RightsCon keynote Alaa Abd El Fattah detained!
RightsCon keynote Alaa Abd El Fatah, a prominent Egyptian activist, blogger, and software developer is now languishing in prison for refusing to answer questions from an illegitimate military tribunal on questionable charges of “incitement.” His crime? Demanding that civilians be tried by judges, not soldiers. Alaa's case represents a far greater injustice - at least 12,000 Egyptian citizens have been tried by military courts since the overthrow of Mubarak. This is a gross violation of international law and a far cry from the democracy Egyptians called for earlier this year. Nearly 10,000 people in less than 24 hours have signed the Access petition calling on President Obama and the U.S. Congress to demand Egypt's military rulers to end emergency law, free Alaa and cease trying civilians in military courts. Go here to sign the Access petition: https://www.accessnow.org/free-alaa … read more
Silicon Valley Standard
One of the objectives of the Silicon Valley Human Rights Conference is the creation of a Silicon Valley Standard (SVS). This is a principled statement incorporating the issues discussed at the 2011 Silicon Valley Human Rights Conference. The document includes 15 principles based on the 15 workshop topics covered at the conference. The document is designed to complement other existing frameworks and uses the international human rights framework as its foundation. These principles served as a useful basis for discussion during the panels and represent a standard, which we hope the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) sector will use after the conference. 1. Technology and Revolutions: Technology companies play an increasingly important role in enabling and supporting the end user’s capacity to exercise his or her rights to freedom of speech, access to information, and freedom of association. ICT companies should respect those rights in their operations and … read more
Wrap Up and Closing Remarks
It's the end of two days and Brett has taken the stage to lead the group in a conclusion of the events. People raise their hand to demonstrate they've had a good conference. A thinner audience than to start with, but enthusiastic. Multistakeholderism, according to Brett, seems to work. Seven governments, academics, civil society, the private sector, activists, and human rights defenders, all in one room. However, the idea of multistakeholderism is at risk, including larger forums, including the IGF. Proposals for international codes of conduct, particularly those that move Internet governance into the remit of the ITU, or multilateral governance, are dangerous to the future of the freedom of the Internet. It seems clear that we need to bring the human rights framework online, and that we strengthen existing rights through digital frameworks. These are tools for strengthening our rights, and the Internet can be a tool for protecting and extending them. There are new rights that … read more
Visual media technologies, content and human rights
Content has changed our world, how do we manage its impact on society, governance, and privacy? Panelists include: Sam Gregory : Program Director, Witness.org Thor Halvorssen : Founder, Oslo Freedom Forum Hans Eriksson : Founder/ Executive Chairman, Bambuser Sameer Padania : CEO, Macroscope (moderator) Steve Grove : Head of News and Politics, YouTube Sameer starts off by framing the discussion, about the intersection of human rights, videography, and photography. Makes reference to last-night's breakup of the occupy Oakland movement, with visual content, almost in realtime, and the sort of content that we would normally never see. Asks the panelists to pinpoint the moment they saw the shift of video and human rights to a big, participatory issues. Hans: For us, we saw right ahead of the elections in Egypt last year (we had no idea what was going on) a huge number of signups. And there were 10,000 videos that came out, and we saw that people were trying to … read more
Mini Keynote: Mitchell Baker, Chair, Mozilla
Business as usual is not enough. We have great business, and they're sponsors, and engaged here. But it's not enough, because businesses themselves have their own relationships with government. What would business do if the government showed up tomorrow to take away our rights? We don't know, because we haven't audited the way companies would respond. Today's communications are not like the Gutenberg Press. Communications go through a bottleneck, and we need more than one press. It's not just YouTube. If I'm putting my life on the line, I need more than one press. I want my own. I may want access to the global press, but I need my own. YouTube may want that too. It's helpful to be able to plug into something, and not be the centerpiece. But it can't be the basis for human rights. Google is doing a phenomenal job to make the waist of the hourglass as fat as possible, but it is still a waist. And we need to make sure there are alternatives there. And that we have both push … read more
John Ruggie, UN Special Representative, Business and Human Rights
You are considering the human rights risk profile of your entire industry, at roughly the time that the business community has reached consensus on how companies should manage such risk. On June 16, the UN Human Rights Council was unnanimous in endorsing a set of principles for better managing human rights related risks that companies themselves can pose to communities and individuals. Intnerational stanards setting bodies, like ISO, have already embraced these principles. These prcinples are a gamechanger--from naming and shaming, to knowing and showing. Naming and shaming is externally imposed pressue, and companies reacting to and trying to keep up with that pressue. Knowing and showing means that company itself has systems in place, and is proactively managing those risks. It can 'know' and 'show' that it is aware of those risks, and can demonstrate how it is managing them There are tow critical pasrts. One is a policy ommitment on the part of the company to observe human … read more
Mini Keynote: Dorothy Chou, Senior Policy Analyst, Google
