Centre for Internet and Society

Kannada Wikipedia Editathon: Prajavani

praskrishna — 2016-01-05T06:40:23Z

The article was published in Prajavani Mangal on December 11, 2015. A scanned version of the article is given below.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/kannada-wikipedia-editathon-prajavani-mangal

Kannada Wikipedia Editathon Coverage in Prajavani

praskrishna — 2016-01-05T06:40:52Z

The article was published in Prajavani Mangal on December 10, 2015. A scanned version of the article is below.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/kannada-wikipedia-prajavani-mangal

Post More Articles on Kannada Wikipedia

praskrishna — 2016-01-05T06:38:06Z

The article was published in Indian Express, Mangaluru edition on December 12, 2015. Dr. U.B. Pavanaja was quoted. A scanned version of the article is given below.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/post-more-articles-on-kannada-wikipedia

Second Regional Conference on Connectivity for All: Future Technologies, Markets and Regulation

praskrishna — 2015-12-27T16:16:09Z

This conference organized by the International Telecommunications Society, IIMA IDEA Telecom Centre of Excellence and Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad was held in New Delhi from December 13 to 15, 2015. Sunil Abraham was a panelist in the session "Going beyond Cybersecurity: Internet Governance Issues".

Click to read the conference details published by International Telecommunications Society here. Download the Agenda here.

The wide availability of Internet/broadband has been a significant driver of economic growth especially in developed countries. On the contrary, emerging economies lag far behind in Internet/broadband penetration even in urban areas. Further, as emerging economies have poor infrastructure as well as physical service deployment platforms, higher penetration of Internet/broadband could serve as an effective platform for social programmes' delivery. However, the increasing gap in penetration, speed and adoption of Internet/broadband between developed and emerging economies is likely to reduce the ability of the latter to participate in an equitable way in the global knowledge and service economy. As the gap increases, the ability of emerging economies to bridge the digital divide becomes more significantly daunting and is a major cause of concern for policymakers.

The challenges for connectivity in the developed and emerging economies are diverse. While developed countries face issues in providing higher speeds, bandwidth and connectivity among devices to large parts of their population who have basic Internet/broadband, emerging economies still struggle for establishing universal access and providing basic Internet/broadband to their citizens. Even where Internet/broadband is available, adoption may not be adequate especially in the rural and remote areas.

The wired infrastructure in emerging economies is poor, however, the mobile phones are ubiquitous. Therefore, mobile Internet/broadband could be an effective way for increasing Internet/broadband penetration. Technological and regulatory changes, especially those related to spectrum, are necessary to leverage these opportunities.

A related aspect of growth in Internet/broadband is the increasing role of Internet governance frameworks at national, regional and international levels. The challenge for nations is how to leverage this framework for growth of Internet/broadband and play a greater role in Internet governance.

A multi-pronged approach is required to address these diverse issues. A supportive environment for policy, regulatory and technology development is required. This conference provides a platform for dialogue between researchers, industry practitioners, government and regulatory bodies to search for collaborative solutions.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/telecom/news/second-regional-conference-on-connectivity-for-all-future-technologies-markets-and-regulation

Second Regional Conference on Connectivity for All

praskrishna — 2015-12-27T16:15:12Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/telecom/blog/second-regional-conference-on-connectivity-for-all

NLSIU Conference on Access to Copyrighted Works for Persons with Disability: An enriching experience

praskrishna — 2015-12-27T16:01:44Z

National Law School of India University, Bangalore hosted a one-day national conference on the ‘Access to Copyrighted Works for Persons with Disability’, on the 26th of November, 2015 to discuss the provisions and implications of the Marrakesh Treaty as signed on the 27th of June, 2013.

The blog post authored by Abolee Vaidya and Nuhar Bansal was published in SINAPSE on December 14, 2015. Pranesh Prakash was a speaker at this event.

The Chief Guest of the conference was Ms. Aparna Sharma, who is the Joint Secretary and Registrar of Copyrights, MHRD. She pointed out at the very onset that it was very opportune for the conference to be hosted on the Constitution Day as what could have been a better day to talk about equal opportunity and non-discrimination.

The conference was roughly divided into three sessions which covered the following perspectives: a brief overview of the treaty, the Indian Copyright Law provisions and the implications of the both of them on stakeholders and beneficiaries in India. Mr. G. R. Raghavender, Director IPR, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, GoI, chaired the first two sessions and told us about how ‘Sparsh’, the 1980 film starring Naseeruddin Shah as a blind teacher, triggered his conscience.

