The Centre for Internet and Society
https://cis-india.org
These are the search results for the query, showing results 31 to 35.
Pre-Budget Consultation 2016 - Submission to the IT Group of the Ministry of Finance
https://cis-india.org/openness/pre-budget-consultation-2016-submission-to-the-ministry-of-finance
<b>The Ministry of Finance has recently held pre-budget consultations with different stakeholder groups in connection with the Union Budget 2016-17. We were invited to take part in the consultation for the IT (hardware and software) group organised on January 07, 2016, and submit a suggestion note. We are sharing the note below. It was prepared and presented by Sumandro Chattapadhyay, with contributions from Rohini Lakshané, Anubha Sinha, and other members of CIS.</b>
<p> </p>
<p>It is our distinct honour to be invited to submit this note for consideration by the IT Group of the Ministry of Finance, Government of India, as part of the pre-budget consultation for 2016-17.</p>
<p>The Centre for Internet and Society is (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. We receive financial support from Kusuma Trust, Wikimedia Foundation, MacArthur Foundation, IDRC, and other donors.</p>
<p>We have divided our suggestions into the different topics that our organisation has been researching in the recent years.</p>
<p> </p>
<h3>Free/Libre and Open Source Software (FLOSS) is the Basis for Digital India</h3>
<p> </p>
<p>We congratulate the policies introduced by the government to promote use of free/libre and open source software and that of open APIs for all e-governance projects and systems. This is not only crucial for the government to avoid vendor lock-in when it comes to critical software systems for governance, but also to ensure that the source code of such systems is available for public scrutiny and do not contain any security flaws.</p>
<p>We request the government to empower the implementation of these policies by making open sharing of source code a necessity for all software vendors hired by government agencies a necessary condition for awarding of tenders. The 2016-17 budget should include special support to make all government agencies aware and capable of implementing these policies, as well as to build and operate agency-level software repositories (with version controlling system) to host the source codes. These repositories may function to manage the development and maintenance of software used in e-governance projects, as well as to seek comments from the public regarding the quality of the software.</p>
<p>Use of FLOSS is not only important from the security or the cost-saving perspectives, it is also crucial to develop a robust industry of software development firms that specialise in FLOSS-based solutions, as opposed to being restricted to doing local implementation of global software vendors. A holistic support for FLOSS, especially with the government functioning as the dominant client, will immensely help creation of domestic jobs in the software industry, as well as encouraging Indian programmers to contribute to development of FLOSS projects.</p>
<p>An effective compliance monitoring and enforcement system needs to be created to ensure that all government agencies are Strong enforcement of the 2011 policy to use open source software in governance, including an enforcement task force that checks whether government departments have complied with this or not.</p>
<p> </p>
<h3>Open Data is a Key Instrument for Transparent Decision Making</h3>
<p> </p>
<p>With a wider set of governance activities being carried out using information systems, the government is increasingly acquiring a substantial amount of data about governance processes and status of projects that needs to be effectively fed back into the decision making process for the same projects. Opening up such data not only allows for public transparency, but also for easier sharing of data across government agencies, which reduces process delays and possibilities of duplication of data collection efforts.</p>
<p>We request the 2016-17 budget to foreground the National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy and the Open Government Data Platform of India as two key enablers of the Digital India agenda, and accordingly budget for modernisation and reconfiguration of data collection and management processes across government agencies, so that those processes are made automatic and open-by-default. Automatic data management processes minimise the possibility of data loss by directly archiving the collected data, which is increasingly becoming digital in nature. Open-by-default processes of data management means that all data collected by an agency, once pre-recognised as shareable data (that is non-sensitive and anonymised), will be proactively disclosed as a rule.</p>
<p>Implementation of the National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy has been hindered, so far, by the lack of preparation of a public inventory of data assets, along with the information of their collection cycles, modes of collection and storage, etc., by each union government agency. Specific budgetary allocation to develop these inventories will be crucial not only for the implementation of the Policy, but also for the government to get an extensive sense of data collected and maintained currently by various government agencies. Decisions to proactively publish, or otherwise, such data can then be taken based on established rules.</p>
<p>Availability of such open data, as mentioned above, creates a wider possibility for the public to know, learn, and understand the activities of the government, and is a cornerstone of transparent governance in the digital era. But making this a reality requires a systemic implementation of open government data practices, and various agencies would require targeted budget to undertake the required capacity development and work process re-engineering. Expenditure of such kind should not be seen as producing government data as a product, but as producing data as an infrastructure, which will be of continuous value for the years to come.</p>
<p>As being discussed globally, open government data has the potential to kickstart a vast market of data derivatives, analytics companies, and data-driven innovation. Encouraging civic innovations, empowered by open government data - from climate data to transport data - can also be one of the unique initiatives of budget 2016-17.</p>
<p>For maximising impact of opened up government data, we request the government to publish data that either has a high demand already (such as, geospatial data, and transport data), or is related to high-net-worth activities of the government (such as, data related to monitoring of major programmes, and budget and expenditure data for union and state governments).</p>
<p> </p>
<h3>Promotion of Start-ups and MSMEs in Electronics and IT Hardware Manufacturing</h3>
<p> </p>
<p>In line with the Make in India and Digital India initiatives, to enable India to be one of the global hubs of design, manufacturing, and exporting of electronics and IT hardware, we request that the budget 2016-17 focus on increasing flow of fund to start-ups and Medium and Small-Scale Manufacturing Enterprises (MSMEs) in the form of research and development grants (ideally connected to government, especially defense-related, spending on IT hardware innovation), seed capital, and venture capital.</p>
<p>Generation of awareness and industry-specific strategies to develop intellectual property regimes and practices favourable for manufacturers of electronics and IT hardware in India is an absolutely crucial part of promotion of the same, especially in the current global scenario. Start-ups and MSMEs must be made thoroughly aware of intellectual property concerns and possibilities, including limitations and exceptions, flexibilities, and alternative models such as open innovation.</p>
<p>We request the budget 2016-17 to give special emphasis to facilitation of technology licensing and transfer, through voluntary mechanisms as well as government intervention, such as compulsory licensing and government enforced patent pools.</p>
<p> </p>
<h3>Applied Mathematics Research is Fundamental for Cybersecurity</h3>
<p> </p>
<p>Recent global reports have revealed that some national governments have been actively involved in sponsoring distortion in applied mathematics research so as to introduce weaknesses in encryption standards used in for online communication. Instead of trying to regulate key-length or mandating pre-registration of devices using encryption, as suggested by the withdrawn National Encryption Policy draft, would not be able to address this core emerging problem of weak cybersecurity standards.</p>
<p>For effective and sustainable cybersecurity strategy, we must develop significant expertise in applied mathematical research, which is the very basis of cybersecurity standards development. We request the budget 2016-17 to give this topic the much-needed focus, especially in the context of the Digital India initiative and the upcoming National Encryption Policy.</p>
