EDRI-gram newsletter - Number 4.13, 5 July 2006

[EDRI-gram newsletter]

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          EDRI-gram

biweekly newsletter about digital civil rights in Europe

  Number 4.13, 5 July 2006

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Contents
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1. Creative Communities and Consumers in TACD Conference
2. Terrorist Finance Tracking Program raises privacy questions
3. Private hotlines questioned at EC Safer Internet Forum
4. Dutch Parliament opposes the new EU IPR draft directive
5. German experts think search engines should be monitored
6. Swedish file-sharing damage insurance company expands
7. New French copyright law gives Apple satisfaction
8. Google's victory in court against German publisher
9. Consultation launched by UK government on the controversial RIPA act
10. IPRED Directive Implementation in Italy
11. News on CoE activities on Human Rights in the Information Society
12. Book launch on Human Rights in the Global Information Society
13. Recommended reading
14. Agenda
15. About

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1. Creative Communities and Consumers in TACD Conference
============================================================
TACD (Trans-Atlantic Consumer Dialogues) organized a conference under the
title "New Relationships Between Creative Communities and Consumers" in
Paris on 19-20 June 2006.  Participants represented a wide range of
interests, including both artists' and consumers' organizations, but also
WIPO and the European Commission.

Several panels explored problems and possibilities in creators' and users'
rights in fields as various as gene research, drug development, software
production, entertainment industry, documentary films and scholarly
publishing.  The breadth of discussion and ideas presented was impressive.

One recurring theme was that creators and users of intellectual works are
not necessarily enemies; their interests are more common than conflicting.
Indeed often they are the same people: professional creators need to be able
to use earlier creations, and in the networked world consumers are
increasingly also creators.

As concerns the software development there was a strong opposition to
software patents and support for open standards, especially for interfaces
and file formats needed for interoperability. The dangers of monopolies and
the importance of free software were stressed, especially for basic
functionality.

Regarding the entertainment industry (music and film), there was a
surprisingly strong consensus that some kind of flat rate and global
licensing system for file sharing and downloading would be a good thing and
that time has come for it. Nonetheless, it was noted there are still lots of
technical and legal problems to be solved.

Scholarly publishing was also debated, observing that the present system
serves mainly the interests of publishers, not those of creators or users
who are indeed mainly the same people - scientists.

A draft document called "Paris accord" containing a collection of
suggestions on how the various issues should be addressed was circulated and
discussed.  The treaty could give directions for the creation of a DRM-free
new music industry that would be beneficial for both artists and consumers.

However, the document remained a draft as there was no real attempt to
finalize it during the conference.  There was an agreement, however, that
something like it would be necessary and that work would continue although
no deadline was decided on its completion

Paris TACD conference - Neil Leyton report (29.06.2006)
http://www.p2pnet.net/story/9217

TACD Workshop - the Paris Accord - 19-20 June 2006
http://www.cptech.org/a2k/pa/

"New Relationships Between Creative Communities and Consumers" - TACD
Conference
http://www.tacd.org/docs/?id=296

(Contribution by Tapani Tarvainen - EDRi-member Electronic Frontier Finland)

============================================================
2. Terrorist Finance Tracking Program raises privacy questions
============================================================
On 22-23 June 2006, the New York Times published a story uncovering an
international financial surveillance programme, called Terrorist Finance
Tracking Program, run by the US authorities. After the 11 September 2001
attacks, the US Treasury Department and/or CIA starting getting access to
international transfer data, available in the SWIFT database, in order to
investigate terrorist activity.

The Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) is a
Belgian-based industry-owned co-operative that supplies a messaging
infrastructure to the global banking community. This 'community' consists of
banks, brokers and dealers, investment managers and their market
infrastructures in payments, securities, treasury and trade. SWIFT provides
messaging services and interface software to more than 7,863 financial
institutions in 204 countries and territories.

SWIFT's activities is overseen primarily by the National Bank of Belgium,
though other central banks are said to "have a legitimate interest in, or
responsibility for, the oversight of SWIFT, given SWIFT's role in their
domestic systems." Therefore it has international oversight in co-operation
with G-10 central banks.

After11 September 2001 SWIFT responded to some very broad US subpoenas.
SWIFT had considered at the time that it could not provide individualised
searches of the information and it had offered the U.S. Government access to
all transaction records. This has been a situation going on since then and
the financial authorities examined tens of thousands of confidential
financial transactions.

