Centre for Internet and Society

Focus on India—WikiConference produces new apps; state government adopts free licenses

praskrishna — 2016-08-22T03:15:22Z

WikiConference India and its productive hackathon

The second WikiConference India, held August 5–7 in the northern Indian city of Chandigarh, drew hundreds of new and experienced members from 20 language communities of various Wikimedia projects from India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal. This event was more thematic than the first WikiConference India (held in 2011), with numerous presentations, panel discussions and workshops on the gender gap, Wikipedia in education, Mediawiki, and state of the movement in India. The event was organized by the Community of Wikimedians in India, supported by Wikimedia India and the Centre for Internet and Society, and funded by the Wikimedia Foundation. The newly formed user group Punjabi Wikimedians hosted the event. WikiConference India's main goal was to build community and increase participation among Wikimedians in India. Interest in the event was strong: 452 Wikimedians from more than six countries applied for ~100 scholarships. Wikipedia's well known gender gap was evident: only 55 scholarship applicants were women, but a strong focus on diversity resulted in ~25% of scholarship recipients going to women, and the inclusion of speakers of ~20 languages. In all, about 250 people attended the conference. Several Foundation staff spoke at the event, including executive director Katherine Maher, Asaf Bartov, and Tighe Flanagan.

A highlight of the conference was the hackathon track, which spanned all three days of the conference. It proved highly productive, yielding seven apps that are expected to help Wikimedians in a variety of ways. I spoke with Santosh Shingare (Cherishsantosh), the Bangalore-based Wikimedian who organized the hackathon. Santosh had previously served as an organizer of the 2011 WikiConference, and has run hackathons annually since then. Santosh's primary motivation for holding such events is learning; he spoke of limited opportunities to learn about new areas of technology beyond his core skills in WebRTC and Android. He enjoys collaborating with other Wikimedians and sharing technical skills. This event was his first with an international draw, and he looks forward to opportunities to collaborate beyond India's borders in the future.

As Santosh outlined in a message to the Wikimania email list, the hackathon's 35 participants made substantial progress with the following projects:

WikiSpeak with native language (web and Android): Speaking the text of Wikipedia articles
Edit Tamil Wiktionary (Android)
Audio file upload to Wikidata (Android): Assists users in uploading small files that demonstrate the pronunciation of lexical items
A layer that shows local Wikipedia articles on a Google Map
Optical character recognition for Hindi and Malayalam
Communication platform [WebRTC] (Web Application): Santosh wrote this app himself; hackathon participants used it to communicate
Notifications: browser notifications for Wikipedia functions such as recent changes

Santosh highlights that the projects grew out of advance communication. To identify problems and generate ideas, the hackathon organizing team posted a survey ahead of the event. Requests from various language communities, including Hindi, Tamil, Punjabi, and Malayalam, drove several of the projects. The software is all freely licensed, and there are no plans to generate revenue.

Santosh is not a prolific Wikipedia writer or editor, but rather sees value in his ability to communicate among Wikimedians who seek features from various language communities, including his native Marathi and other Indic languages in which he has varying degrees of fluency.

He plans to update the Wikimedia community shortly with further details on each of the seven projects. He is already planning the next of India's annual hackathons. Hackathon organizers worldwide might be interested in learning more about Indian Wikimedians' efforts, and Wikimedians around the world can expect to benefit from their projects.

The conference generated a number of media reports. P

Indian state of Tamil Nadu adopts Creative Commons license

The state of Tamil Nadu on the subcontinent

Last week brought a rare piece of good news in the world's uncertain progress towards the widespread free licensing of information on the Internet. Ravidreams announced on the Wikimedia India mailing list that the government of one of India's largest and most populous states—Tamil Nadu—has issued an instruction to Tamil University and "all other government departments and institutions to release all their publications, archives and collections under Creative Commons by Share-Alike license".

The move comes one year after the collaboration between the Global Tamil Wikimedia Community and the Tamil Virtual Academy, an independent institution set up by the state government in 2001 to provide online resources for Tamil-language communities around the world. TVA and the Tamil-language Wikimedia community collaborated to persuade the government to make the order. Wikimedia India (one of three Creative Commons affiliates in the country) served as an institutional partner, signing the initial agreement on behalf of the Indian Wikimedia community, and funding a Wikimedian in Residence at TVA.

Ravi, who also serves on the TVA committee for outreach, told the Signpost that the TVA is very keen to share its collection of encyclopedic resources with Tamil Wikimedia projects. The community contributed strategic knowledge of free-content licensing, providing precedents for free content release by other governments in India and other countries, and helped in the drafting of the actual order. "But it takes a lot of time, effort, high-profile connections to change how government institutions work", he said.

An example of the distinctive Tamil script

“

Almost 99% of the time it's about the right officer/minister who cares for our mission being in charge of the right department at the right time. It's very hard to bring change through a bottom-up approach. These precedents help when someone at the top gets interested in changing things. So, any community that expects to influence public policy should be prepared to do a lot of groundwork.

”

Tamil-language Wikipedian Thamizhpparithi Maari serves as Assistant Director, TVA and state coordinator of its computing outreach unit, which the government is funding to encourage students in the state to use open-source media and software; this program includes the development of mobile apps and the running of contests to enhance students' computing skills. He described to the Signpost the elaborate process of finally gaining legal and administrative approval for the CC-by-SA release order. Thamizhpparithi has already started a process of digitising books from the universities to share with the Tamil wiki community, involving between 400,000 and 500,000 pages in some 200 books, using Google optical character recognition (OCR).

"This is just the beginning; we expect millions of pages to be uploaded to Tamil Wikisource", Ravi said. Most of the content that will become available for uploading is in Tamil, although some will be in English and other Indian languages; this will present significant opportunities for the Tamil Wikimedia community.

A rare Tamil-language book in an archival exhibition

There are about 70 million native speakers of Tamil, and another eight million second-language speakers. It is an official language in Tamil Nadu, Sri Lanka (with which the state shares a maritime border), and Singapore, and is also used in Malaysia and the African island of Mauritius. The language, written in a distinctive curvilinear script, has a rich literature of poetry reaching back thousands of years, and of novels over the past few centuries; this is attested by a related category on the English Wikipedia that is already of impressive size.

The Open Policy Network, a project of Creative Commons, published an overview of the value of this kind of work in 2014; the Network advocates for governments around the world to adopt free content licenses. T

In brief

Mobile app provides offline access to 8,000 medical articles in Arabic, Chinese, Persian, and Spanish: The apps, which supplement a popular English language app, were announced by the WikiProject Med Foundation and Wikimedia Switzerland. More language editions are planned.
Wikimedia Foundation appoints five volunteers to its Board Governance Committee: Newly appointed trustee Nataliia Tymkiv announced the selection of the advisory group. Board governance issues have been the subject of much discussion since the tumultuous events at the WMF over the last year. The four members of the BGC are Tymkiv (chair), Kelly Battles, Christophe Henner, and Dariusz Jemielniak.
WikiConference North America will take place October 7–10, 2016 in San Diego. Scholarship applications are open until August 23; conference submissions until August 31.
WikiConvention Francophone will take place in Paris August 19–21.
New help page takes aim at common newbie obstacle: Many articles carry banners, to flag problems with the articles. New contributors often lack an understanding of how to go about removing the banners, if they address the underlying issues. In recent months, Fuhghettaboutit created a help page to explain the process, and advocated for linking to the page from the templates. The help page now gets several thousand views per day, suggesting that it is filling a significant gap.
Machine-assisted translation of Wikipedia articles, which has increased with the introduction of the Wikimedia Foundation's Content Translation Tool (covered by the Signpost in a June 2015 op-ed, in June 2016, and in various other pieces), has sparked a controversy in recent weeks. See here: Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/CXT.
Wikidata RfC on defining data quality underway: Alessandro Piscopo, a guest of Wikimedia Germany, asserts that: "to achieve high quality, it is important to define first what data quality is on this knowledge base." Join the discussion: Wikidata:Requests for comment/Data quality framework for Wikidata. P

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For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/the-signpost-august-18-2016-pete-forsyth-and-tony-focus-on-india

July 2016 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2016-09-17T14:13:32Z

Welcome to the July 2016 newsletter of the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS).

For us at CIS, July was filled with a a wonderful diversity of activities, opportunities, windows, and future gazing. We made a crucial intervention by bringing attention to the misrepresentation of India's position at the UNHRC meeting by global media, and continued our contribution to the drafting of the open data license by Government of India.

We made a submission to the Ministry of Home Affairs to reject the Geospatial Information Regulation Bill, and also appealed to the MPs to re-examine the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). We contributed to the making of an open source typeface and input tools for the Santhali language. We were studying developmental initiatives driven by big data in three parts of India (more on that in the August newsletter), mapping the emerging global governance frameworks for big data in development, and planning our future steps in this field. We initiated a study of digital transitions in Indian newspapers with support from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at University of Oxford, and also produced a series of analysis of industrial policy engagements by NASSCOM and iSPIRT.

We also kept pushing digital and new media research in India through our annual call for essays (abstracts have been accepted), and a brilliant talk on game studies and storytelling by Dr. Souvik Mukherjee. We were busy, and happily so.

- Sumandro Chattapadhyay

Previous issues of the newsletters can be accessed here.

Highlights
CIS sent a letter to Members of Parliament to appeal to re-examine the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, a mega-regional trade agreement currently under negotiation. Japreet Grewal and Pranesh Prakash in an article published by FactorDaily argued that India did not oppose the United Nations move to make Internet access a human right. Submitted comments on the "Government Open Data Use License - India". CIS listed out its comments and recommendations on name of the licence, changing the language on permissible use of data, adding section on the scope of applicability of the licence, etc. CIS published the Report of the Group of Experts on Developments in the Field of Information and Telecommunications in the Context of International Security and Implications for India. The report developed by governmental experts from 20 States addresses existing and emerging threats from uses of ICTs, by States and non-State actors alike. CIS is collaborating with the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at University of Oxford to study various aspects of digital transition in Indian news media. Zeenab Aneez is leading the pilot study exploring digital transition in three newspapers across English, Hindi, and Malayalam markets. Over a series of three blog posts, Pavishka Mittal documented engagements by NASSCOM and iSPIRT in industrial policy making in the Indian IT sector during 2006-2016, including on transfer pricing policy. Deputy US Trade Representative Ambassador Robert Holleyman discussed the Digital 2 Dozen document with Ambassador Shyam Saran. Anubha Sinha participated in the discussions and wrote a summary. Meera Manoj conducted an analysis of the different models of collection, management, sharing, and governance of global development data that are being discussed in several international forums. Shubhangi Heda in a blog entry has explored the concerns related to data protection and digital privacy under the Trans Pacific Partnership agreement signed recently between United States of America and 11 countries located around the Pacific Ocean region, across South America, Australia, and Asia.

