Participation & Speech at the event celebrating 20 years of EDRi in Brussels

On 21-22 March Homo Digitalis was in Brussels to celebrate the birthday of European Digital Rights!

It was way back in 2003, when a handful of organisations and activists from 7 countries decided to found it! Twenty wonderful years later, full of dynamic interventions in the field of digital rights protection, EDRi has grown and its unique network of organisations now consists of 47 organisations in more than 22 countries!

At this great celebration, EDRi and its important contribution were spoken about by the Executive Vice President of the European Commission Margrethe Vestager, the President, Vice President and Director of EDRi, Anna Fielder, Thomas Lohninger and Claire Fernandez, respectively, Signal Technology Foundation President Meredith Whittaker, MEPs from different political parties, and many important contributors to EDRi’s activities, such as its former Director Joe McNamee and co-founder Sjoera Nas!

It is a huge honour for Homo Digitalis to be invited to talk about our actions and experiences! EDRi and its network were the main inspiration for the creation of Homo Digitalis in 2018, and we are honored to be its Greek member!

Homo Digitalis was represented by our President and Secretary of the Board Elpida Vamvaka and Eleftherios Chelioudakis, with the latter giving a speech about Homo Digitalis’ active participation in the EDRi network already in 2018.

 


Development of partnerships with JOIST Innovation Park and iED in Larissa

Yesterday, we were at the JOIST Innovation Park, a unique phygital ecosystem that fosters innovation and knowledge transfer in the fields of entrepreneurship, technology, science, art and design.

There, we had the great pleasure to tour the – high quality – spaces of the park, to meet the members of the JOIST team, the iED – Institute of Entrepreneurship Development and their partners, and to discuss together a number of interesting topics on the interaction between the use of new technologies and the protection of Human Rights.

Thank you very much for your excellent hospitality! Our team was represented at the meeting by Anastasios Arampatzis and Eleftherios Chelioudakis.

Learn more about Joist Innovation Park here.

 


Our participation in the third plenary session of the CAI in Strasbourg

On 11-13 January Homo Digitalis was in Strasbourg to attend the Third Plenary Session of the Council of Europe’s Committee on Artificial Intelligence (CAI), as an Observer Member.
CAI is preparing a Draft Convention, which will be the first international treaty for the development, design and use of AI systems. Its work is expected to be completed in November 2023.
Our organisation has been participating in relevant processes at the Council of Europe level since 2020, seeking to defend rights and freedoms in the context of the relevant negotiations. Our representative in the plenary session was our Board Secretary, Eleftherios Chelioudakis
You can learn more about CAI here.


Homo Digitalis participates in an online discussion on the AI Act organised by Citizen D

Online discussion on Tuesday 17 January at 15:00-16:30 by Citizen D.
The intrusion of AI into the organization of life today makes us wonder if a global regulatory framework is really needed and how it could be shaped!
Our member Chrissi Sakellari and Ana Martinović from the Share Foundation attempt to answer this question on 17 January. You can register here.


Register for the session we are co-organizing at the Privacy Camp for the use of PREDATOR in Greece

Did you register?
On 25 January, Privacy Camp takes place in Brussels, one of the most important annual meetings in the field of digital rights organised by the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS), European Digital Rights – EDRi, VUB – Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Privacy Salon and iee.

Together with EDRi we are co-organising a summit on the use of spyware, in which we are honoured to have as our guest the journalist Elise Triantafyllou from inside.story who was the leading reporter in the revelations about the use of Predator in Greece.

Register completely free of charge for attendance in person or online until 18/1 here.


Come and meet us at the CAPrice community event in Heraklion

Tomorrow, those of you who are in Heraklion will be able to attend the interesting discussion with our member and DPO of FORTH, Anthi Stratakis and Yannis Chrysakis, who will talk to us about the CAPrice community for a secure digital privacy.
Homo Digitalis is a partner of Caprice – Community for privacy concerns and expectations and supports its actions.
-Wednesday, 11/1/2023, at 19.00, at H2B HUB Koronaiou 14, Heraklion (3rd floor).
-Register here.


Homo Digitalis participates in Turin in a meeting of the Advisory Committee of Professor Alessandro Mantelero, holder of the Jean Monnet Chair in Mediterranean Digital Societies and Law.

On 12-13 December Homo Digitalis had the great honour and pleasure to be at the Politecnico di Torino, invited by Professor Alessandro Mantelero, holder of the Jean Monnet Chair in Mediterranean Digital Societies and Law.

On the first day we attended a workshop attended by the Presidents of the Data Protection Authorities of Tunisia and Morocco, representatives of the Italian and Catalan Data Protection Authorities, leading academics from Italy, Greece, Malta and Spain and representatives of national and international civil society organisations.

On the second day we presented our work regarding the development and use of interventional AI technologies in Greece.
It is a great honor for Homo Digitalis to be a member of the Advisory Committee in this project, and we would like to thank Professor Alessandro Mantelero and Lecturer Maria Samantha Esposito for the kind invitation and the excellent collaboration! Our team was represented by the Secretary of the Board Eleftherios Chelioudakis.

You can learn more about the event here.


We participated in a discussion-speech after the performance of the Andromeda Theatre Group "It's Not a Game"

We actively support the Andromeda Theatre Group, which this year is staging its performance “It’s Not a Game”. The 4 extraordinary protagonists confess stories in which they have been victims or perpetrators via the internet. The topics they deal with are online blackmail, sextortion, revenge porn, bullying, scams and internet addiction.

In the context of the performance, open discussions with the audience, lasting one hour, were organized on 7 and 14 December at the nus theatre, in which Apollonia Ioannidou, a lawyer specializing in Law and Technology, and Katerina Mezini, a lawyer with a Master’s degree in Law and Information Technologies, participated from our team. Thank you to our two members for representing us in this important discussion!

The next discussion with the participation of important stakeholders will take place on 21/12!


The Glass Room Misinformation Edition exhibition that we co-organized at the National Library of Greece was a great success

Hundreds of visitors (among them over 300 students) came to The Glassroom: Misinformation Edition exhibition created by Tactical Tech and we were happy to bring it for the first time in Greece with the Digital Detox Experience and pen Open Lab Athens!
Arriving at the end of the exhibition on Friday 25/11 we organized a #cryptoparty with practical tips of encrypted and secure chat.

Thanks to the volunteers who worked hard translating the interactive games and information of each exhibit, the National Library of Greece and the Stavros Niarchos Foundation for the unique hospitality!