The Secretary for the Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Stuart
Levey confirmed that the Treasury Department had subpoenaed records on
terrorist-related transactions from SWIFT. He reported that the legal basis
was "routine and absolutely clear". Some US Representatives asked US
Department of Justice to investigate the New York Times for its actions for
violating the Espionage Act and other related federal statutes.

The European Commission said it had no jurisdiction over the transfer of
financial data to non-EU countries such as the US, considering that this was
a problem for the national legislation. Friso Abbing, EU spokesman on
justice and home affairs, stated that the European Union remained concerned
that civil liberties were being overlooked in the name of combating
terrorism: "Everyone agrees that in the fight against terrorism we do need
to have measures against the funding of terrorism. But the emphasis is that
this must be done with full respect in the respect of data privacy."

The Belgium government said that they were investigating the legality of the
searches. Prime-Minister Guy Verhofstadt stated that they needed to
determine if the rights of Belgium nationals and the Belgium Law have been
respected during this process within SWIFT.

The National Bank of Belgium acknowledged that it knew of the transfers and
The European Central Bank and the Bank of England were also aware that
customers' payment data were being accessed by US authorities.

There are serious privacy concerns that this classified program might also
be a violation of U.S. and European financial privacy laws, because
individual search warrants to access financial data were not obtained in
advance. Privacy International (PI) lists a number of inconsistencies with
this program, including the US claims that this is a narrowly focused
programme that is compliant with the law, while the Belgian Government has
concerns that the data is accessed without authorisation by a Belgian judge.
Or that, as with most cases of international co-operation, the country
seizing the data, i.e. the U.S., is claiming universal jurisdiction while
the regime responsible for protecting the data, the EU, is disavowing any
responsibility.

PI launched on 28 June 2006 an international campaign against the SWIFT
illeagal activities. They have filed simultaneous complaints with Data
Protection and Privacy regulators in 33 countries, considering that the
activity was undertaken without regard to legal process under Data
Protection law, and that the disclosures were made without any legal basis
or authority whatever. The scale of the operation, involving millions of
records, places this disclosure in the realm of a fishing exercise rather
than a legally authorised investigation.

Pulling a Swift one? Bank transfer information sent to U.S. authorities
(27.06.2006)
http://www.privacyinternational.org/article.shtml?cmd[347]=x-347-538978

PI launches campaign to suspend unlawful activities of finance giant
(28.06.2006)
http://www.privacyinternational.org/article.shtml?cmd[347]=x-347-538985

PI Complaint: Transfer of personal data from SWIFT to the U.S. Government
(27.06.2006)
http://www.privacyinternational.org/issues/terrorism/swiftlettercampaign.pdf

Belgian leader orders bank inquiry (26.06.2006)
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/06/26/news/intel.php

NY Times accused of treason ( 26.06.2006)
http://www.theregister.com/2006/06/26/nyt_on_the_job/

Belgium probes US bank record searches(26.06.2006)
http://today.reuters.com/business/newsArticle.aspx?type=bankingFinancial&sto
ryID=nL26722895

European Central Bank knew about US data access (29.06.2006)
http://euobserver.com/9/21984

Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication - SWIFT
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_for_Worldwide_Interbank_Financial_Telec
ommunication

(Thanks to Gus Hosein - Privacy International)

============================================================
3. Private hotlines questioned at EC Safer Internet Forum
============================================================
With its newly adopted Communication on a 'comprehensive EU strategy to
promote and safeguard the rights of the child', the Commission intends to
pursue its global action on children's rights. One may however wonder
whether the strategy for fighting child porn on the Internet, which mostly
relies on private hotlines, is really efficient and compliant with the rule
of law.

These were the main issues raised at the afternoon session of the EC Safer
Internet Forum 2006, held in Luxembourg on 21 June, on 'Illegal Content:
Blocking access to child sexual abuse images'. Following the invitation of
the organizers, Rikke Frank Joergensen (Digital Rights Denmark) and Meryem
Marzouki (Imaginons un rC)seau Internet solidaire, IRIS - France) represented
EDRI. Other speakers were two representatives of private hotlines, Helena
KarlC)n (ECPAT Sweden) and Peter Robbins (UK Internet Watch Foundation - IWF)
and two representatives of ISPs, BenoC.t Lavigne (French ISP Association,
AFA) and Sabine Frank (German Search Engine Providers, FSM). The discussion
was introduced by Ola-Kristian Off (Norwegian lawyer and former ICRA
European Director) and moderated by Richard Swetenham (Head of the eContent
and Safer Internet Unit, EC DG INFSO).

