AlSur and the Defense of Digital Rights at RightsCon 2025

RightsCon is one of the world’s most important events on digital rights and technology. Each year, it brings together activists, academics, civil society organizations, and technology experts to discuss challenges and advancements in the protection of human rights in the digital age. In 2025, this space becomes even more relevant in a context where fundamental rights, both in physical and digital environments, are under threat in many parts of the world—Latin America being no exception.

As member organizations of AlSur, we will bring a diverse and strategic agenda to RightsCon 2025 to highlight the major challenges facing our region, including privacy, AI regulation, the rights of women and LGTBIQ+ communities in digital environments, access to justice, and the fight against mass surveillance. At a time when setbacks in digital rights have become a worrying trend in Latin America, these sessions aim to influence global policies from a Global South perspective, advocating for more equitable and contextualized solutions.

Below is the agenda of sessions and panels featuring AlSur organizations at RightsCon 2025:

Tuesday, February 25

• Digital Health Governance Forum: Inputs on the Open Health Issue
  • Organization: Idec
• Passing the Torch on the G20 Information Integrity Agenda (private meeting - invitation only)
  • Organizations: Idec, Digital Action
• Is the Regulation of AI in Latin America a Race to the Bottom? Between Technosolutionism and the Brussels Effect
  • Organizations: Idec, Hiperderecho, R3D, CELE, Coding Rights, IPANDETEC
• Accusations and Actions: How to Improve Tech Companies’ Responses to Human Rights Allegations (private meeting - invitation only)
  • Organizations: TEDIC, Business & Human Rights Research Centre, World Benchmark Alliance
• Coalitions on the Move: Civil Society Joint Efforts to Preserve Migrants’ Privacy and Dignity
  • Organizations: Access Now, Centro LATAM Digital, R3D
• Intersectionality and Sustainability in Journalism: Experiences from the Global South
  • Organizations: InternetLab, Wikimedia Foundation

Wednesday, February 26

• Cultural Rights as Human Rights… Also on the Internet!
  • Organizations: Fundación Karisma, UNESCO, Ministério da Cultura-Brasil, InternetLab
• Avengers Assemble! An Intercontinental Approach to Strategic Litigation for Inclusive Digital ID
  • Organization: Idec
• The Perpetrator’s Gaze: Seeking to Understand Perpetrators of OGBV
  • Organizations: TEDIC, Sula Batsu, Fundación Karisma, Pollicy, WOUGNET
• Right to Not Be Subject to Automated Decisions: Challenges and Regulations in the Judicial Sector
  • Organizations: R3D, Hiperderecho, Ipandetec, EFF
• Cajar Case: The Right to Defend Human Rights and Informational Self-Determination vs. Global Digital Surveillance
  • Organizations: Amnesty International, Fundación Karisma, R3D, Center for Justice and International Law (CEJIL), Colectivo de Abogados y Abogadas "José Alvear Restrepo" (CAJAR)
• Scaling the Walls of Border Externalization: Transnational Research Against the Everywhere Border in the Americas
  • Organizations: R3D, iLIT & Surveillance Resistance Lab
• Obstructed Justice: Pathways to Redress for Victims of State Misuse of Spyware
  • Organizations: Access Now, R3D, Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University

Thursday, February 27

• Spyware Accountability in the Courts: The Case Laws in the Americas
  • Organizations: InternetLab, Digital Civil Society Lab (DCSL), Stanford University, R3D
• Online Violence Against Women, Queer, and BIPOC People in Politics
  • Organizations: Center for Technology and Society (CTS-FGV), TEDIC
• Local vs. Global: Addressing Inequalities in Content Moderation
  • Organizations: Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT), Hiperderecho, Centre for Internet and Society, Paradigm Initiative

The discussions at RightsCon 2025 do not end with the event itself. We hope they translate into concrete actions for the defense of digital rights in Latin America. AlSur organizations will continue working together to push for fairer public policies, promote equitable regulatory frameworks, and strengthen global advocacy from a Global South perspective. We will keep building spaces for resistance and transformation to ensure a free, open, and rights-based Internet for all.