World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) conducted a study in 2006 on the extent of execution of Copyright provisions with regard to limitations and exceptions to Copyright for people with disability. The concluding observations were quite disappointing, which is how the talks about the Marrakesh Treaty commenced. He then gave us insights into the negotiations that went into finalizing the treaty, how the World Blind Union played an extremely instrumental role in getting the treaty through and also how Brazil recently became the 12^th country to ratify the treaty.

Mr. Raghavender further shed some light on the basic scope of the treaty:

Addressing the book famine by introducing limitations and exceptions to the rights of the Copyright holder. In this context, most states wanted to restrict the definition of ‘works’ under the treaty to ‘physical books’ and not artistic or audiovisual works. Although, that was not agreed to as audio description is crucial to modern online education in all ways. The international publishing community opposed most of the provisions during negotiation. They argued that publishing accessible copies of their published work would increase the cost of production and subsequently the market price of the work, due to which, majority of the disabled population wouldn’t be able to afford it anyway. Besides, whether the commercial want for the existent printed material in the market would be affected or the sighted consumers would take advantage of the accessible versions in the market are other issues that were brought up.
What kind of limitations and exceptions should be imposed? The developed countries opposed liberal interpretations and exceptions to the treaty. Owing to political influences, translation and public redistribution rights were also proposed to be limited and to be granted only to developing and least developed countries under compulsory Licensing, and in no other circumstances. The proposal allowed for reproduction, distribution and access to all content except audiovisual, excluding translation and public performance rights from the exception ambit. The Vienna Convention for Law of Treaties was referred to quite often for a thorough understanding.
Easier cross border exchange of works- Bigger nations wanted tie-ups with certain commercially available entities across nations for particular exchange purposes thus resulting in it becoming just a business and curbing accessibility. This was negotiated upon and dismissed.
Technological Protection Measures- Mr. Raghavendra spoke about extending the Berne Convention to digital works too so that re-encrypting digital works for the disabled does not qualify as infringement. He also stated how there needs to be more clarity as to the usage and breaking of digital locks.

Prof. T. Ramakrishna, MHRD Chair Professor on IPR , NLSIU launched their website iprindia.law.org, which is a one-stop place to find research material on Indian Intellectual Property law.

It was then followed by a presentation by the students of NLSIU on the basics of Marrakesh Treaty where it was concisely presented as to what the treaty means to the countries ratifying it.

Only 1-7% of the world’s books are available in accessible formats, largely due to Copyright hurdles and Marrakesh treaty intends to help in 2 ways:

Exception in domestic law of every ratifying country to ensure that they allow the print disabled and blind to convert texts into accessible formats without having to first take permission from the Copyright holder.
Cross border exchange of accessible version of books without permission. This will help avoid illegal duplication of transcripts and also allow countries with larger collection of such works to share it with other nations in need.
Specific articles that enable a relatively wide interpretation of the provisions to help make the texts more easily accessible.

Dr. Kalyan. C. Kankanala (Managing Partner BananaIP Counsels, visiting faculty NLSIU and guest faculty IIMB) was the first speaker of the session and he started with a recommendation for the government to make all government documents accessible as a first step of implementing the Marrakesh Treaty. He then went on to tell us how he lost vision in 1998 and found it very hard to access the curriculum related texts. Despite the best of efforts that he could muster, he was able to access barely 10% of the total material. He said that irrespective of how able you are, if your ability cannot access the fodder it is supposed to thrive on then there can be no scope for development. Today, information is available at the click of a button and your ability to succeed and not be discriminated against depends on how fast you access this information. Keeping this in mind, if there is no provision to make other more technologically advanced forms of information also accessible, it is not going to be a sustainable option. Most of the information today is in a non-literary format and to access that, a lot of other barriers have to be broken, which can result in simultaneous Copyright, Trademark and Patent infringement, which the Marrakesh Treaty cannot protect you against. To enable equal opportunity in reality, exceptions should flow under a bunch of laws and not just Copyright. What we face today is an information famine and not just a book famine. The solution lies with the publishing community. Because, the technological tools that the laws can equip us with, will fall short of some or the other parameter at some time and that defeats the aim of equal opportunity. So if the publishing community itself releases accessible versions along side their publications for the sighted consumers, we would have a sustainable solution. Also, the number of authorized entities should be made significantly high because greater the number of authorized entities, greater the chances of the publishers sensing competition and realizing that a commercial model around making accessible books available would be better for their business. He further said that the scope of definitions of terms used in the treaty are not as problematic as certain other areas like what kind of works are covered, what kind of disabilities are covered, what rights are covered and mandated. Nevertheless, the treaty has been negotiated and signed and going to bring out some sort of a positive change if not a revolution, so to say.

