Centre for Internet and Society

Models for Surveillance and Interception of Communications Worldwide

bedaavyasa — 2014-07-10T07:50:08Z

This is an evaluation of laws and practices governing surveillance and interception of communications in 9 countries. The countries evaluated represent a diverse spectrum not only in terms of their global economic standing but also their intrusive surveillance capabilities. The analysis is limited to the procedural standards followed by these countries for authorising surveillance and provisions for resolving interception related disputes.

Sl. No.	Country	Legislation	Model
1.	Australia	Telecommunications (Interceptions and Access) Act, 1979 Governs interception of communications Relevant provisions: S. 3, 7, 6A, 34, 46 Surveillance Devices Act, 2004 Establishes procedure for obtaining warrants and for use of surveillance devices Relevant Provisions: S.13, 14	Authorisation for surveillance is granted in the form of a warrant from a Judge or a nominated member of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal The warrant issuing authority must be satisfied that information obtained through interception shall assist in the investigation of a serious crime The Acts provide a list of prescribed offences for which interception of communication may be authorized The Acts also specify certain federal and state law enforcement agencies that may undertake surveillance
2.	Brazil	Federal Law No. 9,296, 1996: Regulates wiretapping	Authorisation for interception is granted on a Judge’s order for a period of 15 days at a time Interception is only allowed for investigations into serious offences like drug smuggling, corruption murder and kidnapping
3.	Canada	Criminal Code, 1985 Governs general rules of criminal procedure including search and seizure protocols Relevant Provision: §§ 184.2, 184.4	Grants power to intercept communication by obtaining authorisation from a provincial court judge or a judge of the superior court Before granting his authorisation, the judge must be satisfied that either the originator of the communication or the recipient thereof has given his/her consent to the interception Under exceptional circumstances, however, a police officer owing to the exigency of the situation may intercept communication without prior authorisation
4.	France	*Loi d'orientation et de programmation pour la performance de la sécurité intérieure* (LOPPSI 2), 2011: Authorises use of video surveillance and interception of communications Relevant Provisions: Article 36 *Loi de Programmation Militaire* (LPM), 2013: Authorises surveillance for protection of national security and prevention of terrorism	Interception of communication under LOPPSI 2 requires previous authorization from an investigating Judge after consultation with the Public Prosecutor Such authorization is granted for a period of 4 months which is further extendable by another 4 months Interception of communication under LPM does not require prior sanction from an investigating judge and is instead provided by the Prime Minister’s office Information that can be intercepted under LPM includes not only metadata but also content and geolocation services
5.	Germany	Gesetz zur Beschränkung des Brief-, Post und Fernmeldegeheimnisses (G10 Act), 2001 Imposes restrictions on the right to privacy and authorizes surveillance for protecting freedom and democratic order, preventing terrorism and illegal drug trade Relevant Provisions: §3 The German Code of Criminal Procedure (StPO), 2002 Lays down search and seizure protocol and authorizes interception of telecommunications for criminal prosecutions Relevant Provisions: §§ 97, 100a	Authorises warrantless surveillance by specific German agencies like the Bundesnachrichtendienst (Federal Intelligence Service) Lays down procedure that must be followed while undertaking surveillance and intercepting communications Authorises sharing of intercepted intelligence for criminal prosecutions Mandates ex post notification to persons whose privacy has been violated but no judicial remedies are available to such persons The Code of Criminal Procedure authorises interception of communication of a person suspected of being involved in a serious offence only on the order of a court upon application by the public prosecution office
6.	Pakistan	Pakistan Telecommunications Reorganisation Act, 1996: Controls the flow of false and fabricated information and protects national security Relevant Provisions: § 54 Investigation for Fair Trial Act, 2013: Regulates the powers of law enforcement and intelligence agencies regarding covert surveillance and interception of communications Relevant Provisions: §§ 6,7, 8, 9	Authorisation for interception is provided by the federal government. No formal legal structure to monitor surveillance exists Interception can be authorized in the interest of national security and on the apprehension of any offence Requests for filtering and blocking of content are routed through the Inter-Ministerial Committee for the Evaluation of Websites, a confidential regulatory body Under the Fair Trial Act, interception can only be authorised on application to the Fedral Minister for Interior who shall then permit the application to be placed before a High Court Judge The warrant shall be issued by a judge only on his satisfaction that interception will aid in the collection of evidence and that a reasonable threat of the commission of a scheduled offence exists
7.	South Africa	The Regulation of Interception of Communications and Provision of Communication-related Information Act, 2002 Regulates and authorizes monitoring and interception of telecommunications services Relevant Provisions: §§ 16, 22	Warrant for intercepting communications and installing surveillance devices is granted by a designated judge The warrant is issued on satisfaction of the judge that the investigation relates to a serious offence or that the information gathering is vital to public health or safety, national security or compelling national economic interests
8.	United Kingdom	Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, 2000: Authorises interception of communications and surveillance Relevant Provisions: §§ 5, 6, 65	Authorisation for interception is granted in the form of a warrant by the Secretary of State or in certain special cases by a ‘senior officer’ Communications can be intercepted only it is necessary to do so in the interest of national security or for the purpose of preventing and detecting serious crimes Complaints of alleged illegal surveillance are heard by the Investigatory Powers Tribunal
9.	United States	Electronic Communications Privacy Act, 1986 (Title III, Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act) Governs authorisation for wiretapping and interception Relevant Provisions: §18	Authorisation for interception can be granted by a district court or federal appeals court on application by a law enforcement officer duly signed by the attorney general Application mandates obtaining the information through a service provider before invading upon individual’s privacy

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/models-for-surveillance-and-interception-of-communications-worldwide

Mock-Calling – Ironies of Outsourcing and the Aspirations of an Individual

Sreedeep — 2015-08-06T05:00:33Z

This post by Sreedeep is part of the 'Studying Internets in India' series. He is an independent photographer and a Fellow at the Centre for Public Affairs and Critical Theory, Shiv Nadar University, Delhi. In this essay, Sreedeep explores the anxieties and ironies of the unprecedented IT/BPO boom in India through the perspective and experiences of a new entrant in the industry, a decade ago. The narrative tries to capture some of the radical hedonistic consequences of the IT-burst on our lifestyles, imagination and aspirations delineated and fraught with layers of conscious deception and prolonged probation.

best start (the advertisement)

In the darkest hours of night, they remain awake serving some other continent across the oceans.
The sparkling exterior complements the sleeplessness.

Colorful half-pagers listing job openings in dedicated sections of dailies for the ‘educated’ and ‘experienced’ have been common in post liberalized India. When the eyes cruise through the various logos and offerings of the MNCs in these over populated pages, one gets reminded of a decade when the front, back, and inside pages of newspaper supplements overflowed with job offerings in the lowest ranks of the IT. BPO vacancies which littered the folios primarily sought to lure fresh college pass-outs ‘proficient in English’. Back then, one was yet getting familiar with names such as ‘Convergys’, ‘Daksh’, ‘Global-Vantage’, ‘EXL’, ‘Vertex’. It made one wonder why they needed so many people to ‘walk-in’ week after week, and how they made thousands of ‘on the spot offers’ with ‘revised salaries’ following ‘quick and easy interviews’ and ‘fastest selection processes’. What these selected people actually did, once they got in, was another mystery altogether.

Some of these MNCs promising nothing short of a ‘best start’ to one’s career, that too with the ‘best starting salaries for a fresher’, often came to college campuses for recruitment. They conducted large scale interviews and generously granted immediate offer-letters to final-year students, at the end of each academic year. I happily overlooked the (fine) print, the text, design, and all the other details of these BPO ads. In fact, I never bothered to figure out what the acronym meant till such time when I was in desperate need for a gadget make-over. My age old Range-Finder camera deserved to be disposed and displaced by a Digital SLR. That was the summer of 2003...

The iconic ship building of Convergys – one of the first amongst the many that stood alone fifteen years ago, surrounded by far-‐away sketches of multistoried constructions and a cyber-‐hub that was yet to be born and the eight lane highway leading to Jaipur, about to be built beside it.

say something more about yourself (the interview)

Call flow and traffic flow is fast and furious both inside and outside such centers of info-exchange and mega-data transmissions every second every day.

“You have mentioned in this form that your aim is to ‘do something different’. How would you relate that to your decision to work in a call center?” I was asked.

I had given more than couple of interviews, to get rejected on both occasions, and by then had realized what exactly they preferred to hear and the kind of profile that they wanted to hire. I was in no mood to miss my lunch and waste another day in the scorching heat traveling to one of these hotels where the interviews were conducted. I was tired of waiting for hours sipping cold water and looking at formally dressed men and women being dumped from one room to another – going through a series of eliminating rounds before reaching the interview stage, when they politely conveyed “…thank you very much, you may leave for now, we’ll get back to you…”, especially, to all those lacking a ‘neutral English accent'.

On the first occasion, I took great pleasure and interest in observing every bit of it. On the second, I was getting a hang of it. On the third, I felt like a school kid appearing for an oral examination at the mercy of the schoolmaster and was perennially requested at every step to say something (more) about oneself. But, I had no grudges. Neither the posh ambience nor the polite attitude of the employers towards hundreds of candidates walking-in everyday was comparable with the interview-scene of Ray’s ‘Pratidwandi’ [1]. The scene was acting out in reverse. Now they needed us (in bulk) more than we needed them. Any English-speaking dude eager to believe in the promises of the new-age-profession, even with less or ordinary qualifications, or with no desires to seek further qualifications, was in great demand, like never before.

On the fourth occasion, I thought that I had my answers ready.

“Well, your CV suggests something else. Why don’t you contemplate choosing a creative profession?”

The extra curricular activities’ column on my CV was getting reduced in size with each passing interview that I chose to face. Later I felt that I could have said something else instead of answering, “Madam, I am from a middle-class family, where creativity is not given much space beyond a point.”

I was reminded that I should use her first name instead of uttering ‘Madam’ repeatedly. “But, most of the creative minds come from the middle-class background”, she refuted.

“May be I don’t have much of confidence in my creative abilities.”

The conversation continued for quite long. I did not fall short of sentences to cover up this process of conscious deception. She was busy evaluating my English and was possibly overlooking the content of my answers while making points on a piece of paper as she kept asking questions regarding hobbies, movies, etc. I was asked to listen to men talking in American accent and was instructed to choose between options that summarized the probable conclusion of their conversation. Then I was asked me to wait outside.

The interview with the Senior Process Manager from Pune was supposedly the last round, I was told. A charming voice from across the table made me feel as if he had been waiting to hear from me since the time we met long ago, “So, how is life?”

“Great Sir”.

“Great? You don’t get to hear that too often. Okay, please say something about your self.”

There seemed to be no end to this essential inquiry about ‘the self’ at any stage! I started with my name and ended with my ambition, which was to make a career in a call center.

He must have found it useless to discuss the work profile with me. Truly, I had no idea about what I was supposed to do on the deck. But, I did not miss any chance to convey how keen I was to learn and deliver. This was followed by a discussion on salary, which was short, because as a fresher, I was in no position to bargain.

While passing the offer letter, the HR lady formally made a point to emphasize the formal dress code in the office. Looking back, I presume it was my appearance that prompted her to state the code. With the hair almost touching the shoulders, and a face not shaven for more than a month, the loose fit denims incapable of keeping the shirt tucked, I must have made a sufficient impression to instigate concern in her mind, although unknowingly. Jaswindar (the man who thought smoking bidi in the lawns of the corporate cathedral is quite cool) replied, “I don’t have any formal wear. Does the company pay any advance for buying some?”

Cyber Hub @ midnight – the nerve centre of several corporates.

what if they find out (the first day)

Even sky is not the limit. The exchange of information and its pace defies border – political or physical.

A cold current ran through the spine of several candidates, especially the first timers, with every signature they put on the bottom left of each page of the agreement of the terms and conditions that required them to be graduates. Obviously, quite a few of them were not graduates. What if they found out that they were not? But they did not. I guess, they never cared to verify the certificates enclosed in the pink file. Nor did they care to figure out what happened to those tax-forms, provident fund forms, insurance forms signed and submitted by the 124 employees joining job on the 9th of June. Lengthy spells of instructions related to form-filling on the first day were forgotten, as most of them were happily distracted or disinterested. The crowd was busy checking out each other – the vending machine and its options, the fancy phone and its features – also enquiring or narrating previous call center experiences, the hassle in missing or getting the first pick-up for the day...

While these strangers were desperate to know or let the others know ‘something more about themselves’, the junior officials instructing us ‘where to tick’, ‘what to remember’, ‘how to write’, ‘when to stop’ were not in a position to exhibit how irritated they were with the tough task of managing so many recruits. Things got even worse with the daylong induction lectures on training, transport, finance, assets, ‘our motifs’ and ‘your expectations’, ‘your contribution’ and ‘our expectations’. Thankfully, there was good lunch, free internet access (quite unthinkable in those days of expensive cyber cafes) and AC cabs to follow. I fancied my relief from the heat and hostel food for the next few weeks of my paid holiday without any sense of remorse.

The Convergys building (now taken over by Vedanta) on a full moon night. The plush lawns used to be a breeding ground for generating dust haze. The compound is highly protected/exclusive zone. Epitome of global connectivity ensures complete disconnection with the local surroundings.

my camera vs their camera (getting trained)

The ever-expanding city with all its imposed notions of urbanity on an area essentially rural leaves no scope for the evolution of the public space. On the contrary, any space outside the strict confines of these gated nations/notions invite threats of the highest order or at least it is perceived to be so.

What if they find out? No, they didn’t.

For the next one and a half months, we loitered around in the mornings, nights, evenings, and graveyard shifts of the classrooms and cafés (though not in every corner as mobility was highly restricted and under severe surveillance), at times enjoying and at times sleeping through the training sessions, impatiently waiting for the salary to get transferred to the Citi Bank account which they had opened for us to be swiped-out the moment the money arrived. Their surveillant eyes were not technologically advanced enough to guess the respective reasons to take up the job casually and remain appointed before absconding. A host of young fellas kept counting the number of day remaining:

While the trainer with 3 kids in 7 years (now needing one more) with a ‘do it or I’ll make you do it’ attitude reminded us that prostitution is oldest customer care service, and the role of a customer care executive is one of the most prestigious ones and definitely not deplorable just because we work at night (as do the docs and cops).
While listening to the trainees whose primary interests varied from stock exchange to cooking for the wife to horse breeding and extending till the ‘search for truth in Himalayas’. In a free speech session in VNA (Voice and Accent Training), fitness was synonymous with Baba Ramdev for some folks and euthanasia meant mass-killing. And what about capital-punishment? “Would have known if I attended the college debates”, someone proudly said. The trainer was kind to say “Then talk about censorship”. The girl with colored hair was quick to question, “Is that an automated cruise?”
While cruising through the consonants, diphthongs, vowel sounds, and imported ‘modules’, rapid ‘mock-calls’ and learning to intonate. We bit the ‘B’s, kissed the ‘W’s and by the time we rolled the ‘R’s, reached the soft ‘T’s and faded ‘P’s, I felt that the next big revolution was here. Tongue, lip, throat, teeth tried their level best to ape the ones across the Atlantic to the norms of their phonetic culture.
While obviously not uttering the obvious that this entire system was a consequence of service being subcontracted to places where establishment and labour costs were way more cheaper.

