============================================================ EDRI-gram biweekly newsletter about digital civil rights in Europe Number 5.11, 6 June 2007 ============================================================ Contents ============================================================ 1. CSS protection used in DVDs is "ineffective" 2. RFID Expert Group - Kick Off 3. The European Parliament voted for stronger data protection 4. IPRED2 on the DROIPEN table 5. The French Ministry of Interior has a new interception platform 6. Legislation banning "hacking tools" in Germany 7. French State Council allows tracing P2P users 8. Slovenian intelligence agency scandal 9. Italian Government criticized by Free Software Association 10. Launch of Creative Commons Switzerland 11. Germany is preparing the G8 meeting by searching NGOs servers 12. Agenda 13. About ============================================================ 1. CSS protection used in DVDs is "ineffective" ============================================================ In an unanimous decision on 25 May 2007, the Helsinki District Court ruled that Content Scrambling System (CSS) used in DVD movies is "ineffective". The decision is the first in Europe to interpret new copyright law amendments, based on EU Copyright Directive of 2001, that bans the circumvention of "effective technological measures". According to both Finnish copyright law and the above-mentioned directive, only such protection measure is effective, "which achieves the protection objective." The background of the case was that after the copyright law amendment was accepted in 2005, a group of Finnish computer hobbyists and activists opened a website where they posted information on how to circumvent CSS. They appeared in a police station and claimed to have potentially infringed copyright law. Most of the activists thought that either the police did not investigate the case in the first place or the prosecutor dropped it if it went any further. To the surprise of many, the case ended in the Helsinki District Court. Defendants were Mikko Rauhala who opened the website and a poster who published his own implementation of a source code circumventing CSS. According to the court, CSS no longer achieves its protection objective. The court relied on two expert witnesses and said that "since a Norwegian hacker succeeded in circumventing CSS protection used in DVDs in 1999, end-users have been able to get with ease tens of similar circumventing software from the Internet even free of charge. Some operating systems come with this kind of software pre-installed." Thus, the court concluded that "CSS protection can no longer be held 'effective' as defined in law." All charges were dismissed. The defendant's counsel Mikko Vdlimdki explains for EDRI-gram that he "first proposed to the court an interpretation where a protection measure is ineffective when technical experts can circumvent it. The court did not buy that one. Instead, it adopted my secondary proposal where the efficiency test is based on the ability of random end-users to circumvent." He explains that "this should not affect DVD Copy Control Association CCA (DVD CCA - the California group that licenses CSS to DVD player manufacturers in Europe and Asia), or the movies studios. My understanding is that DVD CCA is interested in their player manufacturing monopoly and license income from Asia, not random Linux users who buy DVDs." A DVD CCA spokesman has confirmed that they are aware of the decision, but they "do know that in the US, courts have ruled CSS to be effective, viable protection." Vdlimdki also explained why this decision is important in the European context : "Relevant sections of the Finnish copyright law are copied verbatim from the directive. I think any European court with common sense would end up in the same interpretation." The defendant Mikko Rauhala is also happy about the judgement: "It seems that one can apply bad law with common sense, which was unfortunately absent during the preparation of the law". However, the prosecutor announced she would appeal the decision and might ask the Finnish Copyright Council for an opinion on the interpretation of "effective". The Helsinki Court of Appeal is not expected to rule until 2008. Finnish court rules CSS protection used in DVDs "ineffective" (25.05.2007) http://www.turre.com/blog/?p=102 English translation of the judgment http://www.turre.com/css_helsinki_district_court.pdf Keep on hacking: a Finnish court says technological measures are no longer "effective" when circumventing applications are widely available on the Internet (25.05.2007) http://www.valimaki.com/docs/finnish_css.pdf Case Could Signal Weakening Of Digital Rights Management In Europe (4.06.2007) http://www.ip-watch.org/weblog/index.php?p=639&res=1024_ff&print=0 ============================================================ 2. RFID Expert Group - Kick Off ============================================================ Following the public consultations on RFID last year, the European Commission announced the creation of an RFID Expert Group to assist in drafting the future RFID strategy. The group's kick-off meeting was held in Brussles last week. EDRi was invited to participate in the group. The Group has been established for two years and includes representatives from the industry, standardisation bodies and the civil society. The EU data protection authorities participate as observers. In the past years digital