Centre for Internet and Society

June 2018 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2018-08-11T02:52:10Z

CIS newsletter for the month of June 2018.

Dear readers,

Previous issues of the newsletters can be accessed here.

Highlights

Balbharati – the Maharashtra state bureau of textbook production and curriculum research – has issued a copyright policy that forces all publishers, digital educational-content creators, and coaching classes to obtain expensive licenses for developing material directly or indirectly relating to Balbharati’s content. This is an alarming development for Indian students reported Anubha Sinha in an article in the Asian Times on June 20, 2018.
CIS-A2K has started dialogue with the publishers for the last 6 months regarding FOSS, Open knowledge and content donation to Wikimedia Projects. As a result Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Prakashak Sangh, an apex body of publishers at all India level invited us for a orientation session at their annual gathering in Pune.
Submitted comments on the Draft Digital Communications Policy which was released to the public by the Department of Telecommunications of the Ministry of Communications on 1st May 2018 for comments and views.
Submitted comments on the Telecom Commercial Communications Customer Preference Regulations which was released to the public by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) on 29th May 2018 for comments and views.
The Task Force on Artificial Intelligence was established by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry to leverage AI for economic benefits, and provide policy recommendations on the deployment of AI for India. Elonnai Hickok, Shweta Mohandas and Swaraj Paul Barooah wrote a blog entry on the artificial intelligence task force. The blog entry was edited by Swagam Dasgupta.
The world’s oldest networked infrastructure, money, is increasingly dematerialising and fusing with the world’s latest networked infrastructure, the Internet, wrote Sunil Abraham in an article published in the Economic Times on June 10, 2018.
An essay by P.P. Sneha was published in Summer Hill, a journal published by Indian Institute of Advanced Study. In the essay, edited by Dr. Bindu Menon, Sneha draws upon excerpts from a study on the field of digital humanities and related practices in India, to outline the diverse contexts of humanities practice with the advent of the digital and explore the developing discourse around digital humanities in the Indian context.
The inaugural conference of the Digital Humanities Alliance of India (DHAI) was held at the Indian Institute of Management (IIM), Indore on June 1-2, 2018. P.P. Sneha was a keynote speaker at the event. Her talk was titled ‘New Contexts and Sites of Humanities Practice in the Digital’.

Articles

Why NPCI and Facebook need urgent regulatory attention (Sunil Abraham; Economic Times; June 10, 2018).
Digital Native: Cause an Effect (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; June 17, 2018).
Maharashtra's Copyright Policy Makes Education Unaffordable (Anubha Sinha; Asia Times; June 20, 2018).

CIS in the News

Allow admins to add users to online group chats only after permission: SFLC.in (Times of India; June 1, 2018).
EC disables easy access to electoral data across states (Akshatha M; Economic Times; June 5, 2018).
Draft bill proposes Rs 1 crore fine, 3 year jail for data privacy violation (Vidhi Choudhury; Hindustan Times; June 8, 2018).
Citizens’ Draft Privacy Bill Seeks To Revolutionise Data Collection, Storage In India (Arpan Chaturvedi; Bloomberg Quint; June 9, 2018).
Police to counter fake news on WhatsApp (Nilesh Christopher and Naveen Menezes; Times of India; June 14, 2018).
'Full belief in fake texts shows cops not trusted' (Times of India; June 18, 2018).
Anushka finds support for her anti-litter tirade (Nina C. George; Deccan Herald; June 19, 2018).
Jindal varsity's international affairs students shine in job market (Economic Times; June 19, 2018).
Data Privacy: Footprints on the Web (Sujit Bhar; IndiaLegal; June 21, 2018).
Death By WhatsApp (News18.com, June 25, 2018).
Tech transformation: how agriculture is being redefined through digital innovation and startups (Your Story; June 29, 2018).

Access to Knowledge

Access to Knowledge (A2K) is a campaign to promote the fundamental principles of justice, freedom, and economic development. It deals with issues like copyrights, patents and trademarks, which are an important part of the digital landscape. Our A2K program comprises 2 projects: Pervasive Technologies done under a grant from International Development Research Centre examining interplay between cost-effective pervasive technologies and intellectual property and encouraging development of such technologies for social good, and Wikipedia under a grant from Wikimedia Foundation to enable the growth of Indic language communities and cultivate new editors in different Indian languages.

Wikipedia

Event Organized

Marathi Publishers' orientation session on FOSS,Open knowledge & Wikimedia Projects (Co-organized by Akhil Bharatiya Marathi Prakashak Sangh and CIS-A2K; Maratha Chamber of Commerce, Tilak Road, Pune; June 17, 2018).

Internet Governance

The Tunis Agenda of the second World Summit on the Information Society has defined internet governance as the development and application by governments, the private sector and civil society, in their respective roles of shared principles, norms, rules, decision making procedures and programs that shape the evolution and use of the internet. CIS is engaged in 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

Blog Entries

NITI Aayog Discussion Paper: An aspirational step towards India’s AI policy (Sunil Abraham, Elonnai Hickok, Amber Sinha, Swaraj Barooah, Shweta Mohandas, Pranav M Bidare, Swagam Dasgupta, Vishnu Ramachandran and Senthil Kumar; June 13, 2018).
The AI Task Force Report - The first steps towards India’s AI framework (Authored by Elonnai Hickok, Shweta Mohandas and Swaraj Paul Barooah and Edited by Swagam Dasgupta; June 27, 2018).

Submissions

Comments on the Draft National Policy on Official Statistics (Gurshabad Grover and Sandeep Kumar; June 7, 2018).
Comments on the Draft Digital Communications Policy (Anubha Sinha, Gurshabad Grover and Swaraj Barooah; June 14, 2018).

Participation in Event

Is Privacy Obsolete? (Organized by TERI; Bangalore; June 22, 2018). Pranesh Prakash was a panelist.

Free Speech & Expression

Blog Entry

Network Disruptions Report by Global Network Initiative (Akriti Bopanna; June 12, 2018).

Telecom

CIS is involved in promoting access and accessibility to telecommunications services and resources, and has provided inputs to ongoing policy discussions and consultation papers published by TRAI. It has prepared reports on unlicensed spectrum and accessibility of mobile phones for persons with disabilities and also works with the USOF to include funding projects for persons with disabilities in its mandate:

Submission

Comments on the Telecom Commercial Communications Customer Preference Regulations (Sandeep Kumar, Torsha Sarkar, Swaraj Barooah, and Gurshabad Grover; June 22, 2018).

Researchers at Work

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:

Participation in Event

Digital Humanities Alliance of India - Inagural Conference 2018 (Co-organized by IIM and IIT, Indore with support from CIS; IIM, Indore; June 1 - 2, 2018). P.P. Sneha was a speaker and gave the keynote address.

Essay

New Contexts and Sites of Humanities Practice in the Digital (Paper) (P.P. Sneha; June 25, 2018).

About CIS

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 disabilities, 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/june-2018-newsletter

June 2017 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2017-07-18T02:21:10Z

Welcome to the Centre for Internet & Society (CIS) newsletter for June 2017.

Dear readers,

Previous issues of the newsletters can be accessed here.

Highlights
CIS made a submission on the Goods and Services Tax (GST) that has come into force this year. In the submission assessed the impact of GST on persons with disabilities. Indian Patent Office updated the Guidelines for Examination of Computer Related Inventions. Anubha Sinha throws light on the updated guidelines in a blog post. She has clarified that the updated Guidelines take no concrete position to help clarify the ambiguity around patentability of software inventions in India. A strategic symposium on Marathi Wikipedia and its sister projects was conducted in April 2017. Subodh Kulkarni has shared the developments in a report. Compiled a compendium on cyber security from the Indian context. The document is a comprehensive source compiling all the cyber-security related regulations, policies, guidelines, notifications, executive orders, court rulings, etc. CIS commented on the renewal of the .NET Registry Agreement. CIS expressed its strong opposition to the proposed renewal. The comments were prepared by Vidushi Marda with inputs from Sunil Abraham and Pranesh Prakash. Harsh Gupta discussed "FAT ML (Fairness, Accountability, and Transparency in Machine Learning) for Lawyers and Lawmakers" at the CIS office in Delhi on June 29, 2017. Shyam Ponappa in an article in the Business Standard opined that broadband in India needs reforms for local manufacturing and for infrastructure expansion and utilisation

CIS in the news:

Aadhaar: Ushering in a Commercialized Era of Surveillance in India (Jyoti Panday; Electronics Frontier Foundation; June 1, 2017).
Privacy is culture specific, MNCs hit by Aadhaar, says TRAI chief (Pranav Mukul; Indian Express; June 1, 2017).
Centre brings in new safeguards following cases of Aadhaar data leaks on government websites (Nidhi Sharma; Economic Times; June 2, 2017).
New rules for govt agencies to ensure security of personal data (Komal Gupta; Livemint; June 2, 2017).
Explore money apps but watch your data (Shaikh Zoaib Saleem; Livemint; June 8, 2017).
New law to unlock data economy (Yuthika Bhargava; Hindu; June 9, 2017).
Placements at NUJS: Class of 2017 Scores 100% (Simran Sahni; Livelaw; June 10, 2017).
Why did Nandan Nilekani praise a Twitter troll? (Kiran Jonnalgadda; Indian Express; June 10, 2017).
Are biometrics hack-proof? (Shaikh Zoaib Saleem; Livemint; June 11, 2017).
GoldenEye ransomware attack hit operations at Pipavav Port, JNPT (Jyotika Sood and Utpal Bhaskar; Livemint; June 28, 2017).

CIS members wrote the following articles

Digital Native: In digiville attention is Currency (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; June 11, 2017).
Digital Native: On mute, the Voice of the People (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; June 24, 2017).

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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.

Submission

GST - A Barrier to Human Rights for Persons with Disabilities (Nirmita Narasimhan; June 24, 2017).

Participation in Events

WSIS Forum 2017 (Co-organized by ITU, UNESCO, UNCTAD and UNDP, in close collaboration with all UN agencies; Geneva; June 12 - 16, 2017). Nirmita Narasimhan was a speaker.
Digital Accessibility (Organized by National Informatics Centre; Bengaluru; June 17, 2017). Rakesh Paladugula, a web accessibility trainer and Nirmita Narasimhan made a presentation to scientists about digital accessibility.

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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

Participation in Event

Fixing Copyright for Education (SCCR34 Side Event) (Communia, EIFL, Creative Commons, and PIJIP; June 7, 2017). Anubha Sinha was a speaker.

►Pervasive Technologies

Participation in Event

Preliminary Findings: Working Requirements for Complex Products under the Indian Patent System (Organized by O.P. Jindal University; New Delhi; June 10 - 11, 2017). Prof. Jorge Contreras gave a talk on a forthcoming paper.

►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 Entries

Train The Trainer 2017 (Manasa Rao; June 5, 2017).
Thematic Edit-a-thon at J.P.Naik Centre for Education & Development, Pune (Subodh Kulkarni; June 7, 2017).
Wiki Loves Mayabazaar (Pavan Santhosh; June 7, 2017).
Marathi Wikipedia Symposium at Gokhale Institute Of Politics & Economics (Subodh Kulkarni; June 7, 2017).
Digitisation, Wikimedia Commons and Wikisource Orientation Workshop at Vigyan Ashram, Pabal, Pune District (Subodh Kulkarni; June 7, 2017).

Note: The workshops for the above blog posts were held earlier but the reports were published during the month of June.

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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.

►Cybersecurity

Blog Entry

Cybersecurity Compilation: Indian Context (Leilah Elmokadem and edited by Elonnai Hickok; June 18, 2017).

Participation in Events

2nd India Think Tank Forum (Organized by Observer Research Foundation; New Delhi; June 19 - 21, 2017). Udbhav Tiwari participated in the forum.
Second India China Think-Tank Forum (Organized by Institute of Chinese Studies, the Indian Council of World Affairs, and the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences; Beijing; June 22 - 27, 2017). Saikat Dutta represented an Indian think tank.

►Free Speech and Expression

Submission

Comments from the Centre for Internet and Society on Renewal of .NET Registry Agreement (Vidushi Marda, Sunil Abraham and Pranesh Prakash; June 6, 2017).

Participation in Events

ISEA 2017 (Organized by the University of Caldas, Manizales; Columbia; June 11 - 16, 2017). Sharat Chandra Ram was a panelist.
Freedom of Expression on the Internet : Possibilities and Challenges (Organized by Bolivar Technological University; Cartagena; June 29, 2017). Sharat Chandra Ram was a speaker.

►Privacy

Participation in Events

BIS LITD 17 Privacy Panel meeting (Organized by National School of India University; Bangalore; June 21, 2017). Udbhav Tiwari attended the meeting.
DSCI Best Practices Meet (Organized by Data Security Council of India; Bangalore; June 22 - 23, 2017). Udbhav Tiwari attended the meeting.

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Telecom
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CIS is involved in promoting access and accessibility to telecommunications services and resources, and has provided inputs to ongoing policy discussions and consultation papers published by TRAI. It has prepared reports on unlicensed spectrum and accessibility of mobile phones for persons with disabilities and also works with the USOF to include funding projects for persons with disabilities in its mandate:

Newspaper Column

Broadband Reforms for Local Manufacturing (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard; May 31, 2017 and Organizing India Blogspot; June 5, 2017).

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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:

Event Organized

CISxScholars Delhi - Harsh Gupta - FAT ML for Lawyers and Lawmakers (CIS; New Delhi; June 29, 2017). Harsh Gupta gave a talk.

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About CIS
-----------------------------------
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 disabilities, 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

► Request for Collaboration

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/june-2017-newsletter

June 2016 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2016-08-04T01:57:04Z

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

Previous issues of the newsletters can be accessed here.

Highlights
The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) held a consultation on Free Data. CIS sent its comments to the 4 questions that TRAI posed: (a) need to have TSP agnostic platform to provide free data or suitable reimbursement to users; (b) whether such platforms need to be regulated by TRAI; (c) whether free data to users should be limited; and (d) any other issue related to the matter of consultation. IANA transition is a sham since it doesn't address the most important question - that of jurisdiction. Pranesh Prakash has explored why the issue of jurisdiction is the most important question and why it remains unaddressed. On April 20, 2016, DNA carried a report on a PIL seeking action against advertisements for prostitution in newspapers and on websites. The report noted that the Mumbai Police had obtained an order from a magistrates court to block 174 objectionable websites. The Mumbai Police has not proceeded against any of the people who run these websites. CIS in a blog post has listed out 239 websites that were blocked by the government. Wikipedia is the source for different kinds of knowledge for any one starting-off in a particular field of study. Indian languages are the default languages for study in classroom in India. In this light strengthening the quality of material available on Indian language Wikipedias is certain to have widespread tangible and intangible impact according to Tejaswini Niranjana. An extended survey of digital initiatives in arts and humanities practices in India was undertaken during the last year. Provocatively called 'mapping digital humanities in India', this enquiry began with the term 'digital humanities' itself, as a 'found' name for which one needs to excavate some meaning, context, and location in India at the present moment. The final section has been published. The Reserve Bank of India published a Consultation Paper on Peer to Peer Lending on April 28, 2016, and invited comments from the public. CIS submitted its response. The Department of Science and Technology published the first public draft of the National Geospatial Policy (v.1.0) on May 05, 2016, and invited comments from the public. CIS submitted its comments. The first public draft of the open data license to be used by Government of India was released by the Department of Legal Affairs. CIS was a member of the committee constituted to develop the license concerned, and we contributed substantially to the drafting process. Harsh Gupta and Aditya Tejas wrote a blog post on the Airtel Open Network that was launched recently. The web page displays visualization data on network coverage and signal strength across the country, as well as a detailed breakdown of cell tower placement, including towers that are shutdown or still being planned. CIS organized a one-day workshop in Delhi on Tuesday, July 12 on the evolution and state of the set-top box as an access device in India.

CIS in the News

CIS gave inputs to the following media coverage:

Why Geospatial Bill is draconian and how it will hurt startups (Prabhu Mallikarjunan; Financial Express; June 13, 2016).
ISPs start blocking escort websites following govt order (Moulishree Srivastava; Business Standard; June 14, 2016).
Here is the entire list of 'escorts service' websites that the government has banned (India Today; June 16, 2016).
Indian experts doubt government ban on porn sites will be effective (VL Srinivasan; ZD Net; June 20, 2016).
Slow internet driving you nuts? Here is how your service provider is fleecing you (Kalyan Parbat; Economic Times; June 23, 2016).
Behind the scenes of Escort Economy 2.0 (Sharmila Ganeshan Ram; The Times of India; June 26, 2016).
Call drops: Dealing with the menace or just shifting goal posts? (India TV News; June 26, 2016).

CIS members wrote the following pieces:

Tweak the Make in India Recipe (Rohini Lakshané; Business Today; June 3, 2016).

ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆର ବିକାଶ (Subhashish Panigrahi; The Samaja; June 2, 2016).
ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ: ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ ବିଶାଳତମ ଅନଲାଇନ ଜ୍ଞାନକୋଷ ଗଢ଼ିବାର ଅଭିଯାନ (Subhashish Panigrahi; Your Story Odia; June 3, 2016).
ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ: ଏକ ଅଭିଯାନ (Subhashish Panigrahi; Suryaprava; June 3, 2016).
ଅନଲାଇନ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଜ୍ଞାନକୋଷ ଗଢ଼ା (Subhashish Panigrahi; Samanya Kathan; June 5, 2016).
Digital native: Control A, Backspace (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; June 5, 2016).

►NVDA and eSpeak

June 2016 Report (Suman Dogra; June 30, 2016).

►Pervasive Technologies

Article

Tweak the Make in India Recipe (Rohini Lakshané; Business Today; June 3, 2016).

Media Coverage

NGOs urge PM to ‘resist pressure’ from U.S. on IPRs (Hindu; June 2, 2016).
Climate change will be a priority in talks with Modi: U.S. (Varghese K. George; Hindu; June 6, 2016).
NGOs tell Modi not to succumb to US pressure on intellectual property (Rinku Patel; India Tribune; June 7, 2016).
NGOs tell PM not to succumb to pressure from US on IPR (Economic Times, June 7, 2016).

