Cybersecurity and Cybercrime Laws in the SADC Region: Implications on Human Rights.

This report focuses on enacted and proposed cybersecurity and cybercrime laws in the SADC region and how they have impacted the exercise of rights, more specifically, the right to privacy, freedom of expression and media freedom. It also makes a comparative of these laws with international conventions, standards and norms for instance as found in the provisions of the European
Union, African Union, and SADC Model Laws.

This report focuses on countries such as Botswana, Lesotho, South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe and Zambia. This study which relies heavily on desktop review and key informant interviews shows that although some countries in the SADC region have enacted cybersecurity and cybercrime laws, others are still in the process of drafting similar laws. On the one hand, countries like Botswana, Eswatini, Tanzania, Malawi and Zambia have already passed cybersecurity and cybercrime laws while countries such as Namibia, South Africa, Lesotho and Zimbabwe have gazetted draft legislation on cybersecurity and cybercrime.