The Centre for Internet and Society
http://editors.cis-india.org
These are the search results for the query, showing results 21 to 35.
Save Your Voice — A movement against Web censorship
http://editors.cis-india.org/news/save-your-voice-2014-a-movement-against-web-censorship
<b>‘Save Your Voice (SYV)’ is a movement against Web censorship and its main demand is the repealing of the Information Technology Act, said SYV founders, Aseem Trividi, a cartoonist, and Alok Dixit, a journalist, on Monday. </b>
<p>DNA Correspondent covered a press conference held on March 12, 2012 in Bangalore. Sunil Abraham was quoted in the story.</p>
<p>Trivedi’s website — www.cartoonistagainstcorruption.com — was banned during Anna Hazare’s movement. Trivedi said: “Mumbai police banned the website without any prior notice and cases of ‘treason’ were also filed. The website was banned without a judicial order and I haven’t received an explanation about the crime committed.”</p>
<p>Sunil Abraham, executive director, Centre for Internet and Society, said the private sector does not protect the freedom of expression.</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.dnaindia.com/bangalore/report_save-your-voice-a-movement-against-web-censorship_1661820">Read the original published by Daily News & Analysis on March 13, 2012</a></p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/news/save-your-voice-2014-a-movement-against-web-censorship'>http://editors.cis-india.org/news/save-your-voice-2014-a-movement-against-web-censorship</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaFreedom of Speech and ExpressionPublic AccountabilityInternet GovernanceCensorship2012-03-13T11:44:27ZNews ItemRTI Applications on Blocking of Websites
http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/rtis-on-website-blocking
<b>In recent weeks, an increasing number of incidents have come to light on government-ordered blocking of websites. In one case involving Zone-H.org, it is clear who has ordered the block (a Delhi district court judge, as an interim order), even though the block itself is open to constitutional challenge. In all others cases, including the TypePad case, it is unclear who has ordered the block and why. We at CIS have sent in two right to information requests to find out.</b>
<p>While under the law (i.e., s.69A of the Information Technology Act), the Department of Information Technology (DIT) has the power to order blocks (via the 'Designated Officer'), in some cases it has been noted that the ISPs have noted that the order to block access to the websites have come from the Department of Telecom (DoT). Due to this, we have sent in RTI applications to both the DIT and the DoT.</p>
<h2>RTI Application to Department of Information Technology<br /></h2>
<p align="JUSTIFY">To</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Shri
B.B.Bahl,<br />Joint
Director and PIO (RTI)<br />Office
of PIO (RTI)<br />Room
No 1016, Electronics Niketan<br />Department
of Information Technology (DIT)<br />Ministry
of Communications and Information Technology<br />6,
CGO Complex, New Delhi</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"> </p>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Dear
Sir, </p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><strong>Subject:
Information on Website Blocking Requested under the Right to
Information Act, 2005 </strong></p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><strong>1.
Full Name of the Applicant:</strong><br />Pranesh
Prakash </p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><strong>2.
Address of the Applicant:</strong><br />E-mail
Address:<br />pranesh[at]cis-india.org
</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Mailing
Address:<br />Centre
for Internet and Society<br />194,
2-C Cross,<br />Domlur
Stage II,<br />Bangalore
– 560071 </p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><strong>3.
Details of the information required</strong>:</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY">It
has come to our attention that Airtel Broadband Services (“Airtel”)
has recently blocked access to a blog host called TypePad
(http://www.typepad.com) (“TypePad”) for all its users across the
country. In this regard, we request information on the following
queries under Section 6(1) of the Right to Information Act, 2005:</p>
<ol type="i"><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Did
the Department order Airtel to block TypePad under s.69A of the
Information Technology Act (“IT Act”), 2000 read with the
Information Technology (Procedures and Safeguards for Blocking
Access of Information by Public) Rules, 2009 (“Rules”) or any
other law for the time being in force? If so, please provide a copy
of such order or orders. If not, what action, if at all, has been
taken by the Department against Airtel for blocking of websites in
contravention of s.69A of the IT Act?</p>
</li><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Has
the Department ever ordered a block under s.69A of the IT Act? If
so, what was the information that was ordered to be blocked?</p>
</li><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">How
many requests for blocking of information has the Designated Officer
received, and how many of those requests have been accepted and how
many rejected? How many of those requests were for emergency
blocking under Rule 9 of the Rules?</p>
</li><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Please
provide use the present composition of the Committee for Examination
of Requests constituted under Rule 7 of the Rules.</p>
</li><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Please
provide us the dates and copies of the minutes of all meetings held
by the Committee for Examination of Requests under Rule 8(4) of the
Rules, and copies of their recommendations.</p>
</li><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Please
provide us the present composition of the Review Committee
constituted under rule 419A of the Indian Telegraph Rules, 1951.</p>
</li><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Please
provide us the dates and copies of the minutes of all meetings held
by the Review Committee under Rule 14 of the Rules, and copies of
all orders issued by the Review Committee.</p>
</li></ol>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><strong>4.
Years to which the above requests pertain:</strong><br />2008-2011</p>
<strong>5.
Designation and Address of the PIO from whom the information is
required: </strong>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Shri
B.B.Bahl,<br />Joint
Director and PIO (RTI)<br />Office
of PIO (RTI)<br />Room
No 1016, Electronics Niketan<br />Department
of Information Technology (DIT)<br />Ministry
of Communications and Information Technology<br />6,
CGO Complex, New Delhi</p>
<p>To
the best of my belief, the details sought for fall within your
authority. Further, as provided under section 6(3) of the Right to
Information Act (“RTI Act”), in case this application does not
fall within your authority, I request you to transfer the same in the
designated time (5 days) to the concerned authority and inform me of
the same immediately.</p>
<p>To
the best of my knowledge the information sought does not fall within
the restrictions contained in section 8 and 9 of the RTI Act, and any
provision protecting such information in any other law for the time
being in force is inapplicable due to section 22 of the RTI Act.<br /></p>
<p>Please
provide me this information in electronic form, via the e-mail
address provided above.</p>
<p>This
to certify that I, Pranesh Prakash, am a citizen of India.</p>
<p>A
fee of Rs. 10/- (Rupees Ten Only) has been made out in the form of a
demand draft drawn in favour of “Pay and Accounts Officer,
Department of Information Technology” payable at New Delhi.</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><br /></p>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Date:
Monday, February 28, 2011<br />Place:
Bengaluru, Karnataka</p>
<br />(Pranesh
Prakash)
<p align="JUSTIFY"> </p>
<h2>RTI Application to Department of Telecom</h2>
<p align="JUSTIFY">To</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Shri
Subodh Saxena<br />Central
Public Information Officer (RTI)<br />Director
(DS-II)<br />Room
No 1006, Sanchar Bhawan<br />Department
of Telecommunications (DoT)<br />Ministry
of Communications and Information Technology<br />20,
Ashoka Road, New Delhi — 110001</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"> </p>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Dear
Sir, </p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><strong>Subject:
Information on Website Blocking Requested under the Right to
Information Act, 2005 </strong></p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><strong>1.
Full Name of the Applicant:</strong><br />Pranesh
Prakash </p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><strong>2.
Address of the Applicant:</strong><br />E-mail
Address:<br />pranesh[at]cis-india.org
</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Mailing
Address:<br />Centre
for Internet and Society<br />194,
2-C Cross,<br />Domlur
Stage II,<br />Bangalore
– 560071 </p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><strong>3.
Details of the information required</strong>:</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY">It
has come to our attention that Airtel Broadband Services (“Airtel”)
has recently blocked access to a blog host called TypePad
(http://www.typepad.com) (“TypePad”) for all its users across the
country. Airtel subscribers trying to access this website receive a
message noting “This site has been blocked as per request by
Department of Telecom”. In this regard, we request information on
the following queries under Section 6(1) of the Right to Information
Act, 2005:</p>
<ol type="i"><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Does
the Department have powers to require an Internet Service Provider
to block a website? If so, please provide a citation of the statute
under which power is granted to the Department, as well as the the
safeguards prescribed to be in accordance with Article 19(1)(a) of
the Constitution of India.</p>
</li><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Did
the Department order Airtel to block TypePad or any blog hosted by
TypePad? If so, please provide a copy of such order or orders. If
not, what action, if at all, has been taken by the Department
against Airtel for blocking of websites?</p>
</li><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Has
the Department ever ordered the blocking of any website? If so,
please provide a list of addresses of all the websites that have
been ordered to be blocked.</p>
</li><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Please
provide use the present composition of the Committee constituted
under rule 419A of the Indian Telegraph Rules, 1951. </p>
</li><li>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Please
provide us the dates and copies of the minutes of all meetings held
by the Committee constituted under rule 419A of the Indian Telegraph
Rules, 1951, and copies of all their recommendations.</p>
</li></ol>
<p align="JUSTIFY"><strong>4.
Years to which the above requests pertain:</strong><br />2005-2011</p>
<p><strong>5.
Designation and Address of the PIO from whom the information is
required:</strong><br />Shri
Subodh Saxena<br />Central
Public Information Officer (RTI)<br />Director
(DS-II)<br />Room
No 1006, Sanchar Bhawan<br />Department
of Telecommunications (DoT)<br />Ministry
of Communications and Information Technology<br />20,
Ashoka Road, New Delhi — 110001</p>
<div style="text-align: justify;" class="visualClear"> </div>
<p>To
the best of my belief, the details sought for fall within your
authority. Further, as provided under section 6(3) of the Right to
Information Act (“RTI Act”), in case this application does not
fall within your authority, I request you to transfer the same in the
designated time (5 days) to the concerned authority and inform me of
the same immediately. </p>
<p>To
the best of my knowledge the information sought does not fall within
the restrictions contained in section 8 and 9 of the RTI Act, and any
provision protecting such information in any other law for the time
being in force is inapplicable due to section 22 of the RTI Act.</p>
<p>Please
provide me this information in electronic form, via the e-mail
address provided above.</p>
<p>This
to certify that I, Pranesh Prakash, am a citizen of India. </p>
<p>A
fee of Rs. 10/- (Rupees Ten Only) has been made out in the form of a
demand draft drawn in favour of “Pay and Accounts Officer (HQ),
Department of Telecom” payable at New Delhi.</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"> </p>
<p align="JUSTIFY">Date:
Monday, February 28, 2011<br />Place:
Bengaluru, Karnataka</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"> <br />(Pranesh
Prakash)</p>
<p align="JUSTIFY"> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/rtis-on-website-blocking'>http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/rtis-on-website-blocking</a>
</p>
No publisherpraneshFreedom of Speech and ExpressionIT ActRTIPublic Accountability2012-12-21T06:34:27ZBlog EntryRound Table on Assessing the Efficacy of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) for Public Initiatives: A Report
http://editors.cis-india.org/events/event-blogs/round-table-assessing-efficacy
<b>Zainab Bawa reports on the Round Table on Assessing the Efficacy of Information and Communication Technologies for Public Initiatives, hosted by the Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, on 17 June 2009, in collaboration with the Liberty Institute, New Delhi. </b>
<p></p>
<p>
In
recent times, there has been an upsurge in the use of ICTs to provide
information to people and to elicit participation. Individuals, corporate
organisations, NGOs, civil society organisations, collectives, municipalities,
political parties and politicians have been using the internet and other
mediums to communicate with people. The round table was organised primarily to
discuss two issues:</p>
<ol><li>What is the
effectiveness of the initiatives introduced in recent times?</li><li>How do we
move forward in terms of partnerships/collaborations in the areas of data
gathering, sharing, dissemination and architecture of information? </li></ol>
<p>Given
the constraints of time, however, we were only able to discuss a few issues with
respect to efficacy of initiatives, rather than come up with a concrete action
plan on how to measure effectiveness of many of the existing initiatives. This
remains an agenda for subsequent meetings.</p>
<p>This round table was the first meeting of its kind. It
brought together participants from diverse backgrounds to discuss key issues
involved in leveraging ICTs towards various ends, and to collaborate with each
other on ongoing initiatives. Participants included researchers,
persons who have developed information platforms and databases, individuals
working in the area of leveraging technology for streamlining processes in
society and people who have been studying usage patterns of social media tools.