<p>Along with developing domestic research capacity, a more immediately important step for the government is to ensure high quality Indian participation in global standard setting organisations, and hence to contribute to global standards making processes. We humbly suggest that categorical support for such participation and contribution is provided through the budget 2016-17, perhaps by partially channeling the revenues obtained from spectrum auctions.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/openness/pre-budget-consultation-2016-submission-to-the-ministry-of-finance'>https://cis-india.org/openness/pre-budget-consultation-2016-submission-to-the-ministry-of-finance</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroOpen StandardsOpen SourceCybersecurityOpen DataIntellectual Property RightsOpen Government DataFeaturedPatentsOpennessOpen InnovationEncryption Policy2016-01-12T13:34:41ZBlog EntryResponse to the Draft National Policy on Open Standards for e-Governance
https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/the-response
<b>Pranesh Prakash, Programme Manager at the Centre for Internet and Society, authored a response to the draft Open Standards Policy document published by the National Informatics Centre,
Department of Information Technology, Ministry of Communications and Information Technology.</b>
<p><span id="parent-fieldname-description" class="kssattr-atfieldname-description kssattr-templateId-widgets/textarea kssattr-macro-textarea-field-view inlineEditable">The National Informatics Centre (NIC),
Department of Information Technology (DIT), Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) has recently published a <a class="external-link" href="http://egovstandards.gov.in/Policy_Open_Std_review">Draft Policy on Open Standards for eGovernance</a>. Members of the public have been invited to provide feedback to the document. The last date for feedback is 21st November 2008.</span></p>
<p>The Centre for Internet and Society has prepared a draft response to the draft policy. This response letter only deals
with the policy document from the perspective of the global FLOSS
movement. This is not meant to be comprehensive feedback to the
document itself.</p>
<h3><br /></h3>
<h3>Institutional Co-signatories</h3>
<ol><li>Richard Stallman, Founder, <a class="external-link" href="http://www.fsf.org">Free Software Foundation</a>, USA</li><li>Mishi Choudhary, Partner, <a class="external-link" href="http://www.sflc.org">Software Freedom Law Centre</a>, USA <br /></li><li>Dr. Alvin Marcelo, Director for Southeast Asia, <a class="external-link" href="http://www.iosn.net">International Open Source Network</a>, the Philippines <br /></li><li>Lawrence Liang, Founder, <a class="external-link" href="http://www.altlawforum.org">Alternative Law Forum</a>, Bangalore, India<br /></li><li>Dr. G. Nagarjuna, Chaiman, <a class="external-link" href="http://www.gnu.org.in">Free Software Foundation of India</a>, Mumbai, India<br /></li><li>Vinay Sreenivasa, Member, <a class="external-link" href="http://itforchange.net">IT for Change</a>, Bangalore, India <br /></li></ol>
<h3><br /></h3>
<h3>Individual Co-signatories<strong> </strong></h3>
<ol><li>Shahid Akhtar, Founder, <a class="external-link" href="http://www.iosn.net">International Open Source Network</a>, Canada</li><li>Denis Jaromil Rojo, Developer, <a class="external-link" href="http://www.dyne.org">Dyne</a>, Netherlands<br /></li><li>Raj Mathur, Consultant, <a class="external-link" href="http://www.kandalaya.org">Kandalaya</a>, New Delhi, India<br /></li><li>Marek Tuszynski, Founder, <a class="external-link" href="http://www.tacticaltech.org">Tactical Technology Collective</a>, United Kingdom</li></ol>
<h3><br /></h3>
<h3>Text <br /></h3>
<p>Dear Sir or Madam,</p>
<p>The government had done a commendable job of releasing a progressive and forward-looking policy on the usage of open standards in e-governance. Globally the European Union's Electronic Interoperability Framework (EIF) guidelines (version 2 of which is currently in the draft stage) is considered to be the gold standard as far as open standard policy is concerned. The draft National Policy on Open Standards meets all of the EIF's four open standard requirements. However, there is still some room for improvement as discussed below.</p>
<p>While the document talks of the standard being royalty free (4.1 and 5.1.1) and without any patent-related encumbrance (4.1), it limits those requirements "for the life time of the standard" (5.1.1), which seems a bit ambiguous and is not defined in the appendix either. It would be preferable to make it royalty-free for the lifetime of the patents (if any) as open archival material shouldn't one day (after the end of "life time of the standard", and before the expiry of the patents) suddenly be forced to become paid archives. It would be desirable to make declarations of patent non-enforcement irrevocable (as the EU EIF does), by incorporating a wording such as: "irrevocably available on a royalty-free basis, without any patent-related encumbrance". </p>
<p>There should also be a separate provision in the "policy statement on open standards adoption in e-governance" section of the document making explicit that there can be no restraint on use or implementation of the standard (as has been stated in the "guiding principles" section). </p>
<p>Perhaps when talking of specification documents (5.1.5) the words "any restrictions" could be amended to include a few examples of what the term "any restrictions" would include. The document could make explicit that it must be permissible for all to copy, distribute and use the specifications freely, without any cost or legal barriers. </p>
<p>Sometimes private companies can interfere with the standardisation process, the document could perhaps be more explicit regarding remedial measures that could be undertaken in the event – for example use of competition law, as in the case of the EU EIF which states: "Practices distorting the definition and evolution of open standards must be addressed immediately to protect the integrity of the standardisation process." </p>
<p>As it stands, the draft document addresses many notions of openness (freely accessible, at zero cost, non-discriminatory, extensible, and without any legal hindrances, thus preventing vendor lock-in), and there is much to applaud in it. It has a clear implementation mechanism, with a laudable aim of establishing a monitoring agency and an Open Source Solutions Laboratory. It is applicable not only to future e-governance initiatives, but to existing ones as well. Furthermore, it also has an in-built review mechanism, which is crucial given the rate of change of technologies and consequently of the requirements of the government. Thus, the draft policy document very clearly encourages competition and innovation in the software industry and promotes the Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) movement and industry. As researchers from UNU MERIT have pointed out, even a nominal fee for usage of a standard can lead to exclusion of open source software implementations, leading to less competition in the software industry. Thus, all in all this draft document represents a commendable effort by the Indian government towards a sustainable and robust e-governance structure based on open standards. However, a few small amendments as suggested in this letter would make it an even greater guarantor of openness.</p>
<p><br />Yours sincerely,<br />Sunil Abraham<br />Director (Policy)<br />Centre for Internet and Society<br /><br /></p>
<p>Please download the draft response in the format you prefer.</p>
<ol><li><a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/response-to-indian-open-standards-policy-10-sept-2008.odt" class="internal-link" title="Oo.org Format">Open Office </a><br /></li><li><a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/response-to-indian-open-standards-policy-10-sept-2008.doc" class="internal-link" title="MS Format">MS Office</a></li><li><a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/response-to-indian-open-standards-policy-09-sept-2008.pdf" class="internal-link" title="PDF Format">PDF</a><br /></li></ol>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/the-response'>https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/the-response</a>
</p>
No publishersunilOpen StandardsPublications2011-08-23T03:05:56ZPageSecond Response to Draft National Policy on Open Standards for e-Governance
https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/second-response
<b>Another draft (labelled "version 2", dated May 26, 2009) of the draft national policy on open standards for e-governance was made available to Fosscomm, while many software companies were speaking out against NASSCOM's position on the policy. CIS drafted a second response addressing both the allegations against NASSCOM as well as the few shortcomings we perceive in the draft policy.</b>
<p>To<br />Shri Shankar Aggrawal<br />Joint Secretary (e-Governance)<br />Department of Information Technology<br />Ministry of Communications and Information Technology</p>
