March 12, 2008

ENDitorial: The battle for Sound Copyright

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) Commissioner Charlie McCreevy’s announcement in February 2008 that he proposes to nearly double the term of copyright protection for sound recordings from 50 to 95 years came as a shock to UK digital rights campaigners. Back in 2006, here in the UK, the case against copyright term […]

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May 31, 2017 · Blogs

UK government pushes for companies to weaken encryption

The terrorist attack in Manchester on 22 May has led to a relaunch of the encryption debate in the UK. In December 2016, the UK parliament passed the Investigatory Powers Act. This wide-ranging surveillance law gives government ministers the power to issue Technical Capability Notices (TCNs), which can force companies to modify their products.These powers could […]

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March 29, 2006

Damages on online defamatory statements in UK

Michael Keith Smith, a former parliamentary candidate for the UK Independence Party has received £10,000 in damages in a defamation case occurred on the internet Smith was a participant in a discussion on the Iraq war held on a discussion board run by Yahoo!. Tracy Williams, another participant in the discussion, posted under pseudonym series […]

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March 26, 2008

The Swedish Government decided to take measures against filesharers

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) Although initially the Swedish Government promised not to hunt down young people for filesharing, on 14 March 2008, it made a proposal that will allow courts to force Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to give up IP addresses used for illegal filesharing to the owners of the fileshared […]

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October 20, 2010

French DNS management must respect constitutional freedoms

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Französische DNS-Verwaltung muss verfassungsmäßige Freiheiten respektieren | http://www.unwatched.org/node/2276] In a ruling issued on 6 October 2010, the French Constitutional Council affirmed the constitutional value of domain names. According to this decision, which applies to the whole French DNS, a domain name attribution, renewal, transfer or cancellation process must […]

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April 9, 2014 · Blogs

ECJ: Data retention directive contravenes European law

On 8 April, the European Court of Justice ruled that the EU legislation on mass surveillance contravenes European law. The case was brought before the Court by EDRi member Digital Rights Ireland, together with the Austrian Working Group on Data Retention. While it will take some time to get a clear view of what is […]

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September 21, 2011

Freedom not Fear: High time for European (digital) civil rights

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Freiheit statt Angst: Hochsaison für (digitale) Bürgerrechte in Europa | http://www.unwatched.org/EDRigram_9.18_Freiheit_statt_Angst_Hochsaison_fuer_digitale_Buergerrechte_in_Europa?pk_campaign=edri&pk_kwd=20111004] European policy making has long been blind to the digital environment, ignoring the potentials of the Internet and the positive impact of the free flow of information in society. Over the last 10 years, an increasing number […]

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April 9, 2008

PNR Data infringes human rights

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) The German Working Group on Data Retention expanded its activities beyond the data retention issues, by publishing two applications to the European Court of Justice by the European Parliament contesting the transfer of PNR data to the US. The documents explain why the collection of air passenger […]

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April 26, 2006

Access to Knowledge in the digital world

From 21 June to 23 June, Yale Law School hosted the first international “Access to Knowledge” (A2K) conference. Following two workshops on the same theme held in 2005 in Geneva and London, the aim of this conference was to “come up with a new analytic framework for analysing the possibly distortive effects of public policies […]

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April 25, 2007

French Government Decree on data retention – another Big Brother act

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) The French Government, during this election period, is preparing a decree for the application of the law on the confidence in the numerical economy (LCEN) of 21 June 2004, which requires webmasters, hosting companies, fixed and mobile telephony operators and Internet service providers to retain all information […]

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April 26, 2006

German music industry wants new powers

Representatives of the German music industry asked for new powers in order to obtain, without court order, personal information about alleged file-sharers from Internet Service Providers. In a recent event held in Munich by the Institute of Copyright and Media Law, representatives of the rights holder associations claimed that this change would improve the fight […]

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May 10, 2006

Passports with biometrics for Romanians

Starting with 1 January 2007, passports containing electronic chips will be put into circulation for the Romanian citizens. The passports will include a storage system (probably RFID) for personal data, including a facial image and digital fingerprints. The present passports will preserve their validity and they will be replaced at the request of the citizens. […]

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