You can now download the final event report for this Symposium here.
The Challenge
Digital technologies can offer many opportunities to improve the lives of conflict-affected populations.
But there is growing concern around their possible negative implications as conventional modalities of armed conflict are enhanced, transformed, or replaced by digitally-derived forms of violence, persecution and exploitation.
It is left to individuals and communities to navigate the harmful (often unintended) side-effects of the humanitarian sector's efforts to deploy emerging technologies in already fragile contexts.
The Need
Increasingly sophisticated perpetrators, new tools and forms of conflict, and heightened risk profiles for vulnerable populations, compel us to reconsider matters of humanitarian protection in the digital age.
But as yet, there is little shared clarity on the scope and nature of emerging digital threats, their associated humanitarian consequences for crisis-affected populations, and the implications for those humanitarian organisations who serve them.
How will humanitarian practice evolve to meet a rapidly shifting digital threat landscape?
Our Response
We are convening stakeholders from humanitarian agencies, civil society, governments, private sector, and academia in an effort to:
Develop a deeper understanding about the relationship between digital risk and the protection of individuals and communities affected by situations of armed conflict, and to identify areas for cooperative action for responding more effectively and appropriately to protection needs.
This invites exploration around the principles, ethics, and (emerging) standards that guide our profession; the normative and legal frameworks designed to protect civilian populations; and/or the practices and capabilities that animate humanitarian action to meet the needs of vulnerable populations in the digital age.
The Symposium will run over a day and a half and will be organised around plenary keynotes, workshops, interactive experiences, side events, and panel discussions.
Participants can download the Conference Brief, Agenda and Program, as well as a full list of Speaker Bios.
DOWNLOAD THE FINAL EVENT REPORT