The recent introduction of Do-Not-Track legislation is again bringing the issue of online privacy back to the forefront in the United States. Given its mixed history, lack of widespread agreement on how to treat Do-Not-Track requests, and what sort of behavior constitutes tracking, the effectiveness of existing Do-Not-Track systems are far from adequate.…
11 March 2013
As a member of the Informal Experts Group (IEG) of the World Telecommunication Policy Forum (WTPF), Access joined other civil society representatives in sending a joint submission to the Group emphasizing the need to recognize calls for openness and inclusivity in the upcoming May WTPF.…
6 March 2013
Last week, a review marking ten years since the UN World Summit on Information Society (WSIS) kicked off in Paris at UNESCO. WSIS was a pair of UN-sponsored conferences held in 2003 in Geneva and 2005 in Tunis, aimed at bridging the digital divide and generally advancing the global discussion about the internet and ICTs. …
4 March 2013
The Industry, Research, and Energy (ITRE) Committee of the European Parliament recently voted through its Opinion on the Data Protection Regulation, sending a clear message to European citizens that a majority of the Committee believes the interests of large corporations should trump the protection of their fundamental right to privacy.…
27 February 2013
As the European Parliament debates new data protection reforms,US technology companies have arrived in Brussels to commence an unprecedented lobbying effort aimed at preventing strong regulation and weakening existing standards. Most troublingly, some of the draft legislative proposals have been copied and pasted directly from lobbying documents, evidence of the immense influence of US giants like Google and Amazon on European policy.…
26 February 2013
Today, Access filed a Freedom of Information Act request before the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Department of Justice to ask which governments are requesting user information through mutual legal assistance treaties. This filing comes two days after a blogger and lawyer Rodrigo Ferrari was formally charged by Chilean prosecutors, who obtained his Twitter information through such a process, which was seemingly executed improperly.…
21 February 2013
Access and 20 civil society organizations have published an open letter to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), pushing the UN body to ensure meaningful and sustainable civil society participation at the upcoming World Telecommunication Policy Forum (WTPF).…
21 February 2013
CISPA, the ill-conceived piece of US legislation on information sharing and cybersecurity, is back. Yesterday, the Intelligence Committee of the US House of Representatives held a hearing on cybersecurity, under the banner of “Advanced Threats Facing Our Nation.” The committee, chaired by Republican congressman Mike Rogers, heard testimony from representatives of the financial, energy, corporate, and security industries. No representative of the civil liberties or privacy community was invited to testify.…
15 February 2013
The order sets out provisions for sharing critical threat information from government to the private sector, but potentially establishes a foundation for later bidirectional sharing of sensitive information. Its vague categorization of what constitutes critical infrastructure limits transparency on threat reduction, and may hinder confidence building measures intended to mitigate cyber conflict. It offers some civil liberties protections, but doesn’t go far enough.…
13 February 2013
Roundup of the final meeting of the Information Experts Group for the World Telecommunications Policy Group, an International Telecommunication Union (ITU) forum for discussing key policy issues in today’s telecommunications and information and communication technology (ICT) environment. …
8 February 2013
On January 22nd 2013, the long-running campaign against the draft Iraqi Cyber Crimes law finally bore fruit: the Iraqi Speaker of the House approved a request to the Parliamentary Committee for Media and Culture to permanently revoke the proposed legislation.…
8 February 2013
When the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) organized the controversial World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT) last year, the head of the body stated repeatedly and emphatically that the meeting was not about the internet. As it turned out, he was…
6 February 2013
In the rapidly-changing mobile landscape in the U.S., users often lack information about the new technology running their apps, games, devices, and accompanying privacy policies. On Friday, the Federal Trade Commission stepped in with guidelines to the mobile marketplace to better protect the privacy of mobile users.…
6 February 2013
Access has released a briefing document that provides analysis of the outcomes of the World Conference on International Telecommunications (WCIT), an overview of its geopolitical context, and a preview of upcoming internet governance debates at the United Nations.…
5 February 2013
From 2004, the United States has signed onto free trade agreements with nearly half of the countries in Latin America. As a product of these agreements, Peru, Colombia, Chile, Panama and other Central American countries agreed to enact new and more restrictive copyright laws, which can place important threats on the fundamental rights of internet users across the region.
…4 February 2013
New mechanisms to censor websites and filter mobile communications could come online in Pakistan, possibly within 60 days, according to government officials in the country and activists on the ground. News that the censorship system is being built directly conflicts with promises made by Pakistani government officials a little less than a year ago to not pursue massive online censorship.…
25 January 2013
We were deeply saddened to learn this weekend of the passing of Aaron Swartz: a friend, fighter, and spark of brilliance. Many of us at Access knew Aaron well–we were lucky enough to share an office with him for a chunk of time between 2011 and 2012. We’d find him there, in front of a spread of screens–in late, in early, and sometimes not at all. His unpredictable and irrepressible approach to life–and his life’s work–was one of his most defining characteristics.…
14 January 2013
WCIT WATCH: ITU Secretary General issues information note addressing civil society concerns at WCIT Last week, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) published an information note from Secretary-General Hamadoun Touré dated December 14 in which he reports to ITU Members on…
7 January 2013
Shortly after the end of the World Conference on International Telecommunications members of civil society issued a statement regarding the new International Telecommunication Regulations and the future of multi-stakeholder engagement with the International Telecommunication Union.…
3 January 2013