rights organisations have continuously expressed their strong concerns regarding the implications the usage of RFID may have on privacy. The public consultation on RFID confirmed that these concerns were shared by a majority of the respondents and that safeguards were needed to ensure the protection of personal data and privacy. RFID technology may be used to collect information on directly or indirectly identified persons or to track and trace people's movements in the workspace and in public areas. Therefore privacy and security will be the first topics the group will work on. Input from the group will be taken into account by the European Commission when preparing a Recommendation on RFID usage, which is planned to be issued by the end of 2007. The work of the group will then broaden its scope and deal with the move towards the "Internet of Things". Giving every day objects a representation on the Internet and building "smart" environments that react to the presence or movements of people and things have been subjects of research in the last years. Ambient Intelligence, Ubiquitous Computing, Pervasive Computing and Smart Objects are keywords for the research specialists that often name Mark Weiser's article "The Computer for the 21st Century" as the starting point for these ideas. Privacy, environmental issues and the dangers stemming from the accumulation of electromagnetic fields will certainly be among the issues that have to be discussed with regards to this topic. As a member of the RFID Expert Group, EDRi will promote the implementation of privacy-friendly technologies and stress that the reliable protection of privacy and personal data is a key issue for the acceptance of this technology. Mark Weiser already wrote back in 1991 with regards to Ubiquitous Computing: "If designed into systems from the outset, these techniques can ensure that private data does not become public. A well-implemented version of ubiquitous computing could even afford better privacy protection than exists today." Sixteen years later this statement must still remain the guideline for RFID applications. Key technologies that are said to have the potential to become a new motor of growth and jobs need to be concordant with and to protect the societal standards of the society. In times of mandatory data retention, as communication traffic data has to be stored for up to two years, it is important to ensure that only an absolute minimum of data which can be linked to a certain personis stored. Otherwise any movement in an RFID-enabled "smart" environment could feed into a behaviour-profile of a potential future surveillance society. The RFID Expert Group will make it their mission to discuss these and related issues and to work out possible solutions and necessary regulatory measures over the next two years; EDRi will contribute to this mission. EDRI-gram: EU study on RFID tags shows major privacy concerns (25.10.2006) http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.20/rfid EDRI-gram: Stakeholder group to advise on EU RFID strategy (28.03.2007) http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number5.6/eu-rfid-strategy Results of the Public Online Consultation on Future RFID policy - "The RFID Revolution: Your voice on the Challenges, Opportunities and Threats" http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/policy/rfid/doc/rfidswp_en.pdf Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) in Europe: steps towards a policy framework http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/policy/rfid/doc/rfid_en.pdf Mark Weiser, The Computer for the 21st Century, Scientific American Feb.,1991 http://www.ubiq.com/hypertext/weiser/SciAmDraft3.html (contribution by EDRI-member Andreas Krisch) ============================================================ 3. The European Parliament voted for stronger data protection ============================================================ On 21 May 2007, the European Parliament (EP) voted for the reinstallation of the data protection principles in the legislation that allows the police forces in Europe to share data. The European Council, which is the one deciding in police and judicial matters, had formally asked the EP for its opinion on this issue as, lately, concern has been expressed on the lack of proper protection of personal data processed in the framework of police and judicial co-operation in criminal matters. Such a concern has been expressed also by the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS), Peter Hustinx who, at the end of May, advised the Council against adopting the Commission's new Council Framework Decision proposal as he considered the proposal did not provide appropriate data protection. The MEPs, consulted by the German Presidency, voted in favour of amendments that would provide stronger data protection. The German Presidency proposed that the legislation should only apply to data shared between European police forces and not to data held by national police forces and the decision of whether it should be applied nationally will be discussed in three years time by EC. The proposal is that the police should not send data to other forces that do not have a proper level of data protection in place. The EP has reinstated an amendment that would prevent the police from sending data to third countries that don't have adequate data protection. If the amendment is voted by the Council, a national harmonisation of