Governments are increasingly turning to digital technologies such as GPS ankle monitors and tracking apps as so-called “alternatives to detention.” But a new report from UNSW Sydney’s Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law, the International Detention Coalition and the Refugee Law Lab shows these tools too often replicate detention in digital form, restricting liberty, undermining dignity and causing real harm for people on the move.
This is a recording from a launch event held on 16 September 2025, to present the findings of a global study and introduce 10 Guiding Principles for ensuring technology reduces, rather than expands, detention.
Listen to explore how governments, civil society and technologists can move towards genuine rights-based alternatives that promote freedom, dignity and community integration.
With thanks to the Global Migration Centre at the Graduate Institute of Geneva for kindly hosting this event, and to Robert Bosch Stiftung for its generous support for this project. Read the report:
Download: 'From Surveillance to Empowerment: Advancing the Responsible Use of Technology in Alternatives to Detention' [https://www.unsw.edu.au/content/dam/pdfs/law/kaldor/2025-09-technology-in-alternatives-to-detention.pdf]
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Governments are increasingly turning to digital technologies such as GPS ankle monitors and tracking apps as so-called “alternatives to detention.” But a new report from UNSW Sydney’s Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law, the International Detention Coalition and the Refugee Law Lab shows these tools too often replicate detention in digital form, restricting liberty, undermining dignity and causing real harm for people on the move.
This is a recording from a launch event held on 16 September 2025, to present the findings of a global study and introduce 10 Guiding Principles for ensuring technology reduces, rather than expands, detention.
Listen to explore how governments, civil society and technologists can move towards genuine rights-based alternatives that promote freedom, dignity and community integration.
With thanks to the Global Migration Centre at the Graduate Institute of Geneva for kindly hosting this event, and to Robert Bosch Stiftung for its generous support for this project. Read the report:
Download: 'From Surveillance to Empowerment: Advancing the Responsible Use of Technology in Alternatives to Detention' [https://www.unsw.edu.au/content/dam/pdfs/law/kaldor/2025-09-technology-in-alternatives-to-detention.pdf]
A recording of the opening remarks from the 2023 Kaldor Centre Conference, 'Learning from the future: Foresight for the next decade of forced migration' to set the scene for the day long event.
The conference took participants 10 years into the future, to explore the forced migration challenges we may face in the decade to come. The purpose was not to predict the future, but to help us to be better prepared to shape the future we want to see.
The keynote presentations set out big trends and questions to spark longer term thinking. The panel sessions discussed three distinct future scenarios set in 2033. These were intended to provide a 'sandpit' within which to explore the challenges and opportunities before us, to help us think afresh about what we might need to do today to ensure protection for displaced people in the decade to come.
Speaker: Frances Voon, Executive Manager, Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law
Recorded on 20 November 2023
UNSW Kaldor Centre
Governments are increasingly turning to digital technologies such as GPS ankle monitors and tracking apps as so-called “alternatives to detention.” But a new report from UNSW Sydney’s Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law, the International Detention Coalition and the Refugee Law Lab shows these tools too often replicate detention in digital form, restricting liberty, undermining dignity and causing real harm for people on the move.
This is a recording from a launch event held on 16 September 2025, to present the findings of a global study and introduce 10 Guiding Principles for ensuring technology reduces, rather than expands, detention.
Listen to explore how governments, civil society and technologists can move towards genuine rights-based alternatives that promote freedom, dignity and community integration.
With thanks to the Global Migration Centre at the Graduate Institute of Geneva for kindly hosting this event, and to Robert Bosch Stiftung for its generous support for this project. Read the report:
Download: 'From Surveillance to Empowerment: Advancing the Responsible Use of Technology in Alternatives to Detention' [https://www.unsw.edu.au/content/dam/pdfs/law/kaldor/2025-09-technology-in-alternatives-to-detention.pdf]