Most of the participants were using ICTs to improve information access
related to health issues, education, budgets, development of rural areas and
recently, elections and governance. In the subsequent sections, I will briefly
elaborate on some of the key themes around which discussions took place
during the round table.</p>
<p><strong>Building on Ideas:</strong> In the morning
and pre-lunch sessions, one issue that featured prominently was the importance of developing ideas rather than trying to work out a perfect model that
we believe will solve what we perceive to be people’s problems. Two of the
participants explained that they started implementing ideas as they came to
them, rather than trying to come up with a framework that they thought would
work for the masses. They worked towards evolving their ideas, exploring what
works and what does not. One of them further pointed out that such evolution
cannot be observed as it happens; it only becomes apparent in hindsight. Hence,
discussions such as the current round table are useful.</p>
<p>It is
also important to note that we are still in a nascent stage of understanding
how ICTs can impact people’s lives and deploying them accordingly. As a result, many efforts are likely to be in the stage of trial and error.</p>
<p><strong>Key areas of interest and concern:</strong> Based
on the input from participants in the morning session, we
arrived at a list of areas that require more understanding and discussion.</p>
<ol><li><u>Information gathering, dissemination, access –
including information architecture, technology design</u>:
Here, three issues were discussed:</li>
<ul><li>Who are we talking about when we refer to information
access? It was pointed out that information is crucial particularly for people
who do not have computers and for whom internet is not a priority. The intensity
with which they seek information is remarkable. One of the participants argued
that we undervalue the potential of information to make a difference to
people’s lives.</li><li>How do we deliver information? Providing information
is not enough.</li><li>Representativeness of the information for those who it
is provided for.
</li></ul>
</ol>
<p>Another issue that was referred to
was whether language is a problem, i.e., most information is available only in
English. One of the participants suggested that this is not the case because Google has found that a very small percentage of the population actually refers
to material on the web in languages other than English.</p>
<ol type="1" start="2"><li><u>Community mobilization</u>:
During the deliberations, we referred to the problem of replication of initiatives. Two observers of social media pointed
out that replication happens because people are trying to create their own
unique communities around their initiatives. This is an important insight
for future efforts and also indicates the need to share databases and
information that individuals and organisations have compiled. They also
suggested that it is important to discover existing communities and spaces
where conversations around issues of governance, education, health and
development are taking place. This helps to plug into existing resource
pools and to extend outreach. <br /></li></ol>
<ol type="1" start="3"><li><u>Citizens’ participation</u>:
Initiatives that work and why they
succeed - We briefly discussed the Jaagore campaign and India Vote Report,
which were launched before the 2009 national elections in India to enable
people to register on the electoral rolls and to report irregularities during
elections respectively. Some people found it difficult to register
themselves on the Jaagore website and some had difficulties in finding the
local offices where they needed to follow-up with the process. It was also
pointed out that Vote Report did not connect with the end user because it
would have been easier to report irregularities and anomalies via SMS
rather than trying to report them by logging on to the site. If one looks
at the case of the Online Complaint Management System (OCMS) developed by
Praja, the availability of the telephone hotline service through which
citizens could register their complaints helped in widening usage. Thus,
it appears that two issues are pertinent:</li>
<ul><li>Whether the initiative connects with the people who
are likely to use it;</li><li>Simplicity of design/system that enables more users. <br />
</li></ul>
</ol>
<p><strong>Target
Audience:</strong> One of
the participants pointed out that some initiatives do not work because they are
targeted towards the wrong audiences. For example, when it comes to voting and
elections, poor groups are the ones who go out and vote in large numbers.
Hence, information systems need to be tailored to provide them with the data
that they need most. Access also has to be configured accordingly. In some
instances, the target is too broad to reach out effectively.</p>
<p>It appears that there is a need to
develop strategies on how platforms and databases that have been created to
enhance access to information can be made known among the masses and how people
can be made aware to use them. It is equally important to understand what
constitutes ‘information’ and for whom. Here,
the other issue to explore is how information links back to the people for who
it is provided.</p>
<ol type="1" start="4"><li><u>Technology</u>: In this
area, a key concern was the high costs involved in developing technologies
and whether we could learn from each other’s experience of developing
technologies instead of reinventing the wheel. We also discussed whether
open source software helps to reduce costs of development. The other issue
with respect to open source is whether there is enough assistance and
support available to resolve problems that may crop up during use of
technology from time to time. </li></ol>
<p><strong>Sharing
of Data:</strong> Discussions also veered around the issue of whether
appropriate technology and applications could be created to help with sharing
existing databases and information pools. We did not discuss this issue
in depth, but it remains relevant for subsequent meetings.</p>
<ol type="1" start="5"><li><u>Back end integration</u>: According
to some of the participants, one of major problems is the interface
between government and citizens, which remains weak. Technology
can be used to enhance the interactions. Participants also pointed out
the difficulty in obtaining data from government bodies that is important
to create the interface between government and citizens. A participant
involved with the Jaagore campaign referred to the problem of back-end
integration during their efforts to help citizens register themselves with
the election commission (EC) offices. A participant from Google similarly
reported that they faced problems in obtaining election results from the EC’s
offices as a result of which, they had to rely on their partners for this
information. Here too, we could not deliberate on how to resolve this
problem, but this could be a major theme for a subsequent meeting. <br /></li></ol>
<ol type="1" start="6"><li><u>Performance (monitoring, evaluation)</u>:
One of the themes that participants zeroed in on was the evaluation of
the performance of elected representatives and making this evaluation available for
people to see. Here, the debate was around the problem of evaluation being carried out according to the criteria we set which may not seem relevant
to other sections of society. One of the suggestions that came up was to
develop a matrix for evaluation and put out information accordingly.
People can then use it to make their own judgments. <img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/events/event-blogs/uploads/00016.jpg/image_preview" alt="rt2" class="image-right" title="rt2" /><br /></li></ol>
<p>In
the post-lunch session, some of the participants shared their experiences with
implementation and also the work they and their organisations are currently
engaged with. Towards the end of the round table, each one of the participants
explained their respective projects and how they may wish to collaborate with
other participants (who were present) in their initiatives. An e-group called “CIS-Info-Access” has
been created to take these conversations and collaborations further. </p>
<h3><strong>Evaluation of the Round Table and Way Forward:</strong> <br /></h3>
<p>When
invitations were sent out to people to participate in the round table, many of
the invitees expressed a genuine and enthusiastic interest in being part of
this effort. As mentioned above, one of the reasons for this enthusiasm was
because this was the first meeting of its kind, bringing together
individuals from the fields of technology, research and implementation. We
invited a total of 35 people out of which 27 finally attended the meeting.
The diversity of the participants was an asset in that a variety of issues were
brought to the table. The drawback was that there was not enough time to
discuss some of the pertinent issues in depth. Future meetings can be tailored
to discuss one or two specific themes such as back-end integration and sharing
of information, technology issues, ideas for mobilising citizens and
communities, etc.</p>
<p>The
possibilities of collaboration between participants in this meeting are immense
and we hope that some of the synergies will materialise into concrete outcomes.
Further, a few participants have expressed an interest in organising similar
meetings in their cities/towns, perhaps focusing on a few issues instead of
bringing people together under a broad theme. Of some of the issues discussed,
participants have indicated that back-end integration with government and
ideating on different ways of disseminating data can be further deliberated on
in future. One of the participants also suggested that there is a need to make
‘data’ more relevant to people’s lives.</p>
<p>While
the meeting was fruitful in many respects, one issue needs to be underlined.
This concerns the imagination of internet and ICTs as mediums that can resolve all existing problems with respect to citizen-government
interface, streamlining of processes and provision of information. Such an
overarching imagination of technology overlooks the cultural, economic, social and
political specificities of communities and contexts. Technology
can also have negative implications in some circumstances. It also needs to be
reinforced that technology is embedded in society and culture. Therefore we
need to view technology as one of the avenues among others available which will
facilitate interactions between people and their governments and the state.
Democratisation is more likely to be realised through such a perspective.</p>
<p></p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/events/event-blogs/round-table-assessing-efficacy'>http://editors.cis-india.org/events/event-blogs/round-table-assessing-efficacy</a>
</p>
No publishersachiaSocial mediaDigital ActivismDigital AccessPublic AccountabilityDiscussionFeaturedTransparency, Politics2011-08-20T22:28:55ZBlog EntryResources
http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/publications/pupfip/resources
<b>A collection of resources that will help one navigate through the arguments and evidence for and against the Indian "Bayh-Dole" bill.</b>
<p><u><strong><br /></strong></u></p>
<h2><strong>PUPFIP</strong></h2>
<h3>News-related/General Coverage</h3>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.financialexpress.com/news/relook-at-publicfunded-r&d-bill-to-address-red-tape/376844/0">Relook at public-funded R&D Bill to
address red tape</a> (The Financial Express)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.livemint.com/2008/12/01144901/CSIR-looks-at-commercializing.html">CSIR looks at commercializing, leasing
out patent</a> (Live Mint)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://spicyipindia.blogspot.com/2008/02/exporting-bayh-dole-to-india-whither_21.html">Exporting Bayh-Dole to India: Whither Transparency Part II</a><span class="post-author"> (Shamnad Basheer)</span></p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://ww.scidev.net/es/science-and-innovation-policy/intellectual-property/news/proyecto-de-ley-de-patentes-suscita-debate-en-la-i.html">Indian Patent Bill stirs debate among scientists</a> (Science and Development Network)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.knowledgecommission.gov.in/recommendations/legal.asp">Letter from the Knowledge Commission</a> (GoI)</p>
<h3>Scientific
Culture</h3>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://blogs.thehindu.com/delhi/?p=16251">Does Patenting research change the Culture of Science?</a> (The Hindu)</p>
<h3>Analytical Pieces<strong> </strong></h3>
<p>
<a class="external-link" href="http://www.scidev.net/en/opinions/indian-patent-bill-let-s-not-be-too-hasty.html">Indian Patent Bill: Lets not be too Hasty</a>(Shamnad Basheer)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.livemint.com/2008/11/01001052/Not-in-public-interest.html">Not in public interest</a>(Live Mint)<a class="external-link" href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3867/is_6_128/ai_n32062853/"><br /></a></p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3867/is_6_128/ai_n32062853/">The Indian Public Funded IP Bill: Are we Ready?</a>(K. Satyanarayana)</p>
<p> </p>
<h2><strong>Bayh-Dole</strong></h2>
<h3>Technology
Transfer</h3>
<p>
<a class="external-link" href="http://www.economist.com/displaystory.cfm?story_id=1476653">Innovation's Golden Goose </a>(The Economist)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.economist.com/science/displaystory.cfm?STORY_ID=10787664">Improving Innovation</a>(The Economist)</p>
<h3><strong>Scientific
Culture</strong></h3>
<p>
<a class="external-link" href="http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-129366990.html">Patents and America's Universities</a>(The Economist)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/07/technology/07unbox.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print">When Academia Puts Profits Ahead of Wonder</a>(The New York Times)</p>
<p>
<a class="external-link" href="http://www.economist.com/displayStory.cfm?Story_ID=E1_VPNSGGT">Bayhing for blood or Doling out cash?</a>(The Economist)</p>
<h3>Evaluative
Pieces</h3>
<p>
<a class="external-link" href="http://opensource.mit.edu/papers/Thursby.pdf">University Licensing under Bayh-Dole: What are the Issues and
Evidence?</a>(Thursby and Thursby)</p>
<p>
<a class="external-link" href="http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pbio.0060262">Is Bayh-Dole Good for Developing Countries? Lessons from the US