police data protection rules might be forced especially to strengthen the Europe's co-operation to face US data snooping programmes like PNR and Swift. Germany's action might also allow new EP amendments that deal with the other concerns expressed by EDPS last month, to be accepted by the Council at its meeting this month. Hopefully the European Council will take into consideration the MEPs' vote and will take decisions to allow data sharing between police forces in Europe only with the respect of civil liberties. Europe votes to restrict police data sharing (23.05.2007) http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/05/23/europarl_on_3rdpillar/ EDRI-gram: EDPS advises against new data protection framework decision (9.05.2007) http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number5.9/edps-framework-decision ============================================================ 4. IPRED2 on the DROIPEN table ============================================================ The Second Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive (IPRED2) is now going through the Justice and Home Affairs route. On 4 June, it passed it's first port of call at the Council's Working Group on Substantive Criminal Law (DROIPEN) - the first step on the road to the decision of EU's Council of Ministers. DROIPEN's job is to prepare the Council's first reading on the directive. The national government representatives might come up with a proposal that all Member States agree on, or else they will identify issues that the Ministers of Justice will have to vote on. According to information kindly shared by some Member States representatives following DROIPEN's work, the state of play in general is as follows. Many delegations feel they need more information in order to prepare this legislation properly. There is a general reluctance towards this directive because of the competence issue, so the Council wants to wait for the ECJ ship pollution verdict before moving on. Some delegations have expressed views the directive is the wrong tool to solve the problem and they don't see criminal sanctions as a way forward. Further, since criminal sanctions are already in place in many countries there is no need to rush. Still time should be used to prepare negotiations, but for now, the only thing that could be said to have been decided is not to take any action in any direction. It is now up to the Portuguese Presidency to negotiate what to do next. One question on the table is if DROIPEN should approach the Article 36 Committee (CATS) to have an expert opinion on some issues before involving COREPER 2 (Committee of the Permanent Representatives). The general forecast is that there will be no Council decision before late fall, and it is likely that issues not resolved in COREPER2 will end up in JHA Council votes with a North-South dividing outcome. Meanwhile, outside of Brussels, Member States are working to prepare their positions on IPRED2. The United Kingdom's Intellectual Property Office (IPO) is currently collecting comments from British citizens and companies on the directive. A comprehensive policy paper was submitted by a coalition from FFII/EFF/EBLIDA/BEUC to the UK IPO. The policy is available to be passed on to the Justice Ministry in your own country. For general interest AIPPI has already in 2002 compiled information on criminal law sanctions with regard to the infringement of intellectual property rights. This might give you a starting point in addressing the issue at the national level or comparing the situation with other relevant countries from Europe. Movement on IPRED2 in Brussels and Beyond (4.06.2007) http://www.copycrime.eu/blog/movement-ipred2-brussels-and-beyond Backroom Changes May Be Coming for IPRED2 (16.05.2007) http://www.copycrime.eu/blog/backroom-changes-may-be-coming-ipred2 FFII/EFF/EBLIDA/BEUC coalition report on the proposal as amended in Strasbourg by the European Parliament at its first reading on Wednesday, 25 April, 2007 (25.04.2007) http://action.ffii.org/ipred2/Report_on_EP_vote EDRI-gram: IPRED2 voted in first reading by the European Parliament (25.04.2007) http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number5.8/ipred2 AIPPI report: "Question Q169 - Criminal law sanctions with regard to the infringement of intellectual property rights" http://www.aippi.org/reports/q169/gr_q169_index.htm (Thanks to Erik Josefsson - Electronic Frontier Foundation) ============================================================ 5. The French Ministry of Interior has a new interception platform ============================================================ On 2 May 2007 a new technical platform for the interception of traffic data in all types of communication systems was discretly put into operation by the French Ministry of Interior, covering communication data related to text messages, mobile or Internet. The security services are now in the position of knowing who has contacted whom, when and where and, by a simple click, they can obtain from the telephone operators the list of all calls from and to a subscriber. They can obtain the subscription documents of the respective person with address and bank information and can also require all the Internet sites or forum addresses the respective person has accessed. The authorised services may require such kind of information from Uclat (Coordination unit of the anti-terror fight) that manages the technical centre located in the new headquarters