April fool's day? Was Re: [governance] APC Statement as IGF II closes

[linda misek-falkoff]

Hi Mereym, and all, this listing  is great for us all and thank you so much
for taking the time to transmit it, busy as you must be.

The multiplexing, throughout IGF-II Rio, of those here has been amazing, or
e-mazing!  .

We can all surf independently but it is very helpful to have a starter set
on important subjects where we know who is mentioning them.  Just as e.g.
for medical matters we do not trust totally scattered visits to sites. So
thanks again.

I also want to let you know that it has been extremely interesting to be a
registered IGF-II Rio participant, who actually participated online
throughout and hopped among chat rooms, blogs, email, webcasts, and more.  I
wonder if the "powers," which surely are multi-lateral, might email us our
badges!  E-badges, forecasting a future of more and more access for more and
more people.

We really must thank Jeremy and Adam and Avri and all, who miraculously
found the time to discourse with us throughout  - through the various
windows.  After Athens I planned to return. But circumstances intervened,
and how fortunate that we could hook in and in so many ways.  But we really
should I think get behind Jose's proposal and demonstrated instance of
projecting online participants onto a screen, especially as he has ideas for
filtering (though detents or otherwise, I do not know but look forward to
hearing).

I collected a fair amount of documentation, and hope to contribute it toward
education for future online participants, so write if you would like to
participate in this too.

The sharing here is immense, fueled by heart and mind and conviction.

Well met!   At your service as well, and *respectfully interfacing,*

Linda.


On 11/15/07, Suresh Ramasubramanian <suresh at hserus.net> wrote:
>
> Meryem Marzouki wrote:
>
> > Is APC also seriously proposing same thing for harmul content? i.e. a
>
> To some extent, this is expressed in the Council of Europe's Convention of
> Cybercrime, with an additional protocol concerning criminalization fo acts
> of a racist and xenophobic nature committed through computer systems.
>
> Not all countries are party to this of course - the USA, while a signatory
> to the Convention on Cybercrime, has specifically opted out of signing
> this
> additional protocol.
>
> What Karen touches on goes a bit deeper
>
> 1.  Law enforcement, and ISP / email providers in the USA (which is
> generally the case) are going to be answerable to US law – not to Indian
> law
> or various other countries' laws, especially as their servers are
> physically
> located in the USA.
>
> 2. Long arm legislation or enforcement is a fantasy.
>
> 3. What is a reality is well defined mechanisms for cooperation between
> different LE agencies, and policies at ISPs (most of which are good at
> responsible enforcement).
>
> For law enforcement people that are investigating cybercrime related stuff
> like hacking, espionage, as well as things like threat to life situations
> (ransom notes sent by kidnappers, stalking etc), they can easily use
> MLATs,
> conventions like the CoE convention etc to get very quick action indeed.
> There's even a 24x7 POC provided for (extending the G8 network that
> provided
> for this)
>
> What will NOT get the same kind of quick action is content related cases.
> For example from Thailand reporting a blog that has an insulting photo of
> their king on it (a recent real case). Or something from India where an
> orkut page that calls a famous historical figure a coward [so that a hindu
> right wing + regional political party that idolizes the man, call him a
> local hero both for fighting against the Mughals, who happened to be
> Muslim,
> and for being as famous as anybody from their state is ever going to get,
> decides to go around smashing up cybercafés, calling for orkut to be
> banned
> etc].
>
> Such content is not easy or feasible for US law enforcement to prosecute
> due
> to first amendment free speech protections, unless the free speech is of
> the
> sort that is defined as "shouting fire in a crowded theater" – or more
> precisely, speech that incites imminent lawless action (such as incitement
> to riot, etc) – a test for free speech expressed by the US Supreme Court
> in
> 1969, in Brandenburg vs Ohio.   Note:  if the content really DOES have the
> risk that it will cause a riot, explaining that might be one way to
> proceed.
>
> At the most, in cases where the content is not illegal in the USA, they
> can
> forward the complaint to the provider.   After which it becomes a question
> of
>
> 1.      Whether the provider deems the content contrary to the terms of
> use
> of their service, and takes action on it
>
> a.      Providers need to have mature processes in place.   Most large
> providers do.  Some don't and will learn – but the way they will learn is
> not really by having law enforcement go after them for prosecuting the
> exercise of (quite possibly silly, or even hateful) free speech.  e&oe the
> imminent lawless action exception of course, or that other limit to free
> speech (not infringing on others privacy).
>
> b. Providers wont learn either if the law doesn't have safe harbor for
> providers, and do something silly (like the Indian police who arrested the
> CEO of eBay India because someone was selling a pornographic MMS video) -
> something that attracted quite high level US attention as the arrested man
> was a US citizen, CEO of the Indian subsidiary of a US corporation etc
> etc.
> The publicity hound police officer who arrested that man even went and
> called a press conference to boast about it - something he is apparently
> regretting now..
>
> c. Case in point where providers don't have mature processes in place and
> courts / law enforcement are quite justified in going after them - Google
> is
> in hot water in Brazil, with the Brazilian head of Google facing criminal
> contempt charges in court – for their inaction in allowing Orkut to be
> overrun with child abuse and similar content.  See an article in the WSJ a
> few weeks back about this.
>
> http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB119273558149563775-6_LyeLHpy85P7ZUe7r
> yt_g_bfMI_20081018.html
>
> d. That is mainly, as I said, because Orkut, with lots of Brazilian users,
> has got itself a huge infestation of pages with explicit child porn,
> racist
> content, violations of privacy (hidden cam nude photos of a Brazilian
> actress some years back), etc – and their Google Ads program was doing
> assorted silly things like putting pet store ads in a page dedicated to
> sadists who like photos of animals being stabbed to death - so running
> into
> Brazil's advertising standards body guidelines
>
> e.  In that specific case, Google did not, in my opinion, have mature or
> adequate processes in place to handle abuse issues.   They do have quite
> good ideas on privacy – and are vocal on this in forums including APEC.
> Doesn't change the fact that their abuse handling procedures either were
> grossly inadequate, or slipped up (or both) in this case.
>
> ---
> OR
> ---
>
> 2. Whether the country complaining –has the pull required to pressure the
> ISP into disgorging data.
>
> a.      Technically - and in fact - a company incorporated in a particular
> country, managed / owned / staffed by that country's citizens, is subject
> to
> that country's laws. In the case of an international company, the
> situation
> gets more complex, with local subsidiaries subject to the local country's
> laws.
>
> b. Disgorging content that is not locally hosted by that subsidiary still
> doesn't usually work that easily, especially in free speech cases.  In
> fact,
> any results are *not* likely unless that country is an autocratic
> government
> with a market that is seen as a yet largely untapped, massive source of
> revenue.
>
> b.      The consequence of a subsidiary in that country disgorging data
> due
> to a subpoena from that country's government can be quite embarrassing
> (being hauled up in front of a senate subcommittee among other things, as
> recent headlines show).
>
> Interesting questions to consider, in the light of Karen's remarks.
>
>        srs
>
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-- 
Linda D. Misek-Falkoff, Ph.D., J.D.
For I.D. only here:
Coordination of Singular Organizations on Disability (IDC Steering).
Persons With Pain International.  National Disability Party, International
Disability Caucus.
IDC-ICT Taskforce.
Respectful Interfaces* -  Communications Coordination Committee For The
United Nations;  CCC/UN Board Member and Secretary; Chr., Online Committee..
Vita Summary: <tbp>.
Other Affiliations on Request.
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