Centre for Internet and Society

Your economy, our livelihoods: A policy brief by the All India Gig Workers’ Union

W.C. Shukla, Rikta Krishnaswamy, Rohin Garg, Gunjan Jena, and S.B. Natarajan — 2024-01-31T00:02:12Z

In this policy brief, the All India Gig Workers’ Union (AIGWU) presents its critique on NITI Aayog’s report on India’s platform economy. Through experiences from over 3 years of organising gig workers across India, they highlight fallacies in the report that disregard workers’ experiences and realities. They present alternative recommendations that are responsive to these realities, and offer pathways towards rights-affirming futures for workers in the platform economy.

Click to download the full report

Alternative recommendations towards rights-affirming futures for workers in the platform economy

Regulating the unchecked rise of platforms and the platform workforce

The rise of platforms will not only affect workers in blue collar or grey collar jobs but also engulf other service sectors that currently provide permanent and dignified employment. The platform and gig work paradigm must not be used as a way to further deregulate the Indian economy by subterfuge.

Robust regulatory mechanisms and worker protections must be extended to the gig economy and other forms of perennial employment threatened by the new Central labour codes. Gig workers must be recognised as employees with a clear test of employment enshrined in law.

A stronger push towards better paradigms of work can only come from alternative models of platform work. It is essential that the government foster the creation of platform cooperatives in certain service sectors. Such platform cooperatives will mitigate market concentration that results from the network effects of large private platforms, offer greater stability than profit-oriented private platforms, and offer genuine pro-people alternatives.

Securing data rights and employment security

Gig workers must be guaranteed individual and collective rights to their data collected and stored by platforms. Workers’ data should belong to the workers. Workers should be able to access verified records of their training (if any) and work contributions. The government should prescribe standards to ensure that these records are machine-readable and universally inter-operable. In addition, workers must have easy access to verified receipts for each successful task performed on the platform.

Centering gender-responsive protections for workers facing intersectional vulnerabilities

Platform work is uncritically accepted as a panacea for women without taking a deeper look at labour practices, and how women workers may be particularly vulnerable to workplace risks and exploitation.

Considering these vulnerabilities, there must be legal and regulatory measures enabling women to participate in the gig economy more fully—for example, creches, sexual harassment prevention measures, equal wages, and proper hours and working conditions. Crucially, there should be safety provisions for all gig workers, especially for women who face greater dangers of harassment. Importantly, accessible and efficient enforcement mechanisms must be introduced to operationalise schemes and rights for women workers.

Securing minimum social protection guarantees for all workers on digital platforms

Effective minimum wages of INR 26,000 per month must be enforced as demanded by the Joint Platform of Central Trade Unions in India. This figure must be used to determine the minimum earnings for an hour’s worth of work on a platform.

Provision for Provident Fund (PF) must be introduced, and a bank account that does not require minimum balances or related charges must also be guaranteed. Social insurance measures must be guaranteed including health insurance, personal accident insurance, pension, maternity benefits, and disability benefits. In addition, the state government must consider waiving off charges relating to fuel surcharges and parking expenses/ penalties for gig workers, while on duty.

Security and safety for women workers must be addressed by issuing government ID cards for gig workers. Gig workers are required to travel to unknown localities, where residents tend to be suspicious of them. The government ID card will help workers establish their identity and increase their credibility among the residents.

Social security legislation and a tripartite board (with representation of workers and worker organisations, government, and platforms) must be constituted to ensure registration of all platform-based gig workers and facilitate their access to social security. The law should cover all those persons who are engaged in professions that are using digital platforms for their last mile delivery.

Building accountability mechanisms for financial inclusion measures on platforms

While including gig workers into the formal banking system is essential, this must not be used as a pretext to ensnare them into debt traps. Should the government wish to use platforms as a lever for financial inclusion, it must mandate platforms to deposit a minimum amount above and beyond workers’ existing incomes towards their consumption. For platforms, existing schemes must be rejigged—Firstly, the burden of credit schemes must not be borne only by public sector banks; the private sector must also be directed to take on some of the lending. Secondly, interest rates may be lowered for such loans, but this reduced rate must be made conditional on ensuring a certain threshold of working conditions to gig workers.

Developing workforce estimation strategies that reflect workers’ realities

Workers in the gig economy must not blindly be lumped with the unorganised sector without an understanding of nuances within the broad definition of the gig economy. Assumptions that workers in the gig economy have alternate sources of income must be refuted. Rather, in the case of gig workers in the Indian context, ground realities show that this work actually constitutes primary sources of income.

Primary data must be collected across the country where platform work is seen as a clear option for individuals to choose as a profession. Thus, one can estimate the percentage of the population that depends on the gig economy in a consistent manner. Digital platforms must provide adequate data to state governments on the number of workers registered on the platform in every region (along with work time data) in order for governments to actively prepare for public infrastructure requirements required for such employment generation.

Contributors

Authors: W.C. Shukla, Rikta Krishnaswamy, Rohin Garg, Gunjan Jena, and S.B. Natarajan

Images: All India Gig Workers’ Union (AIGWU)

Design: Annushka Jaliwala

About the All India Gig Workers’ Union (AIGWU)

The All India Gig Workers’ Union (AIGWU) is a registered trade union for all food delivery, logistics, and service workers that work on any app-based platforms in India.

Contact: contactaigwu@gmail.com

Connect: Twitter; Facebook

The views and opinions expressed on this page are those of their individual authors. Unless the opposite is explicitly stated, or unless the opposite may be reasonably inferred, CIS does not subscribe to these views and opinions which belong to their individual authors. CIS does not accept any responsibility, legal or otherwise, for the views and opinions of these individual authors. For an official statement from CIS on a particular issue, please contact us directly.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/your-econonomy-our-livelihoods-a-policy-brief-by-the-all-india-gigi-workers-union

Trans Pacific Partnership and Digital 2 Dozen: Implications for Data Protection and Digital Privacy

Shubhangi Heda — 2016-07-12T07:56:24Z

In this essay, Shubhangi Heda explores the concerns related to data protection and digital privacy under the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement signed recently between United States of America and eleven countries located around the pacific ocean region, across South America, Australia, and Asia. TPP is a free trade agreement (FTA) that emphasises, among other things, the need for liberalising global digital economy. The essay also analyses the critical document titled ‘Digital 2 Dozen’ (D2D), which compiles the key action items within TPP addressing liberalisation of digital economy, and sets up the relevant goals for the member nations.

1. Introduction

2. Analysis of TPP and D2D

2.1. Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP)

2.2. Digital 2 Dozen (D2D)

3. Major Criticisms of the Digital Agenda of TPP

3.1. Data Protection

3.2. Digital Privacy

4. Implications of TPP for RCEP

5. Implications of TPP in the Context of EU Safe Harbour Judgement

6. Implications of TPP for India after US-India Cyber Relationship Agreement

7. Conclusion

8. Endnotes

9. Author Profile

1. Introduction

This essay explores the concerns related to data protection and digital privacy under the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement signed recently between United States of America and eleven countries located around the pacific ocean region, across South America, Australia, and Asia [1]. TPP is a free trade agreement (FTA) that emphasises, among other things, the need for liberalising global digital economy. The essay also analyses the critical document titled ‘Digital 2 Dozen’ (D2D), which compiles the key action items within TPP addressing liberalisation of digital economy, and sets up the relevant goals for the member nations. TPP requires the member countries to facilitate unhindered digital data flow across nations, for commercial and governmental purposes, which evidently have major implications for national and regional data protection and privacy regimes. These implications must also be seen in the context the recent judgement by the EU Court of Justice against the validity of the EU-USA data transfer agreement of 2000. Further, the essay discusses the potential impacts that TPP/D2D might have on India, in the context of the ongoing USA-India Cyber Relationship dialogue. If the privacy concerns are not raised right now TPP might act as a model framework for future FTAs which will fail to encompass proper data protection and digital privacy regime within it.

2. Analysis of TPP and D2D

2.1. Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP)

Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a large multi-partner free trade agreement amongst twelve Asia-Pacific countries, which is closely led by geo-political and economic strategies of the USA. Countries started the negotiation of TPP in 2008 when USA joined Pacific Four (P-4) negotiations and in 2015 negotiations of TPP was concluded and text was released. Ministers from the member countries signed the agreement on February 4, 2016 [2]. The main aim of TPP is to liberalise trade and investment beyond what is provided for within the WTO. It is also considered to be a strategic move by the US to counter the trade linkages that are being established in the Asian region. TPP largely covers topics of market access, and rules on various related issues such as intellectual property rights, labour laws, and environment standards [3].

Between 1992 -2012 there has been an upsurge in bilateral trade agreements being signed in Asia from 25 to 103 and the effect of these FTAs is called the ‘noodle bowl effect’. TPP is seen as framework which will replace these FTAs which are causing the ‘noodle bowl effect’.While these FTAs are being replaced but with TPP being signed there are various bilateral arrangements signed along with TPP. USA has also stated that TPP will not affect the already existing NAFTA [4]. While TPP is being concluded there is another free trade agreement being negotiated between USA and EU , which is Trans Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). Both TPP and TTIP and are considered to be serving similar objective which is to deal with new and modern trade issues. Also both the agreements are US led and since negotiation for TPP are now finalised it may have a significant impact on TTIP [5].

TPP is one of the first document which deals specifically with digital economy and applies across borders. The main aims of TPP are to promote free flow of data across borders without data localisation. It aims to remove national clouts and regional internets. It also includes provisions to combat theft of trade secrets. It allows you to create transparent regulatory process with inputs from various stakeholders. It also aims to provide access to tools and procedures for conduct of e-commerce [6].

Some of the major criticism to TPP were regarding the issues related to [7]:

environment, wherein it does not address the issue of climate change and the language used in the agreement is very weak;
labour rights provision mandates parties to adhere to the ILO provision but it does not seem to provide for effective framework and might not bring the desired change;
investment chapter is seen to be controversial because of the investor state dispute settlement clause which will allow foreign investor to sue government over policies that might cause harm to them;
e-commerce and telecommunication chapter raises major privacy concerns;
intellectual property chapter wherein it includes controversial rules regarding pharmaceutical companies and data exclusivity apart from the privacy concerns.

2.2 Digital 2 Dozen (D2D)

D2D is set of rules and aims which is specifically drafted to be followed for the trade agreements related to open internet and digital economy. More specific aims of TPP as provided within the ‘Digital 2 Dozen,’ aiming for more liberalised trade in digital goods and services, are [8]:

promoting free and open internet,
prohibiting digital custom duties,
securing basic non-discrimination principles,
enabling cross-border data flows,
preventing localization barriers,
barring forced technology transfers,
advancing innovative authentication methods,
delivering enforceable consumer protections,
safeguarding network competition,
fostering innovative encryption products, and
building an adaptable framework.

Strategic goal of the US in introducing D2D as goals of TPP has been to set up a trend within Asian region for all the trade agreements. It is expected to ensure that if TPP is a success, similar goals and policy frameworks will be followed for other trade agreements as we. For example, the USA-India partnership also enshrines similar aims and so does the USA-Korea partnership. Hence while India is not part of TPP, USA is nonetheless trying to get India into a partnership which is similar to the TPP. The language proposed by the USA in TPP negotiations has always been supportive for cross border data flows as it claims that companies have mechanism to keep a privacy check and privacy would not be undermined, but countries like New Zealand and Australia which have strong privacy protection laws nationally have raised concerns which will be discussed in further sections [9]. Also not only in privacy rights but Digital Dozen initiative also affects other digital rights related to - excessive copyright terms TPP proposed to extend the term of copyright to hundred years which deprive access to knowledge; as in the U.S motive to give more power to private entities , the ISP obligations enumerated within TPP which puts freedom of expression and privacy at risk as ISPs are allowed to check for copyright infringement and TPP does not put any privacy restriction in this regard; introduction of new fair use rules; ban on circumvention of digital locks or DRMs; no compulsory limitation for persons with disabilities; lack of fair use for journalistic right; while net neutrality is major issue is many developing nations in Asia no effective provision for net neutrality is aimed at in the D2D initiative; prohibits open source mandates which puts barrier for countries which want to release any software as open source as a policy decision [10].

3. Major Issues Related to Data Protection and Privacy in the TPP

3.1. Data Protection

One of the major concern raised against TPP is regarding data protection provisions that have been integrated within the E- Commerce chapter of the agreement. Article 14.11 and Article 14 .13 are the ones that deal with data flow related to consumer information.Article 14.11 in the agreement puts a requirement on the member states to allow transfer of data across border and Article 14.13 does not allow the companies to host data on local servers. Concerns were raised in few member states for instance, Australian Privacy Foundation raised concerns over Article 14.11 which requires transfers to be allowed in context of business activities of service suppliers. It claimed that exception to this provision is very narrow and the repercussion for not following the exception is that investor state dispute settlement proceedings can be initiated, which is not sufficient to protect privacy. Also, it highlighted the issue that with the narrow exception provided under Article 14.13 which relates to prohibition on data localisation, it might have adverse effect on the implementation of national privacy laws within Australia [11].

Another provision which is of major concern is Article 14.13 which prohibit data localisation. It will raise problems for countries like Indonesia and China which will have to change their local laws to implement the provision [12]. Since there already has been a major concern with regard to USA- EU Safe Harbour Agreement which was later made subject to the ECJ’s ruling on data protection, which invalidated any arrangement which provides voluntary enterprises responsibility to enforce privacy. But both the USA and EU are in process of renegotiating the agreement.The major concern was that in EU data protection is a fundamental right while in USA data protection is more consumer centric. When similar concerns were raised in TPP negotiations, they were rebutted as USA claimed that FTA does not concern itself with data protection [13].

In 2012 Australia proposed an alternative language to TPP which allowed countries to place restriction on data flow as long as it was not a barrier to trade. U.S responded to concerns raised by the Australia through a side letter which ensured Australia that U.S and Australia have a mutual understanding in relation to privacy and U.S will ensure the privacy of data with regards to Australia. While Australia’s concern was given acknowledgement other countries which raised similar issues were not given any assurances [14]. US instead proposed ad- hoc strategy that gave private companies power to form privacy policy with implementation through state machinery [15].