Experience</a>(So et al.)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2005/09/19/8272884/index.htm">The Law of Unintended Consequences</a>(Fortune Magazine)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6V77-41NCXY8-6/2/fa828bbd7705f51ffd8fcf60338daf16">The Growth of patenting and licensing by U.S. universities and the Bayh-Dole Act</a> (Mowery et al.)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.researchoninnovation.org/tiip/archive/2003_5g.htm">Overall Assessment of the Bayh-Dole Act</a> (Nelson, Mowery, et al.)</p>
<p> </p>
<h2><strong>General Resources</strong></h2>
<p> <a class="external-link" href="http://www.researchoninnovation.org/tiip/archive/2003_5b.htm">Joint Ventures and Intellectual Property</a>(Andreas Panagopoulos)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.researchoninnovation.org/tiip/archive/2003_5c.htm">Patents vs. Other Knowledge Transfer</a>(Agrawal and Henderson)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.researchoninnovation.org/tiip/archive/2003_5f.htm">Incentives Structure and Licensing Success</a>(Dan Elfenbein)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.researchoninnovation.org/tiip/archive/2003_5e.htm">University Licensing and Research Behavior</a>(Lach and Schankerman)</p>
<a class="external-link" href="http://www.researchoninnovation.org/tiip/archive/2003_5b.htm">Open Science and Private Property</a>(Paul David)
<p> <strong><br /></strong></p>
<h2><strong>IP Alternatives</strong><br /></h2>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info:doi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pmed.0040293">New Approaches to Filling the Gap in TB Drug Discovery </a>(Casenghi, Cole and Nathan)</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://keionline.org/misc-docs/Prizes/prize_tb_msf_expert_meeting.pdf">The Role of Prizes in Developing Low-Cost Point-of-Care Rapid Diagnostic Tests and Better Drugs for TB</a>(James Love)</p>
<p>How to boost R&D for essential drugs and diagnostics</p>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://bmj.com/cgi/reprint/333/7582/1279.pdf">Scrooge and intellectual property rights</a> (BMJ January 2006)</p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
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<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/publications/pupfip/resources'>http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/publications/pupfip/resources</a>
</p>
No publisherpraneshBayh-DoleAccess to KnowledgeAccess to MedicineOpen AccessPublic AccountabilityOpen Innovation2009-10-20T03:29:16ZPageRegulating the Internet by fiat
http://editors.cis-india.org/news/www-the-hindu-aug-26-v-sridhar-regulating-the-internet-by-fiat
<b>The Union government’s move to ban or block 310 online entities is worrisome.</b>
<hr />
<p class="body" style="text-align: justify; ">This article by V Sridhar was <a class="external-link" href="http://www.thehindu.com/sci-tech/internet/article3821580.ece">published</a> in the Hindu on August 26, 2012. Pranesh Prakash is quoted.</p>
<hr />
<p class="body" style="text-align: justify; ">The unprecedented spike in the velocity of hateful, offensive and blatantly communal online content earlier this month, which reinforced rumour mongering on the ground that resulted in the exodus of people from the northeast from several Indian cities has been a classic example of how new technologies can be harnessed for old vices. But just as disturbing has been the manner in which the government yielded to the old itch of censoring, banning or blocking content. Between August 18 and August 21, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT), in four separate directives issued to all Internet service licensees, asked them to “block access” to a total of 310 URLs (Unique Resource Locators).</p>
<h3>Directing ISPs</h3>
<p class="body" style="text-align: justify; ">The number of URLs blocked does not quite convey the extent of the banned content because the list includes instances of entire websites, a single Web page in some cases, videos posted on YouTube, Twitter handles, Facebook entries, or even instances of links that would take the browser to an img tag (an individual image that is linked to an HTML page). Although the directives clearly stated that the service providers should block only the specific URLs leading to the main sites such as YouTube, Facebook or Twitter.</p>
<p class="body" style="text-align: justify; ">Airtel, the leading telecom and Internet service provider, blocked youtu.be, the short URL that Twitter and Facebook users normally use for sharing images and videos. A perusal of the four orders clearly shows that Airtel overreacted. Although the service provider subsequently corrected the error, worries about arbitrary disruptions remain.</p>
<p class="body" style="text-align: justify; ">Pranesh Prakash, Programme Manager, Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), who did the first analysis of the resources that were pulled out of the Web, said the list was only partial, because they related only to the URLs that ISPs were asked to block, not what action would have been initiated against those offering Web services.</p>
<h3>A ragtag list</h3>
<p class="body" style="text-align: justify; ">Net activists, even those who do not have an absolutist notion of the right to free speech, have expressed deep reservations about the manner in which the government has blocked 310 URLs. Although Mr. Prakash, who is also a lawyer, believes that “temporary curbs” of freedom of expression, in situations such as the unprecedented situation earlier this month may be necessary, he argued that the government acted carelessly and in a kneejerk manner. “It is a ragtag list, prepared in a haphazard manner,” he told <i>The Hindu</i>.</p>
<p class="body" style="text-align: justify; ">Logically, the rules applicable to hate content ought to be the same whether the offence is in print or whether it appears as online content. Mr. Prakash pointed to the fact that official agencies such as the police have not gone after those responsible for the content posted in the blocked URLs, which shows that the government’s approach is not backed by a resolve to bring to book those responsible for spreading hate.</p>
<p class="body" style="text-align: justify; ">The ban-first, examine-later approach is wrong for three sets of reasons, argued Mr. Prakash. First, because there are what he characterises as “egregious mistakes”. Second, he doubts whether regulations prescribing due process of enforcing and reviewing the ban were indeed followed. Third, the government ought to have acted smarter, by using the same media to debunk the rumours that were swirling in several Indian cities but also in the northeast. Mr. Prakash pointed to the case of a Canadian intern working at the CIS who received an SMS from a Canadian government agency that asked her not to heed the rumours. Although the Bangalore police did issue an SMS asking people not to heed such rumours, it came well after the rumour mongering had passed its peak.</p>
<p class="body" style="text-align: justify; ">“I generally believe that the government must exercise utmost caution in censoring,” said Mr. Prakash. He pointed out that in the list were sites and people who had done nothing to promote hate. He refered to the case of Amit Paranjpe, whose twitter handles were blocked. “If you go through his timeline, you will not find anything that is communal at all,” Mr. Prakash says. “I do not think the government acted responsibly by going after material that is not directly inflammatory, or contributes to the state of panic,” he argued. “I do not doubt the motives of the government, because I see that the overwhelming majority of the material it has blocked is stuff that has something to do with communalism or rioting, whether it is as reportage or as material that contributes to tension,” he observed. He also did not think the government used the crisis as an excuse to put down politically dissenting voices, which was what happened last October (critical references to Sonia Gandhi were removed then).</p>
<h3>Cyber terror?</h3>
<p class="body" style="text-align: justify; ">Significantly, the list of blocked domains did not match the government’s claim that a lot of the hate content were in the form of images with misleading captions, most of which came from Pakistan. Mr. Prakash pointed out that many of these images had “been floating around” in Pakistan for at least a month before the rumours hit their peak in mid-August. He noted that within Pakistan there had been debates about the authenticity of these images. “In fact, the reportage and the countering of the reportage in the Pakistani media has been much more sophisticated than in India,” he observed. Significantly, the debate was not even targeted at the Indian audience, but to Pakistani or a global audience. “This debunks the notion some sections of the media have propagated, that this is about cyber war or cyber terrorism,” he says. “I have not seen evidence that India has been targeted from Pakistan,” he observed.</p>
<h3>Lack of transparency</h3>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">It has also been done without abiding by the procedures that are clearly laid down. Mr. Prakash pointed out, the provisions of the Information Technology Act require that “persons or intermediaries” blocked ought to have been given an opportunity to explain their position within 48 hours. He doubted that this had been followed. Moreover, he argued that the people or companies hosting the offensive content, not the ISPs, ought to have been asked to remove them. After all, most of the large and popular intermediaries have clearly laid down conditions of usage, he said.<br /><br />The lack of transparency in the manner in which the government blocked these websites — even if it is accepted that the content was hateful, abhorrent and aimed at stirring social tension — is worrisome because it sets a precedent for unchecked use of power, without proper sanction. Nor was it a smart way of addressing an innovatively virulent way of spreading chaos. While the government’s use of the sledgehammer may have got it out of the immediate crisis it found itself in, it may have fewer friends when faced with a similar outbreak later.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/news/www-the-hindu-aug-26-v-sridhar-regulating-the-internet-by-fiat'>http://editors.cis-india.org/news/www-the-hindu-aug-26-v-sridhar-regulating-the-internet-by-fiat</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaFreedom of Speech and ExpressionPublic AccountabilityInternet GovernanceCensorship2012-08-26T10:13:03ZNews ItemPrometheus bound and gagged
http://editors.cis-india.org/news/prometheus-bound-and-gagged
<b>Funny how a healthy person like me can collapse one day and end up in the hospital. The doctor who made me go through every lab test available, finally diagnosed the cause after a chat with me. Apparently, I collapsed because I’m getting angry, increasing my blood pressure. The only solution he said is to stop reading newspapers, as I’m getting agitated by headlines like ‘India can go the China way and block sites’, or by how the government says there’s no Internet censorship while all it’s actions point the other way.</b>
<p><a class="external-link" href="http://expressbuzz.com/tech/Prometheus-bound-and-gagged/355194.html">The article by Adarsh Matham was published in the New Indian Express on 20 January 2012</a>. Pranesh Prakash is quoted in this article.</p>
<p>Censorship is a word that is particularly abhorrent for someone like me, who grew up listening to tales of how people like Ramnath Goenka fought the censors during the Emergency. And to say that we’ll start blocking websites in India like China is doing, the most heart wrenching moment I’ve ever heard. While researching for this piece, I came across some information that is out in the open on the Internet, but which is not generating the level of debate it deserves. We seem to be immersed in discussing Kolaveri, while slowly sliding into an Orwellian nightmare. As an example, I didn’t know there are rules called ‘Intermediary Guidelines’ and ‘Cyber cafe rules’, and I bet you didn’t either. As Pranesh Prakash of Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) has pointed out in a blog post, these two rules alone, made up by the Department of IT in April 2011, give the government and citizens of India great powers at censoring the web by allowing them to get Internet firms to remove content that is ‘disparaging’, ‘doesn’t have rights to’, etc.</p>
<p>Killing freedom of speech is only the first crime of these rules as proved by the good people at CIS. To test these rules, they complained against some frivolous content to ISPs and Internet companies, which resulted in six out of seven listings being removed without informing posters or users. More alarmingly, of the 358 items the Government of India (and some states) has requested Google to remove, only eight were for hate speech, one for national security, and an astounding 255 for ‘government criticism’.</p>
<p>Since introducing these draconian rules, the tale only gets murkier. Not content with asking Internet firms to self-regulate, Kapil Sibal has introduced an amendment to the Copyright Act, which introduces section 52(1)(C ), that allows anyone to send a notice complaining about infringement of his copyright. While this sounds normal, the catch is that ‘the Internet company has to remove the content immediately without question, even if the notice is false or malicious’. This amendment is before Rajya Sabha, and considering how our Parliament passes bills without a debate, it’ll become a law very soon.</p>
<p>Baleful rules and people behind them fail to realise that such efforts will lead to the Streisand effect, whereby attempts to hide any information will lead to it being publicised more widely. Yes more widely, because you can take out some content, but India’s youth will re-post it in a million places within minutes, like they do with pirated movies. We play a lot of cunning games just to live peacefully in India already. Please don’t let us play them online too.</p>
<p>The writer is a tech geek.<br />Email: articles@theadarsh.net</p>
<p> </p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/news/prometheus-bound-and-gagged'>http://editors.cis-india.org/news/prometheus-bound-and-gagged</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaFreedom of Speech and ExpressionPublic AccountabilityInternet Governance2012-02-14T04:47:46ZNews ItemPrivate sector censors
http://editors.cis-india.org/news/private-sector-censors
<b>If business decides what’s ‘good’ and ‘bad’ speech, it can lead to multiple interpretations and arbitrary decisions. The article by Salil Tripathi was published in LiveMint on April 25, 2012.