>From the digital civil rights point of view, hotlines run by private
organizations, be they ISPs or NGOs, and their cooperation with the police
to remove local content or block access to it when hosted on foreign
websites, are breaching the rule of law in that the police acts as the
judging power and ISPs as the executing power, as Joergensen exemplified
with the Danish case. At the EU level, Marzouki showed how freedom of
expression and creation, transparency and accountability, as well as the
risk of massive over-blocking of legal content are at stake when courts are
left outside the process. Other important issues were related to violations
of due process and dual criminality rules and, in some cases, to the loss of
evidence, which may result in preventing accurate investigations. ISP
representatives backed to a large extent these deep concerns, with Lavigne
discussing the efficiency of filtering, as well as its side effects mainly
in terms of threats to freedom of expression, and Frank insisting on the
transparency issue.

Despite all these risks, private hotlines representatives are pushing hard
towards generalizing blocking of access, as already practiced on a large
scale in 4 European countries. The UK and the 3 Scandinavian countries are
using blocking systems like British Telecom 'Cleanfeed' (recently analyzed
by Richard Clayton from EDRI member FIPR - UK), or the Swedish company
'Netclean Technologies' products and the blocking system of the Danish
Telecom operator TDC. KarlC)n even proposed to interconnect hotlines all
around the world following the SETI at Home project, and to set up an
international database of URL blacklists. Showing how IWF is cooperating
with other hotlines, ISPs and the police, Robbins said that IWF intends to
share its databases with other members of the Inhope network. He also
mentioned that IWF is currently sharing its blacklists with its members,
while licensing them to non IWF members.

The latter information made Marzouki wonder during the discussion whether
these practices could lead on the one hand to commercial business, like we
have witnessed content rating bureaus selling services, and on the other
hand to a 'least common denominator' strategy to define illegal content
throughout the world, and at least in Europe, without any court
intervention. Other participants to the Forum took the floor to raise the
issue of privacy: when tentative access is made to blocked content, what
happens with the personal data of individuals requesting these URLs, some
indeed on purpose, but some others only incidentally, without any intention
to access child porn content?

Despite the conclusions on the need for more hotline transparency, the Safer
Internet Forum 2006 clearly showed that civil liberty organizations must
remain very vigilant against the risk of worldwide interconnection of
blacklists and massive content blocking, without any sound legal decision.

RAPID: 'Commission launches comprehensive EU strategy to promote and
safeguard the rights of the child' (04.07.06)
http://europa.eu.int/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=IP/06/927

EC Safer Internet Forum 2006 (21.06.06)
http://europa.eu.int/information_society/activities/sip/si_forum/forum_june_
2006/agenda

Rikke Frank Joergensen: 'Blocking access to child pornography. The Danish
Case' (21.06.2006)
http://europa.eu.int/information_society/activities/sip/docs/forum_june_2006
/rikke_frank_joergenseng.pdf

Meryem Marzouki: 'Five Little Questions About Blocking Access to Child Porn
Images' (21.06.2006)
http://www-polytic.lip6.fr/article.php3?id_article=144

Richard Clayton: 'Failures in a Hybrid Content Blocking System' (1.06.2005)
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rnc1/cleanfeed.pdf

(Contribution by Meryem Marzouki, EDRI-member IRIS)

============================================================
4. Dutch Parliament opposes the new EU IPR draft directive
============================================================
The Dutch Parliament stated on 28 June 2006 that the European Commission has
no competence to propose a new directive that is focusing on criminalizing
intellectual property offences. The statement refers to a new draft
directive - Directive on criminal measures aimed at ensuring the enforcement
of intellectual property rights, 2005/0127 - revived by the European
Commission at the beginning of May 2006.

The Parliament also said that the Commission should present concrete
evidence why such a directive is needed, considering that the European body
should show why the measures are essential for the good functioning of the
single market. Also it considers that the directive might harmonise some
penalties, but the exchange of information among member states would be a
much more effective solution.