►Wikipedia

Articles

ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆର ବିକାଶ (Subhashish Panigrahi; The Samaja; June 2, 2016).
ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ: ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ ବିଶାଳତମ ଅନଲାଇନ ଜ୍ଞାନକୋଷ ଗଢ଼ିବାର ଅଭିଯାନ (Subhashish Panigrahi; Your Story Odia; June 3, 2016).
ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ: ଏକ ଅଭିଯାନ (Subhashish Panigrahi; Suryaprava; June 3, 2016).
ଅନଲାଇନ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଜ୍ଞାନକୋଷ ଗଢ଼ା (Subhashish Panigrahi; Samanya Kathan; June 5, 2016).
Digital native: Control A, Backspace (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; June 5, 2016).

Blog Entry

Beyond Editor Count: Assessing Quality on Wikipedia (Tejaswini Niranjana; June 12, 2016).

Media Coverage

Online space for Odia (Diana Sahu; New Indian Express; June 10, 2016).
शंभर वर्षापूर्वीचे ग्रंथ मराठी विकिपीडियावर (Maharashtra Times; June 15, 2016).

Event Organized

Wikipedia edit-a-thon at TEDSummit 2016 (Organized by CIS-A2K and Wikimedians Netha Hussain and Ayyappadas; Banff, Canada; June 26 - 30, 2016). Abhinav Garule represented CIS-A2K.

►Openness

Submission

Comments on the National Geospatial Policy (Draft, V.1.0), 2016 (Adya Garg, Anubha Sinha, and Sumandro Chattapadhyay; June 1, 2016).

Blog Entry

Public Consultation for the First Draft of 'Government Open Data Use License - India' Announced (Anubha Sinha; June 30, 2016).

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Internet Governance
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►Freedom of Expression

Submission

Submission by the Centre for Internet and Society on Revisions to ICANN Expected Standards of Behavior (Vidushi Marda with inputs from Nirmita Narasimhan and Sunil Abraham; June 29, 2016).

Blog Entries

UN Special Rapporteur Report on Freedom of Expression and the Private Sector: A Significant Step Forward (Vidushi Marda; June 8, 2016).
Jurisdiction: The Taboo Topic at ICANN (Pranesh Prakash; June 27, 2016).

►Privacy

Article

Criminal Defamation and the Supreme Court’s Loss of Reputation (Bhairav Acharya; June 3, 2016). The article was published in the Wire on May 14 but mirrored in June on CIS website.

Blog Entry

Smart City Policies and Standards: Overview of Projects, Data Policies, and Standards across Five International Smart Cities (Kiran A. B., Elonnai Hickok and Vanya Rakesh; June 8, 2016).

Event Organized

Stand up for Digital Rights (CIS, Bangalore, June 15, 2016)

Submission

Comments on the RBI's Consultation Paper on Peer to Peer Lending (Elonnai Hickok, Pavishka Mittal, Sumandro Chattapadhyay, Vidushi Marda, and Vipul Kharbanda; June 1, 2016).

Blog Entries

Creativity, Politics, and Internet Censorship (P.P. Sneha; June 16, 2016).
Digital Humanities in India – Concluding Thoughts (P.P. Sneha; June 30, 2016).

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Telecom
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CIS is involved in promoting access and accessibility to telecommunications services and resources, and has provided inputs to ongoing policy discussions and consultation papers published by TRAI. It has prepared reports on unlicensed spectrum and accessibility of mobile phones for persons with disabilities and also works with the USOF to include funding projects for persons with disabilities in its mandate:

Blog Entry

Airtel Open Network (Harsh Gupta and Aditya Tejas; June 17, 2016).

Event

Workshop on Set-top Boxes (Organized by CIS, Amar Colony, Lajpat Nagar IV, New Delhi; July 12, 2016).

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About CIS
-----------------------------------
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

► Request for Collaboration

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

June 2015 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2015-09-13T16:10:19Z

Newsletter for the month of June.

We are happy to share with you the sixth issue of the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) newsletter (June 2015). The past editions of the newsletter can be accessed at http://cis-india.org/about/newsletters.

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Highlights
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As part of its project on mapping cyber security actors in South Asia and South East Asia, CIS conducted a series of interviews with cyber security actors. The interviews were compiled and edited into one documentary . The film was produced by Purba Sarkar, edited by Aaron Joseph, and directed by Oxblood Ruffin features Malavika Jayaram, Nitin Pai, Namita Malhotra, Saikat Datta, Nishant Shah, Lawrence Liang, Anja Kovacs, Sikyong Lobsang Sangay and, Ravi Sharada Prasad.

CIS conducted a training on eSpeak Tamil Computing with NVDA in Tirunelveli in the month of June. Sixteen delegates attended the event.
The 30th Session of the World Intellectual Property Organization's ("WIPO") Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights ("SCCR") was held from June 30 to July 3, 2015. CIS was unable to attend the meeting. However, CIS had a statement to make on negotiations on the Proposed Treaty for Broadcasting Organizations .
The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India had called for comments on the technical background paper prepared by the WIPO Secretariat in relation to the Broadcast Treaty. CIS submitted its comments .
Rohini Lakshané in a blog post analysed the commonalities in big-ticket patent infringement lawsuits pertaining to mobile devices.

Sumandro Chattapadhyay co-authored a report on open data intermediaries in developing countries . The report concluded by saying that consideration needs to be given to the presence of multiple intermediaries in an open data ecosystem, each of whom may possess different forms of capital to enable the use and unlock the potential impact of open data.
Odia language Wikipedia has grown to 800k page views in a month. The Odia Wikipedia community gathered in Bhubaneswar on June 3 to celebrate Odia Wikipedia's 13^th anniversary. Subhashish Panigrahi wrote about this.
Sunil Abraham in an article titled "The generation of e-Emergency" published by Livemint on June 22 argued that the next generation of censorship technology is expected to be 'real-time content manipulation' through ISPs and Internet companies.
In two separate blog entries, Jyoti Panday provided insights into IANA Transition Stewardship & ICANN Accountability. The first part gives a background to the IANA transition and updates on the ensuing processes in an attempt to familiarise people with the issues at stake and the second part provides an overview of submitted proposals and highlights the areas of concern that will need attention moving forward .

Sumandro Chattapadhyay co-designed and co-facilitated a workshop for government officials from Bhutan, Maldives, Meghalaya, Sikkim, and Tripura, on open data policy and implementation, organised by UNDP India.
Shyam Ponappa in his monthly column published in the Business Standard stated that government can't control market forces but can and must fix regulatory issues.

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Accessibility and Inclusion
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Under a grant from the Hans Foundation we are doing two projects. The first project is on creating a national resource kit of state-wise laws, policies and programmes on issues relating to persons with disabilities in India. CIS in partnership with CLPR (Centre for Law and Policy Research) compiled the National Compendium of Policies, Programmes and Schemes for Persons with Disabilities (29 states and 6 union territories). The publication has been finalised and is being printed. The draft chapters and the quarterly reports can be accessed on the project page. The second project is on developing text-to-speech software for 15 Indian languages. The progress made so far in the project can be accessed here.

►NVDA and eSpeak

# Monthly Updates

June 2015 Report (Suman Dogra; June 30, 2015).

# Language Testing Reports

Report on eSpeak Tamil Computing with NVDA Training Workshop in Tirunelveli (Organized by NVDA team; Anne Jane Askwith Higher Secondary School for the Visually Impaired, Palayamkottai, Tirunelveli; June 3 - 7, 2015).

►Other

# White Paper

Inclusive Financial Services - Global Trends in Accessibility Requirements (Nirmita Narasimhan; May 3, 2015).

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Access to Knowledge
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As part of the Access to Knowledge programme we are doing two projects. The first one (Pervasive Technologies) under a grant from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) is for research on the complex interplay between pervasive technologies and intellectual property to support intellectual property norms that encourage the proliferation and development of such technologies as a social good. The second one (Wikipedia) 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.

# Submission / Comments

Comments on the Protection of Broadcasting Organizations: Technical Background Paper Prepared by the WIPO Secretariat (Nehaa Chaudhari; June 28, 2015).
Statement by the Centre for Internet and Society on the Broadcast Treaty at SCCR 30 (Nehaa Chaudhari; June 30, 2015).

# Blog Entries

Joining the Dots in India's Big-Ticket Mobile Phone Patent Litigation (Rohini Lakshané; June 1, 2015).
National IPR Policy Series: India's National IPR Policy - What Would WIPO Think? (Nehaa Chaudhari; June 20, 2015).
National IPR Policy Series: Follow-up RTI to DIPP on the IPR Think Tank (Nehaa Chaudhari; June 25, 2015).
The US 301 Report - A Myopic View of IP Rights (Varun Baliga and Nehaa Chaudhari; June 24, 2015).

# Media Coverage

CIS gave inputs for the following:

One reason startups are moving out of India (Evelyn Fok and Varun Aggarwal; The Times of India; April 10, 2015). This was also mirrored in Economic Times .
Indian businesses crave IP certainty, but better patent values are tempting them overseas (IAM Magazine; April 28, 2015).

►Wikipedia

# Blog Entries

How the Odia Wikimedia community is enriching Wikipedia with character encoding technology (Subhashish Panigrahi; June 14, 2015).
Odia Wikipedia meets Google Developer Group (Sailesh Patnaik; June 29, 2015).

# Event Organized

Odia Wikipedia Turning 13 this June 3 (Organized by CIS-A2K and Odia Wikipedia Community; Institute of Physics, Sachivalaya Marg, Sainik School PO, Gajapati Nagar, Bhubaneswar, Odisha; June 3, 2015).

# Media Coverage

CIS gave its inputs for the following:

ଭୁବନେଶ୍ୱରରେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆର ୧୩ ତମ ଜନ୍ମତିଥି ପାଳନ, ୨୦୧୫ ଜୁନ ୩ ତାରିଖ (Odishan.com; June 2, 2015).
Odia Wikipedia celebrates 13 years of free knowledge contribution at Bhubaneswar (Orissadairy.com; June 2, 2015).
Odia Wikipedia Celebrates 13 Years of Free Knowledge Contribution at Bhubaneswar (FullOdisha.com; June 3, 2015).

►Openness

# Blog Entries

FOSS for Public Use:Free and Open Source Software for Digital India (Anubha Sinha; June 1, 2015).
Workshop on Open Data for Human Development (Sumandro Chattapadhyay; June 2, 2015).
Open Data Intermediaries in Developing Countries - A Synthesis Report (Sumandro Chattapadhyay; June 16, 2015).

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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 International Development Research Centre (IDRC)) is on surveillance and freedom of expression (SAFEGUARDS). The second one (under a grant from MacArthur Foundation) is on studying the restrictions placed on freedom of expression online by the Indian government.

►Free Speech and Expression

# Article

The generation of e-Emergency (Sunil Abraham; May 20, 2015).

# Blog Entries

IANA Transition Stewardship & ICANN Accountability (I) (Jyoti Panday; June 20, 2015).
IANA Transition Stewardship & ICANN Accountability (II) (Jyoti Panday; June 21, 2015).

# Participation in Event

Panel Discussion on Internet Intermediaries, Law and Innovation (Organized by Confederation of Indian Industries, Google and Centre For Communications Governance, NLU Delhi; New Delhi; June 2, 2015). Jyoti Panday attended the panel discussion.

► Cyber Security

# Film

DesiSec: Cybersecurity and Civil Society in India (produced by Purba Sarkar, edited by Aaron Joseph, and directed by Oxblood Ruffin). The film features Malavika Jayaram, Nitin Pai, Namita Malhotra, Saikat Datta, Nishant Shah, Lawrence Liang, Anja Kovacs, Sikyong Lobsang Sangay and, Ravi Sharada Prasad.

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Telecom
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CIS is involved in promoting access and accessibility to telecommunications services and resources and has provided inputs to ongoing policy discussions and consultation papers published by TRAI. It has prepared reports on unlicensed spectrum and accessibility of mobile phones for persons with disabilities and also works with the USOF to include funding projects for persons with disabilities in its mandate:

# Op-ed

Unfettering Stranded Capacity (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard; June 3, 2015 and Organizing India Blogspot; June 4, 2015).

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

# Blog Entry

Indic Scripts and the Internet (Dibyajyoti Ghosh; June 30, 2015).

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News & Media Coverage
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CIS gave its inputs to the following media coverage:

Can Uber, Ola apps be blocked? Govt fighting cyber odds (Siladitya Ray; Hindustan Times; June 4, 2015).
Government's stand on internet governance draws applause from civil society organisations (Neha Alawadhi; Economic Times; June 24, 2015).
Most emerging firms low on cyber security: Experts (Malavika Murali and Payal Ganguly; June 24, 2015).

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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
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

► Support Us

Please help us defend consumer / 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:

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/june-2015-bulletin

June 2014 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2014-07-14T10:05:11Z

Our newsletter for month of June is below:

Highlights

Nehaa Chaudhari participated in a Stakeholders Consultation organized by the Planning Commission and the Ministry of Human Resource Development in New Delhi, February 21, 2014, on Mapping Institutions of Intellectual Property. She blogged about the outcome in a two-part series. The first part discusses establishment of a National Institute of Intellectual Property Rights and the second part deals with the documents introduced at the Stakeholders’ Consultation for India’s National Programme on Intellectual Property.
For the first time in the history of Indian books, 10 Telugu books by a single author were released under Creative Commons license (CC-BY-SA 3.0). These books will be uploaded on Telugu Wikisource and converted into Unicode (searchable) text. This will ensure that these books are freely read, both online and offline in various formats like PDF, epub, mobi, text, etc. This is a major milestone initiative by CIS-A2K to make the sum of all knowledge in Telugu freely available to all Telugus over the internet.
ICANN published a call for public comments on "Enhancing ICANN Accountability" in the wake of the IANA stewardship transition spearheaded by ICANN and related concerns of ICANN's external and internal accountability mechanisms. CIS submitted its comments.
ICANN sought comments on the existing barriers to Registrar Accreditation and operation and suggestions on how these challenges might be mitigated. CIS sent its comments.
Vodafone, the world’s second largest mobile carrier released a report disclosing to what extent governments can request their customers’ data. Joe Sheehan analyses the report to tell us that if more companies were transparent about the level of government surveillance their customers were being subjected to then the public would press the government for stronger privacy safeguards and protections.

Accessibility and Inclusion

Under a grant from the Hans Foundation we are doing two projects. The first project is on creating a national resource kit of state-wise laws, policies and programmes on issues relating to persons with disabilities in India. We compiled the National Compendium of Policies, Programmes and Schemes for Persons with Disabilities (29 states and 6 union territories). We will be publishing this soon. The draft chapters along with the quarterly reports can be accessed on the project page. The second project is on developing text-to-speech software for 15 Indian languages. The progress made so far in the project can be accessed here.

NVDA and eSpeak

►Monthly Update

Work Report for June (by Suman Dogra, June 30, 2014).

►Other

Blog Entry

For a Truly Inclusive Consultative Process (by Amba Salelkar, June 25, 2014).

Media Coverage

NISH Website to Help the Disabled (The New Indian Express, June 26, 2014).

Access to Knowledge

As part of the Access to Knowledge programme we are doing two projects. The first one (Pervasive Technologies) under a grant from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) is for research on the complex interplay between pervasive technologies and intellectual property to support intellectual property norms that encourage the proliferation and development of such technologies as a social good. The second one (Wikipedia) 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.

►Analysis

Mapping Institutions of Intellectual Property (Part A): India's National Programme on Intellectual Property Management (by Nehaa Chaudhari, June 10, 2014). This discusses establishment of a National Institute of Intellectual Property Rights.
Mapping Institutions of Intellectual Property: Part B — India's National Program on Intellectual Property Management (by Nehaa Chaudhari, June 26, 2014). This deals with the documents introduced at the Stakeholders’ Consultation for India’s National Program on Intellectual Property

►Participation in Event

Yogyakarta Meeting on Open Culture and Critical Making (organized by organized by HONF Foundation, Catec, and r0g, June 12 – 15, 2014). Sharath Chandra Ram was a panelist.

Wikipedia

The following were done this month:

►Articles / Blog Entries

Twitter weekly Curation WeAreWikipedia brings one Wikipedian Every Week (by Diptiman Panigrahi, June 16, 2014).
This Twitter Account Puts a Face to the Unsung Volunteer Editors Behind Wikipedia (by Subhashish Panigrahi, Global Voices, June 18, 2014).
Odia Language gets a new Unicode Font Converter (by Subhashish Panigrahi, June 20, 2014).
Ten Telugu Books Re-released Under CC-BY-SA 3.0 License (by Rahmanuddin Shaik, June 22, 2014).

►Events Organized

Kannada Wikipedia Workshop for Kannada Book Lovers (co-organized by Navakarnataka Publications, Bangalore, June 4, 2014). Dr. U.B.Pavanaja conducted the workshop.
Knowledge and Openness in the Digital Era (co-organized by Andhra Loyola College and CIS, Vijaywada, June 24-25, 2014).

►News and Media Coverage
CIS gave its inputs to the following media coverage:

Knowledge and Openness in the Digital Era: Coverage in Sakshi (Sakshi, June 25, 2014).
Knowledge and Openness in the Digital Era: Coverage in Enadu (Enadu, June 25, 2014).
Loyola Faculty Enlightened About Open Edn Resources (The New Indian Express, June 25, 2014).

Internet Governance

Freedom of Expression

As part of our project on Freedom of Expression (funded through a grant from the MacArthur Foundation) to study the restrictions placed on freedom of expression online by the Indian government and contribute to the debates around Internet governance and freedom of expression at forums like ICANN, ITU, IGF, WSIS, etc., we bring you the following outputs:

►Submissions

CIS Comments: Enhancing ICANN Accountability (by Geetha Hariharan, June 10, 2014).
Comments to ICANN Supporting the DNS Industry in Underserved Regions (by Jyoti Panday, June 13, 2014).