Walls can guard the flow of trespassers but the walls can rarely be guarded against the practice of public urination. An employee relieves himself in the middle of a graveyard shift on his way back after a quick smoke during the miserly half an hour break.

keeping balance (the absconding case & the attrition list)

The building came first as isolated blocks of self-sufficient units generating its own electricity and meeting its own needs. The infrastructure external and essential to its sustenance is still in its nascent stage.

In between the lines of the Punjabi beats in the moving cab or Pearl Jam playing on the i-pod in full volume to resist the former; before and after ‘hi bro’, ‘hey dude’, ‘yo man’, ‘yap buddy’; from weekend masti to an inspirational night-out, we constantly juggled with call-center jargon and silently yapped about:

How to revolt against ‘IST’ (Indian Stretchable Time)
Why the ‘pick-up time’ hadn’t been SMSed yet
Why the fucking cab driver did not come fucking five fucking minutes earlier
How often to ‘login’ early and ‘logout’ late
Why the ‘systems were running slow’
What should be the perfect ‘call-opening’ and ‘call ending’
How to handle ‘high call flow’
How to ‘sale’ a product to the ‘disinterested customer’
How to ‘appease’ the dissatisfied ‘enquiring consumers’
How to ‘empathize’ with an ‘irate customer’
How to keep the ‘call control’ while making the customer feel empowered
How to avoid ‘escalating’ the call
How to make full use of the two ‘fifteen minutes breaks’ and one ‘half hour break’
Why not to say – “I am sorry to hear that” – to a recently divorced customer
Whom to give the extra food coupons
What to do to in order to know when your calls are being monitored
How to reduce the ‘AHT’ (Average Handling Time)
How to increase the ‘C.Sac’ (Customer Satisfaction) scores
Why not to take two ‘consecutive weekend-offs’
What to write in the ‘feed-back forms’
Which friend should be referred to get compensated for the ‘referral’ before leaving the job
What else could be done to maximize ‘P4P’ (Pay for Performance)

Soon after swiping the card and clearing the balance, many of us became what they called, ‘an absconding case’ and added our names to the ‘attrition list’. The ‘cost-effective-labour’ (not ‘cheap labor’), stopped coming to office just before ‘hitting the (production) floor’ without bothering to formally say a bye, and without multiplying the hundreds of dollars that their clients had invested in our training and maintenance. Some of us had to get back to our colleges, which had re-opened. The others either complained about the team-leader or the work pressure till the time they got a call from some other call-center across the road offering a slight increment, but the same work. Others changed jobs as they habitually did twice or thrice a year to acquire a new ambience and acquaintances only to get bored yet again. One chap was smart enough to hold two offices simultaneously. The rest either perished without a trace or sat on the same chair hoping to climb the ‘vertical ladder’ by pleasing the bosses and putting more working hours while executing the ‘communicative tools’ and ‘navigation skills’ that they remembered from the training days. They were the ones the industry hoped to retain. They were also the ones too particular about their performance. Habitual consumption and consistent conflicts between the personal mornings/mourning and the professional nights took a consistent toll.

The city sleeps. Metros come to halt. Signs of human existence disappear. But thousands of people continue with the calls in each floor of these buildings answering queries and collecting unpaid amounts catering to a different time zone altogether.

Different floors and different corners of the same floor cater to different clients across the globe.

after-call wrap-up (remains of the flirtatious feed-back)

I-cards hung like nameplates around the neck all the time along with codes that were generated from the distant land. Punching these plastic cards ensured automated entry, strictly confined to those floors where we had some business. Forgetting to carry them required prolonged human intervention to convince the security that we did deserve to get in. Losing it lead to penalty. Hiding/absconding beneath one of the many call center note-pads I found the Separation Clause 4b: “upon separation from the company, you will be required to immediately return to the company, all assets and property including documents, files, book, papers and memos in your possession.”

The termination clause 6.b.i. of one of the appointment letters stated - “During the probation period you are liable to be discharged from the company’s service at any time without any notice and without assigning any reason”. But I guess the employees left the company more often without any notice or assigning any reasons. The company, most often, had no answers for this unwanted discharge to its owners across the oceans. IT abroad/onboard was not advanced enough to predict/prevent people who made the industry look like a make-shift arrangement; a probation that would rarely lead to permanence.

A common sight of fleet of cabs (a service which is outsourced to external vendors) outside the building waiting for scheduled drops and pick-ups.

is there anything else that I can do to help you/me

As the piling debris suggest infrastructural work perennially in progress.

Between the cafeteria cleaned once every hour and the adjacent murky road side dhaba; between the latest cars in the parking lot and the rickshaws waiting for those who couldn’t yet afford to pay the car-installment; between the fiber-glass windows and the jhopris (visible once the curtains were lifted) – new heights were achieved and new targets were set that were globally connected, locally disconnected.

In a site, which is otherwise devoid of consistent water supply, electricity and public transport (running it servers on generators 24X7), the vertical-limits of the translucent fiber glass and false roofs prepare the suburbs. The soothing cubicles confirm to the global standards of ‘how a city ought to look’ from a distance.

Just like the enormous demands of the IT industry, which has created its support sectors (catering, security, transport, house-keeping etc) to stray around the BPOs trying to extract their share of profit, I moved around its orbit as well for some time. Why and how there is a bit of BPO in most my creative endeavors and in the purchase of digital devices between 2003-2008 doesn’t require any further explanation.

I got better and better with my mock-calls.

Surrounded by the debris of development and standing tall with its emphatic presence, such an imposing architecture seems like a myth that constantly challenges the harsh realities that envelop it. The pillared peak is so representative of its desire to remain connected with the ‘distant-impossible’ 24x7.

Endnote

[1] The protagonist in the film violently revolted against the lack of basic amenities in the interview-space and against the idea of calling so many people for just a couple of vacancies, when people were expected to be selected not on the basis of merit, anyway.

The post, including the text and the photographs, is published under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license, and copyright is retained by the author.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/raw/blog_mock-calling

MLATs and the proposed Amendments to the US Electronic Communications Privacy Act

Vipul Kharbanda and Elonnai Hickok — 2016-12-28T01:09:34Z

In continuance of our blog post on mutual legal assistance treaties (MLATs), we examine a new approach to international bilateral cooperation being suggested in the United States, by creating a mechanism for certain foreign governments to directly approach the data controllers.

Published under Creative Commons License CC BY-SA. Anyone can distribute, remix, tweak, and build upon this document, even for commercial purposes, as long as they credit the creator of this document and license their new creations under the terms identical to the license governing this document.

In the previous article on MLATs we discussed, in some detail, what MLATs are and why they are needed. One area which was briefly focused upon in that article was the limitations and criticisms of the MLAT mechanism, of which one of the main criticisms being the problems caused due to different legal standards in various jurisdictions as well as the time taken to process a request for information sent from one country to another. Talking specifically about the United States, where most internet companies are headquartered and hold large amounts of data, it typically takes months to process requests under MLATs and foreign governments often struggle to comprehend and comply with the legal standards in the United States for obtaining data for use in their investigations.[1] The requirement that a foreign government should take permission from, and comply with the requirements of a foreign government simply because the data needed happens to be controlled by a service provider based in a foreign country strikes many foreign law enforcement officials as damaging to security and law enforcement efforts, especially when they are requesting data pertaining to a crime between two of their own citizens that primarily took place on their soil.[2]

These inefficiencies of the MLAT process lead to further problems of foreign governments attempting to apply their search and surveillance laws in an extraterritorial manner for example in 2014 the UK passed the Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Act, 2014 with gives the government the power to directly access data from foreign service providers if sought for specific purposes and the request is approved by the Secretary of State or other specified executive branch official.[3] Another response that may occur is if, frustrated by such inefficiencies of the existing systems, courts in foreign states start assuming extra territorial jurisdiction, as happened when a District Court in Vishakhapatnam restrained Google from complying with a subpoena issued by the Superior Court of California, ordering Google to share the password of the Gmail account belonging to an Indian citizen residing in Vishakhapatnam.[4]

Solution proposed in the United States

In order to overcome these inefficiencies, at least in the American context, the Department of Justice has proposed a legislation which seeks to make the process of foreign governments getting information from US based entities more streamlined by amending the provisions of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) of the United States (the “Amendment”). These amendments have been proposed primarily for the US and UK to effectuate a proposed bilateral agreement whereby the UK government will be able to approach US companies directly with requests for information without going through the MLAT process or getting an order from a US court.

The Amendment seeks to ensure that requests from foreign governments for information from US entities get answered in a smooth manner by including those requests in the process for seeking information under the ECPA itself. This move would no doubt, make it easier for foreign governments to access data in the US, but such a move can be criticized on the ground that it would then allow all states, irrespective of their legal standards of privacy, etc. to get access to such information. This problem has been overcome in the amendment by adding a new section to Title 18 which would allow the Attorney General, with the concurrence of the Secretary of State to certify to the Congress that the legal standards in the contracting state which is being given access to the mechanism under the ECPA satisfies certain requirements specified in the chapter (and discussed below). Only after such a certification has been received by the Congress, a contracting state would be able to receive the benefits sought to be granted under the Amendment.

It is important to note that the US administration is looking to use the US-UK Agreement as a standard to be followed for similar potential agreements with a number of other countries wherein the agencies in those countries could request information from US based entities through court orders through a properly specified legal framework. Though to our knowledge India has not been formally approached by the US government to enter into such an agreement, it is important to ask the question viz. if approached:

Does India's present legal system meet the standards laid down in the amendment to the ECPA?
And if they do, should India also seek to enter into such an Agreement with the United States?
And if India does, what could be the implications for citizens and for countries in a similar position as India?

We hope to be able to answer the above three questions, or at least throw some light on them, in the conclusion of this paper by relying upon the discussions contained herein.

Criticisms of the Amendment

While such a mechanism may be very effective in addressing the needs of security agencies in investigation and prevention of criminal activities, one cannot accept such an overarching change in cross border enforcement without analyzing the consequences that such a proposal will have on the right to privacy. Some of these consequences have been highlighted by experts responding to the amendment:

Lack of Judicial Authorisation: The Amendment requires that the foreign governments have a process whereby a person could seek post-disclosure review by an independent entity instead of a warrant by a court.[5] Although a court order is not the norm for interception even in Indian law, however under American law such protection is given to data held by American companies even though the data may belong to Indian citizens and this protection will no longer be available if the Amendment is passed.

Vague Standard for requests: Under the domestic law of any state there is usually a large amount of jurisprudence regarding when search orders can be issued, such as the “probable cause” standard that is followed in the United States or similar standards that may be followed in other jurisdictions. This ensures that even when the wording of the law is not precise, which it cannot be for such a subjective issue, there is still some amount of clarity around when and under what circumstances such warrants may be issued. In contrast, the Amendment requires that the orders be based on “requirements for a reasonable justification based on articulable and credible facts, particularity, legality, and severity regarding the conduct under investigation.” Although the language here may seem reasonable but in the absence of any jurisprudence backing it, it becomes very vague and susceptible to misuse. Disclosure without a Warrant: Under the current MLAT process as followed in the United States, a judge in the U.S. must issue a warrant based on probable cause in order for a U.S. company to turn over content to a foreign government. This requirement protects individuals abroad by requiring their governments to meet certain standards when seeking information held by U.S. companies. The Amendment seeks to remove this essential safeguard for a judicial warrant. The Amendment does not require requests from foreign governments to be based on a prior judicial authorization, since a large number of countries (including India) do not always require judicial orders for such orders.[6]

Allows Real Time Surveillance by Foreign Governments: American privacy rights activists have raised the concern that the Amendment would allow foreign governments to conduct ongoing surveillance by asking American companies to turn over data in real time. The requirements that the foreign governments would have to fulfill to execute such an order are less stringent than those which have to be fulfilled by the American security agencies if they want to indulge in similar activities. When the U.S. government wants to conduct real-time surveillance, it must comply with the Wiretap Act, which imposes heightened privacy protections.[7] The court orders for this purpose also require minimization of irrelevant information, are strictly time-limited, only available for certain serious crimes, etc.[8] In Indian law any such request, apart from being time limited and being available only for certain specified purposes, also has to satisfy that interception is the only reasonable option to acquire such information.

Process to determine which countries can make demands is not credible: Under the Amendment, the Attorney General and the Secretary of State, would decide whether the laws and practices of the foreign government adequately meet the standards set forth in the legislation for entering into a bilateral agreement. Their decisions would not be liable to be reviewed by a court or in any administrative procedure. They could make their determinations based on information which is not available to the public and the criteria for making the decision are vague and flexible. Further these criteria have been described as “factors” and not “requirements”[9] so that even if some of them are not satisfied, the certification process can still be completed.

Companies do not have the resources to determine if a request complies with the terms of the agreement: The Amendment does not provide any oversight to ensure that technology companies are only turning over information permitted in a specific bilateral agreement. For example, a bilateral agreement may permit disclosure of information only in response to orders that do not discriminate on the basis of religion, however, it may not be possible for the companies receiving the request to determine whether a particular request complies with that condition or not. The Amendment does not require that individual companies put in place requisite processes to weed out requests that may be non compliant with the provisions of the agreement; nor are there periodic audits to ensure that companies are properly responding to foreign government information requests.[10]

Non compliance with Human Rights Standards: Under international human rights law, governments are allowed to conduct surveillance only based on individualized and sufficient suspicion; authorized by an independent and impartial decision-maker; necessary and proportionate to achieve a legitimate aim, including by being the least intrusive means possible.[11] However the mechanism proposed by the Amendment falls woefully short of these standards.[12]

One must not lose sight of the fact that most of the criticisms of the proposal that have been discussed above have been made in the context of, and based on the standards of privacy protection that are available to American citizens. If we look at it from an Indian perspective most of those protections are not available to Indian citizens in any case since independent judicial oversight is not a sine qua non for access to information by the security agencies in India. Although the Amendment leaves open the question of how a request would be made by the foreign government to the individual Agreements, it may be safe to assume that were India to enter into such an Agreement with the United States, it would require the orders for access to comply with the standards laid down under Indian law before the relevant authorities send the request to the US based data controllers. At the least, this would ensure that the rights of Indian citizens currently guaranteed under Indian law, howsoever flawed they might be, would in all likelihood be safeguarded as per Indian law.

Certification from the Attorney General to the US Congress

In the above background if India were to enter into the agreement with the U.S Government apart from actually negotiating and signing that Agreement, the Indian government will also have to ensure (if the Amendment is passed) that the Attorney General of the United States, with the concurrence of the Secretary of State gives a certificate to the Congress that Indian law satisfies the requirements set forth in the proposed section XXXX of Title 18.