The conclusion of the text adressed to Mr. Frattini, Commissioner for
Justice, Freedom and Security, and adopted by the Dutch Parliament states
that: "Both Houses of the States-General conclude that no power has been
granted to the Community in respect of the aim of the proposed action.
Nonetheless, both Houses have b for the record b scrutinised the present
proposal by reference to the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality
and concluded that the proposal does not comply with them."

Commenting the decision of the Parliament, FFII analyst Ante Wessels notes
that : "The European Commission and the member states are now in the process
of circumscribing competence: How far can the Commission go? In this power
struggle the Dutch Parliament made its statement: the Commission went much
too far. Earlier Dutch minister of Justice Donner had already stated he was
not 'pleased'."

Letter of Dutch Parliament to Mr. Frattini (3.07.2006)
English Version
http://europapoort.eerstekamer.nl/9310000/1/j9tvgajcovz8izf_j9vvgbwoimqf9iv/v
g7slw5im1tl?key=vhc0fvdga1qw
French Version
http://europapoort.eerstekamer.nl/9310000/1/j9tvgajcovz8izf_j9vvgbwoimqf9iv/v
g7slw5im1tl?key=vhc0fy66g2qw

Dutch Parliament says No to European criminal law against IP violations
(3.07.2006)
http://wiki.ffii.org/IpredNlParl060629En

IP Enforcement Directive 2: European Community goes criminal
http://wiki.ffii.org/Ipred2060510En

EDRi-gram : EU moves to criminalise IP offences (10.05.2006)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.9/ipcriminal

============================================================
5.German experts think search engines should be monitored
============================================================
During the workshop "The Rising Power of Search-Engines on
the Internet: Impacts on Users, Media Policy, and Media Business" that took
place in Berlin on 26-27 June 2006, the experts expressed the opinion that
the search engines should be more regulated.

Marcel Machill, a lecturer in journalism at Germany's Leipzig and Dortmund
universities stated that Google along with Yahoo and MSN were the main
source of information searches for 90% of the Germans, Google alone
accounting for 70%. He expressed serious concern related to the power of the
search engines that would be unconceivable in the classic media. Machill as
well as other experts considers Google should have the same responsibility
as other publishers not to allow access to illegal sites, such as those with
neo-Nazi content or x-rated ones and that mechanisms must be created to
protect children online and to address illegal content.

"Even if not targeted directly, browsing, surfing, or following suggestions
from search engines may lead to material containing unwanted, troublesome,
offensive, as well as surprising or amusing material. To be able to profit
from this opportunity, while still allowing for the protection of children
and for selective approaches to information gathering and communication, is
one of the most important tasks in further developing the internet." said
Machill.

Machill also added that last year, the German subsidiaries of search engine
operators agreed to voluntarily filter sites with x-rated content or those
that incite to violence out of their results lists and that the Government
had to know how the search companies operate and had to regulate them if
necessary.

However, according to Norbert Schneider, director of the North Rhine
Westphalia, the voluntary obligation to filter sites will have no effect
considering it just a  "weak regulation without any sanctions".

Machill also suggested the foundation of a public corporation in Europe to
counterbalance the power of the US search engines.

Google's position was expressed by public relations head Rachel Whetstone
who reaffirmed that the search engine was no newspaper or broadcasting
company and that they only applied an algorithm. She also stated that while
Google observed the local laws regarding the results displayed, they did not
wish to be the ones to decide on what people were supposed to see or not.

The Rising Power of Search-Engines on the Internet: Impacts on Users, Media
Policy, and Media Business
http://www.uni-leipzig.de/journalistik/suma/home_e.html

German Experts Criticize Google's Power (28.06.2006)
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2071471,00.html

German experts want search engines to be monitored (30.06.2006)
http://www.theregister.com/2006/06/30/google_too_powerful/

============================================================
6. Swedish company offers file-sharing damage insurance
============================================================
Swedish company Tankafritt offers insurance against file sharing law suits
damages and intends to expand to other Scandinavian countries.

Magnus Brath, the owner of the company, found it in reaction to the
recent copyright infringement cases in Sweden. He also thinks he could
develop his business in countries like Norway and Denmark where there are
similar laws on file-sharing.

His company is a small one operating on membership basis. For about 15
euro/year the members are covered in case RIAA (Recording Industry
Association of America) asks for damages for copyright infringement..