3.2. Digital Privacy

Article 14.8 in the E- Commerce chapter of the agreement states that countries can form legal framework for the protection of rights but the kind of ‘legal framework’ is not defined. Also, nowhere it states that the privacy protection or data protection laws are expressly exempted, rather it states that any such policy implemented by member states will be put under review of TPP standards. The standards which TPP proposes to follow are based on the underlying idea that any such policy should not hinder free trade in any way. This test will be applied by tribunals which are experts in trade and investment and not on data protection or human rights [16]. While Article 14.8 provides for protection of private information of consumers but the footnote to the provision renders it ineffective. The footnote states that member countries can adopt legal framework for the protection of data which can be done by self-regulation by industry and does not provide for any comprehensive data protection obligation upon the member states [17]. Similar to this Article 13.4 of the telecommunications chapter under TPP also states that the countries can apply regulation regarding confidentiality of the messages as long as it is not “a means of arbitrary or unjustifiable discrimination or a disguised restriction on trade in services" [18].

Another chapter which raises major concerns about the privacy rights is intellectual property. It affects privacy through the provisions related to technological protective measures and the provision that regulate ISP’s liability. Regarding the TPM provision, the TPP follows the DMCA model whereby the exception to anti- circumvention provision is very narrow and does not apply to anti- trafficking provision. The exception allows user to circumvent TPM if it affect the user's privacy in any way, although this provision does not apply to ant- trafficking of TPM. The provision regarding ISP’s liability states that there should be cooperation between ISPs and rights holders and it does not prohibit ISPs to monitor its users. Also TPP proposes the notice for takedown and identification of the infringer by the ISP but this provision is not in consonance with laws of member states, like that of Peru which does not have any copyright law on ISP . Also many countries have tried to introduce proper privacy laws along with implementation of ISP liability but that is not done within the TPP [19]. TPP as whole aims to give greater power to private regulators without providing for minimum standard for protection of privacy.

Although TPP is not a data protection agreement but it consequently deals with various aspects of data protection, hence it is prospective model for privacy and data protection practices in future trade agreements. If positive obligations are included within the free trade agreements it will have an advancing impact on the data protection regime.

4.Implications of TPP for RCEP

While TPP has such lacunas similar provision are proposed in RCEP to which India is a party and which will have serious implication as many of the countries have inadequate data protection laws nationally and with the introduction of such an FTA the exploitation of privacy rights will be rampant [20]. To avoid this EU directive on data protection should be taken into consideration in the negotiations of such FTAs. But for the RCEP negotiations are still going on and in India many companies like Flipkart, Snapdeal etc. have started preparing for the changing norms. The government claims that it is going to accept best practices in the region which indicates that it is going to have same policies as that of TPP. Although people from industry have raised concerns that while there are national laws but it is difficult to check third party involvement within the business and it is becoming increasingly difficult to keep the consumer data confidential [21].

5. Implications of TPP in the Context of EU Safe-Harbour Judgement

Mr. Maximillian Schrems, an Austrian National residing in Austria, has been a user of the Facebook social network since 2008. Any person residing in EU who wishes to use Facebook is required to conclude, at the time of his registration, a contract with Facebook Ireland (a subsidiary of Facebook Inc. which itself is established in Unites States). Some or all of the personal data of the Facebook Ireland’s users who residing in EU is transferred to servers belonging to Facebook Inc. that are located in United States, where it undergoes processing. On 25 June 2013 Mr Schrems made a complaint to the commissioner by which he in essence asked the latter to exercise his statutory powers by prohibiting Facebook Ireland from transferring his personal data to Unites States, and this led to the Maximillian Schrems v Data Protection Commissioner case [22]. He contended that in his complaint that the law and practice in force in that country did not ensure adequate protection of the personal data held in its territory against the surveillance activities that were engaged in thereby by the public authorities. Mr Schrems referred in this regard to the revelations made by Edward Snowden concerning the activities of the United States intelligence services, in particular those of the NSA.(para 26, 27, 28). The case came in the court ruled that “that a third country which ensures an adequate level of protection, does not prevent a supervisory authority of a Member State, within the meaning of Article 28 of the EU 94/46 directive as amended, from examining the claim of a person concerning the protection of his rights and freedoms in regard to the processing of personal data relating to him which has been transferred from a Member State to that third country when that person contends that the law and practices in force in the third country do not ensure an adequate level of protection. The ruling implies that personal data cannot be transferred to third country which does not provide adequate level of protection.

EU safe harbour judgment and EU directive on privacy provide contrasting rules related to privacy. While TPP gives power to private entities to formulate rules regarding privacy while the recent ECJ judgment invalidated giving such power to private entities under EU-US Safe Harbour Agreement. Also in context of the same judgment Hamburg’s Commissioner for Data Privacy And Freedom of Information announced an investigation into the data transfer taking place through Facebook and Google to U.S. Hence in the light of the recent judgment member states within EU are not allowed to permit cross border data flow, in contrast to this one of the main goals of TPP is to maintain free flow of data across border [23]. EU is this regard has also set forth the proposal to introduce General Data Protection Regulation. (GDPR). Although U.S and EU are trying to renegotiate the agreement but the privacy concerns raised cannot be ignored. Hence following the same model as was invalidate under the ECJ judgment lets US exploit privacy of member states under TPP. Similar concerns as raised within the judgment are also raised in India as it also following the same model within U.S-India Cyber Relationship Agreement and in RCEP negotiations.

6. Implications of TPP in the context of USA-India Cyber Relationship

While India is not part of TPP but it might have an effect on the U.S India Cyber Relationship Agreement. In August 2015 there was re- initiation of the India-U.S cyber dialogue to address common concerns related to cybersecurity and to develop better partnerships between public and private sector for betterment of digital economy [24]. One of the key aim of this agreement is free flow of information between two nations, which suffers from similar problem that it will put privacy of the citizens at risk. Also India does not have any bilateral treaty which ensures cyber data protection in such a scenario the only solution is data localisation, but this agreement will put data at risk [25]. Hence while the TPP negotiations were going on and also RCEP is being discussed the concerns about privacy and data protection need to be raised as mention in earlier section regarding implications of TPP on RCEP, the USA-India Cyber Relationship also faces the same implications..Although the aim of USA-India Cyber Relationship is to ensure cybersecurity. After the cases of Muzaffarnagar riots, upheaval in North -Eastern states and Gujarat riots, India has realised it is important to ensure compliance from the social media companies. India sees the USA-India Cyber Relationship as an opportunity to achieve this goal. The Google Transparency Report states that that India made around three thousand requests to Google for user data [26], which indicate at the country's interest in having a common data understanding with the major social media companies (almost all of which are located in USA) about requesting and sharing of user activity data. While this concern is being addressed through the agreement, it is difficult to ignore the clause related to free flow of information, and if the meaning of the term is extended and adopted from TPP itself will put digital privacy of Indian citizens at risk [27].

7. Conclusion

Even though TPP negotiation are completed but the ratification of the agreement is still underway. TPP is being seen as one of a kind trade agreement because it is the first time that countries across the globe have come together as a whole to address concerns of modern trade. Although it fails to address some of the key concerns related to privacy and data protection which are becoming increasingly important. Data protection and privacy issues cannot be seen in isolation and needs to merged within the modern day trade agreements. The D2D component by the USA is strategic move to have trade dominance in Asia and to compete with China’s growth . TPP has privacy and data protection lacunae within the e- commerce , telecommunications and intellectual property discussion.Although it might have serious implications on RCEP negotiation and USA- India Cyber Relationship Dialogue. Similar concern regarding data protection has already been addressed by ECJ judgment invalidating USA-EU Safe Harbour Agreement but the similar ad - hoc strategy has been incorporated within TPP. Since TPP might be considered as best practice model for future FTAs in the Asian region it is important to raise and address these privacy concerns now.

8. Endnotes

[1] The signatory countries include Australia, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Peru, United States of America, Vietnam, Chile, Brunei, Singapore, New Zealand. "The Trans-Pacific Partnership," http://www.ustr.gov/tpp (last visited Jul 7, 2016).

[2] "The Origins and Evolution of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)," Global Research, http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-origins-and-evolution-of-the-trans-pacific-partnership-tpp/5357495 (last visited Jul 7, 2016).

[3] Fergusson, Ian F., Mark A. McMinimy & Brock R. Williams, "The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP): In Brief," (2015), http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/key_workplace/1477/ (last visited Jul 1, 2016).

[4] Gajdos, Lukas, The Trans-Pacific Partnership and its impact on EU trade, Policy Department, Directorate-General for External Policies, Policy Briefing (2013), http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/briefing_note/join/2013/491479/EXPO-INTA_SP(2013)491479_EN.pdf.

[5] Twining, Daniel, Hans Kundnani & Peter Sparding, Trans-Pacific Partnership: geopolitical implications for EU-US relations, Policy Department, Directorate-General for External Policies, June 24 (2016), http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2016/535008/EXPO_STU(2016)535008_EN.pdf.

[6] USTR, "Remarks by Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Robert Holleyman to the New Democrat Network," https://ustr.gov/about-us/policy-offices/press-office/speechestranscripts/2015/may/remarks-deputy-us-trade (last visited Jul 4, 2016).

[7] Murphy, Katharine, "Trans-Pacific Partnership: four key issues to watch out for," The Guardian, November 6, 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/nov/06/trans-pacific-partnership-four-key-issues-to-watch-out-for (last visited Jul 7, 2016).

[8] USTR, "The Digital 2 Dozen" (2016), https://ustr.gov/sites/default/files/Digital-2-Dozen-Final.pdf (last visited Jul 1, 2016).

[9] Fergusson, Ian F.m Mark A. McMinimy & Brock R. Williams, "The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations and issues for congress," (2015), http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/key_workplace/1412/ (last visited Jul 8, 2016).

[10] "How the TPP Will Affect You and Your Digital Rights," Electronic Frontier Foundation (2015), https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/12/how-tpp-will-affect-you-and-your-digital-rights (last visited Jul 7, 2016).

[11] Australian Privacy Foundation (APF), Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement (2016), https://www.privacy.org.au/Papers/Parlt-TPP-160310.pdf.

[12] Greenleaf, Graham, "The TPP & Other Free Trade Agreements: Faustian Bargains for Privacy?," SSRN (2016), http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Papers.cfm?abstract_id=2732386 (last visited Jul 1, 2016).

[13] "GED-Project: Transatlantic Data Flows and Data Protection," GED Blog (2015), https://ged-project.de/topics/competitiveness/transatlantic-data-flows-and-data-protection-the-state-of-the-debate/ (last visited Jul 1, 2016).

[14] Geist, Michael, "The Trouble with the TPP, Day 14: No U.S. Assurances for Canada on Privacy," (2016), http://www.michaelgeist.ca/2016/01/the-trouble-with-the-tpp-day-14-no-u-s-assurances-for-canada-on-privacy/ (last visited Jul 4, 2016).

[15] Aaronson, Susan Ariel, "What does TPP mean for the Open Internet?" From Policy Brief on Trade Agreements and Internet Governance Prepared for the Global Commission on Internet Governance (2015), https://www.gwu.edu/~iiep/events/DigitalTrade2016/TPPPolicyBrief.pdf (last visited Jul 5, 2016).

[16] Lomas, Natasha, "TPP Trade Agreement Slammed For Eroding Online Rights," TechCrunch, http://social.techcrunch.com/2015/11/05/tpp-vs-privacy/ (last visited Jun 30, 2016).

[17] "Q&A: The Trans-Pacific Partnership," Human Rights Watch (2016), https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/01/12/qa-trans-pacific-partnership (last visited Jul 1, 2016).

[18] "TPP Full Text Released," People Over Politics (2015), http://peopleoverpolitics.org/2015/11/07/tpp-just-as-bad-as-you-thought/ (last visited Jul 7, 2016).

[19] "Right to Privacy in Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP ) Negotiations," Knowledge Ecology International, http://keionline.org/node/1164 (last visited Jul 1, 2016).

[20] Asian Trade Centre, "E-Commerce and Digital Trade Proposals for RCEP (2016)," http://static1.squarespace.com/static/5393d501e4b0643446abd228/t/575a654c86db438e86009fa1/1465541967821/RCEP+E-commerce+June+2016.pdf (last visited Jul 1, 2016).

[21] "E-commerce companies like Flipkart, Snapdeal to beef up data security to meet RCEP norms," The Economic Times, http://economictimes.indiatimes.com//articleshow/49068419.cms (last visited Jul 1, 2016).

[22] ECLI:EU:C:2015:650 (C -362/14)

[23] King et al., "Privacy law, cross-border data flows, and the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement: what counsel need to know," Lexology, http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=b5c0b400-8161-4439-a4b7-131552ad5209 (last visited Jul 4, 2016).

[24] "U.S.-India Business Council Applauds Resumption of Cybersecurity Dialogue," U.S.-India Business Council (2015), http://www.usibc.com/press-release/us-india-business-council-applauds-resumption-cybersecurity-dialogue (last visited Jul 5, 2016).

[25] Sukumar, Arun Mohan, "India Is Coming up Against the Limits of Its Strategic Partnership With the United States," The Wire (2016), http://thewire.in/40403/india-is-coming-up-against-the-limits-of-its-strategic-partnership-with-the-united-states/ (last visited Jul 4, 2016).

[26] Countries – Google Transparency Report, https://www.google.com/transparencyreport/userdatarequests/countries/ (last visited Jul 8, 2016).

[27] Sukumar, Arun Mohan, "A case for the Net’s Ctrl+Alt+Del," The Hindu, September 5, 2015, http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/a-case-for-the-nets-ctrlaltdel/article7616355.ece (last visited Jul 5, 2016).

9. Author Profile

Shubhangi Heda is a Student of Jindal Global Law School, O.P Jindal Global University. She has completed her fourth year. She gives due importance to popular culture in her life and loves to read fiction and like to watch TV-shows, her favorite being 'White Collar'.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/tpp-and-d2-implications-for-data-protection-and-digital-privacy

The soon-to-be launched Aadhaar Pay will let you make purchases using your fingerprint

praskrishna — 2017-01-16T03:14:22Z

Paying for your groceries and other goods by using your biometrics instead of an e-wallet, debit card or cash seems to be the next phase in the Centre’s ambitious push to shift the country to a “less cash” economy, as its mandarins term it.