It must be kept in mind that if the negotiations between India and the United States in this regard reach such a mature stage that the certification from the Attorney General is required, then that would mean that there is enough political will on both sides to ensure that such an arrangement actually comes to fruition. In this context it would not be unfair to assume that the Attorney General may have a slight bias towards opining that Indian laws do conform to the requirements of the Amendment, as the Attorney General would want to support the decision taken by the administration, and our analysis shall have a similar bias in order to be more contextual.

The certification would, inter alia, contain the determination of the Attorney General:

That the domestic law of India affords robust substantive and procedural protections for privacy and civil liberties in light of the data collection and activities of the Indian government that will be subject to the agreement.It should be noted that the Amendment specifies various factors that should be taken into account to reach such a determination, which include whether the Indian government:

(i) has adequate substantive and procedural laws on cybercrime and electronic evidence, as demonstrated through accession to the Budapest Convention on Cybercrime, or through domestic laws that are consistent with definitions and the requirements set forth in Chapters I and II of that Convention; Although India is not a signatory to the Budapest Convention the Information Technology Act, 2000 (which is the main legislation dealing with cybercrime) has penal provisions which have borrowed heavily from the provisions of the Budapest Convention.

demonstrates respect for the rule of law and principles of nondiscrimination;

The provisions of Article 14 as well as Article 21 of the Constitution of India demonstrates that the legal regime in India is committed to the rule of law and principles of non discrimination.

adheres to applicable international human rights obligations and commitments or demonstrates respect for international universal human rights (including but not limited to protection from arbitrary and unlawful interference with privacy; fair trial rights; freedoms of expression, association and peaceful assembly; prohibitions on arbitrary arrest and detention; and prohibitions against torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment);

India is a signatory to a number of international human rights conventions and treaties, it has acceded to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), 1966, International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), 1966, ratified the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), 1965, with certain reservations, signed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), 1979 with certain reservations, Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), 1989 and signed the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CAT), 1984. Further the right to life guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution takes within its fold a number of human rights such as the right to privacy. Freedom of expression, right to fair trial, freedom of assembly, right against arbitrary arrest and detention are all fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution of India.

has clear legal mandates and procedures governing those entities of the foreign government that are authorized to seek data under the executive agreement, including procedures through which those authorities collect, retain, use, and share data, and effective of oversight of these activities;

India has a number of legislations which govern the interception and request for information such as the Information Technology Act, 2000, the Indian Telegraph Act, 1885, Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, etc. which put in place mechanisms governing the authorities and entities which can ask for information.

has sufficient mechanisms to provide accountability and appropriate transparency regarding the government’s collection and use of electronic data; and

The Right to Information Act, 2005 provides the citizens the right to access any public document unless access to the same is prohibited due to the specific exemptions provided in the Act. It may be noted here that the provisions of the Right to Information Act are often frustrated by the bureaucracy by using exceptions such as “national security”, but for the purposes of this write up we are already assuming a bias towards fulfillment of these factors/conditions and therefore as long as there is even some evidence of compliance, the conditions will be considered as fulfilled by the Attorney General for the purposes of his certificate.

demonstrates a commitment to promote and protect the global free flow of information and the open, distributed, and interconnected nature of the Internet.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, which regulates telecom services in India has also issued the Prohibition of Discriminatory Tariffs for Data Services Regulations, 2016 which prohibits service providers from charging discriminatory tariffs for data services on the basis of content.

Other than Indian law, the certificate from the Attorney General will also have to certify certain issues which would have to be addressed in the bilateral agreement itself, viz.:

That the Indian government has adopted appropriate procedures to minimize the acquisition, retention, and dissemination of information concerning United States persons subject to the agreement.
That the agreement requires the following with respect to orders subject to the agreement:

(i) The Indian government may not intentionally target a United States person or a person located in the United States, and must adopt targeting procedures designed to meet this requirement;

(ii) The Indian government may not target a non–United States person located outside the United States if the purpose is to obtain information concerning a United States person or a person located in the United States;

(iii) The Indian government may not issue an order at the request of or to obtain information to provide to the United States government or a third-party government, nor shall the Indian government be required to share any information produced with the United States government or a third-party government;

(iv) Orders issued by the Indian government must be for the purpose of obtaining information relating to the prevention, detection, investigation, or prosecution of serious crime, including terrorism;

(v) Orders issued by the Indian government must identify a specific person, account, address, or personal device, or any other specific identifier as the object of the Order;

(vi) Orders issued by the Indian government must be in compliance with the domestic laws of India, and any obligation for a provider of an electronic communications service or a remote computing service to produce data shall derive solely from Indian law;

(vii) Orders issued by the Indian government must be based on requirements for a reasonable justification based on articulable and credible facts, particularity, legality, and severity regarding the conduct under investigation;

(viii) Orders issued by the Indian government must be subject to review or oversight by a court, judge, magistrate, or other independent authority;

(ix) Orders issued by the Indian government for the interception of wire or electronic communications, and any extensions thereof, must be for a fixed, limited duration; interception may last no longer than is reasonably necessary to accomplish the approved purposes of the order; and orders may only be issued where that same information could not reasonably be obtained by another less intrusive method;

(x) Orders issued by the Indian government may not be used to infringe freedom of speech;

(xi) The Indian government must promptly review all material collected pursuant to the agreement and store any unreviewed communications on a secure system accessible only to those trained in applicable procedures;

(xii) The Indian government must segregate, seal, or delete, and not disseminate material found not to be information that is, or is necessary to understand or assess the importance of information that is, relevant to the prevention, detection, investigation, or prosecution of serious crime, including terrorism, or necessary to protect against a threat of death or seriously bodily harm to any person;

(xiii) The Indian government may not disseminate the content of a communication of a U.S. person to U.S. authorities unless the communication (a) may be disseminated pursuant to Section 4(a)(3)(xii) and (b) relates to significant harm, or the threat thereof, to the United States or U.S. persons, including but not limited to crimes involving national security such as terrorism, significant violent crime, child exploitation, transnational organized crime, or significant financial fraud;

(xiv) The Indian government must afford reciprocal rights of data access to the United States government;

(xv) The Indian government must agree to periodic review of its compliance with the terms of the agreement by the United States government; and

(xvi) The United States government must reserve the right to render the agreement inapplicable as to any order for which it concludes the agreement may not properly be invoked.

Conclusion

It is clear from the discussion above that the proposed Amendment is a controversial piece of legislation which will affect the way law enforcement is carried out in the internet. While there is no doubt that proposing an alternate mechanism to the existing inefficient MLAT structure is definitely the need of the hour, whether the mechanism proposed in the proposed Amendment, with all the negative implications on privacy, is the right way forward is far from certain.

As for the three questions that we had sought out to answer in the beginning of this paper, we would not like to say that Indian law definitely conforms to all the requirements listed in the Amendments, but it can safely be said that it appears that if the governments of India and the United States so wish, it would not be difficult for the Attorney General of the United States to be able to give a certification to the Congress as required in the proposed Amendment.

The other two questions as to whether India should try to opt for such an arrangement if given a chance and what would be the consequence for its people are somewhat related, in the sense that it is only by examining the consequences on its citizens that we will arrive at an answer as to whether India should opt for such an arrangement or not. The level of protections offered to Indian citizens under India law in terms of protection of their private data from government surveillance is lower than that which is offered to American citizens under American law. The growing influence of the internet is changing the citizen-state dynamic giving rise to increasing incidents where the government has to approach private actors for permission in order to carry out their governmental functions of providing security. This is because more and more private data of individual citizens is being uploaded on to the internet and controlled by private actors such as telecom companies, social media sites, etc. and the governments have to approach these private actors in case they want access to this information. The fact that the government has to approach private actors to get access to data gives private citizens some leverage to ask for better privacy protections in the context of state surveillance.

Although this proposed Amendment may not affect the local surveillance laws in India, however it would definitely have an effect on the way that citizens’ data is protected and accessed by the government.

[1] Explanation by the Assistant Attorney General attached to the proposed Amendment.

[2] https://www.justsecurity.org/24145/u-s-u-k-data-sharing-treaty/

[3] https://www.justsecurity.org/24145/u-s-u-k-data-sharing-treaty/

[4] http://spicyip.com/2012/04/clash-of-courts-indian-district-court.html

[5] https://www.justsecurity.org/32529/foreign-governments-tech-companies-data-response-jennifer-daskal-andrew-woods/

[6] https://www.aclu.org/letter/aclu-amnesty-international-usa-and-hrw-letter-opposing-doj-proposal-cross-border-data-sharing

[7] https://www.aclu.org/letter/aclu-amnesty-international-usa-and-hrw-letter-opposing-doj-proposal-cross-border-data-sharing

[8] https://www.justsecurity.org/32529/foreign-governments-tech-companies-data-response-jennifer-daskal-andrew-woods/

[9] https://www.justsecurity.org/32529/foreign-governments-tech-companies-data-response-jennifer-daskal-andrew-woods/

[10] https://www.aclu.org/letter/aclu-amnesty-international-usa-and-hrw-letter-opposing-doj-proposal-cross-border-data-sharing

[11] International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, art. 17, Dec. 19, 1966, U.N.T.S 999, cf. https://www.aclu.org/letter/aclu-amnesty-international-usa-and-hrw-letter-opposing-doj-proposal-cross-border-data-sharing

[12] https://www.aclu.org/letter/aclu-amnesty-international-usa-and-hrw-letter-opposing-doj-proposal-cross-border-data-sharing

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/mlats-and-the-proposed-amendments-to-the-us-electronic-communications-privacy-act

MLAT Report

Admin — 2018-09-27T15:53:24Z

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/files/mlat-report

Misuse of Surveillance Powers in India (Case 1)

pranesh — 2013-12-06T09:37:24Z

In this series of blog posts, Pranesh Prakash looks at a brief history of misuse of surveillance powers in India. He notes that the government's surveillance powers have been freqently misused, very often without any kind of judicial or political redressal. This, he argues, should lead us as concerned citizens to demand a scaling down of the government's surveillance powers and pass laws to put it place more robust oversight mechanisms.

Case 1: Unlawful Phone-tapping in Himachal Pradesh

In December 2012, the government changed in Himachal Pradesh. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) went out of power, and the Indian National Congress (INC) came into power. One of the first things that Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh did, within hours of taking his oath as Chief Minister on December 25, 2012, was to get a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to investigate phone tapping during the BJP government’s tenure.

On December 25th and 26th, 12 hard disk drives were seized from the offices of the Crime Investigation Department (CID) and the Vigilance Department (which is supposed to be an oversight mechanism over the rest of the police). These hard disks showed that 1371¹ phone numbers were targetted and hundreds of thousands of phone conversations were recorded. These included conversations of prominent leaders “mainly of” the INC but also from the BJP, including three former cabinet ministers and close relatives of multiple chief ministers, a journalist, and many senior police officials, including the Director General of Police.

Violations of the Law

While the law required the state’s Home Secretary to grant permission for each person that was being tapped, the Home Secretary had legitimately only granted permission in 34² cases. This leaves over a thousand cases where phones were tapped illegally, in direct violation of the law. The oversight mechanism provided in the law, namely the Review Committee under Rule 419A of the Indian Telegraph Rules, was utterly powerless to check this. Indeed, the internal checks for the police, namely the Vigilance Department, also seems to have failed spectacularly.

Every private telecom company cooperated in this unlawful surveillance, even though the people who were conducting it did so without proper legal authority. Clearly we need to revise our interception rules to ensure that these telecom companies do not cooperate unless they are served with an order digitally signed by the Home Secretary.

While all interception recordings are required to be destroyed within 6 months as per Rule 419A of the Indian Telegraph Rules, that rule was also evidently ignored and conversations going back to 2009 were being stored.

Concluding Concerns

What should concern us is not merely that such a large number of politicians/police officers were tapped, but that no criminal charges were brought about on the basis of these phone taps, indicating that much of it was being used for political purposes.

What should concern us is that the requirement under Section 5 of the Indian Telegraph Act, which covers phone taps, of the existence of a “public emergency” or endangerment of “public safety”, which is a prerequisite of phone taps as per the law and as emphasised by the Supreme Court in 1996 in the PUCL judgment, were blatantly ignored.

What should concern us is that it took a change in government to actually uncover this sordid tale.

1385 according to a Hindustan Times report [1]: http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/himachal-pradesh-police-registers-first-fir-in-phone-tapping-scandal/1/285698.html↩
A Zee News report states 34 while it’s 171 according to a Mail Today report ↩

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/misuse-surveillance-powers-india-case1

MHA snoop order & bid to amend IT rules: China-like clampdown or tracking unlawful content?

Admin — 2018-12-30T10:08:31Z

An MHA order last week authorised 10 government agencies to scan data on computers. This was followed by the Modi government’s proposal to amend the Information Technology rules for social media platforms like WhatsApp, Facebook and Twitter to “proactively identify, remove or disable access to unlawful information or content” in order to curb fake news online.

The article by Fatima Khan was published in the Print on December 28, 2018. Amber Sinha was quoted.

No concrete steps taken by either NDA or UPA to enact laws for surveillance reform

The MHA order which gives 10 government agencies the power to intercept, monitor and decrypt ‘any information’ generated, transmitted, received, or stored in any computer, reaffirms the sorry state of communication surveillance law in India. This is reflected in the lack of judicial review, minimal legislative oversight and no regard for the principles of necessity, proportionality, user notification and transparency.

Despite detailed recommendations by the Committee of Experts led by Justice AP Shah back in 2013, there have been no concrete steps taken by either the current NDA government or the previous UPA government to enact laws for surveillance reform. The draft bill by the committee led by Justice Srikrishna does refer to the principles of necessity and proportionality, but stops short of recommending an overhaul of the surveillance regime. This notification is but merely the logical next step in the existing framework for communications surveillance.

On the other hand, the draft amendments to the IT Act regulations seek to address the problem of ‘unlawful content’ and seem to stem largely from concerns about the use of platforms like Facebook and WhatsApp to spread disinformation and impact electoral processes in India. To that extent, these steps are misguided and betray a failure to engage with the actual problem. Already, the powers of content moderation exercised by online platforms suffer from problems of transparency and accountability. The draft regulations will only serve to compound this problem while unreasonably expecting the platforms to exercise powers which should require judicial determination.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-print-december-28-2018-mha-snoop-order-bid-to-amend-it-rules-china-like-clampdown-or-tracking-unlawful-content

Metaphors and Narratives

sachia — 2011-08-20T22:47:52Z

A course designed for Christ College, Bangalore

Status of Course: Basic, Semester II

Duration: 4 credits, 45 hrs.
Course Objectives

The course will serve as an introductory study of Internet technologies and the various social phenomena associated with them to investigate how the Internet becomes a catchall word for contemporary times. Students will explore the several layers of internets to look at the basic debates around questions of identity, subjectivity, gender, and governance, as they have emerged in the last four decades of cybercultures theory. The course will try and initiate new pedagogic practices of thought and research, looking at the several narratives of the internets available to us – from online communities, gaming and pornography to the wider debates around censorship, surveillance and privacy. The emphasis of the course is to de-mystify and consolidate the various narratives of the internet that are available to us from different disciplines and to provide a comprehensive and pedagogic frameworks to make meaning of the digitally inflected world that we live in.