According to Slyck.com, the probability of being sued by RIAA is 1:1,840, a
ration that is lower than that of dying from external causes which is
1:1,755, according to the US National Safety Council. Considering these
figures, the Tankafritt operation has all the chances of being a success.

While in UK such a system would not be considered legal as states the
Association of British Insurers, in Sweden, where there is a political party
for the relaxation of the intellectual property controls, the cause of file
sharers is very much supported.

A large controversy has been created recently by a raid on servers hosting
the Pirate Bay site as the raid has apparently put some legal business
offline as well.

File sharing damages insurer plans international expansion (3.07.2006)
http://www.theregister.com/2006/07/03/filesharing_damages_insurer/

P2P insurer will pay your fines if RIAA sues: $19/year! (28.06.2006)
http://www.boingboing.net/2006/06/28/p2p_insurer_will_pay.html

RIAA's Grand Total: 10,037 - What are Your Odds? (2.05.2006)
http://www.slyck.com/news.php?story=769

EDRI-gram : Swedish torrent website Pirate Bay returns back home
(21.06.2006)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.12/piratebay

============================================================
7. New French copyright law gives Apple satisfaction
============================================================
The most controversial DADVSI Law, now colloquially known also as "iTunes
Law", was finally adopted in the French Parliament with a compromise
allowing Apple to continue operating as before.

The law was adopted by the Parliament under emergency regime, which ended
with a mixed commission, normally made of 7 senators and 7 deputies, from
both the majority and the opposition. But the opposition left the
commission, after 55 more amendments were brought to it by the rapporteurs
at the very final step

The most controversial provision was that of interoperability. In a previous
draft, the law imposed measures to allow interoperability, obliging thus
Apple to give up its DRM system that made "iTunes" products strictly related
to i-Pods.

Apple reacted virulently, accusing of "state sponsored piracy" and
threatening to leave France altogether in case the law was passed as such.

The law as adopted now allows for the DRM and redefines the concept of
interoperability. The text provides for the protection of "the technical
measures meant to prevent or limit non-authorised use" and the fines for
breaking these systems have remained at the level of 3 750 euro. The
producers, distributors or promoters of technical solutions avoiding these
systems can get up to 6 months of imprisonment and 30 000 euro fines.

Interoperability is redefined in the sense that the text now reads: the
technical measures (meant to protect the works) must not result in impeding
interoperability, while observing copyright.

Still stating that all systems must interoperate, the new law allows,
however, for this requirement to be waived with the permission of the rights
holders. It actually means that Apple can continue to operation in the same
way as before with the permission of record labels and artists, only the
balance of power between Apple and the labels may shift more towards the
latter.

The idea of creating a group of mediators to deal with private copy
conflicts was changed to that of establishing a regulator of technical
measures as an independent authority.

The regulator will be responsible with seeing that the DRM systems do not
create additional limitations in the use of artistic works to those
explicitly expressed by the copyright holders.  The law covers only software
and technical systems producers without saying anything about consumer
associations or the open source creators.

The socialist deputies have already announced their intention to contest the
text of the law at the Constitutional Court.

Dadvsi draft finaly adopted by the Parliament (in French only,
30.06.2006)
http://www.zdnet.fr/actualites/internet/0,39020774,39361945,00.htm?xtor=1

France dilutes plans for iTunes law (26.06.2006)
http://www.theregister.com/2006/06/26/france_dilutes_itunes_law/

Zut! France drops iTunes bombshell (30.06.2006)
http://www.theregister.com/2006/06/30/france_itunes_law_loophole/

Compromise on copyright (in French only, 23.06.2006)
http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0@2-651865,36-787328@51-787425,0.html

EDRI-gram : French draft copyright law continues to be criticised
(24.05.2006)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.10/frenchcopyright

============================================================
8. Google's victory in court against German publisher
============================================================

Google has just obtained a significant victory against the German publisher
Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft (WBG), having asked an injunction in a
German court to stop the giant from scanning books in its Books Library
project.

WBG dropped their case on 28 June after the judge told them they had poor
chances in winning. Although backed by the German publishers associations,
the publisher failed to bring arguments in support of its action and the
court ruled that there was no copyright violation resulting from the
development of Google's project.

