[governance] USPTO blocks web access to "Political/Activist Groups" including KEI, ACLU, EFF, Public Citizen, Redstate, DailyKos

Thu Sep 20 15:21:39 EDT 2012

Now that I know that James Love's blog has been verified, here are my
comments. The scenario that is described as being "local" has "global"
implications and I will try to briefly point out why.

What we are seeing is only the "tip" of an iceberg which is scary.
Alejandro and Anupam make a good point about standard filters and how they
are used in private and sometimes public offices. Alejandro mentions the
filtering of "sexual content".

We all know that Freedom of Expression is not absolute and there are rules.
From International Law, we know of the exceptions, they have been
regurgitated on the list for a long time. So we know that there are
"exceptions" but what often does not get talked about is the abuse of these
exceptions.

James in his email pointed us to some of the relevant facts. Primarily
where filtering goes "beyond" the scope of what it was intended to which
was to block "access to terrorist sites".

Last year, the  European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruled that EU law precludes
the imposition of an injunction by a national court which requires an
Internet Service Provider (ISP) to install a filtering system with a view
to preventing the illegal downloading of files.
Revisit the Press Release:
http://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2011-11/<http://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2011-11/cp110126en.pdf>

  The actual Judgement was released on the 24th November, 2011 and is
available here:
http://curia.europa.eu/jurisp/cgi-bin/form.pl?lang=EN&Submit=Submit&numaff=C-70/10

What was interesting about the Judgement was in relation to how they dealt
with the prioritisation of rights, that is the rights if intellectual
property owners, the rights of ISPs to conduct their business freely, the
freedom to receive and impart information and the rights of consumers to
privacy. "The injunction requiring installation of the contested filtering
system involve a systematic analysis of all content, and the collection and
identification of users' IP addresses from which unlawful content on the
network is sent.

Those addresses are protected personal data because they allow those users
to be precisely identified".

The consideration in how the Judges arrived at their decision is on [para
52, 53] where there is no guarantee that lawful content would not be
blocked. After considering all the rights stemming from the Directives
listed in para 55, the courts held in favour of "privacy" of consumers that
is fundamental rights trumping when reading all of the Directives together.
Although the European Court of Justice recommended that harmonization take
place.

The world revolted against SOPA, we lobbied against both SOPA and ACTA and
there were countries who rejected them. However, it is no secret that the
US is pro- Intellectual Property Rights protection. The same US Department
of Commerce that is in charge of IANA is in charge of US PTO. Its actions
whether a genuine mistake or otherwise have global ramifications. Don't get
me wrong, I am not against the US, I quite love the country and have great
respect for its governance systems and the rule of law etc.

If anything we can see that the clear abuse of the exceptions is something
happening globally and sadly it is something that does not get discussed
all too often which is why absolutely loved the Freedom Online conference
that took place in Nairobi of late.

On Fri, Sep 21, 2012 at 4:34 AM, James S. Tyre <jstyre at jstyre.com> wrote:

> Alejandro,****
>
> ** **
>
> It isn’t really that simple at all.  Before I begin, however, let me state
> two things.  First, I do not question that PTO turned the thing off shortly
> after becoming aware of it.  Second, I assume that you’re not aware of some
> of the relevant facts and law, rather than that you’re ignoring them.****
>
> ** **
>
> PTO is a US government agency.  A government agency as employer is not
> held to the same First Amendment restrictions as a government agency as
> government, but, unlike private sector employers, the government as
> employer is subject to some First Amendment restrictions.****
>
> ** **
>
> This particular filter was not in any way supposed to be similar to what
> is seen in corporate IT.  It’s specific purpose, it’s only purpose,  was to
> block access to terrorist sites and similar.  (Some of that is required by
> US law, whether that’s a good or bad law is not something I plan on
> discussing here.)  How any of the blacklisted sites could be found to be
> terrorist sites is incomprehensible.  This was never supposed to be a
> pretty standard filter.****
>
> ** **
>
> Incidentally, the filter is the handiwork of Blue Coat, which did such a
> marvelous job of promoting free expression on the Internet in Syria, among
> other places, see, e.g.,
> https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/10/blue-coat-acknowledges-syrian-government-use-its-products
> ****
>
> **
>
Interesting times ahead.

