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December 15, 2004

130.000 prepaid GSMs disconnected in Switzerland

On 30 November 2004 the Swiss mobile operator Swisscom has disconnected aproximately 130.000 unregistered users of prepaid mobile phones. On 23 June 2004 a new measure was adopted by the Swiss Bundesrat (Council of ministers) that required the operators (besides Swisscom also Orange and Sunrise) to start registering the personal details of all buyers, including […]

December 15, 2004

EU Report: Member States lazy to protect data

The European Commission has adopted, on 7 December 2004, its annual report on the implementation of the EU electronic communications regulatory package. The report states that 20 of the EU’s present 25 Member States have notified the Commission that they have adopted primary legislation transposing the package, which became law in 2002. The Commission has […]

December 15, 2004

Successful access to information claim in Bulgaria

In Bulgaria, proponents of open source and open standards have booked a remarkable legal victory. On 7 December 2004 the Supreme Administrative Court ruled against the minister of state administration, Dimitar Kalchev. Two members of parliament and the foundation ‘Access to Information Program’ had demanded access to the 2002 agreement between Microsoft and the Bulgarian […]

December 15, 2004

EU model for proper privacy notification

The Article 29 Working Party of data protection authorities in the EU has developed an interesting and useful model for a standard EU privacy notice, consisting of a short, a condensed and a full legal notice. Under the European Data Protection Directive 95/46/EC data subjects must be informed of their rights to data protection. The […]

December 15, 2004

Recommended participation

Public consultation on new action plan eEurope 2005-2010. Participants are invited to consider how European Information Society policy should evolve over the next five years if the EU is to reach its ‘Lisbon Goals’ by 2010. Contributions are invited by e-mail and should be submitted by 16 January 2005. http://europa.eu.int/information_society/eeurope/2005/all_about/2010_challenges/text_en.htm Lisbon goals portal site http://europa.eu.int/comm/lisbon_strategy/index_en.html

December 14, 2004

More than 400 million EU Citizens and residents to be fingerprinted

The European Union’s Council of Ministers has decided, during its meeting yesterday, Monday, 13 December, to treat 400 million EU subjects like criminals. By the beginning of 2008, every EU citizen and resident – with the exception of people living on the British isles and possibly in Denmark – will be fingerprinted when applying for […]

December 13, 2004 · Blogs

European Union

December 13, 2004

EDRI Response to the Consultation on the creation of a Human Rights Agency of the European Union

EDRI welcomes the creation of a Human Rights Agency within the European Union, adopted by the Council of the European Union on December 12th 2003. In his opening address to the UN general assembly on 21 September 2004, UN General Secretary Kofi Annan stated that not since the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human […]

December 2, 2004

Hungarian Big Brother Award for Data Protection Commissioner

During the Big Brother Awards ceremony in Budapest, Hungary on 25 November 2004, the People’s Award was presented to the Data Protection Commissioner, Attila Péterfalvi. He was chosen with a large majority of 917 votes (39,8%) from 2.342 valid votes. He was given the negative price for making official statements that could erode the Hungarian […]

December 2, 2004

Finnish security police charged with illegal snooping

Three top officials in Finland’s Security Police (SUPO) and the former head of the security unit of the telecommunications service provider Sonera are to be charged in a case involving suspected illegal telecommunications surveillance, according to the Finnish journal Helsingin Sanomat. The case dates back to November 2000, when Juha E. Miettinen, the head of […]

December 2, 2004

EU court to decide on Microsoft appeal

The EU’s Court of First Instance will decide between 18 and 20 December whether to suspend the Commission’s sanctions against Microsoft. In March 2004 Microsoft got a record fine of 497 million euro after a five-year investigation by the Competition Commissioner into Microsoft’s business practice. The Commission also ordered Microsoft to offer a version of […]

December 2, 2004

European Parliament adopts Safer Internet programme

On Thursday 2 December, the European Parliament adopted the report from the Dutch PSE rapporteur Edith Mastenbroek on the goals and funding of the Safer Internet Plus Programme. Parliament has decided to dedicate 45 million Euro to the program, of which 20,05 million are to be spent in the first 2 years, 2005 and 2006. […]