of the security services of the national police of Levallois-Perret (Hauts-de-Seine), under the supervision of IGPN (The General Inspection of the National Police). This comes as a direct result of the Sarkozy law adopted on 23 January 2006 in an emergency procedure, to prevent terrorist acts, after being found constitutional by the French Constitutional Council. The text of the law states that Internet Service Providers, Internet cafes, hosting providers and operators must communicate the traffic data, called numbers, IP addresses to specialised services in case of investigations related to suspect terrorist activities. The law has created serious concerns to the public freedom advocates as well as to the magistrates as the procedure doesn't need the involvement of judges and ignores guarantees related to public freedoms. Since the entering into operation of the new technical platform on 2 May, the centre has already dealt with 300 requests per week made mostly by DST (Direction de la surveillance du territoire) and RG (Renseignement Generaux). According to an estimation, the platform should be able to address about 20 000 requests per year. The French justice system is, in its turn, creating its own national platform that will be finalised by the end of 2008 - beginning of 2009 to intercept SMSs and record phonecalls, not only for terrorism cases. Although France is not in the worst position in Europe as concerning data interceptions being surpassed by Italy, the Netherlands or Germany, the tendency is obviously towards an increase of the control by the authorities. The anti-terrorism spies mails and text messages as well (only in French, 28.05.2007) http://www.lefigaro.fr/france/20070528.WWW000000165_lantiterrorisme_espionne... EDRI-gram: IRIS protest against delay French government (20.10.2004) http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number2.20/IRIS EDRI-gram: France adopts anti-terrorism law (18.01.2006) http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.1/frenchlaw EDRI-gram: French anti-terrorism law not anti-constitutional (2.02.2006) http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.2/frenchlaw ============================================================ 6. Legislation banning "hacking tools" in Germany ============================================================ The laws on computer crimes have become stricter in Germany where the creation, use or distribution of so-called "hacking tools" have been banned. On 23 May 2007, the Committee on Legal Affairs of the Bundestag (the lower chamber of Germany's Federal Parliament) approved a controversial government bill meant to improve criminal prosecution of computer crimes. The Criminal Code has been modified so as to make illegal for the unauthorized users to access secure data by bypassing the computer security protection system. The "deliberate acquisition of data by tapping into a non-public transmission of data or by way of reading radiation leaked by a data processing system" is now considered a crime. The German law defines hacking as penetrating a computer security system and gaining access to secure data, without necessarily stealing data and any individual or group that intentionally creates, spreads or purchases hacker tools designed for illegal purposes is considered an offender. Under the present Criminal Code, the offenders could face fines and up to 10 years imprisonment for major offences. These measures have been criticised being considered as counterproductive by several groups, including EDRI-member Chaos Computer Club, which drew the attention to the so-called "white hat" hackers who work for security companies. By this present legislation, these experts could be in the position of not being allowed to work with software developers in creating secure products. "It's a win-lose law in favour for the bad guys," wrote a hacker, known by the pseudonym van Hauser. Chaos Computer Club also expressed the concern that this legislation will allow the German Government to install spyware on suspected criminals' computers without their knowledge. The critics argue that the legislation does not make any difference between a password cracker and a password recovery tool for instance. "Forbidding this software is about as helpful as forbidding the sale and production of hammers because sometimes they also cause damage," said Chaos Computer Club spokesman Andy M|ller-Maguhn to Ars Technica who also stated that under the new law, the police will be able to more easily access information on suspects. Germany declares hacking tools 'verboten' (31.05.2007) http://www.out-law.com//default.aspx?page=8103 Green light for tightening of anti-hacker legislation (24.05.2007) http://www.heise.de/english/newsticker/news/90163 Germany leads the way with tough anti-hacking law (25.05.2007) http://www.computerworlduk.com/management/security/cybercrime/news/index.cfm... ============================================================ 7. French State Council allows tracing P2P users ============================================================ The State Council of France validated on 23 May 2007 the automatic tracing of illegal downloading in P2P networks. This decision cancelled the 18th October 2005 CNIL (Commission nationale de l'informatique et des libertis) decision that rejected the introduction of surveillance devices proposed by Sacem and other 3 author and producer associations asking for the automatic tracing