Dr. S. Elumalai, Assistant Professor, Dr. Ambedkar Law University, Tamil Nadu, was the next speaker and he had some wonderful insights to offer. He said that the PWD Act qualifies a person as disabled only if he has more than 40% disability. Whereas, the Marrakesh Treaty addresses reading disability on the whole, which is very important. In fact, it also enables the caretaker and caregiver of the so disabled to claim accessibility rights under the treaty unlike any Indian legislation. He pointed out how our own government machinery is not disabled friendly, to the extent that disabled people are denied higher secondary education and professional education in government institutes. He stated that the government should help the disabled people help themselves and that can be achieved by training the authorized entities to be technologically up to date. The RTI Act talks about accessible formats of texts but the government has done little more than talking in that regard. Understanding that the disabled people are a minority and hence not a force influential enough to manipulate the demand-supply cycle of the market, it becomes all the more important for strong regulatory mechanisms to interfere. The government needs to step in and step up, the stakeholders need to be pro active, the authorized entities and the publishers should know their rights and duties and the disabled people should be made a part of the decision making process from scratch to resolve any moral right conflict that might arise between the above listed parties.

Mr. Pranesh Prakash, Policy Director CIS, was up next on the panel and brought a refreshingly dramatic change to the proceedings of the conference. He said that talks about the formation of this treaty began around 1982 and were initiated by UNESCO and WIPO. Countries such as Brazil, Ecuador, India etc. saw this treaty as an instrument that would lead to global accessibility. He then pointed out that the super nations trying so hard to restrict the scope of the treaty and exercising the power imbalance in the international arena, reminded him of colonialism. Besides that, the treaty advocates free cross border exchange of accessible information which is in principle against the colonial centralization of international relations. Therefore, the ratification of this treaty comes to him as a tiny war victory and which is why none of the major publishing countries in the world have ratified the treaty. He is strongly of the opinion that making books of any kind available to any kind of people is always good for the publishing industry. The publishers need to understand that the treaty is now providing for legal access to the converted materials as against pirated ones which was the only option until now. However, the Technological Protection Measures are not sufficient under the treaty. They do not provide for circumventing the digital lock on electronic data, as pointed out by Mr. Raghavender earlier. He further clarified that making books available in different formats does not amount to infringement as then books available in the library would also amount to Copyright infringement. Legal provisions should be present which would allow disabled people to access materials because if these provisions were absent then people would try to obtain the same materials by infringing copyrights. As of now, there are organizations that give access to readable software like Jaws. It is not a difficult task to make any work digital, the only problem arises when the work has to be made accessible and the manner in which such accessible material is to be used. It is extremely important to create awareness as how to use the accessible material by the physically disabled. When a book is published, its copy is deposited in all the 4 national libraries and when such a book is deposited, an easier way would be to convert it into electronic medium and convert that into accessible formats. Converting print into accessible medium is extremely difficult and will be much easier once it is electronic medium. He also gave an example of publishing books under the Creative Comments License that would make copies available in the accessible format. Not only should literary works be made accessible but all websites should also be redesigned and made accessible.

At this point, Dr. Kalyan brought up an interesting technicality when he asked Mr. Prakash to clarify that although making copies of any literary work is permitted under this treaty, whether the authenticity of the so called literary work would be in question or not. Because there are a number of pirated materials doing to the rounds of the market for sighted people already, and whether converting one such pirated work in an accessible version would still stand good in law. Mr. Prakash admitted that there is ambiguity in the language of the legislation in this regard, however, a liberal interpretation of the relevant provisions of TRIPS indicates that such minor discrepancies in execution can be exempted at the outset. Something, which Mr. Raghavender, in his dutiful government responsibility, disagreed with and said that all conversions should be made from authentic documents to discourage piracy.

