Protecting the environment and the Earth's natural resources is one of the most important tasks for modern societies, economies, and countries. Changes in the environment have made climate protection a key task of state policy implemented at the local, national, and international. They also have caused such negative social manifestations as environmental radicalism and terrorism. The purpose of this paper was to analyze the capacity of state institutions to prevent environmental terrorism and radicalism, particularly in the Russian context, by identifying and prioritizing key challenges and countermeasures. A mixed-methods approach was adopted, involving both qualitative and quantitative analyses. Following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines, a total of 35 articles and reviews were selected to provide a foundation for understanding eco-terrorism trends. Additionally, an expert survey was conducted with 44 qualified participants to rank problems and recommended actions. The Kendall concordance coefficient was used to assess the consistency of expert opinions. The authors conclude that low environmental awareness and insufficient cooperation between state institutions and environmental organizations are the most significant challenges in preventing eco-terrorism. To adequately and competently prevent environmental terrorism and radicalism in society, the prevention system must be based on clear and thoughtful actions by state institutions.

This article presents a comprehensive analysis and strategic framework for enhancing social welfare in Kazakhstan through the adoption of international social security standards. This article aims to formulate scientific and practical recommendations for enhancing the legal framework governing Kazakhstan’s social security system. It posits that integrating international social protection standards is pivotal for refining national legislation and charting future developmental courses. Employing a novel methodology, this study analyzes key documents from the International Labour Organization (ILO), the United Nations, the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), and the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU). It also examines efforts to assimilate these international norms into Kazakhstan’s social security laws. The investigation reveals a stagnation in the evolution of the nation’s social sector, marked by a dearth of innovative ideas and initiatives to elevate the subpar social security standards. The adoption of international social standards emerges as a catalyst for rejuvenating the national social sphere, aiming to elevate the Kazakhstani social protection system to meet global benchmarks. This research outlines the pathways for Kazakhstan’s ratification of and accession to key social protection instruments and offers expert recommendations to support this endeavor. The conclusions and recommendations developed are poised for application in legislative reforms, aiming to amend and enhance existing laws to foster a more robust and inclusive social security framework. The findings suggest that the adoption of international social security standards not only contributes to the improvement of individual lives but also fosters social cohesion and economic stability. The article concludes with tailored recommendations for Kazakhstan, highlighting the role of stakeholder engagement, phased implementation, and continuous evaluation in the successful integration of global social security norms. This research contributes to the ongoing discourse on social security reform, offering a valuable perspective for scholars, policymakers, and practitioners involved in social welfare enhancement efforts in Kazakhstan and similar contexts.

The explosion of information technology, besides its positive aspects, has raised many issues related to personal information and personal data in the network environment. Because children are vulnerable to abuse, fraud and exploitation, protecting children’s personal information and personal data is always of concern to many countries. From the concept and characteristics of personal information and personal data of children in Europe, the United States and Vietnam, it can be seen that children’s personal information and personal data protection is very necessary in every country today. This research focuses on the age considered a child, the child’s consent and his or her parental consent when providing and processing personal information or personal data of children under the laws of the EU, US and Vietnam. Therefore, the article proposes some recommendations related to the child’s consent and his or her parental consent in protecting children’s personal data in Vietnam.

The privacy of personal information is aimed at protecting human rights both under the international human rights regime and the Saudi Arabian constitution and other statutes and regulations, subject only to some exceptions that include the protection of public health. The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has brought about certain challenges that necessitate strategies to augment the conventional surveillance of infectious diseases, contact tracing, isolation, reporting and vaccination. Several governments institutions, and agencies presently adopt mobile applications for collecting, analyzing, managing, and sharing critical personal data of individuals infected with or exposed to COVID-19. While the benefits of sharing private information for achieving public health needs may not be disputed, the risk of breach of personal privacy is enormous. This had forced the national governments into a dilemma of either succumbing to public health needs, strictly respecting and protecting the privacy of individuals, or alternatively, balancing the two conflicting demands. There is a massive body of literature on the security and privacy of such mobile applications, but none has adequately explored and discussed public interest justifications under Saudi Arabian laws for alleged privacy breaches. We examined the health surveillance mobile app technologies currently in use in Saudi Arabia with the aim of determining the potential risks of data breaches under extant data protection laws. The paper recommends, among others, that any potential risk of breach to right to privacy of personal information under the law must be (justified by) the public health needs to protect society during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Nowadays, urban ecosystems require major transformations aimed at addressing the current challenges of urbanization. In recent decades, policy makers have increasingly turned their attention to the smart city paradigm, recognizing its potential to promote positive changes. The smart city, through the conscious use of technologies and sustainability principles, allows for urban development. The scientific literature on smart cities as catalysts of public value continues to develop rapidly and there is a need to systematize its knowledge structure. Through a three-phase methodological approach, combining bibliometric, network and content analyses, this study provides a systematic review of the scientific literature in this field. The bibliometric results showed that public value is experiencing an evolutionary trend in smart cities, representing a challenging research topic for scholars. Network analysis of keyword co-occurrences identified five different clusters of related topics in the analyzed field. Content analysis revealed a strong focus on stakeholder engagement as a lever to co-create public value and a greater emphasis on social equity over technological innovation and environmental protection. Furthermore, it was observed that although environmental concerns were prioritized during the policy planning phase, their importance steadily decreased as the operational phases progressed.

Personal information is a vital productive commodity in the digital economy, and its processing has seen unparalleled transformations in both breadth and depth. This article proposes to enhance the legal remedies for personal information rights in contemporary China. Research has revealed multiple practical challenges in China’s judicial practices, such as hesitance to prosecute owing to an absence of substantial legal foundation, improper distribution of the burden of proof, and inadequate integration of criminal-civil judicial safeguards for personal information. This paper advocates for China to elucidate the definition of personal information rights via legislation, enable the litigation of personal information infringement cases, and establish explicit criteria for their acceptance into judicial proceedings. Furthermore, China must develop an appropriate structure for distributing the burden of evidence. It must also use discretionary judgment to properly tackle the problems related to evaluating damages in instances of personal information violations.