Centre for Internet and Society

Financial Express hosts #NetNeutralityDebate: ‘Price discrimination can be allowed, but not for the same packet of data’

praskrishna — 2015-05-09T10:05:10Z

Trying to cut through the noise on Net Neutrality in India, FICCI in partnership with Financial Express is hosting a panel discussion titled “Decoding Net Neutrality” in New Delhi on Wednesday.

The article was published in Financial Express on April 24, 2015. Pranesh Prakash participated in the discussion.

Trying to cut through the noise on Net Neutrality in India, FICCI in partnership with Financial Express is hosting a panel discussion titled ‘Decoding Net Neutrality’ in New Delhi on Wednesday.

Moderated by Sunil Jain, the guests on the Net Neutrality debate panel are Rajya Sabha MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Lok Sabha MP Baijayant Jay Panda along with ICRIER chief executive Dr Rajat Kathuria, IAMAI president Dr Subho Ray, Facebook’s head of public policy for South and Central Asia Ankhi Das, COAI director general Rajan S Mathew, Com First director Dr Mahesh Uppal and Policy Director of the Centre for Internet and Society Pranesh Prakash.

Highlights of the debate:

Starting off the discussion, Rajeev Chandrasekhar said that this issue is all about market abuse and market power and not as utopian as it sounds. He said that this debate is nothing new as regulators identified the problem long ago. Chandarasekhar added, “TRAI had recognized in 2006 that there is an opportunity to abuse by access providers.”

Joining the conversation, COAI director general Rajan S Mathew said, “We have put the cart before the horse. What needs to be addressed first is online governance.”

Looking forward, ICRIER chief executive Rajat Kathuria said that we need to figure out the best way to use this privately funded public good. He added, “We still haven’t so far.”

Com First director Dr Mahesh Uppal tries to find a common ground and said, “Everyone is against ‘arbitrary commercial’ prioritisation or throttling.”

Subho Ray agreed and said, “There should be no blocking, throttling and preferential treatment.”

Facebook India’s Ankhi Das said that Internet.org is not for people who are already on the Internet. She explained, “Our objective is that it should be free and non-exclusive.”

Pranesh Prakash, Policy Director of the Centre for Internet and Society intervened to add, “An universally affordable model is important. We must ensure that the diversity that Internet provides is not lost.”

Taking the conversation further, Rajeev Chandrasekhar said, “I don’t believe data packets can be discriminated except in terms of speed and bandwidth.

Rajan Mathews interjected, “We do not discriminate, we differentiate. And all businesses differentiate.”

On this point, Rajat Kathuria said, “Price discrimination is something that should be allowed within boundaries of regulation.”

The Indian Express New Media Editor Nandagopal Rajan said that, “#NetNeutralityDebate panel agrees that price discrimination can be allowed, but not for the same packet of data.”

Jay Panda, Lok Sabha MP now also joins the discussion and says, “I have come out in favour of net neutrality despite the fact that my family will be benefiting from the lack of it. Whether fragmentation is desirable on the Internet or not, it needs to be debated. I am not in favour of fragmented access to the Internet.”

Underlining his views, Jay Panda reiterated, “Spectrum may be limited but access won’t be in the future. I am against prioritizing packets over others.”

Pranesh Prakash gave an overarching view and said, “Everyone benefits from Internet. What we need to figure out is whether everyone is getting paid enough.”

Jay Panda said, “It is possible for access providers to make money.”

Rajan Mathews said, “I think it is not fair to say that telcos can influence the govt.”

On this Jay Panda quipped, “The govt has to chip in its share to make the Internet accessible to all.”

Jay Panda says govts have been behind the curve in #NetNeutralityDebate and telcos have benefitted from it.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/financial-express-may-9-2015-financial-express-hosts-net-neutrality-debate

Net Neutrality debate in India: Here are all the arguments you need to know

praskrishna — 2015-05-09T08:01:20Z

While online activists and even big Internet companies have come out to support Net Neutrality, the debate isn’t really as simple when it comes to India.

The article by Shruti Dhapola was published in the Indian Express on April 23, 2015. Pranesh Prakash gave his inputs.

If you are one of India’s active netizens, it is unlikely that the words Net Neutrality have escaped your daily dose of social media updates and news. The debate, which gained pace post AIB’s video on the topic and news of the Airtel Zero programme, has seen some of the biggest names in the Internet and media industries give their take on the issue. More importantly, last month India’s telecom regulator TRAI came out with a consultation paper on the growth of Over-the-top (OTT) players like WhatsApp or Skype and is looking at exploring a regulatory framework for these apps.

In essence, Net Neutrality implies that all Internet data pack should be treated equally, that there should be no fast or slow lanes for Internet, or that users should pay differently for accessing some websites. While online activists and even big Internet companies in India like ClearTrip, Flipkart, have come out to support Net Neutrality, the debate isn’t really as simple when it comes to India.

For starters, in a country like India, Net Neutrality has vast implications, especially for start-ups many of whom are dependent on the medium for the success of their business. A neutral Internet means a level playing field.

Rishabh Gupta, COO, Housing.com, says, “Net neutrality has played a significant role in keeping the internet a level-playing field, simplifying customer outreach for businesses across industries. Further, the platform has encouraged new age entrepreneurs to bring in innovative business models making technology as an integral part of business; be it banking, mobile payments, e-commerce, real estate, etc.”

Manav Sethi, Group CMO, Askme adds that “any violation of Internet Neutrality can have a serious bearing on effective and fair competition in the market place”.

“We feel it is the government’s responsibility to ensure a level playing field for home grown entrepreneurs and at the same time protect the interests of netizens,” says Sethi.

Where licensing is concerned, Internet activists have also pointed out that this just won’t work. Pranesh Prakash, Policy Director at Centre for Internet and Society in India, says that India just can’t go back to the licensing days.

“OTT players aren’t just your Facebook or Viber, it’s the entire Internet. For instance with WebRTC protocol coming in you can do peer-to-peer chat, video calls on Web browsers. How would TRAI propose to regulate this, there’s no central service. It might not be popular, but it is being used by some already.”

He says the telecos’ argument about loss revenue due to rise of OTT’s isn’t a legitimate one but adds that instead of going for more regulation TRAI can look to reduce some differential regulations for telecos to make things easier for them.

There’s also a growing belief that TRAI hasn’t acted fairly when it comes to its paper on OTTs. The Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) has slammed TRAI saying OTTs are already regulated and governed by the IT Act.

A statement issued by IAMAI President Subho Ray said: “It looks like TRAI, in its consultation paper, has copy-pasted from submissions of telcos. India has a robust and at times, overbearing IT Act.” Expressing support for Net Neutrality, his statement said, “the paper makes an assumption that Internet doesn’t come under any regulations, which is incorrect. All Internet companies are regulated by IT Act”.

IAMAI includes firms like Google, Facebook, Snapdeal, Ola, MakeMyTrip and Saavn as its members.

But TRAI has also come out to defend its the whole debate. TRAI chief Rahul Khullar had earlier told Indian Express, “There are passionate voices on both sides of the debate. And if that was not enough, there’s a corporate war going on between a media house and a telecom operator which is confounding already difficult matters.”

While TRAI’s paper has received criticism, it should be noted that the paper does devote a significant proportion to discussing Net Neutrality and the negative impact it could have if India overlooks the principle.

The paper says, “A policy decision to outright depart from “NN” (Net Neutrality) raises various antitrust and public interest issues. There are concerns that TSPs will discriminate against certain types of content and political opinions. Such practices may hurt consumers and diminish innovation in complementary sectors such as computer applications and content dissemination. Discriminatory pricing proposals, if implemented, could raise a variety of significant anti-competitive concerns.”

Discriminatory pricing proposals are what activists fear could take place if India abandons its stand on Net Neutrality, and users will be the one to suffer.

But there is counter-argument to the whole Net Neutrality debate. It states that in a country like India many still don’t have access to data or mobile Internet because it is expensive and that zero-ratings could be a possible solution.

Zero ratings ensure that a TSP or ISP could declare a service or an app as free, and usually these are services that the company has tied-up with. The Facebook-Reliance initiative under the Internet.org initiative is a Zero rating system, where the idea was to provide certain services like Facebook, ClearTrip, NDTV, etc for free for users in certain part of the country. A benevolent scheme no doubt, but a violation of Net Neutrality all the same. Thanks to the furor over Net Neutrality, ClearTrip and others have started pulling out of Internet.org.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has defended Internet.org saying while network operators shouldn’t discriminate between services, “for people who are not on the internet though, having some connectivity and some ability to share is always much better than having no ability to connect and share at all. That’s why programs like Internet.org are important and can co-exist with net neutrality regulations.”

Zuckerberg isn’t the only one making an argument for Zero-rating apps. In a paper for Brookings Institute, Darrell M. West argues that zero-rating apps can actually help improve data access to those who can’t afford it.

As an example, the paper points out how “in Paraguay, an Internet.org project has generated an increase in “the number of people using the internet by 50% over the course of the partnership and [an] increase [in the] daily data usage by more than 50%.” In addition to this the paper says that, African nations have reported substantial upticks in Internet usage following introduction of Facebook Zero.

Interestingly, some countries like Chile have banned Zero ratings because they violate Net Neutrality. Pranesh Prakash says that the argument given in favour of ‘zero ratings’ is a bogus one.

Prakash says, “Exclusive deals like Flipkart-Airtel, or Reliance or Facebook or even free Wikipedia, end-up becoming anti-competitive. Discriminatory deals should not be allowed or those that become anti-competitive under Section 3 of Competition act should not be allowed.”

“If zero-rating can exist in an environment of competition, only then it’s a good thing,” he adds.

But government stepping-in isn’t entirely unexpected. Sajai Singh, Partner at J Sagar Associates Law Firm, points out that the government has now woken up to a new disruptive technology. He gives an example of cable television saying that when it first came up in India, the government had no laws to deal with cable.

“This is another example of the government playing catch up and it happens all across the world. It’ll happen more often with newer disruptive technologies like robotics, artificial intelligence. For instance, when the driverless car comes the government will have to bring in some legislation,” he adds.