</b>
<p>In Milan Kundera’s 1967 Czech novel, Žert (The Joke), Ludvik Jahn sends a postcard to an intense classmate who takes herself too seriously. In the card, he makes sarcastic comments against the Communist Party. Unsurprisingly, others don’t see the joke. He gets expelled from the party, conscripted and has to work in mines.<br /><br />While The Joke was a work of fiction, in the real Soviet era as punishment for such actions, many people lost jobs, sometimes their homes; some went to jail, often betrayed by those they trusted. In Czechoslovakia (as the country was then known), the state ran the postal service and those who read the postcard were party members. In India, the private sector provides Internet access and others don’t have the legal right to see what’s being transmitted, unless they are intended recipients, or if the material is broadcast publicly. The state now wants the private sector to police and censor the Internet.<br /><br />Under the draconian Information Technology (Intermediaries Guidelines) Rules, 2011, any intermediary (a search engine, a website, a domain name registry, a service provider, or a cyber café) must take down the “offending” material from its website within 36 hours. The intermediary need not inform the person who posted the material, nor would the creator get the right to respond. As Apar Gupta points out on the Indian Law and Technology Blog, in one recent case, based on these rules, an injunction has been granted.<br /><br />These rules go significantly beyond the existing restraints on speech. The Constitution limits speech and sections of the criminal code impose further restrictions. To that, add the IT rules’ vaguely defined terms of what can’t be said—content which is “grossly harmful, harassing, blasphemous, defamatory, obscene, pornographic, paedophilic, libelous, invasive of another’s privacy, hateful, or racially, ethnically objectionable, disparaging, relating or encouraging money laundering or gambling or otherwise unlawful in any manner whatever, harms minors in any way, or infringes any patent, trademark, copyright, or other proprietary right”. Who decides that? The intermediaries.<br /><br />These rules make the private sector act like the state. Nobody elected business to play such a role; it does not have the expertise, capacity, legal training, or authority to act as the state. Censorship is bad; whether in state or private hands. If business decides what’s “good” and “bad” speech, it can lead to multiple interpretations and arbitrary decisions, without recourse to appeal. In a country where those who feel offended have often threatened violence, businesses will understandably take the cautious approach and not allow anyone to say anything that’s remotely controversial, even if it is an opinion about a film.<br /><br />Decisions will be made on opaque criteria. Apple and Amazon have arbitrarily stopped some products from being sold on their electronic stores, citing “community standards”. Amazon stopped providing server space to WikiLeaks, even though no government had asked it to do so. Credit card companies stopped processing donations going to WikiLeaks, without any legal order. Even Google, which has admirably stood up to China’s bullying, has had to take down content when governments have required that it does so through proper legal channels. India’s record is poor: of the 358 complaints India lodged with Google, 255 were about content that was controversial or political, but not illegal.<br /><br />To demonstrate the reach of the rules, the Centre for Internet and Society in Bangalore sent random notices to seven companies, asking them to take down content. Of them, six complied beyond what they were called upon to do—instead of the three pages that the centre asked for, one company blocked an entire website. A few legally worded letters were enough to get compliance from companies. The centre’s executive director, Sunil Abraham, told me recently: “Companies which have no interest in free speech are now taking these decisions. They have the power to do so and they are using it without any sense of responsibility.”<br /><br />Aseem Trivedi knows this well. The cartoonist who ran a website called cartoonistsagainstcorruption.com, found that his site had disappeared after a complaint from an individual that the cartoons violated laws. Since then he has been campaigning for freedom on the Internet. Everyone’s freedom is at stake—whether you want to see cartoons of Sonia Gandhi, Narendra Modi, Ramdev, Kisan Hazare, Binayak Sen, Arundhati Roy, Sachin Tendulkar, Poonam Pandey and even Mamata Banerjee. And yet look at what happened to Ambikesh Mahapatra, the professor who sent a cartoon mocking Banerjee to some friends via the Internet. He was arrested and later roughed up. These rules chill speech.<br /><br />Last year, Kapil Sibal, minister for information technology, asked companies to screen content manually and censor the Web. The demand was audacious. It showed lack of understanding of how the Internet works and revealed fundamental ignorance of the state’s role: it has to protect the rights of the one who wishes to express and not the one who claims offence.<br /><br />In Parliament, P. Rajeev, member of Parliament (Rajya Sabha), wants to annul those rules. Everyone should support him.</p>
<p>Read the original in LiveMint <a class="external-link" href="http://www.livemint.com/2012/04/25201119/Private-sector-censors.html">here</a></p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/news/private-sector-censors'>http://editors.cis-india.org/news/private-sector-censors</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaFreedom of Speech and ExpressionPublic AccountabilityInternet GovernanceCensorship2012-04-26T13:30:47ZNews ItemPrivacy Matters — Analyzing the Right to "Privacy Bill"
http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/privacy-matters-analyzing-the-right-to-privacy-bill
<b>On January 21, 2012 a public conference “Privacy Matters” was held at the Indian Institute of Technology in Mumbai. It was the sixth conference organised in the series of regional consultations held as “Privacy Matters”. The present conference analyzed the Draft Privacy Bill and the participants discussed the challenges and concerns of privacy in India.</b>
<p>The conference was organized by Privacy India in partnership with the Centre for Internet & Society, International Development Research Centre, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay, the Godrej Culture Lab and Tata Institute of Social Sciences. Participants included a wide range of stakeholders that included the civil society, NGO representatives, consumer activists, students, educators, local press, and advocates.</p>
<p><a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/high-level-summary-and-critique-to-the-leaked-right-to-privacy-bill-2011" class="internal-link" title="High Level Summary and Critique to the Leaked Right to Privacy Bill 2011">Comments to the Right to Privacy Bill</a></p>
<h2>Welcome</h2>
<p><strong>Prashant Iyengar</strong> was the Lead Researcher with Privacy India, opened the conference with an explanation of Privacy India’s mandate to raise awareness, spark civil action and promote democratic dialogue around privacy challenges and violations in India. He summarized the five “Privacy Matters” series previously organised across India in <a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/privacy/privacy-nujsconference-summary" class="external-link">Kolkata</a> on January 23, 2011, in <a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/privacy/privacy-conferencebanglaore" class="external-link">Bangalore</a> on February 5, 2011, in <a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/privacy/privacy-matters-report-from-ahmedabad" class="external-link">Ahmedabad</a> on March 26, 2011, in <a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/privacy/privacy-guwahati-report" class="external-link">Guwahati</a> on June 23, 2011 and in<a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/privacy-chennai-report.pdf/view" class="external-link"> Chennai </a>on August 6, 2011.</p>
<h2>Keynote Address</h2>
<p><strong>Na. Vijayashankar</strong> (popularly known as <strong>Naavi</strong>), a Bangalore based e-business consultant, delivered the key note address on the quest of a good privacy law in India. </p>
<table class="plain">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/Naavi.jpg/image_mini" title="Naavi" height="171" width="155" alt="Naavi" class="image-inline" /></td>
<td>
<p>He described the essential features of good privacy legislation. In
analyzing the Draft Privacy Bill’s definition of the right to privacy,
he suggested it should be defined through the “right to personal
liberty” rather than through what constitutes “infringements”. Mr.
Vijayashankar went on to explain that the “privacy right” should be
taken beyond “information protection” and defined as a “personal privacy
or a sense of personal liberty without constraints by the society”. He
explained the various classifications and levels of protection
associated with the availability and disclosure of data. He expressed
concerns regarding monitoring of data processors and suggested that data
controllers have contractual agreements between data processors, so as
to ensure an obligation of data security practices. He also called for
the simplification and division of offences and suggested numerous
reasons as to why the Cyber Appellate Tribunal would not be an ideal
monitoring mechanism or authority. See Naavi's presenation <a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/proposed-privacy-bill" class="internal-link" title="Proposed Privacy Bill">here</a></p>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<h2>Session I: Privacy and the Legal System</h2>
<p> <strong>Dr. Sudhir Krishnaswamy</strong>, Assistant Professor at the National Law School of India</p>
<table class="plain">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td>Dr. Krishnaswamy started off the presentation by questioning the
normative assumptions the Draft Privacy Bill makes. He referred to the
controversy of Newt Gingrich's second marriage, to question the range of
moral interests that were involved. The Bill falls short in accounting
for dignity in relation to privacy.<br /><br />He described the Draft Privacy Bill as a reasonable advance, given where
privacy laws were before. Although, he feels that it does fall short,
in terms of a narrow position, on what privacy law should do. He also
questioned if it satisfies constitutional standards. He stressed the
importance of philosophical work around the Draft Privacy Bill
considering that the nature of privacy is not neat and over-arching.<br /></td>
<td><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/sudhir.jpg/image_mini" title="Sudhir Krishnaswamy" height="144" width="152" alt="Sudhir Krishnaswamy" class="image-inline image-inline" /></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<h3>Privacy and the Constitutional Law</h3>
<p><strong>N S Nappinai</strong>, Advocate, High Court, Mumbai,</p>
<table class="plain">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/nappinai.jpg/image_preview" title="Nappinai" height="172" width="157" alt="Nappinai" class="image-inline image-inline" /></td>
<td>Nappinai spoke on the constitutional right to privacy. She explained the
substantial development of Article 21 of the Constitution of India to
include the ‘right to privacy’ with regards to its interpretation and
application. She described the different shift of the application of the
right to privacy in the West in comparison to India. The West has moved
from the right to privacy pertaining to property to the right to
privacy concerning personal rights, whereas India moved from personal
rights to property rights. She outlined three aspects of privacy:
dignity, liberty and property rights. <br /><br />Ms. Nappinai dissected the Bill in its major components: interception,
surveillance, method and manner of personal data, health information,
collection, processing and use of personal data. Using these components,
she questioned what precedence exists? What should be further protected
or reversed? What lessons should legislators draw from?<br /></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>Shortcomings of the Draft Right to Privacy Bill falls include:</p>
<ol><li>The objects and reasons section in the Draft Privacy Bill declares the right to privacy to every citizen as well as delineates the collection and dissemination of data. Nappinai dismisses the need for this delineation on the grounds that data protection is an inherent part of the right to privacy, it is not exclusive.</li><li>Large focus on transmission of data. The provisions do not account for property rights pertaining to the right to privacy. Therefore, the ‘knock-and-enter’ rule, the ‘right to be left alone’ and the ‘right to happiness’ should be included.</li><li>Applicability of the Bill should extend to all persons as well as data residing within the territory. It would be self-defeating if it only includes citizens, considering that the Constitution extends to all persons within the territory.</li><li>The right to dignity is unaccounted for.<br /><br />See Nappinai's presentation <a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/privacy-and-the-constitution" class="internal-link" title="Privacy and the Constitution">here</a><br /></li></ol>
<h2>Session II: Privacy and Freedom of Expression</h2>
<p><strong>Apar Gupta</strong>, Advocate, Delhi</p>
<table class="plain">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td>Apar Gupta is an advocate based in Delhi who specializes in IP and
electronic commerce law, spoke predominantly on the interplay between
privacy and freedom of expression. He used the example of an advocate
tweeting about his criticism of a judges’ ruling, to illustrate how
different realms of online anonymity enable freedom of speech. He went
beyond the traditional realm of journalistic architecture such as
television channels or newspapers and explained online community
disclosure.