How we can measure freedom? How transparency report, and similar projects help citizens measure freedom, and how we, the audience, can help. Measurement, and quantification helps us understand trends, and understand if things are working or not. The internet is unique as a medium f commnication, because it allows us, perhaps for th first time to quantify freedom, in a meanginful way. Governments have to issue orders, or takedown content, and in both cases, it leaves traces. To bgin to understand these laws, we need to start measuring this content in real numbers. But in order to do so, we need to be transparent. Google is transparent, but it's not purely altruistic. We depend on user trust, which requires more accountability, more freedom, more transparency. In order to make a profit, we depend on freedom. That might be weird for a company that operates in 150 countries around the world. But in market terms, we believe that enhancing freedom in order to generate profit, makes … read more
Maria Al-Masani, Founder, Yemen Rights Monitor
In the beginning, the government decided to ban Al-Jazeera. Most Yemenis have satellite television, its how they get their news. So we decided to act fast. Even though we have only 3% internet penetration, we decided to bridge the gap, by broadcasting videos of human rights violations. People film the violations--any form of cellphone camera will do--and then we post on YouTube, so we then post on Facebook as well, because sometimes YouTube blocks violent or shocking content. We'll link then directly to the Al Jazeera stream, and we'll tweet to @acarvin. And now we're launching a website for the National Council, at www.ncyemen.org Followed by a video from Tahrir Square in Yemen, with a young women, speaking into a microphone, in front of a banner filled with logos of different technology companies, and a live stream of a speech, with the same young women, to a full audience in the Yemeni evening. "We want to live, like you. We want to express our opinions, and practice … read more
The Politics of Internet Freedom with John Markoff
Internet freedom: a foreign policy tool or a basic human right? What does Internet freedom actually mean? The right to connect, the freedom to hack, the liberation of information, the equality of data or the protection of the cyber-commons? Who gets to make the decisions about the future of the Internet? And who are the lobby groups that are pulling their strings? This panel will bring some of the leading analysts, actors and activists onto one panel where they can unpack the politics, walk us down the hallways of government and corporate power and and decipher what is really going on in the fight for control over our digital sphere. John Markoff : Science Writer, The New York Times (moderator) Victoria Grand : Director, Global Communications and Policy, YouTube Michael Meehan : Chair, Global Internet Freedom Committee, Broadcasting Board of Governors Brad Burnham : Partner, Union Square Ventures Aaron Swartz : Founder, Advisory Board Director, Demand Progress Imad … read more
Mini Keynote: Jim Fruchterman, CEO, Benetech
I read an article which really disturbed me, about 20 years ago. It told the story of a village in El Salvador, where as many as 500 villagers had been killed at the hands of a US-trained battalion. The US government denied it, El Salvador denied it. The reporter was fired. And ten years later, Argentinean forensic scientists went to El Salvador and found the remains of more than 500 bodies. So I started thinking, as a geek, about what I could do. And someone said to me, the human rights world is an information processing industry which no one writes software for. So, while free speech and free press are necessary, they are not enough to secure human rights. Torture chambers don't have cameras. 500 people disappear all the time in our world, and we don't know about it. So we are the deliberately non-profit high tech company in Silicon Valley. We document these stories. And we've found, through research, that too often documentation of these stories doesn't go anywhere. … read more
Mini Keynote: Jeffery Dygert, Executive Director, Public Policy, AT&T
AT&T decided a few years back to evaluate its position on human rights--how it would advance human rights, and how it would respond to government attempts to limit these rights. The company adopted a policy, which is now publicly available online. At the most basic level, AT&T views its platforms as a mechanism for users to seek, exchange, and communicate information, and that restrictions will reduce innovation and commercial opportunities. Despite this, governments have a legitimate interest in addressing national security and personal security issues. Therefore, the company's position is to base decisions on transparent laws, and supports the US's policies as an example for other countries. … read more
Mini Keynote: Miriam Abu Sharkh, on Gaza and Mobility
Gaza is a danger zone, where human rights are abused on all sides. And yet, internet startups abound, because the internet is the best and--perhaps only--way to connect with the Arab World. Miriam showed a video on Gaza. … read more
Mini Keynote: Andreas Weigend, PhD, Social Data Lab, Stanford University and Former Chief Scientist, Amazon.com
My dad spent his 20s in East Germany, as a prisoner, for his beliefs about the government, based on a conversation in Russian, which he did not speak. My belief about the openness and socialization of data is, at least, in part a response to this. So, social data. I looked at financial data of Wall Street traders, I looked at the traces left by people on the web, and now I look at the traces left via mobile phones and social networks. It's not just more of the same, it's not just better, faster, cheaper. Amazon's data machinations now influence the way people buy things, based on changes made 10-15 years ago. The way we process and find information is based on Google. A friend of mine studied AT&T, and found that comparing segmentation of demographics, versus just trying to sell a phone to people you know, has a factoral efficacy difference of 5. The second part of social data is about the data that people knowingly create and share. Every generation is strongly … read more
Surprise Speaker! Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
Wow, this was unexpected. Brett and Andrew just keyed up a video of the Secretary of State addressing the conference. Nice get. … read more
Mini Keynote: Sokeel Park, Research and Policy Analyst, LiNK (North Korea)
