The Munk School of Global Affairs is hosting a conference titled “Decoding the Digital Debate” on Friday March 31st, 2017, from 9:00am – 5:30pm at 315 Bloor St West. This one-day event will bring together actors from academia, think tanks, government, private sector and civil society to engage on topics from cyber war and state censorship of information to international law.

Citizen Lab Research Associate Christopher Parsons will be moderating Panel 3 on “Surveillance, Censorship, and Human Rights Online,” where he will be joined by Leslie Chan, Sam Wollenberg, Megan Boler, and Sarah Myers West. Panelists will explore the challenges facing the balance between government surveillance and use of data analytics and a citizen’s privacy and civil liberties. This panel will hear from a variety of voices on the balance between national security and civil liberties.

Panel 4, titled “Framework for Interstate Relations,” will feature Citizen Lab Senior Researcher Sarah McKune and moderator Jon Lindsay of the Munk School of Global Affairs. In tandem with David Hong and Ray Boisvert, the group will consider concerns over how states interact with and exploit each other’s software and cyber infrastructure. This panel will explore the current theoretical and practical gaps in the cyber debate within international relations and evaluate the international legal frameworks applicable to cyberspace.

Registration is required. Read more information about conference programming.