<p>Tuesday, July 7, 2009</p>
<p>Dear Sir,</p>
<h3>Sub: Comments on Draft National Policy on Open Standards for e-Governance (version 2)</h3>
<p>I am writing on behalf of the Centre for Internet and Society, which is a Bangalore-based civil society organization involved both in research and policy advocacy. Public accountability and digital pluralism are two of our core concerns, and it is for this that we are writing to you today. As a natural corollary of our mission, we aim at representing the concerns of citizens and consumers. You would recall that we had submitted comments to the call for comments you had put out for the draft National Policy on Open Standards for e-Governance last year (archived at <http://cis-india.org/advocacy/os/iosp/the-response/>). </p>
<p>We have recently received what appears to be a newer draft (version 2) of the National Policy on Open Standards for e-Governance, dated May 26, 2009. We are yet again very pleased to note the progressive nature of this document and wish to congratulate the government on its decision to promote the interests of the citizens of India over the narrow partisan interests of a few companies which wish to promote proprietary standards.</p>
<p>It has brought to our notice by some in the software industry that the National Association of Software and Services Companies (NASSCOM) has argued for the dilution of the definition of open standards by including standards licensed under “reasonable and non-discriminatory” terms to be considered “open”, and has also called for multiple standards in the same domain to be considered valid as a rule under the policy. We believe both these demands go against the interest of consumers of standards — which in this case is the Indian government — and are thus against the interest of citizens as well, since the Indian government handles data on behalf of its citizens.</p>
<p>Even “reasonable and non-discriminatory” terms of licensing of standards are in fact discriminatory as they prevent the development of free/libre/open source software based on those standards. And while having multiple implementations of a standard is beneficial as it increases consumer (i.e., governmental) choice, having multiple incompatible standards is detrimental to the government's interest as the policy itself recognizes in paragraph 4.2, and the very purpose (as enumerated in paragraphs 1, 3, and 4) of having standards is defeated. Even if the multiple standards are bi-directionally interoperable, additional costs are incurred in having concurrent multiple standards.</p>
<p>Thus, one hopes that the the threshold of “national interest” mentioned in paragraph 6.4.1 is set to a high level. Lastly, the views put forth by NASSCOM seem not to be truly legitimate as it has been the complaint of some that NASSCOM did not hold an open consultation with its own members before formulating its views. There are software giants, including IBM, Sun, and Red Hat, that have openly criticized the NASSCOMM position on open standards. More importantly, NASSCOM's position does not concur with what we believe is in the best interest of small and medium software enterprises, which constitute the bulk of the Indian software industry. We pray that you shall keep this in mind while considering NASSCOM's views.</p>
<p>We believe that apart from the technical reasons to favour open standards, there are many public interest reasons as well. We believe that the adoption of open standards is a step towards the promotion of equitable access to knowledge to all the people of our country. We further believe that public accountability will be served greatly by adoption of an open standards policy by the Central and State governments. While even developed countries (such as those of the EU) are mandating open standards in all governmental departments, processes, and interactions, it is developing countries that stand to gain most from open standards. Proprietary standards place a larger burden on developing economies than developed as developing economies have a greater need to participate in the global network by using standards, but do have lesser capabilities than developed economies in terms of paying for royalties.</p>
<p>On the document itself, while there are many reasons to hail it, we believe there are still a few shortcomings which we wish to bring to your notice.</p>
<h3><br /></h3>
<h3>Issue 1: Possibility of following letter of policy while violating its spirit</h3>
<p><strong>Explanation</strong><br />Sometimes private companies can interfere with the standardisation process by exerting undue influence on the members of the standard setting body. That such undue influence have been sought to be applied even in India recently shows that this is not mere conjecture or idle speculation. Given this background, the document should note this as a problem and note that remedial measures could be undertaken in the event such undue influence comes to light.</p>
<p><strong>Resolution</strong><br />Introduce language, such as that used in the EU EIF, stating:<br />“Practices distorting the definition and evolution of open standards must be addressed immediately to protect the integrity of the standardisation process.”</p>
<h3><br /></h3>
<h3>Issue 2: Patenting and licensing of government-developed standards</h3>
<p><strong>Explanation</strong><br />Paragraph 6.3 of the draft policy allows the government to opt for the development of a new standard by a Government of India-identified agency in case no standard is found to meet the government's functional requirements. However, it is not clear under what terms this standard will be available.</p>
<p><strong>Resolution</strong><br />Introduce a paragraph 6.3.1 stating:<br />“Any standard developed by or on behalf of the government shall be patent-free and the specifications of such a standard will be published online and will be available to all for no cost. Along with the standard, the government shall also provide, or shall cause to be provided, a free/libre/open source reference implementation of that standard.”</p>
<h3><br /></h3>
<h3>Issue 3: No framework provided for review or phasing out interim standards</h3>
<p><strong>Explanation</strong><br />Paragraph 6.2 permits the government to adopt a non-open “interim” standard (one which does not fulfil all the mandatory requirements of open standards as laid out in 5.1) if no open standard exists in the specific domain for which the standard is required. This however does not have a clause necessitating the phasing out of such an interim standard.</p>
<p><strong>Resolution</strong><br />A review mechanism should be provided for periodic evaluation of all standards selected by the government, especially those designated as interim standards. A new paragraph 7.1.1 could be added:<br />“All standards selected through the processes outlined in this policy shall undergo an annual review by the Apex Body on e-Governance Standards, and all those designated as interim standards shall be reviewed biannually.”</p>
<h3><br /></h3>
<h3>Issue 4: Problematic definition in the glossary</h3>
<p><strong>Explanation</strong><br />In Appendix A, the definition of “patents” (A.12) states: “The additional qualification 'utility patents' is used in countries such as the United States to distinguish them from other types of patents but should not be confused with utility models granted by other countries. Examples of particular species of patents for inventions include biological patents, business method patents, chemical patents and software patents.” Many of these references are U.S.-specific and are not valid forms of patents in India (e.g. biological patents, business method patents, and software patents).</p>
<p><strong>Resolution</strong><br />Delete the last two sentences in A.12</p>
<p><br />We once again wish to compliment the government on developing such a strong policy on open standards, and hope that our suggestions are incorporated into the text of the final version. We further hope that the policy will be notified at the earliest, as there has already been considerable opportunity for the public and industry to comment on the draft versions of the policy.</p>
<p><br />Yours sincerely,</p>
<p>Pranesh Prakash<br />Programme Manager<br />Centre for Internet and Society</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/second-response'>https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/second-response</a>
</p>
No publisherpraneshOpen StandardsPublic AccountabilitySoftware Patents2009-07-07T16:49:37ZPageReport on Open Standards for GISW2008
https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/report-on-open-standards-for-gisw2008
<b>In this report, Sunil Abraham lays out the importance and the policy implications of Open Standards.</b>
<div id="introduction">
<p>[<a href="https://cis-india.org/openness/sunil-abrahams-publications/Open-Standards-GISW-2008.pdf" class="internal-link" title="Report on Open Standards for GISW 2008">PDF copy</a>]</p>
<p>Most computer users today remain