<p>Mr. Gupta provided a practical example of Indian Kanoon, a popular
online database of Indian court decisions. Because Indian Kanoon is
linked to the Google search engine, many individuals involved in civil
and criminal matters have requested Indian Kanoon to remove the court
judgments, under privacy claims. This particularly occurs with
individuals involved in matrimonial cases. However, as court judgment
constitute public records India Kanoon only removes court judgments when
requested by a court order.</p>
<p>He described the several ways legislators can define privacy and
freedom of expression. Considering that the privacy of an individual may
border upon freedom of speech and expression, he questioned whether or
not privacy should override the right to freedom of speech and
expression. In addition, Mr. Gupta discussed the debate on whether or
not the Privacy Bill should override all existing provisions in other
laws.</p>
</td>
<td><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/Gupta.jpg/image_preview" alt="Apar Gupta" class="image-inline image-inline" title="Apar Gupta" /></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>Additionally, he analyzed the provisions of the Draft Privacy Bill
using three judgments. In these judgments, different entities sought of
various forms of speech to be blocked under privacy claims. He spoke
about the dangers of a statutory right for privacy that does not
safeguard freedom of speech and expression. Considering that the privacy
statute may allow for a form of civil action permitting private parties
to approach courts to stop certain publications, he stressed the
importance for legislators to ensure balanced privacy legislation
inclusive of freedom of speech and expression.</p>
<h3>Sexual Minorities and Privacy<br /></h3>
<p><strong>Danish Sheikh</strong>, researcher at Alternative Law Forum</p>
<table class="plain">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/danish.jpg/image_preview" alt="Danish " class="image-inline image-inline" title="Danish " /></td>
<td>Danish examined the status of sexual minorities in the light of privacy
framework in India. The tag of decriminalization has served to greatly
alter the way institutions approach the question of privacy when it
comes to sexual minorities. He used the Naz Foundation judgment as a
chronological marker to map the developments in the right to privacy and
sexual minorities over the years.
<p>He outlined four key effects on the right to privacy due to the Naz Foundation judgment:</p>
<ul><li>Prepared the understanding of privacy as a positive right and placed obligations on the state,</li><li>Discussed privacy as dealing with persons and not just places, it took into account decisional privacy as well as zonal privacy,</li><li>Connected privacy with dignity and the valuable worth of individuals, and</li><li>Included privacy on one’s autonomous identity.</li></ul>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>He described various incidents that took place before the Naz Foundation judgment, pre-Naz, that altered the way we conceived of queer rights in general and privacy in particular, including the Lucknow incidents, transgender toilets, passport forms, the medical establishment and lesbian unions. Post-Naz, he described two incidents including the Allahabad Muslim University sting operation as well as the TV9 “Expose” that captured public imagination. </p>
<p>He concluded by asking: “What do these stories tell us about privacy?” The issues faced by the transgender community tell us that privacy doesn’t necessarily encompass a one-size-fits-all approach, and can raise as many questions as it answers. The issues faced by the Lucknow NGOs display the institutionalized disrespect for privacy and that has marginally more devastating consequences for the homosexual community by the spectre of outing. The issues faced by lesbian women evidence yet another need for breaching the public/private divide, demonstrating how the protection of the law might be welcome in the family sphere. Alternate sexual orientation and gender identity might bring the community under a common rubric, but distilling the components of that rubric is essential for engaging in any kind of useful understanding of the community and the kind of privacy violations it suffers – or engage with situations when the lack of privacy is empowering.</p>
<h2>Session III: Privacy and National Security</h2>
<p><strong>Menaka Guruswamy</strong>, Advocate, Supreme Court of India</p>
<table class="plain">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td>Menaka explored national security and its relationship to privacy. In
her presentation, she compared the similar manner in which the courts
approach national security and privacy issues. The courts feel national
security and privacy issues are too complex to define, therefore, they
take a case-by-case approach.<br />
<br />
<p>Ms. Guruswamy described three incidents that urged her to question
national security and privacy. First, she was interested in the lack of
regulation surrounding intelligence agencies and was involved in the
introduction of the Regulations of Intelligence Agencies Bill as a
private members bill. Second, national security litigation between the
Salwa Judum judgment and the State of Chhattisgarh is an example of how
national security triumphs constitutional rights and values. Third,
privacy in the context of the impending litigation of Naz Foundation in
the Supreme Court. She described the larger conversation of national security focus on
values of equality and privacy. She discussed the following questions
that serve in advancing certain conception of rights:</p>
<ul><li>How do we posit privacy which necessarily, philosophically as
well as judicially, is carved out as the right of an individual to be
left alone?</li><li>What are the consequences when national security,
which is posited as the rights of the nation, is in conflict with the
right of the individual to be left alone?</li><li>Considering that
constitutional rights are posited as a public facet of citizenship how
does a right to privacy play in that context?</li></ul>
</td>
<td><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/copy_of_menaka.jpg/image_preview" alt="Menaka" class="image-inline image-inline" title="Menaka" /></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<h3>Privacy and UID</h3>
<p><strong>R. Ramakumar</strong>, professor at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences</p>
<table class="plain">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/ramkumar.jpg/image_preview" title="Ramakumar" height="171" width="202" alt="Ramakumar" class="image-inline image-inline" /></td>
<td>Prof. Ramakumar spoke on UID, its collection of information and the
threat to individual privacy. First, he provided a historical trajectory
of national security that has led to increased identity card schemes.
He described the concrete connection between UID and national security.
<p><br />He briefed the gathering on the objectives of the UID project. He
described several false claims as proposed by the UIDAI. He explicitly
disproved the UIDAI claim that Aadhaar is voluntary. He did this by
comparing various legislations associated with the National Population
Registrar that had provisions mandating the inclusion of the UID number.</p>
<p> </p>
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>He went on to explain that the misplaced emphasis of technology to
handle large populations remains unproven. He described two specific
violations of privacy inherent in the UID system: convergence of
information and consent. The UID database makes it possible for the
linking or convergence of information across silos. In addition, consent
is unaccounted for in the UID system. The UID enrollment form requires
consent from a person to share their information. However, the software
of the enrollment form automatically checks ‘yes’, therefore you are not
asked. Even if you disagree, it automatically checks ‘yes’. Default
consent raises the important question, “to what extent are we the owners
of our information?” and “what are the privacy implications?”</p>
<p>Mr. Ramakumar was once asked, by Yashwant Sinha in a Parliamentary Standing Committee meeting, “Is the Western concept of privacy important in developing country like India?”. Using this question posed to him, he stressed the importance of privacy to be understood as a globally valued right, entitlement and freedom. He also referred to Amartya Sen’s work on individual freedoms.</p>
<h2>Conclusion</h2>
<p>During the daylong consultation numerous questions and themes relating to privacy were discussed:</p>
<table class="plain">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td>
<ul><li>How is the right to privacy defined?</li><li>How can the <a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/draft-bill-on-right-to-privacy" class="internal-link" title="Draft Bill on Right to Privacy">Draft Privacy Bill</a> redefine the right to privacy?</li><li>How can reasonable deterrence mechanisms be included?</li><li>Does duplication of the right to privacy exists in different statutes?</li><li>Is the Cyber Appellate Tribunal an ideal monitoring mechanism or authority? <br /></li><li>What are the circumstances under which authorized persons can exercise the Right of privacy invasion?</li><li>How can the Draft Privacy Bill account for the right to dignity?</li><li>How much information should the State be allowed to collect?</li><li>How can citizens become more informed about the use of their information and the privacy implications involved?</li><li>What would be the appropriate balance or trade-off between security and civil liberties?</li><li>What are the dangers with permitting the needs of national security to trump competing values?</li><li>What are the consequences for the homosexual community, when faced with institutionalized disregard for privacy? </li></ul>
</td>
<td><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/copy_of_usha.jpg/image_preview" alt="Usha " class="image-inline image-inline" title="Usha " /></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p> <img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/contests.jpg/image_preview" alt="Participants" class="image-inline image-inline" title="Participants" /></p>
<p> </p>
<p> </p>
<p><a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/proposed-privacy-bill" class="internal-link" title="Proposed Privacy Bill"><br /></a></p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/privacy-matters-analyzing-the-right-to-privacy-bill'>http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/privacy-matters-analyzing-the-right-to-privacy-bill</a>
</p>
No publishernatashaPrivacyFreedom of Speech and ExpressionPublic AccountabilityInternet GovernanceFeatured2012-02-15T04:27:28ZBlog EntryPrimer on the New IT Act
http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/primer-it-act
<b>With this draft information bulletin, we briefly discuss some of the problems with the Information Technology Act, and invite your comments.</b>
<p align="justify">The latest amendments to
the Information Technology Act 2000, passed in December 2008 by the
Lok Sabha, and the draft rules framed under it contain several provisions
that can be abused and misused to infringe seriously on citizens'
fundamental rights and basic civil liberties. We have already <a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/it-act/short-note-on-amendment-act-2008" class="internal-link" title="Short note on IT Amendment Act, 2008">written about some of the problems</a> with this Act earlier. With this information bulletin, drafted by Chennai-based advocate Ananth Padmanabhan, we wish to extend that analysis into the form of a citizens' dialogue highlighting ways in which the Act and the rules under it fail. Thus, we invite your comments, suggestions, and queries, as this is very much a work in progress. We will eventually consolidate this dialogue and follow up with the government on the concerns of its citizens.</p>
<h3 align="justify">Intermediaries
beware</h3>
<p align="justify">Internet service
providers, webhosting service providers, search engines, online
payment sites, online auction sites, online market places, and cyber
cafes are all examples of “intermediaries” under this Act. The
Government can force any of these intermediaries to cooperate with
any interception, monitoring or decryption of data by stating broad
and ambiguous reasons such as the “interest of the sovereignty or
integrity of India”, “defence of India”, “security of the
State”, “friendly relations with foreign States”, “public
order” or for “preventing incitement to” or “investigating”
the commission of offences related to those. This power can be abused
to infringe on the privacy of intermediaries as well as to hamper
their constitutional right to conduct their business without interference.</p>
<p align="justify">If a Google search on
“Osama Bin Laden” throws up an article that claims to have
discovered his place of hiding, the Government of India can issue a
direction authorizing the police to monitor Google’s servers to
find the source of this information. While Google can, of course,
establish that this information cannot be attributed directly to the
organization, making the search unwarranted, that would not help it
much. While section 69 grants the government these wide-ranging
powers, it does not provide for adequate safeguards in the form of having to show due cause or having an in-built right of appeal against a decision by the government. If Google refused
to cooperate under such circumstances, its directors would be liable
to imprisonment of up to seven years.</p>
<h3 align="justify">Pre-censorship<br /></h3>
<p align="justify">The State has been given
unbridled power to block access to websites as long as such blocking
is deemed to be in the interest of sovereignty and integrity of
India, defence of India, security of the State, friendly relations
with foreign States, and other such matters.</p>
<p align="justify">Thus, if a web portal or
blog carries or expresses views critical of the Indo-US nuclear deal,
the government can block access to the website and thus muzzle criticism
of its policies. While some may find that suggestion outlandish, it is very much possible under the Act. Since there is no right to be heard before your website is taken down nor is there an in-built mechanism for the website owner to appeal, the decisions made by the government cannot be questioned unless you are prepared to undertake a costly legal battle. </p>
<p align="justify">Again, if an intermediary (like Blogspot or an ISP like Airtel) refuses to cooperate, its directors may be personally liable to imprisonment for up to a period of seven years. Thus, being personally liable, the intermediaries are rid of any incentive to stand up for the freedom of speech and expression.</p>