Highlights

CIS sent a letter to Members of Parliament to appeal to re-examine the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, a mega-regional trade agreement currently under negotiation.
Japreet Grewal and Pranesh Prakash in an article published by FactorDaily argued that India did not oppose the United Nations move to make Internet access a human right.
Submitted comments on the "Government Open Data Use License - India". CIS listed out its comments and recommendations on name of the licence, changing the language on permissible use of data, adding section on the scope of applicability of the licence, etc.
CIS published the Report of the Group of Experts on Developments in the Field of Information and Telecommunications in the Context of International Security and Implications for India. The report developed by governmental experts from 20 States addresses existing and emerging threats from uses of ICTs, by States and non-State actors alike.
CIS is collaborating with the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at University of Oxford to study various aspects of digital transition in Indian news media. Zeenab Aneez is leading the pilot study exploring digital transition in three newspapers across English, Hindi, and Malayalam markets.
Over a series of three blog posts, Pavishka Mittal documented engagements by NASSCOM and iSPIRT in industrial policy making in the Indian IT sector during 2006-2016, including on transfer pricing policy.
Deputy US Trade Representative Ambassador Robert Holleyman discussed the Digital 2 Dozen document with Ambassador Shyam Saran. Anubha Sinha participated in the discussions and wrote a summary.
Meera Manoj conducted an analysis of the different models of collection, management, sharing, and governance of global development data that are being discussed in several international forums.
Shubhangi Heda in a blog entry has explored the concerns related to data protection and digital privacy under the Trans Pacific Partnership agreement signed recently between United States of America and 11 countries located around the Pacific Ocean region, across South America, Australia, and Asia.

CIS in the News

CIS gave inputs to the following media coverage:

FB & Google have already monopolised Indian cyberspace (Asad Ali; Catch News; July 3, 2016)
Cyberstalkers, the new bullies in town (S. Poorvaja; Hindu; July 4, 2016).
TRAI Free Data paper: Paytm to Hike, the responses from other companies (Indian Express; July 5, 2016).
India No Haven For Net Freedom But It Did Not Oppose UN Move on Internet Rights (Anuj Srinivas; The Wire; July 6, 2016).
India may not be guilty of opposing UN move to save internet rights (Ciol; July 7, 2016).
Flashpoint #TrollControl: Maneka versus NCW (Times Now Television, July 8, 2016).
Place for a safety net (The Telegraph; July 10, 2016).
Tamil Nadu likely to hold Facebook accountable for suicide case (V. Prem Shanker; Economic Times, July 13, 2016).
Belling the trolls (Bishakha Datta; India Today; July 13, 2016).
Mandatory Aadhaar card for govt scholarships violates SC order (Neelam Pandey and Aloke Tikku; Hindustan Times, July 15, 2016).
It's That Eavesdrop Endemic (Arindam Mukherjee; Outlook; July 25, 2016).
Facebook is censoring some posts on Indian Kashmir (Rama Lakshmi; Washington Post; July 27, 2016).
Art, Science and Open Electromagnetic Spectrum Culture [ENG] (Creative Disturbance Platform; July 31, 2016).

CIS members wrote the following articles:

The Gay Pride Charade (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; July 3, 2016).
How are Indian Newspapers Adapting to the Rise of Digital Media? (Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism; Sumandro Chattapadhyay; July 5, 2016).
One Pokémon to Rule Them All (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; July 17, 2016).
No, India did NOT oppose the United Nations move to “make internet access a human right” (Pranesh Prakash and Japreet Grewal; Factordaily; July 13, 2016).
New Approaches to Information Privacy – Revisiting the Purpose Limitation Principle (Amber Sinha; Digital Policy Portal; July 13, 2016).

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Accessibility & Inclusion

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India has an estimated 70 million persons with disabilities who don't have access to read printed materials due to some form of physical, sensory, cognitive or other disability. As part of our endeavour to make available accessible content for persons with disabilities, we are developing a text-to-speech software in 15 languages with support from the Hans Foundation. The progress made so far in the project can be accessed here.

►NVDA and eSpeak

Monthly Report

July 2016 Report (Suman Dogra; July 31, 2016).

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Access to Knowledge

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Our Access to Knowledge programme currently consists of two projects. The Pervasive Technologies project, conducted under a grant from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), aims to conduct research on the complex interplay between low-cost pervasive technologies and intellectual property, in order to encourage the proliferation and development of such technologies as a social good. The Wikipedia project, which is under a grant from the Wikimedia Foundation, is for the growth of Indic language communities and projects by designing community collaborations and partnerships that recruit and cultivate new editors and explore innovative approaches to building projects.

►Copyright and Patent

Blog Entries

Letter to MPs on Concerns on Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (Anubha Sinha; July 27, 2016).
USTR elaborates the Two Dozen Digital Rules of Club TPP (Anubha Sinha; July 29, 2016).

Participation in Events

Mapping & Mobility (Organized by Carnegie India; June 28, 2016). Anubha Sinha attended the event.

Workshop on Declaration on Patents Protection: Regulatory Sovereignty under TRIPS (Organized by the Inter-University Centre for IPR Studies, Cochin University of Science and Technology, Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, Jawaharlal Nehru University and the Institute for Studies in Industrial Development; Institute for Studies in Industrial Development, Institutional Area, Vasant Kunj, New Delhi; July 12 - 13, 2016). Sunil Abraham was a speaker.

3rd International Conference on Management of Intellectual Property Rights and Strategy (Organized by Shailesh J. Mehta School of Management, at IIT Bombay, through the MHRD IPR Chair; July 15-16, 2016). Anubha Sinha was a speaker on the 'Negotiating India's IP Policy" panel.
India and Regional Mega-Trade Agreements (Organized by Observer Research Foundation; New Delhi; July 25, 2016). Anubha Sinha participated in a panel discussion on "India and Regional Mega-Trade Agreements" with Ambassador Robert Holleyman, Deputy US Trade Representative and Ambassador Shyam Saran, Chairman, Research and Information System for Developing Countries.
Live Webinar on Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (Organized by RCEP; New Delhi; July 27, 2016).

►Wikipedia

As part of the project grant from the Wikimedia Foundation we have reached out to more than 3500 people across India by organizing more than 100 outreach events and catalysed the release of encyclopaedic and other content under the Creative Commons (CC-BY-3.0) license in four Indian languages (21 books in Telugu, 13 in Odia, 4 volumes of encyclopaedia in Konkani and 6 volumes in Kannada, and 1 book on Odia language history in English).

Blog Entry

ತರಬೇತಿ ಮಾಡಲು ತರಬೇತಿಗೊಂಡಾಗ.... CIS-A2K TTT 2016 (Dhanalakshmi; July 3, 2016).

Participation in Event

Architectures of Knowledge (Organized by Columbia's Group for Experimental Methods in the Humanities; Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai; July 4, 2016). Rohini Lakshané was a speaker.

Media Coverage

The Digital Oxygen for Odia Language (My City Links; July 4, 2016).

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Openness

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Our work in the Openness programme focuses on open data, especially open government data, open access, open education resources, open knowledge in Indic languages, open media, and open technologies and standards - hardware and software. We approach openness as a cross-cutting principle for knowledge production and distribution, and not as a thing-in-itself.

Article

Open Source Effort gives Indigenous Language an Official Typeface (Subhashish Panigrahi; Opensource.com; July 8, 2016).

Submission

Comments on the 'Government Open Data Use License - India' (Anubha Sinha, Pranesh Prakash, and Sumandro Chattapadhyay; July 26, 2016).

Participation in Event

Open Data Charter Lead Stewards In-Person Meeting (Organized by Open Data Charter; Mexico; July 4 and 5, 2016). Sunil Abraham participated remotely.

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Internet Governance

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As part of its research on privacy and free speech, CIS is engaged with two different projects. The first one (under a grant from Privacy International and IDRC) is on surveillance and freedom of expression (SAFEGUARDS). The second one (under a grant from MacArthur Foundation) is on restrictions that the Indian government has placed on freedom of expression online.

►Privacy

Research Paper

Analysis of the Report of the Group of Experts on Developments in the Field of Information and Telecommunications in the Context of International Security and Implications for India (Elonnai Hickok and Vipul Kharbanda; July 30, 2016)

Blog Entries

Trans Pacific Partnership and Digital 2 Dozen: Implications for Data Protection and Digital Privacy (Shubhangi Heda; July 12, 2016).

Event Organized

Stand up for Digital Rights (CIS, New Delhi; July 29, 2016).

Participation in Event

Privacy Law and impact of emergent technology (National Law School of India University; Bangalore; July 12, 2016). Amber Sinha taught an elective full credit course for final year undergraduate students.

►Big Data

Blog Entry

Big Data Governance Frameworks for 'Data Revolution for Sustainable Development' (Meera Manoj; July 5, 2016).

►Freedom of Expression

Blog Entries

Perumal Murugan and the Law on Obscenity (Japreet Grewal; July 21, 2016).

CIS sought a series of information from ICANN on various topics. The DIDP Requests and the responses solicited were compiled and published by Asvatha Babu:

Participation in Events

Safety Net (Organized by APC and Point of View; Mumbai; July 11, 2016). Rohini Lakshané was a trainer.
Meeting on Net Neutrality and Related Issues (Organized by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India; July 15, 2016; New Delhi). Sunil Abraham attended the meeting.
Digital in South Asia (Organized by World Economic Forum; July 19, 2016; Bangalore). Sunil Abraham attended this event.
Roundtable: Identifying and Limiting Hate Speech and Harassment Online (Organized by SFLC; New Delhi; July 28, 2016). Japreet Grewal attended the event.

