February 25, 2015 · Blogs

UN report on copyright – is the EU really a beacon of human rights?

Copyright has seen a spectacular rise in importance, both politically and legally, in recent decades. The digitisation of cultural and scientific goods has led many rights holders to see strengthened copyright protection as the only means of ensuring the survival of the cultural industry. To a large extent the rights holders’ quest for more legal […]

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July 14, 2010

Yahoo is not bound to give personal data to Belgian authorities

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Yahoo muss belgischen Behörden keine personenbezogenen Daten übergeben | http://www.unwatched.org/node/2066] The Belgian Court of Appeal of Gand ruled on 30 June 2010 that Yahoo was not obliged to hand over personal data of its users to the Belgian authorities, in a case where the first instance had issued […]

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January 29, 2014 · Blogs

The Ukrainian Parliament decides to reject the anti-protest bill

The Ukraine Government’s attempts to censor and restrict freedom of expression and freedom of assembly by a controversial anti-protest legislation has fortunately been stopped by the Ukrainian Parliament on 28 January 2014. In the light of the latest events in Ukraine, in a desperate attempt to curve the protests that have become larger and stronger […]

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February 14, 2007

MEPs support again the rules on defamation in Rome II

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) The European Parliament has voted in its second reading on the Rome II Regulation to reintroduce the rules regarding the defamation by media or publications via the Internet and other electronic networks. The Rome II regulation is establishing the rules on the applicable law to non-contractual obligations. […]

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February 12, 2014 · Blogs

Google France published CNIL’s fine on its homepage

On 7 February 2014, the French State Council rejected Google’s request made on 14 January 2014 to partially suspend the penalty received for privacy infringement from CNIL – the French Data Protection Authority. On 3 January 2014, CNIL fined Google 150 000 euro over its privacy policies and was required to post a message regarding […]

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March 25, 2015 · Blogs

Denmark plans to preserve illegally collected medical data

In Denmark, a controversial plan to prevent illegally collected medical data from being deleted has become a hot topic for the government. The plan involves transferring the data to the National Archives, which has an exemption in the Danish data protection act. Under the Danish health care act, general practitioners can transfer medical data to […]

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August 12, 2003

Campaign against proposed IP Enforcement Directive

An international coalition of 39 civil liberties groups and consumer rights organisations sent a letter to the European Union on 11 August urging rejection of the proposed intellectual property enforcement directive. The coalition warns that the proposed Directive is over-broad and threatens civil liberties, innovation, and competition policy. The proposal requires EU Member States to […]

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March 14, 2007

Cross-border wiretapping proposed by the Swedish Government

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) Mikael Odenberg, the Swedish defence minister presented on 8 March 2007 a draft law to the parliament that would give the national defence intelligence agency the power to monitor all cross-border phone calls and email traffic without court order. The proposal, which according to the government, is […]

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April 8, 2015 · Blogs

Spanish Citizens’ Security law: There is still some hope

Despite considerable global criticism, the Spanish Citizens’ Security law was passed on 26 March 2015, together with the reforms of the Criminal Code, which include punishment of badly-defined “terrorist crimes” online. The Citizens’ Security law was greatly opposed by political parties, but that was not enough against the majority in the Parliament of the Popular […]

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March 14, 2007

Consumer Protection Commissioner wants to see changes in iTunes

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) Many consumer rights organizations in Germany, Norway, France and Finland have gathered to take common actions against Apples on its iTunes bundling services, but new concerns are expressed also by the EU Consumer Protection Commissioner, Meglena Kuneva. In an interview for the German weekly Focus, Kuneva was […]

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April 22, 2015 · Blogs

French surveillance bill pushed ahead despite massive criticism

On 19 March 2015, France proposed a new bill that would allow intelligence services to collect vast amounts of data, to tap phones and emails without permission from judges. The scope of application of the draft bill is extremely broad and covers the following ill-defined areas: National independence, territorial integrity and national defence Foreign policy […]

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December 4, 2019 · Blogs | Information democracy | Disinformation and electoral interference | Equal access to the internet | Freedom of expression online | Platform regulation

Shedding light on the Facebook content moderation centre in Athens

Following months of efforts, in early September 2019, EDRi observer Homo Digitalis managed to shed light on a case that concerns each and every Facebook user: a content moderation centre in Athens, Greece, tasked to moderate Facebook ads. As many other content moderation policies run by virtually unaccounatable private companies, this can pose threats to […]

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