►Blog Entries

Free Speech and Contempt of Court: Overview (by Gautam Bhatia, June 8, 2014).
Multi-stakeholder Models of Internet Governance within States: Why, Who & How? (by Geetha Hariharan, June 16, 2014).
UN Human Rights Council Urged to Protect Human Rights Online (by Geetha Hariharan, June 19, 2014).
Free Speech and Source Protection for Journalists (by Gautam Bhatia, June 19, 2014).
WSIS+10 High Level Event: A Bird's Eye Report (by Geetha Hariharan, June 20, 2014).
Understanding IANA Stewardship Transition (by Smarika Kumar, June 22, 2014).
IANA Transition: Suggestions for Process Design (by Smarika Kumar, June 22, 2014).
Free Speech and Civil Defamation (by Gautam Bhatia, June 25, 2014).
CIS Policy Brief: IANA Transition Fundamentals & Suggestions for Process Design (by Geetha Hariharan and Smarika Kumar, June 22, 2014).
An Evidence based Intermediary Liability Policy Framework: Workshop at IGF (by Jyoti Panday, June 30, 2014).

►FOEX Live
We are also posting a selection of news from across India implicating online freedom of expression and use of digital technology: June 8 – 15, 2014 and June 16 – 23, 2014.

Privacy

As part of our Surveillance and Freedom: Global Understandings and Rights Development (SAFEGUARD) project with Privacy International we are engaged in enhancing respect for the right to privacy in developing countries. We have produced the following outputs during the month:

►Blog Entries

A Review of the Functioning of the Cyber Appellate Tribunal and Adjudicatory Officers under the IT Act (by Divij Joshi, June 16, 2014).
Content Removal on Facebook — A Case of Privatised Censorship? (by Jessamine Mathew, June 16, 2014).
Vodafone Report Explains Government Access to Customer Data (by Joe Sheehan, June 16, 2014).

►Event Organized

Privacy and Surveillance Roundtable (co-organized with the Cellular Operators Association of India and the Council for Fair Business Practices, June 28, 2014, IMC Building, Churchgate, Mumbai).

►Participation in Events

Commonwealth Domain Name System Forum 2014 (organized by the CTO, hosted by ICANN, and supported by Nominet and the Public Interest Registry, London, June 19, 2014). Pranesh Prakash was a panelist. Jyoti Panday participated in the event.
Research Advisory Network Meeting (organized by the Global Commission on Internet Governance’s Research Advisory Network, OECD Headquarters, Paris, June 26-27, 2014). Sunil Abraham was a panelist.

►News & Media Coverage

CIS gave its inputs to the following media coverage:

Right to be forgotten poses a legal dilemma in India (by Leslie D' Monte, Livemint, June 5, 2014).
Stay connected even when you go underground (by Sunita Sekhar, The Hindu, June 12, 2014).

Digital Humanities

CIS is building research clusters in the field of Digital Humanities. The Digital will be used as a way of unpacking the debates in humanities and social sciences and look at the new frameworks, concepts and ideas that emerge in our engagement with the digital. The clusters aim to produce and document new conversations and debates that shape the contours of Digital Humanities in Asia:

►Blog Entries

Not a Goodbye; More a ‘Come Again’: Thoughts on being Research Director at a moment of transition (by Nishant Shah, June 15, 2014).
Living in the Archival Moment (by P.P. Sneha, June 19, 2014).

Telecom

CIS is involved in promoting access and accessibility to telecommunications services and resources and has provided inputs to ongoing policy discussions and consultation papers published by TRAI. It has prepared reports on unlicensed spectrum and accessibility of mobile phones for persons with disabilities and also works with the USOF to include funding projects for persons with disabilities in its mandate:

►Newspaper Column

A Great Start (for the Modi government) (by Shyam Ponappa, Business Standard and Organizing India Blogspot, June 5, 2014).

About CIS

The Centre for Internet and Society is a non-profit research organization that works on policy issues relating to freedom of expression, privacy, accessibility for persons with disabilities, access to knowledge and IPR reform, and openness (including open government, FOSS, open standards, etc.), and engages in academic research on digital natives and digital humanities.

► Follow us elsewhere

Twitter: https://twitter.com/CISA2K
Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/cisa2k
Visit us at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Access_To_Knowledge
E-mail: a2k@cis-india.org

► Support Us

Please help us defend consumer / 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, and theoreticians, both organisationally and as individuals, to collaboratively engage with Internet and society and improve our understanding of this new field. To discuss the research collaborations, write to Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, at sunil@cis-india.org or Nishant Shah, Director – Research, at nishant@cis-india.org. To discuss collaborations on Indic language Wikipedia, write to T. Vishnu Vardhan, Programme Director, A2K, at vishnu@cis-india.org.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/june-2014-bulletin

June 2013 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2013-07-27T09:48:16Z

Our newsletter for the month of June 2013 can be accessed below.

The Centre for Internet & Society (CIS) welcomes you to the sixth issue of its newsletter for 2013. Hivos published a White Paper by Nishant Shah titled Whose Change is it Anyway?, which attempts to reflect critically on existing patterns of making change and its implications for the future of citizen action in information and network societies. The Access to Knowledge team carried out a quantitative analysis to identify trends and growth patterns in Indian Language Wikipedias from September 2012 to April 2013. CIS drafted the Privacy Protection Bill and amended it as per feedback gained from the New Delhi, Bangalore, and Chennai Privacy Roundtable Events. CIS made closing statement on the Treaty for the Blind at the WIPO Diplomatic Conference which was concluded with the adoption of the Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for Persons who are Blind, Visually Impaired, or otherwise Print Disabled. In a research paper Nehaa Chaudhari gives an analysis of patent pools, Sameer Boray gives an analysis of video piracy and Pranav Menon gives an analysis of India-EU FTA and issues surrounding data protection and security. In this period we organised the Institute on Internet and Society with support from the Ford Foundation at Golden Palms, Bangalore from June 8 to 14, 2013.

Celebrating 5 Years of CIS
CIS is now 5 years old and we just celebrated this by holding an open exhibition in our offices in Bangalore and Delhi from May 20 to 23, showcasing our work and accomplishments over the period. We had about 170 visitors from the general public coming in to our office. Videos of the event are here.

Google Policy Fellowship
CIS has initiated processing of applications for the Google Policy Fellowship programme. Shortlisted candidates would be informed about their interview. However, as of now there will be a 20 days delay in announcing the list for the interview.

Jobs
CIS is inviting applications for the posts of Developer (NVDA Screen Reader Project) and Editor/Content Developer. To apply for these posts, send in your resume to Nirmita Narasimhan (nirmita@cis-india.org). CIS is also seeking applications for the post of Programme Officer (Internet Governance). To apply send your resume to Sunil Abraham (sunil@cis-india.org) and Pranesh Prakash (pranesh@cis-india.org).

Accessibility

CIS is doing two projects in partnership with the Hans Foundation. One is to create a national resource kit of state-wise laws, policies and programmes on issues relating to persons with disabilities in India and another for developing a screen reader and text-to- speech synthesizer for Indian languages:

National Resource Kit for Persons with Disabilities
CIS and the Centre for Law and Policy Research (CLPR) are working in this project. Draft chapters have been published. Feedback and comments are invited from readers for the chapter on Jharkhand:

The Jharkhand Chapter (by CLPR, June 30, 2013).

Note: All the chapters published on the website are early drafts and will be reviewed and updated.

Award

Girls in ICT Day 2013 (organized by ITU-APT Foundation of India with support from CMAI - Association of India Communication and Infrastructure, FICCI Auditorium, Tansen Marg, New Delhi, May 7, 2013). Dr. Nirmita Narasimhan got a felicitation for her contribution and achievements in the field of Information and Communication Technology. The honour was conferred during the celebration of this event.

Media Coverage

A Treat for the Blind (by Chitra Narayanan, Business World, June 26, 2013). Pranesh Prakash was quoted.

Access to Knowledge and Openness

The Wikimedia Foundation has given a grant to CIS to support and develop the growth of Indic language communities and projects by community collaborations and partnerships. This is being carried out by the Access to Knowledge team based in Delhi. CIS is also doing a project (Pervasive Technologies) on examining the relationship between production of pervasive technologies and intellectual property. CIS also promotes openness including open government data, open standards, open access, and free/libre/open source software through its Openness programme.

Access to Knowledge (Previously IP Reforms)

WIPO
Pranesh Prakash participated in the WIPO Diplomatic Conference to Conclude a Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works by Visually Impaired Persons and Persons with Print Disabilities in Marrakesh, Morocco, June 17 to 28, 2013. The conference concluded with the adoption of the Marrakesh Treaty to facilitate access to published works by blind persons, persons with visual impairment, and other print disabled persons, by requiring mandatory exceptions in copyright law to enable conversions of books into accessible formats, and by enabling cross-border transfer of accessible format books. Click for:

CIS's Closing Statement at Marrakesh on the Treaty for the Blind (by Pranesh Prakash, June 28, 2013).
India's Closing Statement at Marrakesh on the Treaty for the Blind (June 29, 2013).

Pervasive Technologies

Pervasive Technologies: Patent Pools (by Nehaa Chaudhari, June 27, 2013).

Other (FTA, Piracy)

The Right Way to Fight Video Piracy? (by Sameer Boray, June 6, 2013).
India-EU Proposed Free Trade Agreement: Issues Surrounding Data Protection and Security (by Pranav Menon, June 8, 2013).
India- EU FTA: A Note on the Copyright Issues (by Nehaa Chaudhari, June 18, 2013).

Event Participated

Governance in the Age of the Internet and Free Trade Agreements (organized by Thai Netizen Network and co-hosted by the Ministry of Information and Communication and the National Science and Technology Development Agency, Queen Sirikit National Convention Center, June 8, 2013). Sunil Abraham was a speaker.

Access to Knowledge (Wikipedia)

The A2K team consists of three members based in Bangalore: T. Vishnu Vardhan, Dr. U.B. Pavanaja and Subhashish Panigrahi and one team member Nitika Tandon who is working from Delhi office.

Statistical Report

Indian Language Wikipedia Statistics (by Nitika Tandon, June 30, September 2012 – April 2013).

Event Organised

A 'Kannada' Wikipedia Workshop for Bloggers (Suchitra, Bengaluru, June 23, 2013). Dr. U.B. Pavanaja conducted the workshop.

Event Co-organised

Telugu Wikipedia Training Workshop (co-organised by A2K team and Theatre Outreach Unit, University of Hyderabad, Golden Threshold, Nampally, Hyderabad, March 8, 2013). T. Vishnu Vardhan conducted the workshop.

Upcoming Event

Digital Humanities for Indian Higher Education (co-organised by HEIRA-CSCS, Tumkur University, CILHE-TISS and CCS, Indian Institute of Science, July 13, 2013).

Blog Entries

My First Wikipedia Training Workshop – Theatre Outreach Unit, University of Hyderabad (by T. Vishnu Vardhan, June 26, 2013). The workshop was conducted in March but the report was published only in June.
Wikipedia Visual Editor (by Nitika Tandon, June 27, 2013).

Press Coverage (including videos)

A Feature on Wikipedia and Telegu Wikipedians (HMTV, May 30-31, 2013). Watch the video.
Wikipedia Live Phone-in Programme (HMTV, June 1, 2013). T. Vishnu Vardhan took part in a one hour live phone-in programme on Wikipedia.
Wiki donors (by Akhila Seetharaman, TimeOut Bengaluru, June 21, 2013). T. Vishnu Vardhan and Dr. U.B. Pavanaja are quoted.
Kannada Wikipedia Workshop at Hasan (Prajavani, June 5, 2013). Dr. U.B. Pavanaja conducted the workshop on June 4, 2013.
Kannada Wikipedia Workshop at Hasan (Samyukta Karnataka, June 5, 2013). Dr. U.B.Pavanaja conducted the workshop on June 4, 2013.
Kannada Wikipedia Workshop at Hasan (Vijaya Karnataka, June 5, 2013). Dr. U.B.Pavanaja conducted the workshop on June 4, 2013.
Wiki Rahasya: Panel Discussion (Suvarna News, June 13, 2013). Dr. U.B.Pavanaja participated in a panel discussion around Wikipedia in general and about Kannada Wikipedia in specific.

Openness

Column

Big Data, People's Lives, and the Importance of Openness (by Nishant Shah, DML Central, June 24, 2013).

Event Hosted

RHoK Global Event (Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, June 1 – 2, 2013). Yogesh Londhe shares with you a post-event report.

Internet Governance

CIS began two projects earlier this year. The first one on facilitating research and events on surveillance and freedom of expression is with Privacy International and support from the International Development Research Centre, Canada. The second one on mapping cyber security actors in South Asia and South East Asia is with the Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto and support from the International Development Research Centre, Canada:

Cyber Stewards Project
Laird Brown, a strategic planner and writer with core competencies on brand analysis, public relations and resource management and Purba Sarkar who in the past worked as a strategic advisor in the field of SAP Retail are working in this project.

Video Interview

An Interview with Ram Mohan (June 30, 2013)

Event Organized

The Geopolitics of Information Controls: A Presentation by Masashi Crete-Nishihata (TERI, Bangalore, June 19, 2013). About 20 people participated in the event.

Privacy Research

Privacy Protection Bill, 2013 (With Amendments based on Public Feedback) (by Elonnai Hickok, June 30, 2013): CIS drafted the Bill. Based on feedback received from the New Delhi, Bangalore, and Chennai Roundtables the Bill was amended.

Interviews

Interview with the Citizen Lab on Internet Filtering in India (June 24, 2013). Maria Xynou interviewed Masashi Crete-Nishihata and Jakub Dalek from the Citizen Lab on internet filtering in India.
Interview with Billy Hawkes (June 20, 2014). Maria Xynou interviewed Billy Hawkes, the Irish Data Protection Commissioner on recommendations for data protection in India.

Columns

Indian Surveillance Laws & Practices Far Worse than US (by Pranesh Prakash, Economic Times, June 13, 2013).
World Wide Rule (by Nishant Shah, Indian Express, June 14, 2013). Nishant Shah reviews Schmidt and Cohen's book “The New Digital Age”.
Way to Watch (by Chinmayi Arun, Indian Express, June 26, 2013).
The State is Snooping: Can You Escape? (by Snehashish Ghosh, India Together, June 26, 2013).

Blog Entries

India Subject to NSA Dragnet Surveillance! No Longer a Hypothesis — It is Now Officially Confirmed (by Maria Xynou, June 13, 2013).
SEBI and Communication Surveillance: New Rules, New Responsibilities? (by Kovey Coles, June 27, 2013).
Open Letter to "Not" Recognize India as Data Secure Nation till Enactment of Privacy Legislation (by Elonnai Hickok, June 19, 2013).
Open Letter to Prevent the Installation of RFID tags in Vehicles (by Maria Xynou, June 27, 2013).

Events Organised

Technology, Power, and Revolutions in the Arab Spring (CIS, July 2, 2013). Prof. Ramesh Srinivasan gave a talk.
Learn to Secure Your Online Communication! (CIS, Bangalore, June 30, 2013). A Crypto Party was organised.
Learn to Secure Your Online Communication! (IIC, Delhi University, South Campus, New Delhi, July 6, 2013). A Crypto Party was organised.

Event Co-organised

4^th Privacy Round Table Meeting (co-organised with the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry and the Data Security Council of India, Mumbai, June 15, 2013).

Upcoming / Ongoing Events

Digital Activism in Europe (The Sarai Programme, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi, July 8, 2013). Bernadette Längle will give a talk.
Privacy Round Table, Kolkata (co-organised with the Federation for Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, and the Data Security Council of India, Lytton Hotel, Sudder Street, Kolkata, July 13, 2013).

Event Participated In

Biometrics or bust? India's Identity Crisis (organized by the Oxford Internet Institute, July 2, 2013). Malavika Jayaram was a speaker.

Video

Pranesh Prakash on the US snooping into Indian cyber space (by Tehelka, June 2013).

Media Coverage

Indian student in Cornell University hacks into ICSE, ISC database (by Kim Arora, Times of India, June 6, 2013). Pranesh Prakash is quoted.
‘Hacking’ sparks row over exam evaluation (by Vasudha Venugopal and Karthik Subramanian, Hindu, June 7, 2013). Pranesh Prakash is quoted.
Internet firms deny existence of PRISM (by Javed Anwer and Ishan Srivastava, Times of India, June 8, 2013). Sunil Abraham and Pranesh Prakash are quoted.
Indian Government Quietly Brings In Its 'Central Monitoring System': Total Surveillance Of All Telecommunications (Tech Dirt, June 8, 2013). Pranesh Prakash is quoted.
Facebook, Google deny spying access (by Javed Anwer, Times of India, June 9, 2013). Pranesh Prakash is quoted.
Govt mulls advisory on privacy issues related to Google, Facebook (by Thomas K Thomas, Hindu Business Line, June 10, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.
Cyber experts suggest using open source software to protect privacy (by Kim Arora, Times of India, June 22, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.
Govt goes after porn, makes ISPs ban sites (by Javed Anwer, Times of India, June 26, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.
Indian govt blocks 40 smut sites, forgets to give reason (by Phil Muncaster, The Register, June 27, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.
Concerns over central snoop (by Aloke Tikku, Hindustan Times, June 28, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.
Internet users enraged over US online spying (by Maitreyee Boruah, Times of India, June 29, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.
Issue of duplication of identities of users under control: Nilekani (by Anirban Sen, Livemint, June 29, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.
In India, Prism-like Surveillance Slips Under the Radar (by Anjan Trivedi, Time World, June 30, 2013). Sunil Abraham is quoted.