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Researchers at Work

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The Researchers at Work (RAW) programme is an interdisciplinary research initiative driven by an emerging need to understand the reconfigurations of social practices and structures through the Internet and digital media technologies, and vice versa. It aims to produce local and contextual accounts of interactions, negotiations, and resolutions between the Internet, and socio-material and geo-political processes:

Blog Entries

How are Indian Newspapers Adapting to the Rise of Digital Media? (Sumandro Chattapadhyay; July 6, 2016).
Digital Transition in Newspapers in India: A Pilot Study (Zeenab Aneez; July 19, 2016).
Policy Shaping in the Indian IT Industry: Recommendations by NASSCOM, 2006-2012 (Pavishka Mittal; July 1, 2016).
Policy Shaping in the Indian IT Industry: Comparative Analysis of Recommendations by NASSCOM and iSPIRT, 2013-2016 (Pavishka Mittal; July 4, 2016).
Policy Shaping in the Indian IT Industry: Recommendations by NASSCOM on Transfer Pricing, 2014-2016 (Pavishka Mittal; July 27, 2016).
RBI and Regulation of Digital Financial Services in India, 2012-2016 (Shivalik Chandan; July 11, 2016).
Studying Internet in India (2016): Selected Abstracts (Sumandro Chattapadhyay; July 5, 2016).

Participated in Event

The Data Explosion – How the Internet of Things will Affect Media Freedom and Communication Systems? (Sumandro Chattapadhyay was a panelist at this session organised by the Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) at the Deutsche Welle's Global Media Forum 2016, held in Bonn, Germany; June 13-15, 2016.

Event Organized

Game Studies: A Talk by Dr. Souvik Mukherjee (CIS, Bangalore, July 28, 2016). Dr. Souvik Mukherjee, Assistant Professor, Presidency University, Calcutta gave a talk on game studies, digital media, internet cultures and traditional humanities.

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About CIS

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The Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) is a non-profit organisation that undertakes interdisciplinary research on internet and digital technologies from policy and academic perspectives. The areas of focus include digital accessibility for persons with diverse abilities, access to knowledge, intellectual property rights, openness (including open data, free and open source software, open standards, open access, open educational resources, and open video), internet governance, telecommunication reform, digital privacy, and cyber-security. The academic research at CIS seeks to understand the reconfigurations of social and cultural processes and structures as mediated through the internet and digital media technologies.

► Follow us elsewhere

Twitter: http://twitter.com/cis_india
Twitter - Access to Knowledge: https://twitter.com/CISA2K
Twitter - Information Policy: https://twitter.com/CIS_InfoPolicy
Facebook - Access to Knowledge: https://www.facebook.com/cisa2k
E-Mail - Access to Knowledge: a2k@cis-india.org
E-Mail - Researchers at Work: raw@cis-india.org
List - Researchers at Work: https://lists.ghserv.net/mailman/listinfo/researchers

► Support Us

Please help us defend consumer and citizen rights on the Internet! Write a cheque in favour of 'The Centre for Internet and Society' and mail it to us at No. 194, 2nd 'C' Cross, Domlur, 2nd Stage, Bengaluru - 5600 71.

► Request for Collaboration

We invite researchers, practitioners, artists, and theoreticians, both organisationally and as individuals, to engage with us on topics related internet and society, and improve our collective understanding of this field. To discuss such possibilities, please write to Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, at sunil@cis-india.org (for policy research), or Sumandro Chattapadhyay, Research Director, at sumandro@cis-india.org (for academic research), with an indication of the form and the content of the collaboration you might be interested in. To discuss collaborations on Indic language Wikipedia projects, write to Tanveer Hasan, Programme Officer, at tanveer@cis-india.org.

CIS is grateful to its primary donor the Kusuma Trust founded by Anurag Dikshit and Soma Pujari, philanthropists of Indian origin for its core funding and support for most of its projects. CIS is also grateful to its other donors, Wikimedia Foundation, Ford Foundation, Privacy International, UK, Hans Foundation, MacArthur Foundation, and IDRC for funding its various projects.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/july-2016-newsletter

Responses to Trai’s consultation paper on free data contain some good suggestions

praskrishna — 2016-08-17T03:05:57Z

Trai has announced that it will come up with a final consultation paper on ‘Free Data’, and also a pre-consultation paper on Net Neutrality by the end of this month.

The blog post by Asheeta Regidi was published by FirstPost's Tech 2 on August 15, 2016.

The pre-consultation paper on Free Data (the Consultation Paper), which was issued in May 2016, asked for options where free data could be provided for accessing certain websites or apps without violating the Discriminatory Tariff Regulations issued earlier in February. The objective of the paper is to maximise internet penetration, and make internet available even to the poorest.

The models suggested in the Consultation Paper are a reward of free data for certain internet uses, zero data charges for accessing certain content, and refunding data charges in a manner similar to refund of LPG subsidies. These models are very similar to plans like Facebook’s Free Basics and Airtel Zero, which were banned by the Discriminatory Tariff Regulations.

While it is clear that Trai has no intention of withdrawing the Discriminatory Tariff Regulations, the Consultation Paper does appear to open up the doors to net neutrality violations again. Here’s a look at the comments and counter-comments that have come in response to this paper.

A motorist rides past a hoarding advertising Facebook’s Free Basics. Image: Reuters

Large TSPs and TSP associations want content-based free data schemes
The response of large TSPs like Vodafone, Idea and so on are quite predictable. They, alongwith most of the TSP associations such as ACTO, COAI and AUSPI, are in support of the idea of free access to certain sites. They, in fact, point out the similarities between the proposed models and the similar models brought out by them, such as Airtel’s One Touch Internet and Reliance’s Facebook Tap. They have also asked for a withdrawal of the Discriminatory Tariff Regulations, on the grounds that they hamper the innovation and forbearance capabilities of the TSPs.

They do, however, take issue with the fact that a TSP agnostic platform, or a platform which is completely independent of the TSPs, is to be given the power to decide how the lower prices or discounts are to be provided. They allege that there is nothing to prevent such a platform from acting as a gatekeeper in itself. They argue that TSPs are in a better position to perform this function, since they are subject to strict regulatory and licensing requirements from Trai.

Employees at an outsourcing centre in Bengaluru Image: Reuters

Smaller TSPs and other companies fear net neutrality violations
Smaller TSPs like Atria, Citicom and MTS are against content based free data proposal, mostly on the grounds that the models suggested violate net neutrality. They point out that allowing content based free data in any form will give an unfair advantage to large TSPs and content providers. Smaller companies and start-ups will be left in the lurch since they will not have the financial capabilities to effectively compete with such schemes. These entities also share the fear of the TSPs that there is nothing to stop a TSP agnostic platform from also acting as a gatekeeper.

Commuters with their smartphones in a Mumbai local. Image: Reuters

Some alternative suggestions for free data schemes which do not violate net neutrality
The approach suggested by Trai will, to a large extent, only benefit existing users of the internet, since a basic internet access of some sort is required before the users can enjoy the benefits of a rewards or a refund. Software Freedom Law Centre (SFLC), in its comments, points to research that found that only 12 percent of the users of zero rating services abroad (no data charges for certain websites), started using it because of the zero rating. Clearly, these schemes are not achieving the objective of increasing internet usage, and an alternative solution is required.

Many of the responses came up with alternative suggestions for free data schemes which can increase internet usage without violating net neutrality. Some of these suggestions are listed below:

The Digital Empowerment Foundation suggests the provision of free data quotas or packs, which would give a limited amount of data free of charge to all consumers. Any data usage above the basic pack will be charged at normal rates. It also suggests making such packs mandatory as a part of the TSP licensing terms or alternatively subsidising the cost of these packs through other benefits to the TSPs.
MTS suggests that content providers be allowed free internet access for a limited time or quantity, such as 30 minutes per day, or 100MB per day, to certain groups, like low income groups.
Mozilla and SFLC suggest the ‘equal rating’ system, where a small amount of data per day is made available free of charge to all internet users, over and above whatever other packs they may have purchased.
The Centre for Internet and Society suggests that the government allow TSPs to provide free internet to all, at a lower speed, and in return exempt the TSPs from the USO contributions in their license fees. This will ensure free data to all without differentiating based on content.
SFLC also suggests an increase in free public Wi-Fi hotspots, like the kind being made available in Indian railway stations, to increase internet accessibility without content-based discrimination.
MTNL suggests that if content-based free data is to be allowed, the government should determine what constitutes the basic services to be allowed for free, such as railway booking services, and not leave this to the understanding of the TSPs.
MTS also suggests that content providers be allowed to give data-based rewards for certain activity, such as watching associated advertisements.
Atria suggests that if free data is to be allowed, first establish a negative list of what cannot be done, such as no throttling of speeds.

Anonymous protests against Internet laws in Mumbai. Image: Reuters

First establish ground rules of net neturality
One common aspect of most of the comments to the Consultation Paper was the confusion regarding Trai’s stance on net neutrality. Many entities, including the large TSPs, pointed out the contradiction between this Consultation Paper and the Discriminatory Tariff Regulations.

This paper gives the impression that the Discriminatory Tariff Regulations were issued not to prevent content based discrimination, but to prevent telecom service providers from becoming ‘gatekeepers’. In reality, that is not the main fear of the people, but the fear that net neutrality will be affected. The culprits might be anyone, whether it is the TSP, the content provider or the TSP agnostic platform suggested by Trai. It needs to modify its approach, and first lay down the fundamental rules on net neutrality. Any other regulations must first comply with these rules.

While the motives of Trai are laudible, it is hoped that Trai will look into the several suggestions made that will achieve the dual targets of maximum internet penetration as well as securing net neutrality.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/first-post-tech-2-august-15-2016-asheeta-regidi-responses-to-trai-consultation-paper-on-free-data-contain-some-good-suggestions

WikiConference India 2016 Submission: We, Men, Women: Collective Learning in Bridging Indic Wikipedia Gender Gaps

Elisachang — 2016-08-17T02:37:01Z

There is no denying that non-English Wikipedias are disproportionally underrepresented in scholarly focus despite the significant role of an open knowledge society can play in smaller linguistic groups – local collaboration and communication, knowledge dissemination, as well as preservation of local language resources.