The article by Indulekha Aravind was published in the Economic Times on 15 January 2017. Sunil Abraham was consulted for this.

Ajay Bhushan Pandey, CEO of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), says it will be rolling out Aadhaar-enabled payment system, or Aadhaar Pay, for merchants in the next few weeks. This will be an app for merchants that enables them to receive payments through biometric authentication of the customer, provided their bank accounts are linked to their Aadhaar number. "A pilot is under way in fair price shops in Andhra Pradesh where shopkeepers are accepting payments from PDS beneficiaries. The results are very encouraging," says Pandey.

The idea takes off from the existing Aadhaar-enabled payment system (AEPS) used by bank business correspondents (BCs) in rural areas to disburse and accept cash, using micro ATMs. "We are trying to tweak this so that a similar device can be used by a local merchant," says Pandey. Adoption will depend on two factors: merchants’ acceptance of it and whether they can use an app rather than a micro ATM. The biggest advantage through this method of payment, says Pandey, is that the customer will not need a credit or debit card, or even a smartphone.

The limits for transactions using AEPS, such as the number of daily transactions, will be left to the discretion of the banks. In the long term, the AEPS will be migrated to the BHIM (Bharat Interface for Money) platform but the rollout of Aadhaar Pay will happen before that. Post demonetisation, banking BC’s number of transactions using AEPS has leapt from 4-5 lakh to 14-15 lakh, says Pandey. According to Reserve Bank of India data on electronic payment systems, the total volume of such transactions jumped from 671 million in November 2016 to 957 million in December. USSD-based payments, which can be done using a basic feature phone, are among the biggest beneficiaries: the volume rose from just 7,000 in November to 1,02,000 in December, and value of transactions from over Rs 7,000 to over Rs 1 lakh. Prepaid payment instruments — mainly mobile wallets — rose from 59 million to 88 million in the same period (and value from Rs 1,300 crore to Rs 2,100 crore).

While Aadhaar Pay is likely to ride the demonetisation wave if it is launched soon, certain concerns remain, as the list is how secure such a payment system will be. The UIDAI CEO says it is a paramount concern for the organisation, too. "We are using the latest technology to ensure the information stays encrypted end to-end, so that information is not leaked or misused. In the months to come, we will strengthen the security."

Wary About Security
Sunil Abraham, executive director of the Centre for Internet and Society, a think tank that has been analysing the Aadhaar project for six years, outlines several reasons why Aadhaar-based biometrics is inappropriate for authentication in payments, unlike card-based payments that use cryptography.

"With biometrics, there is always an error ratio. It is imprecise matching, whereas with cryptography (smart cards), there is no false positive or negative. You either have the key (PIN) or you don’t. It is also very cheap to defeat biometric authentication — even an unlettered person can do it," says Abraham. It would be easy enough, he says, to replicate someone else’s fingerprint by pressing it against lukewarm wax and filling the mould with glue to get a dummy finger. In contrast, compromising a smart card requires more cost and effort, from tech-savviness to machines such as a skimmer that will read the card. "And once you are compromised,you are compromised forever. You can’t change it, like a debit card PIN."

Using Aadhaar for authentication had proved to be a failure during the exchange of currency notes following demonetisation, he adds, pointing to how the poor and the middle class stood in queues for money while stacks of new currency were recovered from the homes of businessmen and bureaucrats. "When you have bank officials who are corrupt, giving them your biometrics is giving them more ammunition for corruption." To catch the criminals, law enforcement agencies had to resort to CCTV footage,a relatively older technology, he says. Others point out that while it may be secure, certain factors stand in the way of making biometrics-based payment authentication a large-scale success. Amrish Rau, CEO of PayU India, a payment gateway provider, cites a list of reasons why it would inevitably take off but only in 5-10 years.

"For one, the technology is not yet good enough. There are also bandwidth and data constraints in sending biometric data," says Rau. Even in more mature markets, it has yet to find widespread acceptance, he says, pointing to the slow adoption of Apple Pay and Samsung Pay in the US. "It’s not the answer today.” This is in contrast to NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant’s recent remarks that cards and PoS machines would become redundant by 2020 because Indians would be making payments using their thumb (biometrics). "... my view is that in the next two and a half years, India will make all its debit cards, credit cards, all ATM machines, all PoS machines totally irrelevant,” Kant had said at a Pravasi Bharatiya Divas session in Bengaluru.

UIDAI’s Pandey is more circumspect. “I wouldn’t say who would replace what. But from the government’s side we are encouraging all modes of digital payment. India has a diverse population and some people might prefer using a card, others a wallet. Collectively, they will contribute to a less-cash society.”

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/economic-times-indulekha-aravind-january-15-2017-the-soon-to-be-launched-aadhaar-pay-will-let-you-make-purchases-using-your-fingerprint

The Platform Economy’s Gatekeeping of Class and Caste Dominance in Urban India

Ambika Tandon and Aayush Rathi — 2024-04-19T03:11:44Z

Ambika Tandon and Aayush Rathi contributed an essay on how gated society management apps like MyGate and NoBrokerHood feed on caste and income inequalities in new datafied forms. The essay features in The Formalization of Social Precarities, an anthology edited by Murali Shanmugavelan and Aiha Nguyen and published with Data & Society.

Ashrit is an experienced platform worker. He has been a delivery worker for three years, job-hopping frequently. Ashrit has worked as a package delivery worker for three platforms: two courier services and a hyperlocal grocery delivery company, which promises compressed ten-minute deliveries over short distances. While navigating the city, he often deals with omnipresent surveillance tools deployed in apartment complexes owned by upper-class and dominant-caste homeowners. Ashrit is used to being screened at every apartment complex he enters, including having his picture taken and verifying details such as his name, mobile number, and the platform he is delivering for. The everydayness of constant identity verification means that Ashrit is not bothered much by it — he said he doesn’t mind the process so much as the delay it causes when customers forget to approve his entry.

MyGate is one such company offering “gated community management,” claiming to service over 25,000 gated societies in India. A competing application, NoBrokerHood, services over 18,000 societies. Apps of this nature have sprung up across urban India in the past five years, offering “society management” services to a niche market of gated societies. Their bouquet of services includes everything from property listings with a commission rate for the platform, security services, accounting services for maintenance and related expenses, and in-app discussion forums for residents. These apps market digital security, which allows residents to regulate entries and exits and make a database of all non-resident visitors in the society. The objective of these apps is to legitimize surveillance as a way of ensuring safety in gated societies. Through a preliminary search online, we found over 20 different companies specializing in digital solutions for gated societies. The industry even had a business exposition in Mumbai on “Housing Society Management,” focused on technology solutions for gated societies.

This study uses the framework of platform urbanism to understand surveillance platforms. Platform urbanism analyzes the growing power of digital platforms in cities. Urban geographers have argued that platforms are a symptom of current models of capitalism, which exploit “idle resources” to produce new forms of urban spaces and value where they might not have existed earlier. Airbnb and Uber are often used as examples of this new form of extraction and value creation from existing assets by monetizing empty rooms and car seats. We argue that platforms offering surveillance services are another instance of this wider landscape of platform urbanism, manufacturing the need for surveillance systems in elite urban enclaves. We use this case study to show that platforms monetize not just idle resources but social inequality and stratification to generate value and capital.

Click to download the full essay

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/the-platform-economys-gatekeeping-of-class-and-caste-dominance-in-urban-india

The Competition Law Case Against Whatsapp’s 2021 Privacy Policy Alteration

Aman Nair and Arindrajit Basu — 2021-03-24T16:12:09Z

Having examined the privacy implications of Whatsapp's changes to its privacy policy in 2021, this issue brief is the second output in our series examining the effects of those changes. This brief examines the changes in the context of data sharing between Whatsapp and Facebook as being an anticompetitive action in violation of the Indian Competition Act, 2002.

Executive Summary

On January 4, 2021, Whatsapp announced a revised privacy policy through an in-app notification. It highlighted that the new policy would impact user interactions with business accounts, including those which may be using Facebook's hosting services. The updated policy presented users with the option of either accepting greater data sharing between Whatsapp and Facebook or being unable to use the platform post 15th May, 2021. The updated policy resulted in temporarily slowed growth for Whatsapp and increased growth for other messaging apps like Signal and Telegram. While Whatsapp has chosen to delay the implementation of this policy due to consumer outrage, it is important for us to unpack and understand what this (and similar policies) mean for the digital economy, and its associated competition law concerns. Competition law is one of the sharpest tools available to policy-makers to fairly regulate and constrain the unbridled power of large technology companies.

While it is evident the Indian competition landscape will benefit from revisiting the existing law and policy framework to reign in Big technology companies, we argue that the change in Whatsapp’s privacy policy in 2021 can be held anti-competitive using legal provisions as they presently stand. Therefore, in this issue brief, we largely limit ourselves to evaluating the legality of Whatsapp’s privacy policy within the confines of the present legal system.

First, we dive into an articulation of the present abuse of dominance framework in Indian Competition Law. Second, we analyze whether there was abuse of dominance-bearing in mind an economic analysis of Whatsapp’s role in the relevant market by using tests laid out in previous rulings of the CCI

The framework for determining abuse of dominance as per The Competition Act is based on three factors:

1. Determination of relevant market

2. Determination of dominant position

3. Abuse of the dominant position

In two previous orders in 2016 and 2020, CCI has held that Whatsapp is dominant in its relevant market based on several factors which we explore. These include:

Advantage in user base, usage and reach,
Barriers to entry for other competitors
Power of acquisition over competitors.

However, in both orders, CCI held that Whatsapp did not abuse its dominance by arguing that the practices in question allowed for user choice. We critique these judgments for not reflecting the market structures and exploitative practices of large technology companies. We also argue that even if we use the test of user choice laid down by the CCI in its previous orders concerning Whatsapp and Facebook, the changes made to the privacy policy in 2021 did abuse dominance,and should be held guilty of violating competition law standards.

Our analysis revolves around examining the explicit and implicit standards of user choice laid out by the CCI in its 2016 and 2020 judgements as the standard for evaluating fairness in an Abuse of Dominance claim.We demonstrate how the 2021 changes failed to meet these standards.

Finally, we conclude by noting that the present case offers a crucial opportunity for India to take a giant step forward in its regulation of big tech companies and harmonise its rulings with regulatory developments around the world.

The full issue brief can be found here

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/the-competition-law-case-against-whatsapp2019s-2021-privacy-policy-alteration

That Is Not A Livelihood – That Is Helplessness”: Field notes from the Fraazo Delivery Workers Strike in Noida, Greater Noida, and Ghaziabad

Rikta Krishnaswamy — 2024-04-24T02:05:03Z

In this essay, Rikta Krishnaswamy of the All India Gig Workers’ Union (AIGWU) narrates her experiences of organising and supporting delivery workers’ collective action against Fraazo (a now-defunct platform for produce and grocery delivery). Her essay sheds light on the challenges workers face in organising for better conditions of work. She describes how platforms hide behind legal smokescreens and threats of police action to shirk their responsibility as employers. To make matters worse, obscure employment terms and work management systems make it harder for workers to seek redress from the government through labour dispute resolution processes. The essay is illustrative of how digital platforms have exploited and violated freedoms of the gig workers they employ, while facing no accountability. For this to change, gig workers have to be guaranteed employment rights along with collective rights to their data.

We have observed that over time, Indian gig workers across platforms almost certainly face a decrease in overall wages, an increase in working hours, and ever-worsening working conditions. The rhetoric of ‘large-scale employment’ is a false one, as corporates do not consider the gig workers as employees and the workers do not come under the aegis of the country’s labour laws. But the gig workers on these platforms don’t share the corporate and government view at all.

Unlike the capital city of Delhi, the suburbs of Noida, Greater Noida, and Ghaziabad have fewer opportunities even for gig work. Delivery workers across platforms regularly face theft and petty crimes, especially during late-night deliveries. Housing societies prevent them from taking their bikes to customers’ apartments and, in some cases, deny them access to building lifts to carry out deliveries. Despite its dehumanising nature, gig work provides some means of survival in this epoch of rampant unemployment.

On 30 May 2022, striking delivery workers in Noida, Greater Noida, and Ghaziabad—all of whom work for an app-based, fresh produce and grocery delivery platform called Fraazo —approached the All India Gig Workers’ Union (AIGWU). Many of these delivery workers, who are usually referred to as ‘partners’, had lost jobs at banks, data or telecom companies, and call centres during the pandemic, and had joined Fraazo after it started operations in December 2021. They were initially paid a daily wage, called a minimum guarantee (MG) payout, of INR 500 for a 10-hour work shift during which they delivered vegetables, fruits, and groceries to residences near them. Alongwith the MG payout that was disbursed weekly into their accounts, they were also given a petrol surcharge of four rupees for every kilometre they travelled.

The workers told us that on 28 May 2022, the Fraazo head office in Mumbai decided to replace their daily MG payout with a piece-rate payout of INR 45 per delivery. At a time of sky-rocketing fuel prices and inflation, the company decided to remove the petrol surcharge for delivery distances of less than five kilometres (which constitute a bulk of the orders that these delivery workers service). The delivery workers were apprised of these changes the next day by the Fraazo Store Managers, with a promise that the new piece-rate system would bring in more earnings.

The delivery workers rejected this new system outright and demanded that Fraazo restore the earlier payout system with an assurance that in the future, Fraazo will take the consent of the workers before introducing any drastic changes to their service conditions. In addition, they demanded that all delivery riders be provided with accident insurance and paid leaves.

The workers did not view themselves as merely freelance delivery partners. When the store’s operations had just begun, the company faced a lot of challenges in ensuring consistent service. Some delivery partners would help with unloading and sorting produce at the store during or after their work shifts. Even after operations stabilised, many worked overtime (with no pay) at the behest of the store managers to ensure that deliveries were completed to the customer’s satisfaction. A significant portion of deliveries involved carrying 10 kilos of produce to customers’ homes. Delivery workers were entrusted to escalate and resolve complaints as well. Fraazo’s customers complained that the store managers were lackadaisical when it came to providing appropriate support and often called the delivery workers directly to get items replaced.

