Survey on Best Practices and Challenges in referencing legal protections for human rights in International and European Standards

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The consideration of human rights protections in international standards is of increasing importance as one means of managing the impacts of ICT technology on rights such as privacy, security, accessibility, and non-discrimination. This trend is amplified by legislation that aims to regulate ICT appeals to human rights protections as a legal basis, e.g. the protection of fundamental rights in EU legislation such as GDPR and the AI Act.

The FORSEE, HSbooster.eu and StandICT.eu project have collaborated on developing a Human Rights and ICT Standardisation Report. We are now seeking further insights from standards experts on where human rights have been considered in the development and implementation of ICT standards.

If you have been involved in ICT standardisation processes or know of initiatives where human rights and legal requirements have played a role, we invite you to share your experiences. Your input will contribute to identifying practical approaches, recurring challenges, and recommendations for ensuring that technical standardisation aligns with fundamental rights.

We do this in two parts, first seeking experiences on addressing human rights in standards and second on navigating restrictions on using legal requirements in standards.

Please, fill in the form below.

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Firstly, we ask about your experience from where human rights considerations have informed the design or revision of a standard, served as explicit inputs during standardisation processes, shaped the scope, terminology, or requirements of a standard, or have been referenced directly within the standard or its accompanying guidance.

Are you familiar with any ICT standardisation projects where human rights considerations played a role? If so

Please name the standard(s) involved

Please describe your involvement

e.g. participated in drafting, reviewed in ballots, adopted or implemented the standard

Which specific human rights were addressed?

e.g., privacy, security, accessibility, non-discrimination, transparency

What form did human rights consideration take?

e.g. mentioned in scope, term or concepts definitions, normative requirements, recommendations, statement of possibilities, statement of contextual constraints, drafting discussions or ballot comments, other?

Are you familiar with cases where international standards have had an impact on fundamental rights protections? If so

Please provide any further comments, including any reference to documented experiences, reports, academic work or case studies that may help us advance best practice in human rights considerations in standards

Please name the standard(s) involved

Which specific human rights were impacted?

e.g., privacy, security, accessibility, non-discrimination, transparency

How did the standard(s) impact (positively and/or negatively) on human rights protections?

e.g. through direct enforcement of legislative requirements, through changes to processes or practice in ICT adoption/use, through changes in the design and implementation of ICT, changes in behaviour of market actors, transparency and accountability to rights holders or protection authorities

How was the impact detected, assessed, monitored or measured?

In your view, what are the major challenges in considering human rights in the development and adoption of standards?

e.g. lack of expertise or awareness, resistance from technical communities, absence of assessment or mitigation methodologies, limited stakeholder involvement, others

Please comment on how you think any challenges could be addressed or mitigated?

e.g. specific strategies, actions, or tools etc