Speech by Privacy First chairman at Dutch demonstration against Corona emergency law
Monday, 10 August 2020 Law & Politics
On 21 June 2020, a large-scale protest was organised against the Corona emergency legislation at the Malieveld in The Hague (Netherlands). Many thousands of people were planning to come here to demonstrate peacefully for their freedom. Despite an unjustified ban on this demonstration, several speakers who had been invited for this occasion still gave an appearance, including Privacy First chairman Bas Filippini. You can watch his entire speech (dubbed into English) below or on Youtube. Click here for the original version in Dutch. Privacy First will continue to oppose totalitarian emergency legislation, including the Dutch Corona Emergency Law, by all political and legal means. Do you support us in this? Then become a donor of Privacy First!
Column The coronavirus has plunged the whole world into a deep crisis and governments do their utmost to control the dissemination. As I wrote in my previous column, it is important especially now to keep our heads cool and to protect our civil rights and privacy. A short and temporary infringement of our privacy in the general interest may be legitimate. The western model should imply a partial, temporary lockdown, lasting at most twice the incubation period so as to control the spread of the virus based on increased testing, and to facilitate the healthcare system, augmenting the number of critical care beds. Moreover, this should be a participatory lockdown, based on voluntary participation and citizens’ individual responsibility. This is…
Column Many questions have been raised about Privacy First’s point of view in relation to the protection of privacy in crisis situations, such as the one we’re currently experiencing as a result of the coronavirus. As indicated previously, I support the precautionary principle, i.e., we don’t know what we don’t know and what in fact is effective. A strict, western-style approach on the basis of a temporary (partial) lockdown for a (very) short period of time will drastically flatten the coronavirus curve and will make sure the healthcare system does not collapse. This also allows us to gain time to find a vaccine or medicine. We still don’t know exactly what kind of virus we’re dealing with, how it came…
Writing a New Year’s Column about the state of affairs concerning the protection of everyone’s privacy weighs me down this year. With the exception of a few bright spots, privacy in the Netherlands and the rest of the world has greatly deteriorated. For a while it seemed that the revelations of Edward Snowden in 2013 about secret services tracking everyone’s online behavior would be a rude wake-up call for the world. It was thought that an increasing number of data breaches and a rising number of governments and companies getting hacked, would make people realize that large amounts of data stored centrally is not the solution. The Arab Spring in 2015 would bring about major change through the unprecedented use…
Privacy First New Year’s column Looking back on 2016, Privacy First perceives a renewed attack on our democratic constitutional State from within. Incident-driven politics based on the everyday humdrum prevails and the Dutch government’s frenzy efforts to control the masses is relentless, arrogant and driven by industry and political lobbying. The democratic principles of our constitutional State are being lost out of sight ever more while the reversion of legal principles has become commonplace. Every (potential) attack thus becomes an attack on our civil rights. Current constitutional State unable to defend itself Barely a single day has gone past in the current mediacracy and governors without any historical or cultural awareness hand us, our children and our future over to…
Christmas column by Bas Filippini, Chairman of the Privacy First Foundation Principles of our democratic constitutional State are still very relevant ‘‘Your choice in a free society’’ is the slogan of the Privacy First Foundation. Privacy First has defined its principles on the basis of universal human rights and our Dutch Constitution and is reputed for professional and, if necessary, legal action in line with our free constitutional State. The mere fact that Privacy First exists, means that in recent years the aforementioned principles have come under increasing pressure. We base our (legal) actions and judgements on thorough fact-finding, to the extent possible in our working area. ‘The Netherlands as a secure global pioneer in the field of privacy’, that’s our motto.…
Column by Bas Filippini, Privacy First chairman The Dutch police is currently running a pilot with Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)-chips in license plates. According to an internal report, fraud with license plates is alleged to be a big problem. A chip which is compulsory for every motorist and which can be read from a distance through a 'read-out portal' at all times on public roads, would supposedly be THE solution. However, Privacy First perceives the setting up of a national control system to track all movements in public space of all 17 million Dutch citizens as a great danger to society. Privacy First finds a compulsory spychip disproportional and unfit for a decent democracy under the rule of law.A comprehensive…
Shocking news reached us last week from the United States regarding the eavesdropping scandal that involves the US government. The digital state terrorism under Obama Bin Laden (the difference is really just a mere letter) has only been further institutionalized in his terms of office and undermines the basis of the democratic constitutional state inside and outside of America. Everyone’s a suspect, massive data storage and then continuous, real-time profiling of every citizen, in particular the citizens and organizations the governments dislikes. ‘’Just trust us, we don’t actually trust you.’’ One-sided transparency, citizens without any form of privacy, the government shielded by so-called state security protocols and always at war with an unknown enemy, so ‘’everything is permissible‘’. A democracy…
These days, of all human rights the right to privacy finds itself under the most pressure. Therefore, it is of great importance that the government, being the largest privacy violator, is tightly controlled by means of proper legislation. With good checks & balances, for the government itself as well as for monitoring possible privacy violators such as Microsoft, Google, Apple and large ICT companies like Cisco and Intergraph that set up entire electronic surveillance infrastructures in China. Under the ‘principle of security’, current Western democracies are increasingly being led by suspicion, hate and control instead of the principles of trust, love and freedom. And all of this to protect those last three mentioned? In the view of Privacy First, the line in…