Anywhere between 25–40 workers were tied to a store, according to the size of the operations, and helped Fraazo set up and smoothly run its services across its various stores in Noida, Greater Noida, and Ghaziabad in the first half of 2022. They usually worked through the week, had no paid sick leaves, and were allowed to take just one unpaid day off during a work week (they often incurred penalties if they took more than one leave). While there were problems with their previous time-wage system, they were dead against the new system of a piece-rate payout. The latter meant that their employer could potentially hire hundreds of workers for a store with no minimum guarantee pay, thereby annihilating the earnings of all the workers.

Click to download the full essay

Contributors

Author: Rikta Krishnaswamy

Images: All India Gig Workers’ Union (AIGWU)

Design: Annushka Jaliwala

Copy edit: The Clean Copy

About the All India Gig Workers’ Union

The All India Gig Workers’ Union (AIGWU) is a registered trade union for all food delivery, logistics, and service workers that work on any app-based platforms in India.

Contact: contactaigwu@gmail.com

Connect: Twitter; Facebook

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/that-is-not-a-livelihood-2013-that-is-helplessness201d-field-notes-from-the-fraazo-delivery-workers-strike-in-noida-greater-noida-and-ghaziabad

Survey of Estimates of Economic Value of Open Government Data

Ömer Faruk Sarı — 2015-08-22T08:42:30Z

This is a survey of estimates of economic value of open government data, and public sector information in general, across regions, countries, and sectors offered by several reports published during the last decade. The survey is undertaken by Ömer Faruk Sarı, a student of Business Administration at Koc University in Istanbul, Turkey, and research intern with CIS.

Introduction

This is a survey of economic value estimates of open government data, and public sector information in general, by consultancy groups and government bodies across the world. The first part of the post lists estimates from different regions and countries, while the second part collects estimates for different sectors. Major reports surveyed in this study include the 'MEPSIR: Measuring European Public Sector Information Resources' report (2006), 'The Value of Spatial Information' report by ACIL Tasman (2008), 'Review of Recent Studies on PSI Re-Use and Related Market Developments' report by Graham Vickery (2012), 'Market Assessment of Public Sector Information' report by Deloitte (2013), 'Open Data: Unlocking Innovation and Performance with Liquid Information' by McKinsey (2013), 'Big and Open Data in Europe: A Growth Engine or a Missed Opportunity?' by Warsaw Institute for Economic Studies (2014), and 'Open for Business: How Open Data can Help Achieve the G20 Growth Target' report by Omidyar Network (2014).

Note about Exchange Rate:The monetary values stated in these reports vary by years and currencies. The original estimates are mentioned in the currency concerned followed by the converted amount in US Dollar (using exchange rate of the same year) provided within brackets. The exchange rates concerned are mentioned at the bottom of the post.

Countries and Regions

Global

McKinsey estimates global economic value of open data as USD 3.2 Trillion for seven sectors - Education, Transportation, Consumer Products, Electricity, Oil and Gas, Healthcare, and Consumer Finance. [1]

European Union

Pira International Ltd. et al, in 2000, estimated the monetary value of open data for EU countries as EUR 68 Billion (USD 76 Billion). [2]

Zangenberg and Company, estimated this number for EU countries as for minimum EUR 29 Billion (USD 38 Billion) and for an upper limit of EUR 143 Billion (USD 188 Billion). [3]

The Warsaw Institute for Economic Studies (WISE Institute) estimates the economic value of open data in EU, as increase in GDP by 2020, as EUR 206 Billion (USD 253 Billion). [4]

Graham Vickery estimated this number as EUR 200 Billion (USD 264 Billion) in 2012. [5]

In 2006, MEPSIR, in their report for European Commission, mentioned EUR 27 Billion (USD 36 Billion) could be gained by use of open data. [6]

McKinsey, in their report in 2013, estimated the monetary value of open data for EU countries as USD 900 Billion. [1]

G20

For G20 countries taken together, Omidyar Network estimates the economic value of open data as USD 2.6 Trillion. [7]

Australia

Omidyar Network, in their study on business value of open data, estimated the potential of open data for Australia as AUD 3.4 Billion (USD 2.8 Billion). [7]

In 2008, ACIL Tasman estimated the potential economic value of open data for Australia as AUD 1.4 Billion (USD 938 Million). [8]

John Houghton's estimation for the monetary value of open data is AUD 195 Million (USD 197 Million). [9]

Denmark

Zangenberg and Company, in 2011, estimated the economic value of open data for Denmark as DKK 520 Million (USD 92 Million). [3]

France

SerdaLAB, in 2009, estimated EUR 1.57 Billion (USD 2.3 Billion) can be gained by open data in France. [10]

Germany

In 2011, Dr, Martin Fornefeld et al estimated the economic value of open data for Germany as EUR 1.7 Billion (USD 2.2 Billion), only for geo-information. [11]

The POPSIS study estimated this number as EUR 3.2 Million (USD 4.2 Million), in the same year, 2011. [12]

Norway

Graham Vickery's report mentions the potential value of open data as NOK 260 Million (USD 43 Million). [5]

Spain

The Proyecto Aporta (Spanish open data portal project) study estimated the economic value of the infomediary sector in Spain as EUR 330-550 Million (USD 452-753 Million), in 2012. [13]

The Netherlands

In 2011, the POPSIS study estimated the economic potential that can be gained from open data in Netherlands as EUR 78 Million (USD 102 Million). [12]

United Kingdom

Deloitte, in their report, estimated the value of open data as GBP 6.2-7.2 Billion (USD 10-11.8 Billion) for United Kingdom. [14]

Rufus Pollock, in 2011, estimated GBP 4.5-6 Billion (USD 7-9.3 Billion) that can be unlocked by use of open data. [15]

Dot-Econ's estimation for monetary value of open data in United Kingdom is EUR 590 Million (USD 778 Million). [16]

United States

McKinsey's estimation, in 2013, for the value that can be unlocked by open data in United States is quite remarkable at USD 1.1 Trillion. [1]

Pira International Ltd. et al, in 2000, estimated the value as EUR 750 Billion (USD 838 Billion). [2]

Data Types and Sectors

Consumer Finance

McKinsey estimates USD 210-280 Billion, globally, for the consumer finance sector. [1]

Based on McKinsey's Report: The estimate for G20 countries is USD 169 Billion; for Australia, the estimate is AUD 4.2 Billion (USD 4.3 Billion).

Consumer Products

Across the globe, with the use of open data McKinsey estimates USD 520-1470 Billion can be generated from services of consumer products. [1]

Based on McKinsey's Report: G20 countries, in total, have a potential value of USD 419 Billion for this sector; the value is estimated at AUD 10 Billion (USD 10.2 Billion) for Australia.

Education

McKinsey estimates that USD 890-1180 Billion can be generated alone in education sector, across the globe. [1]

Based on McKinsey's Report: Open data in the education sector in G20 countries can generate USD 717 Billion; for Australia, value of open data in education sector is estimated to be AUD 14 Billion (USD 14.2 Billion).

Electricity

McKinsey estimates USD 340-580 Billion, across the globe. [1]

Based on McKinsey's Report: For electricity sector, USD 193 Billion is estimated for G20 countries; estimate for Australia for electricity sector depending on open data is AUD 6.7 Billion (USD 6.8 Billion).

Geospatial Data

Dr. Nam D. Pham estimates the potential value of Geo-spatial information in US as USD 96 Billion. [17]

In the report by Pira International Limited et al, the economic value of geo-spatial information in EU estimated as EUR 36 Billion (USD 40 Billion). [2]

Fornefeld et al estimates the value of geo-spatial information in Germany as EUR 1.7 Billion (USD 2.2 Billion). [11]

The POPSIS study estimates the economic value of Meteorological data re-use market in Netherlands as EUR 10 Million (USD 13 Million). [12]

Graham Vickery estimates (in 2012) NOK 72 Million (USD 12 Million) can be generated in Norway through geo-spatial information. [5]

The Proyecto Aporta study estimates potential value of geo-spatial information in Spain as EUR 183 Million (USD 240 Million). [13]

ACIL Tasman in their report, estimated that as a direct result of the uptake of spatial technologies New Zealand’s real GDP increased by NZD 1.2 Billion (USD 670 Million) in 2008 through productivity-related gains as a result of the increasing adoption of modern spatial information technologies since 1995. [8]

In the United Kingdom, a 'supply-side' assessment estimated the market size and growth potential for geographic information (GI) products and services. The market size in year 2007 was estimated to be GBP 657 Million (USD 1.32 Billion). [18]

Based on PwC's study in 2010, John Houghton estimates the value of spatial data in Australia as AUD 25 Million (USD 25.3 Million). [9]

Ordnance Survey of UK estimates the economic value of open data published by the same agency as GBP 2.9-6.1 Million (USD 4.5-9.5 Million). [19]

Healthcare

Globally, USD 300-450 Billion is the estimate of McKinsey, depending on open data use in healthcare sector.[1]

Based on McKinsey's Report: Open data in the healthcare sector can generate USD 242 Billion for G20 countries; estimate for Australia is AUD 5.9 Billion (USD 6 Billion).

Oil and Gas

McKinsey estimates USD 240-510 Billion that can be generated through open data for the oil and gas sector, across the globe. [1]

Based on McKinsey's Report: Oil and gas sector, with the use of open data, can generate USD 169 Billion for G20 countries; the value for Australia is estimated to generate AUD 4.8 Billion (USD 4.9 Billion).

Transportation

McKinsey estimates the value of transportation sector with the use of open data as USD 720-920 Billion for the transportation sector, globally. [1]

Based on McKinsey's Report: G20 countries altogether can generate USD 580 Billion in transportation sector; estimate of the value of open data in the transportation sector in Australia is AUD 18 Billion (USD 18.2 Billion).

Reference

[1] Manyika, James, et al. 2013. Open Data: Unlocking Innovation and Performance with Liquid Information. McKinsey Global Institute. October. Accessed from http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/business_technology/open_data_unlocking_innovation_and_performance_with_liquid_information.

[2] Pira International Ltd. et al. 2000. Commercial exploitation of Europe’s Public Sector Information - Executive Summary. European Commission, Brussels. Aceeseed from ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/econtent/docs/2000_1558_en.pdf.

[3] Zangenberg and Company. 2011, Kvantificering af værdien af åbne offentlige data (Quantifying the Value of Open Government Data). Report Prepared for the Danish National Information Technology and Telecom Agency. Accessed from https://digitaliser.dk/resource/1021067/artefact/Kvantificering+af+den+erhvervsm%c3%a6ssige+v%c3%a6rdi+af+%c3%a5bne+offentlige+data+-+Zangenberg2011.pdf.

[4] Buchholtz, Sonia, et al. 2014. Big and Open Data in Europe: A Growth Engine or a Missed Opportunity? demosEUROPA – Centre for European Strategy and Warsaw Institute for Economic Studies. Accessed from http://www.bigopendata.eu/wp-content/uploads/2014/01/bod_europe_2020_full_report_singlepage.pdf.

[5] Vickery, Graham. 2012. Review of Recent Studies on PSI Re-Use and Related Market Developments. European Commission, Brussels. Accessed form http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/newsroom/cf//document.cfm?doc_id=1093.

[6] Dekkers, Makx, et al. 2006. MEPSIR: Measuring European Public Sector Information Resources - Final Report of Study on Exploitation of Public Sector Information – Benchmarking of EU Framework Conditions. European Commission, Brussels. Accessed from http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/newsroom/cf/document.cfm?doc_id=1198.

[7] Lateral Economics. 2014. Open for Business: How Open Data can Help Achieve the G20 Growth Target. Omidyar Network. June. Accessed from https://www.omidyar.com/sites/default/files/file_archive/insights/ON%20Report_061114_FNL.pdf.

[8] ACIL Tasman. 2008. The Value of Spatial Information: The Impact of Modern Spatial Information Technologies on the Australian Economy. March. Accessed from http://www.crcsi.com.au/assets/Resources/7d60411d-0ab9-45be-8d48-ef8dab5abd4a.pdf.

[9] Houghton, John. 2011. Costs and Benefits of Data Provision. Report to the Australian National Data Service. September. Accessed from http://www.ands.org.au/resource/houghton-cost-benefit-study.pdf.

[10] Guerre, Louise, et al. 2009. Le marché de l’information électronique professionnelle en France. SerdaLAB. Presentation at CCIP on January 27. Accessed from http://www.fnps.fr/Public/Article/File/DOCUMENTS/Presentation_ET_IEP09_270109.pdf.

[11] Fornefeld, Martin, et al. 2011. Die europäische Gesetzgebung als Motor für das deutsche GeoBusiness (European Legislation as a Driver for German GeoBusiness). Accessed from http://www.micus.de/pdf/MICUS_GeoBusiness-BMWi.pdf.

[12] Citadel Consulting et al. 2011. POPSIS: Pricing Of Public Sector Information Study - Models of Supply and Charging for Public Sector Information (ABC) - Final Report. European Commission. October. Accessed from http://ec.europa.eu/newsroom/dae/document.cfm?doc_id=1158.

[13] Ministry of Finance and Public Administration et al. 2012. Characterization Study of the Infomediary Sector. Proyecto Aporta. Accessed from http://datos.gob.es/sites/default/files/files/Estudio_infomediario/121001%20RED%20007%20Final%20Report_2012%20Edition_vF_en.pdf.

[14] Deloitte. 2013. Market Assessment of Public Sector Information. Report to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, Government of UK. Accessed from https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/198905/bis-13-743-market-assessment-of-public-sector-information.pdf.

[15] Pollock, Rufus. 2010. Welfare Gains from Opening up Public Sector Information in the UK. University of Cambridge. Accessed from http://rufuspollock.org/economics/papers/psi_openness_gains.pdf.

[16] DotEcon. 2006. The Commercial Use of Public Information (CUPI). Report OFT861. Office of Fair Trading, Government of UK. Accessed from http://www.opsi.gov.uk/advice/poi/oft-cupi.pdf.

[17] Pham, Nam D. 2011. The Economic Benefits of Commercial GPS Use in the U.S. and the Costs of Potential Disruption. June. Accessed from http://www.gpsalliance.org/docs/GPS_Report_June_21_2011.pdf.

[18] Coote, Andrew, and Les Rackham. 2008. An Assessment of the Size and Prospects for Growth of the UK Market for Geographic Information Products and Services. ConsultingWhere. Accessed from http://www.consultingwhere.com/wp-content/uploads/resources/UK_Market_Assessment_v11_Final.pdf.