Knowledge Repository on Internet Access

CIS in partnership with the Ford Foundation is executing a project on Internet Access. It covers the history of the internet, technologies involved, principle and values of internet access, broadband market and universal access. It will also touch upon various policies and regulations which has an impact on internet access and bodies and mechanism which are responsible for formulation of policies related to internet access. The blog posts and modules are being published in the Internet Institute website:

Event Organised

Institute on Internet and Society (supported by Ford Foundation, Golden Palms Resort, Bangalore, June 8 – 14, 2013). Pranesh Prakash, Bernadette Längle, Vir Kamal Chopra, AK Bhargava, Ananth Guruswamy, Archana Gulati, Chakshu Roy, Elonnai Hickok, Gaurab Raj Upadhaya, Helani Galpaya, Michael Ginguld, Dr. Nadeem Akhtar, C. Nandini, Dr. Nirmita Narasimhan, Dr. Nishant Shah, Parminder Jeet Singh, Ravikiran Annaswamy, Dr. Ravina Aggarwal, Satyen Gupta, Dr. Subbiah Arunachalam, Sunil Abraham, Tulika Pandey and T. Vishnu Vardhan were speakers at the event. The presentations can be accessed here.

Telecom

Newspaper Column

Law & Order through Traffic Systems (by Shyam Ponappa, Business Standard, June 5, 2013 and cross-posted in Organizing India Blogspot).

Digital Natives

Digital Natives with a Cause? examines the changing landscape of social change and political participation in light of the role that young people play through digital and Internet technologies, in emerging information societies. Consolidating knowledge from Asia, Africa and Latin America, it builds a global network of knowledge partners who critically engage with discourse on youth, technology and social change, and look at alternative practices and ideas in the Global South:

White Paper

Whose Change is it Anyway? (by Nishant Shah, Hivos, June 18, 2013).

Digital Humanities

We are building research clusters in the field of Digital Humanities. The Digital will be used as a way of unpacking the debates in humanities and social sciences and look at the new frameworks, concepts and ideas that emerge in our engagement with the digital. The clusters aim to produce and document new conversations and debates that shape the contours of Digital Humanities in Asia.

Blog Entries

Mapping the Field of Digital Humanities (by Sara Morais, June 11, 2013).
A Suggested Set of Values for the Digital Humanities (by Sara Morais, June 12, 2013).
Archive Practice and Digital Humanities (by Sara Morais, June 24, 2013).

About CIS

Follow us elsewhere

Get short, timely messages from us on Twitter
Join the CIS group on Facebook
Visit us at http://cis-india.org

Support Us
Please help us defend consumer / 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

CIS is grateful to its donors, Wikimedia Foundation, Ford Foundation, Privacy International, UK, Hans Foundation and the Kusuma Trust which was founded by Anurag Dikshit and Soma Pujari, philanthropists of Indian origin, for its core funding and support for most of its projects.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/june-2013-bulletin

June 2012 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2012-07-25T04:56:23Z

Welcome to the newsletter issue of June 2012. The present issue features an updated version of the Unlicensed Spectrum Policy brief for Government of India and a report of the Privacy Matters series organised in Ahmedabad on June 16, 2012.

Digital Natives

New Blog Entries

The Bots That Got Some Votes Home by Nilofar Ansher: The author gives us some startling updates on the "Digital Natives Video Contest" voting results declared in May 2012.
Hyper-connected, Hyper-lonely? by Nilofar Ansher.

Digital Natives Newsletter

Home Alone: Volume 10, Issue 1, April 2012 of the Digital Natives with a Cause newsletter features Hyper-connected, yet Hyper-lonely. It puts the spotlight on an emerging trope in society and media: the more connected we are to our gadgets, peer network and social media, the lonelier we feel.

Access to Knowledge

The Access to Knowledge programme addresses the harms caused to consumers, developing countries, human rights, and creativity/innovation from excessive regimes of copyright, patents, and other such monopolistic rights over knowledge:

Op-ed in the Hindu

The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Injunctions (Lawrence Liang, The Hindu, May 23, 2012): “The same ‘Ashok Kumar,' now restrained from infringing the copyright of the film, ‘3,' helped its signature song, ‘Kolaveri,’ go viral by downloading and copying it without any restraints.”

Columns / Articles

ಡಿಜಿಟಲ್ ನಿರ್ಬಂಧಗಳ ನಿರ್ವಹಣೆ (Sunil Abraham, Prajavani, June 9, 2012): Read the English translation here.

ಸೃಜನಶೀಲತೆಗೆ ಸಂದ ಗೌರವ (Lawrence Liang, Prajavani, June 9, 2012): Read the English translation here.
Copyright Amendment: Bad, but Could Have Been Much Worse (Sunil Abraham, Business Standard, June 10, 2012): The changes to the Copyright Act protect the disabled — but are restrictive about cover versions and web freedom.
A Ludicrous Ban (Achal Prabhala and Lawrence Liang, Open Magazine, June 2, 2012): Our courts cannot be used as quack-houses to buy pills for imaginary problems. The copyright industry is not a sick patient; it’s just a hypochondriac. Films don’t fail because of piracy; they fail because they’re not worth watching. The most popular films in this country are also the most pirated, and yet they remain money-spinners. The real problem is the unbending inability of this industry to adjust to the world; to the Internet; to the life-changing technologies that human beings have witnessed and embraced and prospered by over the past two decades.

Openness

The 'Openness' programme critically examines alternatives to existing regimes of intellectual property rights, and transparency and accountability. Under this programme, we study Open Government Data, Open Access to Scholarly Literature, Open Content, Open Standards, Open Access to Law, and Free/Libre/Open Source Software:

Media Coverage

Wiki goes the oral citation way (Cyber Media, Chokkapan S, June 11, 2012): Achal Prabhala who serves on the board of CIS speaks about the Oral Citations Project.

Internet Governance

The Internet Governance programme conducts research around the various social, technical, and political underpinnings of global and national Internet governance, and includes online privacy, freedom of speech, and Internet governance mechanisms and processes:

Announcements

Window on the World: Subsequent to the publishing of a peer reviewed essay titled Resisting Revolutions: Questioning the Radical Potential of Citizen Action, CIS has been listed as one of the global organisations working on issues of participation, citizenship and new technologies along with a list of partner organisations. This was published by Palgrave Macmillan.
2012 Internet Freedom Fellows: The names of the 2012 Internet Freedom Fellows were announced on June 19, 2012. This was published by the US Department of State. Pranesh Prakash was selected as a Fellow.

Press Coverage of the Internet Freedom Fellows Event

Internet Freedom Fellows Program Emphasizes Defense of Fundamental Freedoms Online (by Ambassador Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe in DipNote, June 25, 2012).
Internet Freedom At Home: Governments, Companies Need Accountability, Speakers Say (by Catherine Saez, Intellectual Property Watch, June 22, 2012).

Peer Forum

Global Networks, Individual Freedoms: A Peer Forum on Internet Freedom and Human Rights: In Connection with the 2012 Internet Freedom Fellows Program, the United States Mission to the United Nations in Geneva invited Pranesh Prakash to a peer forum. The event was held on June 21, 2012, from 9.00 a.m. to 3.00 p.m.

Upcoming & Ongoing Events

Privacy Matters — Consumer Privacy (India International Centre, New Delhi, July 7, 2012): Privacy India, in partnership with the Centre for Internet & Society, International Development Research Centre, Society in Action Group and Privacy International, invite you to a public conference focused on discussing the challenges and concerns to consumer privacy in India.
The Fifth Elephant (NIMHANS Convention Centre, Bangalore, July 27 and 28, 2012): The event was organised by HasGeek and CIS. The first day covered the technology track and talks from business and industry were held on the following day.

Events Organised

Privacy Mattes — Medical Privacy (Yashwantrao Chavan Academy of Development Administration, Rajbhavan Complex, Baner Road, Pune, June 30, 2012): Privacy India in partnership with the Indian Network for People living with HIV/AIDS, Centre for Internet & Society, IDRC, Society in Action Group and Privacy International organised this event. The discussions explored the various types of medical privacy including informational privacy, physical privacy, proprietary privacy and decisional privacy.
GeekUp with Alan Knott-Craig (CIS, Bangalore, June 30, 2012): Alan Knott-Craig, founder of World of Avatar and CEO of Mxit, Africa’s largest social network gave a lecture.
Freedom of Expression & Privacy Roundtable Discussion (University of Goa, June 2, 2012): Lawrence Liang and Chinmayi Arun were participants in the discussion.

Connecting People Apart - Events Series

Post-Media Lab organised this events series at Lüneburg/Berlin from June 20 to June 23, 2012. Nishant Shah participated in the event series as a speaker:

Opening presentation – ‘Talk to Me’ (Halle für Kunst, Lüneburg, June 20, 2012): Nishant Shah along with Rasa Smite & Raitis Smits made a presentation.
‘What Would the Community Say?’ (Freiraum, Lüneburg, June 21, 2012): Nishant Shah in cooperation with DialogN reflected on the experiences about the changing face of citizen action in a post-mediatised world.
The Community Complex, A Post-Media Lab conference (Denkerei, Berlin, June 22, 2012): Nishant Shah was one of the participants.

Other Events Participated

India Privacy Meet (Hotel LeMeridien, New Delhi, June 29, 2012): The event was organised by Microsoft, DSCI and Greyhead. Sunil Abraham was a panelist in the session on Citizen Privacy.
Meeting of the two Sub-Groups on Privacy Issues under the Chairmanship of Justice AP Shah (Yojana Bhawan, Planning Commission, June 27, 2012). Sunil Abraham participated in this meeting. The report of the committee will be used in drafting of the new privacy bill.
CENSORSHIP 2020: The Future of Free Speech Online (Communication, Culture and Technology Program of Georgetown University 2nd Floor, Car Barn, 3520 Prospect St., N.W., Washington, DC, June 25, 2012): Pranesh Prakash participated in this event organised by the Internet Society. See the original published by Communication, Culture & Technology here.
Multi-Stakeholder Consultation on ‘Internet Rights, Accessibility, Regulation & Ethics’ (Mirza Ghalib Hall, SCOPE Complex, New Delhi, May 3, 2012): Pranesh Prakash was a speaker in this event organised by Digital Empowerment Foundation, Association for Progressive Communications, Department of Information Technology and National Internet Exchange of India. Watch the video here.
Internet at Liberty 2012 (Washington D.C., May 23 and 24, 2012): Sunil Abraham was a speaker in Plenary IV along with Cynthia Wong, Mohamed El Dahshan and Dunja Mijatović. Watch the video here. The event was organised by Google.
Google Hangout with Ashoka Fellow Sunil Abraham: Ashoka Fellows are leading social entrepreneurs who have innovative solutions to social problems and the potential to change patterns across society. Sunil became an Ashoka Fellow in 1999. Watch the video.
Clear and Present Danger: Attempts to Change Internet Governance and Implications for Press Freedom (National Endowment for Democracy, Washington D.C., June 26, 2012): The event was organised by National Endowment for Democracy. Pranesh Prakash participated in it.
Overview of Google’s efforts to promote Internet Freedom and freedom of expression online, including its work on the following reports: “Google Transparency” and “Enabling Trade in the Era of Information Technologies: Breaking Down Barriers to the Free Flow of Information (California, June 28, 2012): The event was organised by Google. Pranesh Prakash participated in a meeting with Derek Slater from Google.
Stanford University Roundtable Discussion (California, June 28, 2012): IFF Fellows introduced themselves and briefly talked about their background and work in internet freedom and human rights issues. Pranesh Prakash was one of the participants.
EFF’s legislative efforts to defend free speech, privacy, innovation, and consumer rights (California, June 29, 2012): Pranesh Prakash participated in a meeting with Katitza Rodriguez, International Rights Director.
Overview of Twitter’s new censorship policies and its impact on human rights activists around the world (California, June 29, 2012): Pranesh Prakash participated in a meeting with Carolina Janssen, Localization Content Coordinator. This was organised by Twitter.
Best practices in utilizing Ustream’s live interactive broadcast platform to showcase human rights issues (June 29, 2012): Pranesh Prakash participated in this meeting organised by Ustream.

Event Report

Securing e-Governance: Ensuring Data Protection and Privacy (Ahmedabad, Management Association, Ahmedabad, June 16, 2012): Privacy India in partnership with the Centre for Internet & Society, Bangalore, International Development Research Centre, Canada, Privacy International, UK and the Society in Action Group, Gurgaon organised a public discussion. Prashant Iyengar and Nisha Thompson spoke at the event. A total of 30 people participated in the event.

Columns in FirstPost

How Facebook is Blatantly Abusing our Trust (Nishant Shah, FirstPost, June 27, 2012): ‘Don’t fix it, if it ain’t broken’ is not an adage Facebook seems to subscribe to... The million dollar question – or maybe a slightly reduced price, given its public listing status on the stock-exchange right now – is that while Facebook might keep us safe from other people using our data, will it also be able to keep us safe from itself?
Beyond Anonymous: Shit people say on Internet piracy (Nishant Shah, FirstPost, June 7, 2012): FirstPost published Nishant Shah's column along with the video that CIS and ALF had made on 'shit people say about piracy' as a lead story. The post is a series of provocations around piracy, censorship and the state of Internet in India. Like all good tasting things, these observations need to be taken with a pinch of salt. But it is the hope of the author that this serves as a response to otherwise very persistent voices that have been demonizing file-sharing online.

Article in the Times of India

The Web of Our Strife (Pranesh Prakash, The Times of India, June 2, 2012): Given the current trend of states individually wielding excessive powers over various aspects of how their citizens access and use the internet, a Committee on Internet-Related Policies may well be what is needed to safeguard democratic principles and innovation on the internet.

Podcast

An Interview with Nishant Shah by Jamillah Knowles (Outriders, BBC Radio 5): “I think what we need to do is perhaps say that there is something happening with the internet in India and then maybe we can move on to figuring out what is happening to Anonymous because we had a series of challenges on freedom of speech and expression and online space in the country.”

New Fellow at CIS

Chinmayi Arun, former Assistant Professor of Law at the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences joined CIS as a Fellow. Chinmayi’s research focus will include privacy, free speech and access to information.

New Blog Entries

CIS entered into a small collaboration with Tata Telecommunications in India to celebrate the IPv6 day on June 6. CIS agreed to write 5500 word vignettes which were sent to their global database consisting of more than 900,000 users in the Asia-Pacific:

News & Media Coverage (International)

India's struggle for online freedom (by Rebecca MacKinnon, Sydney Morning Herald, June 9, 2012): “If you start the drenching early on, by the time you get to 50 per cent [internet penetration], everyone will be well-behaved monkeys.”—Sunil Abraham.

Hackers Take Protest to Indian Streets and Cyberspace (by Shreya Shah, Wall Street Journal, June 8, 2012): “The group attacked the Web site of India’s Supreme Court even when it says it does not attack Web sites used by the common man.” — Pranesh Prakash.
The War for India's Internet (by Rebecca Mackinnon, Foreign Policy, June 6, 2012): “"On free speech I have high faith in the Indian judiciary...There is a good chance to launch a constitutional challenge.” — Sunil Abraham.

News & Media Coverage (National)

No more blocking of entire websites? (by Danish Sheikh, Business Standard, June 24, 2012): CIS research on Intermediary Liability in India is referred to in this article.
UID: Are your biometric I-cards stacked against you? (by M Rajashekhar, Economic Times, June 24, 2012): "If biometrics is used as authentication factor then it would be possible for a criminal to harvest your biometrics — such as using a glass to collect fingerprints — without your conscious cooperation. Or the registrar can cache your biometrics and duplicate transactions." — Sunil Abraham.
Net Loss (Abimanyu Nagarajan, The Telegraph, June 20, 2012): “We sent takedown notices to e-commerce, content hosting, and news media sites...in most cases, we found the intermediaries were very risk averse." — Sunil Abraham.
Cos spying on competitors, staff: Study (The Statesman, June 19, 2012): “Whether or not surveillance is legal, depends on the type... There is some private information a person will expect to remain private, and some information that is expected to be public — like Twitter feeds.” — Sunil Abraham.
Recruitment Tracker: 21 students placed out of the 49 who sat for recruitment in Christ University’s School of Law, Class of 2012 (Bar and Bench News Network, June 11, 2012): CIS recruited Snehashish Ghosh.
PPOs save placement-record as Christ Law’s 2nd graduating batch hosts fewer law firms (by Prachi Shrivastava in Legally India, June 10, 2012).
India: The New Front Line in the Global Struggle for Internet Freedom (Atlantic, June 7, 2012): CIS report on Intermediary Liability in India is quoted.

'Anonymous' hackers to protest Indian Internet laws (AFP, June 8, 2012): The news was also published in NDTV, Jagran Post, The Times of India, LiveMint, and Economic Times on June 9, 2012.
The new Internet watchdogs (Ronendra Singh, Hindu Business Line, June 12, 2012): “The Indian Government is not following the letter of the law and bypassing judicial safeguards in its crackdown on political speech...This aggressive enforcement is also having a chilling effect on access to knowledge and freedom of expression.” — Sunil Abraham.
Concerns raised ahead of proposed India-US trade treaty (Hindu Business Line, June 13, 2012).
Attempts to censor the web ill-advised (by Krishs Fernandes, The Times of India, June 3, 2012).
Poor Guarantee of Online Freedom in India (by Geeta Seshu, Economic & Political Weekly, Vol XLVII No. 24, June 2012).
Tata Communications embraces the change to IPv6 (tech 2, June 7, 2012).
Internet opens doors to trillions more Net addresses with IPv6 (by Aaron Tan, techgoondu): “Despite the larger load of information, IPv6 packets are easier to handle and route, just like postcards with pin codes in their addresses are easier to deliver than those without.” — Nishant Shah.
Biz moving to IPv6 but lower costs, support needed (intellasia.net, June 8, 2012).
Govt websites to get new addresses (The Telegraph, June 7, 2012): “The future of our connected networks is IPv6. Not only is it more efficient and faster than IPv4, which we are currently working with, it is also more reliable and secure.” —Nishant Shah.
Anonymous India’s Takedowns Could Be Counterproductive (by Nikhil Pahwa, Medianama, June 6, 2012).
Watch out for cyber bullies (by KV Kurmanath, Hindu Business Line, June 4, 2012): “It would be very useful if both the government and civil society was more aggressive in awareness raising and triggering change in behaviour. Unfortunately this is a bit like smoking — even though people are aware of the issues — they engage in risky behaviour online.” — Sunil Abraham.
Scared by a spoof? You’ve got to be kidding me! (by Dhamini Ratnam, June 3, 2012). Pranesh Prakash is quoted in this article.
Protest@ censorship.com (by Sandhya Soman, The Times of India, June 5, 2012): “There is corporate and private censorship of internet and it is being done without enough proof of who is violating the copyrights of moviemakers. If these protests create awareness about the larger issues and developments in the areas of e-governance, IT Act and copyright law, then they could be helpful.” — Pranesh Prakash.