The North Korean government is the opposite of the environments we're discussing today. Under the North Korean system of collective punishment, a friend of mine was born into a prison camp. At the age of 14, his brother and mother were caught trying to escape. He was tortured, and then forced to watch his mother and brother murdered. At the age of 21, he was assigned to work with a new prisoner, this one from Pyongyang. Motivated by the stories of this prisoner about what it was like to experience the world, even that of Pyongyang, he escaped. This North Korean world is cracking under the influence of the market. DVD players are amazingly widespread in North Korea. It's one of the benefits of total dominance of state television; a huge hunger for content, including foreign media. Defectors tell us that, in conjunction with new Chinese DVD models with USB sticks built in, people can increasingly view and share foreign content. A tactic of crackdowns is to shut down the … read more
Social Networks: How Human Rights Can Strengthen the Bottom Line
Exploring how defending human rights can actually strengthen a company's bottom line. Hooman Radfar : Executive Chairman, Clearspring Ilya Zhitomirskiy : Co-Founder, Diaspora Shanthi Kalathil : Consultant and Organizing Committee Member, International Digital Economy Accords (IDEA) Project, The Aspen Institute Dilawar Syed : President & CEO, Yonja Media Group Jillian York : Director for International Freedom of Expression and Blogger, EFF (moderator) Jillian: Making human rights profitable is the name of this panel, and we're all a little awkward about this. But in light of everything people have said today, this is a really important subject, and something we need to think about. Quite a bit of overlap in the audience about activists, policy folks, and corporate representatives. Question: What problem in the social networking space is Diaspora trying to solve? Ilya: We started out of the frustration with technologists that we as makers could have social … read more
Human Rights By Design
How and why companies should embed human rights during the development of new technologies rather than responding to crises when they occur. Nathan Freitas : Founder, The Guardian Project Robert Scoble : Blogger, Chief Learning Officer, Rackspace (moderator) Lauren Compere : Managing Director and the Director of Shareholder Engagement, Boston Common Asset Management Mohamad Najem : Co-founder, SMEX Mary Catherine Wirth : Sr. Legal Counsel, Online Services, Adobe Systems Robert Scoble starts off with a discussion of the changing environment, describes a time when it was difficult to get information, but when it was easy to travel through China with three terabytes of data on drives. Asks--what is new, what has changed? Nathan: the era of the BBS was interesting, we could all run our own servers, have our own dialogues, and then the web has come along, and it's all become centralized, and then we started running servers in our living rooms, hosting our own WordPress … read more
Technology and Revolutions: Opportunities and Challenges
Panelists: Alaa Abd El-Fatah, Egyptian Blogger and Software Developer David Gorodyansky, CEO AnchorFree and creator of Hotspot Shield Victoria Graham, YouTube Zied Dridi, Head of Internet Services Department, Tunisian Internet Agency Gideon Litchfield, Technology and Society Correspondent, the Economist (moderator) Gideon: Let's remember why we are here. Governments are catching up with this this unprecedented explosion of connective technologies. And if the discourse on human rights is usually about holding governments accountable, these new changes require that citizens now hold companies accountable for human rights. The bleeding edge, of course, is where companies become the tools for governments seeking to manipulate technologies to control and suppress human and civil rights. Question to Victoria, on behalf of Google. Bob Boorstin earlier outlined reasons and mechanisms for trust and transparency between companies and users, and the summation was, … read more
Mini Keynote: Alex MacGillivray, General Counsel, Twitter
"Twitter is not a triumph of technology, it is a triumph of humanity" -- Biz Stone. We're not the reason for any of this, but we're happy to be a part of it. We're actually a pretty optimistic company. And I want to talk about our company's core values. 1) Defend and respect the user's voice. This isn't a value of the legal department, or the trust and safety team, it's a value of Twitter. Our business is information access, so it's an integrated value. Our mission is to connect people on Twitter to what is most meaningful to them, and not to enforce the use of Twitter in a specific way. 2) The Tweets must flow. Since we're in the information access business, the right thing to do for the long term success of our business is to support people's ability to get their information out, regardless of device, from the simplest phone to the most advance desktop client. For example, we just enabled sat phone tweeting--not a huge demographic, but very important for those in a conflict … read more
Mini Keynote: Van Jones, environmental advocate, civil rights activist, attorney
I want to speak about the struggle for democracy that has broken out here in the United States. There is a struggle against plutocracy, best embodied now by the Occupy Wall Street movement, which is using these digital tools. But first, I want to talk about the pain that these protests are responding to. The middle class in Asia is getting bigger. But the middle class in the West is getting smaller, and smaller. This means that when our veterans get home, there are no jobs for them. There are 17 suicide attempts a day with our young veterans. Young people are graduating every spring off a cliff, into the worst job market since the Great Depression. Those are the voices that are breaking out, and they are using technology to be heard. The elites seem unable to solve the problems of the country, so a new people-powered policy is emerging. The Tea Party, in fact, was the first expression of this, and its agenda was written by 50,000 people through a wiki. It was the first people … read more
Mini Keynote: Rosebell Kagumire, Rosebell’s Blog (Uganda)
