 2(4) of the UN Charter and with the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and its Additional Protocol, art 3(1)(d) VCDR with art 1(1) AP (500 UNTS 95).

53 These, by the way, are also not being respected by the German practice; on the legal issues, see Hoffmann-Riem (n 11).

54 For the concept of transnational law see already PC Jessup, Transnational Law (Yale University Press, New Haven, CT, 1956) 2; for actual case studies and empirical evidence see e.g. the contributions in G Shaffer (ed), Transnational Legal Ordering and State Change (Cambridge University Press, New York, NY, 2013) and TC Halliday and G Shaffer (eds), Transnational Legal Orders (Cambridge University Press, New York, NY, 2015).

55 On the differences between fundamental and human rights, see G Teubner, ‘The Anonymous Matrix: Human Rights Violations by “Private” Transnational Actors’ (2006) 69 Modern Law Review, 327.

56 It cannot be emphasised enough that, of course, liberty also has to be secured in the relationship between the individual and Internet communication, especially with respect to a socio-digital subsistence minimum and individual guarantees, as e.g. proposed by H Maas, ‘Unsere digitalen Grundrechte’, Die ZEIT, 10 December 2015; but these individual rights have to be complemented by a structural attempt to secure social autonomies.

57 O Lepsius, ‘Das Computer-Grundrecht: Herleitung – Funktion – Überzeugungskraft’ in F Roggan (ed), Online-Durchsuchungen. Rechtliche und tatsächliche Konsequenzen des BVerfG-Urteils vom 27. Februar 2008 (Berliner Wissenschaftsverlag, Berlin, 2008) 21–56 – dealing with the fundamental right, developed by the German Federal Constitutional Court, to a guarantee of the confidentiality and integrity of IT systems (BVerfGE 120, 274).

58 W Hoffmann-Riem, ‘Globaler Auftrag: Der Schutz der Freiheit vor staatlichen Eingriffen wie vor privaten Oligopolen muss in der digitalen Welt neu gefasst werden’, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 25 June 2014 (my translation).

59 This is the approach of Habermas, J, The Divided West (Polity Press, Cambridge, 2006) 115ff.Google Scholar

60 This is the conception of Fassbender, B, The United Nations Charter as the Constitution of the International Community (Brill Nijhoff, Leiden, 2009).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

61 See also Kjaer, P, Constitutionalism in the Global Realm: A Sociological Approach (Routledge, London and New York, NY, 2014) 136ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

62 G Teubner, Constitutional Fragments: Societal Constitutionalism and Globalization (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2012) 1.

63 G Teubner, ‘Societal Constitutionalism and the Politics of the Common’ (2010) 21 Finnish Yearbook of International Law 111, 113–14.

64 D Loick, ‘Abhängigkeitserklärung. Recht und Subjektivität’ in R Jaeggi and D Loick (eds), Nach Marx: Philosophie, Kritik, Praxis (Suhrkamp, Frankfurt, 2013) 296.

65 A Peters, ‘The Merits of Global Constitutionalism’ (2009) 16 Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies 397.

66 A von Bogdandy, R Wolfrum, J von Bernstorff, P Dann and M Goldmann (eds), The Exercise of Public Authority by International Institutions. Advancing International Institutional Law (Springer, Heidelberg, 2010).

67 I Hensel and G Teubner, ‘Horizontal Fundamental Rights as Collision Rules: How Transnational Pharma Groups Manipulate Scientific Publications’ in K Blome, A Fischer-Lescano, H Franzki, N Markard and S Oeter (eds), Contested Regime Collisions: Norm Fragmentation in World Society (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2016, forthcoming); this means also that new forms of accountability have to be developed; cf. the discussions about the accountability regime in the context of ICANN: IANA Stewardship Transition Coordination Group (ICG), Proposal to Transition the Stewardship of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) Functions from the U.S. Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to the Global Multistakeholder Community, October 2015.

68 CCPR, GC No 16 (see n 48) para 1; on the horizontal effect, see also Nowak (n 43) art 2, at para 20; and Joseph and Castan (n 32) paras 1106ff.

69 Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression (n 48) paras 72–77.

70 J Ruggie, Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights: Implementing the United Nations ‘Protect, Respect and Remedy’ Framework, 21 March 2011, UN Doc A /HRC/17/31.

71 D Kaye, Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression, 22 May 2015, A/HRC/29/32, para 62ff.

72 See CJEU (n 9), Maximillian Schrems v Data Protection Commissioner, para 94: ‘In particular, legislation permitting the public authorities to have access on a generalised basis to the content of electronic communications must be regarded as compromising the essence of the fundamental right to respect for private life, as guaranteed by Article 7 of the Charter’.

