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How the Plunk Foundation Aligns with the United Nations

Updated: Sep 27, 2023

The Plunk Foundation strongly intersects with 3 of the 17 UN sustainable goals and the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights




UN Goal 5: Gender Equality


Women are at far higher risk of falling victim to doxxing, online harassment, and tech abuse from domestic partners.


The UN did a study of 51 countries [1] which revealed 38% of women had personally experienced online harassment.


In 2019, the Domestic abuse charity, Refuge reported that 72% of women [2] accessing its services have been subjected to technology-facilitated abuse.


The Plunk Foundation aims to support gender equality through:

  • Educating women about their digital footprint and how to protect their digital information

  • Partnering with women-centric nonprofit organizations to help them secure the digital information of those they serve



UN Goal 10: Reduced inequality


Marginalized populations are at higher risk and worry more about data breaches.


The UN defines privacy as a fundamental human right in Article 12 of their Declaration of Human Rights [3].


A journal literature review [4] noted that from 2010-2020 there were only 88 studies that were designed to study data privacy and its affected on inequality. This is a severely underfunded area.


The Plunk Foundation aims to reduce inequalities by:

  • Educating communities about their digital footprint and how to protect their digital information

  • Partnering with fellow nonprofit organizations to help them secure the digital information of those they serve (often members of marginalized and underserved communities)

  • Building technology that is open source, affordable, and accessible and protects privacy by design



UN Goal 16: Peace, Justice, and Strong Communities


Privacy is required for a democracy to function [5], however it takes a global effort to join the various aspects of peace, justice, and strong communities.


The Plunk Foundation was unanimously inducted into the Alliance for Peacemaking (AFP) in 2022.


Human trafficking (which is highly stressed in this category) is reported by the UN as 40% due to online technology [6]. Digital privacy is essential to reduce such scenarios [7].



We aim to address UN Goal 16 by:

  • Educating individuals locally and internationally about their rights when it comes to privacy through speaking engagements, community impact programs, and more.

  • Building educational models that anyone can access online

  • Collaborating with peacebuilders internationally to better understand current challenges in their domains.



Below is Article 12 from the declaration that aligns with the Plunk Foundation:

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

This article explicitly mentions privacy as a human right, which is the premise of the Plunk Foundation's mission. Everyone deserves the right to privacy.





References:

  1. UN Women. (2022). Progress on the Sustainable Development Goals: The Gender Snapshot 2022. Retrieved from https://www.unwomen.org/sites/default/files/2022-09/Progress-on-the-sustainable-development-goals-the-gender-snapshot-2022-en_0.pdf

  2. UK Parliament Post. (n.d.). Technology and Domestic Abuse. Retrieved from https://post.parliament.uk/technology-and-domestic-abuse/

  3. United Nations. (n.d.). Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Retrieved from https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights

  4. Jang, D., & Yoon, J. (2022). Artificial Intelligence in Finance: A Comprehensive Review. arXiv preprint arXiv:2206.15037. Retrieved from https://arxiv.org/pdf/2206.15037.pdf

  5. Dupont, B., & Petit, M. (2016). From Insider Threats to Advanced Persistent Threats Using Formal Concept Analysis. Retrieved from https://pure.unamur.be/ws/portalfiles/portal/54678232/6233.pdf

  6. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC). (n.d.). The Role of Technology in Human Trafficking. Retrieved from https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/human-trafficking/Webstories2021/the-role-of-technology-in-human-trafficking.html

  7. Ashrafi, N., & Mahmood, A. N. (2015). Human trafficking and the role of technology: Identifying emerging trends and gaps. Telematics and Informatics, 32(4), 723-734. doi:10.1016/j.tele.2015.01.001

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