When I first arrived, I took notice of the location, and I decided to take a look at what the issues of Digital Freedom meant in the context of Uganda. Two months ago, I met a woman in Northern Uganda, an area greatly affected by deprivation and conflict; she was so desperate to tell her story. She was abducted and sexually violated, and she's never told this story, because people didn't want to listen. I wanted to tell her story, but I wished she could tell it herself, rather than me as a journalist telling her story for her. I run a blog, and I was able to put this story on my blog. And together, we were able to raise money for her to get the surgery she needed as a result of injury from her rape. And as I looked at the map of digital users from Rebecca's presentation, I saw Uganda. We have few users, but this doesn't mean that there hasn't been great change as a result of the internet. In Uganda, we have these protests, called 'Walk to Work'. As a journalist, I couldn't feel … read more
Mini Keynote: Bennett Freeman, Senior Vice President, Calvert Investments
I share the view of many that the greatest obstacles, threats and risks come from government. But I also share the concern of Rebecca McKinnon and others, that the so-called sovereigns of cyberspace, the inventors of the most spectacular technologies the world has known, are insufficiently responsible or aware of the impacts of how the internet is run. Like others, including Michael Posner, I look to other industries for their efforts and approaches. Companies and industries that were the focus of boycotts only half a dozen years ago, have grabbed control of their own supply chains, to improve their performance, even without perfection. Take the old tech industry: The Electronics Industry Citizen Coalition, or the EICC, came together to look at the environmental and social impacts of their work--it is a means of making progress, although they'll never achieve perfection. Companies here in Silicon Valley, even outside the internet space. And some in the internet space are … read more
Mini Keynote: Elliot Schrage, VP of Global Communication, Marketing and Public Policy, Facebook
I view myself very much as a child of the human rights movement, but perhaps it's better to say that I'm a grandchild of the movement. My grandparents were murdered in the concentration camps of Nazi Germany, and the fact that they weren't able to be a part of my life, and I wasn't able to know them, really shaped my career and the work that I've done. I've known Mike Posner, for example, since my work with the Lawyer's Committee with Human Rights. And I want to recognize them, for taking extraordinary risks, who put themselves in danger, every day. One of them was named Ida Ford, a nun who was kidnapped, raped, and murdered by the Salvadoran military, funded and trained by the US government and military. Her death, and the death of others, is among the reasons we have conditionality in foreign aid. Byram Kalmende, was a lawyer and human rights activist in Pristina, Yugoslavia, who was murdered just before the NATO bombing attacks began. In each of these cases, for these … read more
Unconference Topics & Speakers
Silicon Valley Human Rights Conference Wednesday October 26th, 1:30-2:45pm The Silicon Valley Human Rights Conference is designed to be an open space for collaboration and sharing. With that in mind, we have created the Unconference session, an collection of meetings, presentations and roundtables set aside for individuals to present their findings, display new technologies, engage in discussions and work together on a variety of issues. We have received a variety of proposals online from leaders across the sector who will be discussing important topics in parallel with the main workshops and mini-keynotes. The following discussions will be taking place during the Unconference session: "A Research Tour on Global Internet Freedom" - Andrew Puddephatt, Director @ Global Partners and Associates, will address the current communication revolution happening worldwide and its economic impacts. We all have seen political and economic change leveraged through the use of social … read more
Mini Keynote: Bob Boorstin, Director, Public Policy, Google
I may not be the best person to be the opening speaker. I'm not a Silicon Valley guy, I'm a hack from Washington. I was recently voted the least technologically capable person at Google, as a matter of fact. I don't have much professional experience when it comes to human rights, and I'm not a human rights advocate. My thirteen year old son would say, in fact, I have a great deal of experience violating human rights. But I'm going to ask three questions in an attempt to frame our discussion. 1) Why are we here? Because there is a collision of four trends in the world. The first is the rapid spread of ICT and capabilities. Two statistics--mobile access is growing faster than any technology in the history of human kind, 2/3 of the population now has access. And every minute, 48 hour of video is uploaded to YouTube. What does that tell us, beyond the fact that people have too much free time? We need to find new ways of managing this content. The second trend is that … read more
Mini Keynote: Chiranuch Premchaiporn, Journalist (Thailand)
The International Women's Media Foundation The mission of the IWMF is to help women journalists world-wide, to advocate for them and help them professionally. The internet has changed work for the Foundation, as it has society as a whole. Now it supports women journalists who want to launch startups and be entrepreneurs in new media, and addresses the issue of access that women have to internet content. It may surprise some in the audience here that in some countries in the world, you may not own a cellphone or a computer without permission from your male relative. Forget about gender-sensitive content, we're not even there yet. The highlight of our work is celebrating the successes. Annually, we select three winners. We've had 72 winners, and 69 are alive. Some have paid with their life, including Anna Politkovskaya, of Russia. In Iran, one of our winners has been jailed; and been banned from practicing journalism for 30 years. In Tibet, one of our winners has attracted … read more
Keynote with Michael Posner, US Assistant Secretary of State, Democracy, Human Rights and Labor