Course Evaluation: Individual assignments from a list of topics or a topic worked out in consultation with the course instructors, depending upon the individual choice of the student.

Course Pedagogy: Contact session class room teaching, film screenings, seminars and discussion groups.

Course Content:

Module 1: Surfing the internets

The ‘Internet’ has become one of the most persuasive and prevalent metaphors of our times. As more and more sections of life and being get inflected by Information and Communication Technologies, more narratives of the ‘Internet’ are produced. These narratives often mystify the Internet – through misnomers or through frameworks from earlier technological paradigms which fail to understand or explain the ‘Internet’ – and are not in synchrony with one another. The first Module introduces the internets in their plurality and looks at the various disciplinary approaches to disentangling the internets.

A brief history of the internet technologies

· Origin and intentions

· The principles that built the internet

· The emergence of the WWW

Internet - Cyberspace

· Understanding Cyberspaces

· Convergent Histories of earlier technologies

· Bridging the virtual-real divide

Pre-Lecture Readings:

Gibson, William. Neruromancer. New York: Ace Books, 1984.

Huston, Geoff. “A Decade in the Life of the Internet”. The Internet Protocol Journal. Volume 11 No. 2. 2008.

Lyon, Katie Hafner and Matthew. Where Wizards Stay up Late: The Origins of the Internet. New york: Simon and Shuster, 1996.

Robbins, Kevin. "Cyberspace and the World We Live In." In The Cybercultures Reader, edited by David Bell and Barbara M. Kennedy. London: Routledge, 1992.

Manovich, Lev. “The Database as a Symbolic Form” in The Language of New Media. Cambridge: MIT Press. 2001.

Michael L. Benedikt, 1991, Cyberspace: First Steps, Cambridge: MIT Press

Module 2: The body in the digital paradigm

One of the most significant debates, across disciplines trying to engage with internet technologies, is on the site of the body. With cyberspaces providing multiple conditions within which the narratives of the body can be produced, there has been a radical revisiting of what it means to be human, to be gendered, to be sexual, and to be subject to various kinds of regulation and processes of censorship. This module looks at some of the seminal debates around these issues, by exploring various sites of cyberspatial identity and networking.

The body in the cyberspace

· The real body and the virtual body

· Spaces of regulation and bodies of surveillance

· Anthropomorphisation and the need to be human

Gender and Sexuality Online

· Obscenity, pornography and the sexual body

· The gendered being and the cyborg

· Subject to punishment: Role playing and fantasizing online

Pre-lecture readings:

Turkle, Sherry. Life on the Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet. London: Weidenfield and Nicolson, 1996.

Balsamo, Anne. "The Virtual Body in Cyberspace." In The Cybercultures Reader, edited by David Bell and Barbara M. Kennedy. London and New York: Routledge, 1996.

Dibbell, Julian. "A Rape in Cyberspace, or How an Evil Clown, a Haitan Trickster Spirit, Two Wizards, and a Cast of Dozens Turned a Database into a Society." The village voice (1994).

Haraway, Donna. "A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology and Social-Feminist in the Late 20th Century." In The Cybercultures Reader, edited by David Bell and Barbara M. Kennedy. London: Routledge, 2000.

Shah, Nishant. "Material cyborgs; asserted boundaries" European Journal of English Studies 12.2 .2008.

Sengupta, Suddhabrata. Signatures of the Apocalypse”. Mute: Culture and Politics after the Net. (2003)

http://www.metamute.org/en/Signatures-of-the-Apocalypse 5th July, 2005

Module 3: Circulation, Regulation and Intellectual Property

The economics of being online is closely related to the circuits of transmission, the viral networking and the questions of ownership and possession. As the boundaries between the State and the Market blur, there is an increased public and legal discourse on Intellectual Property, the processes of piracy and the need for regulation and intervention. The third module in the paper brings to the fore, the questions of freedom, of open access and equality, and the conditions of regulation that restrict a free flow of information online.

The value of Information

· Knowledge and Copyright

· Notions of possession and value of information online

· Digital Commons and the freedom of expression

Intellectual Property and the law

· Theft and piracy online

· Ownership and usage rights

· IPR and the role of digital technologies

Pre-Lecture Readings:

Lawrence Lessig. Free Culture: The Nature and Future of Creativity. Penguin. 2005.

Liang, Lawrence and Mayur Suresh. “Copyright/Copyleft : Myths about Copyright”.

(2006) http://www.countercurrents.org/hr-suresh010205.htm 21st August, 2008.

Rosemary J. Coombe. The Cultural Life of Intellectual Property. Duke University Press.

1998.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/publications-automated/curricula/courses-taught-and-designed-by-cis/metaphors-and-narratives

Messaging apps find another foe in India’s market regulator

praskrishna — 2013-06-05T10:46:32Z

Paranoid governments and mobile operators aren’t the only one that dislike messaging apps. Regulatory bodies aren’t crazy about them either. The Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) is worried that attempts to pass on confidential information or manipulate markets are originating from within services like WhatsApp and Blackberry Messenger.

This blog post was published in Quartz on May 8, 2013. Elonnai Hickok is quoted.

The regulator already analyzes data from trades for irregularities through its “integrated market surveillance system”. That gives it an idea of what stocks are being manipulated. Now it wants to expand its horizons. The Press Trust of India reports that SEBI has looked into tracking Twitter and Facebook and is grappling with messaging apps—though as yet it has no systems in place for doing either, according to Elonnai Hickok of the Center for Internet Studies in Bangalore. A SEBI spokesperson could not be reached for comment.

Even if SEBI did start following you on Twitter, it cannot snoop on your WhatsApp messages. That sort of power is the preserve of intelligence and police authorities. And there is good reason for SEBI’s restricted powers. Keeping the markets clean may be an honorable pursuit, but the regulator hasn’t always used honorable means.

India’s finance minister last year said that SEBI would be allowed to request call records, which are the data kept by operators about who called whom, for how long and from where. Such information can help investigators discover sources of leaked information. It can also be used to figure out whether traders are trying to influence other investigators. But a freedom-of-information request recently revealed that SEBI had been requesting—and receiving—such data from carriers at least since 2009, well before it was supposedly allowed to do so.

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/news/quartz-may-8-2013-leo-mirani-messaging-apps-find-another-foe-in-indias-market-regulator

Mesh Networks

Ravikiran Annaswamy — 2013-03-15T09:39:03Z

Ravikiran Annaswamy tells us the definition of Mesh Networks, its importance, applications and the things to explore in future.

Imagine[1] a room full of people in a party spread around randomly. One of the people wants to pass information to another in the corner of the room. The traditional telecom networking way of passing information involves having a person at the center of the room acts as a switch and routes the information from sender to receiver.

Mesh networks provides a new way of organizing the network, every person in the room can speak independently to the person next to him and in turn the second person speaks to the next person till the information reaches the destination. The route for the information is optimized to get the shortest path.

Definition of Mesh Networks

Mesh networks are highly interconnected network of computers or communication devices. This concept is applicable in software systems, wired networks and wireless networks. These networks consist of nodes (like computers, routers, radio base stations and mobile phones) and are connected to each other to carry information across.

Mesh networking is organic — every node in the neighborhood contributes network resources and cooperates.[2]

By Definition, Mesh networks are a way of structuring peer nodes in such a way that each node acts as a switch or a router deciding how to forward the information they receive. These networks use every node to determine the path of the signal, hence its important for every node in the network to be live and healthy. This requires self-healing algorithms to dynamically identify new routes in the network. The concept of Self-organizing Networks (SON) is being implemented to achieve flexibility and scalability.

Importance of Mesh Networks

Traditionally telecom networks are hierarchically structured with centralized control systems. Mobility and increase in number of wireless devices needs a distributed architecture with intelligent nodes like in Mesh networks to manage bandwidth, optimally use spectrum and device power consumption.

IEEE 802.11s is a standard that defines how wireless devices can interconnect to create a mesh network. This covers both the static networks and the ad-hoc networks.

Applications of Mesh Networks

Mesh Networks are applied in various areas of telecom like:

Optical Mesh Networks enable the transport networks with dynamic quality of service, bandwidth on demand and managing bandwidth with peer nodes and applying policies.
Rural or Village communication systems work with wireless nodes in every village connected to each other and provide communication services without depending on the operator infrastructure.
Wireless Ad-hoc networks are decentralized networks with no predefined structure.

Wireless mesh Network is a telecom network made up of radio nodes organized in a mesh topology.[3] This network is used in LTE radio, Metro-Wi-Fi networks and military communication applications in battlefield surveillance, tunnels and oil rigs.
Mobile Ad-hoc Networks (MANET) are mobile devices connected to each other without the need of a central infrastructure. Vehicular ad-hoc networks where vehicles communicate with fixed internet points on the road or between the vehicles themselves is an interesting application.

Next things to look for in future

Mesh networks are evolving in to real world scenarios where in sensors that monitor physical and environmental conditions are networked. These small low power wireless devices are connected through standardized ZigBee[4] protocol specifications.

The application of ZigBee is seen in Home automation, Health care, Remote controls and Smart energy meters.

[1].System Architecture for Wireless Meshes, Fairpoint Group White paper, April 2007, FPG 2007-127.1
[2].Self Organizing Wireless Mesh Networks, Microsoft Research, http://bit.ly/11Rmec
[3].Wireless Mesh Networks: http://bit.ly/hVKII0
[4].ZigBee Description: http://bit.ly/u8XNS

Glossary

Metro-Wi-Fi: Wireless network built with Wi Fi components covering the entire city
MANET: Mobile Ad-hoc networks

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/telecom/resources/mesh-networks

May 2019 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2019-06-26T01:40:33Z

The Centre for Internet & Society Newsletter for the month of May 2019

Highlights for May 2019

Omidyar Network is investing in in establishing a three-region research alliance co-led by the Institute for Technology & Society, Brazil , the Centre for Intellectual Property and Information Technology Law, Kenya, and the Centre for Internet & Society (CIS), India on appropriate use of Digital Identity. CIS will look at the policy objectives of digital identity projects, how technological policy choices can be thought through to meet the objectives, and how legitimate uses of a digital identity framework may be evaluated. The term Fintech is generally used to describe innovative technology and technological processes being used in the financial services sector. Vipul Kharbanda has presented a detailed analysis of RBI’s Draft Framework on Regulatory Sandbox for Fintech. Centre for Internet & Society's 'Access to Knowledge' wing (CIS-A2K) signed a MoU with PAH Solapur University, Maharashtra to promote content generation in Wikimedia projects among the institutions under University affiliation and develop a platform in the university for outreach programs on digital knowledge, language and technologies, FOSS, unicode, etc. Timely and affordable access to scientific research remains a problem in this digital day and age. Most countries including India, continue to struggle with implementing open access. The latest international initiative (created in Europe) to remedy this problem is Plan S. This has been positioned as a strategy to implement immediate open access to scientific publications from 2021 which India is considering adopting. Anubha Sinha in an article unpacks the disorderly growth of open access in India, and discusses the gap between the Plan's vision and current Indian scenario in some respects Shweta Mohandas was nominated to curate Genderlog's Twitter handle (@genderlogindia). She tweeted about topics related to gender and data, more specifically around AI, big data, privacy and surveillance. Sumandro Chattapadhyay and Tim Davies co-authored a chapter titled Open Data and Land Ownership in State of Open Data book which was recently launched at World Bank. The authors have thrown light on how the lessons from the land ownership field highlight the political nature of data, and illustrate the importance of politically aware interventions when creating open data standards, infrastructure, and ecosystems. The Bodies of Evidence collection, edited by Bishakha Datta and Richa Kaul Padte, is a collaboration between Point of View and CIS as part of the Big Data for Development Network supported by International Development Research Centre, Canada. Can data ever know who we really are? This is an excerpt from an essay by Zara Rahman, written for and published as part of the Bodies of Evidence collection of Deep Dives.

CIS and the News

The following news pieces were authored by CIS and published on its website in May:

How privacy fares in the 2019 election manifestos | Opinion (Aayush Rathi and Ambika Tandon; May 1, 2019).
Democracy, Digital India and Networks (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard; May 1, 2019).
Why the TikTok ban is worrying (Gurshabad Grover; Hindustan Times; May 2, 2019).
Digital Native: Narendra Modi’s interview by Akshay Kumar is a PR masterpiece (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; May 5, 2019).
Will the WTO Finally Tackle the ‘Trump’ Card of National Security? (Arindrajit Basu; The Wire; May 8, 2019).
Digital Native: Three things we need to realise about what TikTok is doing to us (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; May 19, 2019).
Open Data and Land Ownership (Sumandro Chattapadhyay; State of Open Data; May 22, 2019).
Can EVM vulnerabilities be used to game the Indian election? (Karan Saini; Kaarana Blog; May 22, 2019).
The Huawei bogey (Gurshabad Grover; Indian Express; May 30, 2019).

CIS in the News

CIS was quoted in these news articles published elsewhere:

Cyber criminals hide in the ‘dark web’ to remain anonymous (Tushar Kaushik; Economic Times; May 2, 2019).
BJP outspends Congress, others in social media advertising (Vidhi Choudhary; Hindustan Times; May 3, 2019).
Three emerging market think tanks to collaborate on Good ID recommendations with Omidyar backing (Chris Burt; Biometric Update; May 8, 2019).
"Aadhaar Reduced Agency in Citizens and Empowered Those in Positions of Authority" (Martin Moore; News Click; May 20, 2019).
In Parts of India, Internet Shutdowns Are a Fact of Life (Megha Bahree; Top10VPN; May 21, 2019).
Artificial Intelligence: Consumer Experiences in New Technologies (Consumer International; May 28, 2019).

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.

Copyright & Patent

Blog Entry

Should India adopt Plan S to realise Open Access to Public-funded Scientific Research? (Anubha Sinha; May 29, 2019).

Wikipdedia

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

Wikipedia assignments workshop for Post Graduate students in PAH Solapur University (Subodh Kulkarni; May 3, 2019).
Wikisource Workshop at Vigyan Ashram, Pabal (Subodh Kulkarni; May 26, 2019)
MoU between PAH Solapur University & CIS-A2K (Subodh Kulkarni; May 31, 2019).

Jobs

CIS-A2K team is seeking applications for the following posts:

Events

Train-the-Trainer 2019 (Organized by CIS-A2K; Vishakhapatnam; May 31 - June 2, 2019).
Wikimedia Education SAARC conference (Organized by Christ University (Deemed to be University) with the association of CIS-A2K; Christ University; Bangalore; June 20 - June 22, 2019).

Media Coverage

Ahmedabad Wikisource Workshop (Vishwavihar; May 13, 2019).
Youths come forward to augment Assamese Wikisource project (NE Now News; May 17, 2019).
Wikipedia looks to ramp up its Indian language content (Tushar Kaushik; May 28, 2019).
Project Tiger: Wikipedia ropes in locals to contribute articles in Indian languages (Tushar Kaushik; May 29, 2019).

