It's the End of the (offline) World as We Know it: From Human Rights to Digital Human Rights – a Proposed Typology / Dafna Dror and Yuval Shany

'The same rights that people have offline must also be protected online' is used as a prevailing concept in international fora in recent years. But does this "normative equivalency" between 'offline' and 'online' afford fully effective protection for the rights of online users? This is the question at the heart of this Article. We first review the development of human rights in cyberspace as conceptualized in international fora, and critically evaluate the normative equivalency paradigm adopted by international bodies for the application of human rights online. In the latter part of this Article, we attempt to describe the contours of a new digital human rights framework, which goes beyond the normative equivalency paradigm. We propose such a framework should be conceptualized as built upon existing human rights norms, but containing additional protections corresponding to unique features and challenges of actors and activity in cyberspace. After laying down the normative justifications, for recognizing new digital human rights, we offer a typology of three generations in the evolution of digital human rights.   

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