<h3 align="justify">We need to monitor your computer: you have a virus<br /></h3>
<p align="justify">The government has been
vested with the power to authorize the monitoring and collection of
traffic data and information generated, transmitted, received or
stored in any computer resource. This provision is much too
widely-worded. </p>
<p align="justify">For instance, if the
government feels that there is a virus on your computer that can
spread to another computer, it can demand access to monitor your
e-mails on the ground that such monitoring enhances “cyber
security” and prevents “the spread of computer contaminants”.</p>
<h3 align="justify">Think before you click "Send"<br /></h3>
<p align="justify">If out of anger you send
an e-mail for the purpose of causing “annoyance” or
“inconvenience”, you may be liable for imprisonment up to three
years along with a fine. While that provision (section 66A(c)) was
meant to combat spam and phishing attacks, it criminalizes much more
than it should.</p>
<h3 align="justify">A new brand of "cyber terrorists" <br /></h3>
<p align="justify">The new offence of “cyber
terrorism” has been introduced, which is so badly worded that it
borders on the ludicrous. If a journalist gains
unauthorized access to a computer where information regarding
corruption by certain members of the judiciary is stored, she becomes
a “cyber terrorist” as the information may be used to cause
contempt of court. There is no precedent for any such definition of cyberterrorism. It is unclear what definition of terrorism the government is going by when even unauthorized access to defamatory material is considered cyberterrorism.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/primer-it-act'>http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/primer-it-act</a>
</p>
No publisherpraneshIT ActDigital GovernancePublic AccountabilityIntermediary LiabilityCensorship2011-08-02T07:41:54ZBlog EntryPost and be Damned
http://editors.cis-india.org/news/telegraphindia-opinion-story-kavitha-shanmugham-nov-14-2012-post-and-be-damned
<b>Your careless comments online could put you in jail, thanks to Section 66A of the Information Technology Act. Kavitha Shanmugam examines a law that some critics say is vague and unconstitutional</b>
<hr />
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Kavita Shanmugham's column was <a class="external-link" href="http://www.telegraphindia.com/1121114/jsp/opinion/story_16193233.jsp#.UKmmGmfm71V">published in the Telegraph</a> on November 14, 2012. Pranesh Prakash is quoted.</p>
<hr />
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Two weeks ago, S. Ravi, owner of a small plastic packaging unit in Puducherry, was rudely woken up by the police at 5am, manhandled and arrested. Reason: Ravi had posted a couple of unflattering comments about Karti Chidambaram, son of finance minister P. Chidambaram, on Twitter. He had tweeted that Chidambaram Junior "had amassed more wealth than Robert Vadra".</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Ravi was arrested under Section 66A of the Information Technology (IT) Act, 2008, and hauled up before a judicial magistrate who remanded him to nine days in custody. "It was then that I became really scared," says Ravi, who is out on bail.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">A casual tweeter with just 16 followers, Ravi believes he did nothing wrong. “I was using a statement that was already there on the Internet. They could have sent me a lawyer’s notice or investigated the complaint before taking action,” argues Ravi, whose Twitter following has now jumped to 2,518.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">"My tweet was retweeted by 20,000 people, who dared the authorities to arrest them too," he adds indignantly, terming Section 66A a “draconian law" with "wide scope for misuse".</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Ravi is not alone in denouncing Section 66A of the IT Act. Indeed, there is now a huge outcry against the law, with a section of legal and cyber experts saying that it is nothing but a useful tool in the hands of the powers that be to curb freedom of speech and expression online.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">At the same time, there are those who believe that online abuse or defamation cannot masquerade as freedom of speech and that the law is necessary to move against those who commit this offence.</p>
<p align="LEFT">Karti Chidambaram, for one, believes that Ravi’s tweet was motivated and defamatory. "The tweeter made one tweet in 78 days. It was about me. It clearly implied that I am corrupt. That is malicious. So I preferred a complaint to the police. The law exists. I didn’t frame the law," he says.</p>
<table class="invisible">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td style="text-align: justify; ">
<p>Section 66A of the IT Act lays down that a person can be punished with up to three years’ imprisonment if he or she sends offensive information or messages through a computer resource or communication device. The problem arises because it fails to clarify what can be termed "offensive". For example, information that is "grossly offensive" or has "menacing character” or information disseminated for the “purpose of causing annoyance and inconvenience" are all brought under the ambit of "offensive". This leaves the law wide open for various interpretations and abuse.</p>
<p>"It’s too vaguely worded," insists M. Lenin, a lawyer advising volunteers of India Against Corruption in Chennai. “Any online statement can be declared 'offensive' and any tweet may be deemed ‘inconvenient’. The section has become a convenient tool for the police to harass people."</p>
</td>
<th><img src="http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/karti.jpg" alt="Karti Chidambaram" class="image-inline" title="Karti Chidambaram" /></th>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Earlier this year, Section 66A was also invoked, among other laws, to arrest Jadavpur University professor Ambikesh Mahapatra for forwarding an email cartoon of West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Indeed, some experts go a step further and call Section 66A patently unconstitutional. Says Pranesh Prakash, policy director, Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, "It’s clearly in violation of Article 19(1)(a) of our Constitution that guarantees freedom of speech. The fact that some information is ‘grossly offensive’ (Section 66A) or that it causes ‘annoyance’ or ‘inconvenience’ while being known to be false (Section 66A(c)) cannot be a reason for curbing freedom of speech unless it is directly related to violating decency, morality or public order, or amounts to defamation."</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">However, apologists for Section 66A argue that the law has its merits too in that it can be used to move against genuine incidents of harassment or defamation online. Take the case of Chinmayee Sripada, a popular Chennai-based playback singer. Chinmayee, who has one lakh followers on Twitter, was targeted by a group of six men who sent her lewd and threatening tweets for a period of time. Apparently, they were upset with her remarks on reservation and for not joining them in a Twitter campaign against the killing of Tamil Nadu fishermen by the Sri Lankan navy.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Recently, Chinmayee complained to the police with “thousands of pages of ugliness and vulgarity” and the trolls, including a professor at the National Institute of Fashion Technology, Chennai, were identified and arrested under Section 66A.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The offending tweeters apologised to her and closed their accounts after the arrest. "I believe Section 66A belled the cat. The arrest made people realise that Twitter also demands self-regulation. In the name of freedom of speech there is zero control on platforms like Twitter. There should be some boundaries," says Chinmayee’s mother T. Padmahasini.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Ramachandra Murthy, Ravi’s lawyer, too believes that Section 66A is a "good tool" for genuine cases of harassment. "Unfortunately, it is being misused by influential people. Still, if you are innocent the case can never hold up in court," he reasons.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Others question the need for a separate law to deal with cases of online defamation or harassment when the Indian Penal Code already has provisions to tackle them. New Delhi-based lawyer Apar Gupta cites the examples of Section 500, 499 and 294 of the IPC which deal with defamation or committing obscene acts in public. "Section 66A only makes the burden on the accused harsher," he adds.</p>
<p align="LEFT">While some IT experts want Section 66A scrapped, others say that it should at least be amended. “Even if the section is not struck off the statute books, the provisions in it may be read down by the courts and safeguards may be prescribed in its application,” says Gupta.</p>
<p align="LEFT">Until that happens, mistaking social media platforms for online drawing rooms where you can indulge in all kinds of freewheeling chat could be fraught with danger.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Justice A.P. Shah, a former chief justice of the Delhi High Court, echoes that view. "Section 66A is very broad and loosely worded. The scope of such a law has to be restricted. Instead, it is vague and clearly violative of Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution that guarantees freedom of speech and expression," he says.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/news/telegraphindia-opinion-story-kavitha-shanmugham-nov-14-2012-post-and-be-damned'>http://editors.cis-india.org/news/telegraphindia-opinion-story-kavitha-shanmugham-nov-14-2012-post-and-be-damned</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaFreedom of Speech and ExpressionPublic AccountabilityInternet GovernanceCensorship2012-11-19T03:40:46ZNews ItemPolitical war on the web
http://editors.cis-india.org/news/www-tehelka-com-kunal-majumder-tehelka-magazine-vol-9-issue-36-sep-8-2012-political-war-on-the-web
<b>Twitter is not only the ‘people’s voice’. It is also a forum for orchestrated propaganda.Kunal Majumder tracks the BJP-Congress online duel.</b>
<hr />
<p>Kunal Majumder's article was <a class="external-link" href="http://www.tehelka.com/story_main53.asp?filename=Ne080912Political.asp">published</a> in Tehelka Magazine, Vol 9, Issue 36, Dated 08 Sept 2012. Pranesh Prakash is quoted.</p>
<hr />
<table class="invisible">
<tbody>
<tr>
<th><img align="middle" src="http://www.tehelka.com/channels/News/2012/September/08/images/digvijay.jpg" /></th><th><img align="middle" src="http://www.tehelka.com/channels/News/2012/September/08/images/sushma.jpg" /></th>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>New battlelines Digvijaya Singh (left) and Sushma Swaraj are active tweeples<br />Photos: Shailendra Pandey</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">ON 27 August, as the Congress and the BJP battled it out in Parliament and later through news conferences, the story on Twitter was a bit different. Congress supporters, who had been at the receiving end of the ‘Coalgate’ issue so far, finally started hitting back. Adopting a strategy they had so far been accusing right-wingers of, they launched into an all-out attack on anyone who supported the BJP. Every tweet was hashtagged with #RIPBJP. At the end of the day, #RIPBJP was trending, making it the most successful Congress campaign against the BJP — a first on Twitter.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">“The social media battle against the BJP has just begun,” says a Congress supporter associated with the new project. “In the days to come, you will see our volunteers in a more combative mode.” However, he says it will not “replicate the negative campaign of the right-wing”.<br /><br />The Congress’ social media strategy is spearheaded by its tech-savvy General Secretary Digvijaya Singh. On Twitter for nearly nine months, Singh has been readying to take on the BJP on its own turf and influence the ‘voice of people’. Though serious doubt remains about how much of this voice is real and how much is a result of political propaganda.<br /><br />The push for the Congress to take the battle online comes from the recent ‘banning’ of Twitter handles of BJP sympathiser and senior journalist Kanchan Gupta. While the government insists that the handles were blocked due to security issues, Gupta claimed political martyrdom and launched a tirade against the Congress for imposing a second Emergency. Hashtags like #Emergency2012 and #GOIBlocks started trending, with BJP supporters turning their display pictures to black. "The fact remains none of the blockings were politically motivated,” says Pranesh Prakash, programme manager with Centre for Internet and Society. Prakash instead points to the UPA’s earlier request to IT companies like Google and Facebook to pull down certain pages, which displayed morphed photos and cartoons of Congress “functionaries” as clear example of politically motivated intervention.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Though no explanation was forthcoming from the government as to why specific handles were blocked temporarily through ISPs (Twitter has still not blocked them), the PMO issued a statement saying it has requested Twitter to take “appropriate action against six persons impersonating the PMO”. Certain handles like @PM0India (with a ‘zero’) were often accused of impersonating the actual @PMOIndia. But that’s another story.</p>
<table class="invisible">
<tbody>
<tr>
<th>
<hr />
#Emergency2012 and #GOIBlocks started trending, <br />with various BJP supporters turning their display pictures to black
<hr />
</th>
<td style="text-align: justify; ">The day Gupta’s handle was ‘blocked’, former bureaucrat B Raman wrote a blog that gave an interesting insight into why the government might have targeted Gupta. Raman describes a meeting that took place in Ahmedabad in 2008 — just before the 2009 General Elections — attended by senior BJP leaders and sympathisers, including Gupta. Raman says the general feeling among BJP participants was that mainstream media was not giving enough opportunities to the BJP and other right-wing activists to air their views. Therefore, “it was suggested by some participants that the BJP could get over this handicap by making good use of the online media”. Raman goes on to point that supporters of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and other right-wingers have since then used online media superbly with help of IT-savvy Hindutva supporters.</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">What Raman wrote in his blog is confirmed by the BJP’s IT Cell Convener, Arvind Gupta. The BJP was not only the first political party in India to have a website in 1999, its social media network has been way ahead of any other political group in the country. From posting updates to engaging users, it has a well-oiled social media machinery in place. Arvind calls this the “listen, engage and inform” model. This includes Internet TV, YouTube and messenger chats. In fact, the next big thing on the party’s social media agenda is the interaction with Narendra Modi on Google+ Hangout.</p>
