EDRi-gram newsletter - Number 11.5, 13 March 2013
EDRi-gram
edrigram at edri.org
Wed Mar 13 11:49:06 PDT 2013
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EDRi-gram
biweekly newsletter about digital civil rights in Europe
Number 11.5, 13 March 2013
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Contents
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1. EDRi at its 10th anniversary
2. France slowly advances towards net neutrality?
3. Ukrainian online editor beaten up for critical articles
4. Article 29 WP takes the next step in its Google investigation
5. Hadopi wants to turn to privatised enforcement measures
6. Total transparency on ACTA and TAFTA documents
7.ENDitorial:Porn, Parliament, Posturing, Politics + Privatised Policing
8. Recommended Reading
9. Agenda
10. About
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1. EDRi at its 10th anniversary
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EDRi celebrated the 10th anniversary with its friends and supporters on
2 March 2013 with music from DJ MEP Ehrenhauser & friends and DJs pEtEr
Withoutfield, Tasmo & Cpt Pudding /Blogrebellen with Creative Commons
sound only.
On the 4th of March 2013, EDRi also celebrated the 10th anniversary at
the European Parliament in Brussels. To mark the occasion, EDRi held a
meeting with European Commission Vice-President, Viviane Reding.
"As EU Commissioner in charge of the Information Society and now as EU
Commissioner for Justice, I have worked together with the European
Digital Rights organisation for many years," said Ms. Reding. "Thanks to
our joint efforts we have made sure that the internet could not be
blocked and that data protection standards remain high in Europe. Today
we are celebrating EDRi's 10th anniversary. Congratulations for 10 years
of great work! I look forward to continuing our joint efforts for strong
data protection rules in Europe. EDRi's continuous support is crucial to
make sure that the fundamental right to data protection is properly
protected in our European Union."
At the EDRi General Assembly of 2-3 March 2013 in Bruxelles, Belgium,
EDRi welcomed 3 new members: Alternative Informatics Association from
Turkey, Modern Poland Foundation and Initiatve fC<r Netztfreiheit (IFNF)
from Austria.
Now, 35 privacy and civil rights organisations have EDRi membership.
They are based or have offices in 21 different countries in Europe.
Press Release: Mainstreaming digital rights in European policy-making b
10 years on (4.03.2013)
http://edri.org/edri10
EDRi-gram: EDRi celebrates its 10th anniversary (27.02.2013)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number11.4/edri-10th-birthday-party
Alternative Informatics Association (Turkey)
http://www.alternatifbilisim.org/wiki/Ana_Sayfa
Modern Poland Foundation
http://nowoczesnapolska.org.pl/
Initiatve fC<r Netztfreiheit (IFNF-Austria)
https://netzfreiheit.org/
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2. France slowly advances towards net neutrality?
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During an intergovernmental seminar on digital policy on 28 February
2013, French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault announced the preparation
for 2014 of a law b on the protection of digital rights and freedomsb
which seemed to bring some improvements in online freedom protection,
mainly in the net neutrality direction.
The National Digital Council (Conseil national du numC)rique b CNNum) was
to express its opinion on net neutrality first. And if b there appears to
be a legal loophole in the protection of freedom of expression and
communication on the Internet (then) the government will initiate some
legislative dispositionsb .
Well, CNNum issued on 12 March 2013 its opinion on net neutrality
recommending to the government to issue a law that would ensure the
principle of the non-discrimination of communications, trying to extend
it to search engines and other online services. Unfortunately, CNNum
recommendations are in very vague terms ignoring to provide precise
measures on the telecom operatorsb obligations regarding net neutrality
or any sanctions against access restrictions imposed by these operators.
b CNNum failed to propose a real protection of the Net neutrality. To try
and solve different problems by one sole magic wand strike, this opinion
risks to result in a neutralized neutrality which will solve so problem.
As it has already been done in The Netherlands, Slovenia, Chile and
Peru, France should legislate to guarantee Net by providing discouraging
sanctions against operators which illegally restrict our online
communications. If the law promised by the government is aligned with
CNNum recommendations and is limited to a minmum protection of a vaguely
defined neutrality, the Parliament should then amend the txt to give it
a real weight,b said JC)rC)mie Zimmermann, spokesperson for EDRi observer
La Quadrature du Net - France.
But the French government also suggested other measures that contradict
the digital rights principles. Thus at the same seminar on 28 February
2013, it announced the return of administrative filtering of
websites, a sort of "independent control" for "administrative cutting
off and filtering measures" without any mention to any judiciary
interventions thus reminding of Loppsi law which allowed authorities to
ask ISPs or hosters to cut access to certain online services deemed to
contain child pornography.