Openness

Publication

Open Data and Land Ownership (State of Open Data; Sumandro Chattapadhyay; May 22, 2019).

Internet Governance

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.

Digital Identity

Announcement

Announcement of a Three-Region Research Alliance on the Appropriate Use of Digital Identity (Amber Sinha; May 13, 2019).

Event Organized

Picking ‘Wholes’ - Thinking in Systems Workshop (Organized by CIS; New Delhi; May 27 - 28, 2019).

Gender

Blog Entry

Workshop on Feminist Information Infrastructure (Ambika Tandon; edited by Gurshabad Grover and designed by Saumyaa Naidu; May 9, 2019).

Free Speech

Participation in Events

Stockholm Internet Forum 2019 (Organized by Stockholm Internet Forum 2019; Stockholm; May 16 - 17, 2019). Gurshabad Grover was a panelist in the discussion on 'Influencing Internet Governance' co-organised by Article 19.
Consilience 2019 (Organized by the Law and Technology Society; National Law School of India University, Bangalore; May 25, 2019). Gurshabad Grover was a panelist on the discussion on 'Online Content Regulation: Global Perspectives and Solutions'.

Privacy

Research Paper

An Analysis of the RBI’s Draft Framework on Regulatory Sandbox for Fintech (Vipul Kharbanda; May 8, 2019).

Participation in Events

Data Empowerment And Protection Architecture (DEPA) Workshop (Organized by iSPIRT Foundation; May 18, 2019). Pranav Manjesh Bidare attended the workshop.
ABLI Privacy Workshop (Organized by Asian Business Law Institute; Singapore; May 21 - 22, 2019). Elonnai Hickok participated in the event.
HillHacks 2019 (Organized by HillHacks; Bir, Himachal Pradesh; May 24 - 26, 2019). Karan Saini was a speaker.

Artificial Intelligence

Participation in Events

Society 5.0 and Artificial Intelligence with a Human Face (Organized by Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations; India Habitat Centre, New Delhi). Radhika Radhakrishnan attended a roundtable consultation.
AI for Good Workshop (Organized by Swissnex India and Wadhwani AI; Bangalore; May 22, 2019).
MWC19 Shanghai AI and Trust in APAC and China (Organized by Digital Asia Hub; MWC Shanghai; June 27, 2019). Sunil Abraham will be making a presentation at the summit on AI and Trust in APAC and China. Sunil has been invited as a speaker on panel ‘Framing AI for Digital Upstarts’.

Cyber Security

Participation in Event

Shining light into darkness: Encouraging greater transparency of government offensive practices in cyberspace (Organized by Rights Con; Tunis; June 12, 2019). Sunil Abraham will be attending a conversation on encouraging greater transparency of government offensive practices in cyberspace.

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.

Article

Democracy, Digital India and Networks (Shyam Ponappa; Organizing India Blogspot; May 1, 2019).

Participation in Event

Live [Closed]: TRAI Open House Discussion on OTT Regulation - Delhi (Organized by TRAI; New Delhi; May 20, 2019). Anubha Sinha attended the event.

Researchers at Work (RAW)

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:

Essay

Can data ever know who we really are? (Zara Rahman; May 22, 2019).

Blog Entries

War Driving in Lhasa Vegas (Oxblood Ruffin; May 11, 2019).

#DotBharatAdoption (Dr. Amit Prakash, K.A. Dayanand, Dr. Srinivasan Ramani, Dr. V. Sridhar, and Vivek Pani; May 11, 2019).
#MaterialisingWriting (Dibyadyuti Roy, Indrani Roy, Padmini Ray Murray, and Puthiya Purayil Sneha; May 21, 2019).
The Shadow that Social Media Casts: The Doubled Offlines of Online Sociality (Karandeep Mehra; May 21, 2019).

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/may-2019-newsletter

May 2018 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2018-06-12T14:03:24Z

CIS newsletter for the month of May 2018.

Dear readers,

Previous issues of the newsletters can be accessed here.

Highlights
The Centre for Internet & Society (CIS) has published a collection of stories of the impact of internet shutdowns on people's lives in the country. The stories were provided by 101 Reporters. The project was funded by Facebook and MacArthur Foundation. The report edited by Debasmita Haldar, Ambika Tandon and Swaraj Barooah can be accessed here. Anubha Sinha on behalf of CIS participated in the 36th Session of WIPO SCCR at Geneva from May 28 to June 1, 2018. CIS made statements on Draft Action Plan for Educational and Research Institutions and Persons with Other Disabilities, Draft Action Plan for Libraries, Archives and Museums, Limitations and Exceptions Agenda, and Proposed Treaty for the Protection of Broadcasting Organizations. CIS was one among the 14 NGOs which circulated a letter that raised concerns about the draft Broadcasting Treaty. India's Department of Telecommunications released a draft new telecom policy, titled ‘Draft National Digital Communications Policy 2018’. Anubha Sinha wrote an analysis on this in the Wire on May 6, 2018. Singapore based Asian Business Law Institute published a compendium on “Regulation of cross-border transfer of personal data in Asia”. The compendium contains 14 detailed reports. The chapter titled Jurisdictional Report India was authored by Amber Sinha and Elonnai Hickok. The purpose of privacy notices and choice mechanisms is to notify users of the data practices of a system, so they can make informed privacy decisions, wrote Saumyaa Naidu in a blog post which was edited by Elonnai Hickok. Divij Joshi wrote a report that assesses the compliance of the Indian intermediary liability framework with the Manila Principles on Intermediary Liability, and recommends substantive legislative changes to bring the legal framework in line with the Manila Principles. The report was edited by Elonnai Hickok and Swaraj Barooah. Data is potentially a toxic asset, if it is not collected, processed, secured and shared in the appropriate way wrote Amber Sinha in an article published in the Economic & Political Weekly. Saman Goudarzi, Elonnai Hickok and Amber Sinha wrote a report titled AI in the Banking and Finance Industry in India which seeks to map the present state of use of AI in the banking and financial sector in India. The report was edited by Shyam Ponappa. Mapping was done by Shweta Mohandas. Pranav M Bidare, Sidharth Ray, and Aayush Rathi provided research assistance in preparing this report. The National Register of Citizens (NRC) exercise in Assam focuses on updating the list of Indian citizens in the state. Khetrimayum Monish Singh and Nazifa Ahmed wrote a research paper that has provided a discourse analysis of media content and user opinions on Facebook, and media responses on the NRC official website. All posts related to this study can be found here.

Highlights

The Centre for Internet & Society (CIS) has published a collection of stories of the impact of internet shutdowns on people's lives in the country. The stories were provided by 101 Reporters. The project was funded by Facebook and MacArthur Foundation. The report edited by Debasmita Haldar, Ambika Tandon and Swaraj Barooah can be accessed here.
Anubha Sinha on behalf of CIS participated in the 36th Session of WIPO SCCR at Geneva from May 28 to June 1, 2018. CIS made statements on Draft Action Plan for Educational and Research Institutions and Persons with Other Disabilities, Draft Action Plan for Libraries, Archives and Museums, Limitations and Exceptions Agenda, and Proposed Treaty for the Protection of Broadcasting Organizations. CIS was one among the 14 NGOs which circulated a letter that raised concerns about the draft Broadcasting Treaty.
India's Department of Telecommunications released a draft new telecom policy, titled ‘Draft National Digital Communications Policy 2018’. Anubha Sinha wrote an analysis on this in the Wire on May 6, 2018.
Singapore based Asian Business Law Institute published a compendium on “Regulation of cross-border transfer of personal data in Asia”. The compendium contains 14 detailed reports. The chapter titled Jurisdictional Report India was authored by Amber Sinha and Elonnai Hickok.
The purpose of privacy notices and choice mechanisms is to notify users of the data practices of a system, so they can make informed privacy decisions, wrote Saumyaa Naidu in a blog post which was edited by Elonnai Hickok.
Divij Joshi wrote a report that assesses the compliance of the Indian intermediary liability framework with the Manila Principles on Intermediary Liability, and recommends substantive legislative changes to bring the legal framework in line with the Manila Principles. The report was edited by Elonnai Hickok and Swaraj Barooah.
Data is potentially a toxic asset, if it is not collected, processed, secured and shared in the appropriate way wrote Amber Sinha in an article published in the Economic & Political Weekly.
Saman Goudarzi, Elonnai Hickok and Amber Sinha wrote a report titled AI in the Banking and Finance Industry in India which seeks to map the present state of use of AI in the banking and financial sector in India. The report was edited by Shyam Ponappa. Mapping was done by Shweta Mohandas. Pranav M Bidare, Sidharth Ray, and Aayush Rathi provided research assistance in preparing this report.
The National Register of Citizens (NRC) exercise in Assam focuses on updating the list of Indian citizens in the state. Khetrimayum Monish Singh and Nazifa Ahmed wrote a research paper that has provided a discourse analysis of media content and user opinions on Facebook, and media responses on the NRC official website. All posts related to this study can be found here.

Articles:

The Huawei pointer (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard and Organizing India Blogspot; May 3, 2018).

India's Draft Telecom Policy Needs to Bridge the Gap Between Intent and Execution (Anubha Sinha; Wire; May 6, 2018).
India's Data Protection Framework Will Need to Treat Privacy as a Social and Not Just an Individual Good (Amber Sinha; Economic & Political Weekly, Volume 53, Issue No. 18, 05 May, 2018).
Digital Native: Web of Wander (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; May 20, 2018).

CIS in the News:

India's National ID Project Brings Pain to Those it Aims to Help (Aayush Soni; Ozy.com; May 11, 2018).
Aadhaar Remains an Unending Security Nightmare for a Billion Indians (Karan Saini; Wire; May 11, 2018).
More errors in Aadhaar data in Andhra Pradesh than in voter database (U Sudhakar Reddy; Times of India; May 18, 2018).
Putting women human rights activists on the world map (Sarumathi K.; Hindu; May 19, 2018).
An open data ecosystem can boost India's GDP by $22 B and double farmer income (Sohini Mitter; Your Story; May 23, 2018).
Complying with Europe’s GDPR will be a “matter of survival” for Indian IT firms (Ananya Bhattacharya; Quartz India; May 24, 2018).
Don't blindly forward WhatsApp messages. You could be sued (Rajitha Menon and Surupasree Sarmmah; Deccan Herald; May 29, 2018).
Alexa’s recording leak in US ‘echoes’ privacy issues here (Mugdha Variyar; Economic Times; May 29, 2018).
Election Experiment Proves Facebook Just Doesn't Care About Fake News In India (Visvak; Huffington Post; May 30, 2018).
India Proposes Law to Give Indians Complete Control of their Digital Health Data (Madhur Singh; India Spend; May 31, 2018).
Patanjali's Kimbho swiftly retreats over security scare, ripped on Twitter (Alnoor Peermohamed and Manavi Kapur; Business Standard; May 31, 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.

►Copyright and Patent

Blog Entries

CIS participated in the 36th SCCR held in Geneva from May 28 to June 1, 2018 and made the following statements:

Statement on the Proposed Treaty for the Protection of Broadcasting Organizations (Anubha Sinha; May 28, 2018).
NGOs circulate letter at WIPO SCCR/36 raising serious concerns about draft Broadcasting Treaty (Anubha Sinha; May 29, 2018).
Draft Action Plan for Educational and Research Institutions and Persons with Other Disabilities (Anubha Sinha; May 31, 2018).
Statement on the Draft Action Plan for Libraries, Archives and Museums (Anubha Sinha; May 31, 2018).
Statement on Limitations and Exceptions Agenda (Anubha Sinha; May 31, 2018).

Participation in Event

RightsCon Toronto 2018 (Organized by RightsCon; Beanfield Centre at Exhibition Place, Toronto; May 17, 2018). Maggie Huang, Amba Kak, Rohini Lakshané, Vidushi Marda, Elonnai Hickok and Anubha Sinha were among the speakers at the event. Amber Sinha remotely participated in a private meeting on 'Strategizing Civil Society Roles in the Artificial Intelligence Debate'. Anubha Sinha, Maggie Huang, Rohini Lakshané and Vidushi Marda presented their findings from the Pervasive Technologies project in a panel titled "Cheap and Chipper: IP in India's Affordable Smartphones". Prof Michael Geist moderated the session. Anubha Sinha and Vidushi Marda participated remotely. Elonnai Hickok participated in these sessions: IDRC cyber policy meeting; GNI board meeting; GNI learning session on MLATs; FOC-AN meeting; GNI session on Intermediary Liability.

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

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

►Privacy

Reports

Methods workshop on researching Future of Work in India (Natallia Khaniejo and Aayush Rathi; May 10, 2018).
AI in the Banking and Finance Industry in India (Saman Goudarzi, Elonnai Hickok and Amber Sinha; May 14, 2018)
Indian Intermediary Liability Regime: Compliance with the Manila Principles on Intermediary Liability (Divij Joshi; May 20, 2018). The report was edited by Elonnai Hickok and Swaraj Barooah.
Jurisdictional Report India (Compendium on Regulation of Cross-Border Transfers of Personal Data in Asia; Amber Sinha and Elonnai Hickok; May 31, 2018).

Blog Entry

Design Concerns in Creating Privacy Notices (Saumyaa Naidu; May 29, 2018). The blog post was edited by Elonnai Hickok.

Participation in Events

Meeting of Coalition for an Inclusive Approach on the Trafficking Bill (Organized by Alternative Law Forum; Bengaluru; May 3, 2018).
Fairness, Transparency and Accountable AI (Organized by DeepMind; London; May 10, 2018). Amber Sinha participated remotely in the inaugural meeting.
Rootconf 2018 (Organized by HasGeek; Bengaluru; May 11 - 12, 2018). Gurshabad Grover, Natallia Khaniejo and Aayush Rathi attended the event.
Inter Movements Open Forum: Trafficking Bill (Organized by Sangram, Naz Foundation, NNSW, Tarshi and VAMP; India International Centre, New Delhi; May 18, 2018).
IETF Indian Community Meetup: RFCs We Love (IoT edition) (Organized by Indian IETF Community; Zoomcar's office; Bengaluru; May 19, 2018). Gurshabad Grover and Sandeep Kumar attended 'RFCs We Love Meetup'.
Emerging Technologies: Issues & Way Forward (Organized by Technology Policy team at the National Institute of Public Finance and Policy; Bengaluru; May 23 - 24, 2018).
Privacy in the Digital Age: Addressing Common Challenges, Seizing Opportunities (Organized by DG Justice and Consumers and European Union; New Delhi; May 25, 2018).

►Free Speech and Expression

Report

Internet Shutdown Stories (Edited by Debasmita Haldar, Ambika Tandon and Swaraj Barooah; Foreword by Sunil Abraham; May 17, 2018). Case studies from the states of Jammu & Kashmir, Haryana, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Telangana, West Bengal, Tripura, Manipur, Nagaland, and Uttar Pradesh have been highlighted in this compilation.