This culminated the first two sessions of the conference and proved to be extremely informative for the participants and audience. The post lunch session of the conference exclusively dealt with the implications of the Marrakesh treaty and Domestic Copyright Law on the Stakeholders and Beneficiaries in India. Prof. Dr. T. Ramakrishna, MHRD Chair Professor on IPR, NLSIU, was the chair/moderator. The first speaker of the afternoon session, Mr. G. Marippan, Asst. Director, Dept. for the Empowerment of Differently Abled and Senior Citizens, Bangalore, gave us all a very bare text understanding of the various provisions under the Karnataka State Government Laws along with the different schemes in place for the benefit of the stakeholders and beneficiaries of the Copyright legislations.

Mr. Gautam Agarwal from the National Federation of the Blind pointed out that less than 1% of the total published print material in the world is available in accessible format as per NFB’s records. With the help of the Marrakesh treaty, countries will overcome legal hurdles to make things accessible and enable cross border exchange. But, he did raise questions as to how efficiently can these provisions be executed to actually help the ones in need. “Law can only facilitate us and show us the path, it is us who will have to do the walking”, he said. Conversion being permitted is merely the preliminary step. But who will do the conversion? What all texts will be converted first and what later? How exactly will they be converted? How will they be circulated? These are all the greater issues that we need to address now. Over 90% of the websites that exist are not accessible and this treaty does not provide for anything to be done about that. Which essentially makes all the online information inaccessible to the disabled. To ensure the right to read to every disabled person at the same time and at a rate as available to the other people, is the simple understanding of the concept of Equal Opportunity in this regard. He reinstated that we are 8 countries short of ratifying the Treaty to make in enforceable and suggested that Indian Government should enter in a dialogue with other nations and encourage and convince them to ratify.

The next speaker was Ms. Madhu Singhal, Managing Trustee, Mitra Jyothi, Bangalore. Their NGO usually provides materials in Braille and large print for persons with disability. She very passionately spoke about sensitization of the publishers as being a very strong influential force in efficient execution of the provisions of the Marrakesh Treaty. She said that merely telling them what to do is not a one step solution. Instead, it is a long procedure which should ideally end in them being mandated into publishing the accessible copies. She also suggested that one database of accessible materials should be created for efficient usage of resources. This way, people across geographical boundaries will know what materials already exist and how to access them, thus reducing the cost of conversion.

Mr. Elumalai was the last speaker for the session and he had a handful of suggestions to make to authorities carrying out the execution of the treaty provisions. He suggested that, for example, if a soft copy of any material is provided to the NIC, then it should be their duty to make it into an accessible format. He also suggested that there could be a reward system in place for the publishing houses that publish accessible formats of their publications or giving tax benefits to people who help in conversion, distribution and access to the accessible formats. He said that disability is as disabling as you let it be. Not having functional body parts is not disability but not wanting to use the existent body parts is.

At the end of the discussion, Mr. Panesh Prakash just brought back some perspective when he asked how many people in the room had ever pirated or bought a pirated version of an accessible format of information. When no one raised their hand, he then pointed out that this is why the publishing community cannot hold ‘exploitation of accessible format by sighted people’ as a valid argument. The treaty might have other flaws but this defense does not apply. He said that there are close to 12 methods as to how a person can apply to the Ministry for obtaining accessible material and all of them are available on the official website, only, not in an accessible format. He let the irony sink in before concluding the session.

That marked the end of the conference, which at the end of the day had being enriching, to say the least. Listening to all the different stakeholders and policy makers and beneficiaries give their perspective over one piece of legislation only makes you realize the multi dimensional impact that laws have on people’s lives.

The Marrakesh treaty stood debated, discussed, dissed and devoured.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/nlsiu-conference-on-access-to-copyrighted-works-for-persons-with-disability-an-enriching-experience

A Scam Masquerading as Santa

praskrishna — 2015-12-26T01:23:56Z

Christmas is here and social media is abuzz with celebrations of its spirit.

The article by Apurva Venkat & Vandana Kamath was published in Bangalore Mirror on December 25, 2015. Sunil Abraham gave inputs.

Lurking in the dark though, is an online scam that has been turning expectations of those participating in it into heartache. Secret Santa, a gift exchange programme, has lured many people into its fold. The exchange programme invites people to join a chain of gift givers (and hopeful receivers) through social media platforms like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. The promised deal is that every person in the chain stands to get 36 gifts against one that they make.