[19] Carpenter, John, and Phil Watts. 2013. Assessing the Value of OS OpenData™ to the Economy of Great Britain - Synopsis. Ordnance Survey. June. Accessed from https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/207692/bis-13-950-assessing-value-of-opendata-to-economy-of-great-britain.pdf.

Exchange Rates

Note: Exchange rates are taken for December of the year concerned.

Euro per 1 US Dollar
2000	0.8947
2006	0.7580
2009	0.6868
2010	0.7562
2011	0.7599
2013	0.7296
2014	0.8123
British Pound per 1 US Dollar
2006	0.5095
2011	0.6415
2013	0.6106
2014	0.6397
Australian Dollar per 1 US Dollar
2008	1.4919
2011	0.9874
2014	1.2144
New Zealand Dollar per 1 US Dollar
2008	1.7923
Norwegian Krone per 1 US Dollar
2010	5.9774
Danish Krone per 1 US Dollar
2011	5.6495

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/openness/survey-of-estimates-of-economic-value-of-open-government-data

Studying Digital Creative Industries in India: Initial Questions

sneha-pp — 2016-03-18T13:55:56Z

This brief overview of the discourse around creative industries is an attempt to explore some ways of identifying what could be digital creative industries in India, and the questions they raise and problematize for us in terms of cultural expression, knowledge production, creativity and labour. The term ‘creative industries’ has been around for a while now, but with the advent of the digital, and with interest from different sectors, especially with a focus on policy and economic development, it would be essential to critically examine the discourse around the term, and see where it may be changing to open up new possibilities, particularly for the arts, humanities and design.

Introduction

The term ‘creative industries’ has been popular for more than two decades now, and continues to remain an important sector for research and development, as indicated by several shifts in policy and public discourse in the last few years. A significant move has been the foregrounding of creativity and knowledge as important resources for economic growth and social well–being. The term has a connection with the older and more specific term ‘cultural industries’, with its origins in the Frankfurt School [1] of theory, but has developed as part of a larger discourse around the creative economy/knowledge economy. First used in Australia in 1994 as part of a report titled Creative Nation [2], it became more widely recognized in the following years with the setting up of the Creative Industries Task Force by the United Kingdom’s Department of Culture, Media and Sport in 1997.The UNESCO Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions (2005) [3] was perhaps the most prominent global effort in recognizing and taking steps towards fostering the growth of creativity and cultural production as part of sustainable development.

Following this there have been several other initiatives across the world, most noticeably in the Anglo-American context, that have built upon this framework to ease and facilitate cross-cultural flows and diversity in the circulation of information, labour and goods. Increasingly, the attempt now is to understand the relevance of these efforts in the digital age, where several advancements in technology and the ubiquitous presence of the internet continue to determine the creation, circulation and consumption of cultural commodities. This blog post is an attempt to outline some initial thoughts on what could be the possibilities of studying ‘digital’ creative industries in India. The digital is an inherent aspect of much cultural and creative expression today, given the steady transition from analogue to digital and the increased presence of internet in almost every domain. What would constitute creative digital industries in the present moment, how do they determine the larger course of cultural production, and pose new questions for labour, commodities, creativity and technology more broadly are some of the questions explored here.

According to the UN Creative Economy Report 2010 [4] the creative industries:

are the cycles of creation, production and distribution of goods and services that use creativity and intellectual capital as primary inputs;
constitute a set of knowledge-based activities, focused on but not limited to arts, potentially generating revenues from trade and intellectual property rights;
comprise tangible products and intangible intellectual or artistic services with creative content, economic value and market objectives;
stand at the crossroads of the artisan, services and industrial sectors; and
constitute a new dynamic sector in world trade.

As the report mentions, these are ‘evolving’ concepts and definitions, and just the number of areas that can come within the purview of the creative industries has increased greatly in the last decade. The report classifies creative industries under four different models as illustrated here:

Source: UN Creative Economy Report 2010.

Creative Industries in India

In India, there has been a keen interest in the potential of creativity as a resource, although creative industries may not be a popularly used term. From a policy perspective it is largely in terms of opportunities for economic growth, and more recently the potential for innovation and entrepreneurship, as seen in the Niti Aayog report presented in 2015 [5], which says that:

the committee proposes using digital platforms to encourage innovation, reforming the educational system to encourage creativity and upskilling workers to make them more employable, improving the ease of doing business, and strengthening intellectual property rights. Finally, the committee also proposes a number of measures to change cultural biases and attitudes towards entrepreneurship in the long-term, including attaching entrepreneurship to large scale economic and social programs, promoting new high-potential sectors via the government’s “Make in India” campaign, fostering a culture of coordination and collaboration, attempting to redefine cultural notions of success, and tying entrepreneurship with the social inclusion agenda.

The report therefore reflects an interest in harnessing creativity or creative labour as a significant factor in fostering innovation and entrepreneurship, and in some sense also expanding the scope of such entrepreneurship by tying it with social inclusion and encouraging collaboration. What this also has implications then is for educational reform, capacity-building and upskilling for increased employability and better livelihoods, something that requires a systemic and focused effort spread over time. The report also explicitly speaks of strengthening an existing intellectual property regime, which also has been a rather dominant framework for the creative industries discourse from a policy perspective. While there is a need to focus on growth and innovation, a perceived objective of IP, the easy conflation of the two is problematic. Further, the role of IPR in fostering innovation and socio-economic development, as reflected in the draft National IPR policy (2014) [6] is contentious, as responses to the draft have pointed out [7]. It would also be imperative to understand better the ‘cultural notions of success’ and how these would also impact the creative industries discourse in India.

As part of a large research initiative titled Culture: Industries and Diversity in Asia (CIDASIA) [8] spread over two years, the Centre for the Study of Culture and Society Bangalore worked on some of the pertinent questions that emerged out of the creative industries discourse in India and the sub-continent. In a report produced as part of this initiative creative industries are described as:

[T]he vast sector that has emerged with the arrival of modern technologies (emphasis as in the original) and forms of mass reproduction since the colonial period. This sector has now become an important site of intervention for both governments such as in UK, Australia and India and international agencies such as the United Nations.

Further, about the programme the report says:

The initiative attempts to assess the viability of international and government policies for cultural and creative industries and thus lay the groundwork for a hitherto unprecedented intervention of philanthropic organizations in the domain. We specifically focus on culture industries through the node of ‘livelihoods’ that we see as inextricably tied to this sector.

The importance of the question of livelihood to the growth in culture industries remains even today, as they are a source of employment for a vast section of society, mostly in rural areas, and often fall into what is called the unorganized sector. Low capital investment and the disputable legality of many of these industries however, make this connection a complicated one, as pointed out by the CIDASIA research. The study critiqued existing models of creative and cultural industries which emphasized copyright and intellectual property rights (IPR) as safeguards of livelihood and identity, a rather contentious connection given the presence of a large underground economy based on creative labour, which is also often migrant in nature. Other initiatives in the programme included a consultation to rethink the existing debates around cultural policy and diversity, with a focus on the rights of marginalized people, rights in the domain of mass culture, copyright and IPR. Diminishing spaces for cultural or political-artistic performances, and the role of creative cities in fostering such spaces was another area of concern.

There were several learnings from these initiatives about the nature of creative industries (audio-visual media including film and television), the conflation and overlap with culture industries (including craft and legacy industries) and the complex relationship between the two, and how the latter benefits from the first. The question of livelihoods, particularly those of non-citizens, or the migrant is an important one, for it highlights the cultural visibility of these industries, and more importantly establishes the presence of an underground economy that produces goods of high economic value, using cheap labour. Policy reforms, especially with respect to IPR and any regulation of these industries would need to take into account these features. The convergence of difference forms of cultural production with the growth of new media technologies, in particular is a pertinent question. Along with growing concerns around piracy, growth of new kinds of content, exclusivity and distribution become important factors here. The availability of capital and technology, and a growing global presence has also changed dramatically the nature of several creative industries, such as media, entertainment and advertising, but also brought with it challenges of finding creative and sustainable business models [9]. The problem of cultural impenetrability, or the difficulty of certain commodities to find a market in certain countries was also brought up as part of a study on the Korean wave in India. The translation of cultural worth into economic value, here studied through an examination of the cinema as cultural object, produced interesting observations in addressing the commodification of these objects and understanding the problem of value in this context [10]. The role of technology in the growth of the creative industries was an inherent aspect of all these studies, with factors such as context, conditions and quality of access, and the need to understand the problem of the 'last mile' as a conceptual and cultural problem, rather than a technological one, being emphasized in these findings [11].

Creative Labour?

The importance of the question of livelihood to the growth in culture industries remains even today, as they are a source of employment for a vast section of society, mostly in rural areas, and often fall into what is called the unorganized sector. Low capital investment and the disputable legality of many of these industries however, make this connection a complicated one, as pointed out by the CIDASIA research. The study also critiqued existing models of creative and cultural industries which emphasized copyright and intellectual property rights (IPR) as safeguards of livelihood and identity, a rather contentious connection given the presence of a large underground economy based on creative labour, which is also often migrant in nature. Other initiatives in the programme included a consultation to rethink the existing debates around cultural policy and diversity, with a focus on the rights of marginalized people, rights in the domain of mass culture, copyright and IPR. Diminishing spaces for cultural or political-artistic performances, and the role of creative cities in fostering such spaces was another area of concern.

In the last decade alone, the internet and digital technologies have grown at an exponential pace in India. Creative industries have been driven greatly by advancements in technology, and the role of the digital here then becomes an important aspect of the discourse, in terms of either a space, object or context. The term itself has drawn different kinds of criticism, beginning with the juxtaposition of creativity and industry, or the ‘economisation of culture’, as another product of contemporary capitalism, a critique that stems from the Frankfurt School. The problems are several, as outlined here by Andrew Ross [12]:

It may be too early to predict the ultimate fate of the paradigm. But sceptics have already prepared the way for its demise:: it will not generate jobs; it is a recipe for magnifying patterns of class polarisation; its function as a cover for the corporate intellectual property (IP) grab will become all too apparent; its urban development focus will price out the very creatives on whose labour it depends; its reliance on self-promoting rhetoric runs far in advance of its proven impact; its cookie-cutter approach to economic development does violence to regional specificity; its adoption of an instrumental value of creativity will cheapen the true worth of artistic creation.2 Still others are inclined simply to see the new policy rubric as ‘old wine in new bottles’ – a glib production of spin-happy New Labourites, hot for naked marketization but mindful of the need for socially acceptable dress. For those who take a longer, more orthodox Marxist view, the turn toward creative industries is surely a further symptom of an accumulation regime at the end of its effective rule, spent as a productive force, awash in financial speculation, and obsessed with imagery, rhetoric and display.

Similar concerns may be highlighted in the Indian context as well, where the employability of many in creative fields of work, which often fall under the informal or unorganized sector, has always been fraught with uncertainty. The access to cultural and social capital also defines the discourse in a certain manner, as largely urban-centric and focused around a particular class. Education, training and capacity-building efforts in creative fields, and access to these are an important factor that requires further exploration. As reflected in the discussions above, the prevalent imagination of cultural and creative industries still focusses on IPR and socio-economic development of certain sectors of the knowledge economy, therefore making invisible other kinds of labour. The appropriation of the term itself to focus on innovation in certain sectors, at the cost of others, and streamlining and regulation of these in some way would be another aspect of concern. More importantly, the definition of creativity, as beyond skilling for certain kinds of work also needs to be emphasized in these discussions.

Key Questions

Whether these are still pertinent criticisms now is a question, and more importantly, what would be new ways to frame the creative industries debate today would be a relevant starting point of engagement. The following are some questions that could be useful in mapping the creative industries discourse and how it could be thought about today, post the digital turn:

What are digital creative industries? Is it possible to identify a smaller subset of industries that would come within the purview of this term, or is it another entry point into the creative industries discourse in India, where the digital is all pervasive? What are new kinds of creative industries that are heavily and/or purely reliant on the internet and digital technologies?
Does the digital add a new perspective/dimension to how we theorise the notion of creative labour, because of the manner in which it affects, or determines creative expressions in the present, on the internet and more broadly in the digital? More importantly, do we need to critically think about a definition of creativity itself, today within the digital context? How do we then understand questions of precarity in working conditions, innovation and entrepreneurship in this space?
Who is the creative subject? Is it possible to understand such a subject outside of the very Eurocentric discourse around creativity and ‘creation’, which paints the creator as hegemonic in some sense? Another new way to reframe the livelihoods question is to understand the creative worker/knowledge worker, and how to think of these distinctions. What are the new ways to understand this debate?
The discourse around creative industries has largely been framed within the context of the intellectual property rights, and as a method to ensure the stability of the IPR regime. Given the changes, and many nuances to the IPR debates in the last few years, and the growth of the Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS) movement, it would be useful to understand the growth of creative digital industries in this context.
What does this tell us about a growing digital economy in India? Creative industries would raise interesting questions about the fostering of a digital economy in India, and the many ways in which it determines cultural production in the rest of the world.

Endnotes

[1] Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer, 'The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception,' 1944. https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/adorno/1944/culture-industry.htm.

[2] See: http://apo.org.au/resource/creative-nation-commonwealth-cultural-policy-october-1994.

[3] See: http://portal.unesco.org/en/ev.php-URL_ID=31038&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html.

[4] See: http://unctad.org/en/Docs/ditctab20103_en.pdf.

[5] See: http://niti.gov.in/mgov_file/report%20of%20the%20expert%20committee.pdf.

[6] See: http://dipp.nic.in/English/Schemes/Intellectual_Property_Rights/IPR_Policy_24December2014.pdf.

[7] For more on this see: 'Comments on the First Draft Of The National IPR Policy' submitted by the Centre for Internet and Society, 2015 http://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/cis-comments_first-draft-of-national-ipr-stategy.pdf, and 'SpicyIP Tidbit: New IPR Policy in 2 months' by Balaji Subramanian, SpicyIP, October 2015, http://spicyip.com/2015/10/spicyip-tidbit-new-ipr-policy-in-2-months.html.

[8] See: http://cscs.res.in/irps/cidasia-1.

[9] S. Ananth, 'Business of Culture in India,' 2008. http://cscs.res.in/dataarchive/textfiles/textfile.2009-12-18.9970782136.