Telecom

While the potential for growth and returns exist for telecommunications in India, a range of issues need to be addressed. One aspect is more extensive rural coverage and the other is a countrywide access to broadband which is low. Both require effective and efficient use of networks and resources, including spectrum:

Telecom Knowledge Repository

Ford Foundation has given CIS a grant of USD 200,000 to build expertise in the area of Telecommunications in India over a period of two years. The programme outline, the modules covered and the profiles and bios of our expert reviewers can be found here:

Broadcasting

Module 7.2.3 (Mobile Television) by Tina Mani
Module 7.2.3 (FAQs)

Emerging Topics

Module 8.3 (Mobile Television) by Tina Mani
Module 8.3 (Mobile Television FAQs)

Featured Research

Unlicensed Spectrum Policy Brief for Government of India (Satya N Gupta, Sunil Abraham and Yelena Gyulkhandanyan): CIS and the Ford Foundation bring you the Unlicensed Spectrum Policy brief for Government of India. The research recommends unlicensed spectrum to the Government of India based on recent developments in wireless technology, community needs and international best practices. (The present report is an updated version of the draft circulated earlier).

Column in Business Standard

Growth, India's Highest Priority (Shyam Ponappa, Business Standard, June 8, 2012): Telecom and spectrum reforms are overdue, as are energy reforms addressing the fuel supply-power generation and distribution-sustainable tariffs chain. In terms of sequence, the next significant effort could focus on the… telecom sector. The empowered group of ministers can decisively abandon short-term government revenues in favour of user benefits, leading in time to even more government revenues.

New Blog Entry

National Telecom Policy 2012 — Issues and Concerns by Snehashish Ghosh: The author throws light on some of the issues and concerns surrounding the recently passed National Telecom Policy 2012.

Event Report

3^rd IJLT-CIS Lecture Series (National Law School of India University, Nagarbhavi, Bangalore, May 27, 2012): Prof. Rohan Samarajiva, Chairman and CEO, LIRNEasia gave the inaugural lecture on “Tariff Regulation in South Asia”. The presentation slides can be accessed here.

Foreign Press Coverage

India’s telecom success story turns sour (by Simon Denyer, Washington Post, June 1, 2012): “"There are very strong economic reasons for not auctioning spectrum in developing countries.” — Shyam Ponappa.

About CIS

CIS was registered as a society in Bangalore in 2008. As an independent, non-profit research organisation, it runs different policy research programmes such as Accessibility, Access to Knowledge, Openness, Internet Governance, and Telecom. Over the last four years our policy research programmes have resulted in outputs such as the e-Accessibility Policy Handbook for Persons with Disabilities with ITU and G3ict, and Digital Alternatives with a Cause?, Thinkathon Position Papers and the Digital Natives with a Cause? Report with Hivos. With foreign governments we worked on National Enterprise Architecture and Government Interoperability Framework for Govt. of Iraq; Open Standards Policy for Govt. of Moldova; Free and Open Software Centre of Excellence project plan for Saudi Arabia; eGovernance Strategy Document for Govt. of Tajikistan. With the Government of India we have done policy research for Ministry of Communications & Information Technology, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Ministry of Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions, Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, etc., on WIPO Treaties, Copyright Bill, Interoperability Framework in eGovernance, Privacy Bill, NIA Bill, National Policy on Electronics and IT Act.

CIS is an accredited NGO at WIPO and has given policy briefs to delegations from various countries, our Programme Manager, Nirmita Narasimhan won the National Award for Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities from the Government of India and also received the NIVH Excellence Award.

Follow us elsewhere

Get short, timely messages from us on Twitter
Join the CIS group on Facebook
Visit our website here

CIS is grateful to its donors, Ford Foundation, Privacy International, UK, Hans Foundation and the Kusuma Trust which was founded by Anurag Dikshit and Soma Pujari, philanthropists of Indian origin, for its core funding and support for most of its projects.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/june-2012-bulletin

June 2011 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2012-07-30T07:14:57Z

Greetings from the Centre for Internet and Society! In this issue we are pleased to present you the latest updates about our research, upcoming events, and news and media coverage:

Researchers@Work

RAW is a multidisciplinary research initiative. CIS believes that in order to understand the contemporary concerns in the field of Internet and society, it is necessary to produce local and contextual accounts of the interaction between the Internet and socio-cultural and geo-political structures. To build original research knowledge base, the RAW programme has been collaborating with different organisations and individuals to focus on its three year thematic of Histories of the Internets in India. Six monographs Rewiring Bodies, Archive and Access, Pornography and the Law, The Leap of Rhodes or, How India Dealt with the Last Mile Problem - An Inquiry into Technology and Governance, Transparency and Politics and Internet, Society and Space in Indian Cities are published online and will be launched later this year.

CEPT to Set up Centre to Research Role of Internet in Social Development [Published in the Indian Express on June 18, 2011]

Upcoming Event in CEPT, Ahmedabad

Locating Internets: Histories of the Internet(s) in India — Research Training and Curriculum Workshop: Call for Participation [Deadline for submission – 15 July 2011; Workshop from 19 to 22 August 2011]

Digital Natives with a Cause?

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

The Digital Natives Newsletter

The Digital Dinosaurs [Volume 5]

Pathways

HE Cell's initiative on social justice, in collaboration with CIS, has initiated the Pathways Project for Learning in Higher Education. It is supported by the Ford Foundation. Under this project, nine under-graduate colleges in different parts of India will be identified to provide special skills in livelihood, knowledge and technology to underprivileged students in those colleges.

New Blog Entry

Pathways for Learning in Higher Education

Accessibility

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

New Blog Entries

Policy Spotlight: 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act [Written by Deepti Bharthur; contains an e-mail interview with Jenifer Simpson, Senior Director for Government Affairs and head of the Telecommunications & Technology Policy Initiative at the American Association of People with Disabilities ]
ICT Accessibility in Sri Lanka [Written by Nirmita Narasimhan]

Intellectual Property

CIS believes that access to knowledge and culture is essential as it promotes creativity and innovation and bridges the gaps between the developed and developing world positively. Hence, the campaigns for an international treaty on copyright exceptions for print-impaired, advocating against PUPFIP Bill, calls for the WIPO Broadcast Treaty to be restricted to broadcast, questioning the demonization of 'pirates', and supporting endeavours that explore and question the current copyright regime.

Statement

Statement of CIS, India, on the WIPO Broadcast Treaty at the 22nd SCCR

New Blog Entry

Putting a Lid on Royalty Outflows — How the RBI can Help Reduce your IP Costs [Written by Sanjana Govil]

Openness

CIS believes that innovation and creativity should be fostered through openness and collaboration and is committed towards promotion of open standards, open access, and free/libre/open source software.

Submission

Comments on the draft National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy [submitted to the National Spatial Data Infrastructure]

Internet Governance

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

New Articles

The Present — and Future — Dangers of India's Draconian New Internet Regulations [By Anja Kovacs in the Caravan on June 1, 2011]
Big Brother is Watching You [By Sunil Abraham in Deccan Herald on June 1, 2011]
The Digital is Political [By Nishant Shah in Down to Earth, Issue of June 15, 2011]
Do You Want to be Watched? [By Sunil Abraham in Pragati on June 8, 2011]
Snooping Can Lead to Data Abuse [By Sunil Abraham in Mail Today on June 9, 2011]
Privacy and Security Can Co-exist [By Sunil Abraham in Mail Today on June 21, 2011]

Column in Indian Express

Nishant Shah, Director-Research will be writing a series of columns on Internet and Society issues:

Say 'Password' in Hindi [By Nishant Shah in the Indian Express, May 15, 2011]

Upcoming Event

Socio-financial Online Networks: Globalizing Micro-Credit through Micro-transactional Networked Platforms – A Public Lecture by Radhika Gajalla [at the Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, July 8, 2011]

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

Featured Research

New Articles

A Street View of Private and the Public [By Prashant Iyengar in Tehelka on June 4, 2011]
The new Right to Privacy Bill 2011 — A Blind Man's View of the Elephunt [By Prashant Iyengar in Privacy India website on June 8, 2011]

New Blog Entry

Bloggers' Rights Subordinated to Rights of Expression: Cyber Law Expert

Event organised in Guwahati

Privacy matters [Donbosco Institute, Kharguli, Guwahati, June 23, 2011]

Upcoming Events

Internet Surveillance Policy: “…the second time as farce?” – A Public Lecture by Caspar Bowden [TERI, Bangalore, June 27, 2011]
Privacy Matters - A Public Conference in Hyderabad [Osmania University Center for International Program, Hyderabad, July 9, 2011]

Telecom

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

Articles by Shyam Ponappa

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

NTP 2011 Objective: Broadband [published in the Business Standard on June 2, 2011]

Miscellaneous

Technology, Transparency and Accountability: A Bar-Camp in Delhi [June 5, 2011, Delhi]
Communication Policy Advocacy, Technology, and Online Freedom of Expression: A Toolkit for Media Development [June 20 – July 1, 2011, Budapest, Hungary]

News & Media Coverage

Your cyber space is a hackers paradise [Mail Today, June 6, 2011]
Centaur website reveals guests' personal info [Times of India, June 20, 2011]
Mumbai Takes Note of Sexting, the Seamier Side of Texting [Times of India, June 19, 2011]
Look what the state just did to you [Mid Day, June 12, 2011]
Tough neighbourhood tests India's e-tolerance [Times of India, June 12, 2011]
India Weighing Looser Web Rules [Wall Street Journal, May 30, 2011]
Public data on the Web leaves much to be desired [Hindu, May 28, 2011]
What documents will you need, to get UID? [CitizenMatters.in, May 28, 2011]
Mobile education comes to villages [Mail Today, May 27, 2011]
Google now stalks your street [Hindu, May 27, 2011]
Women in love with Facebook [Deccan Herald, May 27, 2011]
Google Unveils Controversial Street View Mapping in B’lore [Economic Times, Mumbai, May 27, 2011]
NGOs say eG8 report must stress internet rights [TELECOMPAPER, May 26, 2011]

Follow us elsewhere

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Join the CIS group on Facebook
Visit us at www.cis-india.org

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

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/june-2011-bulletin

June 2010 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2012-08-10T09:38:46Z

Greetings from the Centre for Internet & Society. We bring you updates of our research, news and media coverage, information on events for the month of June 2010.

News Updates

Dont hang up on this one
Is 3G the next twist in the mobile phone growth story?
http://bit.ly/9NkaVP

Peeping Toms In Your Inbox
Nothing’s safe any more—not your mobile number, nor your e-mail—as they’re put on offer for the benefit of telemarketers, writes Namrata Joshi and Neha Bhatt in an article published in the Outlook.
http://bit.ly/ckmRRH

I don't want my fingerprints taken
Through this article published in Down to Earth, Nishant Shah looks at the role of the state as arbiter of our privacy.
http://bit.ly/aYdMia

An artist's hunt for lost stepwells
As part of the Maps for Making Change project, Kakoli Sen has brought to light some facts which she stumbled upon while mapping the stepwells in Vadodara. She mapped these and also discovered 14 such architectural heritage structures. The news was covered in the Times of India.
http://bit.ly/dxtwJU

Facebook, privacy and India
Does Facebook's decision to open out user information and data to third party websites amount to an invasion of privacy and should users' seriously consider getting out of the site? Sunil Abraham doesn't think so.
http://bit.ly/a2HzhT

APC starts research into spectrum regulation in Brazil, India, Kenya, Morocco, Nigeria and South Africa
Communication infrastructure is the foundation of the knowledge-based economy and while there has been a boom in the construction of undersea cables bringing potentially terabits of capacity to the African continent, the ability to deliver broadband to consumers is hampered by inefficient telecommunications markets and policies. Wireless connectivity offers tremendous potential to deliver affordable broadband to developing countries but inefficient spectrum policy and regulation means the opportunity to seize the advantages brought about by improvements in wireless broadband technologies are extremely limited.
http://bit.ly/a67ut8

WIPO Proposals Would Open Cross-Border Access To Materials For Print Disabled
The print disabled feel that the possible UN recommendations being negotiated upon may come up short, reports Kaitlin Mara in this article.
http://bit.ly/99kbS0

The Potential of Open Development for Canada and Abroad
IDRC held a panel discussion on 'The Potential of Open Development for Canada and Abroad' on May 5, 2010 in Ottawa.
http://bit.ly/aSp8J3

A letter to CGIAR in support of Open Access
Professor Subbiah Arunachalam wrote a letter to CGIAR apprising them of the need for, and advantages of making their research output Open Access.
http://bit.ly/doJmAe

Upcoming Event

The Internet, Culture, and Society - Looking at Past, Present, and Future Worldwide
It is now well known that with 4.5 billion mobile phone owners in the world and increased Internet penetration, global cultures and communities have experienced shifts in their economic, political, and social well-being due to the digital revolution. As a scholar and consultant who works worldwide, Prof Ramesh Srinivasan will illustrate how new media technologies have been used creatively to enable political movements in Kyrgyzstan, literacy and educational reform in India, and economic development across the developing world. In addition to this, he will discuss some of digital culture's biggest challenges, including considering how the Web can start to empower different types of cultural perspectives and knowledges.
http://bit.ly/c9cIvc

Research

Survey: Digital Natives with a cause?
This survey seeks to consolidate information about how young people who have grown up with networked technologies use and experience online platforms and tools. It is also one of the first steps we have taken to interact with Digital Natives from around the world — especially in emerging information societies — to learn, understand and explore the possibilities of change via technology that lie before the Digital Natives. The findings from the survey will be presented at a multi-stakeholder conference later this year in The Netherlands.
http://bit.ly/cUtKhV

Queer Histories of the Internet: An Introduction
Nitya Vasudevan and Nithin Manayath introduce the Queer Histories of the Internet through this blog post discussing broadly the relationship between queer identity and technology.
http://bit.ly/9xdYRv

Separating the 'Symbiotic Twins'
This post tries to undo the comfortable linking that has come to exist in the ‘radical’ figure of the cyber-queer. And this is so not because of a nostalgic sense of the older ways of performing queerness, or the world of the Internet is fake or unreal in comparison to bodily experience, and ‘real’ politics lies elsewhere. This is so as it is a necessary step towards studying the relationship between technology and sexuality.
http://bit.ly/9PV9YW

The power of the next click...
P2P cameras and microphones hooked up to form a network of people who don't know each other, and probably don't care; a series of people in different states of undress, peering at the each other, hands poised on the 'Next' button to search for something more. Chatroulette, the next big fad on the Internet, is here in a grand way, making vouyers out of us all. This post examines the aesthetics, politics and potentials of this wonderful platform beyond the surface hype of penises and pornography that surrounds this platform.
http://bit.ly/95twmz

Telecom

India's sorry spectrum story
In this article published in the Business Standard on June 3, 2010, Shyam Ponappa analyses the spectrum story in India. He says that the approach to spectrum management is an object lesson in how not to use information and communications technology for development.
http://bit.ly/cojFFT

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/june-2010-bulletin

July 2019 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2019-08-09T13:50:49Z

Centre for Internet & Society (CIS) newsletter for July 2019.

Highlights for July 2019
CIS presented its comments on the proposed rules 29,30,31 of the Draft Copyright (Amendment) Rules, 2019 to the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Govt. of India. The comments were made in response to Notification G.S.R 393(E) published in the Gazette of India on May 30, 2019. CIS submitted that in the domestic approach to modernising our copyright legislation, we must refrain from considering distribution of born-digital/ digitised works over the public Internet equivalent to the function of broadcasting works over cable/ satellite. The Indian National Trust for Art & Heritage Pune Chapter is working with various organisations to preserve the natural heritage places like rivers in Pune district of Maharashtra, India. After the presentation of 'Project Jalbodh' by CIS-A2K in River Dialogue organised by INTACH in April 2018, several organisations have shown keen interest in collaboration. Subodh Kulkarni shares some insights in his report. ICANN has Advisory Committees which help guide the policy recommendations that the ICANN community develops while its Supporting Organizations are charged with developing policy recommendations for a particular aspect of ICANN's operations. ICANN publishes a combined budget for all these bodies under the head of policy development. CIS inquired about the financial resources allocated to each of them specifically. CIS in partnership with the Internet Society organized an event on the impact of consolidation in the Internet economy. It was divided into two roundtable discussions, the first one focusing on the policies and regulation while the latter dealt with the technical evolution of the Internet. The roundtables aimed to analyze how growing forces of consolidation, including concentration, vertical and horizontal integration, and barriers to market entry and competition would influence the Internet in the next 3 to 5 years. The report by Akriti Bopanna and Gurshabad Grover provides an insight into the developments. As part of its Researchers at work programme on key thematics at the intersections of internet and society, CIS called for abstracts for essays that explore social, economic, cultural, political, infrastructural, or aesthetic dimensions of the ‘list’. Ten abstracts would be shortlisted by August 9 from the list of submissions and the selected authors would be requested to submit the full essay of their draft by September 15. Final versions of the essays are expected to be published in October. With the rise and popularity of app-based platforms such as Ola, Uber, Swiggy Zomato, and others, there is a growing public conversation about regulation of such 'gig-work' platforms and the working conditions of people who work for them. To explore this further CIS conducted a panel discussion at its Bangalore office. Researchers associated with the project presented their preliminary findings. Panelists preliminary field insights along with reflections on what it meant to do such studies, how they went about studying gig-work, and challenges that arose in their work. An excerpt from an essay by Maya Indira Ganesh, written for and published as part of the Bodies of Evidence collection of Deep Dives titled You auto-complete me: romancing the bot explains human relations with bots. The Bodies of Evidence collection, edited by Bishakha Datta and Richa Kaul Padte, is a collaboration between Point of View and the Centre for Internet and Society, undertaken as part of the Big Data for Development Network supported by International Development Research Centre, Canada.