Google has undertaken to digitize library books and place the contents on
its search engine working within this process with six US libraries and one
in Oxford. The books that are out of copyright will be accessed without any
restrictions while books that are found to be covered by copyright are only
presented with bibliographic data and a few snippets. However, even for a
copyrighted book, Google has to scan the entire book in order to create the
index used for its search engine.

The German publisher wanted to stop Google from scanning copyrighted books
without permission but the court admitted Google's argument that the
publishing of short snippets did not infringe the German copyright law.

To make thinks even more complicated, Google considers that the action of
copying a book is covered by the copyright law of the country where the book
is copied and not by that of the country where the book publisher is.
Therefore if it scans a book from a US library is has to comply to US
copyright laws.

But Germany is not the only country where the giant faces opposition to this
project. The French group La Martiniere is also suing Google for
"counterfeiting and breach of intellectual property rights" as reported by
Agency France-Presse.

France's National Publishers' Union, representing over 400 publishers, has
also threatened to take Google to court and publishers in UK have expressed
opposition to the project as well. Google faces two lawsuits in the United
States from author and publisher groups on the same issue.

After the court ruling on 28 June, Google stated that they recognised the
importance of the copyright law as they considered that authors and
publishers were entitled to be rewarded for their creations. Google also
believes the project would also serve authors and publishers as their books
will be easily searchable on the search engine and it will also be easy for
the users to buy them.

David Drummond, senior vice president also expressed the dedication of the
company to the project. "Google is passionate about the digitization of
books, which we believe benefits everyone by making the world's knowledge
more accessible".

Legal victory for Google in library project (29.06.2006)
http://business.guardian.co.uk/story/0,,1808770,00.html

Partial Success for Google in a German Courtroom (29.06.2006)
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,2144,2073046,00.html

Google Book project gets reprieve in Germany (29.06.2006)
http://news.com.com/2061-10812_3-6089897.html

============================================================
9. Consultation launched by UK government on the controversial RIPA act
============================================================.
UK government has launched a consultation on codes of practice covering the
implementation of its communications surveillance laws that, lately, have
been largely debated on by privacy campaigners, internet service providers
as well as security specialists.

The UK Government has launched a public consultation on Part I and III of
The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) Chapter II giving
increased power to public authorities in their access to citizens'
communications data.

The Home Office has published draft codes of practice for both parts of the
act for a 12-week consultation period, stating that the present
text has been modified to take into consideration the current practices, to
reduce bureaucracy and to deal with concerns expressed in relation to data
protection. It also stated that additional elements have been added
where the original draft was lacking in sufficient guidance.

Part 3 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA), allowing the
police to ask for the disclosure of encryption keys or force suspects to
decrypt encrypted data has not yet been implemented but the government
considers time has come for it. The arguments relate to the rapid
development of encryption products and the increased availability to such
products including integrated security features in operating systems.

Comments on the two draft codes are expected by 30 August.

Government launches new data retention consultation (20.06.2006)
http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/2006/06/20/216510/Government+launches
+new+data+retention+consultation.htm

EDRI-gram: UK Government asks for the encryption keys (24.05.2006)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.10/ukencryption

Acquisition and Disclosure of Communication Data - A public consultation
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/documents/351628/ripa-part1.pdf?view=Binary

============================================================
10. IPRED Directive Implementation in Italy
============================================================.
By Legislative Decree no.140 of 16 March 2006, with more than one
month before the deadline, Italy implemented Directive 2004/48/EC on the
enforcement of intellectual property rights (IPRED) by amending law
no.633/1941, which has already been the subject of so many modifications
since its inception that several parties are calling for its complete
re-drafting.

The most notable modifications to the Italian copyright law include the
presumption of ownership of the neighbouring rights, as it was already
the case for author's rights; the possibility for collective and
"representative" organizations to independently promote judicial actions in
order to defend their members' rights; the possibility to ask judges to
inhibit activities, including those by intermediaries, that can be construed
as an infringement of authors' or neighbouring rights; the possibility for
judges in the case of infringement "on a commercial scale"- on request of
the interested party - to order banking, financial and other commercial data
to be produced by the counterpart; a more detailed procedure to calculate
damages.

Some of the modifications were not so relevant, as the Italian judges have
already applied the same principles as a matter of custom and practice. For
example the Italian criminal procedures already contained norms that allow a
judge to apply a sanction in case a party delays of fails to put a writ in
practice. Or the so-called "right of information", by which a judge can
request third parties to produce relevant information they might have with
regards to an infringement.

