The Global Network Initiative (GNI) congratulates Special Rapporteur Leopoldo Maldonado
Gutiérrez on his appointment and appreciates the opportunity to contribute to the mandate’s
priorities. Over its 18-year history, GNI has worked closely with a range of UN offices, processes, and special mandate holders to advocate rights-based expectations for responsible conduct by governments and the private sector, consistent with international human rights law and the UN Guiding Principles on
Business and Human Rights. GNI sees the Special Rapporteur’s work as particularly important at
a time when governments are expanding the range of laws and policies that address cybercrime, online safety, and artificial intelligence, often with significant implications for how people communicate, access information, and form opinions.
GNI considers the preliminary framework a sound basis for the mandate’s work. Drawing on members’ experience and our work on government policies and company practices affecting freedom of expression and privacy, we encourage the Special Rapporteur to give particular attention, over the next three years, to two connected priorities: (i) the expansion of government powers over data and communications, and (ii) growing challenges to transparent, inclusive, and accountable digital policymaking.
The submission highlights the growing risks posed by expanding government powers over personal data and communications. GNI urges the Special Rapporteur to examine how overlapping laws on cybercrime, cross-border evidence-sharing, data localization, online safety, age assurance, and AI can create new avenues for surveillance and misuse of personal information. It raises particular concerns about the UN Convention against Cybercrime and the acceleration of digital transnational repression, calling for stronger safeguards, independent oversight, transparency, and effective remedies for individuals affected by unlawful data access or disclosure.
GNI also calls for greater scrutiny of government interventions in artificial intelligence and age-assurance requirements. While recognizing legitimate objectives such as protecting children online and addressing harmful AI-generated content, the submission warns that poorly designed measures can undermine privacy, anonymity, and access to information. It encourages the mandate to promote human rights assessments, clear legal frameworks, independent oversight, and accessible alternatives where AI is used in essential services. Age-assurance measures, in particular, should meet standards of necessity, proportionality, and data minimization, without unnecessarily restricting access to lawful content and services.
Drawing on experiences across regions, GNI identifies three pressing challenges to freedom of expression: broad content regulation and intermediary liability, expanding surveillance and data-access powers, and network disruptions and website blocking. Vaguely defined prohibitions on online content, disproportionate penalties, and broad government removal powers can encourage censorship and self-censorship. Meanwhile, weak safeguards around data access, mandatory identity verification, internet shutdowns, and website-blocking orders threaten privacy, anonymity, and access to information. GNI calls for narrowly tailored laws, independent review, greater transparency, and accessible avenues for redress.
Finally, GNI emphasizes the importance of transparent, inclusive, and accountable digital policymaking, urging the mandate to strengthen meaningful multistakeholder participation in national, regional, and international governance processes. This includes ensuring that civil society, technical experts, academia, and the private sector can meaningfully contribute to digital policy development, alongside clearer accountability for all actors involved in deploying digital technologies. The submission also highlights the potential of public interest digital infrastructure to support independent media and the free flow of information, provided it is built on open, interoperable, and rights-respecting foundations.