A presentation was made at the WikiIndia Conference 2016.

Likewise, for the issue of the Wikipedia gender gap, missing the discourse and context of the Indian language Wikipedias’ gender imbalance will be a great loss considering the potential it possesses in gender empowerment and the recognition of female’s accomplishment in the local communities.

In this action research, we approach the issue with localized lens to investigate the gender gaps in five Indian language Wikipedias (Kannada, Konkani, Telugu, Odia, and Marathi) and to recode female participants' experiences in editing, negotiating, and communicating. However, this is not an ordinary gender gap bridging plan, we are not only promoting the idea of female-inclusive open knowledge society, but also actively searching for effective incentives, tangible outcomes, and sustainable strategies to cope with the challenges in respective contexts. Most importantly, we hope to create an example for the establishment of “community feedback loops” for reflective learning. Combining practical approach with theories in Feminism and Social Network, we ask.

How do female and women’s organizations perceive Wikipedia and its use on knowledge production?
How do we incentivize females and various female organization and make them feel empowered through online contribution?
What type(s) of network are ideal for female newcomers? How can we improve cross-community/gender communication?
How can we build a more welcoming platform for collaboration?

Indian language Wikipedias may be small, but they are in the phase of much flexibility and opportunities to shape and reshape the cultures and dynamics. Through the cyclical process of an action reaction, narrowing gender gaps in our local Wikipedias is no longer discrete events of individual efforts – but a collective action, a mutual learning, as what Wikipedias were built for.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/wikiconference-india-2016-submission-we-men-women-collective-learning-in-bridging-indic-wikipedia-gender-gaps

WikiConference India 2016 Submission: How to better tell your Wikimedia Community Story using Media as a Tool

subha — 2016-08-17T02:24:19Z

The Wikimedia community has constantly struggled to a) reach out to masses and tell them about their contribution, and motivate people to contribute to the Wikimedia projects. Media plays a very important role in spreading the word about Wikimedia projects and the contributor community, and at times, encouraging the audience to contribute.

A presentation was made at the WikiConference India 2016. This was one of the submissions which was accepted.

This has not been a very successful trend in the movement so far that a large number of people have engaged on Wikimedia projects because of a media shoutout. But there is no doubt about media being a great tool to engage with a large number of people. Apart from the mainstream media, social media has also been a gamechanger in mobilizing masses. The audience in both these kinds of media demand a certain kind of content and storytelling. And it is not easy to create relevant content for an audience that is hungry for new stories. Also, dealing with mainstream media has a lot to do with interpersonal skills.

This workshop would cover a few best practices from lessons learned from several media-related exercises in the recent years. Some of these exercises come with success and some with failures with some specific learning. And these important takeaways will hopefully lead a path in creating some kind open education resources (OER) for the Wikimedia community. However, none of the methodologies that are going to be discussed here are going to be ready solutions to change the awareness about the Wikimedia movement overnight. But these will certainly help the participants map their own community stories. The interactive workshop will help the participants to make some roadmap for a regular and sustained engagement on media.

Those who are keen on learning about using different media tools and take their Wikimedia stories to a wider world should consider participating this. It would be beneficial if they come prepared with a list of challenges that they are facing in media outreach.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/wikiconference-india-2016-submission-how-to-better-tell-your-wikimedia-community-story-using-media-as-a-tool

Using technology to address issues

praskrishna — 2016-08-15T04:26:21Z

Can technology help the visually-disabled, who have no access to books and reading resources in their schools?

The article was published in the Hindu on August 14, 2016. Nirmita Narasimhan was quoted.

Currently, they are provided Braille books, most of which do not cover the schooling syllabus or are provided late in an academic year. This forces them to depend on scribes or someone to read out textbooks — something most cannot afford.

It is here that technology can provide some semblance of independence, believes Nirmita Narasimhan, policy director at The Centre for Internet and Society. “Open source screen readers are available in over 10 languages. During the time of publishing of textbooks, all that needs to be done is to prepare a digital copy. Within no time, audio for the blind will be available,” she said, adding that this was one of the demands put for inclusion in the National Education Policy.

Teachers can be trained to use these readers. They can guide students, she said.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/news/the-hindu-august-14-2016-using-technology-to-address-issues

Telugu Wikipedians create Articles on Punjab in Telugu Wikipedia

praskrishna — 2016-08-12T14:02:20Z

Telugu Wikipedians created articles on Punjab in a national level contest. Telugu Wikipedians received a trophy during the closing ceremony of Wiki conference India at Chandigarh.

Telugu Wikipedians created more than 450 articles about Punjab in Telugu Wiki and shared their experiences with English and Malayalam Wikpedians. Along with Pranay Raj, Pavan santhosh worked in co-ordination and Viswanadh in organizing support for this edit-a-thon. Venkata Ramana, Meena Gayathri, Ravi Chandra, Pavan Santhosh, Murali Mohan, Sujatha, Sultan Khadar, Viswanadh, Bhaskara Naidu, Manikantha, Rahmanuddin, Rajasekhar and few others participated in this edit-a-thon and created Punjab related articles such as Punjab cuisine, Punjabi language, history of Sikhism, Punjabi way of dressing, Punjabi dialects and many such aspects. Telugu Wikipedians also made a presentation on the various developments in Telugu Wikipedia.

Media Coverage

Telugu regional press covered the Punjab edit-a-thon and about the Telugu Wikipedia winning the trophy. The Centre for Internet and Society provided support by releasing an open press note that could be edited by the Wikipedia community in Village pump for press relations.

Coverage in Sakshi

Coverage in Eenadu

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/telugu-wikipedia-articles-on-punjab-media-coverage

And now, Aadhaar-enabled smartphones for easy verification and money transfer

praskrishna — 2016-08-12T02:50:58Z

As reported earlier, the Indian government has planned to make Aadhaar-enabled smartphones , with which users would be able to self-authenticate and let businesses and banks verify the identity of their clients. This would also help in the government's aim of a cashless society.

The article was published in Business Insider on August 10, 2016. Sunil Abraham was quoted.

While applauding this plan Nandan Nikelani, former chairman of UIDAI told ET that, "Iris and fingerprint sensors are now becoming a standard feature in smartphones anyway, and this requirement will only take a minor tweak to the operating system. Once enabled, people will be able to use phones to do self-authentication and KYC (know your customer)."

In July, senior executives of UIDAI and smartphone companies met to discuss ways to allow smartphones let citizens authenticate their fingerprints and iris on the phone, so that they could avail government services from the comfort of their homes.

The most immediate use for these smartphones would be the Unified Payment Interface (UPI), a new payment system which would allow money transfer between any two parties by simply using their mobile phones and a virtual payment address.

"The two-factor authentication in UPI is now being done with mobile phone as one factor, and MPIN as the second factor. But once you have Aadhaar authentication on the phone, then the second factor can be biometric authentication through Aadhaar," said Nilekani.

With time, Aadhaar authentication will also be made open to third party apps, said another person familiar with the ongoing discussions on the condition of anonymity.

This would let users allow apps to access their biometric and iris scans, just like they grant access to other features like camera, contacts, SMS etc. However, from their end, handset makers have raised security concerns about using iris scan for Aadhar authentication.

"The primary challenge lies in safe storing of the iris scan between the time it is captured by the camera and then sent to UIDAI server seeking authentication," said an industry insider.

For this, the he proposal includes a "hardware secure zone" which would encrypt biometric data before sending it out. However, even this isn't a foolproof idea.

"Unfortunately, from the biometric sensor the data goes to the hardware secure zone via the operating system. Therefore, the biometric data can be intercepted by the operating system before it is sent to the hardware secure zone," said Sunil Abraham, executive director at Bengaluru-based research organisation, the Centre for Internet and Society.

To this, Nilekani said, "the reluctance to make changes at the vendor level is mainly coming from a desire for control of biometric data for strategic and commercial purposes. Privacy and security are bogus reasons." He added that both ends, the handset and the Aadhaar database, will be using the highest level of encryption.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/business-insider-august-10-2016-and-now-aadhaar-enabled-smartphones-for-easy-verification-and-money-transfer

Wikipedia WikiMeetup at Bangalore

praskrishna — 2016-08-12T13:31:04Z

Bangalore based Wikipedians will gather for a meeting at the Centre for Internet and Society on Sunday, August 14, 2016 at 3.00 p.m.

Anyone interested in Wikipedia (user, contributor or curious about it). Wikipedians from any part of India or the world and anyone who is interested in Wikipedia! Meetup is open to members of all Wikimedia projects and Wikipedians from all languages. All are welcome, and we are especially interested in seeing newcomers to join the experienced Wikipedians/Wikimedians.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/events/wikipedia-wikimeetup-at-bangalore

US Copyright law faces constitutional challenge

sinha — 2016-08-11T13:28:13Z

In a major international development, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has filed a lawsuit to strike down the provisions on Digital Rights Management(DRM) in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. In this post, I discuss DRMs, the EFF lawsuit, and then draw upon the differences between the US and Indian copyright regime on DRM protection.

Originally published by Spicy IP on August 5, 2016. You may read EFF’s lawsuit here.

Decoding DRM

If you own a Netflix account and travel a lot, you may have been denied access to some TV shows depending on the country you logged in from. While that restriction can perhaps be gotten around by using VPNs, there exist other technological measures that prevent you from fixing your own automobile to sharing/making copies of an e-book that you supposedly bought. Such technological protection measures are commonly known as Digital Rights Management (DRM). These go back twenty years, and it was in 1996 when the first DRM appeared in the form of geo-access restrictions on DVD play.

Soon thereafter, it became de rigeur for businesses dealing in IP to apply all kinds of DRMs to their products. It was largely an embarrassing and a pointless saga of implementing software embedded restrictions to stem piracy (remember the Sony BMG rootkit fiasco?), given how blatantly they were discovered and circumvented. And now since technology is beginning to dwell even in our shoes, DRMs have been slapped onto these as well. So if you discover a bug causing a miscalculation in your step count, you are not only prohibited under law from probing the code and fixing it yourself, but you also may get jailed for doing so. Imagine such how such prohibition impacts and limits our daily lives and the work of professional researchers.