73 US District Court for the Southern District of New York, 25 April 2014 – Memorandum and Order In The Matter Of A Warrant To Search A Certain E-Mail Account Controlled And Maintained By Microsoft Corporation (USDC, 13 Mag 2814).

74 Details in SD Murphy, ‘Taking Multinational Corporate Codes of Conduct to the Next Level’ (2005) 43 Columbia Journal of Transnational Law 389; see the CCPR’s Resolution of 26 June 2014, UN Doc A/HRC/26/L.22, on the ‘Elaboration of an international legally binding instrument on transnational corporations and other business enterprises with respect to human rights’.

75 Ruggie, Guiding Principles (n 70), preamble; see also European Parliament, Committee on Foreign Affairs, M Schaake, Report on ‘Human Rights and Technology: The Impact of Intrusion and Surveillance Systems on Human Rights and Third Countries’, 3 June 2015, A8-0178/2015, para 32: ‘Reminds corporate actors of their responsibility to respect human rights throughout their global operations, regardless of where their users are located and independently of whether the host state meets its own human rights obligations; calls on ICT companies, notably those based in the EU, to implement the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, including through the establishment of due diligence policies and risk management safeguards, and the provision of effective remedies when their activities have caused or contributed to an adverse human rights impact’.

76 See L Viellechner, Transnationalisierung des Rechts (Velbrück, Weilerswist, 2013) 259ff.

77 CJEU, Google Spain (n 21) para 38; see also ibid, para 81: ‘In the light of the potential seriousness of that interference, it is clear that it cannot be justified by merely the economic interest which the operator of such an engine has in that processing.’

78 C Kent, L McGregor, D Murray and A Shaheed, ‘Embedding Human Rights in Internet Governance’ (n 46).

79 UN Human Rights Council, The Right to Privacy in the Digital Age, A1 April 2015, A/HRC/RES/28/16, at 2.

80 See the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Privacy as expressed in Human Rights Council, ibid, at 3ff, and the mandate explication by J Cannataci who was appointed special rapporteur in July 2015, see OHCR, Special Rapporteur on the right to privacy, available at <http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Privacy/SR/Pages/SRPrivacyIndex.aspx>, accessed 2 February 2016.

81 European Parliament, Committee on Foreign Affairs, M Schaake, Report on ‘Human Rights and Technology: The Impact of Intrusion and Surveillance Systems on Human Rights and Third Countries’ (n 75) para 58.

82 The Tunis Summit in 2005 was one of the outcomes of Resolution 56/183 (2001) of the UN General Assembly, which welcomed the creation of an intergovernmental World Summit on the Information Society (‘WSIS’).

83 Tunis Agenda for the Information Society, 18 November 2005, WSIS-05/TUNIS/DOC/6(Rev. 1)-E, para 34; see also United Nations General Assembly’s Overall Review of the Implementaion of WSIS Outcomes, Zero Draft, October 2015, para 32.

84 G Teubner, ‘The Project of Constitutional Sociology: Irritating Nation State Constitutionalism’ (2013) 4 Transnational Legal Theory 44, 44–5.

85 Cf European Parliament, Committee on Foreign Affairs, M Schaake, Report on ‘Human Rights and Technology: The Impact of Intrusion and Surveillance Systems on Human Rights and Third Countries’ (n 75) para 58; but see J Bast, ‘Das Demokratiedefizit fragmentierter Internationalisierung’ in H Brunkhorst (ed), Demokratie in der Weltgesellschaft, special issue no 18 of Soziale Welt (Nomos, Baden-Baden, 2009) 185–93.

86 C Thornhill, ‘A Sociology of Constituent Power: The Political Code of Transnational Societal Constitutions’ (2013) 20 Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies 551.

87 See Google, Privacy Policy, last updated 30 June 2015, available at <http://www.google.com/policies/privacy/>, accessed 2 February 2016.

88 Wikileaks, Standard Operating Procedures, para 1, available at <https://wikileaks.org/About.html>, accessed 2 February 2016: ‘We derive these principles from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. In particular, Article 19 inspires the work of our journalists and other volunteers. It states that everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers. We agree, and we seek to uphold this and the other Articles of the Declaration.’

89 Ibid, para 1.2.

90 G Teubner, ‘Self-constitutionalizing TNCs? On the Linkage of “Private” and “Public” Corporate Codes of Conduct’ (2011) 18(2) Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies 617.

91 On the inefffectiveness of this mechanism and the concluding violation of fundamental rights see CJEU (n 9), Maximillian Schrems v Data Protection Commissioner, para 94ff; for a critical assessment, see also P Schaar, ‘Lässt sich die globale Internetüberwachung noch bändigen?’ (2013) 46 Zeitschrift für Rechtspolitik 214–16.