> **
>
> --****
>
> James S. Tyre****
>
> Law Offices of James S. Tyre****
>
> 10736 Jefferson Blvd., #512****
>
> Culver City, CA 90230-4969****
>
> 310-839-4114/310-839-4602(fax)****
>
> jstyre at jstyre.com****
>
> Policy Fellow, Electronic Frontier Foundation****
>
> https://www.eff.org****
>
> ** **
>
> *From:* governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org [mailto:
> governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org] *On Behalf Of *Dr. Alejandro
> Pisanty Baruch
> *Sent:* Thursday, September 20, 2012 7:09 AM
> *To:* governance at lists.igcaucus.org; Salanieta T. Tamanikaiwaimaro; Riaz
> K Tayob
> *Subject:* RE: [governance] USPTO blocks web access to
> "Political/Activist Groups" including KEI, ACLU, EFF, Public Citizen,
> Redstate, DailyKos****
>
> ** **
>
> Sala, ****
>
> ** **
>
> any knowledge of corporate IT will tell you that this is a pretty standard
> filter used in private as well as public offices. Usually installed by
> third parties who set up the networks or even run them, or accessed by IT
> at third-party sites. As Jamie Love writes as well, the filter was removed
> upon request. It is the same type of filter that would have caused some
> hotel reservation sites to be blocked "for sexual content."****
>
> ** **
>
> Clues... they used to be more widely available.****
>
> ** **
>
> Alejandro Pisanty****
>
> ** **
>
>    ****
>
> ! !! !!! !!!!****
>
> NEW PHONE NUMBER - NUEVO NÚMERO DE TELÉFONO****
>
>  ****
>
> +52-1-5541444475 FROM ABROAD ****
>
> +525541444475 DESDE MÉXICO ****
>
> SMS +525541444475
>      Dr. Alejandro Pisanty
> UNAM, Av. Universidad 3000, 04510 Mexico DF Mexico
>
> Blog: http://pisanty.blogspot.com
> LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/pisanty
> Unete al grupo UNAM en LinkedIn,
> http://www.linkedin.com/e/gis/22285/4A106C0C8614
> Twitter: http://twitter.com/apisanty
> ---->> Unete a ISOC Mexico, http://www.isoc.org
> .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  . ****
> ------------------------------
>
> *Desde:* governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org [
> governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org] en nombre de Salanieta T.
> Tamanikaiwaimaro [salanieta.tamanikaiwaimaro at gmail.com]
> *Enviado el:* jueves, 20 de septiembre de 2012 05:02
> *Hasta:* governance at lists.igcaucus.org; Riaz K Tayob
> *Asunto:* Re: [governance] USPTO blocks web access to "Political/Activist
> Groups" including KEI, ACLU, EFF, Public Citizen, Redstate, DailyKos****
>
> If what is reported is legitimate, we are in for some troubling times
> ahead of us. :( :(:( ****
>
> ** **
>
> Sala****
>
> On Thu, Sep 20, 2012 at 8:21 PM, Riaz K Tayob <riaz.tayob at gmail.com>
> wrote:****
> *USPTO blocks web access to "Political/Activist Groups" including KEI,
> ACLU, EFF, Public Citizen, Redstate, DailyKos<http://keionline.org/node/1548>
> *
>
>    - View <http://keionline.org/node/1548> ****
>    - What links here <http://keionline.org/node/1548/backlinks> ****
>
> Submitted by James Love on 18. September 2012 - 12:32 ****
>
> *Update:* At 5 pm the USPTO called and said that the public access wifi
> network was using a filter, provided by a contractor, to block "political
> activist" sites. This filter was not used by the network providing Internet
> access for the USPTO staff. After our meeting, the USPTO reviewed its
> policies, and has removed the filter. USPTO says the filter was implemented
> by a contractor, and no one we talked to at USPTO was aware of who was
> being blocked. In any event, the filter has been removed. ****
>
> Today I was visiting the USPTO, for a high level meeting on global
> negotiations on intellectual property and access to medicine. The meeting
> was held in the Stockholm Room, on the 2nd floor of the USPTO library, at
> the main USPTO building at 600 Dulany Street, Alexandria, VA. The USPTO
> also uses these meeting rooms for its Global Intellectual Property Academy
> (GIPA). The USPTO offers free Wifi for the visitors. But when I tried to
> login to http://keionline.org, I received this message:****
>
> Access Denied (content_filter_denied) ****
>
> Your request was denied because this URL contains content that is
> categorized as: "Political/Activist Groups" which is blocked by USPTO