of infringements of the intellectual property code. The State Council believes that such devices are acceptable considering the extent of the piracy phenomenon in France. The number of downloaded files decreased by half in 2006 as compared to 2005 but according to GfK institute this is probably due to the evolution from a quantitative type of downloading to a qualitative one. GfK institute has also reached the conclusion that the illegal downloading in P2P networks have not caused the decrease in the sales of cultural products but actually "quite the contrary, downloading is really perceived by half of the Internet users as a promotion vector for artistes." The State Council's decision was to the liking of the associations the request of which was rejected by CNIL in 2005. SCPP (Sociiti civile des producteurs phonographiques), one of these associations, stated that CNIL's rejection of their request had "not allowed them to take measures to prevent and repress music piracy that were however taken by most states of the European Union". In their opinion "France is one of the countries where Internet piracy is the most developed and where, therefore, the legal music market develops more slowly". CNIL reaction to the State Council decision came after two days by stating that its intention is that of +ensuring a fair balance between the copyright protection and the protection of the right to private life of Internet users". CNIL also stated having already authorized Sell (Syndicat des iditeurs de logiciels de loisirs) to develop an automatic surveillance system for the downloading of video games in P2P networks. In comparison with the systems proposed by the music associations, this system was approved because it puts less burden on the ISPs and it involves "only the users that are responsible with the first sharing in a network of a work or having shared a not yet commercialized work". The surveillance devices are ready and a request of tenders has been launched. CNIL will meet the author associations among which Sacem and SCPP as well as ISPs and the discussions will last for several weeks.All parties have expressed their willingness to collaborate. Peer-to-peer: The State Council says yes to the pirate chase (only in French, 23.05.2007) http://www.zdnet.fr/actualites/internet/0,39020774,39369675,00.htm Surveillance of P2P networks: CNIL acknowledges the decision of the State Council (only in French, 25.05.2007) http://www.cnil.fr/index.php?id=2221&news[uid]=464&cHash=57a0f43bbe Peer-to-peer: half downloaded files less in 2006 (only in French, 18.01.2007) http://www.zdnet.fr/actualites/internet/0,39020774,39366341,00.htm Peer to peer : CNIL does not authorise the devices presented bu the author and music producer associations (only in French, 25.10.2005) http://www.cnil.fr/index.php?id=1881 ============================================================ 8. Slovenian intelligence agency scandal ============================================================ The Slovenian intelligence agency (SOVA) is monitoring telecommunications in the Balkans in cooperation with German BND (Bundesnachrichtendienst) and UK's MI5. Some believe that the recently disclosed secret location in the Slovenian capital could be a part of Echelon. The Slovenian intelligence agency is currently a part of a political scandal which has revealed some secret locations and methods that SOVA was using for intelligence purposes. Moreover, international credibility in SOVA and its agents is compromised, as the Slovenian press managed to obtain classified information regarding SOVA's secret financing, its company of straw and its international cooperation with other intelligence agencies. Most likely, the information leaked from the parliamentary committee for monitoring the secret services activtiy. The latest disclosure reveals SOVA's secret location for monitoring international telecommunications in Ljubljana near Telekom Slovenije (Slovenian Telco) and Siol (the major Slovenian ISP) headquarters, as well as near the Slovenian Internet Exchange (SIX) and Ljubljana Stock Exchange (LJSE) buildings. The Slovenian media is reporting that the above mentioned location was also used by German BND (Bundesnachrichtendienst) and UK's MI5, especially to monitor telecommunications in the Balkans. Miso Alkalaj, an IT expert from Jozef Stefan Institute said he would not be surprised if the location was a part of Echelon. An interesting fact is that residents of the block of flats where SOVA has its secret location, knew that conspiratorial activities were taking place there. Apart from that, elder residents are able to tell that the former communist intelligence agency used the same flat to wiretap telephone conversations. The other disclosure reveals that Slovenian intelligence agency SOVA established a webhosting company WEBS, which is presumably a company of straw that SOVA needed for its intelligence activities. Having in view the recent events regarding the Slovenian intelligence agency, it becomes interesting that SOVA's headquarters are located in Stegne, an industrial area of Ljubljana, where among others, Telekom Slovenije (Slovenian Telco) has its operational services. Intention or coincidence? Telekom Slovenije indirectly admits SOVA's wiretapping (only in Slovenian, 1.06.2007) http://dnevnik.si/novice/slovenija/249095/ Director of SOVA takes action after disclosure of wrath of foreign intelligence agencies (only in Slovenian, 