Our work
EDRi is the biggest European network defending rights and freedoms online. We work to to challenge private and state actors who abuse their power to control or manipulate the public. We do so by advocating for robust and enforced laws, informing and mobilising people, promoting a healthy and accountable technology market, and building a movement of organisations and individuals committed to digital rights and freedoms in a connected world.
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Shareholders give Big Brother Award to Bayer AG
Critical shareholders of the German medicine-company Bayer AG have presented the Big Brother Award to the board during the annual shareholders meeting in Cologne on 25 April 2003. The Award was given to the company in October 2002 for demanding a drug test from every employee applying for in-company training. Bayer did not bother to […]
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Scientists against new EU Patent Law
Last week, 30 authoritative scientists and software innovators from all over Europe signed a petition against the proposed new EU Directive on Patent Law. In their letter to members of the European Parliament they argue that allowing for patents on computer programs will seriously harm innovation in information technology and endanger the future of the […]
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EDRI-gram – Number 7, 23 April 2003
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Many EU-websites violate privacy-rules
According to research by World IT Lawyers, a majority of European websites violates EU directives protecting on-line consumers. More than half of the researched websites lacks essential information about the on-line buying procedure or the consumer right to cancel an order within 7 days. On top of that, almost half of the websites of companies […]
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Germany expands academic use of copyrighted material
On 11 April German parliament agreed on the implementation-proposal of the EU Copyright Directive (EUCD). Only the small liberal opposition party opposed. Public debate centered around new educational and scientific limitations on copyright. The new law allows teachers to make works available to a limited group of class members, e.g. in an intranet, for the […]
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UK proposal for biometric ID card
The controversy in the UK around the introduction of an ‘entitlement card’ was stirred up again last week by the Home Office (the Ministry of Internal Affairs for England and Wales). The Sunday Telegraph reported that Home Secretary David Blunkett (the minister) intends to charge people 35 – 43 euros for the cards. Thus he […]
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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. […]
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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, […]
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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 […]
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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. […]
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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 […]
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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 […]
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