UNESCO protects the last frontier: Cognitive sovereignty for all

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OPINION

By Peter Yehangane

In a landmark decision on November 5, 2025, the UNESCO General Conference adopted a global framework, the Recommendation on the Ethics of Neurotechnology, that formalises, for the first time in history, the protection of mental privacy, neural data and cognitive rights. This represents a profound shift: the human mind, once considered beyond legal reach, is now acknowledged as a domain requiring the same dignity and protection long accorded to the human body, the home and personal communications. The Recommendation entered into force on 12 November 2025.

Neurotechnology includes any technique or device capable of measuring, interpreting, or influencing the activity of the nervous system, from clinical brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) and deep-brain stimulation implants to increasingly ubiquitous consumer devices such as EEG-derived headbands, smart headphones, eye trackers and wearables that infer stress, attention or emotional states.

Whereas for decades such neuro-interventions remained largely confined to medical or experimental contexts, recent advances, especially where neurotechnology meets artificial intelligence (AI), are rendering the mind readable and therefore vulnerable. Researchers can now decode neural data to infer mental states, and some companies are pursuing (or advertising) devices that claim to influence cognition or emotion.

Without adequate governance, the same technologies that hold promise for alleviating neurological disorders or enabling communication for people with disability could, in the wrong hands, become tools of surveillance, manipulation or exploitation. The mind, our last sanctuary of autonomy, risks being colonised. By adopting this Recommendation, UNESCO refuses to allow that fate.

The adopted ethical-legal norms core stipulations, include recognising “neural data” as a distinct category of sensitive personal data requiring rigorous privacy protection; affirming the inviolability of the human mind: mental privacy, cognitive liberty, freedom of thought, personal identity and mental integrity cannot be compromised without explicit, informed, revocable consent; it warns against neurotechnology use for non-therapeutic, commercial, surveillance or manipulative purposes, e.g., workplace productivity monitoring, subliminal marketing, behavioral targeting or influence during vulnerable states such as sleep (dream-time marketing); requiring transparency, accountability and ethical oversight in research, development, deployment and commercialisation of neurotechnologies; and emphasizing fairness, inclusion, non-discrimination and global equity, calling special attention to low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), to ensure they are not left behind either in accessing neurotechnology benefits or in being protected from risks.

In short, the Recommendation frames what many scholars have called “neurorights”, the rights to mental self-determination, cognitive sovereignty and mental integrity.

This UNESCO breakthrough is not a standalone moment but part of an emerging global turn towards protecting the brain in the digital age. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) had earlier issued its own guidelines for responsible neurotechnology innovation, calling for safeguarding personal neural data, oversight, human-rights-based governance, and inclusive access. Academic and bioethical discourse has advanced the concept of “neurorights” over recent decades, arguing for the protection of mental privacy, cognitive liberty, mental integrity, identity and autonomy as fundamental human rights.

The new UNESCO instrument builds on and elevates these ideas by embedding them in a universal, globally agreed normative framework accessible to all countries, cultures and political systems. In doing so, UNESCO completes a logical extension of human rights into the cerebral realm, just as rights once expanded to protect communications, personal data, genetic integrity and bodily autonomy.

For developing countries, the UNESCO Recommendation is nothing short of transformative. In many low-income and middle-income countries, the expansion of ICT through smartphones, social media, satellite internet and emerging neuro-enabled consumer gadgets is often externally driven and rapidly diffused. The asymmetry of power lies not only in access, but in control: who controls data, who interprets it, who monetises it.

Without ethical safeguards, neurotechnology could become another vector through which technological hegemony, cultural dominance and economic exploitation are re-imposed. By formally recognising mental privacy, neural data protection and cognitive liberty, UNESCO empowers these countries to assert cognitive sovereignty, the right of individuals and communities to preserve their mental integrity, self-determination and autonomy even in the face of powerful global techno-economic forces.

The Recommendation provides a normative foundation upon which to legislate and regulate neuro-enabled technologies in culturally and socially appropriate ways, ensuring that future adoption of neurotech is both equitable and protective. For civil society and communities, it affirms a moral and legal basis to resist exploitative or intrusive uses. In sum, this is not only a breakthrough for human rights, it is a defence of collective dignity, cultural integrity and the freedom of minds, both individual and communal.

UNESCO’s decision is a hinge moment in human history! Neurotechnology will likely become as transformative as the printing press, electricity or the internet, perhaps more so, because it touches the mind itself. The question is: who will govern that transformation? Who will define the boundaries? Who will defend the inner sanctum of mental privacy?

With the Recommendation, UNESCO has taken the first step; but the true work begins now: Member states must transpose its principles into enforceable national laws; policymakers must embed neuro-ethical concerns into technology and innovation strategies, particularly in LMICs; civil society, academia, global health organisations and human rights movements must mobilise to ensure that neurotechnology serves human flourishing rather than exploitation; and technology developers must internalise neurosecurity, privacy by design, human dignity and equitable access as core values not afterthoughts.

If this framework is robustly implemented, neurotechnology can indeed help unlock human potential,  heal neurological illness, restore mobility, enable communication, enhance learning while preserving human agency, dignity and sovereignty. But make no mistake, if we fail, we risk ushering in a new era of mental surveillance, cognitive colonisation and commodification of the mind. This UNESCO Recommendation is our declaration: the human mind remains our last frontier of freedom and it is protected.

The writer is an Independent Commentator