November 3, 2010 · Blogs

New EDRi members

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Neue EDRi-Mitglieder | http://www.unwatched.org/node/2322] At the EDRi General Assembly of 30 October 2010 in Barcelona, Spain, EDRi welcomed two new members. The Panoptykon Foundation is a Polish organisation focusing on human rights, in particular the right to privacy, in the clash with modern technology used for surveillance purposes. […]

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May 10, 2006

Three Spanish courts uphold validity of music free licenses

Spanish courts have upheld three times already the validity of music free licenses. In the three cases, the Sociedad General de Autores (SGAE), Spanish music copyright collecting society, sued some open public premises on alleged rights to the music listened therein. In all the three cases, the defences demonstrated that the music played was downloaded […]

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November 3, 2010

Free Culture 2010 in Barcelona

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [‘Free Culture’ 2010 in Barcelona | http://www.unwatched.org/node/2327] Barcelona was the capital of free culture at the end of October 2010, with two events – Oxcars and then the Free Culture Forum (FCF) – organized by Exgae for awarding and promoting free culture concepts across Europe and beyond. The […]

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November 5, 2003

Big Brother Awards presented across Europe

Privacy and civil liberty activists across Europe have presented their Big Brother Awards to governments, companies and persons that have excelled in violating the right to privacy. In a weeks period Award ceremonies were held in Germany (24 October), Spain (25 October), Austria (26 October) and Switzerland (1 November). In Germany prices went to German […]

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May 9, 2007

New calls for computer online searches by German authorities

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) The German authorities seem to have a higher desire to push for a legal basis of the online searches of personal computers in Germany, despite the Federal Supreme Court decision in February 2007 that, according to the German Code of Criminal Procedure, decided that online police snooping […]

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November 17, 2010

Dutch government cancels plans for national database on bank data

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Niederländische Regierung gibt Pläne für nationale Bankdatenbank auf | http://www.unwatched.org/node/2360] After facing enormous pressure from the media, civil society and several MPs, The Dutch Ministry of Security and Justice announced that it will not develop a national database or search engine containing bank data of all Dutch citizens. […]

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May 7, 2014 · Blogs

Copyright meets broadcasting in Geneva

The 27th session of the World Intellectual Property Organization´s Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR) took place from 28 April to 2 May in Geneva. The Committee assessed the proposal for a Broadcasting Treaty. This initiative for a new binding global copyright treaty has been discussed at WIPO for over 10 years at […]

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December 18, 2003

WSIS report – the long way ahead

The first phase of the World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) ended in Geneva last week, after more than 18 months of preparatory process. Its 2 outcomes are a Declaration of Principles and a Plan of Action, both enthusiastically adopted by government representatives, though hardly discussed until the last hour. A major outcome is also […]

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June 6, 2007

IPRED2 on the DROIPEN table

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) The Second Intellectual Property Rights Enforcement Directive (IPRED2) is now going through the Justice and Home Affairs route. On 4 June, it passed it’s first port of call at the Council’s Working Group on Substantive Criminal Law (DROIPEN) – the first step on the road to the […]

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June 6, 2007

The French Ministry of Interior has a new interception platform

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) On 2 May 2007 a new technical platform for the interception of traffic data in all types of communication systems was discretly put into operation by the French Ministry of Interior, covering communication data related to text messages, mobile or Internet. The security services are now in […]

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June 6, 2007

French State Council allows tracing P2P users

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) The State Council of France validated on 23 May 2007 the automatic tracing of illegal downloading in P2P networks. This decision cancelled the 18th October 2005 CNIL (Commission nationale de l’informatique et des libertés) decision that rejected the introduction of surveillance devices proposed by Sacem and other […]

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December 16, 2009

The new Swedish anti-piracy law stirs things for file sharers

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Das neue schwedische Anti-Piraterie-Gesetz stiftet Unruhe unter Filesharern| http://www.unwatched.org/node/1632] As already foreseen this summer, the Swedish recording industry is using the new anti-piracy IPRED law to chase filesharers. On 7 December 2009, the Swedish branch of the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) filed a suit with […]

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