| APrIGF 2022 Session Proposal Submission Form | |||||||||||||
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| Part 1 - Lead Organizer | |||||||||||||
| Contact Person | |||||||||||||
| Mrs. Wai Phyo Myint | |||||||||||||
| Organization / Affiliation (Please state "Individual" if appropriate) * | |||||||||||||
| Access Now | |||||||||||||
| Designation | |||||||||||||
| Asia Pacific Policy Analyst | |||||||||||||
| Gender | |||||||||||||
| Female | |||||||||||||
| Economy of Residence | |||||||||||||
| Thailand | |||||||||||||
| Primary Stakeholder Group | |||||||||||||
| Civil Society | |||||||||||||
| Part 2 - Session Proposal | |||||||||||||
| Session Title | |||||||||||||
| Telegram in Conflict: Doxxing, hate speech and incitement to violence in Myanmar and absent protections for rights online | |||||||||||||
| Session Format | |||||||||||||
| Fireside Chat | |||||||||||||
| Where do you plan to organize your session? | |||||||||||||
| Offsite from the venue at a local hub (with online moderator for questions and comments from remote participants) | |||||||||||||
| Specific Issues for Discussion | |||||||||||||
| Amidst an ongoing and deteriorating conflict in Myanmar, military-linked actors have been abusing Telegram to amplify hate speech and incitement to violence, and communicate and coordinate the commission of serious human rights violations on the ground. Doxxing of individuals has proliferated on the platform – leading to arrest, assault, detention and ill-treatment of individuals; and property confiscation. More recently, this has escalated to calls on Telegram directly resulting in the murder of civilians on the ground – both by military-supporting actors and People’s Defence Forces (PDF) of suspected ‘dalan’ (‘military infiltrators’). Personal, private information circulates in the messaging service alongwith images of dead bodies, hate speech and violent incitement. This session will provide context to the trend of escalation of attacks via Telegram and highlight cases monitored by civil society organizations from Myanmar. | |||||||||||||
| Describe the Relevance of Your Session to APrIGF | |||||||||||||
| This session focuses on a key local and ongoing emblematic case of Myanmar in highlighting some of the most serious challenges posed by Telegram currently. Not only within Myanmar, but across countries, the company has failed to address human rights risks and violations; coordinate with or respond to civil society concerns; or take adequate and effective measures to protect the rights of their users. This is accentuated in a zone of conflict - where online abuses directly interlink with and cause offline rights violations – including murder, ill-treatment and crimes against humanity. People’s rights to security, liberty, freedom from ill-treatment, expression, association and information are being undermined consistently while the company takes no apparent action to promote or protect the trust of its users. This session aims to provide a starting point for urgent conversations on content governance standards and regulations required from Telegram to protect digital rights in Myanmar. | |||||||||||||
| Methodology / Agenda (Please add rows by clicking "+" on the right) | |||||||||||||
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| Moderators & Speakers Info (Please complete where possible) | |||||||||||||
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| Please explain the rationale for choosing each of the above contributors to the session. | |||||||||||||
| Speakers have been involved in promoting digital rights issues in Myanmar for years. And, they have worked on monitoring, documenting and campaigning against the activities of the pro-military supporters on Telegram which led to various kinds of real world harm including killings, arrests and house/property confiscation. Access Now, which leads this session has a mandate protecting and promoting human rights in the digital space - with a team dedicated to working on Myanmar in policy advocacy, technical support and provision of digital security assistance. Golda Benjamin (female)- Access Now-Moderator (Philippines) - is Access Now’s campaigner for Asia-Pacific. She previously worked with Business & Human Rights Resource Centre as Programme Director for Asia, Labour, and Corporate Legal Accountability. Having started as a grassroots lawyer for farmers and workers, Golda has shaped her work via litigation, policy advocacy, and campaigning. Her government experience includes serving as chief for legislation for a senator and legal consultant to a head of the agrarian reform department of the Philippines. Golda holds a masters degree on international commercial arbitration law from Stockholm University and is a licensed attorney. Wah Wah Phaw @ Phyu - has been serving as a researcher, educator, and civil society member for more than a decade in Myanmar. In 2018, she published an oral history book in Myanmar titled “Of Peaceful Days, Nyein Chan Kae Thaw Nay Yat Myar Tho” together with two other researchers. Her research interests include religion, media, culture, and peace. She holds a BSc in Physics from Yangon University, Myanmar, and an MA in Social Science (Sustainable Development) from Chiang Mai University, Thailand. She is currently doing her PhD in Peacebuilding at Payap University, Thailand. Wai Phyo Myint - works as a Asia Pacific Policy Analyst at Access Now. She has been working as a digital rights advocate in Myanmar for over six years, and has previous experience in political advisory, media, and communications. Wai Phyo has served as one of the leading persons in Myanmar organising the Myanmar Digital Rights Forum since it was first held in 2016. Wai Phyo Myint has a BA in Communications and International Politics from Green Mountain College, Vermont, USA. Breanna Randall, Sisters2Sisters (Myanmar) - is a founding member of Sisters2Sisters, a Myanmar digital advocacy team focused on women’s rights issues in the wake of the 2021 military coup. Breanna is a writer and storyteller with experience in non-profit work. Breanna led the Fight Like a Garment Worker storytelling project for Sisters2Sisters in late 2021. Together with the Sisters2Sisters team, Breanna has planned various campaigns and digital protest events to aise awareness about the Myanmar military regime’s ’s abuse against women. One of Sisters2Sisters latest campaigns was the #TelegramHurtsWomen campaign in March 2022 |
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| If you need assistance to find a suitable speaker to contribute to your session, or an onsite facilitator for your online-only session, please specify your request with details of what you are looking for. | |||||||||||||
| We hope to hold this session as a local hub session from Chiangmai in Thailand where the speakers and most Myanmar digital rights experts are currently based (for security reasons). Ideally the local hub can then tune from there into Singapore. We would require an on-site facilitator to assist with coordinating and streaming this session, and ideally any translation support would also be very helpful. | |||||||||||||
| Please declare if you have any potential conflict of interest with the Program Committee 2022. | |||||||||||||
| No | |||||||||||||
| Are you or other session contributors planning to apply for the APrIGF Fellowship Program 2022? | |||||||||||||
| No | |||||||||||||
| APrIGF offers live transcript in English for all sessions. Do you need any other translation support or any disability related requests for your session? APrIGF makes every effort to be a fully inclusive and accessible event, and will do the best to fulfill your needs. | |||||||||||||
| Yes - we need from English to Burmese and Burmese to English. We need any support for sign language. | |||||||||||||
| Number of Attendees (Please fill in numbers) | |||||||||||||
| Consent | |||||||||||||
 I agree that my data can be submitted to forms.for.asia and processed by APrIGF organizers for the program selection of APrIGF 2022. |
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