The Italian implementation of IPRED has been severely criticized, among
others by Andrea Monti of ALCEI (Associazione per la Liberta` nella
Comunicazione Elettronica Interattiva - EDRi-member). In an article
published on the Italian journal "InterLex", Monti considered that the
Legislative Decree is too vague in its key parts - including the definition
of what is an "intermediary" and the type of evidences that must be produced
in order for a judicial injunction to be issued.

Text of Legislative Decree no. 140/16 March 2006 (only in Italian,
16.03.2006)
http://www.gazzettaufficiale.it/guri/attocompleto?dataGazzetta=2006-04-07&re
dazione=006G0161&service=0&ConNote=2
http://www.camera.it/parlam/leggi/deleghe/testi/06140dl.htm

Andrea Monti, Copyright - a "particular" and "concrete" law (only in
Italian, 23.02.2006)
http://www.interlex.it/copyright/amonti84.htm

Explanatory report on the Italian implementation of IPRED (only in Italian)
http://www.interlex.it/testi/pdf/rec482004.pdf

EDRI-gram: New Italian IT legislation limits civil rights (1.03.2006)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.4/italianlaws

(Contribution by Andrea Glorioso, consultant on digital policies - Italy)
(Thanks to Ms. De Angelis - DDA Law Firm )

===========================================================
11. News on CoE activities on Human Rights in the Information Society
===========================================================

On 20 June, Rikke Frank Joergensen (Digital Rights Denmark) and Meryem
Marzouki (Imaginons un rC)seau Internet solidaire, IRIS - France)
participated as EDRI observers to the 5th Council of Europe meeting of the
Group of Specialists on Human Rights in the Information Society (MC-S-IS).
Among the many points on the agenda, the following news are worth reporting
at this step.

The draft Recommendation on empowering children in the new
information and communications environment has been submitted to the
CoE Steering Committee on the Media and New Communication Services
(CDMC), where some member states (France, Germany, Russia) expressed
their willing to make further comments before having it adopted.
EDRI previously reported on the important changes made to this
document by MC-S-IS group.

The group received information on CoE follow-up to the second phase
of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). This concerns
action line C8 on bCultural diversity and identity, linguistic
diversity and local contentb, C9 on bMediab and C10 on bThe ethical
dimension of the Internetb, as well as the Internet Governance Forum,
which will hold its first meeting in Athens, 30 October to 2 November
2006. EDRI proposed stronger cooperation between CoE and human rights
groups, i.e. through common workshops at the Forum.

The group was also informed that a new CoE Ad Hoc Committee on e-
democracy (CAHDE) was created, in the framework of the CoE project on
bGood governance in the information societyb. The CAHDE mandate,
which runs until December 2007, is inter alia to bexamine
developments on e-democracy/e-participation at European and
international level, with a view to identifying political, social,
ethical, legislative and technological issues and their
interdependenceb. Its first meeting will be held in September 2006.
While there is no observer status for NGOs non member of the CoE
Conference of INGOs, EDRI insisted on the need to associate NGOs
directly involved in these issues to the CAHDE works.

Given the very few (less than 15) answers received so far to the
questionnaire on the implementation by member States of the 2003
Declaration on freedom of communication on the Internet, EDRI
proposed that a European compliance study/mapping based on the
Declaration be rather commissioned by the group.

Finally, the second CoE Pan-European Forum on Human Rights in the
Information Society will be held in Erevan on 5-6 October 2006, on
the main theme of bEmpowering children and young peopleb.

EDRi-Gram : CoE Works On New Instrument On Children Empowerment On The
Net (15.03.06)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.5/coe

CoE MC-S-IS public website
http://www.coe.int/t/e/human_rights/media/1_intergovernmental_co-operation/MC
-S-IS/

WSIS follow-up action lines and Internet governance forum
http://www.itu.int/wsis/implementation/
http://www.intgovforum.org/

CAHDE draft terms of reference
https://wcd.coe.int/ViewDoc.jsp?Ref=CM/Del/Dec(2006)965/2.3&Sector=secCM

(Contribution by Rikke Frank Joergensen and Meryem Marzouki, EDRI-
members Digital Rights Denmark and IRIS)

===========================================================
12. Book launch on Human Rights in the Global Information Society
===========================================================
A new book on Human Rights in the Global Information Society, edited by
Rikke Frank JC8rgensen (EDRI board member from Digital Rights DK) was
presented 23 June 2006 in Copenhagen.