Clearly, DRM is not just a mere trifle to be brushed aside via smarter code– its ramifications go much farther. DRMs come with the problem of masking vulnerabilities, compromised security of the device and us er-privacy, and trampled consumer rights, fair use and free speech. Further, the poor design of DRMs makes them unable to distinguish between illegal use and fair-use. Progressive cutting down of users’ rights to store, reproduce, distribute media has become especially problematic for developing countries because of our greater dependence on free-er terms for sale, lending and donation. On the other hand, DRMs continue to become more ubiquitous(could be incorporated in the HTML 5 standard soon).

However, in an exciting development, the first major legal battle to kill DRM has begun!

Because finally in an unprecedented move, a constitutional challenge has been lodged in the US against DRM provisions, on the grounds that they restrict free speech and fair-use of copyright materials (the fair-use doctrine allows copyright law to co-exist with the first amendment). The complaint has been filed by EFF on behalf of Matthew Green (a security researcher) and Andrew “bunnie” Huang (a technologist)

The rejection that prompted a legal challenge..

Sections 1201-1205 of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) lay down provisions relating to circumvention of DRM. Uniquely, the DMCA vests power in the Librarian of Congress to periodically enact rules granting exemption from the anti-circumvention provisions to legitimate non-infringing use of works (known as DMCA Rulemaking). It was under this particular instance of rulemaking in 2015, wherein the Librarian failed to grant an exemption for “…speech using clips of motion pictures, for the shifting of lawfully-acquired media to different formats and devices, and for certain forms of security research.” The rejection triggered the challenge against ‘Rulemaking’, ‘anti-circumvention’ and ‘anti-trafficking’ provisions of the DMCA, namely sections 1201(a), 1203, and 1204 . (This exemption was applied for by EFF, which has been seeking (and been granted) exemptions since 2003.)

In fact, universally, DRM provisions pose questions of free speech, consumer rights, privacy and copyright law. In the following section I will examine and compare the US and Indian copyright regime on DRM protection.

WCT and DMCA were used to push DRM protection into Indian Copyright Act

The Indian Copyright Act, 1957 provisions on DRM are based in sections 2(xa), 65A and 65B, which were introduced through the Copyright Amendment Act, 2012. The sections define ‘Rights Management Information’, provide for ‘Protection of technological measures’ and ‘Protection of Rights Management Information’, respectively. It must be noted that the WIPO Copyright Treaty (WCT) was the first instrument to conceive rules on DRM protection (Articles 11, 12). US was the first country to import WCT provisions into its copyright law via DMCA, which even went above the WCT standards. Soon, Hollywood-backed USTR wanted India to follow suit, and the provisions were queued up for an amendment to India’s copyright law. Please note that India is NOT a party to the WCT, and was under no obligation to enact laws on DRMs. Nevertheless, the Indian provisions with some changes and added limitations were loosely lifted from the equivalent WCT articles.

It is worth noting that the Indian DRM provisions have better safeguards than the DMCA provisions:

1) The Indian provisions (s. 65A+ 65B) do not make building and distribution of circumvention tools illegal. Only the act of circumvention attracts criminal liability. However, there is a duty on the person facilitating circumvention for another person to maintain a record of the same, including the purpose for which the facilitation occurred. The purpose should not be expressly prohibited under the Copyright Act, 1957.

Regardless, being criminally liable for circumventing DRM is a major threat to small businesses and developers. In one instance, when some Indian developers had built an open source software “PlayFair” to bypass Apple’s FairPlay DRM, they were threatened with legal action under the US’ DMCA. Despite the DMCA having no jurisdiction in India, the developers shut shop.

2) Clauses 65A(1) and 65A(2)(a) confine violation of technological protection measures to rights enumerated in the act, only. This means that the section does not restrict circumventions which attempt to get access to the underlying work.

While India has not seen major challenges to this provision, in 2013 the Delhi High Court injuncted persons from jailbreaking into Sony Playstations. Amlan analysed the order and questioned it in terms of the Court finding the act of ‘modifying the playstation without Sony’s consent’ illegal. Because, if you read section 65A (emphasis supplied is mine):

65A. Protection of Technological Measures

(1) Any person who circumvents an effective technological measure applied for the purpose of protecting any of the rights conferred by this Act, with the intention of infringing such rights, shall be punishable with imprisonment which may extend to two years and shall also be liable to fine.

(2) Nothing in sub-section (1) shall prevent any person from:

(a) doing anything referred to therein for a purpose not expressly prohibited by this Act:

Provided that any person facilitating circumvention by another person of a technological measure for such a purpose shall maintain a complete record of such other person including his name, address and all relevant particulars necessary to identify him and the purpose for which he has been facilitated; or

(b) doing anything necessary to conduct encryption research using a lawfully obtained encrypted copy; or

(c) conducting any lawful investigation; or

(d) doing anything necessary for the purpose of testing the security of a computer system or a computer network with the authorisation of its owner; or

(e) operator; or [sic]

(f) doing anything necessary to circumvent technological measures intended for identification or surveillance of a user; or

(g) taking measures necessary in the interest of national security.

Clause (1) clearly states that the law is only applicable to such technological protection measures applied to protect any of the rights conferred by the copyright act. Which raises the questions of which rights are affected when OS of the playstation is modified, and how does the modification amount to copyright infringement? One may perhaps draw that the Court in this order placed the ‘consent’ of Sony above the law.

3) S. 65A(2) safeguards certain acts which also exist as exceptions granted in the Copyright Act. These enumerated acts may be performed without attracting liability: for instance, circumventions for purposes of encryption research, security testing, lawful investigation, evading surveillance by DRM are kosher. Note that s. 65A(2)(g) permits circumvention in the interest of national security.

(For a detailed exegesis of these provisions, please read this piece.)

A look at the draconian DMCA provisions

As I mentioned earlier, the DMCA provisions on DRMs are much stricter compared to the Indian copyright act. Both circumvention(s. 1201(a)(1)), and building and distribution of circumvention tools(s. 1201(a)(2)) are illegal and punishable. The DMCA also meticulously defines circumvention, in terms of “circumventing a technological measure” and “circumventing protection afforded by a technological measure.”

More alarmingly, these provisions envisage access controls as well as use controls. So a person decrypting a DVD to gain access to the work would be held liable for infringement (unlike in India where only the act of copying or modifying the work would trigger infringement). It is also worth noting that there is no clause stating that circumvention (and tools) of only those DRMs is illegal when the DRMs protect rights conferred under the DMCA.

While s. 1201(c) states that the section shall not affect “…rights, remedies, limitations or defenses to copyright infringement, including fair-use…” Further, there do exist exemptions to clauses(a)(1) and (2):

Exemption for nonprofit libraries, archives and educational institutions; and
Exemption for the purposes of law enforcement, intelligence and other government activities, reverse engineering (solely for the purposes of achieving interoperability), restricting internet access to minors, protecting personally identifiable information, security testing, encryption research, etc.

While the list seems to permit circumvention for a wide range of purposes and fair-use, the vague and narrow language has failed the implementation of these exemptions. EFF lists a bunch of these instances where the DRM provisions have been not necessarily used against pirates, but also scientists, consumers and legit competitors.

Further, the DMCA left it entirely to the US copyright agencies to carve exemptions for non-infringing uses of works on a triennial basis. This rulemaking procedure has received heavy criticism, and as a result of the 2015 rejection the Library of the Congress finds itself in a legal soup.

Finally, the EFF lawsuit also illustrates the violations of the plaintiffs rights to free speech and fair-use, as a direct result of the provisions and the Rulemaking process. Armed with a strong case, and as Cory Doctorow puts it, we may witness the eradication of DRM in our lifetime. And I will be following the developments closely and keep our readers updated.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/us-copyright-law-faces-constitutional-challenge

Aadhaar-enabled smartphones will ease money transfer

praskrishna — 2016-08-10T13:33:54Z

With its plans to make smartphones Aadhaar-enabled, the government hopes to provide users a means to do self-authentication and let businesses and banks verify the identity of their clients through their smartphones, a move that could potentially lead the way to a cashless society.

The article by Neha Alawadhi and Gulveen Aulakh was published in the Economic Times on August 10, 2016. Sunil Abraham was quoted.

"Iris and fingerprint sensors are now becoming a standard feature in smartphones anyway, and this requirement will only take a minor tweak to the operating system. Once enabled, people will be able to use phones to do self-authentication and KYC (know your customer)," Nandan Nikelani, former chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India, told ET, welcoming the government's plan to make smartphones Aadhaar-enabled.

ET was the first to report that on July 27 a meeting between UIDAI, which administers Aadhaar, and senior executives of smartphone-makers discussed ways to allow smartphone handsets let citizens authenticate their fingerprints and iris on the phone to get services. The most immediate use for the Aadhaar-enabled smartphones is the Unified Payment Interface (UPI), the new payment system that allows money transfer between any two parties using mobile phones and a virtual payment address.

"The two-factor authentication in UPI is now being done with mobile phone as one factor, and MPIN as the second factor. But once you have Aadhaar authentication on the phone, then the second factor can be biometric authentication through Aadhaar," said Nilekani. Over time, the idea is to open Aadhaar authentication to third party apps, said another person familiar with the ongoing discussions, who did not wish to be named.

In effect, biometric and iris scan authentication could become one of the permissions a user grants to different third party apps, such as access to camera, contacts, phone book and so on. Handset makers have raised concerns about some security issues on using iris scan for Aadhar authentication. Also, companies such as Apple that have very closed ecosystems, would not be easy to get on board, several people told ET.

"The primary challenge lies in safe storing of the iris scan between the time it is captured by the camera and then sent to UIDAI server seeking authentication," said an industry insider, who is aware of the discussions, requesting anonymity. The proposal for smartphone makers includes a "hardware secure zone" where biometric data will be encrypted and sent out. It will not leave the electronic secure zone without encryption, and every phone doing Aadhaar authentication will be registered in the UID system.