For now, TRAI has received over 7-8 lakh comments on the discussion paper that they had first put up on their site on 27 March.

It is fair to argue that Net Neutrality has helped preserve the Internet’s free and open character in India and that a deviation from the same will hurt users the most. Then there’s the very real picture that India needs to provide Internet access to more of its citizens especially those who can’t afford it. For TRAI, treading a fine line between the two will prove to be a real challenge.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/indian-express-april-23-2015-net-neutrality-debate-in-india

Privacy International Network Meeting

praskrishna — 2015-05-02T05:02:55Z

Sunil Abraham will be attending this meeting organized by Privacy International, UK in London on April 22 and 23, 2015.

A total of 26 delegates have been invited to take part in this meeting. The emphasis of the meeting is to share stories and experiences and discuss more about taking the research forward.

Some of the strategies discussed include stories of policy engagement (how to inform policy and interact with policy-makers); Research and Investigations; UN Privacy Agenda; Privacy International Network; Governance and good practice; Reflections and looking forward.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/privacy-international-network-meeting

CII Digital India Summit

praskrishna — 2015-05-02T03:56:58Z

The Digital India Summit was organized at the Taj Mahal Hotel and Pragati Maidan in New Delhi on April 21 and 24, 2015. Pranesh Prakash participated in it.

Day 1 - 21 April 2015: Taj Mahal Hotel, New Delhi

Programme

0900 - 1000 hrs	Registration
1000 - 1030 hrs	Inaugural Session
1000 - 1015 hrs	Opening Remarks	Mr Kiran Karnik Chairman CII National Mission on Digital India
1015 - 1030 hrs	Setting the Context, Goals	Mr Bhaskar Pramanik Chairman CII National Committee on IT & ITes & Chairman Microsoft India Private Limited
1030 - 1100 hrs	Tea Break
1100 - 1315 hrs	Breakout Sessions
Group 1 1100 - 1315 hrs	Tackling Structural Issues and Developing Business Models for Digital India
Moderated by	Mr Sanjeev Gupta, Joint Secretary - IT, Department of Agriculture & Cooperation, Ministry of Agriculture Mr Kiran Karnik, Chairman, CII National Mission on Digital India
According to a DeitY estimate INR 100,000 cr. is needed just for funding the existing schemes. The achievement of the vision will need finance, expertise & intent from the private as well as the government. Given the different credo & objective for each sector, the need will be to build effective, collaborative & sustainable business models which provide a return on their investment while harnessing their strengths. Some of the key questions which will need to be answered are : · What is the role of public-private partnerships towards overcoming each of these five challenges? · How can we coordinate multi-stakeholder discussions and stimulate a collaborative approach towards shared goals of Digital India? · What are the sustainable business models that guarantee significant commercial (business feasibility) and social returns (such as inclusive growth, rural skill-building and employment generation)?
Group 2 1100 - 1315 hrs	Overcoming India's Last Mile Challenge-Creating Access through Network Reach, Innovative Business Models and Affordable Data-Enabled Devices/Internet plans
Moderated by	Ms Aruna Sundararajan, Additional Secretary & Administrator (USOF) and Chairman-cum- Managing Director, BBNL
Given India's size & demographics providing digital reach to the people at the right price is one of the most piquant issues that we face. Bringing every citizen on the digital backbone will increase empowerment & inclusion. Reaching out to the 2.5 lakh villages as envisaged in the plan will require intent, innovation & investment. Some of the questions that we need to discuss are: · What are the roadblocks in increasing internet penetration in India? · What are the alternate technologies that may be used to offer cost-effective internet in rural areas? · What are the regulatory changes that need to be in place? · What are the prerequisites for creating practical business models? · How do we stimulate internet usage through affordable service delivery in rural India? · What can the government do to encourage such business models?
Group 3 1100 - 1315 hrs	Developing a Digital Workforce - Empowering the Current and Future Workforce through Digital Literacy
Moderated by	Mr Pramod Bhasin, Non-Executive Vice Chairman and former President and CEO, Genpact Mr Atul Bhatnagar , Chief Operating officer, National Skill Development Corporation*
India's success in the technology sector has been based on our strength in skilled workforce. There are significant challenges in creating similar program to help build out the Made in India campaign in the manufacturing sector. The key questions are: · How should we define Digital Literacy? What does this mean and how much is still left to be done. What should we target to achieve over the next 3, 5 and 10 years? · What are the most effective measures Govt can take to enhance digital literacy and what kind of PPPs can we build to really take this to a completely different level? What are the biggest roadblocks to achieving digital literacy and how do we overcome these? · What is the role schools, colleges and vocational institutions, skills training providers can play in this area? How can that role be made much more effective and impact many more people? · How can digital literacy empower the unorganised sectors and entrepreneurship across India--in areas that are not touched by it normally--agriculture, farmers, construction, etc? How can this help bring a real revolution to these sectors which represent the majority of the work force? · How can digital literacy help create employability and access to jobs? How can it empower women and the hard to reach communities across India and bring them into the mainframe? · How can we use Digital literacy to substantially improve Governance and Transparency specially in public services and delivery of these across the population? · How can we use digital literacy to solve substantive problems such as Healthcare, Swatch Bharat, Build Smart Cities, increase Employability.
Group 4 1100 - 1315 hrs	Delivering Critical Services through a Universal, Verifiable Digital Identity
Moderated by	Mr Rajesh Bansal , Assistant Director General, UIDAI Mr Bhaskar Pramanik, Chairman, CII National Committee on IT and ITes and Chairman, Microsoft
The UID is already the largest program of its kind in the world. The real benefits will accrue when we build on this program to create add on programs which will harness what has been created and co-ordinate with financial, telecom & regulatory entities to create a collaborative model around direct benefit transfer and universal banking. Some of the key points that need to be discussed are: · What are the top 3 high-impact applications that would leverage the UID platform to offer critical services? · How can the govt. foster public and private sector innovation, and entrepreneurial creativity to foster UID-linked application to access services? · What is the potential for cross-sector collaboration and new business opportunities? For example, leveraging UID for enabling direct subsidies would require an effective partnership between financial services and energy sectors. What other avenues are worth exploring? · What is the action plan for different stakeholders and enablers? o Government and regulators o Corporates and institutions o Financial ecosystem partners o Telecom and IT companies o Individuals
1315 - 1415 hrs	Networking Lunch
1415 - 1435 hrs	Report back by Group 1
1435 - 1455 hrs	Report back by Group 2
1455 - 1515 hrs	Report back by Group 3
1515 - 1535 hrs	Report back by Group 4
1535 - 1550 hrs	Tea/ Coffee Break
1550 - 1700 hrs	Summing up and finalization of recommendation of each group by Mr Kiran Karnik

Day 2 - 24 April 2015: Hall No. 14, Pragati Maidan, New Delhi

1100 hrs	Inauguration of Digital Pavilion by Mr Ravi Shankar Prasad, Minister for Communications & Information Technology.
1130 - 1300 hrs	Panel Discussion on "Accelerating the Digital transition"
The Panel Discussion will focus on the imperatives required to ensure digitization across the value chain and what stakeholders must do to ensure that digitization supports sustainable growth. Outcomes from the discussions on Day 1 will be presented by each of the Session Chair to Hon'ble Minister
*"Release of the CII Compendium on cross company best practices / success stories on Digital India by Mr Ravi Shankar Prasad, Hon'ble Minister of Communications and Information Technology"*

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/cii-digital-india-summit

Airtel defends Airtel Zero, calls it toll-free service

praskrishna — 2015-05-09T09:19:05Z

Releasing an official statement, Airtel said its vision is to have every Indian on the Internet while appmakers will decide how to pay for data.

With the net neutrality debate raging in the online world, Airtel's Airtel Zero platform has been in the eye of storm. Internet activists, celebrities and social media users have expressed their distrust of the platform and are campaigning for an open Internet. On Saturday, Airtel sought to play down the concerns with a statement from CEO Gopal Vittalon which was circulated to customers and also shared on the company's official Facebook page.

Stating that the company's vision is to have every Indian on the Internet, Mr. Vittal's compares Airtel Zero with a toll-free service. "We are simply taking the concept of toll-free voice to the world of data. As a result, it is for the application developers and their customers to decide how data charges will be paid for." Mr. Vittal assures all customers that Airtel Zero will be a paltform that is open to all application developers, content providers and Internet sites on an equal basis.

Airtel Zero offers a platform for application developers and others to pay to feature their products and sites. However, this has raised the issue of big companies being able to pay a higher price to be featured on the platform while fledgling companies might be at a disadvantage. This, according to many pro-net neutrality activists, violates the very essence of open Internet.

Read the full article published in the Hindu on April 20, 2015. Pranesh Prakash was quoted.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-hindu-april-20-2015-airtel-defends-airtel-zero-calls-it-toll-free-service

Net neutrality: Net activism packs a punch

praskrishna — 2015-05-09T09:02:03Z

For the first time in the history of internet campaigns in India, a protest movement has successfully changed the course of a debate without having to take to the streets. The net neutrality movement is being fought almost totally in the virtual world. Hashtag activism isn't new in India. In recent times, several big campaigns have been bolstered by the internet which helped mobilize mass support and kept people constantly updated on events. Pink Chaddi, Jan Lokpal and the Nirbhaya movements were some examples of successful on-the-ground campaigns that were galvanized by social media. But they still needed public action — dharnas, candlelight vigils and actual pink undies — to make a difference.

The article by Sandhya Soman was published in the Times of India on April 19, 2015. Pranesh Prakash was quoted.

But the ongoing battle for internet freedom has proved that clicktivism isn't just about passive engagement with a cause. While it's all too easy to 'like' a cause, leading to what David Carr describes as "favoriting fatigue" in an article in the New York Times, some clicks can count in the real world.

It all started when the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) posted a vaguely worded and complicated discussion paper on net neutrality and called for public responses to it. "Clearly, many people understood that some of the proposals put forward by Trai in its paper threatened the internet as they knew it," says Anja Kovacs, who directs the Internet Democracy Project and has closely followed online activism in India.