“digitally colonised” (Bhattacharya, 2008) due to our unquestioning use
of proprietary standards. As users of proprietary standards we usually
forget that we lose the right to access our own files the moment the
licence for the associated software expires. For example, if I were to
store data, information or knowledge in .doc, .xls or .ppt format, my
ability to read my own files expires the moment the licence for my copy
of Microsoft Office expires.</p>
<h3>Definition</h3>
<p>Unlike
the terms “free software” or “open source software”, the term “open
standard” does not have a universally accepted definition. The free and
open source software (FOSS) community largely believes that an open
standard is:</p>
</div>
<p>[S]ubject to full public assessment and use
without constraints [royalty-free] in a manner equally available to all
parties; without any components or extensions that have dependencies on
formats or protocols that do not meet the definition of an open
standard themselves; free from legal or technical clauses that limit
its utilisation by any party or in any business model; managed and
further developed independently of any single vendor in a process open
to the equal participation of competitors and third parties; available
in multiple complete implementations by competing vendors, or as a
complete implementation equally available to all parties (Greve, 2007).</p>
<div id="introduction">
<h3>The controversy</h3>
<p>Proprietary
software manufacturers, vendors and their lobbyists often provide a
definition of open standards that is not in line with the above
definition on two counts (Nah, 2006).</p>
<p>One, they do not
think it is necessary for an open standard to be available on a
royalty-free basis as long as it is available under a “reasonable and
non-discriminatory” (RAND) licence. This means that there are some
patents associated with the standard and the owners of the patents have
agreed to license them under reasonable and non-discriminatory terms
(W3C, 2002). One example is the audio format MP3, an ISO/IEC
[International Organisation for Standardisation/International
Electrotechnical Commission] standard where the associated patents are
owned by Thomson Consumer Electronics and the Fraunhofer Society of
Germany. A developer of a game with MP3 support would have to pay
USD 2,500 as royalty for using the standard. While this may be
reasonable in the United States (US), it is unthinkable for an
entrepreneur from Bangladesh. Additionally, RAND licences are
incompatible with most FOSS licensing requirements. Simon Phipps of Sun
Microsystems says that FOSS “serves as the canary in the coalmine for
the word ‘open’. Standards are truly open when they can be implemented
without fear as free software in an open source community” (Phipps,
2007). RAND licences also retard the growth of FOSS, since they are
patented in a few countries. Despite the fact that software is not
patentable in most parts of the world, the makers of various
distributions of GNU/Linux do not include reverse-engineered drivers,
codecs, etc., in the official builds for fear of being sued. Only the
large corporation-backed distributions of GNU/Linux can afford to pay
the royalties needed to include patented software in the official
builds (in this way enabling an enhanced out-of-the-box experience).
This has the effect of slowing the adoption of GNU/Linux, as less
experienced users using community-backed distributions do not have
access to the wide variety of drivers and codecs that users of other
operating systems do (Disposable, 2004). This vicious circle
effectively ensures negligible market presence of smaller
community-driven projects by artificial reduction of competition.</p>
<p>Two,
proprietary software promoters do not believe that open standards
should be “managed and further developed independently of any single
vendor,” as the following examples will demonstrate. This is equally
applicable to both new and existing standards.</p>
<p>Microsoft’s
Office Open XML (OOXML) is a relatively new standard which the FOSS
community sees as a redundant alternative to the existing Open Document
Format (ODF). During the OOXML process, delegates were unhappy with the
fact that many components were specific to Microsoft technology,
amongst other issues. By the end of a fast-track process at the ISO,
Microsoft stands accused of committee stuffing: that is, using its
corporate social responsibility wing to coax non-governmental
organisations to send form letters to national standards committees,
and haranguing those who opposed OOXML. Of the twelve new national
board members that joined ISO after the OOXML process started, ten
voted “yes” in the first ballot (Weir, 2007). The European Commission,
which has already fined Microsoft USD 2.57 billion for anti-competitive
behaviour, is currently investigating the allegations of committee
stuffing (Calore, 2007). Microsoft was able to use its financial muscle
and monopoly to fast-track the standard and get it approved. In this
way it has managed to subvert the participatory nature of a
standards-setting organisation. So even though Microsoft is ostensibly
giving up control of its primary file format to the ISO, it still
exerts enormous influence over the future of the standard.</p>
<p>HTML,
on the other hand, is a relatively old standard which was initially
promoted by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), an
international community of techies. However, in 2002, seven years after
the birth of HTML 2.0, the US Department of Justice alleged that
Microsoft used the strategy of “embrace, extend, and extinguish” (US
DoJ, 1999) in an attempt to create a monopoly among web browsers. It
said that Microsoft used its dominance in the desktop operating system
market to achieve dominance in the web-authoring tool and browser
market by introducing proprietary extensions to the HTML standard
(Festa, 2002). In other words, financial and market muscle have been
employed by proprietary software companies – in these instances,
Microsoft – to hijack open standards.</p>
<h3>The importance</h3>
<p>There
are many technical, social and ethical reasons for the adoption and use
of open standards. Some of the reasons that should concern governments
and other organisations utilising public money – such as multilaterals,
bilaterals, civil society organisations, research organisations and
educational institutions – are listed below.</p>
<ul><li><strong>Innovation/competitiveness:</strong>
Open standards are the bases of most technological innovations, the
best example of which would be the internet itself (Raymond, 2000). The
building blocks of the internet and associated services like the world
wide web are based on open standards such as TCP/IP, HTTP, HTML, CSS,
XML, POP3 and SMTP. Open standards create a level playing field that
ensures greater competition between large and small, local and foreign,
and new and old companies, resulting in innovative products and
services. Instant messaging, voice over internet protocol (VoIP),
wikis, blogging, file-sharing and many other applications with
large-scale global adoption were invented by individuals and small and
medium enterprises, and not by multinational corporations. </li><li><strong>Greater interoperability:</strong>
Open standards ensure the ubiquity of the internet experience by
allowing different devices to interoperate seamlessly. It is only due
to open standards that consumers are able to use products and services
from competing vendors interchangeably and simultaneously in a seamless
fashion, without having to learn additional skills or acquire
converters. For instance, the mail standard IMAP can be used from a
variety of operating systems (Mac, Linux and Windows), mail clients
(Evolution, Thunderbird, Outlook Express) and web-based mail clients.
Email would be a completely different experience if we were not able to
use our friends’ computers, our mobile phones, or a cybercafé to check
our mail. </li><li><strong>Customer autonomy: </strong>Open
standards also empower consumers and transform them into co-creators or
“prosumers” (Toffler, 1980). Open standards prevent vendor lock-in by
ensuring that the customer is able to shift easily from one product or
service provider to another without significant efforts or costs
resulting from migration. </li><li><strong>Reduced cost: </strong>Open
standards eliminate patent rents, resulting in a reduction of total
cost of ownership. This helps civil society develop products and
services for the poor. </li><li><strong>Reduced obsolescence: </strong>Software
companies can leverage their clients’ dependence on proprietary
standards to engineer obsolescence into their products and force their
clients to keep upgrading to newer versions of software. Open standards
ensure that civil society, governments and others can continue to use
old hardware and software, which can be quite handy for sectors that
are strapped for financial resources. </li><li><strong>Accessibility: </strong>Operating
system-level accessibility infrastructure such as magnifiers, screen
readers and text-to-voice engines require compliance to open standards.