A person interested in being part of the chain, has to post their agreement on their wall, and invite six more participants. The scheme encourages the person to send a gift valued below Rs 600 to a person whose name and address is at the top of a long list of participants that is sent as a private message. Once they have made the gift, they remove the name of the person in first place, and replace it with the person in the second place. The new recruit then puts their name in the second place of the list.

Social media experts call it as nothing but a pyramid scheme scam. While this has gone viral in the city only recently, the UK and USA governments have already warned their citizens against falling prey to such scams and termed them illegal. While most victims of the scam are sending books as gifts to strangers, there are others who have been gifting cosmetics, chocolates or Christmas gift packs. Of course, most are doing it in the hope of getting back similar gifts.

Chaitanya KM, Kannada film director, who sent a book as a gift under the scheme, told Bangalore Mirror, "I sent one book and seven people have asked me for my address but I have not received anything in return. I haven't heard about this scam but I do not mind gifting a book anyways without getting anything in return." Some hope that Secret Santa will work as an eye opener for city social media users.

Sunil Abraham, executive director of Centre for Internet and Society, said, "This seems to be a rumour to which many are falling prey. This will work like net-user education, and people will get wiser after they are cheated. Some form of awareness needs to be done because at least two per cent of people will respond to this."

Facebook bars it
According to Facebook rules, multi-level marketing on the platform is prohibited. The Facebook agreement terms state that engaging in things like pyramid schemes is not allowed. Also posting personal details on Facebook makes one vulnerable to many more identity fraud that can follow.

IT'S MATHEMATICALLY IMPOSSIBLE

Not only are pyramid schemes like this one mathematically impossible, they're also against Facebook's terms of use. The list of theoretical participants multiplies into millions of people in just a few steps of Secret Santa. The idea sounds feasible but it is not. Going from step one it starts with six people, who each invite six more, who all send gifts to the person in the number one spot before they're moved off the list. However, as it spreads, the number of people involved increases far more than would ever take part — if the 36 each invite six people then the total number of participants is 216 going on to 1,296 and so on. Only those who start the schemes or enter in the second round stand a chance of receiving something in return and even in that case it is just one gift not 36 as the post claims. Those who join later never ever reach the top of the list.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/a-scam-masquerading-as-santa

October 2015 Report

praskrishna — 2015-12-24T02:50:39Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/october-2015-report

RTI PDF

praskrishna — 2015-12-22T02:54:15Z

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

Global Charter: Promoting Global Digital Inclusion through ICT Procurement Policies & Accessibility Standards

praskrishna — 2016-01-03T05:26:44Z

The Centre for Internet & Society was a signatory to this initiative.

This was published by G3ict.

Foreword

G3ict, the Global Initiative for Inclusive Information and Communications Technologies (“ICTs”), whose mission is to promote the full implementation of the dispositions of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities ("CRPD”) relative to the accessibility of ICTs,

Considering that Accessibility, Equal Opportunity and Non-Discrimination are among the fundamental principles of the CRPD, the realization of which in the digital age is conditioned by the availability of accessible ICTs,
Taking into account that the CRPD specifically recognizes the accessibility of information and communication technologies (ICTs) both as a right (Article 9) and as an enabler of other human rights as prescribed in other articles of the Convention.
Noting that its articles 4(a) to 4(d) under "General obligations" further require that States Parties adopt appropriate legislative, administrative and other measures to ensure these rights are met and to refrain from any act or practice that is inconsistent with the Convention and that public authorities and institutions are in particular required to act in conformity with the Convention.
Acknowledging that the procurement of ICTs for use by the public that are not usable and accessible by persons with disabilities may be deemed to be in contravention of the Convention.
Recalling that Reporting Guidelines to States Parties should include legislative and other measures taken to ensure access by persons with disabilities, on an equal basis with others, to the physical environment, to transportation and to information and communications; technical standards and guidelines for accessibility, as well as the use of public procurement provisions and other measures that establish compulsory accessibility requirements.

Offers the attached charter for signature by leaders of Civil Society, International Organizations and the Private Sector to further the progress and momentum of international cooperation in establishing public procurement policies and standards in compliance with the CRPD.