Soon, an unlikely collective of techies, lawyers, journalists and even stand-up comics had banded together. Some of them — such as tech entrepreneur Kiran Jonnalagadda and journalist Nikhil Pahwa — had been writing and tweeting about the issue for a while but the Trai paper galvanized them. "I dropped everything and asked for help. Kiran, (lawyers) Apar Gupta amd Raman Chima, Sandeep Pillai, standup group All India Bakchod and several Reddit India users (some of whom remain anonymous), started getting involved," says Pahwa, who is the founder of Medianama. The only common factor was their love for internet and an acute worry what this policy consultation might do to destroy its open and equal nature.

Though scattered across India, once they came together online, this 'apolitical collective' was able to rope in engineers, developers, open source activists, entrepreneurs, policy experts, lawyers and journalists as volunteers.

The best way to counter propaganda and opposition was to get people involved. An abridged version of the voluminous Trai paper was posted online, and a FAQ section created on a public Google Doc. "Many came forward to answer the questions and that exercise helped create an understanding of the situation," explains Pahwa. By the time, Jonnalagadda and a few other developers set up the savetheinternet.in website by April 1, there was enough information and data points. Lawyers Gupta and Chima had also decoded the legalese and prepared cogent answers to Trai's 20 questions. This was turned into a ready-to-use email template for users to hit 'send'.

And send they did. The flood of emails to the Trai inbox number is already 803,723 and counting. The results of the social media backlash are evident — with e-commerce retailer Flipkart pulling out of Airtel Zero and several websites backing out of Facebook and Reliance's internet.org. "I was hoping to get around 15,000 responses to counter, say, 15 from the telecom lobby. Now, people make fun of me because I said that," laughs Pahwa. In this case, what also struck a chord was the idea of a bunch of young guys using tech to take on mismanagement by the older generation and corporate greed, says entrepreneur Mahesh Murthy. "We were telling them we like things on the internet as they are now."

But it is hard to sustain online outrage without an action plan, relentless groundwork and some comic warfare. So, when the contentious paper came out on March 27, the website was followed by AIB's punchy video that decoded the concept and took irreverent potshots at those who wanted to limit access while urging people to write to Trai. A lot of the lessons for the campaign came from the US where a John Oliver video turned the tide in the net neutrality debate. "We had seen that several people don't take internet petitions seriously. Also, we wanted to follow the proper legal course in this issue and not hold dharnas," says Jonnalagadda.

It is also important for campaigns to result in doable action. As Kovacs points out, savetheinternet.in and netneutrality. in gave users practical tools to respond before the April 24 deadline. The team also kept clarifying doubts and complex concepts on social media and also had an AMA (ask me anything) chat on Scrollback on Saturday while the 'other side' stuck to big words and jargon.

Of course, like every movement, this one too has attracted criticism. The proneutrality band has been branded as socialist and utopian and there were intense arguments amongst supporters. "Disagreements and arguments are not unique to the activism online," says Pranesh Prakash, policy director at Centre for Internet and Society.

Earlier in the debate, Prakash had said he'd received strong pushback from friends and allies when he spoke about the possible benefits of non-competitive zero rating, an example would be allowing companies to offer free access to their sites and apps via an arrangement with a telecom company — if effective competition exists. Airtel Zero and Reliance's Internet.org claim to do the same though most supporters remain critical. Says Prakash: "There might've been differences. But the fact that a lot of people are thinking about effects of 'free', and comparing it to predatory pricing shows that #savetheinternet is one of the better examples of engaged activism."

Online campaigns have previously also successfully mobilized people to get involved in issues they do not know much about, says author Nilanajana Roy, who is an influential voice on Twitter. The J&K flood relief efforts last year started on Twitter but got volunteers moving on the ground, she says. "People don't always realize what they care strongly about so, despite the risk of compassion fatigue or armchair volunteerism, it's worth having some online activism," says Roy.

Meanwhile, those behind the savetheinternet campaign are struggling with their new-found identity as "activists". "I think of myself as a venture capitalist and marketing consultant, not a khadi kurta-jholawala from JNU," says Mahesh Murthy, among those who strongly support the movement.

And at the end of the day, most of these activists would like to go back to their cubicles, free to browse or start a business. But not before they've tried to keep the internet open.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-times-of-india-sandhya-soman-april-19-2015-net-neutrality-net-activism-packs-a-punch

Shreya Singhal Judgment

praskrishna — 2015-04-19T08:06:38Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/shreya-singhal-judgment.pdf

Court Order Mobile Phone Patents

praskrishna — 2016-04-20T15:19:17Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/court-orders-mobile-phone-patents.rar

Now you can search Google in Kannada, in your handwriting

praskrishna — 2015-05-09T08:29:52Z

All you need to do is to make changes in settings on your phone or tablet.

The article by Apurva Venkat was published in Bangalore Mirror on April 18, 2015. Dr. U.B.Pavanaja was quoted.

Do you often have trouble searching for those Kannada words on Google? You don't know the English word for it and Google does not seem to understand when you type the Kannada word with English spelling. Well, now you can input your search requests on Google in your own handwriting, and that too in Kannada.

Google has come up with a third way to input your search requests after typing and voice recognition. The latest input methods recognises your handwriting and gives you a result. The new method allows you to input in 82 different languages, one of which is Kannada.

As you write in Kannada, your handwritten words would be converted to text in the search box. To start using the new feature, all you need to do is, go to your Google settings on your phone or tablet and enable handwriting. Then go to the setting and turn off 'use system language'. You will get an option of 82 languages. Choose the language you want to input your search item in. Once you have enabled the option on the lower right of the Google screen on your phone, you will see a handwriting option. Once you click on that, you can start writing what you want to search anywhere on your screen. The Google Handwriting Input can recognise 20 distinct scripts.

Wondering how effectively it will recognise the alphabets and numbers that look similar? The search giant has come up with a solution for that as well. If there is a confusion, it will give you options of the all the similar-looking alphabets and numbers on the bottom of the page. (eg 0 and o). A partial overlap of words is also supported by Google.

The Google Research Team said, "Google Handwriting Input works with both printed and cursive writing input with or without a stylus. Beyond text input, it also provides a fun way to enter hundreds of emojis by drawing them (simply press and hold the 'enter' button to switch modes). Google Handwriting Input works with or without an Internet connection." The feature can be used on any Android phone or tablet that works on 4.0.3.

UB Pavanaja, programme manager in Indian languages, Centre of Internet and Society, Bengaluru, said, "The new method of input is a very good initiative specially introducing it in Indian languages. The input method currently available to use for Indian languages are not very user friendly. It involves long pressing of buttons etc handwriting recognition will make it easier especially for people on the move."

Pavanaja has tried out the new input system and found it good. He said, "However, there are a few lags. For example, Ne is not recognised and a few more alphabets as well. However, with any new technology a small number of bugs are expected. This should be improved when more and more people start using it and giving feedbacks."

Another programmer from the city Thejesh GN feels that the new method will increase the local language communication online. Thejesh, said," All recognition is perfect. The input method is very useful as before one use to use Phonetic keyboard but here anyone and everyone can write in Kannada and take advantage of the new tool."

Google Handwriting Input even predicts your next word in Kannada. Beluru Sudarshan, a blogger from the city, felt that the whole input system is fantastic. When he tried the app, he noticed that the input system also predicts in Kannada, which is very useful. Belluru, said, "Even on a really small screen on my smartphone, it recognised all the Kannada alphabets very well. The input will surely much better on a tab or pen tablet. The errors in handwriting input are also human errors that occur due to human gestures which cannot be avoided. Overall, it works very well."

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/news/bangalore-mirror-apurva-venkat-april-18-2015-now-you-can-search-google-in-kannada-in-your-handwriting

Better intellectual property values luring Indian startups abroad

praskrishna — 2015-04-16T01:49:02Z

Prime Minister Narendra Modi says Make in India. But anyone who wants to, finds that their intellectual property is valued much more if the patent is filed in the US, or anywhere else, but India.

The article by Evelyn Fok and Varun Aggarwal was published in the Economic Times on April 10, 2015. Sunil Abraham is quoted.

Take the case of BITS Pilani graduate Sriram Kanuni, for instance, who decided to come back to India after spending 12 years with SAP in Germany. His family thought he was out of his mind, but he wanted to work for India and primarily serve Indian clients.

His core vision hasn't wavered five years down the line, but he has been forced to move a large part of his company's intellectual property (IP) to the US, just to get a better valuation for his next round of funding. And his is not an isolated case. "Global investors seem to value companies with patents in the US much higher. Therefore, it makes more sense to shift patents out of India, in case you're looking to raise money or exit the company," Kanuni, who is the CEO and co-founder of Arteria Technologies, said. Major Indian startups such as Flipkart, Myntra and ZipDial, which have either raised over a billion dollars or exited, already have their IPs outside the country. Experts say that is one of the reasons that attracted investors.

"If a company with its IP in India is acquired by an international firm, and post acquisition the buyer wishes to transfer the IP to a different jurisdiction, such transfer would need to be at a fair value decided by the government and the company is taxed at the rate of 34% on that," one of the bankers who was part of a large exit told ET.

"For tech-centric companies where the value of IP would comprise over 70-80% of their value, such high taxes can possibly make them unattractive for potential investors," they added. With better valuation and exits in mind, startups are moving out their innovation to countries such as Singapore and the US, leaving behind very little intellectual property that the country can proudly call its own.

"You would want to incorporate somewhere with a respected reputation for maintaining legal protection when it comes to copyright and trademarks, especially with global licensees or partners," said Sharad Devarajan, co-founder and CEO of character entertainment company Graphic India, which is incorporated in Singapore. "Incorporation in a country like the US where potential for M&A is higher, especially for core technology startups, will generally make it more attractive to potential buyers as it avoids a lot of legal and financial paperwork," said Brij Bhasin, India investment lead of Japanese venture capital firm Rebright Partners.