"Unfortunately, from the biometric sensor the data goes to the hardware secure zone via the operating system. Therefore, the biometric data can be intercepted by the operating system before it is sent to the hardware secure zone," said Sunil Abraham, executive director at Bengaluru-based research organisation, the Centre for Internet and Society.

"The reluctance to make changes at the vendor level are mainly coming from a desire for control of biometric data for strategic and commercial purposes. Privacy and security are bogus reasons," Nilekani said, adding that both ends - the handset and the Aadhaar database -- will use the highest level of encryption.

Samsung India, which in May launched the Galaxy Tab Iris, a device that uses Aadhaar authentication, said it has taken care that its user's biometric data does not fall into the wrong hands. "We ensure that biometric data is encrypted as per UIDAI specifications in device itself for Galaxy Tab Iris," Sukesh Jain, vice president, Samsung India Electronics, told ET in an email response.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/economic-times-august-10-2016-neha-alawadhi-gulveen-aulakh-aadhaar-enabled-smartphones-will-ease-money-transfer

Community digest: Konkani language speakers are separated by scripts but unite by Wikipedia; news in brief

subha — 2016-08-07T03:11:06Z

Konkani-language Wikipedians on what they think of Wikipedia as a binding factor for native speakers who speak in different variations of the same language and write in different scripts.

This was published on Wikimedia Blog on August 4, 2016

I reached out to a few Goan Konkani Wikipedians to learn about their experience with the project, especially after it went live in 2015. In the interview they share what they think of Wikipedia as a binding factor for native speakers that are currently dispersed in many states, speak in different variations of the same language, and write in different scripts.

Subhashish Panigrahi (SP): Hi The Discoverer [a long time contributor to Wikipedia who is actively contributing to the Goan Konkani Wikipedia], you have been actively contributing to the Goan Konkani Wikipedia since 2006 even before it went live in 2014. What potential do you see in the Goan Konkani Wikipedia bringing Konkani speakers from the states of Goa, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Kerala?
User:The Discoverer (TD): Even though my first contributions were in 2006, I have been moderately active on Wikipedia all these years.

I do agree with you that Konkani Wikipedia has the potential to bind people across borders. As you have rightly pointed out, Konkani is remarkable in that, for the small geographical area where it is a native language, it has developed a large number of dialects, in addition to being used in multiple scripts. Unfortunately, in the offline world, we see that there are disagreements over certain Konkani scripts being favored or not favored in terms of official recognition. Konkani Wikipedia can not only be a platform in bringing together Konkani speakers from many regions but can also be the unifying factor among the Konkani people.

SP: How do think Wikipedia could be a good platform to help unifying the Konkani people?
TD: For Konkani Wikipedia to succeed, it is not just a ‘good idea’ for Konkani speakers writing in various scripts to work together on one Wikipedia, but it’s also a necessity and a challenge at the same time. It’s a necessity, because as things stand, no one script has a strong enough community to run a Wikipedia by themselves. It’s a challenge because not everyone can read every script, and it’s important for all the users of a Wikipedia to be able to understand all the content on that site.

SP: Very rightly spotted. And how do you think the Wikipedia community and the CIS-A2K program should work together to tackle this challenge?
TD: We need an automatic script converter (see the script converter resource page for Konkani on Meta and task on Phabricator) that could make the lives of the editors easier. Most people cannot read more than two scripts. Most users are currently depending on an external site for transliteration when the user cannot read the script used in a Wikipedia article. That’s painful and a user might also would not know about a third party converter. An automatic script converter on Wikipedia would enable people to read any page in the script of their choice in a single click. This is where CIS-A2K can really help Konkani Wikipedia, by helping to implement the script converter. In addition to the script converter, CIS-A2K could also study various multi-script Wikipedias in existence and prepare a list of such features that are used in these Wikipedias to deal with multiple scripts, so that Indian multi-script Wikipedias can consider implementing such a feature as well.

Konkani Wikipedia is facing another challenge right now in growing the community as there are only handful of active editors. And we need contributors from varied walks of life to add more diversity to the community. The boost that was needed initially to make Konkani Wikipedia live—thanks to institutions like Goa University (GU) and Nirmala Institute of Education (NIE) and CIS-A2K for bringing in many student-editors—needs more intensity now. Students from GU and NIE were mainly from the Konkani language and teaching disciplines. If you consider other larger Wikipedias, like the English Wikipedia, they owe their success to editing by people from a diverse backgrounds, and also to the fact that the people are comfortable with the basics of markup and coding and were able to build templates, etc. Today, there is almost no one who is working on templates and other similar technical stuff for Konkani Wikipedia. Here too, CIS-A2K can help by reaching out to Konkani speakers with a background in computing—for instance, students of Bachelor of Computer Application (BCA), Master in Computer Application, Computer Science and engineering. This will help build a community that is technically adept at creating templates and dealing with more advanced types of content for the Wikipedia.

The Konkani Wikipedia can also take advantage of software extensions like VisualEditor and Flow that the knowledge of markup and other technicalities that the user needs to have, so that users who are uncomfortable with editing markup can focus on just adding content with a much more simple and user-friendly interface.

In these ways, participation of people from different regional and vocational backgrounds can form a vibrant editing community leading to the growth of the Konkani Wikipedia.

In brief

WikiConference India 2016 to be held at Chandigarh during August 5–7: The second WikiConference India (WCI) will be held on August 5-7 in Chandigarh, India. After the first WCI in 2011, this will be the largest gathering of the Wikimedians from the Indian subcontinent. A team of volunteers representing several Wikimedia communities across the country and three Wikimedia affiliates—Wikimedia India, Punjabi Wikimedians and Centre for Internet and Society’s Access to Knowledge program—are working together to make this event a success. Over 100 scholarships have been offered to noteworthy contributors from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka. Various talks, meetups and workshops are planned for the three-day event, and a needs assessment survey has been put in place for ensuring any hackathon needs are addressed.
Punjab edit-a-thon: A month-long edit-a-thon has been running in 12 Indic language Wikipedias and one European language Wikipedia (the Ukrainian) to enrich the content related to Punjab, the Punjabi people, and their language and culture. So far, more than 1000 articles have been created by about 100 Wikipedians. As we have already surpassed the dream target of 1000 articles, we are planning to extend the edit-a-thon through WikiConference India so many can participate during the event.
Campaign for relicensing copyrighted books under Creative Commons licenses: A campaign has been started to relicense Telugu-language books of several noted authors from “all rights reserved” to a Creative Commons Share-Alike (CC BY-SA) license. This campaign was started on June 19 and copyright migration process is complete for 17 books so far. Once the copyright migration is over the books—ranging from historical figures and popular personalities to regional history—are going to be digitized on Wikisource. “I don’t want these works to be in bookshelf and get wasted by termites. My wish as an author and researcher is to make these works available to future historians who can make use of it, so that our people get to know the local history” shares Kanuri Badarinadh, a historian, novelist and journalist who has donated some of his books.
Train-the-trainer and Mediawiki training program for capacity building of community leaders from Indian subcontinent: After two iterations of the Train the Trainer in 2013 and 2015, CIS-A2K organized the third program during June 15-17 at Bengaluru. The Mediawiki training was designed to help groom technical leadership skills of the technical contributors of the communities. A total of 45 participants, that were selected by a collaborative consultation with the community, took part in these events. The trainers for both the events consisted of subject experts from the Wikimedia community, the free knowledge movement, the free and open source software community and CIS-A2K program staff. A series of small Mediawiki trainings will follow soon that will be led by the trained participants.
Indian women in Science edit-a-thon: Organized by IndiaBioscience, a not-for-profit working for research and advocacy on the life sciences in India, this edit-a-thon began with an introduction to the series of Wikipedia edit-a-thons that have been running to expand Wikipedia’s reach on Indian women with contribution to Science. There was a Q&A session Professor Vaishnavi Ananthanarayanan followed by introduction to Wikipedia editing, its policies and guidelines, and brief on copyright, and Creative Commons licensing. 11 new articles were created and 11 existing articles were expanded in English, Hindi and Odia-language Wikipedias.
Indigenous South-Asian language gets a new open Unicode font: A new font for the Ol chiki script (used to write the Santali language) along with input tools are getting ready to be released soon. Santali is spoken by over 6 million people in South Asia over Bangladesh and Nepal and six states in India. This project, supported by the Centre for Internet of India, will help native language speakers type in Unicode across platforms, and also using Universal Language System in all Wikimedia projects.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/community-digest-konkani-language-speakers-are-separated-by-scripts-but-unite-by-wikipedia-news-in-brief

Why experts are worried about Aadhaar-based authentication

praskrishna — 2016-08-07T02:16:29Z

As private companies are increasingly using Aadhaar data, is the privacy and security of personal data really at risk? What do those defending Aadhaar have to say?

The post was published in Citizen Matters on August 2, 2016. Amber Sinha was quoted.

The Unique Identification numbers of Aadhaar card holders are being extensively used by government and private agencies for authentication purposes, as we have already seen in an earlier article.

There are 246 registered Authentication User Agencies in India, both government and private, which are helping organisations and individuals in executing the authentication process. In simple terms, they help the organisation that has placed the authentication request, to confirm the identity of a person during hiring, lending loans or while implementing welfare schemes.

But all does not seem well with the Aadhaar authentication process. Concerns have been raised about the privacy and security aspects and, loopholes in the law.

The amended Aadhaar Bill (now, Aadhaar Act) has a clause that allows the UIDAI to respond to any authentication query “with a positive, negative or any other appropriate response.” This move has drawn a lot of criticism from the activist fraternity. They have questioned the government on framing an Act that places the security and privacy of individual citizens at risk.

Even before the Bill was passed, legal scholar Usha Ramanathan had, in an article published in Scroll.in, expressed concern over private agencies using the Aadhaar database for authenticating the identity of an individual.

“Very little was heard about the interest private companies would have in this information data base. It is not until the 2016 Bill was introduced in Lok Sabha that we were told, expressly, that just about any person or company may draw on the Aadhaar system for its purposes. There are no qualifications or limits on who may use it and why. It depends on the willingness of the Unique Identification Authority of India, which is undertaking the project, to let them become a part of the Aadhaar system,” she wrote.