Open standards therefore ensure greater access by people with
disabilities, the elderly, and neo-literate and illiterate users.
Examples include the US government’s Section 508 standards, and the
World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) WAI-AA standards.</li><li><strong>Free access to the state:</strong>
Open standards enable access without forcing citizens to purchase or
pirate software in order to interact with the state. This is critical
given the right to information and the freedom of information
legislations being enacted and implemented in many countries these
days. </li><li><strong>Privacy/security:</strong> Open
standards enable the citizen to examine communications between personal
and state-controlled devices and networks. For example, open standards
allow users to see whether data from their media player and browser
history are being transmitted along to government servers when they
file their tax returns. Open standards also help prevent corporate
surveillance. </li><li><strong>Data longevity and archiving: </strong>Open
standards ensure that the expiry of software licences does not prevent
the state from accessing its own information and data. They also ensure
that knowledge that has been passed on to our generation, and the
knowledge generated by our generation, is safely transmitted to all
generations to come. </li><li><strong>Media monitoring:</strong>
Open standards ensure that the voluntary sector, media monitoring
services and public archives can keep track of the ever-increasing
supply of text, audio, video and multimedia generated by the global
news, entertainment and gaming industries. In democracies, watchdogs
should be permitted to reverse-engineer proprietary standards and
archive critical ephemeral media in open standards.</li></ul>
<h3>Policy implications</h3>
<p>Corporations
have a right to sell products based on proprietary standards just as
consumers have a right to choose between products that use open
standards, proprietary standards, or even a combination of such
standards. Governments, however, have a responsibility to use open
standards, especially for interactions with the public and where the
data handled has a direct impact on democratic values and quality of
citizenship. In developing countries, governments have greater
responsibility because most often they account for over 50% of the
revenues of proprietary software vendors. Therefore, by opting for open
standards, governments can correct an imbalanced market situation
without needing any additional resources. Unfortunately, many
governments lack the expertise to counter the campaigns of fear,
uncertainty and doubt unleashed by proprietary standards lobbyists with
unlimited expense accounts.</p>
<p>Most governments from the
developing world do not participate in international standard-setting
bodies. On the other hand, proprietary software lobbyists like the
Business Software Alliance (BSA) and Comptia attend all national
meetings on standards. This has forced many governments to shun these
forums and exacerbate the situation by creating more (totally new)
standards. Therefore, governments need the support of academic and
civil society organisations in order to protect the interests of the
citizen. For example, the Indian Institute of Technology in Kanpur
(IIT-K) helped the government of India develop the open standard Smart
Card Operating System for Transport Applications (SCOSTA) for smart
card-based driving licences and vehicle registration documents.
Proprietary vendors tried to jettison the move by saying that the
standard was technically not feasible. IIT-K developed a reference
implementation on FOSS to belie the vendor's claims. As a consequence,
the government of India was able to increase the number of empanelled
smart-card vendors from four to fifteen and reduce the price of a smart
card by around USD 7 each (UNDP, 2007a). This will hopefully result in
enormous savings during the implementation of a national multi-purpose
identification card in India.</p>
<p>In some instances,
proprietary standards are technically superior or more universally
supported in comparison to open standards. In such cases the government
may be forced to adopt proprietary and de facto standards in the short
and medium term. But for long-term technical, financial and societal
benefits, many governments across the world today are moving towards
open standards. The most common policy instruments for implementation
of open standards policy are government interoperability frameworks
(GIFs). Governments that have published GIFs include the United
Kingdom, Denmark, Brazil, Canada, the European Union, Malaysia, Hong
Kong, Malaysia, New Zealand, and Australia (UNDP, 2007b).</p>
<p>While
challenges to the complete adoption of open standards in the public
sector and civil society remain, one thing is certain: the global march
towards openness, though slow, is irreversible and inevitable.</p>
<h3>References</h3>
<p align="left">Bhattacharya, J. (2008) <em>Technology Standards: A Route to Digital Colonization. Open Source, Open Standards and Technological Sovereignty</em>.
. <br />
Available at:<br />
<a href="http://knowledge.oscc.org.my/practice-areas/%E2%80%8Cgovernment%E2%80%8C/oss-seminar-putrajaya-2008/technology-standards-a-route-to-digital/at_download/file">knowledge.oscc.org.my/practice-areas/government/oss-seminar-putrajaya-2008/technology-standards-a-route-to-digital/at_download/file</a></p>
<p align="left">Calore, M. (2007) Microsoft Allegedly Bullies and Bribes to Make Office an International Standard. <em>Wired</em>, 31 August. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://www.wired.com/software/coolapps/news/2007/08/ooxml_vote">www.wired.com/software/coolapps/news/2007/08/ooxml_vote</a></p>
<p align="left">Disposable (2004) <em>Ubuntu multimedia HOWTO</em>. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://www.oldskoolphreak.com/tfiles/%E2%80%8Chack/%E2%80%8Cubuntu.txt">www.oldskoolphreak.com/tfiles/hack/ubuntu.txt</a></p>
<p align="left">Festa, P. (2002) W3C members: Do as we say, not as we do. <em>CNET News</em>, 5 September. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://news.cnet.com/2100-1023-956778.html">news.cnet.com/2100-1023-956778.html</a></p>
<p>Greve, G. (2007) <em>An emerging understanding of open standards</em>.<br />
. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://www.fsfe.org/%E2%80%8Cfellows%E2%80%8C/greve/freedom_bits/an_emerging_understanding_of_open_standards">www.fsfe.org/fellows/greve/freedom_bits/an_emerging_understanding_of_open_standards</a></p>
<p align="left">Nah, S.H. (2006) <em>FOSS Open Standards</em> <em>Primer</em>. New Delhi: UNDP-APDIP. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://www.iosn.net/open-standards/foss-open-standards-primer/foss-openstds-withnocover.pdf">www.iosn.net/open-standards/foss-open-standards-primer/foss-openstds-withnocover.pdf</a></p>
<p align="left">Phipps, S. (2007) <em>Roman Canaries</em>.. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://blogs.sun.com/webmink/entry/%E2%80%8Croman_canaries">blogs.sun.com/webmink/entry/roman_canaries</a></p>
<p align="left">Raymond, E.S. (2000) <em>The Magic Cauldron</em>. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://www.catb.org/%7Eesr/writings/%E2%80%8Ccathedral-%E2%80%8Cbazaar/%E2%80%8Cmagic-%E2%80%8Ccauldron/%E2%80%8Cindex.html">www.catb.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-bazaar/magic-cauldron/index.html</a></p>
<p align="left">Toffler, A. (1980) <em>The Third Wave</em>. New York: Bantam.</p>
<p align="left">UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) (2007a) <em>e-Government Interoperability: A Review of Government Interoperability Frameworks in Selected Countries</em>. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://www.apdip.net/projects/gif/gifeprimer">www.apdip.net/projects/gif/gifeprimer</a></p>
<p align="left">UNDP (2007b) <em>e-Government Interoperability: Guide</em>. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://www.apdip.net/projects/gif/GIF-Guide.pdf">www.apdip.net/projects/gif/GIF-Guide.pdf</a></p>
<p align="left">US DoJ (Department of Justice) (1999) <em>Proposed Findings of Fact – Revised</em>. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://www.usdoj.gov/%E2%80%8Catr/%E2%80%8Ccases/%E2%80%8Cf2600/v-a.pdf">www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/f2600/v-a.pdf</a></p>