Today we face a series of challenges at the intersection of human rights, companies, and governments. It's a busy intersection. First a word about the challenges: Almost every day, we see new examples of the transformative, and disruptive power of new technologies. In a single decade, we've seen how the traditional media newsroom was upended, and the business model destroyed. And yet, we have the rise of the citizen journalist, reporter, and blogger. Some can upload in seconds, some have to smuggle footage, but the truth is getting out. The Arab Spring brought home the power of these communications tools, and the response has been more censorship, more blocking, more surveillance. They use sophisticated keylogging, bots, and filtering, and they're trying to change national and international legal standards to legitimize it all. And example, the governments of Tajikistan, China, Russia, and Uzbekistan proposed a new model of code of conduct. Whether it's called a halal internet, or … read more
Mini Keynote: Alaa Abd El-Fatah, Blogger, Activist, Software Developer (Egypt)
Let me take 30 seconds to speak out against extra-ordinary justice. I'm going to be facing it when I get back to Egypt, in front of our military government. Here you should be familiar with extraordinary justice, as it was practiced in Guantanamo. There are roughly 12,000 civilians in military prison right now, for participating in a revolution the military pretends to have sided with, and sometimes it is for events in which the military committed the crimes, not civilians. I urge you to find ways to stand with anyone facing this future. I'm here as an activist, as a foot-solider in the revolution, to talk about how companies can find ways to maintain, promote, and protect the human rights of their users. I'm quite cynical about this. Companies are not likely to do any of that. It's not exactly that there's a conflict of interest. We're here because we do believe it is actually possible. But the relationship, and the structure of relationships between power, means that it … read more
Welcome Keynote with Rebecca McKinnon
Rebecca kicks off with Aziza's Dream, a video mash-up of the Apple 1984 ad, by Riad Guerfali. "I imagine many of you, with Steve Jobs' passing, have re-seen the 1984 video. Have many seen the Tunisian mashup?" There are two ways to think about technology and human rights. 1) Think about how to use technology to push for human rights. "Human rights via technology" 2) How do you ensure that the technology itself is compatible? That it maximizes human rights "Human rights through technology" Another way of thinking of part two is Lessig's 'Code is Law' dictum. It's not just the laws of policy makers, its' the law of the coders. It's 'East Coast Law', or parliamentary law, versus 'West Coast Law', which is the code of communications itself. With this new code, and new law, there is a challenge to the traditional concept of jurisdictions. Looking at a map of the world, with the concentration of social networks, we see that platforms like Facebook are challenging … read more
Welcome with Brett Solomon, Andrew McLaughlin, and Marietje Schaake
Andrew and Brett take the screen to applause. It's an informal reception thus far, lots of good mornings from the crowd. They'll be acting as moderators for the morning's speeches. Brett: "The decisions made here in the Valley have such an extraordinary effect on the way the world operates and understands itself, but no one at the time ever expected these tools to be catalysts for revolutions, or tools for exposes of injustice under dictators. The technologies that are made here in the Valley, and in other places around the world, are also used to enable the oppressors, to silence, detain, and monitor. Many technologies are not designed for this, but are twisted and used against purpose. We need to be cognizant, when tools are made, from the creation of chip to writing of code to operation of network, about the human rights considerations. Luckily, we have a human rights framework to understand this. States have a duty to protect these rights, and companies have an obligation to … read more
Welcome to the #RightsCon Live Blog
Good morning from San Francisco, where we're getting ready for the start of first-ever Silicon Valley Human Rights Conference. The auditorium at the Mission Bay Conference Center is filling up with attendees with their coffee and laptops. You'll be able to follow the events today on a couple different channels: The conference livestream: rightscon.org/video The Twitter hashtag: #rightscon or @rightscon And here on the liveblog I'll be live-blogging the keynotes as they go--which means that within 5-10 minutes of the end of each talk, I'll post a recap of the speaker's discussion. We're still working on how best to document the excellent breakout panels planned for this afternoon. Check back here for more details. And to introduce myself--I'm Katherine Maher, a tech/rights geek. You can find me at @krmaher on Twitter. … read more
Canadian Supreme Court rules linking not libel
In an unanimous decision, the Canadian Supreme Court today ruled that linking to defamatory material on another website does not constitute publishing the material and webhosts cannot be held liable for the libelous content. The case stems from a suit brought by a Vancouver political volunteer against a website, after the site refused to take down links to a supposed defamatory article about the man. Wednesday's ruling upheld rulings from two lower courts, which said only the original publisher of such content is liable. The high court's ruling strongly defends an online publication's right to link to other material, citing it as a critical tool for communication on the internet. Justice Rosalie Abella wrote: Limiting their usefulness by subjecting them to the traditional publication rule would have the effect of seriously restricting the flow of information and, as a result, freedom of expression. If the court had ruled such linking were akin to publishing libel, our … read more
The political arm of social media
The days of major civil unrest at Tahir Square in Egypt seem somehow far in the past. However, the outcomes of the revolution are still unfolding. While the population questions whether a political transition has really occurred, since the Egyptian Armed Forces (SCAF) still holds the power in the country, it is possible to affirm that one paramount transformation has come to stay: the use of social media as a prominent tool for political activism and citizen journalism. After thousands of civilians have faced military trials post-revolution, local activists decided to launch a campaign on Facebook seeking for people's support to bombard SCAF's website with criticism against the practice. After 15 minutes of uninterrupted criticisms at SCAF's and other ministries websites, an official authority shut down the comments sections on Facebook sites. This is just a simple example of how local population is using social media to keep the Arab Spring alive in Egypt. Another ongoing … read more