Other announcement referred to a reform of the French 1881 law on
freedom of the press to take into account b the Internet's strike forceb ,
and the calling into question of web hosting services' liability and
their increased role against illicit content.
b The government does as if Net neutrality was the sole issue at stake in
the protection of freedom of expression online. In the meantime, we see
a resurgence of the sarkozyst rhetoric of considering Internet a
dangerous lawless zone, which in turn justifies private polices or the
return of administrative censorship. Under the guise of a law on
freedoms online, which could bring real improvements, the French
government is postponing a possible legislation on Net neutrality and
bringing the issue of repressive measures back on the agenda.b declared
JC)rC)mie Zimmermann.
Freedoms Online in France: One Step Forward, Two Steps Back? (1.03.2013)
https://www.laquadrature.net/en/freedoms-online-in-france-one-step-forward-tw
o-steps-back
The government discretely calls up filtering without judge of Loppsi
(only in French, 28.02.2013)
http://www.numerama.com/magazine/25241-le-gouvernement-evoque-discretement-le
-filtrage-sans-juge-de-la-loppsi.html
Net Neutrality: the government should be invited to legislate (only in
French, 5.03.2013)
http://www.numerama.com/magazine/25276-neutralite-du-net-le-gouvernement-devr
ait-etre-invite-a-legiferer.html
The Net neutrality neutralized? (only in French, 12.03.2013)
https://www.laquadrature.net/fr/la-neutralite-du-net-neutralisee
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3. Ukrainian online editor beaten up for critical articles
=======================================================================
On 5 March 2013, Taras Chornoivan, chief editor for the Ukrainian news
website Tarasova Pravd, ended up in hospital with serious injuries after
having been attacked and beaten by three unidentified men.
According to Chornoivanbs declarations, the attack was probably due to
the series of articles published by Tarasova Pravda website accusing
Aleksandr Dombrovskiy, a former governor, of vote rigging in the last
parliamentary elections. In January 2013, Ukraine's Supreme
Administrative Court cancelled Dombrovskiy's election to the Parliament
after an opposition politician had filed a complaint against him based
on similar accusations of vote rigging. The website launched a print
edition on 4 March, with a mocking photo, showing Dombrovskiy on a
toilet, accompanied by a critical story.
"We are alarmed by this vicious assault against Taras Chornoivan, and
urge regional authorities to bring those responsible to justice. A
thorough, transparent, and effective investigation will demonstrate
authorities' commitment to free expression and the rule of law," stated
Muzaffar Suleymanov, Europe and Central Asia Program Research Associate
of the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Dombrovskiy's spokesman denied his involvement in the incident.
Editor of critical website brutally assaulted in Ukraine (8.03.2013)
http://www.ifex.org/ukraine/2013/03/08/assault_editor/
Journalist violently beaten in Vinnytsya (7.03.2013)
http://imi.org.ua/en/news/journalist-violently-beaten-vinnytsya
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4. Article 29 WP takes the next step in its Google investigation
=======================================================================
In October 2012, Article 29 Working Party (representing the data
protection authorities (DPAs) of the EU member states) made
recommendations to Google to solve certain deficiencies regarding its
privacy policy. Now the group believes that the company has not taken
the necessary measures to address the highlighted issues and therefore
it is still in non-compliance of Data Protection Directive 95/46/EC.
In the plenary session meeting of 26 February 2013, the EU DPAs decided
to continue their investigations on Google and to take all necessary
actions in their power and according to their competences, under the
coordination of a taskforce led by the French DPA (CNIL).
It appears as if the data protection authorities are no longer willing
to close their eyes to Googlebs irregularities.
The DPAs taskforce will meet in the coming weeks and Google will be
invited for a hearing. Some of the issues that could be questioned by
the DPAs include the conditions of Googlebs transfer, to application
developers, of personal information of all Android device users having
purchased an application from the b Google Playb app store and the
conditions under which data has been transferred outside the EU, the
lack of response to CNILbs questions regarding Googlebs changes in its
privacy policy or the privacy issues in new projects, such as Google
Glass.