<p align="left">W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) (2002) <em>Current patent practice</em>. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://www.w3.org/TR/patent-practice#def-RAND">www.w3.org/TR/patent-practice#def-RAND</a></p>
<p align="left">Weir, R. (2007) <em>How to hack ISO</em>. <br />
Available at: <a href="http://www.robweir.com/blog/2007/09/how-to-hack-iso.html">www.robweir.com/blog/2007/09/how-to-hack-iso.html</a></p>
</div>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/report-on-open-standards-for-gisw2008'>https://cis-india.org/openness/publications/standards/report-on-open-standards-for-gisw2008</a>
</p>
No publisherpraneshOpen StandardsFLOSS2009-01-05T06:52:54ZBlog EntryComments on the National Geospatial Policy (Draft, V.1.0), 2016
https://cis-india.org/openness/comments-on-the-national-geospatial-policy-draft-v-1-0-2016
<b>The Department of Science and Technology published the first public draft of the National Geospatial Policy (v.1.0) on May 05, 2016, and invited comments from the public. CIS submitted the following comments in response. The comments were authored by Adya Garg, Anubha Sinha, and Sumandro Chattapadhyay.</b>
<p> </p>
<h2>1. Preliminary</h2>
<p><strong>1.1.</strong> This submission presents comments and recommendations by the Centre for Internet and Society (<strong>"CIS"</strong>) on the proposed draft of the National Geospatial Policy 2016 (<strong>"the draft Policy / the draft NGP"</strong>) <strong>[1]</strong>. This submission is based on Version 1.0 of the draft Policy released by the Department of Science and Technology (<strong>"DST"</strong>) on May 5, 2016.</p>
<p><strong>1.2.</strong> CIS commends the DST under the aegis of the Ministry of Science and Technology, Government of India, for its efforts at seeking inputs from various stakeholders to draft a National Geospatial Policy. CIS is thankful for this opportunity to provide a clause-by-clause submission.</p>
<h2>2. The Centre for Internet and Society</h2>
<p><strong>2.1.</strong> The Centre for Internet and Society, CIS, <strong>[2]</strong> 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 reconfiguration of social processes and structures through the internet and digital media technologies, and vice versa.</p>
<p><strong>2.2.</strong> This submission is consistent with CIS’ commitment to safeguarding general public interest, and the interests and rights of various stakeholders involved. The comments in this submission aim to further the principle of citizens’ right to information, instituting openness-by-default in governmental activities, and the various kinds of public goods that can emerge from greater availability of open (geospatial) data created by both public and private agencies and crucially, by the citizens. The submission is limited to those clauses that most directly have an impact on these principles.</p>
<h2>3. Comments and Recommendations</h2>
<p><em>This section presents comments and recommendations directed at the draft policy as a whole, and in certain places, directed at specific clauses of the draft policy.</em></p>
<p><strong>3.1.</strong> The draft policy should make references to five policies applicable to geospatial data, products, services, and solutions</p>
<p><strong>3.1.1.</strong> CIS observes that the draft policy lists the key policies related to geospatial information and sharing of government data, namely the National Map Policy 2005, the Civil Aviation Requirement 2012, the Remote Sensing Data Policy 2011 and 2012, and the National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy 2012 (“NDSAP”).</p>
<p><strong>3.1.2.</strong> CIS submits that apart from the policies mentioned above, Geospatial Data,Products, Services and Solutions (“GDPSS”) are also intricately linked to concepts of “open standards,” “open source software,” “open API,” “right to information,” and prohibited places” These concepts are governed by specific acts and policies, and are applicable to geospatial data, as follows:</p>
<ul><li>Adoption of Open Standards: CIS observes that the draft policy captures the importance of open standards in the section 1.4 of the draft policy. It states that “A very high resolution and highly accurate framework to function as a national geospatial standard for all geo-referencing activity through periodically updated National Geospatial Frame [NGF] and National Image Frame [NIF] by ensuring open standards based seamless interoperable geospatial data.”<br /><br />CIS submits that the Policy on Open Standards for e-Governance <strong>[3]</strong> which establishes the Guidelines for usage of open standards to ensure seamless interoperability, and the Implementation Guidelines of the National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy, 2012 <strong>[4]</strong> listing two key open standards for geospatial data - KML and GML, should be mentioned in the draft policy.<br /><br />CIS recommends that the final version of the NGP embrace open standards as a key principle of all software projects and infrastructures within the purview of the Policy. This is essential for easier sharing and reuse of open (geospatial) data.<br /><br /></li>
<li>Adoption of Open Source Software: The Policy on Adoption of Open Source Software for Government of India states that the “Government of India shall endeavour to adopt Open Source Software in all e-Governance systems implemented by various Government organisations, as a preferred option in comparison to Closed Source Software” <strong>[5]</strong>. As the draft policy proposed to guide the development of GDPSS being developed and implemented both by the Government of India and by other agencies (academic, commercial, and otherwise), it must include an explicit reference and embracing of this mandate for adoption of Open Source Software, for reasons of reducing expenses, avoiding vendor lock-ins, re-usability of software components, enabling public accountability, and greater security of software systems.<br /><br /></li>
<li>Implementation of Open APIs: To actualise the stated principle to “[e]nable promotion, adoption and implementation of emerging / state of the art technologies” as well as to ensure the “[a]vailability of all geospatial data collected through public funded mechanism to all users,” CIS suggests that final version of the NGP must refer to and operationalise the Policy on Open Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) for Government of India <strong>[6]</strong>. This will ensure that the openly available geospatial data is available to the public, as well as to all the government agencies, in a structured digital format that is easy to consume and use on one hand, and is available for various forms of value addition and innovation on the other.<br /><br /></li>
<li>Right to Information Act 2005: The framework for reactive disclosure of information and data collected and held by the Government of India, as well as the basis for proactive disclosure of the same, is enshrined in the Right to Information Act 2005 <strong>[7]</strong>. The draft NGP, CIS proposes, should refer to this Act, and ensure that whenever an Indian citizen request for such government data and/or information that is of geospatial in nature, and the requested data and/or information is both shareable and non-sensitive, the citizen must be provided with the geospatial data and/or information in an open standard and under open license, as applicable.<br /><br /></li>
<li>Refer to Official Secrets Act, 1923: The Official Secrets Act defines “Prohibited Places” and prohibits all activities involving “sketch, plan, model, or note which is calculated to be or might be or is intended to be, directly; or indirectly, useful to an enemy or (c) obtains collects, records or publishes or communicates to any other person any secret official code or password, or any sketch, plan, model, article or note or other document or information which is calculated to be or might be or is intended to be, directly or indirectly, useful to an enemy” <strong>[8]</strong>. This provides the fundamental legal basis for regulation, expunging, and stopping circulation of geospatial data containing information about Vulnerable Points and Vulnerable Areas. CIS submits that this Act should be referred to in this context of ensuring non-publication of sensitive geospatial data (that is geospatial data related to Prohibited Places).<br /><br /></li></ul>
