THE OFFICE of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) has formally asked Trial Chamber III to reject a Defense request seeking stricter, systematic authentication rules for open-source and user-generated digital evidence in the case against former President Rodrigo Roa Duterte.
In a public redacted document dated Sept. 9, 2026 (based on an initial September 4 filing), ad interim Prosecutor Mame Mandiaye Niang argued against amending the court’s E-Court Protocol to require mandatory expert verification for all online materials submitted into evidence.
The Defense team had pushed for heightened verification safeguards—including systematic technical screening—for digital content such as social media posts, videos, photographs, and online articles to guard against potential tampering, editing, or artificial intelligence (AI) manipulation.
Pushing back against the proposal, the Prosecution argued that imposing mandatory expert reports for every piece of open-source material would be “unhelpful and unduly burdensome,” warning that a blanket mandate could cause unnecessary trial delays.
Instead, prosecutors maintained that digital authentication should be evaluated on a flexible, case-by-case basis as items are formally introduced during trial.
“Whether a party adduces an expert report alongside open source or user-generated evidence that it seeks to formally submit in the trial will become clear upon the party’s application to the Chamber,” the Prosecution stated, adding that creating a rigid checklist within the court’s Nuix Discover system would not benefit the Chamber or the participants.
While opposing universal expert verification, the Prosecution acknowledged that certain anonymous digital materials or complex multimedia items may indeed require forensic examination to detect potential AI generation or digital alteration.
Prosecutors also conceded that relying solely on a web URL is insufficient to authenticate open-source digital evidence.
Trial Chamber III, presided over by Judge Joanna Korner alongside Judge Keebong Paek and Judge Nicolas Guillou, will issue a ruling on whether to amend the E-Court Protocol or maintain the existing evidence submission rules.