Blog Entry

DIDP Request #30 - Enquiry about the employee pay structure at ICANN (Paul Kurian and Akriti Bopanna; May 26, 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:

Articles

The Huawei pointer (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard and Organizing India Blogspot; May 3, 2018).
India's Draft Telecom Policy Needs to Bridge the Gap Between Intent and Execution (Anubha Sinha; Wire; May 6, 2018).

-----------------------------------
Researchers at Work
-----------------------------------

Draft Research Paper

Infrastructure as Digital Politics: Media Practices and the Assam NRC Citizen Identification Project (Khetrimayum Monish Singh and Nafiza Ahmed; May 15, 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

► Request for Collaboration

For more details visit https://cis-india.org/about/newsletters/may-2018-newsletter-1

May 2017 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2017-06-17T02:46:03Z

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

Dear readers,

Previous issues of the newsletters can be accessed here.

Highlights
CIS compiled a report that highlighted four government projects run by various government departments that have made sensitive personal financial information and Aadhaar numbers public on the project websites. Article 19 had put out a call for applications for its Internet of Rights Fellowship in February 2017. Vidushi Marda was selected for Internet of Rights Fellowship. CIS gave inputs on a document on implementing digital accessibility to Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology on May 2, 2017. The 34th session of the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (SCCR) was held in Geneva from May 1 to 5, 2017. Anubha Sinha participated in the event and a summary report is available here. She made statements on behalf of CIS on the Discussion on Limitations and Exceptions for Libraries and Archives and on the Proposal for Analysis of Copyright Related to the Digital Environment. CIS-A2K’s widely well-regarded flagship skill building program, Train The Trainer and MediaWiki Training was conducted in Kolkata earlier this year. Tito Dutta captured the developments in a blog post. Although it has made the topographic maps or the Open Series Maps available to general public, Survey of India’s (SoI) Nakshe portal will have to go through a variety of litmus test, as the initiative fails to implement the mandates of public sharing of government data using open standards and open license as put forward by the NMP 2005 and NDSAP 2012, said Sumandro Chattapadhyay in an interview with Geospatial World on May 02, 2017. In an interview with nettime.org, Geert Lovink discussed with Ramesh Srinivasan Tech Anthropology Today and "how can we embrace the realities of communities too-often relegated to the margins". In an article published in the Business Standard on May 3, 2017, Shyam Ponappa examined whether policies can be better framed to harness the market potential. Why is so much investment flowing into India's securities markets?

CIS in the news:

130 Million Aadhaar Numbers Were Made Public, Says New Report (The Wire; May 1, 2017 and MensXP.com; May 5, 2017).
Aadhaar Details Of 13.5 Crore People Available On Government Sites (Mahima Kapoor; Bloomberg Quint; May 2, 2017).
Aadhaar numbers of 135 mn may have leaked, claims CIS report (Press Trust of India; May 2, 2017).
Details of 135 million Aadhaar card holders may have leaked, claims CIS report (Hindustan Times; May 2, 2017).
UIDAI remains silent on #Aadhaarleaks of 13 crore users through government portals (Shruti Menon; Newslaundry; May 2, 2017).
১৩ কোটি আধার তথ্য ফাঁস চার সরকারি পোর্টাল থেকে! বিস্ফোরক দাবি রিপোর্টে (Amar Bazar Patrika; May 2, 2017).
13 crore Aadhaar numbers on four government websites compromised: Report (Akram Mohammed; New Indian Express; May 2, 2017).
Aadhaar numbers of 135 mn may have leaked, claims CIS report (DNA; May 2, 2017).
Biggest blast on Aadhaar leak so far: govt sites leaked data of 13 crore people (Jikku Varghese Jacob; Manorama; May 2, 2017).
Around 13 crore Aadhaar numbers easily available on government portals, says report (Scroll.in; May 2, 2017).
What privacy? 13 crore Aadhaar numbers accessible on government portals (Anusha Ravi; Oneindia; May 2, 2017).
Govt may have made 135 million Aadhaar numbers public: CIS report (Komal Gupta; Livemint; May 2, 2017).
Aadhaar numbers of 135 mn may have leaked, claims CIS report (The Times of India; May 2, 2017)
Aadhaar data leaks not from UIDAI: Centre (Krishnadas Rajagopal; Hindu; May 3, 2017).
135 MEELLION Indian government payment card details leaked (Richard Chirgwin; The Register; May 3, 2017).
Aadhaar data of over 13 crore people exposed: New report (Indian Express; May 3, 2017).
In The Biggest Data Leak, Info Of 13 Crore Aadhaar Card Holders Has Been Compromised And Is Available Online (Bobins Abraham; The Times of India; May 3, 2017).
Around 130-135M Aadhaar Numbers published on 4 sites alone (Nikhil Pahwa; Medianama; May 4, 2017).
Aadhaar's the largest biometric database globally but it is leaky by design (Rohith Jyotish; Global Voices; May 2, 2017 and Business Standard; May 5, 2017).
Why Aadhaar leaks should worry you, and is biometrics really safe? (Rakesh Mehar; Newsminute; May 4, 2017).
Indian Government says it is still drafting privacy law, but doesn’t give timelines (Vivek Pai; Medianama; May 4, 2017).
आधार नंबर, नाम, पता, बैंक अकाउंट और दूसरी संवेदनशील जानकारियां लीक: CIS रिपोर्ट (Aaj Tak; May 4, 2017).
With digitisation at the forefront, government departments need to be cautious about digital security (Manas Pratap Singh; NDTV; May 4, 2017).
Kashmir: Telecom firms struggle to block 22 banned social media sites (Aijaz Hussain; Livemint; May 4, 2017).
Aadhaar data of 130 millions, bank account details leaked from govt websites: Report (India Today; May 4, 2017).
Aadhaar: Are a billion identities at risk on India's biometric database (Soutik Biswas; BBC News; May 4, 2017 and Rawlson King; Biometric Update.com; May 5, 2017).
135 million aadhaar details, 100 million bank accounts "leaked" from government websites: Researchers (Counterview; May 5, 2017).
Suicide videos: Facebook beefs up team to monitor content (Kim Arora; The Times of India; May 5, 2017).
Aadhaar assurances fail to assuage privacy concerns (Anirban Sen; Livemint; May 5, 2017).
A 13-year-old's rape in TN highlights the major threat online sexual grooming poses to children (Priyanka Thirumurthy; May 6, 2017).
Experts stress on need for enhanced security (New Indian Express; May 6, 2017).
Taking Cognisance of the Deeply Flawed System That Is Aadhaar (Shreyashi Roy; Wire; May 10, 2017).
Plug data leak before imposing Aadhaar (Deccan Herald; May 11, 2017).
Aadhaar data leak: Take precautions while sharing info on websites, MEITy tells all depts (Indian Express; May 11, 2017).
Aadhaar security: Here's how your private information can be protected (Sanjay Kumar Singh; Business Standard; May 11, 2017).
Online Trolls Attack Critics of India's Aadhaar State ID System (Rohith Jyothish; Global Voices; May 31, 2017).
India is building a biometric database for 1.3 billion people — and enrollment is mandatory (Shashank Bengali; Los Angeles Times; May 12, 2017).
Watch: Aadhaar has become a whipping boy: Nandan Nilekani (Alnoor Peermohamed and Raghu Krishnan; Business Standard; May 13, 2017).
Partnership on AI Adds Corporate, NGO Members, Charts Initial Course (Benjamin Romano; Xconomy; May 16, 2017).
WannaCry: ATMs not to shut down, clarifies RBI, but how safe are our machines? (Soumya Chatterjee; May 16, 2017).
Google, Facebook's AI group adds new members (Jens Meyer; Axios; May 16, 2017).
22 companies join Partnership on AI, begin to study AI's impact on work and society (Alison DeNisco; TechRepublic; May 17, 2017).
Intel, Salesforce, eBay, Sony and others join the grand AI partnership club (CIOL; May 17, 2017).
IT companies in Bengaluru on high alert over WannaCry ransomware (Kiran Parashar K M & Shruthi H M; New Indian Express; May 17, 2017).
Partnership on AI adds new organizations to its network (Madison Moore; Software Development Times; May 17, 2017).
Intel, eBay, SAP, Salesforce y Sony colaborarán en inteligencia artificial (Monica Tilves; Silicon; May 17, 2017).
22 nieuwe leden voor Partnership on AI (Telecom Paper; May 17, 2017).
Provide hacker details, outfit that claimed data leak told (Mahendra Singh; The Times of India; May 18, 2017).
UIDAI asks Centre for Internet & Society to provide hacker details (Mahendra Singh; Economic Times; May 18, 2017).
Hack exposes Zomato's weak protection of customer data, say Cyber experts (Alnoor Peermohamed; Business Standard; May 19, 2017).
What’s Hard To Digest About The Zomato Hacking (Aayush Ailawadi; Bloomberg Quint; May 19, 2017).
UIDAI puts posers to CIS over Aadhaar data leak claim (Press Trust of India and Financial Express; May 19, 2017).
Faking it on WhatsApp: How India's favourite messaging app is turning into a rumour mill (Samarth Bansal; Hindustan Times; May 19, 2017).
Debate over #Aadhaar Turns Nasty as Critics Accuse Supporters of Online Trolling (Ajoy Ashirwad Mahaprahasta; The Wire; May 19, 2017).
Hacker steals 17 million Zomato users’ data, briefly puts it on dark web (Kim Arora and Digbijay Mishra with inputs from Ranjani Ayyar; The Times of India; May 19, 2017).
UIDAI goes after org that disclosed government departments were releasing Aadhaar data (Nikhil Pahwa; May 19, 2017).
Developer releases WannaCry key-recovery tool for Windows XP (Cirilo Laguardia; Hoyen TV; May 20, 2017).
Will Aadhaar leaks be used as an excuse to shut out scrutiny of welfare schemes? (Anumeha Yadav; Scroll.in; May 20, 2017).
Microsoft says WannaCry ransomware must be a wake-up call for governments (Journaldu Maghreb; May 20, 2017).
Noida cyber cell gives tips on preventing WannaCry attack (Juana McKenzie; World News Journal; May 20, 2017).
Chinese state media says U.S. should take some blame for cyber attack (Ellis Neal; Villages Suntimes; May 21, 2017).
Zomato hack: You need to enhance online security with a password manager (Sanjay Kumar Singh; Business Standard; May 23, 2017).
Sharad Sharma Apologises for Trolling Aadhaar Critics; Unmasking Ispirit's Controversial Trolling Program (Shweta Modgil; Inc 42; May 23, 2017).
iSpirt's Sharad Sharma: Sorry, I trolled Aadhaar critics (Shalina Pillai and Anand J; The Times of India; May 24, 2017).
Sharad Sharma's case shows how rampant troll culture has become under Modi (Catch News; May 25, 2017).
Aadhaar Card: One Identity, Multiple Disorders (Gaurav Raj; India Saga; May 25, 2017).
Tweets from the afterlife (Heena Khandelwal; DNA; May 28, 2017).
BBMP faces ire for publishing pourakarmikas' Aadhaar details on website (Bharat Joshi; Economic Times; May 29, 2017).

CIS members wrote the following articles

Aadhaar Case: Beyond Privacy, An Issue of Bodily Integrity (Amber Sinha and Aradhya Sethia; Quint; May 1, 2017).
Digital native: Free speech? You must be joking! (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; May 14, 2017).
Digital native: Look before you (digitally) leap (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; May 28, 2017).

-------------------------------------
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.

Submission

Comments on the draft Policy on IT Accessibility for People with Disabilities (Nirmita Narasimhan; May 19, 2017).

►Copyright

Blog Entries

34th SCCR: A Summary Report (Anubha Sinha; May 15, 2017).
34th SCCR: CIS Statement on the Proposal for Analysis of Copyright Related to the Digital Environment (Anubha Sinha; May 15, 2017).
34th SCCR: CIS Statement on the Discussion on Limitations and Exceptions for Libraries and Archives (Anubha Sinha; May 15, 2017).
34th SCCR: Observer Statements on Proposal for Analysis of Copyright related to the Digital Environment (Anubha Sinha; May 30, 2017).
34th SCCR: Observer Statements on Limitations and Exceptions for Educational and Research Institutions (Anubha Sinha; May 30, 2017).
34th SCCR: Observer Statements on Limitations and Exceptions for Libraries and Archives (Anubha Sinha; May 30, 2017).

Participation in Event

Fixing Copyright for Education (SCCR34 Side Event) (Hosted by Communia, EIFL, Creative Commons, and PIJIP; May 5, 2017). Anubha Sinha was a speaker.

►Wikipedia

Blog Entries

Wiki Loves Mayabazaar (Pavan Santhosh; May 1, 2017).
Marathi Wikipedia Symposium at Gokhale Institute Of Politics & Economics (Subodh Kulkarni; May 1, 2017).
Digitisation, Wikimedia Commons and Wikisource Orientation Workshop at Vigyan Ashram, Pabal, Pune District (Subodh Kulkarni; May 4, 2017).
Thematic Edit-a-thon at J.P.Naik Centre for Education & Development, Pune (Subodh Kulkarni; May 10, 2017).
Train The Trainer 2017 (Manasa Rao; May 10, 2017).
Continuing community engagement: Communities of interest and Quarrying (Manasa Rao; May 19, 2017).
Preliminary research result on Wikipedia gender gap in India (Ting-Yi Chang; May 22, 2017).
MediaWiki Training 2017 (Tito Dutta and Ananth Subray; May 23, 2017).
Mini TTT and MWT held in Kolkata (Tito Dutta; May 23, 2017).

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

►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.

Blog Entry

SoI’s Open Series Maps Fails to Implement Public Sharing of Govt Data (Geospatial World; May 4, 2017). Sumandro Chattapadhyay was interviewed.

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

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

►Freedom of Speech and Expression

Submission

Comments from the Centre for Internet and Society on Renewal of .NET Registry Agreement (Vidushi Marda with inputs from Pranesh Prakash and Sunil Abraham; May 31, 2017).

Event Organized

Communication Design and Visualising Information (CIS, Bengaluru; May 5, 2017). Saumyaa conducted a session on the broad principles of communication design and visualising information.

Participation in Events

World Press Freedom Day 2017 (UNESCO and the Digital Empowerment Foundation; New Delhi; May 3, 2017). Udbhav Tiwari participated in the event.
Consilience 2017 - A Conference on Artificial Intelligence & Law (Organized by National Law School of India University; May 20, 2017). Vidushi Marda was a panelist.

►Privacy

Submission

Comments on the Statistical Disclosure Control Report (Srinivs Kodali and Amber Sinha; May 2, 2017).

Blog Entry

(Updated) Information Security Practices of Aadhaar (or lack thereof): A documentation of public availability of Aadhaar Numbers with sensitive personal financial information (Amber Sinha and Srinivas Kodali; May 1, 2017).