<h3>3.2. Grant adequate permissions to the public to re-use geospatial data</h3>
<p><strong>3.2.1.</strong> CIS observes that section 1.4 of the draft policy states that, “Geospatial data of any resolution being disseminated through agencies and service providers, both internationally and nationally be treated as unclassified and made available and accessible by Indian Mapping and imaging agencies.”</p>
<p><strong>3.2.2.</strong> CIS recommends the abovementioned section be broadened to include not only availability and accessibility of geospatial data, but also its re-use. Further, such accessibility, availability and re-use should not be only limited to public and private entities such as Indian mapping and imaging agencies, but as well as to Indian people in general.</p>
<p><strong>3.2.3.</strong> CIS further submits that section 1.4 be revised as “[g]eospatial data of any resolution being disseminated through agencies and service providers, both internationally and nationally be treated as unclassified and made available, accessible, and reusable by Indian mapping and imaging agencies in particular, and by the people of India in general.”</p>
<h3>3.3. Ensure Open Access to shareable and non-sensitive geospatial data</h3>
<p><strong>3.3.1.</strong> CIS observes that the draft policy directs all “geospatial data generating agencies” to classify their data into “open access,” “registered access,” and “restricted access.” The document, however, neither defines “geospatial data generating agencies”, nor does it clarify what conditions the data must satisfy to be classified as one of the three types. Without a listing of such conditions (at least necessary, and not sufficient, conditions), nothing restricts the agencies from classifying all generated geospatial data as “restricted.”</p>
<p><strong>3.3.2.</strong> Further, CIS observes that the draft policy aims to provide geospatial data acquired through public funded mechanism to be made available to the public at free of cost. It is submitted that the policy should not only be made available for free of cost, but it should also be made available in open standard format under an open license.</p>
<p><strong>3.3.3.</strong> As defined in the section 1.3, the National Data Sharing and Accessibility Policy (“NDSAP”) applies to “all shareable non-sensitive data available either in digital or analog forms but generated using public funds” <strong>[9]</strong>. Clearly all shareable <strong>[10]</strong> and non-sensitive <strong>[11]</strong> geospatial data, either in digital or analog forms, and generated using public funds should be proactively disclosed by the government agency concerns in accordance to the NDSAP. CIS recommends that the draft policy makes an explicit reference to NDSAP when discussing the topic of Open Access geospatial data, and re-iterates the mandate of proactive publication of shareable and non-sensitive government data.</p>
<p><strong>3.3.4.</strong> Further, the process for defining an open government data license to be applied to all open government data sets being published under the NDSAP, and through the Open Government Data Platform India, is in progress. Given this, it is absolutely crucial important that the draft NGP takes this into consideration, and mandates that Open Access geospatial data must be published using the open government data license to be defined by the Implementation Guidelines of the NDSAP, when applicable.</p>
<h3>3.4. Lack of clarity regarding the clearances and permits required for data acquisition and dissemination, and the procedures thereof</h3>
<p><strong>3.4.1.</strong> Section 1.8 of the draft policy states that “[a]ll clearances / permits, as necessary, for data acquisition and dissemination be through a single window, online portal. These clearances be provided within a time span of 30 days of filing the online request.” CIS observes that the draft policy does not specify the kind of clearances/permits needed before a public or private entity, or an individual, can undertake acquisition and dissemination of geospatial data. It neither clarifies under what circumstances and conditions application for such clearance / permits would be required for users.</p>
<p><strong>3.4.2.</strong> Since the recently published draft Geospatial Information Regulation Bill (“GIRB”) 2016, directly addresses this topic of clearance / permit required to acquire and share geospatial information <strong>[12]</strong>, it will be effective if the NGP can refer to this Bill and provide an overall governance framework for the same. Further, CIS noted that the time span of 30 days mentioned in the draft policy is inconsistent with the time period specified in the GIRB (which is 90 days).</p>
<p><strong>3.4.3.</strong> CIS recommends that the draft policy also be amended suitably to include the circumstances and conditions under which required permissions shall be issued. Accordingly, the draft policy should reference the standardised and time bound security vetting process envisaged in the GIRB.</p>
<h3>3.5. Clarification Needed regarding “Cybersecurity is to be ensured through … use of Digital Watermarks for authentication of GDPSS”</h3>
<p><strong>3.5.1.</strong> CIS submits that the draft policy does not elaborate on the use of “Digital Watermarks” to ensure cybersecurity, neither it is explained who will authenticate GDPSS, under what conditions, and for what reasons. CIS recommends that the draft policy be amended suitably to specify the same.</p>
<h3>3.6. Remove Classification of Non-Public (at Present) Satellite / Aerial Imagery as Restricted by Default</h3>
<p><strong>3.6.1.</strong> CIS observes that the draft policy recommends that “[s]atellite/aerial images of resolution other than those currently made available on websites” should all be “classified for restricted access.”</p>
<p><strong>3.6.2.</strong> CIS submits that blanket categorisation of all satellite / aerial imagery of resolution that is not currently available through a public website (for whatever reason it might be) as “restricted access” should be re-evaluated, given the immense importance of such imagery to mapping agencies and industry participants using GDPSS.</p>
<p><strong>3.6.3.</strong> CIS recommends that the section be revised to define clear principles for defining satellite /aerial imagery as “open,” “registered,” and “restricted.”</p>
<h3>3.7. Governance of User-contributed Geospatial Data</h3>
<p><strong>3.7.1.</strong> A key resource and feature of contemporary geospatial industry in particular, and the digital economy in general, is the proliferation of user-contributed and user-generated geospatial data and information. CIS observes that this crucial topic, as well as the unique governance concerns that it raises, has not been addressed in the draft policy at all. CIS requests the DST to consider this matter with due attention to the specific nature and values of such user-contributed and user-generated in the digital economy on one hand, and in emergency contexts such as natural disasters on the other, and prepare a framework for its appropriate governance as part of the NGP itself.</p>
<h3>3.8. Protect Geospatial Privacy of Citizens by Defining Sensitive Personal Geospatial Data and Information</h3>
<p><strong>3.8.1.</strong> CIS observes that the draft policy lacks rules for collection, use, storage, and distribution of geospatial data from an individual’s privacy standpoint. Further, neither does the Information Technology (Reasonable Security Practices and Procedures and Sensitive Personal Data or Information) Rules, 2011 address these concerns <strong>[13]</strong>. Section 3 of the Rules define “Sensitive personal data or information”, which do not include geospatial information.</p>
<p><strong>3.8.2.</strong> The argument of violation of constitutional right to privacy was pleaded in a case against Google and other private mapping agencies in 2008 <strong>[14]</strong>. In the judgment, Madras HIgh Court noted that there existed no legislation/guidelines to prohibit mapping programmes from conducting their activities indiscriminately, and the lack of one thereof prevented the Court from injuncting such activities. Thus, there exists a judicial ambiguity on the aspect of collection and use of geospatial data.</p>