Investor concerns over IP are well founded. "Indian courts aren't uniform when it comes to developing jurisprudence around copyright and patent infringement," explained Sunil Abraham, executive director of Bengaluru based research organization Centre for Internet and Society.

"There is a high chance that a judge who doesn't understand the details would give an injunction. Then the loss of six months, etc., can be quite expensive, because in six months' time your competitor might eat into all of your market," he said.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/economic-times-april-10-2015-evelyn-fok-varun-aggarwal-better-intellectual-property-values-luring-indian-startups-abroad

Live Chat: For a neutral net

praskrishna — 2015-05-09T07:13:40Z

How much do you know about net neutrality? How does it affect you?

This was published in the Hindu on April 15, 2015. Pranesh Prakash participated in the chat.

Join us at The Hindu for a live chat at 5 p.m., today with Pranesh Prakash from Centre for Internet and Society, Vijay Anand from The Start Up Centre and Sriram Srinivasan, The Hindu's Business Editor - Online.

Here is the transcript of the chat:

The debate on net neutrality

The Hindu: Hello and welcome to The Hindu's live chat on net neutrality in India.

The Hindu: We have with us Pranesh Prakash from The Centre for Internet and Society and Vijay Anand from The Start Up Centre joining us today!

The Hindu: Also on the panel is The Hindu's Business Editor Online - Sriram Srinivasan who will be moderating this discussion.

Pranesh Prakash: Hi Sriram, thanks for having me on.

Sriram Srinivasan: Hi Pranesh, thanks for joining us

Vijay Anand: Thanks for the invite and looking forward Sriram.

Sriram Srinivasan: The topic of the day is proving to be of huge interest to the public. Pranesh, do you want to start off outlining why Net neutrality is such a big deal.

Sriram Srinivasan: Welcome Vijay, thanks for joining us.

Sriram Srinivasan: Vijay, would like to have your thoughts on the Net neutrality issue too. And how do you see the recent events, starting from the consultation paper that Trai published?

Vijay Anand: Sure, I'll get started as Pranesh puts together his thoughts. In the past few years if you have noticed, entrepreneurship has taken off with a boom. And I'd credit it mostly to the nature of the web - the web being open and allowing anyone with an entrepreneurial thought to build a solution over it. Considering the various constraints we have in a country like India, being ranked over 100 in a list of 146 countries when it comes to the ease of doing business, the fact that the internet is the equaliser has been a huge relief. Thats been recently threatened when Airtel forced TRAI's hand in putting out that 118 page consultation paper. Though, the issue has been brewing for a while now.

Pranesh Prakash: Today, we no longer live in a world of “roti, kapda, makaan”, but in the world of “roti, kapda, makaan aur broadband”. Telecom regulation and net neutrality has a very important role in enabling this vision of Internet as a basic human need that we should aim to fulfil. According to the IAMAI, as of October 2014, India had 278 million internet users. Of these, the majority access Internet through their mobile phones, and the WEF estimates only 3 in 100 have broadband on their mobiles. Thus, the bulk of our population is without broadband.

Pranesh Prakash: All ICT regulation should be aimed at achieving three goals: achieving universal, affordable access; ensuring effective competition in an efficient market and avoiding market failures; protecting against consumer harms.

Sriram Srinivasan: We have sort of taken the openness of the Internet for granted isn't it!

Pranesh Prakash: Given that background, net neutrality is the principle that we should regulate gatekeepers like ISPs to ensure they do not use their power to unjustly discriminate between similarly situated persons, content or traffic.

Vijay Anand: Sriram, we have. The internet by default is open. Thats the way it was built as well, and by nature, carries it through.

Sriram Srinivasan: Pranesh, Vijay, were you both surprised by the kind of reactions that have come in to the Trai paper?

Pranesh Prakash: Currently, ISPs get to play gatekeepers: they can throttle speeds for any service, they can say that a service they don't like (such as WhatsApp) should have to pay them more money to reach their customers (or that customers ought to pay more money to use WhatsApp), etc.

Pranesh Prakash: Well, the Internet has generally been an unregulated space, but the carriers -- those on whose pipes the Internet gets delivered -- have always been highly regulated.

Pranesh Prakash: So, no, the openness of the Internet (by which I guess you mean the unregulated aspect of the Internet) cannot be taken for granted.

Sriram Srinivasan: Just to highlight the issue in a more stark manner, what do both of you see as the best case scenario and worst case scenario facing us now?

Pranesh Prakash: No, I believe that the kinds of responses to the TRAI paper has attracted are predictable. There is a large group of people (including me) who believe the TRAI paper is incredibly biased toward the telecom industry who want greater regulation of "OTTs" like WhatsApp and Facebook and Flipkart.

Pranesh Prakash: What is unexpected is the volume of responses.

Vijay Anand: Sriram, there has been hints of this coming quite sometime back infact. Folks like Nikhil Pawa from Medianama has been raising flags about this issue for almost a year. I dont think it was the TRAI Paper that stirred the waters much as Airtel announcing the differential pricing to charge VoIP calls that woke people up.

Pranesh Prakash: More than 5 lakh responses have been sent in so far!

Vijay Anand: I agree with pranesh. We thought we'd do phenomenally well if we got 10,000 folks to write to TRAI. As of now thats crossed 500,000.

Sriram Srinivasan: That's huge!

Sriram Srinivasan: Vijay is referring to Airtel's decision to charge extra for VoIP apps, which they rolled back immediately.

Vijay Anand: Sriram, they sneakily announced the plan a day after Christmas, hoping everyone was on holidays. But yep the backlash started almost immediately.

Sriram Srinivasan: At that time, Airtel said they were waiting for more clarity from Trai. And then Trai's consultation paper was released around the end of March.

Pranesh Prakash: The worst case scenario is that we have TRAI & the govt setting regulations to enshrine "net non-neutrality" or "network discrimination". The best case scenario is we have TRAI and the govt setting in place good net neutrality regulations and creating an effective marketplace for competitive zero-rating.

Sriram Srinivasan: Pranesh, could you elaborate on what an effective marketplace for competitive zero-rating would look like?

Pranesh Prakash: That's a complicated question... but let me give it a shot.

Vijay Anand: IMO, thats leaving the web as is. Operators not taking a call or having the power to decide, but letting users decide. :)

Sriram Srinivasan: Readers will remember that plans like internet.org and Airtel Zero are zero-rating plans, where some select sites are allowed for access by subscribers free of charge

Pranesh Prakash: Leaving the web as it is, for me, isn't a viable option, since currently operators (who are *gatekeepers*) have the power to decide winners and losers.

Pranesh Prakash: Zero-rating is the practice of not counting (aka “zero-rating”) certain traffic towards a subscriber’s regular Internet usage. The zero-rated traffic could be zero-priced or fixed-price, capped or uncapped, metered or unmetered, subscriber-paid, Internet service-paid, or unpaid. Further, depending on the terms, zero-rating could be competitive or anti-competitive.

Pranesh Prakash: I believe that anti-competitive zero-rating (for instance, Airtel zero-rating it's own Hike chat service's traffic) should be prohibited.

Sriram Srinivasan: Pranesh, what do you think about internet.org?

Sriram Srinivasan: Thanks Vijay, this is very useful

Pranesh Prakash: Internet.org provides free access to a range of Internet services. I hate that they are calling it "Internet.org", when they don't provide access to the whole of the Internet.

Pranesh Prakash: But having said that, Internet.org (for which no operator gets paid) could be competitive or anti-competitive depending on the existence of regulations to ensure a competitive marketplace.

Vijay Anand: I agree with Pranesh on that bit. The name is a bit misleading, and even papers reported it as facebook's web, or facebook giving the Internet for free.

Sriram Srinivasan: But isn't it surprising that criticism against it has been muted, compared to say Airtel Zero. Is that because of its message that it wants to reach out to those who aren't connected with the Net?

Pranesh Prakash: And the good side of Internet.org is that it provides access. That, as I pointed out earlier, is one of the three goals of ICT regulation.

Vijay Anand: Sriram: It could also be that there arent a lot of subscribers on Reliance, as compared to Airtel, Vodafone and Idea, which i believe has close to 75% of the user base.

Sriram Srinivasan: Let's also remind readers that this isn't a fight confined to India. It's happening all over the world, each with their own unique issues. The one in the US was the most high-profile and recent and would be fresh in everyone's mind.

Pranesh Prakash: I think the reason why people view them as being different is that Airtel Zero is explicitly commercial but Wikipedia Zero and Airtel.org are non-commercial (in that they don't pay Airtel or any other provider for carrying their content). But I, personally, don't think this should make a difference.

Comment From Sabiya

What is the scope of zero-rating vis-a-vis important government websites?

Vijay Anand: Its something to think about. And i think this proposal will get floated. But one has to think about Net Neutrality from the perspective of "is this person who is picked, the best person to provide the service (forever)". In the future, i somehow anticipate that it would make far more sense for the government to build the fundamental system and build APIs that other entrepreneurs can build front-ends to, rather than them ending up more clones of IRCTC. Does that answer your question?

Comment From Sankar

Is net neutrality the socialism of the internet world? Is it sustainable on a long run?

Pranesh Prakash: 1. I don't believe it is socialism. In fact, the most important concept that underlies Net Neutrality is competition law. 2. It is sustainable in the long run, since discriminatory practices hurt competition, and harm consumers as well. In fact, not having Net Neutrality will be unsustainable.

Vijay Anand: Sankar: Quite the opposite, it is the platform that enables a free market. In that sense its democratic.

Comment From Guest

How can we make sure that neutrality is made public in India like US or Canada did. What should we do about it? I understand that all ISP have power to decide the winner but its also about consumers who has to pay more to get basic requirements done in right way.

Vijay Anand: If the policy makers and protests that are going on do their job, we will have a net neutrality policy. Canada doesnt have a net Neutality policy by the way. Only 7 countries in the world do. Canada isnt one of them. In a way we are ahead of this trend.

Comment From Ravi

In a country which is democratic, how can one be more free in communication can the other?

Pranesh Prakash: Well put. But do remember that rich people *are* currently more free in communicating with others than poor people since the rich have greater access to the platforms of communication.