CIS and the News

The following articles were authored by CIS secretariat during the month:

Fostering Strategic Convergence in US-India Tech Relations: 5G and Beyond (Justin Sherman and Arindrajit Basu; The Diplomat; July 3, 2019).
Fix Problems Before Complete Failure (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard; July 4, 2019).
What is the problem with ‘Ethical AI’? An Indian Perspective (A rindrajit Basu and Pranav M.B; cyberBRICS; July 17, 2019).
Old Isn't Always Gold: FaceApp and Its Privacy Policies (Mira Swaminathan and Shweta Reddy; The Wire; July 20, 2019).
The worrying survival of moon landing conspiracy theorists (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; July 22, 2019).
India Is Falling Down the Facial Recognition Rabbit Hole (Karan Saini and Prem Sylvester; The Wire; July 23, 2019).
Why I’m not going to tell you about the dangers of apps like FaceApp (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; July 28, 2019).
The Digital Identification Parade (Aayush Rathi and Ambika Tandon; Indian Express; July 29, 2019). The authors acknowledge Sumandro Chattapadhyay, Amber Sinha and Arindrajit Basu for their edits and Karan Saini for his inputs.
In India, Privacy Policies of Fintech Companies Pay Lip Service to User Rights (Shweta Mohandas; The Wire; July 30, 2019).

CIS in the News

CIS secretariat was consulted for the following articles published during the month in various publications:

PIB plans a fact-checking unit to counter fake news (Smriti Kak Ramachandran; Hindustan Times; July 3, 2019).
How Sai Baba Was Made To Spy On Your Phone For Credit Ratings (Gopal Sathe; Huffington Post; July 4, 2019).
Mozilla is funding a way to support Julia in Firefox (Catalin Cimpanu; ZD Net; July 8, 2019).
Deepfakes: Algorithms at war, trust at stake (Rajmohan Sudhakar; Deccan Herald; July 14, 2019).
Digital public information system design: Talk to experts, find the right way (Prachatai; July 18, 2019).
Easing the US-India divergence on data localisation (Shashidhar KJ and Kashish Parpiani; Observer Research Foundation; July 22, 2019).
For sex workers, mobile phone becomes a double-edged sword (Tushar Kaushik; Economic Times; July 23, 2019).
Twitter reacts to the India's cryptocurrency drama (Rajarshi Mitra; FXStreet; July 26, 2019).

Access to Knowledge

Access to Knowledge is a campaign to promote the fundamental principles of justice, freedom, and economic development. It deals with issues like copyrights, patents and trademarks, which are an important part of the digital landscape.

Copyright and Patent

Research on harms caused to consumers, developing countries, human rights, and creativity/innovation from excessive regimes of copyright, patents, and other such monopolistic rights over knowledge:

Submission

Comments on the Draft Copyright (Amendment) Rules, 2019 concerning Statutory Licensing (Anubha Sinha; July 11, 2019). This submission presents comments to the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (“DPIIT”), Ministry of Commerce and Industry pertaining to the notification G.S.R 393(E) containing the draft Copyright (Amendment) Rules, 2019 issued on 30th May 2019.

Wikipedia

Under a grant from Wikimedia Foundation we are doing a project 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.

Blog Entries

Orientation programme, Wikipedia workshop & Action Plan meeting in PAH Solapur University (Subodh Kulkarni; July 19, 2019).
Wikimedia Workshop on Rivers under Project Jalbodh (Subodh Kulkarni; July 30, 2019).
Re-licensing Sessions with Authors and Organisations (Subodh Kulkarni; July 31, 2019).

Openness

Participation in Event

Learning and Understanding the Frameworks of Rights at Work (Organized by Kai Hsin Hung; IT for Change; Bangalore; July 13, 2019). Torsha and Mira attended the workshop.

Internet Governance

The Tunis Agenda of the second World Summit on the Information Society has defined internet governance as the development and application by governments, the private sector and civil society, in their respective roles of shared principles, norms, rules, decision making procedures and programmes that shape the evolution and use of the Internet. As part of internet governance work we work on policy issues relating to freedom of expression primarily focusing on the Information Technology Act and issues of liability of intermediaries for unlawful speech and simultaneously ensuring that the right to privacy is safeguarded as well.

Freedom of Speech & Expression

Under a grant from the MacArthur Foundation, CIS is doing research on the restrictions placed on freedom of expression online by the Indian government and contribute studies, reports and policy briefs to feed into the ongoing debates at the national as well as international level. As part of the project we bring you the following outputs:

Blog Entry

DIDP #34 On granular detail on ICANN's budget for policy development process (Akriti Bopanna; July 6, 2019).

Participation in Events

13th European Summer School on Internet Governance (Organized by European Summer School on Internet Governance; Meissen; July 13 - 20, 2019). Akriti Bopanna attended the school.
ICANN 65 De-briefing Meeting (Organized by Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations ; July 16, 2019). Akriti Bopanna remotely presented on the Human Rights related developments that took place at the Marrakech meeting, over the course of the 4 days.

Privacy

Under a grant from Privacy International and IDRC we are doing a project on surveillance. CIS is researching the history of privacy in India and how it shapes the contemporary debates around technology mediated identity projects like Aadhar. As part of our ongoing research, we bring you the following outputs:

Blog Entry

The Impact of Consolidation in the Internet Economy on the Evolution of the Internet (Akriti Bopanna and Gurshabad Grover; July 3, 2019). The blog post was edited by Swaraj Barooah, Elonnai Hickok and Vishnu Ramachandran. Swagam Dasgupta provided inputs.

Participation in Events

Digital ID Forum 2019 (Organized by UNDP; Chulalongkorn University, Thailand; July 3, 2019). Sunil Abraham was one of the panelists at this event.
BIS LITD 17 meeting (Organized by Bureau of Indian Standards; New Delhi; July 3, 2019). Gurshabad Grover attended the sixteenth meeting of the Information Systems Security and Biometrics Section Committee (LITD17).
Facebook Data for Good in Bangalore (Organized by Facebook; Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore; July 25, 2019).
Roundtable with the WhatsApp leadership (Organized by WhatsApp; Mountbatten, The Oberoi, New Delhi; July 26, 2019). Will Cathcart, WhatsApp's new global head, visited India and invited Sunil Abraham for a discussion.
Facebook Data for Good in New Delhi (Organized by Facebook; University of Chicago Center, New Delhi; July 29, 2019).

IT / Information Technology

A research on the usage of systems (computers and telecommunications) for storing, retrieving and sending information as well as the IT Act:

Participation in Event

Leveraging Web Application Vulnerabilities for Reconnaissance and Intelligence Gathering (Organized by Has Geek; GRD College of Science, Coimbatore; July 5, 2019). Karan Saini gave a talk at the JSFoo Conference.

Artificial Intelligence

With origins dating back to the 1950s Artificial Intelligence (AI) is not necessarily new. However, interest in AI has been rekindled over the recent years due to advancements of technology and its applications to real-world scenarios. We conduct research on the existing legal and regulatory parameters:

Participation in Events

Roundtable Discussion on “The Future of AI Policy in India” (Organized by Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations, New Delhi; July 1, 2019).
Emerging AI technology in health care in India, health equity and justice: Critical reflections and charting out way forward (Organized by HEaL (Health, Ethics, and Law Institute of Training, Research and Advocacy) of FMES (Forum for Medical Ethics Society) in collaboration with CPS (Centre for Policy Studies), Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay; July 13, 2019). Radhika Radhakrishnan, participated in a roundtable discussion on "Emerging AI technology in health care in India, health equity and justice: Critical reflections and charting out way forward."

Gender

Presentation to Amnesty International on researching the Future of Work (Organized by Amnesty Interntional, New Delhi; July 18, 2019). Aayush Rathi and Ambika Tandon made a presentation on CIS research on Future of Work.

Telecom

Monthly Blog

Fix Problems Before Complete Failure (Shyam Ponappa; Organizing India Blogspot; July 4, 2019).

Researchers@Work

The researchers@work programme at CIS produces and supports pioneering and sustained trans-disciplinary research on key thematics at the intersections of internet and society; organise and incubate networks of and fora for researchers and practitioners studying and making internet in India; and contribute to development of critical digital pedagogy, research methodology, and creative practice.

Event Organized

#MappingDigitalLabour - Panel discussion on platform-work in Mumbai and New Delhi (CIS, Bangalore; July 19, 2019). Watch the session recording video here.

Blog Entries

Studying the Internet Discourse in India through the Prism of Human Rights (Deva Prasad M.; July 1, 2019).
#DigitalPedagogies (Ashutosh Potdar, Maya Dodd, Nidhi Kalra, and Ravikant Kisana; July 1, 2019).
#OpenAccessScholarlyPublishing (Abhishek Shrivastava, Dibyaduti Roy, and Nirmala Menon; July 11, 2019).
#RenarrationWeb (Anuja Mirchandaney, Deepak Prince, Dinesh and Shalini; July 23, 2019).

About CIS

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 disabilities, 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 CIS on:

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 CIS:

Collaborate with CIS:

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/july-2019-newsletter

July 2018 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2018-08-11T02:50:52Z

CIS July 2018 newsletter.

Dear readers,

Previous issues of the newsletters can be accessed here.

Highlights

Paul Kurien and Akriti Bopanna carried out an analysis of the diversity of participation at the ICANN processes by taking a close look at their mailing lists.
CIS-A2K organized 6 events: partnership discussions with Misimi Telugu monthly magazine; partnership activity in Annamayya Library, Guntur, a workshop in Tumakur University; a workshop of river activists for building Jal Bodh; a workshop of publishers and writers on unicode, open source and wikimedia projects; and a Telugu literary conference.
CIS had worked with the Research and Advisory Group (RAG) of the Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace (GCSC). The work looked at the negotiation processes and strategies that various players may adopt as they drive the cyber norms agenda. In continuation CIS has brought out a report which focuses more extensively on the substantive law and principles at play and looks closely at what the global state of the debate means for India.
The debate surrounding privacy has in recent times gained momentum due to the Aadhaar judgement and the growing concerns around the use of personal data by corporations and governments. In this light CIS has made comments and recommendations to the India Privacy Code, 2018.
CIS drafted a response to a Notice of Inquiry (NOI) issued by the U.S. Commerce Department's National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) on "International Internet Policy Priorities." CIS commented on the free flow of information and jurisdiction, mult-stakeholder approach to internet governance, privacy and security.
Elonnai Hickok, Shweta Mohandas and Swaraj Paul Barooah compiled the AI Task Force Report, India's first step towards an AI framework. The Task Force on Artificial Intelligence was established by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry to leverage AI for economic benefits, and provide policy recommendations on the deployment of AI for India.
Paul Kurian and Akriti Bopanna carried out an analysis of the diversity of participation at the ICANN processes by taking a close look at their mailing lists.

Articles

Digital Native: The bigger picture (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; July 1, 2018).
The Problems That Should Occupy Our Electioneers (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard; July 6, 2018).
Digital Native: How smart cities can make criminals out of denizens (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; July 15, 2018).
Anti-trafficking Bill may lead to censorship (Swaraj Barooah and Gurshabad Grover; Livemint; July 24, 2018).
Digital Native: Hashtag Along With Me (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; July 29, 2018).
Lining up the data on the Srikrishna Privacy Draft Bill (Sunil Abraham; Economic Times; July 30, 2018).
Spreading unhappiness equally around (Business Standard; July 31, 2018).

CIS in the News

Smartphone rumours spark series of mob killings in India (Samanth Subramanian; The National; July 2, 2018).
Government Gives Nod To Bill For Building DNA Databases In India, For 'Criminal Investigation And Justice Delivery' (Huffington Post; July 5, 2018).
'Hope for such swift crackdowns for everyone' (Times of India; July 6, 2018).
Child-lifting rumours caused 69 mob attacks, 33 deaths in last 18 months (Business Standard; July 9, 2018).
Death by Social Media (Pretika Khanna, Abhiram Ghadyalpatil and Shaswati Das; Livemint; July 9, 2018).
India's Latest Data Leak: People's Aadhaar Number And Bank Account Are Just One Google Search Away (Gopal Sathe; Huffington Post; July 12, 2018).
People Should Have Right To Their Data, Not Companies, Says TRAI (Bloomberg Quint; July 16, 2018).
After Securing Net Neutrality In India, TRAI Goes To Bat For Data Privacy (Gopal Sathe; Huffington Post; July 16, 2018).
TRAI recommendations on data privacy raises eyebrows (Surabhi Agarwal and Gulveen Aulakh; Economic Times; July 18, 2018).
Srikrishna panel upset at timing of Trai suggestions (Megha Mandavia; Economic Times; July 19, 2018).
Firms find wealth in your data (Rajitha Menon; Deccan Herald; July 20, 2018).
WhatsApp races against time to fix fake news mess ahead of 2019 general elections (Venkat Ananth; Economic Times; July 24, 2018).
The crown of thorns that awaits Facebook’s India MD hire (Sunny Sen and Jayadevan PK; Factory Daily; July 25, 2018).
Bit by byte protecting her privacy (Mihir Dalal and Anirban Sen; Livemint; July 26, 2018).
Govt asks CBI to probe Cambridge Analytica in data breach case (Komal Gupta; Livemint; July 27, 2018).
Data localisation may pinch startups, payments firms (Mugdha Variyar and Pratik Bhakta; Economic Times; July 28, 2018).

Access to Knowledge

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.

Wikipedia

Blog Entries

ವಿಕಿಪೀಡಿಯ ತರಬೇತಿ ೨೦೧೮ @ ರಾಂಚಿ (Vikas Hegde; July 4, 2018).
How to write differently for different Telugu digital platforms - awareness session to Indu Gnana Vedika (Pavan Santosh; July 19, 2018).
వాట్సాప్ సాహిత్య వేదిక నుంచి వికీసోర్సుకు (Pavan Santosh; July 31, 2018).

Events Organized

Partnership activity in Annamayya Library (Guntur; July 10, 2014).
Partnership discussions with Misimi Telugu Monthly Magazine (July 24, 2018).
Tumakur University Workshop (Tumkur; July 25, 2018).
Workshop of River activists for building Jal Bodh - Knowledge resource on Water (Pune; July 25, 2018).
Workshop of Publishers and Writers on Unicode, Open Source and Wikimedia Projects (Pune; July 25, 2018).

Internet Governance

Privacy

Submissions

Response to a Notice of Enquiry by the US Government on International Internet Policy Priorities (Swagam Dasgupta; July 18, 2018).
The Centre for Internet and Society’s Comments and Recommendations to the: Indian Privacy Code, 2018 (Shweta Mohandas, Elonnai Hickok, Amber Sinha and Shruti Trikanand; July 20, 2018).

Blog Entry

The AI Task Force Report - The first steps towards India’s AI framework (Elonnai Hickok, Shweta Mohandas and Swaraj Paul Barooah; June 27, 2018). The blog post was edited by Swagam Dasgupta.

Participation in Events

IETF 102 Montreal (Organized by Internet Engineering Task Force; Fairmont Queen Elizabeth Montreal in Canada; July 14 - 20, 2018). Gurshabad Grover presented a review of the human rights considerations in the drafts of the Software Update for IoT Devices (SUIT) Working Group in the meeting of the HRPC research group.
Ethical Data Design Practices in the AI (Artificial Intelligence) Age (Organized by Startup Grind, Bangalore at NUMA Bangalore; July 28, 2018). Shweta Mohandas was a panelist.

Cyberspace and Cyber Security

Analysis

The Potential for the Normative Regulation of Cyberspace: Implications for India (Arindrajit Basu; July 30, 2018). The report was edited by Elonnai Hickok, Sunil Abraham and Udbhav Tiwari with research assistance from Tejas Bharadwaj.

Blog Entry

CIS contributes to the Research and Advisory Group of the Global Commission on the Stability of Cyberspace (GCSC) (Arindrajit Basu; July 5, 2018).

Participation in Event

IEEE-SA InDITA Conference 2018 (Organized by IEEE Standards Association; IIIT-Bangalore; July 10 - 11, 2018). Gurshabad Grover gave a brief presentation on how we could apply or reject 'Trust Through Technology' principles in the design of public biometric authentication.

Free Speech & Expression

Blog Entries

ICANN Diversity Analysis (Paul Kurian and Akriti Bopanna; July 16, 2018).
DIDP #31 Diversity of employees at ICANN (Akash Sriram; July 19, 2018).

Participation in Event

26th AMIC Annual Conference – India 2018 (Organized by Manipal Academy of Higher Education; Fortune Inn Valley View, Manipal, Karnataka; June 7 - 9, 2018). Swaraj Paul Barooah was a speaker. An article announcing the event by Kevin Mendonsa was published in the Times of India on June 5, 2018.

Telecom

Newspaper Column

The Problems That Should Occupy Our Electioneers (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard; July 5, 2018 and Organizing India Blogspot; July 6, 2018).

About CIS

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July 2017 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2017-08-23T02:03:19Z

Dear readers,

Previous issues of the newsletters can be accessed here.

Highlights
In an article published in the Huffington Post on July 1, 2017, Nirmita Narasimhan stated that imposing taxes on assistive devices is unfair. It is unconscionable that disability aids and assistive technology are considered a luxury and taxed at a higher rate than rough semi-precious stones or cashew nuts. A research paper on patent working requirements and complex products in India authored by Prof Jorge L. Contreras, University of Utah, and Rohini Lakshané, CIS has been accepted for publication in the Jindal Global Law School Law Review 2017. Negotiators from 16 countries met in Hyderabad for discussing a free trade agreement titled Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership. Anubha Sinha along with Arul George Scaria reported this in an article published by Live Law.in. Supreme Court of India while dismissing an appeal by the Indian Reprographic Rights Organization ruled that there was no copyright infringement and no licence was required since the activities fell under the education exception in Indian copyright law. In an article published by EIFL, Anubha Sinha discusses the judgment and what it means for access to educational materials in India. Odia Wikipedians, in conjunction with Indian Athletics Federation and Sports and Youth Services collaborated to document the 2017 Asian Athletics Championships. Hundreds of photos were uploaded and new Wikipedia content added to inform the event’s fans, wrote Sailesh Patnaik and Jnanaranjan Sahu in a blog post. As recently as May 27, 2016, the General Data Protection Regulation (REGULATION (EU) 2016/679 was adopted The Data Protection Directive (1995/46/EC) will be replaced by this Regulation. It is expected that under this Regulation data privacy will be strengthened. Aditi Chaturvedi analyses the developments in a report.