Article 29 Data Protection Working Party Press Release -
Googlebs privacy policy: European data protection authorities are
coordinating their enforcement actions (27.02.2013)
http://ec.europa.eu/justice/data-protection/article-29/press-material/press-r
elease/art29_press_material/20130227_pr_google_privacy_policy_en.pdf
Five questions European regulators need to ask Google b and Al Capone
(11.03.2013)
http://www.privacysurgeon.org/blog/incision/five-questions-european-regulator
s-need-to-ask-google-and-al-capone/
Google's privacy policy: G29 ready for coordinated enforcement actions
(28.02.2013)
http://www.cnil.fr/english/news-and-events/news/article/googles-privacy-polic
y-g29-ready-for-coordinated-enforcement-actions/
EDRi-gram: Google needs to improve its privacy practices (24.10.2012)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number10.20/european-dpas-google-privacy-policy
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5. Hadopi wants to turn to privatised enforcement measures
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The French anti-piracy authority Hadopi has produced a new report on how
to fight illegal streaming and downloading of copyrighted material.
This is probably an attempt of ensuring its future as, since its
installation in 2009, the authority has not yet proven its efficiency
with the so-called three-strikes system, in terms of revenues to the
culture industry, and has already cost France tens of millions of euros.
b Some Internet sites, streaming services and direct download sites are
specialized in the massive exploitation of illegal content from which
they make profits for their own benefit. This report, showing the state
of the ecosystem of illegal streaming and direct downloads, explores
different ways to fight against the massive exploitation of illegal
content.b says the report drafted by Mireille Imbert-Quaretta, President
at the Commission for the Protection of Rights (Commission de Protection
des Droits).
Hadopi suggests it might rely more on ISPs, search engines, advertising
agencies, payment solutions providers, as well as hosting companies
which could be asked to implement content recognition and filtering
technologies utilizing fingerprinting techniques supplied by
rightsholders. These systems can automatically remove infringing content
by the identification of their digital b watermarks" or restrict user
access based on location.
The report even suggests that a website operator may be itself subject
to a strikes-style system in case it refuses to sign filtering
agreements with rightsholders and illicit content repeatedly appears.
b In the event that it would not be possible to reach an agreement
because of the apparent unwillingness of the platform hosting the
reported content (to comply with the law), the public authority may
decide to correct the behaviour of the platform through an alert
procedure,b says the report.
The punishments suggested in the report to non-compliant sites vary from
reporting them to search engines for un-listing, to reporting them to a
judge in order to begin a domain blocking process. Once blocked by IP
and DNS, Hadopi wants to have the power to ensure that domains (and any
subsequent mirrors) blocked by IP and DNS remain blocked and even domain
seizures are also possible.
Moreover, Hadopi wants to target the financial intermediaries of sites
subjected to the copyright alerts procedure If the financial partners
refuse to suspend or terminate payments, Hadopi suggests taking the
matter to court.
Another idea is that of "a browser plug-in to perform some filtering" to
stop users from getting access to copyright-infringing material, or that
of using a filtering system directly embedded within the operating system.
The report states it only offers a number of proposals and not final
recommendations. In the meantime, Hadopibs future seems related to the
conclusions drawn by Pierre Lescure who has the task from the French
government to find ways to protect the country's digital works in the
digital age. Lescure's conclusions will be discussed by the French
parliament this autumn.
Report on the means to fight illegal streaming and direct downloading
(only in French, 15.02.2013)
http://www.hadopi.fr/sites/default/files/page/pdf/Rapport_streaming_2013.pdf
French Government Mulls Next Generation Anti-Piracy Measures (26.02.2013)
http://torrentfreak.com/french-government-mulls-next-generation-anti-piracy-m
easures-130226/
How Hadopi wants to suppress illegal streaming and Direct Downloading by
blackmail (only in French, 25.02.2013)
http://www.numerama.com/magazine/25197-comment-la-hadopi-veut-supprimer-strea
ming-et-ddl-illegal-par-le-chantage.html
France's anti-piracy watchdog ponders evolution, faces extinction
(6.03.2013)
http://www.zdnet.com/frances-anti-piracy-watchdog-ponders-evolution-faces-ext
inction-7000012162/
EDRi-gram: Hadopi report says nothing about decreases in sales (11.04.2012)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number10.7/hadopi-report-misleading
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6. Total transparency on ACTA and TAFTA documents
=======================================================================
In a letter sent to the president of the European Parliament, Linus
Nordberg, a Swedish advocate, developer for Tor and representative of
the EDRi-member Association for Digital Liberties from Sweden
(FC6reningen fC6r digitala fri- och rC$ttigheter b DFRI) asks for
transparency and clarity regarding ACTA treaties and an immediate and
full release to the public of the related documents.
Nordberg considers that The European Parliament (EP) has given ambiguous
messages regarding ACTA, playing an b active role in transparency issues
relating to ACTA both by demanding disclosure and by disclosing
documents, but also, in some instances, by actively withholding public
information."
DFRI wants the EP to keep showing high transparency standards even after
the closure of ACTA files and asks for a total and public disclosure of
the all documents related to the agreement.