Events Organized

Stand Shielded of Digital Rights (CIS; New Delhi; May 5, 2017). Amutha Arunachalam gave a talk.
Meeting on Proactive Disclosure and Personal Data (CIS; New Delhi; May 13, 2017).

Participation in Events

4th National Standards Conclave Evolving a Comprehensive National Strategy for Standards Sectoral and Regional Inclusiveness (Organized by Ministry of Commerce and Industry and the Confederation of Indian Industry; May 1 - 2, 2017).
Stockholm Internet Forum 2017 (Organized by Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency; Stockholm; May 15 to 18, 2017). Elonnai Hickok was a panelist in the session, "Private sector and civil society collaboration to advance freedom online".
Open house on information breaches (Organized by Has Geek; Bengaluru; May 26, 2017). Udbhav Tiwari was a speaker.
T20 Germany and Beyond: Digital Economy (Organized by GIZ and EPF; May 29 - 30, 2017). Elonnai Hickok participated in a round-table discussion.

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

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

Policies to Sustain India's Market (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard; May 3, 2017 and Organizing India Blogspot; May 4, 2017).

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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:

Blog Entry

Tech Anthropology Today: Collaborate, Rather than Fetishize from Afar (Geert Lovink and Ramesh Srinivasan; nettime.org; May 16, 2017).

Participation in Event

Consultative Meeting for a Digital Archive Lab (Organized by Ambedkar University, New Delhi; May 20, 2017). P.P. Sneha participated in the meeting.

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

► 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/may-2017-newsletter

May 2016 Newsletter

praskrishna — 2016-06-10T19:34:10Z

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

Early last year, thanks to the fund raising efforts of a friend of CIS - Suhail Kazi, we received Rs. 1.9 lakhs as donations from 19 individuals. In January this year, we set up an online giving feature on our website which would ease the donation process, but we haven’t got a single donation so far! Today, we are unable to find a single donor who is interested in our Accessibility, Telecom, or RAW programmes. In other words, we need your support. Would you to consider making a small donation to CIS? Click here to donate.

Previous issues of the newsletters can be accessed here.

Highlights
CIS along with 20 other organisations petitioned the Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment, Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Information Technology to bring in accessibility considerations within the draft Procurement Bill. Pavishka Mittal wrote a blog post on the legality and implications of the Reserve Bank of India's proposed classification of Peer-to-Peer lending companies as non-banking financial institutions. The sixth section of our extended survey of digital initiatives in the practice of arts and humanities in India is now online. The final report will be published serially, and will comprise seven sections in total. CIS invites abstracts for essays that explore how we study the Internet in India today. Please send the abstracts (no more than 200 words) to raw@cis-india.org by Sunday, June 12, 2016. CIS will select up to 10 abstracts and announce them on Monday, June 20, 2016. CIS filed RTI applications seeking information from institutes such as IIM Bangalore; NLU Jodhpur; NLSIU; IIT Kanpur; IIT Kharagpur; NALSAR; NUJS; Delhi University; and IIM Ahmedabad. Sumandro Chattapadhyay and Adya Garg wrote an article for the Wire in which they analyzed the draft Geospatial Information Regulation Bill, 2016. They argue that the Bill seems to be undoing various economic and humanitarian efforts, and hindering other opportunities offered by maps. CIS sent its comments on the Draft New ICANN By-Laws in which it observed that the draft by-laws are overwrought and that rather than producing a broad constitutional document for ICANN the by-laws read like the worst of governmental regulations and create more problems than they solve.

CIS in the News

CIS gave inputs to the following media coverage:

Exercise to correct articles in Tulu Wikipedia begins (The Hindu; April 28, 2016). This was mirrored on CIS website on May 1, 2016.

T’puram to host Wikipedia workshop on May 4, 5 (Mathrubhumi; May 1, 2016).
Spread awareness through Malayalam Wikipedia: Gadgil (The Times of India; May 5, 2016).
Promoting Online Content Through 'Wiki Malayalam' (New Indian Express; May 6, 2016).

Why India’s attempt to police digital maps and satellite images is a ‘dumb’ idea (News Minute; May 6, 2016).
Google, Apple and Microsoft may need licence for satellite mapping in India (Aman Sharma and Neha Alawadhi; Economic Times; May 9, 2016).
Geospatial Info Regulation Bill will hurt start-ups, small firms (Varun Aggarwal; Hindu BusinessLine; May 10, 2016).
Why The New Government Policy Mandating Panic Buttons On Phones Isn’t Going To Protect Women (The Ladies Finger; May 14, 2016).
India's Proposed Map Law Prompts Outcry (Anjana Pasricha; Voice of America; May 17, 2016).
Suckfly Attacks National Stock Exchange Tech Vendor, Among Others (Rohit Pathak; The Quint; May 21, 2016).
India Seeks to Limit Use of Maps and Satellite Images (Anjana Pasricha; Voice of America; May 27, 2016).
How tech brings self-reliance to students with disabilities (The Times of India; May 29, 2016).

CIS members wrote the following pieces:

Why It's Essential To Grow Indian-Language Wikipedias (Subhashish Panigrahi; Huffington Post; February 2016). The post was mirrored in Global Voices. The post was translated into Greek by Maria Souli. It was translated into Spanish by Daniela Diaz and into Russian by GV Russian.
A Large Byte of Your Life (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; April 3, 2016). This was mirrored on the website recently.

A four year, action-packed experience with Wikipedia (Sailesh Patnaik; Opensource.com; April 15, 2016). This was mirrored on CIS website recently.
Online Censorship on the Rise: Why I Prefer to Save Things Offline (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; April 17, 2016). This was mirrored on the website recently.
Facebook: A Platform with Little Less Sharing of Personal Information (Nishant Shah; Indian Express; May 8, 2016).

Wikipedia’s 15th birthday inspires Bangla translators; Odia-language Women’s History Month edit-a-thons (Nahid Sultan and Shailesh Patnaik; Wikimedia Blog; May 9, 2016).

Identity of the Aadhaar Act: Supreme Court and the Money Bill Question (Sumandro Chattapadhyay and Vanya Rakesh; The Wire; May 9, 2016).
Criminal Defamation and the Supreme Court’s Loss of Reputation (Bhairav Acharya; The Wire; May 14, 2016).
Before Geospatial Bill: A Long History of Killing the Map in Order to Protect the Territory (Sumandro Chattapadhyay and Adya Garg; The Wire; May 16, 2016).
Protecting the Territory, Killing the Map (Sumandro Chattapadhyay; The Wire; May 17, 2016).
Women's Safety? There is an App for That (Rohini Lakshané; Gender IT.org; May 19, 2016).

ଇଣ୍ଟରନେଟରେ ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଏନସାଇକ୍ଲୋପିଡ଼ିଆ "ଉଇକିପିଡ଼ିଆ" ବିକାଶ ପାଇଁ ଏକାଠି ହେଲେ ପୁରୀର ଛାତ୍ରଛାତ୍ରୀ (Subhashish Panigrahi; YourStory Odia, May 20, 2016).

Celebrating 13 Years of the Kannada-language Wikipedia (Subhashish Panigrahi; DNA; May 22, 2016).
Modi’s New Intellectual Property Rights Policy Will Only Benefit Players with Deep Pockets (Anubha Sinha; May 28, 2016).

►NVDA and eSpeak

May 2016 Report

►Other

Accessible ICT Procurement (Pranesh Prakash; May 9, 2016).

►Pervasive Technologies

Blog Entries

CIS gathered information from various educational institutions in response to several RTI applications. All of these have been published as different blog posts:

MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from JNU (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 15, 2016).
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from IIT, Kharagpur (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 15, 2016).
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from NALSAR (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 15, 2016).
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from NUJS (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 15, 2016).
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from Delhi University (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 15, 2016).
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from IIM, Ahmedabad (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 17, 2016).
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from IIM, Bangalore (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 21, 2016).
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from NLU, Jodhpur (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 26, 2016).
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from NLSIU (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 27, 2016).
MHRD IPR Chair Series: Information Received from IIT, Kanpur (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 31, 2016).

Nisha S. Kumar assisted in the preparation of all these documents.

Participation in Event

National Confererence on Competition & IPR in ICT, Telecom and Mobile Sets (Organized by CMAI; May 18, 2016; Vigyan Bhawan, New Delhi). Rohini Lakshané and Anubha Sinha attended this conference.

Other Blog Entry

Sectoral Innovation Councils on Intellectual Property Rights – RTI Requests + DIPP Responses (Nehaa Chaudhari and Saahil Dama; May 21, 2016).

►Wikipedia

Blog Entries

Images and Links Matter Quality (Rahmanuddin Shaik; May 4, 2016).
Indian English Wikipedian Nvvchar completes 1500 Did You Know articles (Tito Dutta; May 9, 2016).
Celebrating the 13th anniversary of Kannada Wikipedia (Subhashish Panigrahi; May 19, 2016). Ananth Subray contributed to this blog.

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

►Freedom of Expression

Submission and Comment

Comments on Draft Electronic Health Records Standards (Amber Sinha; May 28, 2016).
Submission by the Centre for Internet and Society on Draft New ICANN By-laws (Pranesh Prakash, Vidushi Marda, Udbhav Tiwari and Swati Muthukumar with inputs from Sunil Abraham; May 30, 2016).

Blog Entry

Criminal Defamation Remains and so does the Debate (Japreet Grewal; May 19, 2016).

►Privacy

Blog Entry

Privacy Issues with DRM (Jalaj Pandey; May 3, 2016).

Event Organized

Understanding Aadhaar and its New Challenges (Organized by Centre for Studies in Science Policy, JNU and CIS; May 26 - 27, 2016; New Delhi). The event was supported by the Centre for Communication Governance at NLU Delhi, Free Software Movement of India, Knowledge Commons, PEACE, and Center for Advancement of Public Understanding of Science & Technology.

Announcement

Call for Essays: Studying Internet in India (Sumandro Chattapadhyay; May 20, 2016).

Blog Entries

New Modes and Sites of Humanities Practice (P.P. Sneha; May 19, 2016).
RBI Consultation Paper on P2P Lending: Summary (Pavishka Mittal; May 18, 2016).
RBI Consultation Paper on P2P Lending: Legality and Implications (Pavishka Mittal; May 23, 2016).
RBI Consultation Paper on P2P Lending: Data Security and Privacy Concerns (Vipul Kharbanda; May 31, 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/may-2016-newsletter

May 2015 Bulletin

nirmita — 2015-07-29T14:29:08Z

Newsletter for the month of May can be accessed below.

Editor’s Note: After seven years of having used Inigo Tech headed by Khairil Yousuf for its email server, CIS shifted recently to Greenhost Projects, founded in 2001 by Mart van Santen and Sacha van Geffen. Greenhost offers a fresh approach to ICT and sustainability and also supports various projects in the fields of education, culture and journalism. While being grateful to Inigo Tech for providing secure services over the years, CIS takes this opportunity to welcome Greenhost on board. During this migration there was a total disruption of service and CIS couldn’t send its monthly bulletins earlier. CIS further apologises for the delay in the June newsletter which will also be sent shortly. From July onwards we will be back on track.

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Highlights
-------------------------------

G3ict and CIS jointly researched and published a report titled Inclusive Financial Services - Global Trends in Accessibility Requirements. The research paper comprises a Foreword and Introduction, four chapters — Barriers to Access for Persons with Disabilities and Diverse Abilities, International Framework, Integrating Accessibility into the System, and State of Practice - Impact of the Convention on Inclusive Finance and Accessibility Efforts around the Globe. Pina D’ Intino from Scotiabank and Mohan Tanksale of Indian Banks Association were also contributors to the report.
During the month NVDA team conducted training in basic computing with use of NVDA and eSpeak in Assamese and Tamil. NVDA team also conducted a 30 Days Summer Course on Basic Computer Competencies and Language Proficiency.

CIS has prepared an analysis of the commonalities in big-ticket patent infringement lawsuits pertaining to mobile devices.

The first public draft of the International Open Data Charter was released at the International Open Data Conference in Ottawa in May. CIS had contributed comments to a previous version of the draft, and also took part in the pre-release meeting of potential stewards of the Charter on May 26 in Ottawa.

The Fibreculture Journal has accepted an abstract from Sumandro Chattapadhyay for its upcoming issue on 'Computing the City.' The paper titled Mathematisation of the Urban and not Urbanisation of Mathematics: Smart Cities and the Primitive Accumulation of Data proposes that production, circulation, and ownership of data must be considered as a central problematique in the discussions of smart cities.

An abstract for a proposed chapter on 'making' in the humanities has been accepted for publication in a volume titled 'Making Humanities Matter'. This is part of a new book series titled 'Debates in the Digital Humanities 2015' to be published by University of Minnesota Press.
Chinmayi Arun has authored a research paper titled Paper-thin Safeguards and Mass Surveillance in India that tells readers of Indian government’s new mass surveillance systems and the threats it has on right to privacy.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), in March 2015 invited comments on its Consultation Paper for the regulation of over-the-top (OTT) services. In an unprecedented wave of public participation, TRAI received over a million e-mails in support of net neutrality. CIS has prepared a note which sets out the law in relation to the unauthorized disclosure of personal information.

Shyam Ponappa’s op-ed titled Stranded Capacities and Greater Expectations in the Business Standard on May 6 highlights India’s infrastructure problems.

► Vacancies at CIS

CIS is seeking applications for:

Intern (Pervasive Technologies Project)

Interns (Other Projects) for its offices in Bangalore and Delhi.

----------------------------------------------
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. 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 project was completed, books in English and Hindi were printed and are being sent to ministries, departments, panchayats and NGOs around the country. The publication 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

May 2015 Report (Suman Dogra; April 30, 2015).

Training Programmes

eSpeak Tamil Computing with NVDA (Centre for Differently-abled Persons, Bharathidasan University, Tiruchirappalli; May 4 – 8, 2015). Seventeen delegates attended.

Training in Basic Computing with use of NVDA and eSpeak in Assamese (Monfort School, Guwahati; May 9 – 10, 2015). Eleven delegates attended.

Training in the Use of eSpeak for Indian Languages during TOT (Organized by Enable India; May 11 – 20, 2015; Blind Empowerment Association, Kolkata). Twenty-six delegates attended.

Tamil Language (Differently Abled Children Section, District Central Library, Coimbatore; May 25 – 29, 2015). Twenty-one delegates attended.

Training on the Use of eSpeak Hindi on Windows and Android Platforms (Indian Association for the Blind, Delhi; May 28, 2015).

Report on 30 Days Summer Course on Basic Computer Competencies and Language Proficiency (Karna Vidya Technology Centre, Thiru-Vi-Ka, Industrial Estate, Chennai, May 1 – 30, 2015). Twenty delegates attended.

# Blog Entry

Report on the Progress in Manipuri Language Testing (May 10, 2015). This blog post captures the key updates of the work done by CIS team for Manipuri language.

►Other

White Paper

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

-----------------------------------------------------------
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.

