April 2011 Bulletin

Researchers@Work

RAW is a multidisciplinary research initiative. CIS believes that in order to understand the contemporary concerns in the field of Internet and society, it is necessary to produce local and contextual accounts of the interaction between the Internet and socio-cultural and geo-political structures. To build original research knowledge base, the RAW programme has been collaborating with different organisations and individuals to focus on its three year thematic of Histories of the Internets in India.

Workshops organised in Bangalore

• Shadow Search Project (SSP) [CIS, April 18, 2011]
• Facebook Resistance [CIS, April 2, 2011]

Digital Natives with a Cause?

Digital Natives with a Cause? is a knowledge programme initiated by CIS and Hivos, Netherlands. It is a research inquiry that seeks to look at the changing landscape of social change and political participation and the role that young people play through digital and Internet technologies, in emerging information societies. Consolidating knowledge from Asia, Africa and Latin America, it builds a global network of knowledge partners who want to critically engage with the dominant discourse on youth, technology and social change, in order to look at the alternative practices and ideas in the Global South. It also aims at building new ecologies that amplify and augment the interventions and actions of the digitally young as they shape our futures.

Columns on Digital Natives

A fortnightly column on ‘Digital Natives’ authored by Nishant Shah is featured in the Sunday Eye, the national edition of Indian Express, Delhi, from 19 September 2010 onwards. The following were published in the month of April:

• Who the Hack? [Indian Express, April 24, 2011]
• One for the avatar [Indian Express, April 3, 2011]

Digital Natives Newsletter

Links in the Chain is a bi-monthly publication which highlights the projects, ideas and news of the Digital Natives with a Cause? The first issue of volume IV is here:

• links in the chain volume 4 Best Practices

New Blog Entry by Samuel Tettner

Samuel Tettner is a Digital Natives Coordinator in CIS. He has written the following blog entry:

• Cyber Fears: What scares Digital Natives and those around them

Accessibility

Estimates of the percentage of the world's population that is disabled vary considerably. But what is certain is that if we count functional disability, then a large proportion of the world's population is disabled in one way or another. At CIS we work to ensure that the digital technologies, which empower disabled people and provide them with independence, are allowed to do so in practice and by the law. To this end, we support web accessibility guidelines, and change in copyright laws that currently disempower the persons with disabilities.

Workshop organised in Hyderabad

• Web Sites Accessibility Evaluation Methodologies: Conference Report

Openness

CIS believes that innovation and creativity should be fostered through openness and collaboration and is committed towards promotion of open standards, open access, and free/libre/open source software. Its latest endeavour has resulted into these:

Submission

• Comments on Draft National Policy on ICT in School Education

New Blog Entry

• Towards Open and Equitable Access to Research and Knowledge for Development [PLoS, March 29, 2011]

Internet Governance

Although there may not be one centralized authority that rules the Internet, the Internet does not just run by its own volition: for it to operate in a stable and reliable manner, there needs to be in place infrastructure, a functional domain name system, ways to curtail cyber crime across borders, etc. The Tunis Agenda of the second World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), paragraph 34 defined Internet governance as “the development and application by governments, the private sector and civil society, in their respective roles, of shared principles, norms, rules, decision-making procedures, and programmes that shape the evolution and use of the Internet.”  Its latest endeavour has resulted into these:

Featured

• DIT's Response to RTI on Website Blocking

New Blog Entries

• What are the legal provisions for blocking websites in India?
• We are anonymous, we are legion [published in the Hindu, April 18, 2011]
• You Have the Right to Remain Silent [published in the Sunday Guardian, April 17, 2011]

Study Tour

• Iraq Delegation to Visit India for Study of E-Governance in Indian Cities ― Meetings in Bangalore and Delhi

CIS is doing a project, ‘Privacy in Asia’. It is funded by Privacy International (PI), UK and the International Development Research Centre, Canada and is being administered in collaboration with the Society and Action Group, Gurgaon. The two-year project commenced on 24 March 2010 and will be completed as agreed to by the stakeholders. It was set up with the objective of raising awareness, sparking civil action and promoting democratic dialogue around challenges and violations of privacy in India. In furtherance of these goals it aims to draft and promote over-arching privacy legislation in India by drawing upon legal and academic resources and consultations with the public.

Featured Research

• The DNA Profiling Bill 2007 and Privacy
• Privacy and the Information Technology Act — Do we have the Safeguards for Electronic Privacy?

Interview

• An Interview with Activist Shubha Chacko: Privacy and Sex workers

Workshops organized in Ahmedabad and Bangalore

• 'Privacy Matters', Ahmedabad: Conference Report [Ahmedabad Management Association, Ahmedabad, March 26, 2011]
• Privacy, By Design [CIS, April 16, 2011]

New Blog Entries

• Is Data Protection Enough?
• Surveillance Technologies
• Encryption Standards and Practices
• News Broadcasting Standards Authority censures TV9 over privacy violations!

Telecom

The growth in telecommunications in India has been impressive. While the potential for growth and returns exist, a range of issues need to be addressed for this potential to be realized. One aspect is more extensive rural coverage and the second aspect is a countrywide access to broadband which is low at about eight million subscriptions. Both require effective and efficient use of networks and resources, including spectrum. It is imperative to resolve these issues in the common interest of users and service providers. CIS campaigns to facilitate this:

Column

Shyam Ponappa is a Distinguished Fellow at CIS. He writes regularly on Telecom issues in the Business Standard and these articles are mirrored on the CIS website as well.

• Learning from Fukushima [published in the Business Standard on April 7, 2011]

News & Media Coverage

• The Gary Chapman International School on Digital Transformation[International School on Digital Transformation, July 17-22, 2011]
• Iraqi delegation in Bangalore to study e-governance projects [Economic Times, April 20, 2011]
• Dark waders [Time Out Bengaluru, Vol. 3, Issue 20, April 15 - 28, 2011]
• Beyond Clicktivism [Outlook, April 18, 2011]
• Gone in a flash [Times of India, April 16, 2011]
• How Web 2.0 responded to Hazare [Hindu, April 11, 2011]
• EU Commissioner Hedegaard to deliver keynote address at consumer world congress
• Net cracker [Time Out Bengaluru Vol. 3 Issue 19, April 1 - 14, 2011]
• On the Path to Global Open Access: A Few More Miles to Go [PLoS, March 2011, Volume 8, Issue 3]

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CIS is grateful to Kusuma Trust which was founded by Anurag Dikshit and Soma Pujari, philanthropists of Indian origin, for its core funding and support for most of its projects.