EU data protection watchdog says no privacy without Net neutrality
The only way to ensure that communications online remain private is to implement strong regulations prohibiting the discrimination of internet services and content. This was the striking opinion of the European Data Protection Supervisor, who said that privacy online starts with net neutrality. Monitoring networks that goes beyond maintaining integrity and security is an invasion of a users private online communications, said Peter Hustinx, the EDPS. Inspecting such communications, Hustinx says, may be a violation of Article 8 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. Here's Hustinx: Inspection techniques based on traffic data and inspection of IP payloads, i.e. the content of communications, may reveal users’ Internet activity: websites visited and activities on those sites, use of P2P applications, files downloaded, emails sent and received, from whom, on what subject and in which terms, etc. ISPs may want to use this information … read more
Secret court order forces Google, ISP to turnover e-mail info related to Wikileaks
A secret court order was issued allowing the the U.S. government, in its ongoing investigation into Wikileaks, to obtain information from the e-mail account of U.S.-based Wikileaks volunteer Jacob Applebaum, according to the Wall Street Journal. Google and Sonic.net, a small ISP, were forced to hand over the U.S. government the names of Applebaum's e-mail contacts from the past two years, though not the contents his correspondences. The orders were issues earlier this year, but only became public after Sonic fought to have the seal lifted. Both Google and Sonic fought to inform Applebaum, who has not been charged with any wrongdoing, of the order, the WSJ reported. U.S. laws like the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, a law passed in 1986 which preceded the World Wide Web, and the 1994 Stored Communications Act, allow for records to be accessed without a search warrant or any suspicion of criminal activity. Technology companies, including Google, for some time have been … read more
Former U.S. security chief: Let NSA monitor public networks for threats
Michael Hayden, former head of the NSA and FBI, asked Congress this week to allow for the NSA to monitor public networks for threats to ward off potential cyber-based attacks. Currently, the Department of Homeland Security oversees cybersecurity issues regarding government networks and working with private companies to maintain critical infrastructure. But Hayden, along with other government officials, has said the NSA should be tasked with this responsibility, as well as the ability to monitor private networks. Hayden's comments before the House Intelligence Committee revive an old debate: How much, if any, breadth should the government be given when keeping an eye on networks when it comes to cybersecurity issues? And if so, which agency should do it? Referencing the lack of trust given to his former department (given their history of secret warrantless wiretapping), Hayden assured the committee that the NSA could monitor private networks without reading the … read more
Wikipedia reacts to Berlusconi’s Wiretap Act
In an unprecedented reaction to Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's newly proposed Wiretap Act, which would impose a 12,000 euro fine to any website that didn't take down content within 48 hours, Wikipedia has posted a warning in its Italian page. The organization highlights the potential damages of the project to freedom of speech and to the pillars upon which Wikipedia has founded its basis: neutrality; freedom and verifiability of content. Wikipedia also calls users attention for the long-term consequences of the Act. According to the organization, the harsh sanctions could lead to a complete shutdown of Wikipedia in Italy, depriving millions of citizens of the information provided by the online encyclopedia. The following statement can be found at http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Comunicato_4_ottobre_2011/en "Dear reader, At this time, the Italian language Wikipedia may be no longer able to continue providing the service that over the years was useful to … read more
International copyright treaty ACTA to be signed Oct. 1
The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, an international treaty with far-reaching implications for how we share and access information online, is expected to be signed by key negotiators in Japan on Oct. 1, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. The multilateral agreement would create international standards for enforcing copyright and intellectual property. While many countries, including the U.S., Japan, and Australia, will sign the treaty, the EU, Mexico, and Switzerland will not part of the ceremony. The European Parliament will have to approve the agreement before they sign it. Mexico and Switzerland are also still conducting their reviews of the agreement. Though other countries will sign ACTA, it still needs for to be ratified by each country’s respective legislative bodies before enacted. How exactly ACTA will play out is still unknown, though many anticipate it to have wide-spread effect on the Internet. Supporters believe the … read more
EU restricts exporting of surveillance technology to repressive regimes
The European Parliament approved restricting the export of surveillance technologies to countries that use the tools to spy on political dissidents and violate human rights. Exporting such technologies, which can monitor phone calls, text messages, and Internet activity, was previously left up to the discretion of each member state, with no authorization process in place. Now, such a sale would be barred if the purchasing country uses the gear "in connection with a violation of human rights, democratic principles or freedom of speech," according to a statement from from the European Parliament. Though, under these new restrictions, companies need approval from their country's authorities, they do not require pre-approval before being exported. Companies are permitted to declare the export 30 days after it has left the EU, a requirement added to the measure in order for it be approved. "This is a good step towards strengthened control over dual-use products exported from … read more