Charter

We believe that governments should use their purchasing power to support the innovation of accessible technology and the creation of more robust accessible technology markets in every country.

We encourage governments at all levels and around the world to promote the digital inclusion of persons with disabilities and older persons by adopting effective policies for the public procurement of accessible ICT and an international accessibility standard to support them.

Public Procurement as an Inclusion Strategy

Public procurement processes have gained increased attention as an effective policy tool to promote the accessibility of information and communications (ICT) equipment, software, applications, and services purchased by governments or government-funded programs. Global interest in the positive effect of public procurement is in part the result two well-known accessibility public policy activities; Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act in the United States (governing the federal government purchase of accessible electronic and information technology) and in Europe, the Public Procurement Directive of 2014 in combination with EN 301 549 (the European accessibility standard developed to support the public procurement of accessible ICT products and services in Europe). However, G3ict research and analysis show that to date only 33% of States Parties to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) have enacted some type of policy on the procurement of accessible ICT.

Everyone Benefits from the Procurement of Accessible ICT

Public procurement of accessible ICT can advance equality and non-discrimination for persons with disabilities. Governments that purchase accessible ICT are better able to provide inclusive services to all citizens. Because governments are large employers, their investments in accessible ICT products and services help to create inclusive workplaces and support the employment of people with disabilities. Procurement policies strengthen the local technology industry in a country. They lead to greater innovation, competition, and choice for accessible technology. They drive the creation of new development tools for accessible technology and better accessibility training for technology professionals. Procurement policies create positive ripple effects into the broader consumer ICT marketplace.

The Tools Available for Success

G3ict, working with the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and with global experts from civil society and industry has created a model procurement policy as resource for governments wanting to ensure that their technology purchases support digital inclusion. There exists today a comprehensive technical standard, EN 301 549, that was developed by experts specifically for public procurement. It defines accessibility across all types of disability and technology. The ITU has created a training course to support procurement officials as they implement accessibility into their procurement work.

If your organization would like to be part of this Global Charter for Accessible ICT Procurement, please send us an email globalcharter@g3ict.org.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/accessibility/news/global-charter-promoting-global-digital-inclusion-through-ict-procurement-policies-accessibility-standards

CODE Session

praskrishna — 2016-01-13T13:39:43Z

CODE Project is an IDRC funded project, and CIS is a partner institution, along with PIJIP at American University Washington College of Law, USA, Karisma Foundation, Colombia, Derechos Digitale, Chile, American Assembly, Columbia University, USA and FGV, Rio.

At this session held in New Delhi on December 17, 2015, CIS presented some preliminary research and sought input on methodology as well as content. The project broadly studies law and policy environment that facilitates/hinders content creation online in Brazil, US, India, Colombia and Chile. A second part of the project, led by PIJIP is developing a copyright index, to chart copyright law developments in many countries around the world. Nehaa Chaudhari and Anubha Sinha participated in the open session.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/code-session

November 2015 Report

praskrishna — 2015-12-16T13:06:31Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/november-2015-report.pdf

Strategy Meeting on Global Copyright Policy and Advocacy

praskrishna — 2016-01-31T10:00:18Z

Sunil Abraham and Pranesh Prakash participated in the meeting held on December 14, 2015 at National Law School in Delhi.

Earlier this year, the Open Society Foundations convened a two-day meeting on access to knowledge strategy. Copyright emerged as a major issue and many of the attendees focused on a next-generation copyright reform strategy. The discussion included identifying best user practices, capacity building, WIPO, and risk management. By the end of the two-days, there was strong support to continue the dialogue with a further one-day meeting at the Global Congress.

Agenda overview and guidelines

The agenda is being designed as a combination of planned sessions and participant-driven discussions, and specific topics will be placed into time slots based on input from the participants. Sessions will be dialog- and outcome-oriented rather than presentations or lecture format.

14 December 2015

The Meeting will take place at:

Room 102

National Law University, Delhi

Sector 14, Dwarka

New Delhi – 110078

9:00 Interactive Plenary

This session will provide a collaborative opportunity for participants to share some of their thoughts on the issues relevant to copyright reform strategies, priorities, and directions.

10:00 Identify opportunities for advocacy

Participants will break out into small groups to discuss opportunities for advocacy both internationally and domestically. Some possibilities include:

Limitations and exceptions/user rights
Remedies/damages/risk
Intermediaries
International – WIPO
International - trade agreements (TPP, TTIP, CETA, etc.)