92 See the criticism in J Seeger, ‘To cloud or not to cloud. Editorial’ iX. Magazin für professionelle Informationstechnik 11/2011: ‘that these provisions aren’t worth the paper they are printed on’ (my translation).

93 To this effect G Teubner, ‘Substantive and Reflexive Elements in Modern Law’ (1983) 17 Law and Society Review 239.

94 Deva, S, Regulating Corporate Human Rights Violations: Humanising Business (Routledge, London and New York, NY, 2012) 96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

95 J von Bernstorff, ‘Die UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights’, November 2012, available at <https://www.unesco.de/wissenschaft/2012/uho-1112-keynote-bernstorff.html>, accessed 2 February 2016.

96 GW Anderson, ‘Societal Constitutionalism, Social Movements, and Constitutionalism from Below’ (2013) 20 Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies 881.

97 E.g., see the Shadow Report by the NGO ‘Article 19’ for the October 2013 session of the UN Human Rights Committee: ‘Protecting whistleblowers that hold governments and institutions to account is central to protecting the right to freedom of expression under international law, available at <https://www.article19.org/resources.php/resource/37185/en>, accessed 2 February 2016.

98 G Teubner, ‘Whistle-blowing in the Stampede? Comment on B Frey and R Cuenis, ‘Moral Hazard and Herd Behaviour in Financial Markets’ in S Grundmann, F Möslein and K Riesenhuber (eds), Contract Governance (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2015) 100–5; see also Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Committee on Legal Affairs, Report: ‘Mass Surveillance’, Rapporteur Pieter Omtzigt (n 39) para 122: ‘But even after appropriate legal limits and oversight mechanisms have been established on the national level and on the international plane in the form of a multilateral “intelligence codex”, whistle-blowing will be needed as the most effective tool for enforcing the limits placed on surveillance. The activities of secret services are by nature difficult to scrutinise by any of the usual judicial or parliamentary control mechanisms. Access of any monitoring bodies to relevant information and capacity issues in view of the huge volume of activity to be monitored will always remain a problem for effective supervision. The “sword of Damocles’’ of the disclosure of any abuses by well-protected inside whistle-blowers may well constitute the most powerful deterrent against serious violations of the legal limits that should in our view be placed under surveillance.’

99 Foucault (n 7) 195ff.

100 A Fischer-Lescano, ‘Putting Proportionality into Proportion: Whistleblowing in Transnational Law’ in K Blome et al. (n 67).

101 E Snowden, cited after C Friedersdorf, ‘Edward Snowden’s Other Motive for Leaking’, The Atlantic, 13 May 2014. The well-known original quote goes: ‘In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution.’

102 Global Internet Liberty Campaign (GILC), Resolution in Support of the Freedom to Use Cryptography, September 25, 1996 (Appendix B); on the right to cryptography as a ‘right to be unheard’ under US law, see PE Reiman, ‘Cryptography and the First Amendment: The Right to be Unheard’ (1996) 14 John Marshall Journal of Computer & Information Law 325; for a German perspective, see J Gerhards, (Grund-)Recht auf Verschlüsselung? (Nomos, Baden-Baden, 2010).

103 OECD Cryptography Policy Guidelines. Recommendation of the Council Concerning Guidelines for Cryptography Policy, 27 March 1997.

104 International Working Group on Data Protection in Telecommunication (IWGDPT), Common Statement on Cryptography, 12 September 1997.

105 See also D Kaye, Report of the Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of the Right to Freedom of Opinion and Expression (n 71), who insists on the implication of art 17 ICCPR (para 16ff) and concludes (para 62ff): ‘At a minimum, companies should adhere to principles such as those laid out in the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, the Global Network Initiative’s Principles on Freedom of Expression and Privacy, the European Commission’s ICT Sector Guide on Implementing the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, and the Telecommunications Industry Dialogue Guiding Principles. Companies, like States, should refrain from blocking or limiting the transmission of encrypted communications and permit anonymous communication. Attention should be given to efforts to expand the availability of encrypted data-centre links, support secure technologies for websites and develop widespread default end-to-end encryption. Corporate actors that supply technology to undermine encryption and anonymity should be especially transparent as to their products and customers. The use of encryption and anonymity tools and better digital literacy should be encouraged. The Special Rapporteur, recognizing that the value of encryption and anonymity tools depends on their widespread adoption, encourages States, civil society organizations and corporations to engage in a campaign to bring encryption by design and default to users around the world’.

106 Foucault (n 7) 195ff.