Group sues FCC over net neutrality rules
Free Press, a Washington-based media advocacy group, filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the Federal Communications Commission over its newly-published net neutrality rules, arguing the regulations do not go far enough in protecting mobile Internet users. While the rules have been out there for almost a year, they were not officially "published" until last week and will go into effect Nov. 2o. The regulations bar ISPs from the "unreasonable discrimination" in delivery of content from providers to users. Mobile wireless providers, though, are only prohibited from blocking voice or other competing services. This creates a very stark distinction between the rules protecting the open Internet for those who access it through traditional in-the-home providers, and those who access it through their mobile wireless carriers. Free Press argues the distinction in the rules are "arbitrary," and the "disparity that the FCC's rules create is unjust and unjustified." In a statement, … read more
Mexicans turn to social networks during wave of violence
In the midst of a drug war that has claimed tens-of-thousands of lives, Mexicans are turning more to social media sites like Twitter to get information on the on-going drug war and avoid the wide-spread violence. The press has effectively been silenced in recent years by drug cartels, who reportedly have threatened journalists over their reporting of violence, intimidation, and brutal public displays of butchery. Information provided by brave citizens or anonymous journalists through social media has allowed for the public to be informed about the drug trade and the subsequent violence, which puts many in danger everyday. Some have even been tortured and killed over their reporting on social networks. Just this weekend, the decapitated body of Maria Elizabeth Macias, the editor of daily newspaper Primera Hora, was found in Nuevo Laredo. Many are saying Macias was targeted because of her reporting on social networks on drug gangs. All this is happening just as local … read more
Researchers to unveil hack of HTTPS encryption
A pair of security researchers claim to have developed a tool that allows for the real-time hacking of Secure Sockets Layer and Transport Layer Security, the technology underlying HTTPS, the most ubiquitous encryption protocol used to secure e-commerce sites and protected signup forms. Juliano Rizzo and Thai Duong are scheduled Friday to unveil the tool Browser Exploit Against SSL/TLS, known as BEAST, at the EkoParty conference in Argentina. The hack decrypts communications between the users and servers by obtaining authentification cookies used in the HTTPS request. This type of tool puts millions of sites, including financial websites and services such as PayPal, at serious risk for security breaches and exposes their underlying vulnerabilities. To showcase the tool's ability, Rizzo and Duong on Friday will decrypt an authentication cookie and access a PayPal account. While the speed of the tool will not exactly be known until then, reports say that it can be done in … read more
Italy proposes ‘one-strike’ copyright law
Italy, already viewed by some as being restrictive of digital rights, is now proposing a draconian law that would cut off Internet access for users accused of a single act of copyright infringement! The Centemero law, named after deputy Elena Centemero, is absurd not only because one offense can lead to a shut down of a user's Internet, but that the accusation can come from anyone -- not just the copyright holder. The proposal is being fast-tracked through Parliament, and is being backed by other members of Centermero's party, the People of Freedom (the party of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi). Under the proposed bill, ISP's have to block a blacklisted users even they are only *suspected* of committing copyright infringement. If passed, there would be no judicial oversight or intervention before a citizen (who has not been found guilty of a crime) is permanently banned from the Internet, blacklisted, and cut-off from the digital world. Providers who do not use filters … read more
Craig Newmark at SVHRC
We are pleased to announce that Craig Newmark, Craigslist' s founder, will speak at the Silicon Valley Human Rights Conference in October. After more than 15 years working with his innovative online advertisement tool, Craig is currently embracing a new challenge: the craigconnects, a website that focus on connecting people around the world to promote the common good. The initiative touches a broad range of actors, from military families and veterans in the US to non-profit journalists and governments worldwide. The idea is to use the Web to promote social being around the world by supporting a vast range of projects. Among his main initiatives is the Technology for the Common Good, which includes micro finance help and Internet support to unserved areas such as Haiti, the West Bank and Kenya. Craig is also involved in programs devoted to increase Internet protection to online users and consumers and to promote governmental accountability to citizens. For more information go … read more
The chilling effects of Internet laws in Thailand
The use of Internet monitoring legislation to control political content in the digital sphere has been creating substantial side effects to Thailand's economy. Once a safe harbor for foreign investments, which helped the country to become the second major economy in southeast Asia, Thailand is now raising concerns among a key group of companies including Google and e-Bay. The restrictive Internet laws adopted four years ago had the initial purpose of preventing fraud and analogue crimes on the Web. However, the government have been enforcing this legislation in a much more stringent way, using it as a mechanism to control public opinion and criticisms to the Establishment. The most recent example of political censorship promoted via Internet laws is the case involving Chiranuch Premchaiporn, a local webmaster and director of an online newspaper. Premchaiporn has been put on trial for allegedly violating Thailand's Computer-Related Offenses Act. According to the … read more
