December 5, 2005

Cryptography almost banned in the Czech Republic

The Czech Lower House recently approved of a law introducing a new Penal Code, including a ratification of the Cybercrime convention. The original version, prepared by the Ministry of Justice, contained a provision that would criminalise hacking and cracking IT systems, but due to misguided and very unclear wording it also criminalised legitimate activities such […]

Read more

June 2, 2010

ENDitorial: EP Legal Affairs adopts incoherent report on IPR enforcement

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [ENDitorial: Rechtsausschuss des EP verabschiedet inkohärenten Urheberrechtsbericht | http://www.unwatched.org/node/1975] This week, the Legal Affairs Committee of the European Parliament adopted a far-reaching, contradictory and, at times, fundamentalist non-legislative report on enforcement of intellectual property rights. The Committee report takes some quite extreme, apocalyptic and sometimes almost comically absurd […]

Read more

April 25, 2012

European Court of Justice ruling in the Bonnier case

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Entscheidung des Europäischen Gerichtshofs in der Rechtssache Bonnier | https://www.unwatched.org/EDRigram_10.8_Entscheidung_des_Europaeischen_Gerichtshofs_in_der_Rechtssache_Bonnier?pk_campaign=edri&pk_kwd=20120507] Bonnier Audio took the Swedish Internet service provider (ISP) Perfect Telecommunication to court, to obtain an order to disclose the identities of alleged infringers of their intellectual property (IP) rights. As a result, the Swedish High Court asked […]

Read more

February 22, 2017 · Blogs

New legal framework for predictive policing in Denmark

After the terrorist attack in Copenhagen in February 2015, the Danish government presented an action plan to strengthen the data analysis capacity of the police and the Danish Security and Intelligence Service (PET). The action plan, called “A Strong Guard against Terror”, specifically mentions monitoring of social media posts in order to discover possible terrorist […]

Read more

 

June 16, 2010

Macedonia: Civil society calls for the respect of privacy

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Mazedonien: Zivilgesellschaft fordert Respekt vor Privatsphäre | http://www.unwatched.org/node/2002] On 11 June 2010, fifteen Macedonian civil society organizations reacted to the threats to privacy and democracy contained in the Draft Law amending the Law on Electronic Communications, calling for the withdrawal of the text from parliamentary procedure. The call […]

Read more

October 9, 2013 · Blogs

ENDitorial: Licences for Europe – user generated content and Commission-generated users

While the entire “Licences for Europe” project has been through a lot of turmoil and subsequently criticised for its lack of credibility, the so-called “Working Group 2 on User-Generated Content” takes absurdity to a whole new dictionary-changing level. One of the “user” groups that was invited by the Commission, at the request of Neelie Kroes’s […]

Read more

December 20, 2006

Biometric scanning is being tested in Heathrow Airport

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) A biometric scanning system called miSense started to be used as a trial on December 2006 at Heathrow Airport, as part of the International Air Transport Association’s Simplifying Passenger Travel Programme. The system allows passengers to scan their passport and right index finger, creating an electronic key […]

Read more

December 19, 2007

The broadcasting treaty resuscitated by the Council of Europe

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) Pending the approval of its Committee of Ministers, the Council of Europe will try to promote a new broadcasting international document, building on the failed convention for the protection of broadcasting signals of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). As WIPO’s 184 members have failed in agreeing […]

Read more

January 18, 2006

UK ID card scheme – defeated in the House of Lords

On 17 January 2006, a full House of Lords debated at length the purposes, costs, and details of the proposed identity cards scheme. And in three votes serious obstacles were raised against the Government. The Government contends that the card is essential for combating crime, illegal immigration, and identity theft, and can be achieved for […]

Read more

February 11, 2015 · Blogs

Digital Rights orgs call on world leaders to uphold human rights

Over 30 digital and civil liberties organisations from around the world have endorsed a joint statement calling on the world’s governments not to expand surveillance measures in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo attacks. In addition to European Digital Rights (EDRi), signatories include Article19, digitalcourage, IT-pol, Vrijschrift, La Quadrature du Net, Panoptykon, Initiative für Netzfreiheit, […]

Read more

 

May 7, 2003

Danish company convicted for spamming

The Danish company Fonndanmark was convicted for spamming last week. The company, specialised in human resource software, has to pay a fine of EUR 2.000 for sending out 156 unsolicited commercial e-mails to 50 different addresses. In Denmark, spamming is forbidden since June 2000, under section 6a(1) of the Danish Marketing Practices Act (Markedsforingsloven). The […]

Read more

January 15, 2014 · Blogs

Digital Rights sessions at the CPDP Conference

The first tradition of every new year is the Computers, Privacy and Data Protection Conference (CPDP) which will take place on 22‐24 January 2014 in Brussels, Belgium. Before the official start of the conference, the annual pre-CPDP event for NGOs will take place on 21 January. It is co-organised by CPDP, VUB, EDRi, Access & […]

Read more