Constitutional human rights in the context of bridging the digital divide

Abstract

In modern society, the full-fledged communication of citizens correlates with the ability to access information and skills to handle multifunctional gadgets and the Internet. The uneven spread of information and communication technologies (hereinafter - ICT), which can be traced when comparing technological development, both between states and within individual countries, gives rise to the problem of the so-called «digital inequality» (in foreign literature more commonly known as «digital divide»). With the gradual digitalization of social relations, traditionally regulated by legal norms, the problem is exacerbated by the fact that citizens’ lack of access to ICT limits their real opportunities to exercise their constitutional rights. Consequently, overcoming the digital divide is a modern condition for ensuring the legal status of the individual. The purpose of this article is to investigate the impact of the digital divide on constitutional human rights. In the process of research, the author applied such methods as analysis, synthesis, induction, deduction, statistical and formal-legal methods. As a result, the author made conclusions about the presence of economic, age, gender, educational reasons that do not allow to overcome the digital divide. The state of constitutional law and order in the Russian Federation depends on their eradication.