The letter makes reference to the observations sent by the EP to the
European Court of Justice and to the question asked by the Court of
Justice also sent to the EP, as well as to other documents b we don't
know of."
The request follows actions announced by US President Obama towards the
Trans-Atlantic Free Trade Agreement (TAFTA), a joint American and
European legislative initiative that might be another version of ACTA
which was rejected by the EP in July 2012 with a crashing majority,
following large public protests. The talks over TAFTA will start this year.
"(ACTA) was a wake up call for many of us in the European Union member
states, that the European Parliament lacked the will or the power,
whichever would be the worst I don't know, to let the people ultimately
affected by the upcoming legislation learn what was at stake," stated
Nordberg for the The Inquirer.
Digital liberties group wants to shine a light on all ACTA and TAFTA
discussions (1.03.2013)
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2251585/digital-liberties-group-want
s-to-shine-a-light-on-all-acta-and-tafta-discussions
DFRI (Linus Nordberg)bs letter (26.02.2013)
http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.org.user-groups.dfri/406
EDRi-gram: Thank you SOPA, thank you ACTA (4.07.2012)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number10.13/good-bye-acta
=========================================================================
7.ENDitorial:Porn, Parliament, Posturing, Politics + Privatised Policing
=========================================================================
There was a lot of noise surrounding the proposed b porn banb that was
voted on this week (on 12 March 2013) in the European Parliament. The
draft Resolution, adopted by the Women's Rights and Gender Equality
Committee (FEMM), called for the Commission to take action to implement
the measures indicated in the 1997 Parliament resolution on advertising,
in particular with regard to the ban on pornography that it proposed. It
further called for an over-arching industry effort to police gender
equality issues through the use of a b Charterb to be enforced by
Internet operators.
The text being proposed was a vote to ban b all forms of pornographyb in
the b mediab . What does b all formsb mean? What does b pornographyb
mean?
According to the online Oxford English Dictionary, the intention of the
portrayal is crucial to whether an image or a text can be considered
b pornographyb . What exactly was the drafter of this text trying to ban?
And which media? Books meant to tittilate? The b mummy pornb book b 50
Shades of Greyb was in the print medium and apparently intended to
tittilate. It was the first book ever to sell one million Kindle
e-books. Was the plan to prohibit women from purchasing this book in
order to protect them from... ? Almost certainly not.
Actually, it turns out that this was not the intention at all. During
the debate, Kartika Liotard, the Parliamentarian that proposed that
particular text, made it clear that she didn't mean the proposal to be
taken seriously. Instead it is simply meant to draw attention to the
issues at stake. When she wrote that she wanted to ban b all forms of
pornographyb she absolutely did not want to create any obligations or to
ban anything. b Everyone knowsb she explained, that it is not a
legislative proposal. A non-legislative report like this one is to draw
attention to issues and to advise the Commission. In short, she fully
expected and accepted that a vote of the European Parliament for a text
proposing a ban on pornography would simply be understood as not meant
to be taken seriously b it was just to highlight the issue. As Alice in
Wonderland said, b the question is, whether you can make words mean so
many different thingsb .
Some of the politics played with the report were disappointing, but
almost funny. Swedish Pirate Party b evangelistb Rick Falkvinge set up an
e-mail b exploderb address to be used to campaign against the proposal.
Every single e-mail sent to the europarl-all-mar2013 at falkvinge.net sent
e-mails to every one of the 754 MEPs - and he was surprised when the
ensuing of tens of thousands of e-mails caused the European Parliament's
IT services to set up countermeasures. He then wrote a blog post which
wilfully misrepresented non-legislative reports like this one as being
b part of a legislative processb . If this were true, the 1997 Parliament
report which called for a b ban on pornb would have been in place for
years. He then goes on to say that the fact that the Parliament
explicitly deleted a reference to the proposed ban on pornography
somehow means that the Parliament supports this provision of the 1997
text. Most surprisingly of all, he attacks the fact that there were not
recorded (b roll callb ) votes, arguing that this means that the
Parliament b decided collectively to disable their constituents from
holding them accountable.b Why is this surprising? Each political group
can formally request a roll-call vote b so, he is (unjustly) accusing
his own Pirate Party colleagues that are members of the European
Parliament of anti-democratic behaviour.