Vijay Anand: IMO, I am opposed to zero rating, because saying we want to give access to the "poor" for free, sounds a lot like the aid model. I am not a big fan of that, since I havent seen many who have been weaned of that. An entire continent of Africa has been subject to that. You are right, if you ask me.

Comment From Nayan

I hate technology. So why should I still be bothered about Net Neutrality

Sriram Srinivasan: So that your voice can still be heard.

Pranesh Prakash: To ensure that when Airtel offers you "free Internet" it isn't in fact locking you up in a walled garden of a few services instead of the Internet.

Comment From Pranav

Should we not put pressure on the government to amend the Telegraph Act, 1885 instead of focusing on TRAI? An amendment to the act would ensure that net neutrality remains rather than just focusing on consultation papers by TRAI.

Vijay Anand: Pranesh would know how to answer this best.

Comment From Abhinav Goyal

To save internet from the general perception "more you pay easier it gets for you" , neutral net is essential.

Pranesh Prakash: If we dogmatically oppose all zero rating, then it will take much much longer for Internet services to trickle down to poor people. So as things stand, the more you pay, the more free you are. And if you're poor, you're not free to access Internet services.

Comment From Guest

how is airtel zero similar to net non neutrality. isnt it like OLX/quicker who return search result with preference to their paid advertiser

Vijay Anand: Yes. or a Google for that matter. But unlike the operators who are the gateway to the internet, OLX and Quickr both have to fight to better their experience for folks to come to them in the first place. Take the case of Google for example, if you are starting to get better search results in bing, you might switch. But operators could dramatically alter the way that goes, when they start prioritizing.

Pranesh Prakash: Stated as a general principle, I don't think those two situations are alike. In economic jargon: OLX/Quickr don't exhibit as strong a network effect as Airtel does, and thus are lesser "gatekeepers" than Airtel. So them showing preferential treatment to some matters less than when Airtel does it.

Pranesh Prakash: Airtel Zero is similar to Facebook, though. Not to OLX/Quickr. Facebook exhibits huge network effects, and the shifting costs (to VK or Sina Weibo) are huge since the people and businesses you want to reach are present in Facebook but not on VK.

Comment From Guest

Could you please explain in detail what are all the possible ways in which Airtel Zero could unduly make money if the platform is given the permission to operate.

Vijay Anand: If you say come up with an idea to start a music service - or prefer Gaana.com or you listen in Saavn or rdio, but Airtel says data is free if you use Wynk, which would people prefer? Thats the issue. Operators could have the opportunity to pick winners, (based on who could pay), whereas the web, being an open platform was always about the best solution winning.

Sriram Srinivasan: It could make it difficult for internet start-ups to compete with incumbents, therefore.

Pranesh Prakash: Three potential problems which are closely linked, are cross-subsidization, tying (anti-competitive bundling) of multiple services, and vertical price squeeze. All three of these are especial concerns now, with the increased diversification of traditional telecom companies, and with the entry into telecom of companies that create content. Hence, if Airtel cross-subsidizes the Hike chat application that it recently acquired, or if Reliance Jio requires customers to buy a subscription to an offering from Reliance Big Entertainment, or if Reliance Jio meters traffic from Reliance Big Entertainment differently from that from Saavn, all those would be violative of the principle of non-discrimination by gatekeepers.

Comment From Abhishek

Sir dont u think always and everytime there is a protest when something emerges which is out of conventional stuffs......this protest culture is holding back India to develop a healthy competitive culture.

Vijay Anand: Who is protesting, usually has a lot to say. At times very very good things come out of protests. thats the way democracy works. Doesnt it?

Pranesh Prakash: There are some modes of protest that I didn't agree with (down-voting the Flipkart app on Google Play Store and on iTunes, eg). But what's wrong with protest?

Comment From abutiger@gmail.com

Panel members : Can any members explain what is Net Neutrality. In what it is going to effect the net user had the new law come in to force? Thank you. Abu

Vijay Anand: Abu, there is no new law yet. There is a proposal from the operators asking for differential pricing based on a few factors. You can read that 118 page proposal on the website. At the moment, the government is considering both sides of the argument.

Sriram Srinivasan: Comments on the paper can be sent till April 25. And counter-comments close on May 8.

Sriram Srinivasan: Apologies, it should be April 24

Comment From Badri Narayanan

How is net neutrality in developed nations? Does it work differently there?

Vijay Anand: Only 7 countries in the world (pranesh can correct me if wrong) have a policy in place. it is assumed that by default the internet is open and neutral. Its only when that is challenged that we need a policy in place, so that there are no grey areas.

Sriram Srinivasan: Also, even in developed countries, the telecom companies do keep complaining about OTT services, the apps, and how they are cannabalising into their business.

Comment From kasthuri rangan

I support the TRAI suggestion as it will put an end to unwanted sites that spoils the youth and waste their tiem

Vijay Anand: I'd agree, but one can do that on a more individual household level, rather than on a national / network level. Who decides what we consume? What if tomorrow the government decides everyone watching youtube is wasting their time, or watching cricket should be doing something better. That starts to tread into censorship - which infact is a totally different matter altogether.

Sriram Srinivasan: Totally agree with Vijay.

Comment From RAJAT

My question is that why the ISPs want to disrupt the ongoing net neautrality?/

Vijay Anand: To make more money :) Even though their revenues are doubling every year from selling data services.

Pranesh Prakash: Currently net neutrality doesn't exist. So ISPs can't destroy it.

Comment From Amit Jha

Who owns the Internet and where does money come for its maintenance/expansion etc.

Vijay Anand: Amit, thats a brilliant question, Worthy of going into Quora infact. Its a long answer. The core of the web is managed by an organization called iCANN which is infact a confederation. However the extension, hosting, services etc are put together by virtually everyone and anyone. You can plug a computer into the internet and decide to be a server or a consumer. That's the beauty of the internet.

Sriram Srinivasan: You might want to read a very interesting book called 'Tubes' by Andrew Blum. It is about "a journey to the center of the internet." The author wanted to understand the physicality of the Internet.

Comment From Jyotiranjan

In the garb of net neutrality are the companies like whatsapp, skype getting their business without paying licencing fee where as telcos had to pay substantial sum for doing business?

Sriram Srinivasan: It's a completely different business model. It's tech that has enabled of lot of these things, in the same way that telcos can now play a part, albeit small, in the banking industry.

Vijay Anand: Jyoti, In a way yes. But skype or whatapp still doesnt work unless we pay for the data through which all of this rides. So infact even when we use skype and think its a free call there is cost of bandwidth associated with it. With the fact that the call is no longer circuit switched by packet switched, the charges that the operator claims they incur are also eliminated. its a far more efficient system.

Comment From VA

If airtel is providing free access to certain websites, I welcome that. I already have access to other websites via other service providers for which I pay. I don't understand what is this fuss all about.

Pranesh Prakash: This can be a good thing if it doesn't harm competition. If it harms competition, then in the long run, it is bad (even if immediately consumers think it is good). Think about predatory pricing: http://www.ictregulationtoo... Consumers might like predatory pricing in the beginning, but that allows for a company to squeeze out competition and then raise prices later. Harming competition is harmful for consumers in the long run. That's why we need to ensure that we only allow competitive zero-rating.

Vijay Anand: I agree. Users will want this. I Would want this. But the truth is, when you think about it from the other side, of people who are building companies, and coming up with new ideas to make things better, it makes it an uphill battle.

Comment From sapan

i would like request to Trai. do not give Net Nuutrality

Pranesh Prakash: Why do you think it would be harmful? Protection of consumers from harm is something you oppose? Ensuring fair non-discriminatory competition is something you oppose? I'm unclear why.

Vijay Anand: Sapan, I presume you mean the other way around.

The Hindu: Thank you Pranesh, Vijay and Sriram for all the replies!

Vijay Anand: It was a pleasure. And thanks for having me.

The Hindu: Is there anything else you'd like to say before we close this chat?

Pranesh Prakash: Net neutrality is the principle that we should regulate gatekeepers to ensure they do not use their power to unjustly discriminate between similarly situated persons, content or traffic. It is a democratic principle (in line with the right to equality in our Constitution) and it is important for freedom of speech and expression. Let us ensure that through effective regulation of competition we can ensure a free and open Internet that is accessible by all!

Sriram Srinivasan: Thanks! Also, readers, would be great to treat this as a consultation process initiated by Trai. There will be different points of view. It's not like a usual protest. It's just to find the right way forward for us. Also, please do participate in the process, whatever your views.

The Hindu: Well said! Thank you to all the readers who followed and participated in this live chat. Do connect with us on Twitter/Facebook for more questions and discussions on this topic.

The Hindu: Thanks and have a great evening!

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-hindu-april-15-2015-chat-for-neutral-net

Net neutrality: Debate rages on

praskrishna — 2015-05-02T08:45:03Z

The article by Surabhi Agarwal was published in the Business Standard on April 11, 2015. Sunil Abraham gave his inputs.

Net neutrality campaigners have raised the pitch as the telecom regulator seeks public comments on the issue.

They argue any kind of discrimination will scuttle the Internet's growth in the country. Opponents claim technology may make it difficult for the government to stop network management.

A controversy was sparked after Bharti Airtel, the country's largest telecom operator, launched 'Airtel Zero' on Monday that allows companies to offer their applications to Airtel subscribers for free. The maker of the application pays the operator for the customer's free use. "It is wrong for me to have to pay Airtel or Vodafone money to access YouTube, Skype or any site they decide to charge for," Mahesh Murthy, founder of digital marketing agency Pinstorm, wrote in a blog on Wednesday. "What we do with bandwidth must be up to us, not up to some profiteering telecom tycoon," he added. Sachin Bansal, founder of e-commerce company Flipkart.com, on the other hand, tweeted, "When foreign companies do it in India - innovation. Indians do it - violation". Flipkart may have signed up with Airtel's Zero platform.