[10]'When The Host Arrived: A Report on the Problems and Prospects for the Exchange of Popular Cultural Commodities with India,' 2008. http://cscs.res.in/dataarchive/textfiles/textfile.2009-07-17.9853066637/file.

[11]Ashish Rajadhyaksha, 'The Last Cultural Mile' (Bangalore: Centre for Internet and Society, 2011) http://cis-india.org/raw/histories-of-the-internet/blogs/the-last-cultural-mile/the-last-cultural-mile-blog-old.

[12] Andrew Ross, 'Nice Work of You Can get it: The Mercurial Career of Creative Industries Policy,' in MyCreativity Reader. Eds. Geert Lovink and Ned Rossiter (Amsterdam: Institute of Network Cultures, 2007).

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/studying-digital-creative-industries-in-india-initial-questions

Strategies to Organise Platform Workers

furtado — 2023-10-22T09:54:52Z

In 2022, the Centre for Internet and Society hosted a panel with Akkanut Wantanasombut, Ayoade Ibrahim, Rikta Krishnaswamy, and Sofía Scasserra at RightsCon, an annual summit on technology and human rights.

Click to download the full report

Event Report

This event report is based on proceedings from a panel hosted at the 2022 edition of RightsCon. Hosted by the labour and digitalisation team at CIS, the panel brought together seasoned labour organisers, activists, and researchers working across Thailand, Nigeria, India, and Argentina. The panellists represented a diverse group of worker organisations, including transnational federations, national unions, and informally organised movements.

Their experiences of organising in research and practice infused our discussion with insight into collective action struggles across varied sectors and platform economies in the global south. Collective resistance among platform workers has witnessed a sustained rise in these economies over the past three years, with demands for transparency and accountability from platforms, and for a guarantee of rights and protections from governments.

Through this panel, we sought to answer:

How have workers’ organisations overcome challenges in sustained collective action?
What have been unique aspects of organising in the global south?
Which strategies have been gaining traction for organising workers and mobilising other stakeholders?

Placing workers’ participation front and centre, the panellists incorporated common threads around campaigning, education, and mobilisation for increasing worker participation, as well as bargaining with the government for legal and social protections. The panellists highlighted that it’s the resilience and resistance led by workers that drive the way for sustained organising. This panel hoped to spotlight steps taken in that direction, where organising efforts strive to form, sustain, and champion worker-led movements.

Contributors

Panellists:
Akkanut Wantanasombut
Ayoade Ibrahim
Rikta Krishnawamy
Sofía Scasserra

Worker organisations in focus:
Tamsang-Tamsong
National Union of Professional App-based Transport Workers
International Alliance of App-based Transport Workers
All India Gig Workers’ Union
Federación Argentina de Empleados de Comercio y Servicios
Asociación de Personal de Plataformas

Conceptualisation and planning: Ambika Tandon, Chiara Furtado, Aayush Rathi, and Abhishek Sekharan

Author: Chiara Furtado
Reviewers: Ambika Tandon and Nishkala Sekhar
Designer: Annushka Jaliwala

This event report is part of research supported by the Internet Society Foundation under the ‘Labour futures’ grant.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/strategies-to-organise-platform-workers-rightscon

Seminar on Understanding Financial Technology, Cashless India, and Forced Digitalisation (Delhi, January 24)

sumandro — 2017-01-23T13:17:19Z

The Centre for Financial Accountability is organising a seminar on "Understanding Financial Technology, Cashless India, and Forced Digitalisation" on Tuesday, January 24, at YWCA, Ashoka Road, New Delhi. Sumandro Chattapadhyay will participate in the seminar and speak on the emerging architecture of FinTech in India, as being developed and deployed by UIDAI and NPCI.

Cross-posted from Centre for Financial Accountability.

Programme Schedule

09.30 - Registration

10:00 - Introduction to the Seminar & Setting the Context

Madhuresh Kumar, National Alliance of People’s Movements

10:15–11:30 - Session 1 - Understanding the Political Context of FinTech

B P Mathur, Former Dy CAG

Prabir Purkayastha, Free Software Movement of India and Knowledge Commons

C P Chandrasekhar, Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, JNU

11:30-11:45 – Tea / Coffee break

11:45-13:15 - Session 2 - How will FinTech Impact the Poor, and Labour and Banking Sector?

Ashim Roy, New Trade Union of India

Nikhil Dey, Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan

Ravinder Gupta, General Secretary, State Bank of India Officers Association

13:15-14:00 – Lunch

14:00-15:30 - Session 3 - Understanding the Economic Context of FinTech

Indira Rajaraman, Former Director, RBI

Tony Joseph, Sr. Journalist

15:30-17:00 - Session 4 - Understanding the Architecture of FinTech: Linkages to Aadhaar, IndiaStack etc

Sumandro Chattapadhyay, the Centre for Internet and Society

Gopal Krishna, ToxicsWatch

17:00 – Tea

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/seminar-on-understanding-financial-technology-cashless-india-and-forced-digitalisation-delhi-jan-24-2017

Research Symposium on Digital Transitions in Cultural and Creative Industries in India, New Delhi, Feb 27-28

sumandro — 2018-02-26T11:04:24Z

It is our privilege to collaborate with LabEx ICCA (Université Paris 13), UNESCO New Delhi, Centre for Social Sciences and Humanities (CSH), and Centre d'études de l'Inde et de l'Asie du Sud (CEIAS), to organise a Research Symposium on Digital Transitions in Cultural and Creative Industries in India. The symposium gathers researchers and practitioners engaging with the changing landscape of cultural and creative industries in India in the context of the rapid expansion of digital technologies and social media. We invite you to join us for a critical exploration of the prevalent discourse around cultural and creative industries, to identify what could be the different forms of digital creative and cultural industries developing in India, and how they problematise the questions of cultural expression, knowledge production, creativity, and labour.

Venue: Conference Room, UNESCO New Delhi, 1 San Martin Marg, Chanakyapuri, New Delhi, 110021 (Note: Please bring your identity document to enter the UNESCO premises)

RSVP: Registration is closed

Booklet: Download (PDF)

Programme: Download (PDF)

Poster: Download (PNG)

Organisers: LabEx ICCA, Université Paris 13, UNESCO New Delhi, Centre for Social Sciences and Humanities (CSH), Centre d'études de l'Inde et de l'Asie du Sud (CEIAS), and the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), India

Concept Note

Digital technologies involve, accompany and provoke changes in the structuring of industrial sectors. How are they more particularly transforming the creation, production, distribution processes in cultural and creative industries? What are reconfigurations and challenges associated with the rise in power of actors from the industries of communication and information? What are the new stakeholder strategies, economic models and power relationships involved? Does digital have the effect of empowering the smallest actors / self-employed / freelancers or on the contrary does it allow large players to relieve themselves of the promotion, production costs on individual creator?

A growing interest in fields such as digital humanities, new media, digital cultures and the Galleries, Libraries, Archives and Museums (GLAM) sector is another important development here. The rise of a number of digital initiatives in arts and humanities practice, research and teaching has also brought up significantly the question of new skills or expertise required in these fields. The need for digital literacy and ‘re-skilling’ to adapt to new forms of arts and humanities practice in a digital environment has often come with much criticism, as it is viewed as an effort towards vocationalisation and professionalization of these disciplines, a result of the changing mandates of the university and higher education in general. How do we then productively engage with these questions of skill, expertise and labour that goes into the building of new digital industries, which are often located within and at the periphery of academia and creative practices? Importantly, how can concerns about a perceived conflict of creativity and industry be addressed as these transformations take place rapidly with the advent of the digital is an important point of focus.

A critical exploration of the prevalent discourse around creative industries would offer ways of identifying what could be the different forms of digital creative and cultural industries developing in India, and how they problematize for us questions of cultural expression, knowledge production, creativity and labour. The conflation and overlap of both ‘cultural’ and ‘creative industries’ and the location of these terms within a larger discourse around policy, economic development, livelihoods and rights, takes on different dimensions post the digital turn. In the context of initiatives like Digital India, and efforts to consolidate an IPR regime, the implications of policy reforms for creative work, especially that performed within informal/underground economies and in the cultural heritage sector are many. These discussions would inform and draw from the ongoing efforts in fostering of a digital economy in India, and the many ways in which it determines cultural production in the rest of the world.

Topics that will be addressed at the symposium include, but are not restricted to:

- Digital turns and transformations in cultural and creative industries

- Media infrastructure, digital platforms, and changing landscape of actors

- Digital transitions in the Indian news industry

- Online/offline lives of creative industries and media consumption

Presented by the Labex ICCA and the Center for Internet and Society (CIS), the symposium will gather Indian, French, and international specialists in the cultural industries, new media and technology, information and communication sciences, and social sciences but also professionals and industrial actors in the cultural and artistic sectors. The event is driven an ambition to promote the creation of an interdisciplinary and inter-institutional Franco-Indian research network to initiate, develop and share research on cultural industries in India and more widely in South Asia.

Organising Committee

- Christine Ithurbide (LabEx ICCA, Université Paris 13 / CSH)

- Philippe Bouquillion (LabEx ICCA, Université Paris 13)

- Vibodh Parthasarathi (Jamia Millia Islamia)

- Sumandro Chattapadhyay (The Centre for Internet and Society)

- Puthiya Purayil Sneha (The Centre for Internet and Society)

Symposium Programme (Draft)

First Day – Tuesday, February 27, 2018

10:00-10:30
Tea and Coffee

10:30-11:00
Welcoming Address
Snigdha Bisht (UNESCO Cultural Department)
Introductions
Shailendra Sigdel (UNESCO Institute for Statistics), Christine Ithurbide (LabEx ICCA / CSH), and Vibodh Parthasarathi (Jamia Millia Islamia)

11:00-12:30
Session 1: Digital Opportunities and Challenges in the Cultural Industries
Speakers: Tanishka Kachru (National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad), Akshaya Kumar (IIT Indore), and Vivan Sharan (KOAN Advisory)
Chair: Christine Ithurbide (LabEx ICCA / CSH)

12:30-13:30
Lunch

13:30-15:00
Session 2: Digital Transitions in the News Landscape
Speakers: Zeenab Aneez (Freelance Journalist), Ravichandran Bathran (Dalit Camera), and Franck Rebillard (University of Paris 3 – Sorbonne Nouvelle and Labex ICCA)
Chair: Vibodh Parthasarathi (Jamia Millia Islamia)

15:00-15:30
Tea and Coffee

15:30-17:00
Session 3: Technology, Creativity, and (Re)Skilling
Speakers: Padmini Ray Murray (Srishti School of Art Design and Technology), Sneha Raghavan (Asia Art Archive), and Xenia Zeiler (University of Helsinki)
Chair: Puthiya Purayil Sneha (The Centre for Internet and Society)

Second Day – Wednesday, February 28, 2018

10:00-10:30
Tea and Coffee

10:30-12:30
Session 4: Digital Platforms and Media Distribution
Speakers: Narendra Ganesh (KPMG), Mae Thomas (Maed in India), Philippe Bouquillion (Université Paris 13 / LabEx ICCA), and Nikhil Pahwa (Medianama)
Chair: Sumandro Chattapadhyay (The Centre for Internet and Society)

12:30-13:30
Lunch

13:30-15:00
Session 5: Copyright, Creative Content, and Rights of Performers
Speakers: Nandita Saikia (Lawyer), Anubha Sinha (The Centre for Internet and Society), and Manojna Yeluri (Artistik License)
Chair: Neha Paliwal (Sahapedia)

15:00-15:30
Tea and Coffee

15:30-17:00
Session 6: Technologies of Aesthetic Imagi/nation
Speakers: Farrah Miranda (Artists), Rashmi Munikempanna (Artist), Swati Janu (Architect), and Tara Atluri (Writer, Researcher, Artist)
Chair: Tara Atluri (Writer, Researcher, Artist)

17:00-18:00
Concluding Remarks
Speakers: Christine Ithurbide (LabEx ICCA / CSH), Neha Paliwal (Sahapedia), Philippe Bouquillion (Université Paris 13 / LabEx ICCA), Puthiya Purayil Sneha (The Centre for Internet and Society), Tara Atluri (Writer, Researcher, Artist), and Vibodh Parthasarathi (Jamia Millia Islamia)
Chair: Sumandro Chattapadhyay (The Centre for Internet and Society)

Location of Venue

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/digital-transitions-in-cultural-and-creative-industries-in-india-symposium-2018

Platforms, Power, and Politics: Perspectives from Domestic and Care Work in India

Aayush Rathi, and Ambika Tandon — 2021-07-07T15:19:37Z

CIS has been undertaking a two-year project studying the entry of digital platforms in the domestic and care work in India, supported by the Association for Progressive Communications as part of the Feminist Internet Research Network. Implemented through 2019-21, the objective of the project is to use a feminist lens to critique platform modalities and orient platformisation dynamics in radically different, worker-first ways. Ambika Tandon and Aayush Rathi led the research team at CIS. The Domestic Workers’ Rights Union is a partner in the implementation of the project, as co-researchers. Geeta Menon, head of DWRU, was an advisor on the project, and the research team consisted of Parijatha G.P., Radha Keerthana, Zeenathunnisa, and Sumathi, who are office holders in the union and are responsible for organising workers and addressing their concerns.

The Executive Summary for the project report is below.

The full report, ‘Platforms, power, and politics: Perspectives from domestic and care work in India’, can be found here.

The press release can be found here.

Introduction

Paid domestic and care work is witnessing the entry of digital intermediaries over the past decade. More recently, there has been tremendous growth of digital platforms. This holds the potential to impact millions of workers in the sector, which is characterised by a long history of informality and exclusion from rights-according legal frameworks. Digital intermediation of domestic and care work has been a space of high-growth, but also high-attrition. In India, order books of digital platforms providing domestic and care work services were reported to have been growing by upto 60 percent month-on-month in 2016. This is expected to shift the organisation of workers and employment relations profoundly.

Broadly, the discourse on digital platforms providing home-based services can be summarised as follows: proponents argue that digitisation will act as a step towards bringing formalisation to the sector, while critics argue that platforms could replicate the exploitation of workers by further disguising the employer-employee relationship. Similar debates around lack of protections and precarity have also taken place in other occupations in gig work such as transportation and food delivery. In fact, the similarity in precarity and the informal nature of this relationship across gig work and domestic work has led to domestic workers being labelled the original gig workers. Domestic work is a particularly vulnerable and unprotected sector, which makes work in the sector qualitatively different from most other sectors in the gig or sharing economy.