30.05.2007) http://dnevnik.si/novice/slovenija/248654/ (Contribution by Aljaz Marn, EDRI-observer, Slovenia) ============================================================ 9. Italian Government criticized by the Free Software Association ============================================================ After filing a case to the Regional Administrative Tribunal of Lazio against the Italian Ministry of Work for launching a call for tenders where only Microsoft software was considered as eligible, Italian NGO Assoli (Associazione Software Libero) is criticizing again its Government. The problem arose when the Government - specifically the Ministry for University and Research, headed by Mr.Fabio Mussi (Left democrats) and the Ministry for Innovation in the Public Administration, headed by Mr. Luigi Nicolais (Left democrats) - announced an official agreement with Microsoft Italia whose main goals are "education/training, technology transfer and facilitation of research projects". AsSoLi publicly objected to the agreement by which Microsoft commits to invest only 737,000 euros - 0.0007% of the total turnover of the company for 2006, according to AsSoLi's calculations - in three years, to be subdivided among three research centres. Moreover, AsSoLi notices that, according to the agreement, the investment will not take the form of cash, but will rather be performed "through (the work of) third parties, on the basis of specific needs for hardware products, software, technical support services and training activities". On the other hand, continues AsSoLi, the agreement does not specify what would be the financial burden for the Italian Public Administration. In reaction to what it considered a waste of public money, AsSoLi officially committed to make available to the Italian Government, for a period of five years, training activities, training material, technological solutions and software, either directly or delegating Italian companies specialised in Free Software, for a value of about 10.000.000 euros per year - a total value of 50.000.000 euros. AsSoLi stresses the fact that their offer is absolutely serious. Moreover, AsSoLi conducted a study on the Microsoft Research Center located in Trento (Northern Italy). According to the study, Microsoft invested only 250.000 euros in research activities on their own products, with the Italian Public Administration paying more than 1.800.000 euros. The study was sent to hundreds of representatives of national and local institutions. AsSoLi also announced the forthcoming release of a second study, providing a more thorough assessment of the financial elements in the first analysis. The Italian Government, through its spokesman Mr. Alfonso Lelio, has recently answered AsSoLi's criticisms, stressing that the agreement with Microsoft does not mean that the Government is not interested in investing in Free Software, or is not already doing so, as the Government claims is the case with the latest budget law, where 10.000.000 euros for 2007-2009 are allocated to "Information Society" projects, with an explicit priority to those that "develop or use" Free Software. AsSoLi - Associazione Software Libero http://www.softwarelibero.it/ EDRI-Gram 5.72, "Free software needs to be considered in Italian public acquisitions" (12.04.2007) http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number5.7/free-software-italy AsSoLi offers EUR 10,000,000 to the Italian Government (Italian only, 8.05.2007) http://www.softwarelibero.org/lassociazione-il-software-libero-offre-50-000-... Text of the proposed agreement with the Italian Government (Italian only, 8.05.2007) http://www.softwarelibero.org/progetti/proposta_governo Study by AsSoLi on the Microsoft Research Center in Trento (Italian only, 18.05.2007) http://softwarelibero.it/riflessione-politiche-innovazione-ict Answer of the Italian Government to AsSoLi's criticisms (Italian only, 29.05.2007) http://www.lastampa.it/_web/CMSTP/tmplrubriche/giornalisti/grubrica.asp?ID_blog=2&ID_articolo=549&ID_sezione=3&sezione=Web%20Notes (contribution by Andrea Glorioso - Italian consultant on digital policies) ============================================================ 10. Launch of Creative Commons Switzerland ============================================================ On 26 May 2007 the Swiss version of Creative Commons licenses were launched in Zurich at a ceremony held as the finishing highlight of this year's Tweakfest, Switzerland's Festival for Media, Culture, and Digital Lifestyle. The launch was hosted by Digitale Allmend, a Swiss NGO focused on access to digital information and creativity. Openlaw and Digitale Allmend are co-leading the Swiss Creative Commons project in a joint effort. With Switzerland, the Creative Commons licenses are now offered in localized versions in a total of 37 countries around the world. John Buckman, Creative Commons board member and founder of magnatune.com, gave the keynote address, explaining how he developed his website as a successful example of a Creative Commons based business. There was live audio and visual performances by DJ Soult and VJ Set from Pixelpunx.ch who released a number of works under the new Swiss Creative Commons licenses that evening. Urs Gehrig from Openlaw explained the system: "The Creative Commons licensing system simplifies the exchange of cultural goods such as music, video, text and other creative media." "We see the porting of Creative Commons licences to Switzerland as an