"Telecom companies are saying zero-rating websites (that are offered free like Facebook or Wikipedia) are cannibalising revenues from customers who used to pay for data earlier. It is also failing to convert non-data paying customers into paying ones, so it is not working for telecom companies," said a member of an Internet think tank who did not wish to be named.

The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India released a discussion paper on net neutrality in the last week of March and is seeking public comments by April 24 and counterviews by May 8.

Another Internet expert said people paying extra to visit select sites was like higher charges for high definition cable television. If net neutrality was restricted to price, consumers could decide what they wished to pay for, he added.

However, if websites or apps were blocked or telecom operators bumped up internet speed for certain services, the implications for innovation would be wider, he pointed out. "If the government is attempting to make a policy, it has to be as fair as possible," he said.

Sunil Abraham, executive director of the Centre for Internet Society, said ensuring network neutrality might be difficult, but the government could stop censorship and discrimination. "Competition usually resolves these issues. We have competition among telecom service providers and Internet service providers. This must be protected," he added.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/business-standard-surabhi-aggarwal-april-11-2015-net-neutrality-debate-rages-on

Net neutrality debate rages

praskrishna — 2015-05-08T14:45:34Z

While Airtel has put out a statement on the pull out by Flipkart, other operators are playing a cautious game.

The article by Lalatendu Mishra and Pradeesh Chandran was published in the Hindu on April 15, 2015. Pranesh Prakash gave his inputs.

It’s a major victory for the proponents of net neutrality and a big setback for service provider Airtel. As the e-commerce firm Flipkart pulled out of talks on joining the controversial Airtel Zero platform, launched by Airtel last week, the debate on net neutrality has taken a fresh turn in the Indian context. In the wake of a virtual uproar in social media and following wide condemnation by votaries of net neutrality, Flipkart has to just give in. With Flipkart-induced new twist in the net neutrality game, the Internet Service Providers (ISPs), mostly telecom operators, are running for cover without knowing how to deal with the evolving situation that has the potential to adversely affect their business.

While Airtel has put out a statement on the pull out by Flipkart, other operators are playing a cautious game. And, they are unwilling to comment on a subject that has become an emotive issue. There are, however, voices which seek a middle path as solution to this issue.

“We are in favour of net neutrality. But this has to be defined in the Indian context. That is what TRAI is precisely doing. The debate on net neutrality is appropriate and important. All stakeholders should be able to decide what is net neutrality for India after due debate,” said Rajan Mathews, Director-General, Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI). “We must have a holistic approach to this issue. There should be rational debate, and we are committed for open and non-discriminatory Internet,” Mr Mathews added. A thought must go into protecting the interest of telecom operators as well, he felt.

While supporting net neutrality, analysts have voiced concern over its impact on the finances of telecos. “Net neutrality is a fair concept but it must take into account the concerns of telecom operators and ensure that their revenue and margins are not significantly impacted,” said Rajiv Gupta, Partner and Director, BCG. “Some kind of middle path needs to be achieved,” Mr Gupta said. Only a few countries so far have made net neutrality into a law. “We are yet to see whether our government’s moral support for net neutrality can translate into a law,” Mr Gupta added.

Surprisingly, Airtel which has come under flak on two occasions in last four months for alleged violation of net neutrality norms, too, has pledged its support for net neutrality! “Airtel fully supports the concept of net neutrality. There have been some misconceptions about our toll free data platform Airtel Zero. It is a not a tariff proposition but is an open marketing platform that allows any application or content provider to offer their service on a toll free basis to their customers who are on our network… The statement made by Flipkart regarding their decision not to offer toll-free data service to their customers is consistent with our stand that Airtel Zero is not a tariff proposition. It is merely an open platform for content providers to provide toll free-data services,” Airtel said. Without spelling out the future of Airtel Zero, it said “The platform remains open to all companies who want to offer these toll free data services to their customers on a completely non-discriminatory basis.” Over 150 start-ups have already expressed willingness to come on board Airtel Zero.

Pranesh Prakash, Policy Director, Centre for Internet and Society, said, “The need for net neutrality is very real and urgent. There are many practices that telecom companies are trying to engage in, such as blocking of WhatsApp to force customers to pay more money for it, which ought not to be allowed.” On Airtel Zero plan, he said “We should clearly separate out the issue of "zero rating" from that of "net neutrality". ``Only anti-competitive instances of zero-rating - for instance, Airtel offering it's own Hike service for free, or Airtel entering into an exclusive deal with Flipkart for zero-rating its app — are problems. Competitive zero-rating, with regulatory safeguards to ensure a fair and efficient marketplace, should be allowed, just as we allow free TV channels and allow toll-free numbers. Banning is akin to a brahmastra in a regulator's arsenal: it should not be used lightly,” Mr Prakash said.

No such plans: Snapdeal

Snapdeal said, “We have no such plans at this point, especially given the regulatory framework is unclear.’’

Zero rating is a practice among mobile network operators, where customers are not charged for a certain volume of data by specific applications or internet services.

An Amazon spokesperson said, “Amazon supports net neutrality - the fundamental openness of the Internet - which has been so beneficial to consumers and innovation.”

Earlier, Facebook and Reliance Communications had partnered for Internet.org. Reliance had announced in 2012 that it would offer free Facebook and WhatsApp for Rs 16 a month, without any additional data costs.

Amidst the debate on net neutrality, Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said a six-member panel had been constituted by the telecom department to submit its recommendations regarding the same by early next month.

Start-ups for net neutrality:

Sumit Jain, Co-Founder & CEO, CommonFloor.com

“It’s well acknowledged that Internet has disrupted the world of business like no other technology has in last few decades. It has enabled start-ups with hardly any capital and clout to make a mark. So by rejecting net neutrality, we will be shutting the door on the entrepreneurial aspirations of millions and will leave telcos to play the gate-keeper to a valuable resource as the Internet and challenges the democratic behaviour that Internet in known for”.

Sameer Parwani, CEO & Founder, CouponDunia

“We will stand for net neutrality. India has been in the forefront of digital world. It is the Internet that has given the country hope and aspirations to the common man to be informed and entertained. Not being able to give equal access will just make the situation anti- competitive and it will have a negative effect on the upcoming businesses.”

Kashyap Vadapalli, Chief Marketing officer, Pepperfry

“Lack of net neutrality supports a monopolistic market which will adversely affect the growing start-up eco-system. While heavily funded businesses will be able to maintain their supremacy over consumers start-ups will stand to lose out heavily. We do not encourage discrimination of any sorts when it comes to consumer's access to information.”

Yogendra Vasupal, Founder of Stayzilla

“Airtel Zero seems like an innovative solution to bring Internet to every person. Whether this is on a firm footing or a slippery slope will be decided by the actual implementation. The current way of individual companies buying Internet for their consumers is a slippery slope. The right way to do it would be through a central consortium formed from the e-commerce companies and who has the interests of both the start-ups in this sector and the end-users in mind. After all, Internet is all about freedom of choice. Keeping in mind that currently it would be free only if you use a particular company makes it free at the cost of the freedom of choice it offers. This is everyone's loss.”

Ritesh Agarwal, CEO, OYO Rooms

“Net neutrality is absolutely essential for a free and competitive market especially now since there is a start-up boom in the country particularly in the online sector. Most importantly, Internet was created to break boundaries and as concerned industry players, we should maintain that. We support net neutrality and will do all needed to build this further.”

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-hindu-lalatendu-mishra-pradeesh-chandran-april-15-2015-net-neutrality-debate-rages

Indians Join ‘Save the Internet’ Campaign

praskrishna — 2015-05-09T07:42:06Z

In India, hundreds of thousands have joined a public campaign to ensure equal access to the Internet as an impassioned debate engulfs the country on what is called “net neutrality.”

The article by Anjana Pasricha was published by Voice of America on April 15, 2015. Pranesh Prakash gave his inputs.

The controversy heated up after one of the country’s main telecom providers launched a new marketing platform, Airtel Zero, where Internet businesses could pay to have users browse their sites for free.

This triggered a nationwide backlash from those who fear that this could deny equal access to the Internet. They are demanding that the Internet remain a level playing field with all data getting equal treatment - whether it is a student’s blog or an online company with deep pockets.

Celebrities, professionals, entrepreneurs and students, are among the tens of thousands who have signed up for an online campaign “savetheinternet.”

Petitions are being sent at a furious pace to the telecom regulator, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), which invited public comments last month on various proposals such as allowing telecom companies to charge for services like Skype and YouTube.

One of the persons behind the campaign to ensure net neutrality, Kiran Jonnalagadda, in Bangalore, has been taken aback by the overwhelming response.

“400,000 users have on their own copy, pasted an email from our website and mailed it to TRAI from their own computers. It is not an automated script. There is nothing is going on from our servers. People are doing it by themselves on their own computers. That is incredible. We did not think they would do it,” said Jonnalagadda.

The strident public criticism on the issue has already had an impact. One of the country’s biggest online retailers, Flipkart, said on Tuesday that it had scrapped discussions with Airtel Zero on giving users free access to its app.

Flipkart announced its decision after some angry supporters of net neutrality denounced the company saying it would get an unfair advantage over its competitors. Some users even threatened to boycott the online retailer.

Supporters of allowing telecoms to give preferential, free access to Internet sites say providers need the funds to expand infrastructure and net coverage in countries like India, where broadband access is still limited. Opponents say such practices allow for preferential treatment for some websites over others, creating a disadvantage for upstart websites that would inhibit innovation.

Pranesh Prakash at the Bangalore-based Center for Internet and Society supports net neutrality. However he said that under certain conditions, companies could pay for customers using their data.

“They anyway have to pay money for using data. Right now what some companies are offering to do is not only to pay money for their data use, but also for customers data use. That can be anti-competitive, for instance if there is in exclusive deal, or if the terms of the deal are not transparent. But just the fact that a company is offering to pay for its customers data does not by itself make it anti-competitive. For instance toll free numbers are not considered anti-competitive by anyone,” said Prakash.

The government says it will wait for a report from a six-member committee due in May before it takes a position on the issue. But net users hope the government is leaning toward net neutrality.

Earlier this week, Minister for Communications and Information Technology, Ravi Shankar Prasad, called the Internet “one of the finest creations of the human mind.”