> policy. If you believe the categorization is inaccurate, please contact the
> USPTO Service Desk and request a manual review of the URL.****
>
> For assistance, contact USPTO OCIO IT Service Desk. (io-proxy4)****
>
> We checked and found that the USPTO blocks access to a number of groups
> that have followed SOPA and the TPP intellectual property negotiations,
> particularly those critical of the USPTO positions on intellectual property
> issues. Among the NGOs that were blocked were aclu.org, cdt.org,
> citizen.org, eff.org, healthgap.org, keionline.org and publicknowledge.org.
> Among the sites NOT BLOCKED were the industry lobby groups BSA, MPPA, RIIA,
> and PhRMA. ****
>
> The USPTO also selectively blocks certain blogs and new sites, including,
> for example, dailykos.coms, firedoglake.com, redstate.org,
> rushlimbaugh.com and talkingpointsmemo.com., ****
>
> Here are examples of what the USPTO blocks, and does not block. ****
>
> *Blocked NGOs*****
>
> aclu.org
> cdt.org
> citizen.org
> eff.org
> healthgap.org
> keionline.org
> publicknowledge.org ****
>
> *NGOs that are NOT blocked*****
>
> bsa.org
> creativecommons.org
> iipa.com
> iipi.org
> ipi.org
> mpaa.org
> PhRMA.org
> pubpat.org
> RIIA.Org
> stockholm-network.org ****
>
> *Blocked Blogs and news outlets*****
>
> dailykos.coms
> firedoglake.com
> redstate.org
> rushlimbaugh.com
> talkingpointsmemo.com ****
>
> *Blogs and new outlets that are NOT blocked *****
>
> 71patent.blogspot.com
> aljazeera.com
> boingboing.net
> dailycaller.com
> democracynow.org
> drudgereport.com
> groklaw.net
> huffingtonpost.com
> ip-watch.org
> itcblog.com
> lessig.org
> michaelgeist.ca
> nationalreview.com
> spicyipindia.blogspot.com
> techdirt.com
> washingtonmonthly.com ****
>
>    - James Love's blog <http://keionline.org/blog/jamie> ****
>    - Add new comment<http://keionline.org/comment/reply/1548#comment-form>
>    ****
>    - Printer-friendly version <http://keionline.org/print/1548> ****
>    - Send by email <http://keionline.org/printmail/1548> ****
>
> *Cause of foul up <http://keionline.org/node/1548#comment-7970>*
>
> Submitted by Anonymous dude or dudess on 19. September 2012 - 12:02. ****
>
> 'Ex-Patent Examiner here. If this was anything other than a contractor
> foul-up, I'll eat my hat. There were a dozen instances where I'd need to
> call the help desk to access a website that would enable me to do my job.'
> If true, this means no one at USPTO tried to access those sites and asked
> for the filter to be removed since it was implemented.****
>
>    - reply <http://keionline.org/comment/reply/1548/7970> ****
>
>
> ____________________________________________________________
> You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
>      governance at lists.igcaucus.org
> To be removed from the list, visit:
>      http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing
>
> For all other list information and functions, see:
>      http://lists.igcaucus.org/info/governance
> To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
>      http://www.igcaucus.org/
>
> Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t****
>
>
>
> ****
>
> ** **
>
> -- ****
>
> Salanieta Tamanikaiwaimaro aka Sala****
>
> P.O. Box 17862****
>
> Suva****
>
> Fiji****
>
> ** **
>
> Twitter: @SalanietaT****
>
> Skype:Salanieta.Tamanikaiwaimaro****
>
> Fiji Cell: +679 998 2851****
>
> ** **
>
>  ****
>
> ** **
>
> ** **
>

-- 
Salanieta Tamanikaiwaimaro aka Sala
P.O. Box 17862
Suva
Fiji

Twitter: @SalanietaT
Skype:Salanieta.Tamanikaiwaimaro
Fiji Cell: +679 998 2851
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.igcaucus.org/pipermail/governance/attachments/20120921/5021a9eb/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
____________________________________________________________
You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
     governance at lists.igcaucus.org
To be removed from the list, visit:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/unsubscribing

For all other list information and functions, see:
     http://lists.igcaucus.org/info/governance
To edit your profile and to find the IGC's charter, see:
     http://www.igcaucus.org/

Translate this email: http://translate.google.com/translate_t