<hr />
<p style="text-align: justify; "><b>Poli-Tweeting</b></p>
<table class="invisible">
<tbody>
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<th><img align="middle" src="http://www.tehelka.com/channels/News/2012/September/08/images/twi1.jpg" /></th>
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<td><img align="middle" src="http://www.tehelka.com/channels/News/2012/September/08/images/sushma2.jpg" /></td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><b>Poli-Faking</b></p>
<table class="invisible">
<tbody>
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<th><img align="middle" src="http://www.tehelka.com/channels/News/2012/September/08/images/tweet1.jpg" /></th>
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<td><img align="middle" src="http://www.tehelka.com/channels/News/2012/September/08/images/advani.jpg" /></td>
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<td><img align="middle" src="http://www.tehelka.com/channels/News/2012/September/08/images/neta.jpg" /></td>
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<td><img align="middle" src="http://www.tehelka.com/channels/News/2012/September/08/images/bjp.jpg" /></td>
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<p style="text-align: justify; ">BUT IT is not political agenda that has left Digvijaya Singh singed. Speaking to TEHELKA, Singh points to abusive — and at times, factually incorrect — tweets posted by right-wing supporters. In many cases, the mere mention of anything against Modi or Baba Ramdev would have scores of right-wing supporters bombarding Twitter timelines with counter-criticism, and often, abuses. “Anything that incites hate is a problem,” he says.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Though what can be called ‘hate’ is a very subjective matter, Arvind Gupta feels social media reflects the mood of the young population. “People call themselves Internet Hindus. We, as a party, have nothing to do with this. People are so passionate about Modi that they take up his case (against anyone who posts anti-Modi tweets),” says Gupta. He also points towards a similar trend when it comes to people tweeting against Team Anna.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Many right-wing Twitter users are accused of posting sponsored tweets against specific people who they believe are anti-BJP. This accusation has not been proven so far, though many users claim to have tracked interaction between rightwing Twitter users on coordinated attacks on users with liberal or pro-Congress ideologies. “There is a belief — and let me tell you that it is wrong — that we hire people,” says Gupta. So can the high number of right-wing users be put down to an ideological stance alone? Gupta says it’s got to do with understanding politics better. “Our volunteers are generally more educated and understand the the Congress’ wrong policies. That category also forms a major part of the ecosystem in this new media,” he says.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Within minutes of talking to this correspondent, Gupta posts a new hashtag on Twitter — #MotaMaal — taking a cue from Sushma Swaraj’s accusation of corruption against the Congress in the coal scam. The next day, Twitter became all about #MotaMaal versus #RIPBJP. Handles like @BJP0fficials and @PMAdvani have been created to counter the right wing. Clearly, Congress supporters are hitting back even at the risk of adding to the cacophony of an already-chaotic medium.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; "><i>Kunal Majumder is a Principal Correspondent with Tehelka</i>.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/news/www-tehelka-com-kunal-majumder-tehelka-magazine-vol-9-issue-36-sep-8-2012-political-war-on-the-web'>http://editors.cis-india.org/news/www-tehelka-com-kunal-majumder-tehelka-magazine-vol-9-issue-36-sep-8-2012-political-war-on-the-web</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaSocial mediaFreedom of Speech and ExpressionPublic AccountabilityInternet GovernanceCensorship2012-09-05T05:27:24ZNews ItemPitroda seeks to put govt information in public domain
http://editors.cis-india.org/news/www-livemint-september-25-2012-surabhi-agarwal-pitroda-seeks-to-put-govt-information-in-public-domain
<b>In the first-ever Indian government press conference on Twitter, Sam Pitroda, adviser to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on public information infrastructure and innovations, championed the cause of putting government information in the public domain to usher in openness and empowerment. </b>
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<p>Surabhi Agarwal's article was <a class="external-link" href="http://origin-www.livemint.com/Politics/5xXKN9JH15noiYuQtVQtrL/Governments-first-ever-conference-on-Twitter-to-begin-short.html">published in LiveMint</a> on September 25, 2012. Sunil Abraham is quoted.</p>
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<p> </p>
<p><img alt=" " src="http://origin-www.livemint.com/rw/LiveMint/Period1/2012/09/26/Photos/sam%20pitroda1--621x414.jpg" title=" " /></p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">“In India, we have the Right to Information (Act) but the information is locked up in files,” he said in a video that was uploaded on YouTube before the conference started. Pitroda said the government has various plans to build robust information infrastructure on a scale that has never been done before.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">“I firmly believe that information is the fourth pillar of democracy along with (the) legislature, executive and judiciary,” he tweeted as opening remarks during the press conference titled “Democratization of information”.</p>
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<p>Even though Pitroda largely reiterated the government’s already announced plans in the space of digitization, the move to hold a press conference over Twitter has been largely construed as as a sign that the administration, criticised for attempting to rein in social media, is trying to come to terms with it.</p>
<p>Sunil Abraham, executive director of Bangalore-based research organization Centre for Internet and Society, said too much shouldn’t be read into Pitroda holding a press conference on Twitter. One government bureaucrat available on Twitter for a fixed period doesn’t make up for the non-existence of the government on social media, he said. “They (government) should be available all the time.”</p>
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<p style="text-align: justify; ">The department of electronics and information technology recently issued guidelines for government agencies on improved engagement with citizens through social media. Tuesday’s press conference may spark a trend of more such engagements on social media platforms by government agencies.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Pitroda said that the public information infrastructure (PII) will include a national knowledge network that will connect 1,500 nodes for universities, colleges, research labs and libraries along with connecting 250,000 panchayats in the country through fibre optics. The information network will be operational in the next two year, Pitroda said in the YouTube video.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The government’s open data platform (<i>http://www.data.gov.in</i>), the beta site for which was launched some time ago, will provide access to government data and documents, he said.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Even though the government’s battles with the Internet continue over issues of regulation, which have often been construed as censorship, an increasing number of political leaders and agencies have been using the route to get their message across.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">Gujarat chief minister <a href="http://origin-www.livemint.com/Search/Link/Keyword/Narendra%20Modi">Narendra Modi</a> has sought to engage with people through video chat on <a href="http://origin-www.livemint.com/Search/Link/Keyword/Google+">Google+</a> Hangout. West Bengal chief minister and Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief <a href="http://origin-www.livemint.com/Search/Link/Keyword/Mamata%20Banerjee">Mamata Banerjee</a> has been using <a href="http://origin-www.livemint.com/Search/Link/Keyword/Facebook">Facebook</a> to make public her views on recent economic and political developments.</p>
<p style="text-align: justify; ">The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has also been communicating over Twitter in the recent past. The authorities have sought to block accounts that style themselves as belonging to the Prime Minister. Account holders have said that some of these are satirical in nature.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/news/www-livemint-september-25-2012-surabhi-agarwal-pitroda-seeks-to-put-govt-information-in-public-domain'>http://editors.cis-india.org/news/www-livemint-september-25-2012-surabhi-agarwal-pitroda-seeks-to-put-govt-information-in-public-domain</a>
</p>
No publisherpraskrishnaFreedom of Speech and ExpressionPublic AccountabilityInternet GovernanceSocial media2012-09-27T05:13:05ZNews ItemOpening Government: A Guide to Best Practice in Transparency, Accountability and Civic Engagement across the Public Sector
http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/opening-government-best-practice-guide
<b>The Transparency & Accountability Initiative has published a book called “Opening Government: A Guide to Best Practice in Transparency, Accountability and Civic Engagement across the Public Sector”. We at the Centre for Internet & Society contributed the section on Open Government Data.</b>
<p>Cross-posted from the <a class="external-link" href="http://www.transparency-initiative.org/reports/opening-government">Transparency & Accountability Initiative blog</a>.</p>
<p>Download <a class="external-link" href="http://www.transparency-initiative.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Opening-Government3.pdf">the full report</a> (PDF, 440 Kb)</p>
<h3>Open Government Partnership</h3>
<p>In January 2011, a small group of government and civil society leaders from around the world gathered in Washington, DC to brainstorm on how to build upon growing global momentum around transparency, accountability and civic participation in governance. The result was the creation of the Open Government Partnership (OGP), a new multi-stakeholder coalition of governments, civil society and private sector actors working to advance open government around the world — with the goals of increasing public sector responsiveness to citizens, countering corruption, promoting economic efficiencies, harnessing innovation, and improving the delivery of services.</p>
<p>In September 2011, these founding OGP governments will gather in New York on the margins of the UN General Assembly to embrace a set of high-level open government principles, announce country-specific commitments for putting these principles into practice and invite civil society to assess their performance going forward. Also in September, a diverse coalition of governments will stand up and announce their intention to join a six-month process culminating in the announcement of their own OGP commitments and signing of the declaration of principles in January 2012.</p>
<h3>'Opening Government' report</h3>
<p>To help inform governments, civil society and the private sector in developing their OGP commitments, the Transparency and Accountability Initiative (T/A Initiative) reached out to leading experts across a wide range of open government fields to gather their input on current best practice and the practical steps that OGP participants and other governments can take to achieve it.</p>
<p>The result is the first document of its kind to compile the state of the art in transparency, accountability and citizen participation across 15 areas of governance, ranging from broad categories such as access to information, service delivery and budgeting to more specific sectors such as forestry, procurement and climate finance.</p>
<p>Each expert’s contribution is organized according to three tiers of potential commitments around open government for any given sector — minimal steps for countries starting from a relatively low baseline, more substantial steps for countries that have already made moderate progress, and most ambitious steps for countries that are advanced performers on open government.</p>
<h3>Chapters and Contributing Authors</h3>
<ol>
<li>Aid – <a href="http://www.publishwhatyoufund.org/" target="_blank" title="Publish What You Fund">Publish What You Fund</a></li>
<li>Asset disclosure - <a href="http://www.globalintegrity.org/" target="_blank" title="Global Integrity">Global Integrity</a></li>
<li>Budgets – <a href="http://www.internationalbudget.org/" target="_blank" title="IBP">The International Budget Project</a></li>
<li>Campaign finance – <a href="http://www.transparency-usa.org/" target="_blank" title="TI USA">Transparency International - USA</a></li>
<li>Climate finance – <a href="http://www.wri.org/" target="_blank" title="WRI">World Resources Institute</a></li>
<li>Fisheries – <a href="http://transparentsea.co/" target="_blank" title="TransparentSea">TransparentSea</a></li>
<li>Financial sector reform <a href="http://www.gfip.org/" target="_blank" title="Global Financial Integrity">Global Financial Integrity</a></li>
<li>Forestry – <a href="http://www.globalwitness.org/" target="_blank" title="Global Witness">Global Witness</a></li>
<li>Electricity – <a href="http://electricitygovernance.wri.org/" target="_blank" title="Electricity Governance Initiative">Electricity Governance Initiative</a></li>
<li>Environment – <a href="http://www.accessinitiative.org/" target="_blank" title="The Access Initiative">The Access Initiative</a></li>
<li>Extractive industries – <a href="http://www.revenuewatch.org/" target="_blank" title="RWI">The Revenue Watch Institute</a></li>
<li>Open government data – <a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/" target="_blank" title="CIS India">The Centre for Internet and Society - India</a></li>
<li>Procurement – <a href="http://www.transparency-usa.org/" target="_blank" title="TI USA">Transparency International-USA</a></li>