“It is the property of the entire human race, not of any country or of any society. Net to become truly global must have integral link with the local and when we talk of digital inclusion, it is equally important it must be available to those who are underprivileged and on the margins,” said Prasad.

India is one of the world’s biggest Internet markets after the United States and China with an estimated 180 million users. It is not the only country to debate net neutrality - it has also been a subject of intense discussion in the United States and Europe.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/voice-of-america-april-15-2015-anjana-pasricha-indians-join-save-the-internet-campaign

Global Conference on CyberSpace 2015

praskrishna — 2015-05-01T16:48:59Z

Sunil Abraham is a panelist at this event.

Opening session

Mark Rutte, Prime Minister of the Netherlands, will open the conference, followed by an introduction by Bert Koenders, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, host of the GCCS. The conference will start with a strategic discussion among representatives of all stakeholders on the most important current developments in cyberspace. A panel consisting of high-level government officials and private sector and civil society leaders will sketch the main opportunities, dilemmas and challenges facing the further evolution of the internet. All main issues of the conference will be touched upon: internet governance and multistakeholder cooperation, freedom and privacy online, the digital divide, the internet as enabler for social and economic development, cyber security and cybercrime. The panel will address questions such as:

How should we balance freedom, security and economic development and innovation in cyberspace?
How do we guarantee an open, free and secure internet?
What are the responsibilities of the various stakeholders in cyberspace, e.g.: what role should governments vis a vis the private sector play in protecting privacy online?
How can we improve cooperation between governments, private sector and civil society in cyber-related matters?
How can we maintain and improve trust by consumers in the internet?
How can we stimulate research and development, and interdisciplinary academic cooperation in order to strengthen cyberspace?

The panel will be followed by ministerial statements.

Moderator: Riz Kahn, Founder and CEO of Global Media Productions

Panellists:

Mireille Ballestrazzi, President of Interpol
Vint Cerf, Vice-President of Google
Nnenna Nwakanma, World Wide Web Foundation
Fadi Chehadé, CEO ICANN
Yurie Ito, Director of Global Coordination Division for the JPCERT/CC

12:30 to 13:15 None

Side Event: Lunch panel on 'Cyber warfare and jus in bello'

The International Committee of the Red Cross, with the support of the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, will organise a short side-event on 'Cyber warfare and jus in bello' during the Thursday lunch break of the conference. This panel will focus on the use of cyber operations as means and methods of warfare during armed conflict, namely cyber warfare. It will give participants insights into the challenges that cyber warfare creates for the application and interpretation of international humanitarian law (IHL). The panel will touch upon issues such as the potential human cost of cyber warfare; the protection that IHL affords to infrastructure essential to the civilian population against cyber attacks; the challenges that the dual use of cyberspace creates for the principle of distinction; or the legal review of cyber weapons.

The panel should support participants in gaining a better understanding on whether the relevant IHL norms, in particular the rules governing the conduct of hostilities, appear to be sufficiently clear in light of the specific characteristics and foreseeable human cost of cyber warfare.

13:15 to 14:45 Livestream available

Scenario-based Policy Discussion

An interactive discussion ensures all participants are aware of the urgency of the challenges we face in cyberspace. The discussion is based on a fictitious but realistic scenario which presents dilemmas we face in cyberspace. See the teaser on youtube. Panellists representing governments, private sector and civil society will be asked to come up with concrete solutions to the issues posed in several short film clips. The entire audience will be able to react to the scenario and to the proposed solutions.

Moderator:

Riz Kahn, Founder and CEO of Global Media Productions

Panellists-VIP Panel:

Klaas Dijkhoff, State Secretary for Security and Justice of the Netherlands
Robert Nicholson, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada
Pedro Huichalaf, Vice Minister for Telecommunications of Chile
Michèle Coninsx, President of Eurojust
Eelco Blok, CEO of KPN
Cheri McGuire, Vice President, Global Government Affairs & Cybersecurity Policy of Symantec Corporation
Sunil Abraham, Executive Director of the Centre for Internet and Society

Panellists - CyberSpace Perspective Panel:

Giuseppe Targia, Vice President Security of Nokia
Gerard Hartsink, Vice-Chair of the Digital Economy Commission of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC)
Guillaume Poupard, Director General of the Agence Nationale de la Sécurité des Systèmes d’Information (ANSSI)
Coen Vermeulen, Division Director Cash and Payment Systems of the Dutch Central Bank

15:00 to 16:15 Livestream available

Prolonged Opening Session

Ministerial statements.

15:00 to 16:15 Livestream available

FOCUS SESSION : International peace and security in cyberspace

The use of cyber operations has become a new challenge in the field of international peace and security. How can international political cooperation be reinforced and international law applied in order to avoid conflicts and maintain a stable cyberdomain?

It is likely that cyber capabilities will be part of future conflicts and, below the threshold of armed conflict, there is a growing risk of cyber attacks by state and non-state actors. The use of this tool is incentivized by low entry costs, high potential gains and low political and legal risks in case of discovery. Given the unique attributes of this tool and the difficulty of verifying behavior, there is the potential for mistaken attribution, miscalculation and unintended escalation in a time of crisis. The threats and risks must not be exaggerated, but the increasing use of cyber operations potentially creates instability and mistrust in international relations. Uncertainty and insecurity raise the spectre of a cyber arms race, which would be even more destabilizing.

The need for international cooperation to reduce these risks is clear. This is a strategic challenge for states that transcends the technical and operational level. It is also a challenge in which the private sector must be a part of any solution, given its ownership over most of the global cyber infrastructure. Although sometimes described as “wild West” characterized by normative ambiguity, cyberspace is not sui generis. Much work has been done to affirm the applicability in cyberspace of existing international law and norms for State conduct, in which especially the 2013 the report of the Group of Governmental Experts stands out as a landmark achievement.

Against this background, the fundamental challenge is to further develop a sustainable international cyber stability “regime”, both between states and non-state actors, and to work out how this connects into the overarching regime complex for managing global cyber activities. This focus is relevant for all countries and companies, not just for the ‘cyber great powers’.

1. How to develop international security and stability within the regime complex for managing global cyber activities
2. What are the responsibilities of States towards other States that follow from the application of international law and the principle of State sovereignty to State activities in cyberspace?
3. What norms or additional measures of self-restraint or mutual assistance can States and companies implement to create a more stable cyberspace?

Speakers:

The Hon. Julie Bishop MP, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Australia
Mr. Christopher Painter, Coördinator for State Department United States of America
Chen Xu H.E. Ambassador Ministry of Foreign Affairs People’s Republic of China
Arvind Gupta H.E. Deputy National Security Adviser India
Minister for Foreign Affairs, Estonia (to be confirmed)
Mr. Matt Thomlinson, Vice President of Security Microsoft United States of America
H.E. Mrs. Amina Mohamed, Cabinet Secretary for Foreign Affairs, Kenya

Moderator:

Joseph S. Nye, Professor University Distinguished Service Professor Harvard Kennedy School of Government United States of America

Professor Joseph S. Nye is the author of The Regime Complex for Managing Global Cyber Activities, which was written as part of his participation in the Global Commission on Internet Governance.

15:00 to 16:15 Livestream available

Parallel Session : The Ethics of Algorithms - From Offensive Content to Self-Driving Cars

From search engine results to predictive policing, algorithms are determining and shaping ever more parts of our lives. This new type of governance has a name: algorithmic regulation. What are the ethical responsibilities of those architecting algorithms and for us as a society?

Algorithms are used to decide who should be hired, or who should be flagged as a suspect; which news gets highlighted and which stories disappear from social media feeds. The subjective decisions by institutions and companies who design computer algorithms to process information, also known as ‘algorithmic regulation’, may directly interfere with freedom of speech. Ensuring that such algorithms are in line with human rights standards will be a challenge for governments and companies in the coming years.

This is why this session brings together leading experts from academia, technology and civil society to discuss the ethical dimensions for those architecting algorithms and for us as a society.

Background information: Ethics of Algorithms

Panellists:

Ben Wagner, director Centre for Internet & Human Rights (moderator)
Jillan York, Policy Director freedom of expression Electronic Frontier Foundation
Richard Allan, Director of Policy in Europe, Facebook
Frank LaRue, Director of European Operation, Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights
Kave Salamatian, Professor of computer Science, University of Savoie
Joe McNamee, Executive Director, European Digital Rights
Frank Pasquale, Professor of law, University of Maryland, Francis King Carey School of Law

15:00 to 16:15

Parallel Session : CSIRT Maturity

The cyber threat landscape is constantly changing and the responsibility to prevent, detect and respond to incidents is ever more challenging. To remain effective and to be able to meet these rapidly evolving challenges, Computer Security Incident Response Teams (CSIRTs) must evolve continuously. The cyber domain is not limited by political borders and most cyber threats cannot be adequately addressed by any single CSIRT. Therefore international cooperation with a view to reaching higher levels of CSIRT maturity is essential. During this session (among other things) the “Quick Scan CSIRT Maturity” as well as the “Toolkit CSIRT Maturity” will be demonstrated.

Moderator:

Wout de Natris, Consultant, De Natris Consult/MKB Cyber Advies Nederland

Speakers:

Baiba Kaskina, General manager CERT Latvia
Aart Jochem, Head of Monitoring and Response, National Cyber Security Center - NL
Jordana Siegel, Director, International Affairs, Office of Cybersecurity and Communications, US Department of Homeland Security

Panellists:

Maarten van Horenbeeck, Chairman, Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams (FIRST)
Steve Purser, Head of Core Operations Department ENISA
Jean Robert Hountomey, CEO AfricaCERT

15:00 to 16:15

Parallel Session : Cybercrime, jurisdiction and hosting

Cybercrime is a growing problem for people, business and the economy. This parallel session will focus on the problem of cybercrime and the specific problems that law enforcement organisations encounter in addressing it. For cybercriminals, the rewards can be substantial, while the risk of being caught is limited. The risk can further be decreased by using the complex nature of the internet and by spreading criminal activity across different jurisdictions. The reselling of hosting services can hamper the efficient acquisition of digital evidence and other relevant data. Furthermore, criminals often know which countries have limited legal possibilities or technical capacity for effective law enforcement.