In the book, a number of scholars, human rights activists and practitioners
examine the links between information and communication technology (ICT) and
human rights, exploring the ways in which the information society can either
advance human rights around the world or threaten them. This includes issues
such as freedom of expression, access to information, privacy,
discrimination, freedom of assembly, political participation, gender
equality, minority rights, and intellectual property. The book was produced
during the World Summit of the Information Society process (2003-2005), and
the Introduction examines how human rights were dealt with within this
global ICT policy process.

Following the presentation of the book, Gus Hosein from Privacy
International / LSE and author of the book chapter on Privacy, gave a
keynote on 'Privacy, Terrorism and the New Security Agenda'.

In his presentation, Hosein illustrated with current examples how privacy
rights are being eroded, not least in a European context, and how the policy
dynamics of the 'new security agenda' stretches beyond terrorism into other
parts of our daily lives. He also addressed the intimate link between
privacy and other human rights, such as freedom of expression and freedom of
assembly, and stressed the need for more concerted civil society actions in
Europe on these issues.

Human Rights in the Global Information Society
http://www.mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=10872

Danish Human Rights Institute
http://www.humanrights.dk

Digital Rights Denmark
http://www.digitalrights.dk

Danish WSIS network
http://www.una.dk/wsis

(Contribution by Rikke Frank JC8rgensen  - EDRi-member Digital Rights
Denmark)

===========================================================
13. Recommanded Reading
===========================================================
Michelle Child - Notes of Barcelona Conference "The Proposed WIPO Treaty on
the Protection of Broadcasting Organizations: From the Rome Convention to
Podcasting" -  21 June 2006
http://downontheriver.blogspot.com/2006/06/notes-of-wipo-barcelona-seminar.h
tml

Report on the situation of fundamental rights in the EU in 2005
http://www.statewatch.org/news/2006/jun/EU-funrights-report05.pdf

European Commission opened an online public consultation on radio frequency
identification (RFID)
http://www.rfidconsultation.eu/
Read also the consultation background paper
http://www.rfidconsultation.eu/docs/ficheiros/Your_voice_on_RFID.pdf

===========================================================
14. Agenda
===========================================================

7 July 2006, Zurich, Switzerland
Free cultures - a Free Internet. Internet Governance and Switzerland
Who is supposed to govern the internet? A symposium on the "Internet
Governance Forum" will be looking for the answers.
http://www.igf-06.ch

16 - 28 July 2006, Oxford, UK
Annenberg/Oxford Summer Institute: Global Media Policy: Technology and
New Themes in Media Regulation
http://www.pgcs.asc.upenn.edu/events/ox06/index.php

2-4 August 2006, Bregenz, Austria
2nd International Workshop on Electronic Voting 2006
http://www.e-voting.cc/stories/1246056/

3 August 2006 , Prague, Czech Republic
Travelers privacy and EU - One day seminar organized by Iuridicum
Remedium, providing a space for privacy experts to meet Czech
officials to discuss passports, biometrics, RFID, PNR deal and other
issues related to privacy risks possibly encountered by travellers in
the EU.
http://www.bigbrotherawards.cz/en/index.html

14-16 September 2006, Berlin, Germany
Wizards of OS 4 Information Freedom Rules
http://wizards-of-os.org/

===========================================================
15. About
===========================================================

EDRI-gram is a biweekly newsletter about digital civil rights in Europe.
Currently EDRI has 21 members from 14 European countries and 5 observers
from 5 more countries (Italy, Ireland, Poland, Portugal and Slovenia).
European Digital Rights takes an active interest in developments in the EU
accession countries and wants to share knowledge and awareness through the
EDRI-grams. All contributions, suggestions for content, corrections or
agenda-tips are most welcome. Errors are corrected as soon as possible and
visibly on the EDRI website.

Except where otherwise noted, this newsletter is licensed under the
Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 License. See the full text at
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

Newsletter editor: Bogdan Manolea <edrigram at edri.org>

Information about EDRI and its members:
http://www.edri.org/

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______________________________________________________________
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