Friday, 26 August 2011

Dangerous Cybercrime Treaty Pushes Surveillance and Secrecy Worldwide

As part of an emerging international trend to try to ‘civilize the Internet’, one of the world’s worst Internet law treaties--the highly controversial Council of Europe (CoE) Convention on Cybercrime--is back on the agenda. Canada and Australia are using the Treaty to introduce new invasive, online surveillance laws, many of which go far beyond the Convention’s intended levels of intrusiveness. Negotiated over a decade ago, only 31 of its 47 signatories have ratified it. Many considered the Treaty to be dormant but in recent years a number of countries have been modeling national laws based on the flawed Treaty. Moreover, Azerbaijan, Montenegro, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom are amongst those who have ratified within the last year. However, among non-European countries, only the U.S. has ratified the Treaty to date, making Canada and Australia’s efforts unique. The Treaty has not been harmless, and both Australia and Canada are fast-tracking legislation (Australia's lower house approved a cybercrime bill last night) that will enable them to ratify the Treaty, at great cost to the civil liberties of their citizens.
Leaving out constitutional safeguards
Australia’s invasive bill highlights one of the fundamental flaws of the Convention on Cybercrime: the Treaty’s failure to specify proper level of privacy protection necessary to limit the over-broad surveillance powers it grants law enforcement agencies. This creates problems in countries like Australia since, as the Australia Privacy Foundation points out, Australia lacks the legal constitutional safeguards afforded to many other democratic countries:

The CoE Convention has to be read within the context that applies in CoE countries – where there are substantial and actionable constitutional protections for human rights. The absence of any such countervailing protection for human rights in Australia makes it completely untenable for the Convention to be implemented in Australia without very substantial additional provisions that achieve a comparable balance.

Bills proposed in Canada (read here and here) are also affected by the Convention’s flaws as they adopt the lowest possible standard of protection against many of the invasive powers they grant. The bills provide law enforcement access to sensitive data on the mere suspicion it might be useful to an investigation. Indeed, at times they leave out the safeguards altogether, as noted in a letter from Canadian privacy scholars and civil society organizations:

[the legislation] will give state agents the power to access ...highly sensitive personal information, even where there is no reason to suspect it will assist in the investigation of any offense...What [this] facilitates, simply put, are unjustified and seemingly limitless fishing expeditions for private information of innocent and non‐suspicious Canadians...

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Katitza Rodriguez @'EFF'

Unveiling the Secret - The Roots of Trance

Steve Job's Patents

Government backs down on plan to shut Twitter and Facebook in crises

The government has climbed down on plans to ban suspected rioters from using social networking websites in times of civil unrest.
The home secretary, Theresa May, told social networks at a meeting on Thursday that the government had no intention of "restricting internet services".
Research in Motion (RIM, the maker of BlackBerry), Facebook and Twitter were summoned to the meeting with May after David Cameron signalled a clampdown on the sites following the recent riots in England.
The social networks were poised to face down the government on its plans, which they warned could usher in a new form of online censorship in the UK.
However, government ministers sought to back away from the prime minister's comments and instead focus on how law enforcement could better use Twitter and Facebook in emergencies.
A Home Office spokeswoman described the meeting as constructive. May chaired the meeting with the Foreign Office minister Jeremy Browne, and members of the Association of Chief Police Officers.
The Home Office said in a statement: "The discussions looked at how law enforcement and the networks can build on the existing relationships and co-operation to prevent the networks being used for criminal behaviour. The government did not seek any additional powers to close down social media networks."
The possibility of banning suspected rioters from social networks was first raised by Cameron a fortnight ago when he vowed to do whatever it took to prevent a repeat of the riots and looting.
Hours before the meeting human rights groups sent an open letter to government ministers warning that powers restricting the internet could be "susceptible to abuse" and undermine free speech.
May is understood to have opened the meeting by immediately ruling out restrictive measures and indicating that it was a discussion about improving law enforcement online.
According to sources at the meeting, police acknowledged that they "needed to do more" with regard to learning how to use social media. The Metropolitan police are understood to have said they were "slightly behind" other forces when it came to Twitter and Facebook.
Surprisingly, RIM was not forced to explain how its BlackBerry Messenger service differed from other social networks, despite the system reportedly having played a pivotal role for the rioters.
A spokeswoman for Facebook said the discussion was constructive, building on work her firm already did to ensure Facebook was "one of the safest places on the internet". She said: "We welcome the fact this was a dialogue on working together to keep people safe rather than about imposing restrictions on internet services."
A Twitter spokeswoman said: "Governments and law enforcement agencies around the world use Twitter to engage in open, public, communications … we've heard from many that Twitter is an effective way to distribute updates and dispel rumours in times of crisis or emergency."
In a statement RIM said: "RIM continues to maintain an open, positive, dialogue with the UK authorities and continues to operate [within] UK regulations."
The Home Office meeting followed a study of riot-related tweets, compiled by the Guardian, that cast doubt on the rationale behind Cameron's proposal to bar suspect rioters from Twitter and Facebook.
Josh Halliday @'The Guardian'

Thursday, 25 August 2011

A burger and COKE to go!

Via

♪♫ Ana Egge - Hole In Your Halo

From the new Steve Earle produced album 'Bad Blood'

James Blake & Bon Iver – Fall Creek Boys Choir

Available on itunes next week (w/c 29th Aug 2011)

Suelette Dreyfus talks Wikileaks

Suelette Dreyfus is an Australian-American researcher, journalist and writer. She wrote the cult classic book Underground with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Watch the full episode here: http://www.abc.net.au/tv/qanda/txt/s3294021.htm
Panellists: Nick Minchin, Former Liberal Minister; Hanifa Deen, Pakistani-Australian author; Daniel Pipes, American political commentator; Doug Cameron, Labor Senator; and Suelette Dreyfus, academic and author of Underground.

A young Steve Jobs introduces the Macintosh in 1984

Israeli Video Games in Gaza

He looks at the camera with bright eyes and the beginning of a smile, wearing a miniature dark blue zipper sweatshirt, the cuffs folded up a bit to make it fit.
I can imagine his mother dressing him that morning, making sure he would be warm enough. I wonder if she’s the one who took the picture. Someone has written on the photo “kisses.”
It’s not a formal picture. He’s outside on a sunny day. It looks like he was probably moving when the picture was snapped; his arms seem to be swinging a little. As with most almost two-year-olds, I suspect it was hard to get him to stay still long enough for a photo.
It’s a happy picture, the kind that makes you smile; perhaps it reminds you of funny, energetic little children you know or remember.
Until you see the next picture. It was taken on his second birthday. His name was Islam Quraiqe’.
Death from a drone strike is not pretty. The small body is charred, ripped apart; internal organs are pouring out.
He had been riding with his father and uncle on a motorcycle in Gaza whenthe missile hit them. His 29-year-old father, a member of the Palestinian resistance, and 32-year-old uncle physician were also killed. Five bystanders, including a woman, were injured.
The missile was fired remotely by an Israeli sitting in front of a video screen and operating one of the many drones that periodically fly over Gaza and shoot Palestinians like fish in a fishbowl. The operators are usually female, the preferred group for this kind of desk job...