CIS in the news:

UIDAI declining multiple requests by police to share Indian citizens’ biometrics (Justin Lee; Biometrics; July 4, 2017).
Act now to protect yourself against future ransomware attacks (Sanjay Kumar Singh; Business Standard; July 5, 2017).
Reliance Jio data leaked on website : report (Livemint; July 10, 2017).
Supreme Court sets up constitution bench to hear Aadhaar privacy issues (Priyanka Mittal; Livemint; July 12, 2017).
Centre to form panel to 'encrypt' MGNREGA-DBT database and prevent leaks (Sanjeeb Mukherjee; Business Standard; July 14, 2017).
Calls for law change after Indians left in dark over data leaks (Rahul Bhatia and Sankalp Phartiyal; Reuters; July 14, 2017).
Indians Call For More Stringent Data Protection Laws (PYMTNS; July 17, 2017).
Social Activist Alleges Threat By Police Officer Over Possession of Aadhaar (Gaurav Vivek Bhatnagar; Wire; July 16, 2017).

Aadhaar privacy: Key issues that all Aadhaar card holders should bear in mind (Business Today, July 19, 2017).
Data in the open makes it easy for cyber criminals (Kiran Parashar KM; New Indian Express; July 26, 2017).

CIS members wrote the following articles

Why GST Is A Step Backward For The Disabled (Nirmita Narasimhan; Huffington Post; July 1, 2017).
Course Packs for Education Ruled Legal in India (Anubha Sinha; EIFL; July 12, 2017).
Digital native: Not only words (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; July 16, 2017).
Aadhar: Privacy is not a unidimensional concept (Amber Sinha; Economic Times; July 23, 2017).
RCEP IP Chapter: A Serious Threat to Access to Knowledge/ Cultural Goods? (Arul George Scaria and Anubha Sinha; July 27, 2017).
Digital native: Ever on the go (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; July 30, 2017).

Article

Why GST Is A Step Backward For The Disabled (Nirmita Narasimhan; Huffington Post; July 1, 2017).

►Pervasive Technologies and Copyright

Research Paper

Patent Working Requirements and Complex Products: An Empirical Assessment of India's Form 27 Practice and Compliance (Jorge L. Contreras and Rohini Lakshané; SSRN and Jindal Global Law School Review; July 17, 2017).

Participation in Event

19th RCEP Meeting (Organized by Ministry of Commerce, Government of India; July 17 - 28, 2017; Hyderabad). Anubha Sinha participated in the meeting.

►Wikipedia

Blog Entries

Note: The events were organized earlier but reports were published in July 2017:

Christ University Wikipedia Education Program Internship (Manasa Rao and Ananth Subray; July 5, 2017).
Christ University Wikipedia Education Program Faculty Orientation Report (Ananth Subray; July 7, 2017).
How It Came To Be: Wiki Loves Uniformed Services (Krishna Chaitanya Velaga; July 10, 2017).
Tallapaka Pada Sahityam is now on Wikisource (Pavan Santhosh; July 10, 2017).
Thematic Edit-a-thon at Yashawantrao Chavan Institute of Science, Satara (Subodh Kulkarni; July 11, 2017).
Asian Athletics Championships 2017 Edit-a-thon (Sailesh Patnaik and Jnanaranjan Sahu; July 31, 2017).

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Internet Governance
-----------------------------------

►Privacy

Blog Entry

Data Protection: Understanding the General Data Protection Regulation (Aditi Chaturvedi; July 4, 2017).

Participation in Event

IViR Summer Course on Privacy Law and Policy (Organized by the University of Amsterdam; July 3 - 7, 2017; Amsterdam). Amber Sinha attended the course.

►Free Speech and Expression and Cyber Security

Participation in Events

OHD on Consultation Paper on Net Neutrality (Organized by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India; July 25, 2017). Pranesh Prakash was a speaker.
UNESCO Multistakeholder consultation at 8th Asia Pacific Regional Internet Governance Forum (APrIGF) (Organized by UNESCO; Bangkok; July 26 - 29, 2017). Sunil Abraham was a speaker. Vidhushi Marda also participated in the event.
Cybersecurity Workshop: Spotlight On GCCS 2017 (Organized by Global Partners Digital (GPD) and the Centre for Communication Governance at National Law University, Delhi, in collaboration with Digital Empowerment Foundation, Digital Asia Hub and Open Net Korea; Bangkok; July 25 - 27, 2017). Sunil Abraham was a speaker. Udbhav Tiwari and Vidushi Marda participated in the event.

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Telecom
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CIS is involved in promoting access and accessibility to telecommunications services and resources, and has provided inputs to ongoing policy discussions and consultation papers published by TRAI. It has prepared reports on unlicensed spectrum and accessibility of mobile phones for persons with disabilities and also works with the USOF to include funding projects for persons with disabilities in its mandate:

Participation in Event

Workshop on Public Open Wi-Fi Pilot (Organized by Telecom Regulatory Authority of India; July 25, 2017). Pranesh Prakash was a speaker.

Event Organized

Dr. Prerna Prabhakar - Impact of Digitisation of Land Records in Rural India (CIS, New Delhi; July 7, 2017).

-----------------------------------

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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

-------------------------------------

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).

-----------------------------------

Access to Knowledge

-----------------------------------

►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

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).

-----------------------------------

Openness

-----------------------------------

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.

-----------------------------------

Internet Governance

-----------------------------------

►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.

-----------------------------------

Researchers at Work

-----------------------------------

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.

-----------------------------------

About CIS

-----------------------------------

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.

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July 2015 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2015-11-21T16:23:52Z

Our newsletter for the month of July is below:

We are happy to share with you the seventh issue of the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) newsletter (July 2015). The past editions of the newsletter can be accessed at http://cis-india.org/about/newsletters.

Highlights

NVDA team conducted a training at SIES College, Sion, Mumbai. Thirty-four delegates attended the training programme. A training workshop was held at Anne Jane Askwith Higher Secondary School for the Visually Impaired, Palayamkottai, Tirunelveli by NVDA team. Sixteen delegates participated in this. Konkani Wikipedia is the second Wikimedia project after Odia Wikisource that has gone live out of incubation. The project stayed in the incubation for nine long years and the community has gone through a long debate to have a Wikipedia of their own. Subhashish Panigrahi has blogged on this highlighting the three Konkani Wikimedians. The 30^th Session of the WIPO Standing Committee on Copyrights and Related Rights was held in Geneva from June 29 to July 3. Nehaa Chaudhari prepared a statement about the negotiations on the Proposed Treaty for Broadcasting Organisations. Sumandro Chattapadhyay wrote an article in the Hindustan Times about India’s “Digital India” initiative to develop communication infrastructure, government information systems, and general capacity to digitise public life in India. CIS published the first draft of its analysis on technology business incubators ("TBI") in India. The report prepared by Sunil Abraham, Vidushi Marda, Udbhav Tiwari and Anumeha Karnatak looks at operating procedures, success stories and lessons that can be learnt from TBIs in India. Pranesh Prakash did a brief analysis about the Department of Telecommunications Panel Report on Net Neutrality. CIS has participated in the Expert Committee for DNA Profiling constituted by the Department of Biotechnology in 2012 for the purpose of deliberating on and finalizing the draft Human DNA Profiling Bill and appreciates this opportunity. CIS has prepared a dissent note to the Expert Committee on DNA Profiling. In the last few decades, all major common law jurisdictions have decriminalised non-procreative sex – oral and anal sex (sodomy) – to allow private, consensual, and non-commercial homosexual intercourse. Bhairav Acharya brought out the developments from across the world in a blog entry. As part of its project on mapping cyber security actors in South Asia and South East Asia, CIS conducted interviews with a Tibetan security researcher and information activist and Shantanu Ghosh, Managing Director, Symantec Product Operations, India. CIS, the Observer Research Foundation, the Internet Policy Observatory, the Centre for Global Communication Studies and the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania had organized a conference in April in New Delhi. The findings have been condensed in a report titled “Effective research, policy formulation, and the development of regulatory frameworks in South Asia”. Pranesh Prakash in a research paper titled Regulatory Perspectives on Net Neutrality gives an overview on why India needs to put in place net neutrality regulations, and the form that those regulations must take to avoid being over-regulation. Rakshanda Deka undertook an analysis on the anti-spam laws in different jurisdictions. This analysis is a part of a larger attempt at formulating a model anti-spam law for India by analysing the existing spam laws across the world. As part of the 'Studying Internets in India' series, RAW has published blog entries on WhatsApp and the Creation of a Transnational Sociality; Users and the Internet; Effective Activism: The Internet, Social Media, and Hierarchical Activism in New Delhi; Studying the Internet Discourse in India through the Prism of Human Rights; and 'Originality,' 'Authenticity,' and 'Experimentation': Understanding Tagore’s Music on YouTube. The National Optic Fibre Network, a part of the Government's Digital India Initiative, has been in the news since the recent Expert Committee Report. Aditya Garg in a blog entry examined the accountability of the funding of the project.

Accessibility and Inclusion

NVDA and eSpeak

Monthly Updates

July 2015 Report (Suman Dogra; July 31, 2015).

Event Reports

The training programmes were held in June and the reports were published in July:

Tamil Computing with NVDA Training Workshop (Organized by NVDA team: Anne Jane Ask with Higher Secondary School for the Visually Impaired, Palayamkottai, Tirunelveli; June 3 – 7, 2015).
Training in eSpeak Marathi (Organized by NVDA team; SIES College, Sion, Mumbai; June 28, 2015).

Access to Knowledge

Submission / Comment

Statement by the Centre for Internet and Society on the Broadcast Treaty at SCCR 30 (Nehaa Chaudhari; July 2, 2015).

Wikipedia

Blog Entries

Reading Devanagari Script based sites like Konkani Wikipedia in Kannada Script (Dr. U.B. Pavanaja; July 13, 2015).
Konkani Wikipedia Goes Live After 'Nine Years' of Incubation (Subhashish Panigrahi; July 18, 2015).

Events Co-organized

Christ University Undergraduate Programme (Organized by CIS-A2K; Bangalore; July 1 - 8, 2015). Students were initiated into the Wikimedia activities with hands on sessions of typing on Wikisource. Faculty of the Christ University helped the A2K team in deciding on the texts that were to be typed. These texts will provide much needed impetus for Wikisource related activities in Indian Languages. Wikipedia Education Programme at Christ University received support from Ravishankar.A of the Tamil Wikimedia community and Sayant Mahato from Sanskrit Wikimedia community.
Aloysius College (Organized by CIS-A2K; Mangalore; July 1 – 4, 2015). Tulu and Kannada Wikipedia workshops were conducted in St. Aloysis College, Mangalore. Tulu Wikipedia is in Incubator and a small community is growing in Mangalore. Pavanaja U.B. and Rahmanuddin Shaik participated in this events.
Media Wiki Train the Trainer Program (Organized by CIS-A2K; Bangalore; June 24 – 27, 2015): A four-day long train-the-trainer program aimed at building leadership among technical contributors to Indic language Wikimedians in the areas of bugs, bots--Pywikipedia and Auto Wiki Browser, various MediaWiki tools, and translations. Ravishankar A. from Wikimedia India, MediaWiki developers Pavithra H., Yogesh Omshivaprakash H.L. and Harsh Kothari, and Tamil Wikimedian Dineshkumar Ponnusamy provided support for the event.

Participation in Events

Wikimania 2015 (Organized by Wikimedia Foundation; Mexico City; July 15 - 19, 2015): A whole day was dedicated for evaluation of strategies and activities by various major stakeholders of the Wikimedia movement. Community members who lead major activities, Wikimedia chapters, affiliate organizations and Wikimedia Foundation itself took part in the discussions. There were several group activities, exchange of ideas focused on project and community level outreach and other activities, tools and techniques, and best practices. Subhashish Panigrahi participated in this event and gave a talk on How to do Guerrilla GLAM. Subhashish Panigrahi was a panelist along with Rohini Lakshané in the session “Edit-a-thons for Bridging the Gender Gap on Wikimedia: A Panel Discussion”. An Indic Meet-up was also organized. Wikimedians from India, Bangladesh and Nepal representing various language communities, Wikimedia India, Wikimedia Bangladesh, Wikimedia Nepal, and Access to Knowledge (CIS-A2K) gathered to discuss about various challenges, cross-community collaborative projects, organizing larger events, and strategies to grow the Wikimedia movement in South Asia.
Classical Languages in the Digital Era Conference (Organized by Central Institute of Indian Languages, Mysore; July 17, 2015) Tanveer Hasan participated in this conference aimed at discussing about the future of Indian classical languages in the digital era.

Media Coverage

Not many contributors for Kannada-centric Wiki page (The Times of India, July 5, 2015)
Upload More Kannada Articles on Wikipedia (Indian Express, July 5, 2015)
Kannada Wikipedia Workshop in Mangaluru (Udayavani; July 5, 2015)
Kannada Wikipedia Workshop in Mangaluru (Prajavani; July 5, 2015)

Staff Movement

Tito Dutta, Luis Gomes and Abhinav Garule have joined the CIS-A2K team as Programme Associates from March this year. Tito is working for internal documentation and resource building, and Luis and Abhinav are implementing the Konkani and Marathi work plan respectively along with community liaison.

Internet Governance

Free Speech and Expression

Blog Entries

Regulatory Perspectives on Net Neutrality (Pranesh Prakash; July 8, 2015). Vidushi Marda and Tarun Krishnakumar assisted Pranesh Prakash in this.
Free Speech Policy in India: Community, Custom, Censorship, and the Future of Internet Regulation (Bhairav Acharya; July 13, 2015).
Net Neutrality and the Law of Common Carriage (Bhairav Acharya; July 14, 2015).
Freedom of Expression in a Digital Age (Geetha Hariharan and Jyoti Panday; July 14, 2015). CIS, the Observer Research Foundation, the Internet Policy Observatory, the Centre for Global Communication Studies and the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania organized this conference on April 21, 2015 in New Delhi. Elonnai Hickok edited the report.
Clearing Misconceptions: What the DoT Panel Report on Net Neutrality Says (and Doesn't) (Pranesh Prakash; July 21, 2015).
Role of Intermediaries in Countering Online Abuse (Jyoti Panday; July 31, 2015). This got published as two blog entries in the NALSAR Law Tech Blog. Part 1 can be accessed here and Part 2 here.

Event Co-organized

A Public Discussion on Criminal Defamation in India (Organized by CIS, the Network of Women in Media, India; and Media Watch; Bangalore; July 29, 2015). The event was a public discussion about the continued criminalisation of defamation in India.

Participation in Event

Roundtable discussion on WHOIS (Organized by Department of Electronics & Information Technology (DeitY), Govt. of India; July 28, 2015; New Delhi). Sunil Abraham and Vidushi Marda participated in the discussion remotely. Aditya Garg attended in person.

Privacy

Blog Entries

Anti-Spam Laws in Different Jurisdictions: A Comparative Analysis (Rakshanda Deka; July 2, 2015).
A Dissent Note to the Expert Committee for DNA Profiling (Elonnai Hickok; July 17, 2015). Click for DNA Bill Functions, DNA List of Offences, and CIS Note on DNA Bill. A modified version was published by Citizen Matters Bangalore on July 28.
Privacy, Autonomy, and Sexual Choice: The Common Law Recognition of Homosexuality (Bhairav Acharya; July 18, 2015).
Aadhaar Number vs the Social Security Number (Elonnai Hickok; July 21, 2015).

Participation in Event

7th Best Practices Meet 2015 (Organized by Data Security Council of India; Bangalore; July 9 – 10, 2015). Sunil Abraham was a panelist in the session "Architecting Security for transformation to Digital India". Elonnai Hickok was a panelist in the session "Steering privacy in the age of extreme innovation technology & business models."

Cyber Security

Videos

Cyber Security Series Part 23 (Purba Sarkar; July 13, 2015). CIS interviews a Tibetan security researcher and information activist.
Cyber Security Series Part 24 (Purba Sarkar; July 15, 2015). CIS interviews Shantanu Ghosh, Managing Director, Symantec Product Operations, India, as part of the Cybersecurity Series.

Miscellaneous

Article

Iron out contradictions in the Digital India programme (Sumandro Chattapadhyay; Hindustan Times; July 28, 2015).

Research Paper

First draft of Technology Business Incubators: An Indian Perspective and Implementation Guidance Report (Sunil Abraham, Vidushi Marda, Udbhav Tiwari and Anumeha Karnatak; July 25, 2015).

Telecom

Op-ed

The Centrality of Cash Flows (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard; July 1, 2015 and Organizing India Blogspot; July 2, 2015).

Blog Entry

Funding of National Optic Fibre Network (NOFN) - Who's Accountable? (Aditya Garg; July 17, 2015).

Researchers at Work

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

Blog Entries

WhatsApp and the Creation of a Transnational Sociality (Maitrayee Deka; July 1, 2015).
Users and the Internet (Purbasha Auddy; July 10, 2015).
Effective Activism: The Internet, Social Media, and Hierarchical Activism in New Delhi (Sarah McKeever; July 16, 2015).
Studying the Internet Discourse in India through the Prism of Human Rights (Deva Prasad M.; July 22, 2015).
'Originality,' 'Authenticity,' and 'Experimentation': Understanding Tagore’s Music on YouTube) (Ipsita Sengupta; July 27, 2015).