In this parallel session the participants will discuss possible options to prevent criminal safe havens. How can we prevent criminals from abusing the complex and international nature of the internet to avoid law enforcement? How do criminals use the complex and international nature of the internet, cloud services and bad hosting for their criminal activity? Considering the loss of location of data and services, what policies could help overcome the problems connected to the territory-based concept of jurisdiction? In a multistakeholder cyber environment, how can hosting providers, cloud services and other private organisations help to prevent criminal safe havens from emerging?

Moderator:

Jamie Saunders, Director, National Cyber Crime Unit, United Kingdom

Speakers:

Sergey Lozhkin, researcher Kaspersky Labs
Zahid Jamil, Barrister-at-law, Jamil & Jamil, Pakistan
Angela McKay, Director of Cybersecurity Policy and Strategy, Microsoft
Bert-Jaap Koops, Professor of Regulation & Technology at the Tilburg Institute for Law, Technology, and Society (TILT), the Netherlands
Koen Hermans, Public Prosecutor, Eurojust

16:45 to 18:00 Livestream available

FOCUS SESSION : A secure place for business and people

To help fight the abuse of the internet, cooperation between different international stakeholders is key. This cooperation is explored by discussing the various roles and responsibilities of businesses, governments and citizens/consumers.

Even after 30 years, the internet is still unlocking extraordinary potential within societies. Unfortunately, along with this extraordinary potential are equally unbelievable threats. The rise of consumer broadband has greatly increased the power of botnets to launch crippling denial of service (DoS) attacks on servers, infect millions of computers with malware, steal identity data, send out vast quantities of spam, and engage in click fraud and extortion. As a result, botnets are considered a primary security threat of the internet today, threatening businesses and people worldwide.

Moderator: Riz Khan, Founder and CEO of Global Media Productions

Panellists:

Mr. Hiromichi Shinohara, Senior Executive VP and CTO of NTT
Mr. Christian Rivierre, VP International Development Thales
Mrs. Kathryn Brown, President and CEO of Internet Society
Mr. Rob Wainwright, director Europol
Jan Kleijssen, Director Information Society and Action Against Crime, Council of Europe
Mr. Thorbjørn Jagland, Secretary General Council of Europe
Mr. Han Moraal, Chairman of the GPEN Committee (Global Prosecutors E-crime Network) at International Association of Prosecutors (IAP)
Mr. Raphael Koffi, Head of Telecommunication/ICT Division, Ecowas, Nigeria
Mr. Peter Lord, Director of Technology Policy of Oracle, special advisor to Commission on the Digital Economy of the International Chamber of Commerce

16:45 to 18:00 Livestream available

Parallel Session : Rethinking the social impact of new cyber technologies

As in the recent past, the coming months will be characterized by exciting new technological developments in the cyber domain becoming adopted in our everyday lives. Many of these innovations have great potential in improving and enhancing matters in areas such as healthcare, education or business. Just think of the enormous potential being unlocked by wearable computers, drone technology or brain-computer interface!

Policymakers, however, often lag behind in estimating the social impact of these innovations, both in validating their potential and their disadvantages. At the GCCS2015 various stakeholders will therefore sit down to discuss the impact of today’s and tomorrow’s technological developments in the cyber domain, thereby looking for fitting policy answers to the social issues (security, privacy, ethics) raised.

Speakers:

Erik Huizer, Chief Technology Officer at SURFnet, part-time professor Internet Applications University of Utrecht
Philip Brey, professor of philosophy of technology and chair of the department of philosophy, University of Twente
Gry Hasselbalch, founder of Mediamocracy

Demo's:

Wladimir Mufty, product manager at SURFnet
Joost Damen, IT Engineer and Young Talent Program participant at SURFnet.

16:45 to 18:00 Livestream available

Parallel Session : Clarifying the application of existing international law in cyberspace

This panel discussion will put forward a range of perspectives on the future progressive development of the application of international law in cyberspace. This panel will bring together legal specialists from academia or think tanks from key cyber states and other stakeholders.

Objectives:

To promote in-depth discussion on a number of questions related to the application of existing international law, both above and below the threshold of armed conflict.
To facilitate an airing of views, not to resolve these issues or to reach consensus.
To inform the thinking of the international community as they continue to discuss the specifics of applying international law to the cyber domain.

Participants:

Ben Baseley-Walker, Programme Lead, Emerging Security Threats program, United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (moderator)
Professor Michael N. Schmitt, Professor of Public International Law, Exeter University
Mr. Laurent Gisel, Legal Adviser, International Committee for the Red Cross
Professor Tang Lan, Deputy Director, Insitute of Information and Social Development, China Institutes for Contemporary International Relations
Mr Kriangsak Kittichaisaree, United Nations, member of the International Law Commission

16:45 to 18:00

Parallel Session : Towards 21st century internet standards

While modern internet standards are of crucial importance to protect cyberspace, the limited uptake of security related internet standards seems systemic. The structural inability to shed troublesome legacy internet technology, and upgrade to more secure and reliable 21st century alternatives, is by now seriously affecting the usability, robustness and scalability of the internet. This in turn significantly affects growth opportunities as well as hollowing out user trust.

Why is it so hard to migrate the internet to more modern internet standards? What are the underlying economic factors that come into play, and what are the possibilities for e.g. governments to positively influence market externalities? What can we do to create and leverage awareness of suppliers and users? How can we raise the bar to a cybersecurity level which is better in line with the global business and societal importance of the internet?

This parallel session is centred around the issue of spurring adoption of modern internet standards in cyberspace, and highlighting some interesting approaches and best practices - including the initiative internet.nl which will be launched during the GCCS.

It will be an interactive session, delving deep into the issue together with renowned speakers and panellists representing governments, civil society, academia, business, and the internet technical community. We will discuss the role of different stakeholders with regard to the adoption, promotion and implementation of modern internet standards - and discuss approaches to finally start moving the needle.

Moderator

Gerben Klein Baltink, Chairman of Platform Internet Standards and co-owner SME Cyber Advise Netherlands

Panellists

Olaf Kolkman, Chief Internet Technology Officer at Internet Society International
Melissa Hathaway, Senior Advisor Project on Technology, Security, and Conflict in the Cyber Age at Belfer Center, Harvard University
Jonne Soininen, Head of Software Industry Initiatives at Nokia Networks
Demi Getschko, Chief Executive Officer at Brazilian Network Information Center
Ramsés Gallego, Security Strategist & Evangelist at Dell Software
Michiel Leenaars, Director at Internet Society Netherlands

16:45 to 18:00

Parallel Session : Building Public Private Cooperation in Cyber Security

For a more secure cyberspace, partnerships are essential for the security and resilience of our infrastructures. Sharing good practices in public private partnerships can help managing the collaborative cyber risks in a domain where the threat landscape is continuously changing.

Main goals of the session:

Inform: Showing the importance of (international) public-private partnerships
Practice: Sharing international good practices in public private partnerships (incl conditions, issues, lessons learned and the next steps)
Activate: Sharing information to create an international community on cooperation

Moderator:

Roderik van Grieken, founder and director of the Dutch Debate Institute

Speakers:

Hans Henseler, Managing Director Tracks Inspector
Mari Ichikawa, counsellor, National center of Incident readiness and Strategy for Cybersecurity (NISC) Japan
Joanne Trimble, Head of International Engagement | CERT-UK
Igor van Gemert – Senior Business Consultant , Alliander
Fernando Sanchez, Director National Centre for Critical Infrastructure Protection, Ministry of the Interior, Spain.
Auke Huistra, International Corporation

Documents:

Cyber Security of Industrial Control Systems
Crucial processes in most critical infrastructures, and in many other organisations, rely on the correct and undisturbed functioning of Industrial Control Systems (ICS). A failure of ICS may both cause service disruptions, and result in safety risks to people and or the environment. Therefore, the cyber security and resilience of ICS is of utmost importance to society as a whole, to utilities and other critical infrastructure operators, and to organisations which use ICS. This document first and foremost, provides private and public sector executives with an Executive Summary outlining the ICS risk and challenges. This document appeals to the executive leadership of organisations to address the clear and present cyber security danger to their organisations and our societies as a whole.
From Awareness to Action: Bridging the gap in 10 steps
This interactive website presents the results from The Grand Conference 2014, “Building a Resilient Digital Society”. The website captures the most salient points that have been raised by the high-level stakeholders from the private, public, and knowledge domains during the interactive debates about necessary steps to enhance cyber resilience across all levels of society.
Sharing Cyber Security Information
When discussing cyber security in an international context, information sharing in a public-private-participation context is one of the most heard suggested solutions for increasing cyber resilience. However, there is a world, if not a universe, between the concept of information sharing and the practice of doing it. This Good Practice booklet contains the Dutch experiences, knowledge and lessons learned concerning information sharing.
Summary Report of the Meridian Conference 2014
The Meridian Conference 2014, a conference for government officials responsible for Critical Information Infrastructure Protection (CIIP), was held from 12 to 14 November, 2014, in Tokyo, Japan.
As a deliverable of the Meridian Conference 2014, the Summary Report of the Meridian Conference 2014 was developed to present key findings for CIIP.

18:15 to 19:00 Livestream available

Global Forum on Cyber Expertise

Founding partners will launch the Global Forum on Cyber Expertise: a global platform that contributes to cyber capacity building. The GFCE stimulates new funding streams and the sharing of expertise and experiences in the field of cyber security, cyber crime, data regulation and e-development. By matching supply and demand, countries that lack knowledge in certain cyber areas can benefit from the knowledge and expertise that will be provided by countries and companies with more experience in cyber matters. The GFCE will be launched officially with the adoption of a political declaration that emphasises the need for more capacity building, exchanges of best practices and strengthened international cooperation.

Moderator: Riz Khan, Founder and CEO of Global Media Productions

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/global-conference-on-cyber-space-2015