Through a feminist approach to digital labour, our project aimed to examine the dynamics of platformisation in, and of domestic or reproductive care work. Our hypothesis was that platforms are reconfiguring labour conditions, which could empower and/or exploit workers in ways qualitatively different from non-standard work off the platform. In order to interrogate this further, we studied several aspects of the work relationship, including wages, conditions of work, social security, skill levels, and worker surveillance off platforms.

Methodology

We borrowed from ethnographic methods and feminist principles to co-design and implement the research tools with grassroots workers and organisers. Between June to November 2019, we conducted 65 in-depth semi-structured interviews primarily in New Delhi and Bengaluru. A majority of these were with domestic workers who were seeking or had found work through platforms. We also did interviews with workers who had found work through traditional placement agencies to compare our findings, and with representatives from platforms, government labour departments, and workers collectives. Of the workers we interviewed, a majority were women, but men were included as well. Interviews in New Delhi were undertaken by CIS, while interviews with workers in Bengaluru were undertaken by grassroots activists in Bengaluru, affiliated with the Domestic Workers Rights Union (DWRU).

In implementing the data collection approach, we employed feminist methodological principles of intersectionality, self-reflexivity, and participation. The methodology draws on standpoint theory, which encourages knowledge production that centres the lived experiences of marginalised groups. We were acutely aware of our own positionality as high income, Savarna researchers studying a sector dominated by Dalit, Bahujan and Adivasi women from low income groups. This power differential was softened partially by involving DWRU through the course of the project. Workers across both field sites were also interviewed in spaces familiar to them, most often their homes, in languages that they were comfortable with including Hindi, Kannada, and Tamil.

Feminist principles also instrumental during the data analysis, with focus on intersectionality and self-reflexivity. We highlighted the ways in which inequalities of gender, income, migration status, caste, and religion are replicated and amplified in the platform economy. In particular, we discussed the impact of the digital gender gap in access and skills on workers’ ability to find economic opportunities.

Findings

Our typology of platforms mediating domestic work finds three types of platforms – (i) marketplace, or platforms that list workers’ data on their profile, provide certain filters for automated selection of a pool of workers, and charge a fee from customers for access to workers’ contact details, (ii) digital placement agency, or platforms that provide an end-to-end placement service to customers, identify appropriate workers on the basis of selection criteria, and negotiate conditions of work on behalf of workers, and (iii) on-demand platforms, or companies that provide services or ‘gigs’ such as cleaning on an hourly basis, performed by a roster of workers who are characterised as ‘independent contractors’.

When it comes to the role played by platforms in determining employment relations, there is a wide variation within and across platform categories. There are both weak and strong models of intervention. On one end of the spectrum are marketplaces, with minimal intervention in the recruitment process, and on the other on-demand platforms, that exact control over each aspect of work. Digital platforms reconfigure the conception of intermediaries in the domestic work sector, functioning as next-generation placement agencies. All three platform types contain aspects that provide workers agency, as well as those that reinforce their positions of low-power. Platform design impacts the role platforms play in setting conditions of work, but does not determine it entirely.

(Re)shaping the terms of work
Across the three types of platforms, wages are slightly higher than or matching those of workers off platforms. Some marketplace platforms have incorporated features to nudge customers towards setting higher wages, such as enforcing minimum wage standards, or informing customers of expected wages in their locality. Conversely, on-demand platforms charge a high rate of commission from workers, despite refusing to recognise them as employees. This indicates that this is a misclassification of an employment relationship, given that workers are unable to set their own conditions or wages for work. Despite the high rates of commission and appropriation of labour by platforms, on-demand workers earn higher wages than workers on other platforms. The relatively high wage is a result of marketing on-demand cleaning as professionalised and more skilled than day-to-day cleaning. Tasks in the sector continue to be distributed along the lines of gender and caste, as has historically been the case. Dalit, Bahujan and Adivasi women are more likely to take up work such as cleaning and washing dishes, while men and women across castes are equally distributed in cooking work. Women dominate tasks such as elderly and childcare, as in the traditional economy. Workers in professionalised tasks such as deep cleaning that requires technical equipment and chemicals are almost entirely men.

Digital divides and workers’ agency
We find that workers are primarily onboarded onto platforms by learning about it from other workers, through onboarding camps held by platforms, or offline advertising by platforms. Such in-person onboarding techniques allows workers with no digital access or literacy to register themselves on marketplace platforms and digital placement agencies.

However, we find that low levels of education and digital literacy continue to impact platformed labour by creating a strong informational asymmetry between workers and platforms. For instance, we find that women workers from low income communities have very little information about how platforms work, causing deep distrust. Workers with digital devices and literacy (and therefore a relatively better understanding of the functionality of the platform), physical mobility and the resources to bear indirect costs that were outsourced to them were at a significant advantage in finding better-paying jobs. Workers who were seeking flexibility and were not necessarily dependent on the platform for their primary income were also better placed than those entirely dependent on platforms. Women workers tended to be disadvantaged on all these counts, limiting their agency and capacity to reap the benefits of the platform economy.

Across the three types of platforms, systems of placement and ratings add to the information asymmetry, as workers are not aware of the impact of ratings on their ability to find work or charge better wages. Ratings and filtering systems also hard-code the impact of workers’ social characteristics on their work. Workers are unable to exercise control over their data, further undermining their agency vis-a-vis platforms and employers. We identify a clear need for collective bargaining structures to protect workers’ rights, although platformed domestic workers remained distant from both domestic work unions and emergent unions of platform workers in other sectors.

Intersectionalities of formalisation
We find that inequalities of caste, class, and gender that have historically shaped the sector continue to be replicated or even amplified in the platform economy. What remains clear is that platforms in the domestic work sector adopt the logics of this sector, more than the converse. Platformisation is conflated with formalisation, and it is within this vector, from complete informality to piecemeal formalisation, that platforms operate. Labour benefits do not take the form of labour protections or welfare entitlements that are the central function of formalisation processes. Instead, the so-called benefits are intended to transform domestic workers to participate within the logics and vagaries of the market.

Policy Recommendations

Recognise and implement labour protections for domestic workers
Domestic workers have historically occupied the most vulnerable positions in the workforce, with limited legal protections. Exposed to the regulatory grey areas that platforms operate in, this doubly exposes domestic workers to precarious conditions of work. Despite an avowed move towards formalisation of domestic work, platform-mediated labour continues to retain characteristics of informal labour, even heightening some.

If pushed to do so, platform companies can be instrumental in resolving some of the implementation challenges that governments have faced in enforcing legislative protections sought to be made available to domestic workers. Platforms have databases of workers, which can be used to mandatorily register them for social security schemes offered by the government. This data can also be used for better policy making, in the absence of reliable statistics particularly on migrant workers in the informal economy.

Reduce the protective gap between employment and self-employment
The (mis)classification of “gig” work within labour law frameworks is still a matter that continues to be hotly debated within policy practitioners, legal scholarship, and civil society actors. Three positions, in particular, have been taken—treating gig workers as employees, independent contractors, or occupying a third intermediate category. More recently, there have been some legal victories guaranteeing employment protections and increasing platform companies’ accountability. However, these successes have been more visible in Global North jurisdictions.

Regardless of the resolution of these ongoing debates over employment status, labour frameworks should provide some universal protections to all categories of labour. Such protections must include universal coverage of social security, in addition to rights such as freedom of association, collective bargaining, equal remuneration and anti-discrimination. Policies geared towards achieving this objective would be significant in reducing the protective gaps between different categories of labour, and would particularly help historical and emerging occupational categories of workers such as “gig” workers and domestic workers.

Recognise the specific challenge(s) and potential of platformisation of domestic work
Platforms hold the potential of acting as effective facilitators in informal labour markets. Even when they do not replace existing recruitment pathways, they provide alternate ones. Workers were more likely to register on a platform if they were entering the domestic work labour market recently (often distress and migration driven), or had not enjoyed success with informal, word-of-mouth networks. However, platforms also heighten labour market insecurities, and create new ones. These potential risks need to be specifically recognised through appropriate frameworks, such as social security, discrimination law and data protection.

Tailor policy-making to platform models
We identify three types of platforms, each of which intervene to varying degrees in the work relationship. We recommend that digital placement agencies and marketplace platforms be registered with governments and enforce basic protections for workers such as provision of minimum wage, preventing abuse (including non-payment of wages) and trafficking. On-demand companies on the other hand, must be treated as employers, and workers be accorded employment protections including social security.

In addition to rights-based policy actions, legal-regulatory mechanisms geared towards mitigating the precariousness of platform-based work are required. This can take the shape of clarifying and expanding existing legal-regulatory formulations, or preparing new ones. Such policy making should factor in the power and information asymmetry between domestic workers (and gig workers, generally) and platforms.

Further, in the absence of health or retirement benefits, risks and indirect costs of operations are shifted from employers to workers. For instance, workers provide capital in the form of tools or equipment, support the fluctuation of business and income, and can be ‘deactivated’ from an application as a result of poor ratings or periods of inactivity. Any regulation aiming to extend employee status should mandate platforms to support such indirect costs.

Related Publications

1. Research notes with reflections from union members.
2. The event report from a stakeholder consultation with workers, unions, companies and government representatives.
3. A reflection note on the participatory approach taken by the project.
4. A paper with a comparative analysis of the policy landscape on domestic work in the platform economy.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/platforms-power-and-politics-perspectives-from-domestic-and-care-work-in-india

Platformisation of Domestic Work in India: Report from a Multistakeholder Consultation

tasneem — 2020-02-17T09:46:52Z

On November 16, 2019, The Centre for Internet and Society invited officials from the Department of Labour (Government of Karnataka), members of domestic worker unions, domestic workers, company representatives, and civil society researchers at the Student Christian Mission of India House to discuss preliminary findings of an ongoing research project and facilitate a multistakeholder consultation to understand the contemporaneous platformisation of domestic work in India. Please find here a report from this consultation authored by Tasneem Mewa.

Report from the consultation: Download (PDF)

Agenda and details of the consultation: URL

Introduction

This collaborative project is being led by the the Centre for Internet and Society, India (CIS) together with Domestic Workers Rights Union (DWRU) in Bangalore. The research team comprises of Geeta Menon, Parijatha G.P., Sumathi, Radha K., and Zennathunnisa from DWRU, and Aayush Rathi and Ambika Tandon from CIS. Through a collective research process, this research team has explored the proliferation of digital platforms as a key intermediary in the domestic work sector, and in supporting or challenging deeply rooted structural inequities. For more information on the research project, see the project announcement published on the CIS website [1]. This work forms part of the Association for Progressive Communications’ Feminist Internet Research Network project, supported by the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada.

The multistakeholder consultation was structured in two segments: a) a presentation outlining initial observations and analysis, and b) a semi-moderated open discussion. Together, these sessions aimed to initiate conversations pertaining to the role of digital platforms, the legal classification of domestic and gig workers, and devising regulatory solutions to improve conditions of work. Preliminary findings were based on qualitative in-depth interviews with workers, platform companies, unions, skilling agencies, and labour officials in both Bengaluru and New Delhi. Feminist approaches were employed in conducting these interviews, and participatory, consensual, reflexive and collaborative research was prioritised.

Situating the lived realities of domestic workers, the event sought to centre the voice of domestic workers in the consultation around the future of their work. The event had attendance from multilingual attendees. The original presentation was made in English, and Geeta Menon translated the presentation and the discussion that followed in Kannada [2].

Footnotes

[1] Tandon, A., & Rathi, A. (2019, October 1). Digital mediation of domestic and care work in India: Project Announcement. Retrieved from https://cis-india.org/raw/digital-domestic-work-india-announcement

[2] Rathi, A. (2019, November 16). Domestic Work in the 'Gig Economy'. Retrieved from https://cis-india.org/raw/domestic-work-in-the-gig-economy-20191116; Tandon, A., & Rathi, A. (2019). Domestic workers in the ‘gig’ economy [PowerPoint slides]. Retrieved from https://cis-india.org/raw/domestic-work-and-platforms-presentation

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/platformisation-of-domestic-work-in-india-report-from-a-multistakeholder-consultation

Platforming precarity: Data narratives of workers sustaining urban platform services

2024-10-15T02:42:26Z

CIS conducted quantitative surveys with over 800 workers employed in the app-based taxi and delivery sectors across 4 cities in India as part of the ‘Labour Futures’ project supported by the Internet Society Foundation. The surveys covered key employment indicators, including earnings and working hours, work-related cost burdens, income and social security, and platform policies and management. Findings from these surveys are presented as data visualisation briefs centring workers’ everyday experiences. These data briefs form a foundational evidence base for policy and action around labour rights, social protection, and urban inclusion in platform work.

It has been over a decade since app-based delivery and taxi sectors began operations in India, and have since expanded to several metropolitan and smaller cities. These sectors together account for the largest proportion of the platform workforce in India. Workers’ organising and collective action have long revealed extractive labour practices in the platform economy. Their demands call for the recognition of their labour rights by policymakers and platforms, an end to exploitative working conditions, and the introduction of effective policy that protects their rights and wellbeing.

In 2021-22, the labour research vertical at the Centre for Internet and Society conducted quantitative surveys with over 800 workers in the app-based taxi services and app-based delivery services sectors. Spanning four cities (Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Guwahati, Lucknow), the surveys gathered comprehensive data on the conditions of work in the platform economy in these cities, within its two dominant sectors.

The survey covered key labour indicators—(i) the conditions of work for workers, including recruitment, wages, incentive structures, and work-related cost burdens (ii) workforce management, including hours spent working for the platform, surveillance and control measures, and (iii) workers’ coverage under income security, social security and social protections, including provident funds, health and accident insurance, and pensions.

Key Findings

The generation of city-level data aimed to support policymaking and advocacy towards achieving just outcomes for workers in the rapidly platformising Indian economy. These survey findings speak to i) top-down approaches of regulatory, legislative, and judicial action through evidence-building, and ii) bottom-up approaches of mobilisation and advocacy campaigns of workers’ collectives.