News & Media Coverage

CIS gave its inputs to the following media coverage:

'IRCTC’s Aadhaar play can violate SC order and derail National Security' (Shubhra Rishi; CIO.IN; July 1, 2015).
The Digital Divide: pros and cons of Modi's latest big initiative (Suhas Munshi; July 2, 2015).
Corporate push to Modi’s Rs.4.5-billion digital dream (Rakesh Kumar; The Statesman; July 13, 2015).
Criminal Defamation: The Urgent Cause That has United Rahul Gandhi, Arvind Kejriwal and Subramanian Swamy (Betwa Sharma; Huffington Post; July 15, 2015).
Five Nations, One Future? (Bjorn Ludtke, Ellen Lee, Jaideep Sen, Gwendolyn Ledger, David Nicholson, and Jesko Johannsen; Voestalpine; July 18, 2015).
The scariest bill in Parliament is getting no attention – here’s what you need to know about it (Nayantara Narayanan; Scroll.in; July 24, 2015)
Regulation, misuse concerns still dog DNA profiling bill (Nikita Mehta; Livemint; July 29, 2015)

About CIS

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 mediation and reconfiguration of social and cultural processes and structures by the internet and digital media technologies.

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For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/july-2015-bulletin

July 2014 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2014-08-11T05:46:53Z

Seventh issue of the newsletter (July 2014) below:

We at the Centre for Internet & Society (CIS) welcome you to the seventh issue of the newsletter (July 2014). Archives of our newsletters can be accessed at: http://cis-india.org/about/newsletters

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Highlights
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Nehaa Chaudhari participated in the 28^th session of the World Intellectual Property Organisation Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (WIPO-SCCR) held in Geneva from June 30 to July 4, 2014. The Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) gave its statements on the Limitations and Exceptions for Libraries and Archives and Proposed Treaty for the Protection of Broadcasting Organizations.
India became the first country to ratify the Marrakesh Treaty and the Accessible Books Consortium was launched. Nehaa Chaudhari who participated in the 28^th session of the WIPO-SCCR reports on this in a blog entry.
Vikrant Narayan Vasudeva produced a research paper on patent valuation and license fee determination as part of the Pervasive Technologies project.
Our grant application to the Wikimedia Foundation was approved. CIS has been awarded Rs. 12,000,000 for the next one year for the Access to Knowledge (Wikipedia) project.
CIS and the University of Mysore organized the Open Knowledge day in Mysore on July 15, 2014. Six volumes of Kannada Vishwakosha was re-released under the Creative Commons (CC license).
We helped the Ministry of Science and Technology draft the Open Access Policy for the DST/DBT.
The first of the seven proposed roundtable meetings on “Privacy and Surveillance” conducted by CIS in collaboration with the Cellular Operators Association of India and the Council for Fair Business Practices was held in Mumbai on June 28, 2014. Anandini K. Rathore has blogged on this.
Bedavyasa Mohanty has produced a blog entry that analyses the nuances of interception of communications under the Indian Telegraph Act and the Indian Post Office Act.
Vinayak Mithal has written a blog entry on the Constitutionality of Indian surveillance law that analyses ICANN's reactive transparency mechanism, comparing it with freedom of information best practices. He describes the DIDP and its relevance for the Internet community.
Nishant Shah speaks on the right to freedom of speech and expression in the latest interview conducted as part of the Cybersecurity series being done with a grant from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), Ottawa.
Nishant Shah’s peer reviewed article “Asia in the Edges: A Narrative Account of the Inter-Asia Cultural Studies Summer School in Bangalore” was published in Inter-Asia Cultural Studies Journal, Volume 15, Issue 2, on July 3, 2014. Nishant gives a narrative account of the experiments and ideas that shaped the second Summer School, “The Asian Edge” hosted in Bangalore, India, in 2012.
CIS recruited two new staff members in its Bangalore office. Rohini Lakshane joined as a Program Officer in the Pervasive Technologies project and K.N. Medini joined as a Senior Accounts Officer. Their profiles can be accessed at http://cis-india.org/about/people/our-team.

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Accessibility and Inclusion
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Under a grant from the Hans Foundation we are doing two projects. The first project is on creating a national resource kit of state-wise laws, policies and programmes on issues relating to persons with disabilities in India. We compiled the National Compendium of Policies, Programmes and Schemes for Persons with Disabilities (29 states and 6 union territories). We will be publishing this soon. The draft chapters along with the quarterly reports can be accessed on the project page. The second project is on developing text-to-speech software for 15 Indian languages. The progress made so far in the project can be accessed here.

►NVDA and eSpeak

Monthly Update

Work Report for July (by Suman Dogra, July 31, 2014).

Blog Entry

India's Ratification of the Marrakesh Treaty Celebrated; Accessible Books Consortium Launched (by Nehaa Chaudhari, July 1, 2014): India became the first country to ratify the Marrakesh Treaty.

Media Coverage

SpicyIP Tidbit: India ratifies the Marrakesh Treaty for the Visually Impaired (by Thomas J. Vallianeth, Spicy IP, July 1, 2014).

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Access to Knowledge
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As part of the Access to Knowledge programme we are doing two projects. The first one (Pervasive Technologies) under a grant from the International Development Research Centre (IDRC) is for research on the complex interplay between pervasive technologies and intellectual property to support intellectual property norms that encourage the proliferation and development of such technologies as a social good. The second one (Wikipedia) 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.

►WIPO

Participation in Event and Statements
Nehaa Chaudhari participated in the 28^th session of WIPO-SCCR held in Geneva from June 30 to July 4, 2014. The following have been the outputs from the event:

Statement on the Proposed Treaty for the Protection of Broadcasting Organizations at WIPO SCCR 28 (by Nehaa Chaudhari, July 2, 2014).
Opening Comments by India on Limitations and Exceptions for Libraries and Archives at WIPO SCCR 28 (posted by Nehaa Chaudhari, July 7, 2014). This was the statement made by the Indian delegation at WIPO-SCCR 28^th session on July 2, 2014.
Statement on the Limitations and Exceptions for Libraries and Archives at WIPO SCCR 28 (by Nehaa Chaudhari, July 3, 2014).
28th Session of the WIPO SCCR: Report on the Proposed Treaty for the Protection of Broadcasting Organizations (by Nehaa Chaudhari, July 29, 2014).

► Pervasive Technologies

Research Papers

Patent Valuation and License Fee Determination in Context of Patent Pools (by Vikrant Narayan Vasudeva, July 9, 2014). Vikrant has produced research that examines patent valuation and license fee determination in detail.
Grounds for Compulsory Patent Licensing in United States, Canada, China, and India (by Maggie Huang, July 29, 2014). In her research paper Maggie tries to answer questions about the grounds of compulsory licensing in international treaties with specific examples from America and Asia.

►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).

Announcement
Our grant application to the Funds Dissemination Committee (FDC) of the Wikimedia Foundation was approved by its board which met in Frankfurt from May 21 to 24, 2014. CIS had requested a grant of Rs. 18,406,454 and were awarded Rs. 12,000,000 for the next one year.

The following were done this month:

Articles / Blog Entries

Aircel & Wikimedia Foundation announce Wikipedia Zero (by Dr. U.B.Pavanaja, Prajavani, July 3, 2014). As per this, users of Aircel need not pay for data for accessing Wikipedia.
ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଅକ୍ଷରସଜ୍ଜା (by Subhashish Panigrahi, Samaja, July 4, 2014).
State of Odia Language in Computing and Future Steps (by Subhashish Panigrahi, Sovereign, July 7, 2014).
ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଭାଷା ବିକାଶର ରାସ୍ତା (by Subhashish Panigrahi, The Sambad, July 23, 2014).
University of Mysore Re-releases Kannada Vishwakosha (Encyclopaedia) under Creative Commons Free License (by Dr. U.B.Pavanaja, July 24, 2014). Leading English and Kannada dailies like Andolana Kannada, City Today, Deccan Herald, Hosa Diganta, Kannada Jana Mana, Kannada Prabha, Rajya Dharma, Samyukta Karnataka, The Hindu, The New Indian Express, Udayavani, Vijaya Karnataka, and Vijaya Vani published about this. Scanned versions of the published articles can be downloaded here.
Wiki Loves Pride 2014 and Adding Diversity to Wikipedia (by Dorothy Howard, Wikimedia Blog, July 25, 2014).
Doctors and Translators Are Working Together to Bridge Wikipedia's Medical Language Gap (by Subhashish Panigrahi, Global Voices, July 27, 2014). This was re-published on the Wikimedia Blog, July 30, 2014.
Classical Odia Language in the Digital Age (by Subhashish Panigrahi, Odisha Review, posted on July 28, 2014). The essay was published in the magazine’s June edition.

Event Organized

Open Knowledge Day (co-organized by Mysore University and CIS-A2K, Kuvempu Institute of Kannada Studies, University of Mysore, July 15, 2014). The event coincided with the Open Knowledge Festival in Berlin from July 15 to 17. Dr. U.B.Pavanaja conducted the event. On this occasion Mysore University released six volumes of Kannada Vishwakosha under the Creative Commons (CC) license.

Participation in Events

National Level Seminar on Computer Application and Odia Language (organized by Institute of Odia Studies and Research, July 6, 2014). Subhashish Panigrahi was a panelist.
Open Knowledge Festival 2014 (organized by Google, Omidyar, et.al., Berlin, July 15 – 17, 2014). Subhashish Panigrahi represented India as the India Ambassador of OpenGLAM local and made a presentation.
#NAMA: The Future of Indic Languages (organized by Medianama, The Oberoi Hotel, Bangalore, July 24, 2014). Subhashish Panigrahi participated in the event.

News and Media Coverage
CIS-A2K team gave its inputs to the following media coverage:

Wikipedia edit-a-thons to add content on LGBTs (by Renuka Phadnis, The Hindu, July 7, 2014).
Font problem hits Odia (by Bibhuti Barik, The Telegraph, July 7, 2014).
Four volumes of Kannada Encyclopaedia digitised (by R. Krishna Kumar, The Hindu, July 12, 2014).
‘ಕನ್ನಡ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ’ಕ್ಕೆ ಇನ್ನು ಲೈಸೆನ್ಸ್ ಹಂಗಿಲ್ಲ (Prajavani, July 14, 2014).
Soon, all 14 volumes of Kannada encyclopaedia to be online (by R. Krishna Kumar, The Hindu, July 15, 2014).
ವಿಕಿಪಿಡಿಯಾಗೆ ಕನ್ನಡ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ (Kannada Prabha, July 15, 2014).
ಕನ್ನಡ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶದ ಆರು ಸಂಪುಟ ವಿಕಿಪೀಡಿಯಾಗೆ (Udayavani, July 15, 2014).
ವಿಕಿಪೀಡಿಯಾದಲ್ಲಿ kannada ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ : ಈಗ ಆನ್ ಲೈನ್ ನಲ್ಲಿ 6 ಸಂಪುಟಗಳು ಮುಕ್ತ…ಮುಕ್ತ……( Just Kannada, July 15, 2014).
Six Kannada encyclopaedias released (Webindia 123, July 15, 2014).
150 Rare Books Get New Lease of Life Online, Courtesy Students (by Anila Backer, New Indian Express, July 15, 2014).
Open Access: Students help revive and digitize rare books for Malayalam Wiki Library (Spicy IP, July 15, 2014).
'Trolled' from US Congress, Wikipedia bans edits (by Narayan Lakshman, The Hindu, July 25, 2014).
Telugu Wikipedia struggles to stay afloat (by Renuka Phadnis, The Hindu, July 27, 2014).
The joys of being a Wikipedian (by Svetlana Lasrado, New Indian Express, July 29, 2014).
Kannada Wikipedia Presentation (Vijayavani, July 30, 2014).
Kannada Wikipedia Presentation for Kannada Science Writers (Prajavani, July 31, 2014).

►Openness

Blog Entries

Mozilla brings Indian Communities together Twice in One Month (by Subhashish Panigrahi, Mozilla Website, July 8, 2014).
Mozilla Brings Indian Communities Together (by Subhashish Panigrahi, Opensource.com, July 13, 2014).
Department of Biotechnology and Department of Science, Ministry of Science and Technology, Government of India, release Open Access Policy (by Anubha Sinha, July 18, 2014). We have also been acknowledged in the policy.

HasGeek Event

The Fifth Elephant (NIMHANS Convention Centre, July 25-26, 2014). CIS was a community outreach partner.

Media Coverage

Plan for open access to science research (by Renuka Phadnis, The Hindu, July 22, 2014).
Indian Govt looks to provide free access to publicly-funded research works (by Riddhi Mukherjee, Medianama, July 23, 2014).

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Internet Governance
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►Freedom of Expression

Blog Entries

ICANN’s Documentary Information Disclosure Policy – I: DIDP Basics (by Vinayak Mithal, July 1, 2014).
Reading the Fine Script: Service Providers, Terms and Conditions and Consumer Rights (by Jyoti Panday, July 2, 2014).
Facebook and its Aversion to Anonymous and Pseudonymous Speech (by Jessamine Mathew, July 4, 2014).
Free Speech and Surveillance (by Gautam Bhatia, July 7, 2014).
Delhi High Court Orders Blocking of Websites after Sony Complains Infringement of 2014 FIFA World Cup Telecast Rights (by Anubha Sinha, July 8, 2014).
GNI and IAMAI Launch Interactive Slideshow Exploring Impact of India's Internet Laws (by Jyoti Panday, July 17, 2014).

FOEX Live

We are also posting a selection of news from across India implicating online freedom of expression and use of digital technology: July 7, 2014.

►Privacy

Blog Entries

Models for Surveillance and Interception of Communications Worldwide (by Bedavyasa Mohanty, July 2, 2014).
The Constitutionality of Indian Surveillance Law: Public Emergency as a Condition Precedent for Intercepting Communications (by Bedavyasa Mohanty, July 4, 2014).
UK’s Interception of Communications Commissioner — A Model of Accountability (by Joe Sheehan, July 24, 2014).

Event Report

First Privacy and Surveillance Roundtable (by Anandini K Rathore, July 18, 2014).

Article

Private Censorship and the Right to Hear (by Chinmayi Arun, The Hoot, July 17, 2014). The article was also mirrored on the website of the Centre for Communication Governance.

Participation in Events

Information Influx Conference (organized by the Institute for Information Law, University of Amsterdam, July 2 – 4, 2014). Malavika Jayaram was a speaker.
Consultation to Frame Rules under the Whistle Blowers Protection Act, 2011 (organized by National Campaign for People's Right to Information and Centre for Communication Governance, National Law University, New Delhi, July 5, 2014). Bhairav Acharya participated in the event.
Best Practices Meet (organized by DSCI, Hotel Leela Palace, Bangalore, July 9, 2014). Sunil Abraham was a panelist.
Rethinking Privacy: The Link between Florida v. Jardines and the Surveillance of Nature Films (organized by Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, July 11, 2014). Bhairav Acharya gave a talk.
Region as Frame: Politics, Presence, Practice (organized by International Association for Media and Communication Research, Hyderabad, July 18, 2014). Sunil Abraham was a speaker for these panels: Governing Digital Spaces: Issues of Access, Privacy and Freedom, UNESCO panel debate, and Special Session on Research Paths In and Outside of the Academy.
ICT Awareness Program for Myanmar Parliamentarians (organized by Myanmar ICT for Development Organization, July 26 – 27, 2014, Yangon). Sunil Abraham participated in the event as a speaker and presented on Innovation Ecosystem and Thinking about Internet Regulation.

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News & Media Coverage
--------------------------------------
CIS gave its inputs to the following media coverage:

Cyber-crimes shoot up 52% in India over last year (by K.V.Kurmanath, Hindu Businessline, July 2, 2014).
COAI, Centre for Internet & Society to hold pan-India meetings on privacy issues (IANS, July 4, 2014). The news was mirrored in the Times of India , NDTV, Business Standard , Economic Times , and World News.
Living in a Fish Bowl (by Shuma Raha, The Telegraph, July 16, 2014).
Terror recruiters target Indians on internet (by Sandhya Soman, July 18, 2014).
The trouble with trolls (by Vishal Mathur, Livemint, July 22, 2014).
India’s dedicated Cryptology centre gets Rs. 115 crore funding (by Harichandan Arakali, SearchSecurity.in, July 28, 2014).

►Cyber Stewards
As part of its project on mapping cyber security actors in South Asia and South East Asia with the Citizen Lab, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto and the International Development Research Centre, Canada, CIS conducted 2 new interviews. With this it has finished a total of 19 interviews:

Video Interviews

Lobsang Gyatso Sither (July 31, 2014).

Lobsang Sangay (July 31, 2014).

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Digital Humanities
--------------------------------
CIS is building research clusters in the field of Digital Humanities. The Digital will be used as a way of unpacking the debates in humanities and social sciences and look at the new frameworks, concepts and ideas that emerge in our engagement with the digital. The clusters aim to produce and document new conversations and debates that shape the contours of Digital Humanities in Asia:

Peer Reviewed Article

Asia in the Edges: A Narrative Account of the Inter-Asia Cultural Studies Summer School in Bangalore (by Nishant Shah, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies Journal, Volume 15, Issue 2, July 3, 2014). This is the narrative account of the experiments and ideas that shaped the second Summer School, “The Asian Edge” which was hosted in Bangalore, India, in 2012.

Blog Entry

Reading from a Distance — Data as Text (by P.P. Sneha, July 23, 2014).

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About CIS
-----------------------------------------------------
The Centre for Internet and Society is a non-profit research organization that works on policy issues relating to freedom of expression, privacy, accessibility for persons with disabilities, access to knowledge and IPR reform, and openness (including open government, FOSS, open standards, etc.), and engages in academic research on digital natives and digital humanities.

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Visit us at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Access_To_Knowledge
E-mail: a2k@cis-india.org

► Support Us
Please help us defend consumer / 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, and theoreticians, both organisationally and as individuals, to collaboratively engage with Internet and society and improve our understanding of this new field. To discuss the research collaborations, write to Sunil Abraham, Executive Director, atsunil@cis-india.org or Nishant Shah, Director – Research, at nishant@cis-india.org. To discuss collaborations on Indic language Wikipedia, write to T. Vishnu Vardhan, Programme Director, A2K, at vishnu@cis-india.org.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/july-2014-bulletin