10.45 Break

11.00 Deeper discussion of identified opportunities

In small groups, participants will have the opportunity to discuss the opportunities which have been identified. (5 x 30 min = 2.5 hours)

12.30 Lunch Break

13:30 Deeper discussion of identified opportunities, cont.
Small group discussion continues.

15:00 Report back
Each group will have an opportunity to report back.

15:30 Best of the best
In the full group, the participants can discuss the best opportunities, biggest risks, and the best models to follow.

16.30 Closing

This session will invite participants to weigh in on what has been most useful during the course of the day.

17.00 Adjourn

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/strategy-meeting-on-global-copyright-policy-and-advocacy

Consultation on "Understanding the Freedom of Expression Online and Offline"

praskrishna — 2016-01-03T10:27:08Z

The event organized by Digital Empowerment Foundation and Association for Progressive Communications was held at YMCA, New Delhi on December 10, 2015. Jyoti Panday attended the event as a speaker. She covered imposition of legitimate expression specifically in the context of intermediary liability practices in India.

The sessions were divided as under:

Welcome & Overview of the consultation by Digital Empowerment Foundation
Launch of the Country Research Report & Keynote Address
Introducing the Country Research Report titled “Limited Access and Restricting Expression by Osama Manzar, Founder and Director, Digital Empowerment Foundation
Working Session I: Understanding the “Freedom of Expression Online and Offline” in conversation with experts
Working Session II: “Unboxing the Freedom of Expression Online & Offline”
Sub-Group Presentations
Concluding Remarks

Download the Agenda here

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/consultation-on-understanding-the-freedom-of-expression-online-and-offline

Unbundling Issues of Privacy, Data Security, Identity Matrics, for Financial Inclusion

praskrishna — 2016-01-03T10:45:19Z

This event was organized by Indicus Foundation and MicroSave on December 10, 2015 at the Metropolitan Hotel and Spa, New Delhi. Sunil Abraham was a speaker.

While the initiative towards financial inclusion has gathered new impetus with the PMJDY and the accelerated roll out of benefits, there is also a parallel narrative of concerns over the legality and fundamental constitutionality of identity verification, which is a centre piece for delivery of financial benefits and services. These divergent narratives have now reached the Supreme Court.

At one end of the spectrum are the voices that avow the power of biometric technology to irrepudiately establish biological identity; at the other, the alarmism over targeting, concentration and misuse of personal information contained in the world’s biggest personal database. There is also a third extreme position of whether Indian citizens are entitled to the right to privacy constitutionally, and whether the right to privacy includes the right to refuse a national identity number or metric altogether. That India has yet to enact a Privacy Bill and the National Identity Authority Bill on which rests the statutory basis for UIDAI and Aadhaar only adds to the quagmire.

Several issues lie intertwined in this miasma: Privacy as an absolute right; Definition and Limits of Personal Information and Sensitive Personal Information; Consent protocols over use of personal information; Data Security; Appropriate and inclusive technology platforms; and Responsibilities and Liabilities governing the use of personal information for bonafide purposes. These straddle multiple domains: data accuracy and irrepudiability; storage, security and encryption; and sharing of information for transaction processing including across national boundaries. Unfortunately, all of these tend to get lumped together in the public debate.

The aim of this workshop is to unbundle the issues and understand each of them from the perspective of financial inclusion, to be able to answer these questions:

How essential and critical is a unified Identity metric for digital financial transactions? How essential is that such a metric be biometric?
To what extent does the centralised storage of biometric data represent risks of personal safety and national security, compared to the information on election voter lists, passport offices, census data, and bank accounts?
What are the possible sources of transactional risk and security breaches in data sharing, and what are the international best practices?
Is the present Aadhaar architecture robust enough to: address all the genuine and reasonable concerns over leakage and misuse of sensitive personal information; and to ensure that no genuine identity holder is turned away from a service, entitlement or benefit to which (s)he has a right or claim?

In this direction, we have the privilege to interact in this workshop with experts from The Centre for Internet and Society, and Data Security Council of India who have been at the forefront of the discussions on privacy and data security aspects of technology based innovations including for financial inclusion.

Download the Workshop Schedule here

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/unbundling-issues-of-privacy-data-security-identity-matrics-for-financial-inclusion