The city-wise data briefs highlight region-specific differences and similarities shaped by histories and newer developments of labour platforms operating in the urban economy. Across the four survey cities, the data briefs reveal the ways in which precarity materialised in platform work. Workers grappled with numerous socioeconomic vulnerabilities that influenced their entry and continued employment in platform work. They faced low-wage outcomes, worsened by a reduction in bonuses, and high operational work-related expenses. Earnings remained low and uncertain despite workers putting in immensely long hours working for platforms. Worsening these burdens was widespread income insecurity that workers faced in both app-based taxi and delivery sectors.

Mapping delivery and taxi platform services across cities

The taxi services sector in all cities was dominated by two large platforms—Uber and Ola Cabs. These platforms had established a highly concentrated labour market for taxi workers. The exception to this was the taxi platform labour market in Guwahati, where the local platform, PeIndia, employed 35% of taxi workers in the city.

The delivery services sector in all cities had a high concentration of pan-India platforms. Food delivery services were concentrated by Swiggy and Zomato across cities. E-commerce delivery services had a diversity of platforms including Amazon, Flipkart, E-kart Logistics, and Shadowfax, as well as grocery delivery services like Big Basket, Dunzo, and Jio Mart.

Economic necessity and a lack of alternative employment pushing workers into precarious platform work

The pathway to precarious platform work was distress-driven, borne out of low wages in previous salaried work, or a lack of alternative employment. A large proportion of workers were previously engaged in salaried employment, who then shifted to platform work, marking increased informality and precarity in their employment status. In Mumbai, over 64% of workers were in salaried employment previously, and this also the case for over 50% of workers in Guwahati, and over 42% of workers in Delhi-NCR. In Lucknow and Delhi-NCR, pandemic-driven unemployment was a key driver for a staggering proportion of workers who joined platform work as a distress employment source. Over 30% of workers in Lucknow and Delhi-NCR were previously unemployed.

These socioeconomic vulnerabilities influenced workers entry and continued employment in platform work. Key factors for workers entering were the lack of alternative employment sources and the hope for better pay and potential job flexibility. The lack of alternative jobs was a major push into platform work for workers in Delhi-NCR and Lucknow—over 60% of workers in Delhi-NCR and over 50% of workers in Lucknow. At least 40% of workers across cities mentioned the expectation of better pay as a major reason to start platform work, while potential job flexibility was also a key reason for workers in Mumbai and Guwahati. However, as the findings below show, workers’ expectations were unmet.

Externalised joining, statutory, and operational costs

High joining, statutory, and operational costs were offloaded onto workers to access and continue platform work. This was especially the case for taxi workers who owned their vehicles, and had to incur vehicle investment costs and downpayment, as well as statutory costs that included operating permits, road tax, vehicle insurance, and fitness fee. Across all cities, average monthly expenses for taxi workers were above INR 30,000. For delivery workers, average monthly expenses mostly comprised fuel costs, and were around INR 5,500 in Guwahati and Lucknow, and around INR 6,700 in Delhi-NCR and Mumbai. These high externalised costs reveal the economic vulnerabilities inherent within platform work.

Compounding these costs, platforms in the taxi services sectors also charged commissions unevenly and in varying fee structures—ranging from 20% to 30% of the fare in Mumbai and Lucknow, and going as high as 35% in Delhi-NCR and Guwahati. It is important to note that high commissions persist despite the mandate under the Motor Vehicle Aggregator Guidelines, 2020 to cap commissions and other platform charges at 20% of the fare.

Platforms’ offloading of costs to workers have resulted in workers’ having to rely on informal leasing, debt, and subcontracting arrangements. These arrangements were seen across all cities, where workers in the city were either renting the vehicle they were driving, paying a commission to a vehicle owner, paying off vehicle EMIs on someone else’s behalf, or were paid a fixed salary by a vehicle owner. Notably, in Lucknow, around 35% of taxi workers were engaged under these informal arrangements.

Insufficient incomes and economic vulnerabilities

Workers' experiences, across cities, highlight how a majority contended with low-wage outcomes. Earnings remained low and uncertain for workers despite the fact that they were putting in long work hours. Several factors contributed to this insufficiency and uncertainty in workers’ earnings: stringent platform requirements around high acceptance rates and ratings, which were important determinants, decreased flexibility, and high offloaded work-related expenses.

Across cities, earnings for delivery workers were considerably lower than those for taxi workers. When earnings were adjusted for standard weekly work hours (48 hours/week), over 50% of delivery workers in Mumbai, Guwahati, and Lucknow were earning less than the corresponding state-wise minimum wages. Further, over 75% of delivery workers in these cities were earning below estimated state-wise living wages. Platform work was also insufficient in meeting essential living needs for taxi workers in Mumbai, Guwahati, and Lucknow. Around 30% of taxi workers (23% in Guwahati) were earning less than minimum wages, and around 50% (80% in Mumbai) were earning less than estimated living wages. Earnings for both delivery and taxi workers in Delhi-NCR were substantially lower than minimum wage and living wage standards. 69% of workers in the taxi services sector and 87% of workers in the delivery services sector earned less than the minimum wage in Delhi. Moreover, 92% of workers in the taxi sector and 97% of workers in the delivery sector earned lower than the estimated living wage.

These insufficient incomes were particularly damaging to workers’ lives and livelihoods, considering their high dependence on income from platform work. An overwhelming proportion of workers (over 94% across all cities) were engaged in platform work as their main source of income, as opposed to part-time employment. They also faced significant economic burdens such as being sole earners in their household, having multiple financial dependents, having financial commitments to provide remittances back home, and so on. Worsening these burdens was widespread income insecurity that workers faced across all cities—for over 43% of workers (up to 65% in Guwahati), earnings from platform work were insufficient for covering basic household expenses.

Workplace risks and ineffective redressal mechanisms

Workers in both sectors were working immensely long hours in order to try and make adequate earnings while working for platforms, working several hours above standard weekly work hours (48 hours/week) typically prescribed by occupational health standards. Across all cities, delivery workers spent a median of over 60 weekly hours working for platforms, and taxi workers spent a median of around 84 weekly hours.

Alongside the adverse health impacts of long work hours, workers faced grievous workplace risks, including risks of physical assault, theft, poor road safety, and harsh weather conditions. Around 75% of delivery and taxi workers faced these issues in Mumbai and Lucknow. An even greater proportion of workers were exposed to these risks in Delhi-NCR (84%) and Guwahati (90%).

Despite several workplace risks, platforms remained unaccountable for their failure to guarantee safe working conditions. Across all cities, less than 10% of workers found that their platform took steps to improve working conditions. Workers’ overall experience with platform grievance redressal mechanisms was mixed. For instance, in Lucknow, only around 25% of workers who raised grievances did not receive a resolution. In contrast, 50% of taxi workers in Delhi-NCR did not receive a resolution, as was the case for 76% of taxi workers in Mumbai. Workers have limited recourse when their grievances go unanswered. Platforms, however, wield significant control over terms of work, making it difficult for workers to challenge unfair decisions.

Low coverage and accessibility of social protection mechanisms

Social security covered by platforms typically included health insurance and accident insurance. Workers faced significant gaps in insurance coverage, and these gaps were particularly glaring in the taxi services sector. Across cities, health and accident insurance coverage for taxi workers was below 10% (an exception was 11% of workers covered by accident insurance in Delhi-NCR). It is important to note that this low coverage exists despite the Motor Vehicle Aggregator Guidelines, 2020 mandating provision of health insurance and term insurance from platforms.

Delivery workers had a relatively higher percentage of insurance coverage from platforms, although coverage varied across cities. Health insurance coverage was low for delivery workers in Delhi-NCR (21%) and Guwahati (14%), but higher for workers in Lucknow (34%) and Mumbai (44%). In the case of accident insurance, insurance was covered by platforms for over 40% of delivery workers in Delhi-NCR and Lucknow, while a greater proportion of workers were covered in Mumbai (63%) and Guwahati (72%). Even though delivery workers were covered by platform-provisioned insurance, claiming benefits was an unreliable and time-consuming process. Workers who attempted to access benefits faced several obstacles, including poor awareness of available schemes, inadequate coverage, and little to no platform support in navigating complex claims procedures.

The inadequacy of platform-provisioned insurance was exacerbated by the exclusion of workers from government social protection mechanisms. In Delhi-NCR, Guwahati, and Lucknow, over 35% of workers in both sectors were left outside of social protection from governments. In Mumbai, over 66% of workers were excluded.

Contributors

Conceptualisation + planning: Aayush Rathi, Abhishek Sekharan, Ambika Tandon, Chetna V M, Chiara Furtado, and Nishkala Sekhar

Writing: Aayush Rathi, Ambika Tandon, Chetna V M, Chiara Furtado, and Nishkala Sekhar

Data analysis: Abhishek Sekharan, Chetna V M, and Nishkala Sekhar

Data visualisation: Sriharsha Devulapalli

Design + design direction: Annushka Jaliwala and Yatharth

Review: Aayush Rathi and Abhineet Nayyar

Survey design + planning: Abhishek Sekharan and Ambika Tandon

Survey implementation: Abhishek Kumar

Research advice: Nora Gobel and Uma Rani Amara

We are deeply grateful to the workers who participated in the surveys for generously sharing their time, experiences, and insights with us.

This work was supported by the Internet Society Foundation, as part of the “Labour Futures” project at the Centre for Internet and Society.

This work is shared under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-SA 4.0)

To know more about this work, please write to us at chiara@cis-india.org

Explore more of CIS’ research on labour and digitalisation at platformwork.in

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/platforming-precarity-data-narratives-workers

Millions of Indians move from cash to digital payments. But some ask whether it’s safe

praskrishna — 2017-01-16T02:52:33Z

Minutes after Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi began an ambitious new mobile-phone-payment application in December, several clones of the app popped up at Android smartphone stores.

The article by Rama Lakshmi was published by Washington Post on 14 January 2017, Sunil Abraham was quoted. Annie Gowen contributed to this report.

In the first few days, users were flooded with spam requests for money.

The Bhim app sponsored by the government was rushed out after Modi’s abrupt withdrawal of large currency bills two months ago. More than 10 million people downloaded it in just 10 days, but in a country where awareness and regulation of privacy, data protection and digital security are low, the number of cyberattacks is rising.

“We are rushing toward launching and using these plethora of financial tech apps without the exhaustive security testing and education that is needed,” said Sunil Abraham, executive director of the Center for Internet and Society. “We are operating in a bit of a regulatory vacuum.”

Modi’s ambitious move to swap old bills for new was intended to fight the hoarding of illicit cash reserves. But it was derailed by shoddy implementation, left citizens in Asia’s third-largest economy without cash for weeks, slowed manufacturing and sent workers home, and is now likely to significantly affect the country’s economic growth this year, economists say. It was acutely painful for a country where 80 percent of transactions were conducted with cash.

Modi quickly responded by turning the adversity into a call for Indians to kick their overwhelming dependence on cash and opt for digital payments overnight. The Bhim app is just one of many available. But in this leap, experts say, security concerns are being overlooked.

The new payment apps and e-wallet companies are governed by India’s outdated information technology law of 2008 and central bank guidelines.

“India urgently needs a new digital payment law that regulates all these mobile payment apps that have sprung up overnight,” said Pavan Duggal, a cyber-law expert. “We are right now in a completely uncharted and unsupervised territory legally. The norms for wallet companies are undefined. If I lose my money due to a fraud, I can go round and round in circles with no remedy.”

The central bank recently issued guidelines asking payment banks to carry out security audits, but Duggal said “there is no penalty or punishment for noncompliance.”

The problem is compounded by the fact that education about security risks online is abysmally sparse, especially in India’s small towns and villages. Indians are complacent about cyber risks in their online behavior, according to the Norton Cyber Security Insights Report. India does not have a privacy law.

India reported more than 39,000 incidents of cyberattacks in the first nine months of 2016, according to the government, including phishing, scanning and probing, website intrusions, defacements, virus and malicious code, and denial-of-service attacks.

“The Pentagon got hacked, right? You haven’t closed down the Pentagon as yet,” said Piyush Goyal, a minister. “These things will happen, and we have to be one step ahead of the hackers and the so-called security breaches and continuously improving and improvising as they do in America or other developed economies.”

In October, top banks had to fix the security codes of about 3.2 million debit cards in one of the biggest data breaches in India. Some users complained that their cards had been used in China.

Last month, hackers attacked Twitter and email accounts of prominent politicians and journalists and defaced the website of the National Security Guard, an elite commando force.

“The focus of global hackers has shifted to India. The cyber risk is a direct fallout of the growth in the number of digital users,” said Saket Modi, the chief executive of Lucideus Tech, the firm that conducted the security audit of the government’s Bhim app.

Since the cash crunch began, the largest private e-wallet company, Paytm, has experienced a 400 percent jump in new downloads.

But only 342 million people access the Internet on their mobile phones. The government has introduced dial-in service for those who have basic cellphones to make digital payments.

The government is airing radio jingles telling citizens not to share their personal identification numbers and has a toll-free helpline to teach people how to make online payments.

“Officials understand how security worries can be a big dampener in their campaign to get people to go digital,” said Vinayak Godse, senior director at the Data Security Council of India, an industry body that advises the government.

But in a trade-off between convenience and security, the central bank recently waived the mandatory two-factor authentication for transactions less than $30 online.

Some cybersecurity experts say that Indians are not ready for this step.

The police recently arrested a gang in the eastern state of Jharkhand; operators were calling people posing as bank executives and tricking them into sharing their card details. They used the cards to do online shopping and transferred money into their e-wallet accounts.

“People are gullible and can be threatened or lured to part with their bank details easily. We need as many safeguards as we can have,” said Surendra Kumar, a senior police officer in New Delhi who busted the gang.

But the biggest problem people face is that police in one state get very little cooperation from those in another state in digital-crime complaints, said Rakshit Tandon, a cybersecurity expert who trains police, military members and school students.

“Only in big-ticket frauds will police departments from different states coordinate their investigations,” Tandon said. “If a person loses a relatively smaller amount digitally, the case won’t go far. Even though that amount may mean a lot in that person’s life.”

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/washington-post-january-14-2017-rama-lakshmi-millions-of-indians-move-from-cash-to-digital-payments