While the b ban on pornb was worrying, the b Charterb for policing of
gender stereotypes was much more serious. It was yet another attempt to
privatise the regulation of free speech in the hands of online
operators. This proposal was also explicitly rejected in the vote, with
the Parliament following the same approach as it did during the vote on
the Cavada Report on Distribution of Audiovisual Works in the European
Union in July 2012. These two votes represent a change of approach from
the European Parliament. Whereas it voted at the beginning of the
current term of office for more online policing (in the Gallo report) by
internet intermediaries, the Parliament has now twice voted, by a
significant majority, in plenary session against this approach.
Dictionary: Definition of Pornography
http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/pornography?q=pornography
Ms Liotard's intervention in the Parliament debate (min. 17.22)
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/ep-live/en/plenary/video?debate=1363018698990
Cavada Report on the online distribution of audiovisual works in
the European Union (as adopted by Committee) (25.07.2012)
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-%2f%2fEP%2f%2fNONSGML%2
bREPORT%2bA7-2012-0262%2b0%2bDOC%2bPDF%2bV0%2f%2fEN
Gallo report on enforcement of intellectual property rights in the
internal market (3.06.2010)
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?type=REPORT&reference=A7-2010-0
175&language=EN
Falkvinge: European Parliament Just Voted To Ban Porn, But Refrains From
Extending Scope To Internet Following Protests, And Hides Who Voted For
It (12.03.2013)
http://falkvinge.net/2013/03/12/european-parliament-just-voted-to-ban-porn-bu
t-limits-scope-to-advertising-following-protests-and-hides-who-voted-for-it/
European Parliament considers a ban on b all pornographyb , policed by
private companies (7.03.2013)
http://edri.org/porn_ban
(Contribution by Joe McNamee - EDRi)
=======================================================================
8. Recommended Reading
=======================================================================
The Enemies of Internet 2013 (12.03.2013)
Special report on Internet surveillance, focusing on five governments
and five companies that are Enemies of the Internet
http://surveillance.rsf.org/en/
Italian police investigate telecom data retention (6.03.2013)
http://www.telecompaper.com/news/italian-police-investigate-telecom-data-rete
ntion--929520
How Facebook could get you arrested (9.03.2013)
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2013/mar/09/facebook-arrested-evgeny-mor
ozov-extract
Comprehensive Study on Cybercrime - UN Office on Drugs and Crime, Vienna
(draft, 9.03.2013)
http://www.unodc.org/documents/organized-crime/UNODC_CCPCJ_EG.4_2013/CYBERCRI
ME_STUDY_210213.pdf
Privacy and data protection developments in 2013: Google, Facebook,
Leveson and more (11.03.2013)
http://www.panopticonblog.com/2013/03/11/privacy-and-data-protection-developm
ents-in-2013-google-facebook-leveson-and-more/
=======================================================================
9. Agenda
=======================================================================
21-22 March 2013, Malta
Online Privacy: Consenting to your Future
http://www.onlineprivacyconference.eu/
12 April 2013, Biefeld, Germany
Big Brother Awards Germany
http://www.bigbrotherawards.de/
6-8 May 2013, Berlin, Germany
re:publica 2013
http://re-publica.de/en/
20-21 June 2013, Lisbon, Portugal
EuroDIG 2013
http://www.eurodig.org/
25-26 June 2013, Barcelona, Spain
9th International Conference on Internet Law & Politics: Big Data:
Challenges and Opportunities.
http://edcp.uoc.edu/symposia/idp2013/?lang=en
25-26 June 2013, Washington, DC, USA
23rd Computers, Freedom and Privacy Conference (CFP)
http://www.cfp.org/2013
31 July b 4 August 2013, Geestmerambacht, Netherlands
Observe. Hack. Make. - OHM2013
CfP by 1 May 2013
https://ohm2013.org/
14-15 September 2013, Vienna, Austria
Daten, Netz & Politik 2013 - DNP13
https://dnp13.unwatched.org/
23-26 September 2013, Warsaw, Poland
Public Voice Conference 2013
35th International Data Protection and Privacy Commissioners conference
http://www.giodo.gov.pl/259/id_art/762/j/en/
25-27 October 2013, Siegen, Germany
Cyberpeace - FIfF annual Meeting 2013
============================================================
10. About
============================================================
EDRi-gram is a biweekly newsletter about digital civil rights in Europe.
Currently EDRi has 32 members based or with offices in 20 different
countries in Europe. European Digital Rights takes an active interest in
developments in the EU accession countries and wants to share knowledge
and awareness through the EDRi-gram.
All contributions, suggestions for content, corrections or agenda-tips
are most welcome. Errors are corrected as soon as possible and are
visible on the EDRi website.
Except where otherwise noted, this newsletter is licensed under the
Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. See the full text at
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Newsletter editor: Bogdan Manolea <edrigram at edri.org>
Information about EDRi and its members:
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