important step - firstly because the swiss cultural movement will be able to contribute a variety of interesting works to a global creative community and secondly in achieving a more balanced choice for creators when deciding how their works is distributed and accessible." was the declaration of Martin Feuz from Digitale Allmend. During the launch, Creative Commons Switzerland announced several upcoming projects that plan to use the Swiss Creative Commons licenses, including netlabels (starfrosch.ch, sonicsquirrel.net), two online cultural TV channels (kulturtv.ch and rebell.tv) or a video art website (lenarmy.ch). Creative Commons Switzerland http://www.creativecommons.ch/ Digitale Allmend - News and videos from CC Switzerland launch (only in German) http://blog.allmend.ch/ Openlaw http://www.openlaw.ch Tweakfest http://www.tweakfest.ch ============================================================ 11. Germany is preparing the G8 meeting by searching NGOs servers ============================================================ The German government decided to prepare the G8 meeting that will take place during 6-8 June in Heiligendamm, a Baltic seaside resort, by increasing the number of searches and seizures to NGOs and anti-globalization movements offices and servers. During the entire month of May the Federal Prosecutor gave order to the Police in Hamburg, Berlin and other states to search private homes, offices, libraries, social centres or other locations were there were located servers of the anti-globalisation opponents, without making any arrests. The searches and seizures were explained by the German authorities by the possibility to create a terrorist organization by the altermondialist German chapter of the association Attac, a group founded in France to campaign for a global tax on speculative capital movements to finance development aid. The association between terrorism and altermondialism was considered as "scandalous" by the co-president of the Attac France, Aurilie Trouvi, taking into consideration the objectives of the association: democratisation of the international institutions, fight against poverty or the preservation of the natural resources. She rhetorical asked: "Do freedom of expression and democracy stop were the interests of the richest eight countries begin?" Peter Wahl from Attac Germany has underlined the obvious political purpose of this operation: "to discredit the democratic actions that contest the G8 summit. It is an excessive measure that is incompatible with the rule of law." Another measure that the German Government took was the temporary suspension of the Schengen Agreement until 10 June. Every persons travelling to Germany until that date will have to pass the identity and security controls. The German authorities have also banned any demonstration near the resort where the G8 summit will take place. Searches against the alter movements on Germany (only in France, 17.05.2007) http://www.france.attac.org/spip.php?article7093 The police authority Rostock - not the demonstrators - are severely damaging the reputation of the Federal Republic of Germany (17.05.2007) http://www.statewatch.org/news/2007/may/germany-g8-protests.pdf Germany: Police raid G8 activists (5.2007) http://www.statewatch.org/news/2007/may/02germany-g8-raids.htm Despite Germany's Tight Controls, Violence (3.06.2007) http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=38015 ============================================================ 12. Agenda ============================================================ 8 May - 22 July 2007, Austria Annual decentralized community event around free software lectures, panel discussions, workshops, fairs and socialising http://www.linuxwochen.at 11-15 June 2007, Geneva, Switzerland Provisional Committee on Proposals Related to a WIPO Development Agenda: Fourth Session http://www.wipo.int/meetings/en/details.jsp?meeting_id=11927 11-12 June 2007, Strasbourg, France Council of Europe - Octopus Interface 2007 - Cooperation against Cybercrime http://www.coe.int/t/e/legal_affairs/legal_co-operation/combating_economic_c... 12 June 2007, Berlin, Germany German Federal Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information - Symposium "Data Protection in Europe" http://www.bfdi.bund.de/cln_029/nn_533554/DE/Oeffentlichkeitsarbeit/Termine/... 14 June 2007, Paris, France ENISA/EEMA European eIdentity conference - Next Generation Electronic Identity - eID beyond PKI http://enisa.europa.eu/pages/eID/eID_ws2007.htm 15-17 June 2007, Dubrovnik, Croatia Creative Commons iSummit 2007 http://wiki.icommons.org/index.php/ISummit_2007 17-22 June 2007 Seville, Spain 19th Annual FIRST Conference, "Private Lives and Corporate Risk" http://www.first.org/conference/2007/ 18-22 June 2007, Geneva, Switzerland Second Special Session of the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR) http://www.wipo.int/meetings/en/details.jsp?meeting_id=12744 28 June 2007, London, UK First London CC-Salon organized by Free Culture London and the Open Rights Group http://wiki.creativecommons.org/London_Salon 8-12 August 2007, near Berlin, Germany Chaos Communication Camp 2007 "In Fairy Dust We Trust!" http://events.ccc.de/camp/2007/ 5-11 September 2007 Ars Electronica Festival - Festival for Art, Technology and Society http://www.aec.at/en/festival2007/index.asp ============================================================ 13. 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