CENTRE ON HUMAN RIGHTS IN CONFLICT UNIVERSITY OF EAST LONDON 03 FEBRUARY 2016 THE CONCEPT OF STATE JURISDICTION ON THE INTERNET AND RESPECT FOR HUMAN RIGHTS IN CONTEMPORARY INTERNATIONAL LAW SARA SOLMONE PhD student UNIVERSITY OF EAST LONDON

RESEARCH CONTEXT UNIVERSITY OF EAST LONDON Fulfilling human rights online involves several challenges, one of which is the borderless nature of the Internet. * * Multiple and conflicting domestic laws are currently being applied simultaneously to regulate content published online 1. * There is currently no agreement as to the meaning of State jurisdiction in cyberspace according to both general international law and human rights law. An analysis of the meaning of State jurisdiction in cyberspace according to human rights conventions is needed in order to clarify when a State has the right and/or in fact the duty to apply its own laws to regulate content published online. * 1. Council of Europe High Commissioner for Human Rights “The rule of Law of the Internet and in the Wider Digital World”, 2014, section 3.4.2, available at (Accessed: 14 September 2015).

RESEARCH QUESTIONS UNIVERSITY OF EAST LONDON * * RQ1 : What does State jurisdiction mean according to human rights conventions, when human rights violations are committed online? RQ2 : How can States guarantee the protection of human rights online according to the human rights conventions to which they are a signatory? What are the actions that they should refrain from doing and what the actions that they should actually undertake to fulfil human rights online?

RESEARCH METHOD UNIVERSITY OF EAST LONDON * Qualitative methodology : combined use of modern positivism and comparative legal analysis. * Modern positivism : Analysis of primary and secondary sources of international law in order to understand where the “existing law stands” on the subject under analysis 2 (analysis of the law as it is, lex lata, as opposed to as it should be, lex ferenda 3 ). Comparative legal analysis : Comparison between the meaning of State jurisdiction and online State jurisdiction emerging from the human rights conventions. Comparison between the standards of protection from human right violations foreseen by the human rights conventions and that offered by the national laws of the State parties to the conventions. * 2.B Simma and A L Paulus, ‘The responsibility of individuals for human rights abuses in internal conflicts: a positivist view’ (1999) 93 AJIL Ibid. 303.

RESEARCH DESIGN UNIVERSITY OF EAST LONDON * Analysis of the concept of State jurisdiction according to general international law and multilateral human rights conventions. * Analysis of the jurisprudence of international human rights courts with the aim of understanding how these courts have interpreted both the term State jurisdiction and online State jurisdiction. RQ1 * Comparison between the meaning of State jurisdiction and online State jurisdiction according to the human rights conventions. Analysis of the jurisprudence of international human rights courts with the aim of understanding what the positive and negative obligations are that States must respect to ensure the fulfilment of human rights online. * RQ2

SARA SOLMONE PhD student UNIVERSITY OF EAST LONDON CENTRE ON HUMAN RIGHTS IN CONFLICT UNIVERSITY OF EAST LONDON 03 FEBRUARY 2016 THANK YOU!