What’s crucial in the entire process is how the government is allowing private players to use Aadhaar-based information, putting the privacy of Aadhaar-holders at stake. The government is technically allowed to share the Aadhaar information with other agencies, only if the holder has given consent to sharing his information, during enrollment.

The guidelines for recording Aadhaar demographic data states: “Ask resident’s consent to whether it is alright with the resident if the information captured is shared with other organisations for the purpose of welfare services including financial services. Select appropriate circle to capture residents response as - Yes/No.”

In 2011, Citizen Matters had published a report on how people wanting to register for Aadhaar were not asked if they would agree to share their personal information. Citizens seemingly were unaware of the provision for sharing information with a third party and data operators had reportedly not asked them for their consent before marking ‘yes’ for the consent option.

There remains a regulatory vacuum

In less than four months of the enactment of the Aadhaar Act, the number of private agencies using Aadhaar database for identity authentication too has grown long. Amber Sinha, Programme Officer at the Center for Internet and Society expresses concern over the privacy implications that a project of this magnitude would lead to.

“The original idea of Aadhaar was to use it for providing services under welfare schemes. But the Aadhaar Act lets private agencies avail the Aadhaar authentication service. The scope of the Act itself doesn’t envisage sharing the data with private parties, but if any third party wants to authenticate the identity of an individual, they can use the UIDAI repository for the purpose,” he points out.

In the process, Amber says, the CIDR has to send a reply in ‘yes’ or ‘no’ format, for any request seeking to confirm the identity of an individual. The new legislation gives scope for the authorities to respond to a query with a positive, negative or any other appropriate response.

“The Aadhaar enrollment information includes demographic and biometric details. So at this stage, we do not know what that “other appropriate response” stands for. Further, while there are requirements to take the data subject’s consent under the Act, there is lack of clarity on the oversight mechanisms and control mechanisms in place when a private party collects information for authentication. The UIDAI is yet to frame the rules and the rules will probably determine this. Until the rules are framed, some of the issues will exist in regulatory vacuum,” Amber observes.

Under the current circumstances, Amber says, the responsible thing to do for UIDAI is not to make such services available until the rules are framed.

But why has the Authority then started the authentication process even before the rules have been framed? Assistant Director General of the Authentication and Application Division of UIDAI, Ajai Chandra says the rules when framed will have retrospective effect, from the date the Act was enacted.

Activists have also questioned the UIDAI for allowing private agencies to use and authenticate Aadhaar data, when the Supreme Court has restricted the use of Aadhaar. In its last order dated 15 October 2015, the Apex Court allowed the government to use Aadhaar in implementing selective welfare schemes such as PDS, LPG distribution, MGNREGS, pension schemes, PMJDY and EPFO. It makes no mention about the UIDAI using the Aadhaar data repository to provide services to private agencies.

“When the Supreme Court has restricted the use of Aadhaar number to a few specific government programmes only, how can UIDAI allow the data to be used for any other programmes, let alone by private agencies?” Amber asks.

In a very brief conversation, Reena Saha, Additional DG, UIDAI told Citizen Matters that UIDAI was acting as per the Supreme Court’s order dated October 15th. “We aren’t sharing the data with private agencies,” she said.

‘Authentication happening only with consent’

Srikanth Nadhamuni, CEO of Khosla Labs - a registered Authentication User Agency, who was also the Head of Technologies at UIDAI, rejects the accusations on the security aspect, saying that the authentication system is completely secure and foolproof.

“We have made a secure system so that there is no man in the middle taking the biometric information. The biometric information shared on the application is encrypted and neither the AUA nor the Authentication Service Agency (an intermediary between the AUA and the CIDR) can open it. Both the AUA and ASA will sign on the packet and forward it to the data repository as it is. There is no way that we can figure out what is inside the packet. Once the request reaches the data repository, they will unlock the signatures, run the authentication and reply in ‘yes’ or ‘no’ or with an error code,” Srikanth explains.

ADG Chandra says that at present the CIDR is replying to authentication requests in an “yes/no” format. “We aren’t sharing the data with any agencies. Upon receiving the request for authentication, be it demographic, biometric or one time pin (OTP), a notification is sent to the registered mobile / email address of the Aadhaar holder,” he says. So if the Aadhaar holder has changed the address, phone number, email ID etc after Aadhaar enrollment, he/she should update the data with UIDAI by placing a request online or through post. This will avoid any confusion that may occur during the authentication.

Ajai Chandra further clarifies, “the private agencies seeking authentication (the Authentication User Agency) are not given direct access to the database. On receiving the request, the intermediary Authentication Service Agencies first examine the format of the authentication request. The request is forwarded to the CIDR only if it complies with the format.”

Apart from authentication, the eKYC (Know Your Customer) option also allows companies to retrieve eKYC data of the Aadhaar holder. This data includes photo, name, address, gender and date of birth (excludes mobile number and email ID). But in this case too, “eKYC data can be retrieved only with the consent of the Aadhaar card holder, the person has to be adequately informed about the retrieval and the data cannot be shared with a third party,” says Chandra.

Though Aadhaar Act allows the UIDAI to perform authentication of Aadhaar number, subject to the requesting entity paying the fee, UIDAI at present is providing the service free of cost. “We will provide free service till December 2016 and may levy the fee thereafter,” the ADG says.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/bangalore-citizen-matters-august-2-2016-akshatha-why-experts-are-worried-about-aadhaar-based-authentication

WikiConference India 2016

praskrishna — 2016-08-07T01:35:50Z

WikiConference India 2016 is an event to provide a common platform for all Wikimedians in India to meet and share their views, discuss challenges and exchange useful tips, best practices and other information. The Conference is open for participation of Wikimedians from all nations, and will be taking place on the 5th, 6th, and 7th of August 2016 at Chandigarh.

The Conference has a very distinct Indian flavor and deals primarily with issues relating to India on Wikipedia and its sister projects.

The main objective is to reduce the gap between different communities and get help from other community members on technical issues and other things like best practices in decision making and how we resolve the disputes in the community.

Guests

Katherine Maher, Executive Director, Wikimedia Foundation
Nataliia Tymkiv, Board Member, Wikimedia Foundation
Asaf Bartov, Senior Program Officer, Emerging Wikimedia Communities, Wikimedia Foundation
Runa Bhattacharjee, Manager, Language Engineering Team (International), Wikimedia Foundation
Dr. Surjit Patar, Punjabi poet and writer
Tighe Flanagan, Senior Manager, Wikipedia Education Program, Wikimedia Foundation
Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, The Centre for Internet and Society
Yohann Varun Thomas, President, Wikimedia India
María Kreuz, Communications and Outreach Coordinator, Wikimedia Foundation

Social Media Campaign

Facebook event page - https://www.facebook.com/events/146258892472025/ (More suited for conference participants only)
Facebook Page - https://www.facebook.com/WikiConferenceIndia2016
Facebook group - https://www.facebook.com/groups/WikiConferenceIndia2016/
Official Twitter Handler - https://twitter.com/WikiConIndia
IRC Channel - #wikiconferenceindia

More Info, click here

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/a2k/news/wikiconference-india-2016

An India Where the Disabled have a Choice

praskrishna — 2016-08-06T17:06:38Z

The Roundtable on Digital Access to the Disabled held in Bangalore brought forward many issues related to the topic. Dr. Nirmita Narasimhan, Policy Director, Centre for Internet and Society speaks to Dr. Archana Verma about the problems faced by the disabled while using technology. Being herself partially visually impaired, this is an interview from an expert as well as the personal experiences of a person from the disabled group.

This interview was published in Dataquest on August 5, 2016.

Q-Please throw some light on the issue of the inaccessibility of mobile apps to the disabled, since these have become essential for independent living today.

While mobile apps are fast becoming the preferred and often the only way to access services, these remain unavailable to a large section of the Indian population living with disabilities. This is because they are not designed in a way which conforms to standards of accessibility and cannot be used by persons using assistive technologies such as screen readers. Apps such as Ola, Uber, Big Basket, Make my trip, Flipkart, Myntra and most others are not completely accessible. The inaccessibility varies from total inaccessibility, where the screen reader remains absolutely silent and is unable to give any information to the user opening the app, to partially inaccessible, disallowing persons using screen readers from accessing complete information or from completing transactions. For instance, if one opens Flipkart, one hears a button labelled home page banner and then the screen reader just keeps saying button for whatever is pressed, without being able to give any information on what the buttons are for or what is written there. Similarly, if one opens Myntra, one doesn’t hear any information at all, just a series of clicks, at one point one hears buttons labelled for man, for women, for kids and then when one presses any of those, one is again greeted by complete silence. The Big Basket app also has problems such as unlabelled buttons and fields and makes it difficult to carry out transactions such as changing the quantity, changing the address etc.

It is rather sad that the IT industry fails to realise that persons with disabilities, a group which is the world’s largest minority and account for a very large percentage of our population can potentially be amongst the biggest consumers of these ICT products and services. Consider before the advent of technology, a blind person could not read mainstream books and newspapers, work in routine office environments, shop alone or pay bills, file returns etc. on his/her own. Now, when everything can be done on line and there is technology which can read out and assist blind persons to use computers/ phones themselves, they offer the opportunity to negate the limitations of disability. However, this is not happening because products and services are not designed and developed in compliance with standards of accessibility and universal design, resulting in them being ineffectual or useless for persons using assistive technology. If the apps and websites conform to accessibility standards, Developers need not test their software against each and every disability, which can get understandably complicated, they are automatically accessible to persons with different disabilities in one way or another.

While accessing necessary services and information itself is challenging and often impossible for the disabled, the ability to access and enjoy games like other people is completely beyond imagination, not even something one could dream of said a friend of mine. I asked my friend Dinesh Kaushal, an accessibility expert who heads development of NVDA, an open source screen reader for the blind in India what his experience with the new gaming app Pokemon Go was, which is all the rage nowadays and he said that it was completely inaccessible. There is absolutely no information on the game screen and the Android screen reader Talk Back is absolutely silent. And this according to him this is not uncommon in many gaming apps.