Rebecca MacKinnon at the SVHRC
We are pleased to announce that Rebbeca MacKinnon, the co-founder of Global Voices Online and renowned activist, will be speaking at the Silicon Valley Human Rights Conference in October. MacKinnon is a current fellow at the New America Foundation where she conducts researches on global Internet policies, freedom of speech and the impact of new technologies on human rights. Rebecca just finished writing her new book, Consent of the Networked, which is due on January 31st, 2012. In the book, the author discusses the different ways technologies can be used worldwide to support the rights and freedoms of Internet users. According to MacKinnon, this is the real question that governments, corporations and users should be posing to one another. Rebecca goes through her experience on Chinese Internet censorship to point out the hidden power dynamics among governments and corporations and how the practices adopted by these actors can influence and threaten digital freedom of speech and … read more
Internet redefines censorship in Malaysia
Since 1996, Malaysia has experienced a curious situation regarding its censorship rules. In that year, the local government established the Multimedia Super Corridor in order to foster foreign investments in the country by providing speedy Internet access within its borders. The project had an unexpected but important side effect: freedom of speech online for media channels censored in their printed versions. While the printed media is regulated by the Printing Presses and Publications Act, which provides for many mechanisms of control such as annual licenses for newspapers, the 1998 Communications and Multimedia Act, which governs cyberspace, contains no such regulations. For more information go to http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/09/world/asia/09iht-malaysia09.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1 Without such stringent censorship, the Internet has flourished in the country opening an important space for online media and freedom of speech. Now, the government seems to realize that its … read more
Alex Fowler from Mozilla at the SVHRC
We are pleased to announce that Alex Fowler will be speaking at the Silicon Valley Human Rights Conference in October. Alex is the Global Privacy and Public Policy leader for Mozilla, a leading non-profit organization, whose main goal is to empower Internet users by enhancing their control over their online experience. Among Mozilla main privacy tools are the new Do-Not-Track (DNT), a mechanism that prevents companies from tracking and profiling users activities. On September 8th, the organization has released its DNT Field Guide to help developers at advertising and technology companies to redesign their privacy codes according to the DNT standards. For more information go to http://blog.mozilla.com/privacy/2011/09/08/mozilla-publishes-developer-guide-on-dnt-releases-dnt-adoption-numbers/ Alex is on the head of these innovations and will be discussing the development of Internet privacy mechanisms and their impacts to corporations and Internet users at the SVHRC … read more
China renews key license to Google
The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, a main Chinese Internet regulator, stated that the government has renewed the “Internet Content Provider License” that Google uses in China for another year. The renewal comes after last year's struggles between Google and the Chinese government regarding the censor filters used by the company. The disagreement arose after Google decided to challenge the censorship imposed by local regulations over its search engine. Many users were concerned that Google would be banned from China for not respecting the regulations imposed by the government. The license renewal suggests that the concerns were unfounded, at least until next year. For more information go to http://news.ebrandz.com/google/2011/4596-google-gains-chinas-favoritism-regulators-renew-key-license-for-google-.html The challenges faced by Google in China are not isolated events. While Chinese governmental censorship is well-known and well-established, many … read more
Jan Malinowski, Head of Media for the Council of Europe at SVHRC
In October, Mr. Jan Malinowski, Head of Media and Information for the Council of Europe, will be speaking at the Silicon Valley Human Rights Conference (SVHRC). Mr. Malinowski will be sharing his expertise on freedom of information and Internet governance with the participants and discussing the latest developments in the area, especially within the EU. In its latest meeting, the Steering Committee on Media and New Communication Services (CDMC) of the Council of Europe, which he heads, discussed some relevant topics such as the new notion of media, Internet governance principles, protection and promotion of Internet's universality, integrity and openness. For more information go to: http://www.coe.int/t/dghl/standardsetting/media/ These recent trends and their consequences to civil society, companies and governments will be discussed throughout the entire Conference. The idea is to identify the roles played by each actor and the main opportunities and challenges raised by … read more
Putin calls for Internet freedom
Russian Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin, has defended Internet freedom in a speech delivered early this month. The former soviet KGB officer stated that "In the modern world you cannot limit anything, you must simply work more effectively in this area". Putin is trying apparently to mitigate the effects of a declaration released early this year by the Russian security service, which affirmed that uncontrolled use of communication providers such as Gmail could threaten national security. The biggest fear is that the Russian government will try to censor Internet during parliamentary elections at the end of this year and at the presidential elections on March 2012. For more information go to: http://www.timeslive.co.za/scitech/2011/09/01/putin-calls-for-internet-freedom Similar concerns have been raised all around the globe. The recent UK riots led Prime Minister Dave Cameron to consider shutting down social medias like Twitter in times of civil unrest. The controversial measure … read more
Website Launch
We are happy to announce the launch of our website today. Click on the Register button to purchase tickets. … read more
