September 10, 2008

Spanish local police keeps illegal database for political reasons

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) It has been revealed that the Spanish local police of Sada (Galicia) was keeping an illegal database with information and pictures of people, gathered during night patrols. On 14 August 2008, a counsellor, a local police officer and a Guardia Civil sergeant discovered in an office of […]

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September 12, 2007

EU asks the customers' opinion on the DoubleClick -Google affair

As Google plans to buy out U.S. web advertising supplier DoubleClick, the European Commission has already sent questionnaires to Google customers on the matter, even before Google has actually filed to the European Union’s top antitrust regulator for the purchase. This is considered a rather unusual step as although the European Commission has frequently sent […]

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September 26, 2007

EU court confirms the 497 million euro fine against Microsoft

Microsoft has lost the appeal made to the Court of First Instance against the European Commission’s (EC) ruling of monopoly abuse that obliged Microsoft to grant competitors access to its server protocols and to unbundle its Media Player software from its Windows operating system . The case has a long history; following a complaint in […]

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November 18, 2015 · Blogs

EU and US NGOs propose privacy reforms post Schrems

On 12 November 2015, leading human rights and consumer organisations issued a letter to urge the US and the EU to protect the fundamental right to privacy. After the Schrems ruling by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in October 2015, the parties are now attempting to negotiate a revised Safe Harbor […]

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September 26, 2007

European Commission investigates Apple's European prices

The representatives of the European Commission (EC) had a closed meeting last week with Apple and other four major record companies, regarding the different pricing schemes used in different countries in Europe. The meeting should have lasted for two days, but two record companies EMI Group and Warner Music Group decided they didn’t need to […]

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March 24, 2010

Kyrgyzstan protests against website blocking call for Europe's help

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Kirgisistan protestiert gegen die Blockade von Webseiten und ruft Europa zu Hilfe | http://www.unwatched.org/node/1798] About 50 activists demonstrated in Kyrgyzstan on 14 March 2010 in front of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, appealing to European organizations to support them in regaining access to independent news […]

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April 7, 2010

ENDitorial: Commissioner blames USA for imposition of EU censorship

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [ENDitorial: Kommissarin gibt der USA die Schuld an der wachsenden Zensur in der EU | http://www.unwatched.org/node/1836] In a blog post, Commissioner Malmström’s press spokesman Love Berggren placed the blame for the perceived need to impose EU-wide blocking squarely at the feet of the governments in the USA, Russia […]

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October 10, 2007

UK: Decrypt data or go to prison!

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) The controversial Part 3 of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) in UK is in force starting with 1 October 2007. This new regulation gives the power to police forces to ask for the disclosure of encryption keys, or force suspects to decrypt encrypted data. RIPA […]

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November 5, 2008

One more step for France in adopting the graduated response

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) Despite all opposition and debates, on 30 October 2008, a crushing majority of the French Senate voted in favour of the anti-piracy law, the so called Hadopi law, introducing the graduate response against illegal content downloading. The law enabling the introduction of three-strikes measure against file-sharers and […]

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November 7, 2007

Whois privacy problems not solved by ICANN

(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar) ICANN meeting that took place last week (29 October – 2 November 2007) in Los Angeles was expected to decide on the WHOIS database privacy problems. But unfortunately the decision taken was just to make further studies on the matter, despite the already seven years of discussions […]

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October 23, 2013 · Blogs

European Court Of Justice: Fingerprints In Electronic Passport Are OK

The European Court of Justice ruled on 17 October 2013 that the inclusion of the fingerprints in the EU electronic passports is lawful. While the Court acknowledged that taking and storing of fingerprints in passports constitutes an infringement of the rights to respect for private life and the protection of personal data, it ruled that […]

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March 27, 2013 · Blogs

Online piracy is not to be blamed for the drop in music revenues

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Online-Piraterie nicht schuld an rückläufigen Musikumsätzen | https://www.unwatched.org/EDRigram_11.6_Online-Piraterie_nicht_schuld_an_ruecklaeufigen_Musikumsaetzen?pk_campaign=edri&pk_kwd=20130327] As continuously argued by different IT specialists, digital freedom activists and organisations during the last few years, online piracy does not affect music industry revenues, as it is shown by a new research performed by The Institute for Prospective Technological […]

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