July 27, 2015 · Document pools

EU PNR document pool

The proposal for a EU PNR Directive  (Fight against terrorism and serious crime: use of passenger name record (PNR) data (procedure file 2011/0023(COD) ) was adopted by the European Parliament’s Civil Liberties Committee on 15 July 2015. The narrow vote (32 in favor, 26 against, no abstentions) in favour happened despite the rejection of this […]

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February 19, 2020 · Blogs | Information democracy | Privacy and data protection | Alternatives to dominant digital services | Data protection standards | Equal access to the internet | Freedom of expression online | Inclusive technologies | Platform regulation

The impact of competition law on your digital rights

This is the first article in a series dealing with competition law and Big Tech. The aim of the series is to look at what competition law has achieved when it comes to protecting our digital rights, where it has failed to deliver on its promises, and how to remedy this. This series will first […]

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February 10, 2016 · Blogs

Holland and India prohibit zero-rating: the first of many?

The principle of net neutrality requires that internet access providers carry data without discrimination on the basis of origin, destination or type of data. Net neutrality prohibits telecoms operators from blocking or degrading content applications or services. From a telecom operator’s perspective, the goal is to move away from the “any-to-any” principle that is a […]

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February 22, 2017 · Blogs

Illegal surveillance against civil society continues in Macedonia

Macedonian civil society organisations advocating for human rights and democracy have come under increasing pressure by the authorities. They have previously been caught up in use of the state apparatus for massive illegal surveillance, including wiretapping of activists.

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May 23, 2012

Finland: Open WiFi owners are not liable for copyright infringement|

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Finnland: Betreiber offener W-Lans haften nicht für Urheberrechtsverstöße | https://www.unwatched.org/EDRigram_10.10_Finnland_Betreiber_offener_W-Lans_haften_nicht_fuer_Urheberrechtsverstoesse?pk_campaign=edri&pk_kwd=20120523] On 14 May 2012, a District Finish Court decided on the condition of open WiFi owners in respect to their liability for online copyright infringements. In a two-year long case brought to court by the anti-piracy group CIAPC […]

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July 30, 2003

Landwell scares Spanish peer-to-peer users

On 17 July, Landwell, a Spanish legal firm related to Price-Waterhouse-Coopers, issued a press release stating that they were planning to present a lawsuit against 4.000 Spanish Kazaa users for illegally downloading copyrighted material such as movies, songs or software. They announced they had identified a total of 95.000 Spanish file-sharers, and were going to […]

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February 26, 2014 · Blogs

The Turkish Government is trying to justify Internet censorship

A large and aggressive campaign has been deployed by the Turkish ruling party AKP (Justice and Development Party) over the last few weeks in an attempt to justify Internet censorship. Paid-for advertising, press statements, op-eds in pro-government newspapers or tweets were meant to press the idea that censorship is a mean to protect Internet users […]

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April 8, 2015 · Blogs

Social media platforms blocked again in Turkey

Turkish authorities ordered access to 166 websites, including Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, to be blocked after photos of a hostage crisis that ended with the death of a government prosecutor were circulated in the social media platforms. On 31 March 2015, in Istanbul’s courthouse, two militants took Mehmet Selim Kiraz hostage. He was the prosecutor […]

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April 8, 2015 · Blogs

Report says Facebook tracking breaches EU law

On 31 March 2015, researchers of the University of Leuven and Vrije Univeristeit Brussel, Belgium, issued a report claiming that Facebook tracks online activity both of its users and non-users. According to the report, which was commissioned by the Belgian Privacy Commission, this type of tracking contravenes EU online privacy laws. Facebook uses a tracking […]

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July 18, 2012

German Federal Supreme Court rules in the RapidShare case

This article is also available in: Deutsch: [Deutscher Bundesgerichtshof: Entscheidung im Fall RapidShare | https://www.unwatched.org/EDRigram_10.14_Deutscher_Bundesgerichtshof_Entscheidung_im_Fall_RapidShare?pk_campaign=edri&pk_kwd=20120718] A file-hosting site could be partially liable for the content uploaded by others in Germany. In a case brought to court by video games company Atari which accused file-sharing site RapidShare of unlawfully providing access to one of its games, […]

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March 26, 2014 · Blogs

Macedonia bans gambling, raises concern over Internet censorship

Macedonia’s government has announced plans to block access to foreign gambling sites in an effort to prevent an outflow of capital. The ban will occur at some point in March and follows a change in the Law of Games and Chance adopted on the 28 December 2013. Far from banning gambling outright – the Macedonian […]

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September 25, 2013 · Blogs

FBI was controlling servers located in France

The FBI admitted on 12 September 2013 that, in late July, it had secretly taken control of some servers located in France in order to plant a malware within a police action. The agency has introduced the spyware on web pages hosted by Freedom Hosting, meant for Tor anonymization network. The hoster had been exposed since 2011 by activists […]

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