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April 23, 2003

Internet censorship in the Ukraine

During a meeting of the Freedom of Speech Committee of the Parliament and Council of Europe on 18 April, Privacy Ukraine presented a report on Internet censorship in Ukraine. Though the Ukrainian parliament has organised several hearings on censorship, and earlier this month even adopted legislation clarifying the term ‘censorship’, the overall perspective is bleak. […]

April 23, 2003

All cops granted access to telecommunication data in NL

Early in April, the Dutch Lower House silently approved of a change of the Telecommunication Law that lowers access barriers to personal data substantially. All 40.000 policemen will have the right to demand the name and address data of all telephony and internet subscribers. There is no need for the user to be a suspect, […]

April 23, 2003

Spanish case law about hyperlinks

A Spanish judge last month dismissed charges against a website accused of hyperlinking to illegal material. The website www.ajoderse.com (which means ‘fuck off’) was accused based on the article 17 of the LSSICE (the Spanish version of the European E-Commerce Directive). The site includes hyperlinks to websites which, supposedly, describe techniques to descramble TV satellite […]

April 23, 2003

Global Privacy Award announced

The human rights group Privacy International (PI) has announced that it will this year host the first international Big Brother Awards. The Awards, which started in the UK in 1998, were established to ‘name and shame’ the most relentless government and private sector privacy invaders. They have now become an annual event in fifteen countries. […]

April 9, 2003 · Blogs

EDRI-gram – Number 6, 9 April 2003

April 9, 2003

Draft law promotes free software in Bulgaria

A draft law, currently discussed in parliament in Bulgaria, will oblige all governmental institutions to use free software and open formats with their computer information systems within 2 years. The law addresses all state bodies, mayors of municipalities and regions, higher schools, medical establishments, non-profit legal entities as well as other bodies and entities that […]

April 9, 2003

New content restrictions in Germany

In Germany, new content restrictions were introduced for the protection of minors, extending current regulations and indexing schemes for film and video to internet and games. Since 1 April all kinds of ego shooters and electronic media “glorifying war” are banned. Furthermore, under the new regulation, all computer games must carry labels with minimum age […]

April 9, 2003

Swiss providers to keep email records for 6 months

Since 1 April, new legislation went into force that obliges Swiss Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to keep a 6 month email log file. That means they will have to store time, size and addresses of all emails sent by their customers (the SMTP envelope data). The authorities will be able to access these stored data […]

April 9, 2003 · Blogs | Privacy and data protection | Privacy and confidentiality

Danish committee on citizens IT-rights

The Danish ministry of science and technology has mandated a committee on citizens IT-rights. The committee has representatives from various ministries, consumer organisations, the IT-business sector and civil society. EDRi-member Digital Rights has participated in the committee since it started its work in September 2002. The aim of the committee is to give recommendations to […]

April 9, 2003 · Blogs | Privacy and data protection | Privacy and confidentiality

Austria looses court case about surveillance costs

Telecommunication companies in Austria have won an important court case against the federal government. Though in general the wiretapping provisions in the new Telecommunications Law were not deemed unconstitutional, from 2004 onwards, government will have to reimburse providers for the costs of procuring and maintaining surveillance equipment. Full verdict in German (27.02.2003) http://www.vfgh.gv.at/vfgh/presse/G37-16-02.pdf

March 27, 2003 · Blogs | Privacy and data protection | Data protection standards

Restrictions on cryptography in Spain

A proposal to modify the Spanish telecommunication law threatens the free use of cryptography. The current General Law of Telecommunications (Ley General de Telecomunicaciones (LGT) already puts some restrictions on the use of cryptography. The second part of article 52 (‘Cifrado en las redes y servicios de telecomunicaciones’, that is, network encryption and telecommunication services) […]

March 27, 2003 · Blogs | Privacy and data protection | Surveillance and data retention

UK home office not amused with big brother award

Yesterday, Privacy International announced the winners of the 5th Annual UK ‘Big Brother’ awards to the government and private sector organisations that have done the most to invade personal privacy in Britain. Winner of the award for worst public servant is London Mayor Ken Livingstone, for his efforts in transport surveillance. Prime Minister Tony Blair […]