<p><strong>3.8.3.</strong> CIS submits that the draft policy may be suitably amended to ensure that collection, processing and dissemination of geospatial information is in consonance with the constitutionally protection of an individual’s privacy.</p>
<h3>3.9. Clarification Needed regarding “Mechanisms to be put in place to evaluate / audit GDPSS creation, consumption and distribution”</h3>
<p><strong>3.9.1.</strong> The draft policy suggests that “mechanisms to be put in place to evaluate/audit GDPSS creation, consumption and distribution” without clarifying the scope, purpose, and purview of this mechanism, and most crucially it does not describe what exactly will be evaluated / audited. CIS submits that this section is revised and expanded.</p>
<p><strong>3.9.2.</strong> The same section also identifies the need for a “framework to be put in place to assess the data collection versus its utilization towards government program and socio-economic development.” CIS observes that this is a very promising and much welcome gesture by the DST, but this section must be developed as a separate and detailed mandate. At the least, the NGP may suggest that a more detailed guideline document regarding this framework will be developed in near future.</p>
<h3>3.10. Data Taxation and Geospatial Cess</h3>
<p><strong>3.10.1.</strong> The draft policy refers to imposition of “data taxation (geospatial cess)” and use of “licensing” of geospatial data to raise money for geospatial activities of the Government of India. CIS is of the opinion will severely affect the geospatial industry in the country in particular, and will raise the monetary barrier to public use of geospatial data and maps in general; and hence must be strictly avoided.</p>
<h3>3.11. Data Dissemination Cell</h3>
<p><strong>3.11.1.</strong> CIS submits that instead of development of a separate Data Dissemination Cell within all government agencies to operationalise the mandate of the NGP, the Chief Data Officers within all government agencies identified under the implementation process of the NDSAP be given this complementary responsibility. This would ensure effective channelisation of human and financial resources to take forward the joint mandate of NGP and NDSAP towards greater public availability and use of (shareable and non-sensitive) government data.</p>
<h3>3.12. Special Infrastructure for Governance, Management, and Publication of Real-time Geospatial Data</h3>
<p><strong>3.12.1.</strong> A key term that the draft policy does not talk about is “big data.” The static or much-slowly-changing geospatial data such as national boundaries and details of Vulnerable Points and Vulnerable Areas are really a very small part of of the global geospatial information. The much larger and crucial part is the real-time (that is continuously produced, stored, analysed, and used in almost real-time) big geospatial data – from geo-referenced tweets, to GPS systems of cars, to mobile phones moving through the cities and regions. Addressing such networked data systems, where all data collected by digital devices can quite easily be born-georeferenced, and the security and privacy concerns that are engendered by them, should be the ultimate purpose of, and challenge for, a future-looking NGP.</p>
<p><strong>3.12.2.</strong> Further, with increasing number of government assets being geo-referenced for the purpose of more effective and real-time management, especially in the transportation sector, the corresponding agencies (which are often not mapping agencies) are acquiring a vast amount of high-velocity geospatial data, which needs to be analysed and (sometimes) published in the real-time. CIS submits a sincere request to DST to highlight the crucial need for special infrastructure for such data, as well as its governance, and identify the key principles concerned in the next version of the draft NGP.</p>
<h3>3.13. Sincere Request for Preparation and Circulation of a Second Public Draft of the National Geospatial Policy</h3>
<p><strong>3.13.1.</strong> CIS commends the DST for publishing the draft policy, and facilitating a consultation process inviting stakeholders and civil society to submit feedback. The NGP envisages to address crucial concepts of privacy, licensing, intellectual property rights, liability, national security, open data, which cut across and impact various technology platforms, industries and the citizens.</p>
<p><strong>3.13.2.</strong> In view of the multifarious issues highlighted that arise at the intersection of various legal and ethical concepts, CIS respectfully requests the DST to conduct another round of consultation after the publication of the second draft of the NGP. Multiple rounds of consultation and feedback would contribute to the robustness of the lawmaking process and ensure that the final policy safeguards the general public interest, and the interests and rights of various stakeholders involved.</p>
<p><strong>3.13.3.</strong> CIS is thankful to DST for the opportunity to provide comments, and would be privileged to provide further assistance on the matter to DST.</p>
<p> </p>
<h2>Endnotes</h2>
<p><strong>[1]</strong> See: <a href="http://www.dst.gov.in/sites/default/files/Draft-NGP-Ver%201%20ammended_05May2016.pdf">http://www.dst.gov.in/sites/default/files/Draft-NGP-Ver%201%20ammended_05May2016.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[2]</strong> See: <a href="http://cis-india.org/">http://cis-india.org/</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[3]</strong> See: <a href="https://egovstandards.gov.in/sites/default/files/Published%20Documents/Policy_on_Open_Standards_for_e-Governance.pdf">https://egovstandards.gov.in/sites/default/files/Published%20Documents/Policy_on_Open_Standards_for_e-Governance.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[4]</strong> See: <a href="http://data.gov.in/sites/default/files/NDSAP.pdf">http://data.gov.in/sites/default/files/NDSAP.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[5]</strong> See: <a href="http://deity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/policy_on_adoption_of_oss.pdf">http://deity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/policy_on_adoption_of_oss.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[6]</strong> See: <a href="http://deity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/Open_APIs_19May2015.pdf">http://deity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/Open_APIs_19May2015.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[7]</strong> See: <a href="http://rti.gov.in/webactrti.htm">http://rti.gov.in/webactrti.htm</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[8]</strong> See: <a href="http://www.archive.india.gov.in/allimpfrms/allacts/3314.pdf">http://www.archive.india.gov.in/allimpfrms/allacts/3314.pdf</a>, sections 2(d) and 3(b).</p>
<p><strong>[9]</strong> See: <a href="https://data.gov.in/sites/default/files/NDSAP.pdf">https://data.gov.in/sites/default/files/NDSAP.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[10]</strong> See section 2.11 of NDSAP.</p>
<p><strong>[11]</strong> See section 2.10 of NDSAP.</p>
<p><strong>[12]</strong> See: <a href="http://mha.nic.in/sites/upload_files/mha/files/GeospatialBill_05052016_eve.pdf">http://mha.nic.in/sites/upload_files/mha/files/GeospatialBill_05052016_eve.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[13]</strong> See: <a href="http://deity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/GSR313E_10511%281%29.pdf">http://deity.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/GSR313E_10511%281%29.pdf</a>.</p>
<p><strong>[14]</strong> J. Mohanraj v (1) Secretary To Government, Delhi; (2) Indian Space Research Organisation, Bangalore; (3) Google India Private Limited, Bangalore, 2008 Indlaw MAD 3562.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='https://cis-india.org/openness/comments-on-the-national-geospatial-policy-draft-v-1-0-2016'>https://cis-india.org/openness/comments-on-the-national-geospatial-policy-draft-v-1-0-2016</a>
</p>
No publishersumandroOpen StandardsOpen DataOpen Government DataFeaturedGeospatial DataNational Geospatial PolicyOpenness2016-06-30T09:40:59ZBlog Entry