<li>Right to information – <a href="http://www.access-info.org/" target="_blank" title="Access Info">Access Info</a> and the <a href="http://www.law-democracy.org/" target="_blank" title="Center for Law and Democracy">Center for Law and Democracy</a></li>
<li>Service delivery – <a href="http://www.twaweza.org/" target="_blank" title="Twaweza">Twaweza</a></li>
</ol>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/opening-government-best-practice-guide'>http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/opening-government-best-practice-guide</a>
</p>
No publisherpraneshDigital GovernanceOpen DataPublic AccountabilityOpennesse-governance2012-12-14T10:26:42ZBlog EntryOpen Letter to the Vatican: Request for Holy See to Comment on IPR
http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/open-letter-to-the-vatican-request-for-holy-see-to-comment-on-ipr
<b>Due to the Holy See’s demonstrated pro-access position to medicines and published materials for persons with disabilities, the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) requested for His Excellency, Archbishop Silvano M. Tomasi, to also consider copyrights, patents or IPR more generally, as the Holy See’s Permanent Observer at WIPO. We strongly encourage other organizations and civil society groups to modify this letter, as needed, and to contact the Holy See Mission to the United Nations (and WIPO) in Geneva in order to help us prompt His Excellency to contribute to the international dialogue on IPR.</b>
<hr />
<p>You may view the original letter sent by CIS <a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/cis-original-open-letter-to-the-vatican-request-for-holy-see-to-comment-on-ipr" class="internal-link">here</a>.</p>
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<p>His Excellency, Archbishop Silvano M. Tomasi, Apostolic Nuncio<br />Holy See Mission to the United Nations in Geneva<br />P.O. Box 28<br />1292 Chambésy<br />Geneva, Switzerland<br />mission.holy-see@ties.itu.int<br />+41 22 758 98 20</p>
<p><strong>Friday, January 24, 2014<br /><br /></strong></p>
<p align="justify">Your Excellency Archbishop Silvano M. Tomasi,</p>
<p align="justify"><strong>Subject: Call for the Holy See’s comment on Intellectual Property Rights</strong></p>
<p><strong> </strong></p>
<p align="justify">On behalf of the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), Bangalore, India, I, Samantha Cassar, write to Your Excellency’s opinion on copyrights, patents and intellectual property rights.</p>
<p align="justify">We are a not-for-profit, non-governmental research organization that works on addressing policy issues related to access to knowledge and intellectual property law reform (http://cis-india.org/a2k), and accessibility for persons with disabilities (http://cis-india.org/accessibility) among other areas related to internet and information and communication technologies.</p>
<p align="justify">CIS is an accredited organization with the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) and a regular participant at the meetings of the Standing Committee on Copyrights and Related Rights (SCCR), the Standing Committee on the Law of Patents (SCP), as well as the Committee on Development and Intellectual Property.</p>
<p align="justify">At the outset, we commend Your Excellency for signing the Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for Persons Who Are Blind, Visually Impaired, or Otherwise Print Disabled. As one of the contributors to this treaty, we appreciate the concern of the Holy See for those who are marginalised within our information society by their disabilities.</p>
<p align="justify">As Pranesh Prakash, Policy Director from CIS noted at Marrakesh during the adoption of this treaty, “When copyright doesn't serve public welfare, states must intervene, and the law must change to promote human rights, the freedom of expression and to receive and impart information, and to protect authors and consumers.” We are happy to see this being done through a treaty as such.</p>
<p align="justify">Also said by Your Excellency, within the Holy See’s statement at the 9th Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO), “Among the most damaging concessions developing countries make in regional and bilateral agreements are those enhancing the monopolies on life-saving medicines, which reduce access and affordability and those that provide excessive legal rights to foreign investors, limiting the policy space for nations to promote sustainable and inclusive development.”</p>
<p align="justify">Given the Holy See’s demonstrated standpoint on the accessing of medicines and published works, we at the Centre for Internet and Society would like to request Your Excellency to also consider <strong>copyrights, patents or more generally, intellectual property rights (IPR)</strong>, as Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations and Other International Organizations in Geneva.</p>
<p align="justify">On behalf of CIS, I am honoured to be writing to Your Excellency and for this request to be considered. Due to the ability of copyright and other forms of IPR to obstruct the access of one’s own human rights and even the sustainable development of one’s country, we feel this area must be crucially considered within an international dialogue—not only from a place of political strategy but also from principles of mercy and compassion.</p>
<p align="justify">With meetings approaching for both <strong>WIPO’s Standing Committee on the Law of Patents</strong> (January 27-31, 2014) and <strong>WIPO’s Committee on Development and Intellectual Property</strong> (May 19-23, 2014), we are very excited at the possibility of the Holy See enriching this discussion, and hope for such a contribution to take place when the international community is listening—at these meetings, or in any other form.<br /><br /></p>
<p>With Every Best Wish,<br />Sincerely Yours,</p>
<p><br />Samantha Cassar<br /><br />Programme Associate<br />The Centre for Internet & Society</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/open-letter-to-the-vatican-request-for-holy-see-to-comment-on-ipr'>http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/open-letter-to-the-vatican-request-for-holy-see-to-comment-on-ipr</a>
</p>
No publishersamanthaAccess to KnowledgeCopyrightPublic AccountabilityIntellectual Property RightsOpen Content2014-01-31T07:14:07ZBlog EntryOnline Pre-Censorship is Harmful and Impractical
http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/online-pre-censorship-harmful-impractical
<b>The Union Minister for Communications and Information Technology, Mr. Kapil Sibal wants Internet intermediaries to pre-censor content uploaded by their users. Pranesh Prakash takes issue with this and explains why this is a problem, even if the government's heart is in the right place. Further, he points out that now is the time to take action on the draconian IT Rules which are before the Parliament.</b>
<p>Mr. Sibal is a knowledgeable lawyer, and according to a senior lawyer friend of his with whom I spoke yesterday, greatly committed to ideals of freedom of speech. He would not lightly propose regulations that contravene Article 19(1)(a) [freedom of speech and expression] of our Constitution. Yet his recent proposals regarding controlling online speech seem unreasonable. My conclusion is that the minister has not properly grasped the way the Web works, is frustrated because of the arrogance of companies like Facebook, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft. And while he has his heart in the right place, his lack of knowledge of the Internet is leading him astray. The more important concern is the<a class="external-link" href="http://www.mit.gov.in/sites/upload_files/dit/files/RNUS_CyberLaw_15411.pdf"> IT Rules</a> that have been in force since April 2011.</p>
<h3>Background <br /></h3>
<p>The New York Times scooped a story on Monday revealing that Mr. Sibal and the <a class="external-link" href="http://www.mit.gov.in/">MCIT</a> had been <a class="external-link" href="http://india.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/05/india-asks-google-facebook-others-to-screen-user-content/?scp=2&sq=kapil%20sibal&st=cse">in touch with Facebook, Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft</a>, asking them to set up a system whereby they would manually filter user-generated content before it is published, to ensure that objectionable speech does not get published. Specifically, he mentioned content that hurt people's religious sentiments and content that Member of Parliament Shashi Tharoor described as <a class="external-link" href="http://zeenews.india.com/news/nation/i-am-against-web-censorship-shashi-tharoor_745587.html">'vile' and capable of inciting riots as being problems</a>. Lastly, Mr. Sibal defended this as not being "censorship" by the government, but "supervision" of user-generated content by the companies themselves.</p>
<h3>Concerns <br /></h3>
<p>One need not give lectures on the benefits of free speech, and Mr. Sibal is clear that he does not wish to impinge upon it. So one need not point out that freedom of speech means nothing if not the freedom to offend (as long as no harm is caused). There can, of course, be reasonable limitations on freedom of speech as provided in Article 19 of the <a class="external-link" href="http://www2.ohchr.org/english/law/ccpr.htm">ICCPR</a> and in Article 19(2) of our Constitution. My problem lies elsewhere.</p>
<h3>Secrecy <br /></h3>
<p>It is unfortunate that the New York Times has to be given credit for Mr. Sibal addressing a press conference on this issue (and he admitted as much). What he is proposing is not enforcement of existing rules and regulations, but of a new restriction on online speech. This should have, in a democracy, been put out for wide-ranging public consultations first.</p>
<h3>Making intermediaries responsible <br /></h3>
<p>The more fundamental disagreement is that over how the question of what should not be published should be decided, and how that decision should be and how that should be carried out, and who can be held liable for unlawful speech. I believe that "to make the intermediary liable for the user violating that code would, I think, not serve the larger interests of the market." Mr. Sibal said that in May this year <a class="external-link" href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304563104576355223687825048.html">in an interview with the Wall Street Journal</a>. The intermediaries (that is, all persons and companies who transmit or host content on behalf of a third party), are but messengers just like a post office and do not exercise editorial control, unlike a newspaper. (By all means prosecute Facebook, Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft whenever they have created unlawful content, have exercised editorial control over unlawful content, have incited and encouraged unlawful activities, or know after a court order or the like that they are hosting illegal content and still do not remove it.)
Newspapers have editors who can take responsibility for content published in the newspaper. They can afford to, because the number of articles in a newspaper is limited. YouTube, which has 48 hours of videos uploaded every minutes, cannot. One wag suggested that Mr. Sibal was not suggesting a means of censorship, but of employment generation and social welfare for censors and editors. To try and extend editorial duties to these 'intermediaries' by executive order or through 'forceful suggestions' to these companies cannot happen without amending s.79 of the Information Technology Act which ensures they are not to be held liable for their user's content: the users are.
Internet speech has, to my knowledge, and to date, has never caused a riot in India. It is when it is translated into inflammatory speeches on the ground with megaphones that offensive speech, whether in books or on the Internet, actually become harmful, and those should be targeted instead. And the same laws that apply to offline speech already apply online. If such speech is inciting violence then the police can be contacted and a magistrate can take action. Indeed, Internet companies like Facebook, Google, etc., exercise self-regulation already (excessively and wrongly, I feel sometimes). Any person can flag any content on YouTube or Facebook as violating the site's terms of use. Indeed, even images of breast-feeding mothers have been removed from Facebook on the basis of such complaints. So it is mistaken to think that there is no self-regulation. In two recent cases, the High Courts of Bombay (<a href="http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/janhit-manch-v-union-of-india" class="internal-link" title="Janhit Manch & Ors. v. The Union of India"><em>Janhit Manch v. Union of India</em></a>) and Madras (<em>R. Karthikeyan v. Union of India</em>) refused to direct the government and intermediaries to police online content, saying that places an excessive burden on freedom of speech.</p>
<h3>IT Rules, 2011 <br /></h3>
<p>In this regard, the IT Rules published in April 2011 are great offenders. While speech that is 'disparaging' (while not being defamatory) is not prohibited by any statute, yet intermediaries are required not to carry 'disparaging' speech, or speech to which the user has no right (how is this to be judged? do you have rights to the last joke that you forwarded?), or speech that promotes gambling (as the government of Sikkim does through the PlayWin lottery), and a myriad other kinds of speech that are not prohibited in print or on TV. Who is to judge whether something is 'disparaging'? The intermediary itself, on pain of being liable for prosecution if it is found have made the wrong decision. And any person may send a notice to an intermediary to 'disable' content, which has to be done within 36 hours if the intermediary doesn't want to be held liable. Worst of all, there is no requirement to inform the user whose content it is, nor to inform the public that the content is being removed. It just disappears, into a memory hole. It does not require a paranoid conspiracy theorist to see this as a grave threat to freedom of speech.
Many human rights activists and lawyers have made a very strong case that the IT Rules on Intermediary Due Diligence are unconstitutional. Parliament still has an opportunity to reject these rules until the end of the 2012 budget session. Parliamentarians must act now to uphold their oaths to the Constitution.</p>
<p>
For more details visit <a href='http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/online-pre-censorship-harmful-impractical'>http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/online-pre-censorship-harmful-impractical</a>
</p>
No publisherpraneshIT ActObscenityFreedom of Speech and ExpressionPublic AccountabilityYouTubeSocial mediaInternet GovernanceFeaturedIntermediary LiabilityCensorshipSocial Networking2011-12-12T17:00:50ZBlog Entry