Blog Entries

Literature Survey: Patent Landscaping in the Indian Marketplace (Rohini Lakshané; December 31, 2014). This post has been updated.
2015 USTR Report: Old Wine in New Bottle (Anubha Sinha; May 11, 2015).
Call for Participation: Global Congress on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest (Anubha Sinha; May 14, 2015).
National IPR Policy Series: Who is a 'public authority' under the RTI Act? (Nehaa Chaudhari and Devrupa Rakshit; May 21, 2015).
Report: Global Intellectual Property Convention 2015 (Rohini Lakshané; May 22, 2015). Anna Liz Thomas and Nayana Dasgupta assisted with the making of this report.
National IPR Policy Series - CIS Letter to IPR Think Tank (Nehaa Chaudhari; May 26, 2015). CIS acknowledges Varun Baliga and Devrupa Rakshit for their research.
Joining the Dots in India's Big-Ticket Mobile Phone Patent Litigation (Rohini Lakshané; May 31, 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

Articles

Odia Wikipedia Set to Celebrate 13 Years of Volunteer Contributions (Subhashish Panigrahi; May 13, 2015).
ଓଡ଼ିଆ ଉଇକିପିଡିଆ: ନୂତନ ଯୁଗର ଆରମ୍ଭ (Subhashish Panigrahi; May 31, 2015).
Odia Language Wikipedia Page Grows to 800K Page Views A Month (Subhashish Panigrahi; Opensource.com; May 31, 2015).

►Openness

Blog Entry

International Open Data Charter: First Public Draft (Sumandro Chattapadhyay; May 29, 2015).

Participation in Events

Open Street Map "Mapping Workshop" (Organized by Phandeeyar; Yangon; May 13, 2015). Sumandro Chattapadhyay conducted a workshop. Twenty delegates attended.
What is the Open Data Movement & Why Does it Matter? (Organized by Phandeeyar; Yangon; May 13, 2015). Twenty-five delegates attended. Sumandro Chattapadhyay gave a talk.

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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.

►Privacy

Blog Entry

Paper-thin Safeguards and Mass Surveillance in India (Chinmayi Arun; May 20, 2015).

► Other

Participation in Events

The Transformative Power of Online Activism (Organized by Hertie School of Governance; Berlin; May 4, 2015). Rohini Lakshané was a panelist. The event was part of the re:thinking tomorrow series.
Consilience (Organized by National Law School of India University, Bangalore; May 9 – 10, 2015).

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

Definition of Net Neutrality should be flexible: Pranesh Prakash (Sanjay Vijaykumar; The Hindu; May 10, 2015).
Anti-harassment app wins hackathon for women (Sci Dev Net; May 15, 2015).
Indian music streaming service Gaana hacked, millions of users’ details exposed (Abhimanyu Ghoshal; TNW News; May 28, 2015).
Your phone is a surveillance device, your ISP a surveillance provider…: Pranesh Prakash (Dyanne Coelho; mxmindia.com; May 27, 2015).
Digital India: PM Modi to launch BJP's flagship programme likely in July (Jochelle Mendonca and Neha Alawadhi; Economic Times; May 29, 2015).
Digital India launch likely in July (Jochelle Mendonca and Neha Alawadhi; The Times of India; May 29, 2015).
Only digital sex, please (Prasun Chandhuri and Avijit Chatterjee; The Telegraph; May 31, 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 Entries

Making in the Humanities – Some Questions and Conflicts (P.P. Sneha; May 22, 2015).
Mathematisation of the Urban and not Urbanisation of Mathematics: Smart Cities and the Primitive Accumulation of Data - Accepted Abstract (Sumandro Chattapadhyay; May 25, 2015).

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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 had worked with the USOF to include funding projects for persons with disabilities in its mandate:

Comments

TRAI and the Disclosure of Personal Information (Nehaa Chaudhari and Vidushi Marda; May 10, 2015).

Op-ed

Stranded Capacities & Greater Expectations (Shyam Ponappa; Business Standard; May 6, 2015 and Organizing India Blogspot; May 8, 2015).

Participation in Event

5G Technologies Workshop (Organized by IEEE Communications Society Bangalore Chapter; The Capitol Hotel, Bangalore; May 22 – 23, 2015). Rohini Lakshané attended the workshop.

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About CIS
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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

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. To discuss collaborations on Indic language Wikipedia, 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, The Hans Foundation, MacArthur Foundation, and IDRC for funding its various projects.

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

May 2014 Bulletin

praskrishna — 2014-07-04T04:59:03Z

Our newsletter for the month of May is below:

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

Highlights

We have published a summary of the various landmark judgments given by the Supreme Court and some of the high courts in a blog post as part of our National Resource Kit project.
CIS submitted its comments on the Open Licensing Policy Guidelines to the National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (NMEICT), Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India.
The Access to Knowledge team from CIS has signed a memorandum of understanding with Shri Dharmasthala Manjunatheshwara (SDM) College to introduce “Indian Language Wikipedias in the Indian Under Graduate and Post Graduate Classroom”.
Sunil Abraham wrote an article “Net Freedom Campaign Loses its Way” in the Hindu Businessline which analyses the recently concluded NETMundial.
Divij Joshi gives a comparative analysis of the United States of America and India with regards to search and seizure and the right to privacy in digital age.
Anirudh Sridhar has produced an essay “Binary Code Invades the Universal Problematic” looks at language as an archive and posits, through a reading of Foucault, Derrida, Saussure and Jakobson that the means of perceiving language in the digital has changed.
As part of its Making Change project CIS is holding a public exhibition of stories of change from all over Asia, where the first of its Production Sprints will take place. The exhibition will be held at CIS office in Bangalore on June 7, 2014.
Earlier this year (February 11 – 17) we organized the second Institute on Internet in Pune. A draft of the Knowledge Repository on Internet Access was presented at the event. We are uploading digital versions of the repository for archival purposes. Three units (The Body in Cyberspace, Access to Knowledge and Openness) have been published.

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 first draft of the kit (29 states and 6 union territories). The 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 May (by Suman Dogra, May 31, 2014).

National Resource Kit

Blog Entry

Summary of Judgements on Disability Rights (by CLPR, May 15, 2014).

Other

Blog Entries

The Road to Financial Inclusion (by Amba Salelkar, May 12, 2014).
Open House with George Abraham: Mainstreaming Persons with Disabilities (by Anandhi Viswanathan, May 22, 2014).

Event Organized

An Open House Session with George Abraham (co-organized by Ashoka India and CIS, Ashoka-Innovators for the Public, Bangalore, May 21, 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.

Submission

Comments on the Open Licensing Policy Guidelines of the National Mission on Education through Information and Communication Technology (by Sunil Abraham and Nehaa Chaudhari, May 28, 2014). The comments were submitted to the NMEICT, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India.

Blog Entry

France, Greece, India and the European Union Sign the Marrakesh Treaty (by Nehaa Chaudhari, May 2, 2014).

Participation in Event

OGP Asia Pacific Regional Conference (co-organized by Web Foundation, World Bank, and UKP-PPP, Bali, May 6 – 7, 2014). Sunil Abraham was a speaker in the session on “Open Data in Asia-Pacific: a Cross-Country Learning Discussion”.

Media Coverage

WIPO: Scope and rights of potential broadcasting treaty clarified (by Alexandra Bhattacharya, SUNS – South-North Development Monitor, May 5, 2014 and cross-posted in Third World Network, May 6, 2014).
At WIPO, Authors, Civil Society Watchful of Rights for Broadcasters (by Catherin Saez, IP Watch, May 1, 2014).
Pushing the Boundaries in Open Governance: Insights from OGP Asia Pacific Regional Conference in Bali, Indonesia (Day 1) (by Michael Canares, Open Government Partnership, May 6, 2014 and cross-posted in Open Data Research Network, May 27, 2014).

Wikipedia

The following has been done under grant from the Wikimedia Foundation:

Announcement

CIS Signs MoU with Shri Dharmasthala Manjunatheshwara College (by Dr. U.B.Pavanaja, May 27, 2014): to introduce “Indian Language Wikipedias in the Indian Under Graduate and Post Graduate Classroom”. Dr. U.B. Pavanaja on behalf of the CIS-A2K team signed the MoU. The signing event took place earlier on April 21, 2014.

Articles

Books and More are Relicensed to Creative Commons (by Subhashish Panigrahi, Opensource.com, May 2, 2014).
GLAM in India: 10 tips for successful GLAM projects (by Subhashish Panigrahi, OpenGLAM, May 27, 2014).
Indic Language Wikipedias as Open Educational Resources (by Subhashish Panigrahi, Open Education Working Group, May 27, 2014).

Event Organized

Tulu Wikipedia Workshop (co-organized by CIS-A2K and the Regional Research Centre, MGM College, Udupi, May 25, 2014). Dr. U.B.Pavanaja conducted the workshop.

News and Media Coverage

Wikipedia in UG Education program at Christ University (Prajavani, May 15, 2014).
Subhashish Panigrahi joins Open GLAM Working Group: Subhashish recently joined the OpenGLAM Working Group (a global network of people who work to open up cultural data and content.) as a member and OpenGLAM Local (a local affiliate of OKFN's OpenGLAM project) as an ambassador for India. Both the positions will be voluntary.

Internet Governance

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.

FOEX Live

As part of our MacArthur project on free speech and expression we are posting a selection of news from across India implicating online freedom of expression and use of digital technology:

News Compilation

May 26-27, 2014; May 28-29, 2014

Articles

Net Freedom Campaign Loses its Way (by Sunil Abraham, Hindu Businessline, May 10, 2014).
Networks: What You Don’t See is What You (for)Get (by Nishant Shah, DML Central, April 17, 2014 and cross-posted in Hybrid Publishing Lab, May 13, 2014).

Blog Entries

European Court of Justice rules Internet Search Engine Operator responsible for Processing Personal Data Published by Third Parties (by Jyoti Panday, May 14, 2014).
Net Neutrality, Free Speech and the Indian Constitution – III: Conceptions of Free Speech and Democracy (by Gautam Bhatia, May 18, 2014).

Participation in Events

Freedom of Expression Scholars Conference 2 (organized by Yale Law School, May 2-4, 2014). Pranesh Prakash participated as a discussant in the session “Speech and Safety Laboratories”.
Re:publica 2014: Looking for Freedom (organized by Re:publica in partnership with DAIMLER, Global Innovation Gathering, Microsoft and Science: Lab, Berlin, May 6 – 8, 2014). Pranesh Prakash was a speaker at the session “The Architecture of Invisible Censorship: How Digital and Meatspace Censorship Differ”.
Does Size Matter? A Tale of Performing Welfare, Producing Bodies and Faking Identity (organized by the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, Harvard University, May 13, 2014). Malavika Jayaram gave a talk on “Does Size Matter? A Tale of Performing Welfare, Producing Bodies and Faking Identity”.
The Future of Cyber Governance (organized by Hague Institute for Global Justice in association with the Observer Research Foundation, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Netherlands, and the Netherlands Institute for International Relations – Clingendael, The Hague, May 13 – 15, 2014). Sunil Abraham was a speaker in the session “Do users of major social media platforms have adequate protection of their rights to privacy and freedom of expression?” and “Expert Panel on the Future of Cyber Governance”.
WSIS+10 High-Level Event: Open Consultation Process (organized by ITU, UNESCO, United Nations and UNDP, WIPO Conference Room, Geneva, May 28 – 31, 2014). Jyoti Panday participated in this event.

Event Organized

National Elections 2014: How Technology Powered Campaigns (organized by HasGeek and CIS, Bangalore, May 23, 2014). Vijay Grover, founder of Bangalore Media Foundation, Viral Shah, part of Nandan Nilekani's campaign management team, and BG Mahesh, founder and managing director at Oneindia.in, made presentations.

Privacy

Articles

Filtering content on the internet (by Chinmayi Arun, The Hindu, May 6, 2014).
Legislating for Privacy - Part II (by Bhairav Acharya, The Hoot, May 20, 2014).

Blog Entry

Search and Seizure and the Right to Privacy in the Digital Age: A Comparison of US and India (by Divij Joshi, May 31, 2014).

News & Media Coverage

CIS gave its inputs to the following media coverage:

Civil Society Pushes for Privacy Panel (by Laxmi Ajai Prasanna, The Times of India, May 6, 2014).
Students lead the way with apps for ideas (by Sruthy Susan Ullas, The Times of India, May 21, 2014).
India needs better cyber police (by Surabhi Agarwal, Business Standard, May 23, 2014).
Digital death: Log off in peace (by Purnima Sharma, The Times of India, May 25, 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 Entry

Binary Code Invades the Universal Problematic (by Anirudh Sridhar, May 26, 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

An Infrastructure Road Map (by Shyam Ponappa, Business Standard, April 30, 2014 and Organizing India Blogspot, May 1, 2014).

Knowledge Repository on Internet Access

As part of our research (with Ford Foundation) on the origins of the Internet in India, its impact on the Indian GDP and topics and debates surrounding the Internet in today's world we published the following units:

The Body in Cyberspace (by Nishant Shah, May 13, 2014).
Access to Knowledge (by Anirudh Sridhar, May 22, 2014).
Openness (by Prof. Subbiah Arunachalam and Anirudh Sridhar, May 30, 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

► 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/may-2014-bulletin

Centre for Internet and Society

Models for Surveillance and Interception of Communications Worldwide

Mock-Calling – Ironies of Outsourcing and the Aspirations of an Individual

best start (the advertisement)

say something more about yourself (the interview)

what if they find out (the first day)

my camera vs their camera (getting trained)

keeping balance (the absconding case & the attrition list)

after-call wrap-up (remains of the flirtatious feed-back)

is there anything else that I can do to help you/me

Endnote

MLATs and the proposed Amendments to the US Electronic Communications Privacy Act

MLAT Report

Misuse of Surveillance Powers in India (Case 1)

Case 1: Unlawful Phone-tapping in Himachal Pradesh

Violations of the Law

Concluding Concerns

MHA snoop order & bid to amend IT rules: China-like clampdown or tracking unlawful content?

No concrete steps taken by either NDA or UPA to enact laws for surveillance reform

Metaphors and Narratives

Status of Course: Basic, Semester II Duration: 4 credits, 45 hrs. Course Objectives

Messaging apps find another foe in India’s market regulator

Mesh Networks

Definition of Mesh Networks

Importance of Mesh Networks

Applications of Mesh Networks

Next things to look for in future

Glossary

May 2019 Newsletter

Highlights for May 2019

CIS and the News

CIS in the News

Copyright & Patent

Wikipdedia

Events

Openness

Digital Identity

Gender

Free Speech

Privacy

Artificial Intelligence

Cyber Security

May 2018 Newsletter

May 2017 Newsletter

May 2016 Newsletter

May 2015 Bulletin

May 2014 Bulletin

Highlights

NVDA and eSpeak

National Resource Kit

Other

Wikipedia

FOEX Live

Privacy

Knowledge Repository on Internet Access

Status of Course: Basic, Semester II

Duration: 4 credits, 45 hrs.
Course Objectives