Author
Asst Prof Theodore Te
Organisation/Institution
University of the Philippines, College of Law
Country
PHILIPPINES
Panel
Human Rights
Title
Digital Surveillance, Privacy and Freedom of Expression in Asian Authoritarian Contexts
Abstract
Across Asia, digitalisation has intensified state capacity for data surveillance, online content regulation, and algorithmic control. Governments justify these measures as tools for national security, public order, or “digital sovereignty”, often overlooking one important aspect--that they frequently curtail core human rights, especially privacy, freedom of expression, of the press, and association. This paper examines how selected Asian jurisdictions have navigated the tension between state control and individual rights in the digital sphere. It traces the evolution of cybersecurity, anti-terrorism, and data protection frameworks to assess whether current legal safeguards adequately protect fundamental freedoms. Drawing from international norms such as the ICCPR, the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, and the UN Human Rights Council reports on digital surveillance and artificial intelligence, the paper identifies regional patterns of rights restriction and gaps in accountability. An analysis of relevant jurisprudence, legislative texts, and policy debates would show that legal knowledge and civic literacy are crucial for empowering citizens to challenge overbroad regimes of surveillance and censorship. The paper proposes a framework to strengthen protection of these rights.
Biography
He is an Assistant Professor at the University of the Philippines and also, at the same time, a human rights lawyer and advocate for many human rights issues with the Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG), the oldest human rights lawyers’ network in the country, where he is currently the national chairperson. He has taught a broad range of subjects in more than three decades of academic life, including criminal law, civil and criminal procedure, evidence, special proceedings, special human rights writs (amparo, habeas data, and habeas corpus), labor law, and has pioneered electives on law and medicine, martial law jurisprudence, and international criminal law and the law on transnational crimes. He has been bar examiner three times—for criminal law (2014), labor law (2015), and procedure (2021/22). At present, he heads the UP Law Clinical Legal Education Program (CLEP) and is concurrently the Director of the UP Office of Legal Aid and the clinic head of the Civil and Political Rights Clinic. He also teaches at the Ateneo Law School and has taught at the De La Salle University Tañada-Diokno School of Law. He is also Chair of the Humanitarian and Human Rights Law Department of the Philippine Judicial Academy (PHILJA) and is a member of its Academic Council and its Curriculum Review Committee. He sits on three technical working groups created by the Supreme Court for the review and revisions of the Rules of Court. He has litigated, and continues to litigate, cases at all levels of the court system. He has presented oral arguments to the Philippine Supreme Court on many occasions, involving issues such as the constitutionality of the death penalty in the Philippines and the Anti-Terrorism Law of 2020. He has represented journalists in libel and cyberlibel suits and continues to do so. He has also given, and continues to give, training to journalists to equip them against nuisance defamation suits as well as to NGOs and advocates against red- and terror-tagging. He has filed communications before international human rights bodies in representation of death row convicts, spoken in international and domestic forums regarding abolition of capital punishment. Among his chief advocacies are the abolition of capital punishment, freedom of expression and freedom of the press, the protection of civil and political rights, and abolition of criminal libel laws. He has served as consultant on tobacco control campaigns including legislation on packaging and branding as well as smoke-free environments. At present, he is consultant of a movement advocating against plastic pollution and has sat on an experts panel for the implementation of the liability provision (Art. 19) of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). He currently sits on an experts group to frame global principles to protect digital rights.
