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September 25, 2003 · Blogs

EDRI-gram – Number 18, 25 September 2003

September 25, 2003

European Parliament limits software patents

The European Parliament yesterday drastically altered the proposed directive on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions. A long summer of intensive lobbying by an impressive European alliance of open source advocates, economists and CEOs of small and medium-sized businesses has paid off. One of the great fears about software patents, the extension to business methods like […]

September 25, 2003

EU-US negotiations about PNR Data

Negotiations about airline passenger data between the European Commission and the US are stuck but both parties have agreed to solve their differences before the end of this year. On 22 September, Asa Hutchinson, US Under Secretary for Border & Transportation Security met with EU Commissioner Bolkestein, but that didn’t result in any public change […]

September 25, 2003

English ISPs condemn 1 year data retention

Industry and human rights campaigners have condemned new data retention proposals from the UK’s Home Office (Ministry of Internal Affairs). The draft Statutory Instruments (secondary legislation) would approve ‘voluntary’ retention by Internet Service Providers, but preserve the power of the Home Secretary to impose a compulsory code. Data on customers would be retained for up […]

September 25, 2003

First ruling under new UK anti-spam legislation

On 11 December 2003 new anti-spam legislation in the UK will come into force, implementing the European Directive on privacy in the telecommunications sector (2002/58/EC). In the UK, spammers risk a fine of 7.196 EUR (5.000 GBP) from a magistrates court or even an unlimited penalty from a jury. Though a criminal offence, spammers in […]

September 25, 2003

Reporters sans frontieres banned from WSIS

Reporters Sans Frontieres, a non-governmental organisation fighting for freedom of the press, was banned from further participation in the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). According to a letter from the Executive Director of the Summit, RSF was excluded for ‘administrative reasons’. The exclusion is in fact a direct result of a protest RSF […]

September 25, 2003

Verisign violates privacy millions of internet users

Verisign, the US based registrar of the .com and .net top level domain, refuses to stop redirecting internet users to its own search engine Site Finder. Since 15 September everybody who makes a mistake in typing a web address is re-directed to their website, instead of just getting an error message. In spite of massive […]

September 25, 2003

Legal victory for German anonymiser AN.ON

On 15 September the Frankfurt District Court confirmed an earlier partial ruling in favour of the German web anonymiser AN.ON. According to this ruling, there was no legal ground for the request by the German Federal Bureau of Criminal Investigation to record data about visitors to a specific website (see EDRI-gram 16 and 17). The […]

September 25, 2003

New directive on privacy in the workplace

The European Commission is planning a new Directive on privacy in the workplace, in 2004 or 2005. After two consultations with the social partners, in August 2001 and October 2002, the Commission is convinced of the necessity of such a new directive. 3 main grounds for the new legislatory framework are: technological advances that increasingly […]

September 25, 2003

Confusion about UK ID-card plans

Confusion still reigns within the UK government over plans for a national ID card. Home Secretary David Blunkett (the Minister of Internal Affairs) has continued to push his scheme despite opposition from Cabinet colleagues. Though it is unclear whether carrying a card would be mandatory, Blunkett said at the very least no-one should be able […]

September 25, 2003 · Blogs

EDRI-gram in Italian

Thanks to an enthusiastic group of Italian-speaking activists, EDRI-gram is now also available in Italian. Similar to the Russian translation, the Italian translation will appear on-line a few days after the mailing. An archive is available from Nr. 10 onwards. Check out: http://www.autistici.org/edrigram/

September 10, 2003

Fines and prison sentence for Italian spammers

Italy is introducing tough fines and prison sentences against spammers. Senders of unsolicited junk e-mails can expect fines up to a maximum of 90.000 euros and 3 years in prison. The penalties go far beyond those in any other European country. All EU member states will have to outlaw spam by 31 October 2003 as […]