Kenyan platform workers demand protection against exploitation

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Kenyans working for digital platforms have called on the government to treat all workers with dignity, saying it is a basic human right.

The platform workers comprise the Africa Tech Workers Movement, Data Labelers Association, HomeNet International, Kenya Union of Gig Workers, Women Commercial Drivers Association of Kenya and Africa Content Moderators Union.

The stakeholders said that during the ongoing International Labour Conference (ILC) 2026 in Geneva, Switzerland, they expect that governments, workers and employers will engage in a tripartite discussion with the goal of coming up with a convention to realise decent work in the platform economy.

“This is a crucial moment for platform workers. For years, platform workers have been powering tech and AI systems in silence, behind screens, inside apps, and across systems that, in return, extract and exploit them without rightful compensation. These are the people known as platform workers, the heroes powering our tech,” said Kenya Union of Gig Workers National Chairperson Frida Mwangi.

Addressing a press briefing on Tuesday in Nairobi, Mwangi said that platform workers are content moderators, data labelers and annotators who are the workers training the algorithms behind the AI models that are now part of our daily reality.

“What you may not know is that platform workers have been fighting exploitation by tech platforms for over a decade. The apps they work for have subjected them to unstable and inadequate income, unachievable output quotas, opaque rating systems and algorithm management, extensive surveillance, fraudulent algorithms, unfair deactivations, unlawful deductions of pay, lack of social and occupational protection. They have tied us in a race to the bottom,” she said.

The Kenya Union of Gig Workers chairperson said that platform workers are powering the world’s most famous technology but their pockets are empty.

She lamented that their mental and physical health was compromised because they had been exploited by algorithms so that tech companies can continue earning billions in profit.

They demanded that the Convention must ensure all digital platform workers enjoy the fundamental rights, freedoms and protections at work.

The workers want the convention to ensure that any work facilitated by a digital platform is inherently safe and without risk to health.

This includes preventing risks to the physical or psychosocial health of workers, protections, and ethical safeguards.

The digital economy, they said, is being built on human sacrifice. "...and that is a future none of us can afford, recognize all workers as workers and extend labour protections to all workers, establish provisions addressing the governance of automated systems, provide safeguards against unjustified suspension or deactivation of digital platform workers’ accounts among other demands," said Mwangi.

Africa Tech Workers Movement chairperson Wycliffe Alutalala, called on the Kenyan delegation at the ILC, to champion the rights of the 'invisible workforce’ of tech and AI.

From the content moderators protecting the internet to the drivers and caregivers navigating our cities, platform workers face unique precocity.

“We are at a crossroads: we can either allow technology to erode labor standards or use international policy to reinforce them. We urge governments at the ILC to adopt a framework that mandates social protections and mental health support for those performing the digital world’s most essential, and often most taxing, labor,” he maintained.

Data Labelers Association (DLA) led by Geoffrey Asia urged the governments, institutions, and industry leaders to confront the silent crisis of exploitation of platform workers.

“Decent work must not exclude the very workers who make AI possible. Without wages, protections, and ethical safeguards, the digital economy is being built on human sacrifice, and that is a future none of us can afford,” said Asia.

HomeNet International interim Jemimah Nyakongo said that this is a historic opportunity to close regulatory gaps and prevent the expansion of informality.

“We need a convention that protects all platform workers, including workers in informal employment, own-account workers and home-based workers who are economically dependent on platforms. Workers in the platform economy must have the same rights, protections and voice as all other workers, regardless of employment status or where they work,” she said.