Q- Highlight some of the problems related to the inaccessibility of websites and content to the disabled.

Web site inaccessibility very often hinders a person using assistive technology from accessing information on the internet. A web site can be inaccessible for different persons because of different reasons, depending upon the disability. However, this can be solved by compliance with standards. Inaccessibility of websites also hinders accessing content on mobile phones or affects persons with limited bandwidth or elderly persons.

While progress is being made to make government web sites accessible, this has not yet been completely achieved. In addition, web sites of important services and organisations such as banks, health care, education etc. are often inaccessible. Often a person using a screen reader may come across an important document which is an image file and cannot be read by the screen reader or a deaf person cannot enjoy an audio visual clip because there are no sub titles. Web sites with frequent flashing and flickering, constantly changing pages, images without descriptions and unlabelled form fields and headings, audio visual media content without subtitles, image files of documents without alternate accessible format options continue to populate the Internet. Unless web site accessibility is taken seriously and is treated as a non-negotiable ingredient of a contract for web site development and maintenance, the Internet will continue to be inaccessible.

Q- Can you enumerate the policy and guidelines requiring web site accessibility and the large spread of non-compliance with them?

Although most transactions happen online today, the fact that websites do not conform to universal standards of accessibility render them unusable by persons with disabilities.
The World Wide Web consortium has had accessibility standards for web site accessibility for over a decade now and these have been adopted by many countries around the world. This standard is known as the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0. India also notified the Guidelines for Indian Government Websites (GIGW) which borrows from the WCAG 2.0 to ensure that government websites are accessible. The National policy on universal electronic accessibility was notified in October 2013 and requires conformance to standards of accessibility. It mentions W3C standards such as WCAG 2.0, ARIA and ATAG and identifies procurement as a route to make electronic infrastructure accessible. It also identifies strategies such as awareness raising, training, research and development of assistive technology as vital to implementation of the policy and allocates different roles to different stake holders, including to ministries, departments, private organisations, etc. Other commitments are to be found in the accessible India and digital India campaigns, commitments under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) which requires government to make all ICT and Internet available and accessible to persons with disabilities and encourage private service providers to make their services accessible, Access to ICTs are also covered under the goals of the Incheon Strategy to make the rights real for persons with disabilities.

Q- Give us some information about the work of the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) in the realm of the digital and technological accessibility for the disabled.

We are an eight year old organisation. Our accessibility programme works in multiple ways, which include the following –

(A) Policy research and advocacy (initiating and contributing to new and existing policy discussions to bring digital accessibility on the agenda: We started our work on 3 issues:

(a)Website and electronic accessibility – We produced research on what different countries have in terms of policies, guidelines and measures to promote website and electronic accessibility and worked with the Department of Electronics and information technology (DEITy) to formulate the National Policy on Universal Electronics accessibility which was notified in 2013. We also serve on the Implementation committee.

(b) Getting an exception into the Indian Copyright Act to allow conversion of books and other copyrighted works into accessible formats without the need to get permission from copyright holders. We provided research to MHRD on what other countries have in terms of copyright exceptions to promote access to published works for persons who are blind, have low vision or other print disabilities, we carried out a right to read campaign around India, provided submissions to the standing committee and finally were able to positively influence, along with other NGOs, the amendment to the Copyright Act in 2012.

(c) Aiding the negotiation of a Treaty at the World Intellectual Property Organisation which would facilitate international sharing of books for persons with print disabilities. We attended the negotiations at Geneva from 2010 and are a permanent observer there now, intervening and providing research advice on various issues. The Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for persons who are blind, visually impaired or otherwise print-disabled was concluded in 2014 and India was the first country to ratify it. The 20 ratifications required to bring the treaty into force just got concluded on June 30th 2016 and the treaty will come into force from 1st September 2016.

(d) We also worked with the Universal Service Obligation Fund of India to launch a pilot scheme to fund projects for persons with disabilities in rural areas.

(e) Apart from the above, we have produced global reports with international partners like the International Telecommunication Union and G3ict on topics such as mobile accessibility and produced research which we sent to relevant government agencies on topics such as banking and financial inclusion, emergency and disaster management for persons with disabilities, accessible broadcasting and so on.

(f) We are implementing a project to develop text to speech for several Indian languages using an open source speak synthesiser called e-Speak and enhanced working of NVDA an open source screen reader which works with English and other Indian languages. We have also carried out several trainings on this software around the country.
We also provide advice to governments and organisations in other countries on ICT accessibility related issues. We have also organised trainings on web accessibility and other topics as may be required.

Q- What kinds of challenges are faced by the CIS in its work?

Limited resources – very few donors fund the kind of work we do although no one denies the criticality and usefulness of it. Neither do we fall within the bracket of a traditional organisation serving persons with disabilities, nor is accessibility as marketable a topic as say something like privacy and cyber security, hence to have a team which can actively carry on this work of research and advocacy, constantly responding to policy developments, attending meetings is very difficult and we are not able to do the kind of work we want.

Q- What kind of vision of empowerment would you propose for the disabled through digital accessibility? How can this vision be achieved?

My Vision- Every person with a disability in India is able to access the Internet, content and facilities through an ICT enabled device, be it computers or phones; where this access is unhindered by barriers and is instantaneous, not retrospective. Further, I speak for an India which is inclusive in the complete sense, i.e. accessibility standards are part of mainstream standards and Universal Design is the standard approach to creations and developments of all kind and not where separate considerations need to be made for the disabled on specific products and services. Where a person with a disability has a choice, as do the other citizens and not where they are given an option; they have access to the world at the same time on the same terms; where there is true equality and we live a life with dignity and pride.

How Can We Achieve It?

India has already taken certain steps to show her commitment to accessibility –

We have ratified the UNCRPD, are part of the Incheon Strategy to make the rights real for persons with disabilities and are in the process of passing a new Rights of Persons with disabilities legislation. We also have a National Policy on Universal Electronics Accessibility, Guidelines on Government Websites, the Accessible India and Digital India campaigns and the Smart Cities Mission. There is ample opportunity and scope for ensuring accessibility is implemented to give complete effect to these. Some of the areas where action can be taken include:

1. Web site accessibility should be taken up immediately since it affects access for all on using different platforms. The plan can identify number of web sites and different stakeholders and the time lines by which they are required to make their web sites compliant. Both self-certification as well as regular audits should be carried out to check for compliance.

2. Public Procurement is another critical tool in the hands of the government to ensure that all public infrastructure and all facilities/ resources/ products/ services procured out of public money or for the consumption/ use of the public should be made accessible. This is increasingly being adopted in countries around the world. India has a draft procurement bill, several organisations serving the disabled have given a request for the inclusion of accessibility considerations within the procurement bill, we hope they will be taken seriously. By including compliance with accessibility standards as part of performance criteria in all government contracts and calls for proposals and contracts for development and maintenance of products and services, we can ensure not only that web sites etc. become accessible, but that competence is generated in the market to create and market accessible products and increase choice in the market for persons with disabilities.

3. Government ensuring that accessibility requirements are integrated in all government schemes and programmes and accessibility should be considered no longer a matter of choice, but of necessity. There are budgets for different ministries and agencies, there should be a mechanism to evaluate that all the budget set aside for meeting the needs of persons with disabilities are expended meaningfully and not accumulated or go back to the main kitty unspent. There should be proactive disclosure on the part of all government agencies on their spending on accessibility/ disability and they should solicit advice from persons with disabilities and accessibility experts who are part of the committee to review budget spending.

4. Development of appropriate technologies- we need to ensure that enough resources are pumped towards creating our own research and development community to support development and maintenance of assistive technology that caters to needs of specific groups. Open source solutions are desirable for a country like India because of the opportunity they offer for deployment, customisation and improvements.

5. Accessible Smart Cities- The Smart Cities Mission should immediately ensure that their advisory panel includes accessibility experts and that the smart cities which emerge as part of this initiative are inclusive- this is the ideal opportunity to build an accessible city, universal design should be the basic principle on which these smart cities are developed; if this is not done, then there will always remain two worlds- one for the world at large and one for persons with disabilities, and the disparity between the two will always continue.

6. Finally the most important advice I would reiterate is the inclusion of persons with disabilities across all work of the government – only then will the accessibility perspective be represented and taken into account everywhere. Otherwise we may have a situation where accessibility is either missing, or where projects are being implemented to aid the disabled, which are totally meaningless or inappropriate and only serve to waste precious resources, time and effort.

Q- What measures do you suggest for making digital accessibility available to the disabled people across the divides of class, gender and more developed and less developed regions?

Digital accessibility should be implemented at the levels of content, user interface and end user device. Hence accessibility of documents and information on the Internet should conform to standards of accessibility, such as EPUB 3.0, html etc.

User interface-WCAG 2.0 for websites is a must for any device to function effectively. Assistive software must be completely accessible. For instance, it is not uncommon to find that an ATm which is termed ‘accessible’ actually needs the input of a sighted person at some stages of the transaction while some other points are completely prompted through audio. In such a case, the blind still cannot use this.

Schemes under the USOF and others may be used to provide devices and connectivity to persons with disabilities in rural and far flung areas and also targeting specific user groups such as women. For instance a project under the USOF to promote women entrepreneurship in rural areas by providing them with a mobile phone can easily be replicated for disabled women. They could be funded for initiatives such as operating public internet kiosks or public phone booths etc. Schools in villages could be provided with computers fitted with assistive technology (hardware and software as may be required) s that disabled children and teachers have access and exposure to technology.

Providing mobile phones to all persons with disabilities will go a long way to open up the world of books, information, communication and access to emergency services to persons with disabilities.

Common Services Centres throughout the country are an excellent way of reaching persons with disabilities and providing them access to technology. By providing assistive technology on computers there, which is not at all inexpensive if one were to use free and open source software such as the NVDA screen reader and one trained person to impart training to the disabled, who can also be a person with a disability, we can make a lot of progress in terms of both building trained capacity and providing access to technology for persons with disabilities. Private employers and organisations also have a critical role to play in promoting accessibility for the disabled.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/accessibility/news/dataquest-august-5-2016-an-india-where-the-disabled-have-a-choice