Centre for Internet and Society

The Fifth Elephant in Bangalore

praskrishna — 2014-07-16T11:02:15Z

HasGeek is organizing the Fifth Elephant in Bangalore at NIMHANS Convention Centre on July 25 and 26, 2014. The Centre for Internet and Society is a community outreach partner with HasGeek.

Facebook has 100 million users in India. You know who has a billion?

The Indian Census.

Varsha Joshi, Director of the National Population Register, was present at The Fifth Elephant 2013 to explain on how the census team collects and processes such a vast amount of data.

Each year, The Fifth Elephant conference brings consumers and producers of technology to understand how data is processed (via available technologies), insights mined from datasets in different domains, and opportunities that data presents for economy and society. The key differentiator of The Fifth Elephant conference is that the content is crowdsourced and carefully curated by a panel of experts.

HasGeek, organizer of The Fifth Elephant, also shares a strong commitment to open access, open knowledge and open data. We ensure that every edition of The Fifth Elephant has representatives from the government –– either officials themselves or technology teams working on important data projects –– addressing citizens’ concerns around privacy and protection of data.

In 2012, we had Pramod Varma and Regunath B. speaking about the Aadhar project alongside Lucy Chambers’ presentation on the OKF’s work with data journalism, Nikhil Pahwa’s on RTI and Sumandro’s on NSSO data.

In 2013, Varsha Joshi talked to participants about the challenges that the census faces in collating data.
This year, we have invited Mr. Ram Sewak Sharma, secretary of Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DEITY), to talk about the state of government data and how citizens can participate in strengthening government’s efforts.

Why should you attend The Fifth Elephant?
The Fifth Elephant is a relevant event for data geeks and enthusiasts, NGOs, journalists and members of advocacy groups not just from the immediate standpoint of open data. This year’s edition also brings talks from finance and healthcare where speakers will talk about the challenges of working with complex financial datasets, data security and privacy concerns in the field of genomics, and related concerns. S. Anand will speak about what it took – in terms of technology infrastructure and data visualization – to do real-time visualizations for the recently concluded Indian elections. Participants will also get a flavour of frameworks – Lambda, Julia,OSM – and how these are used for building tools and platforms for mining data.

We welcome you to participate in the discussions and enrich interactions at the conference.

Schedule: https://fifthelephant.in/2014/conference
Registrations: http://fifthelephant.doattend.com
For more information, write to support@hasgeek.com

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/the-fifth-elephant

Living in a Fish Bowl

praskrishna — 2014-07-16T07:15:22Z

Though India needs a comprehensive law on the right to privacy, it may not be ready for something as avant garde as the “right to be forgotten” on the Internet, argues Shuma Raha

The article by Shuma Raha was published in the Telegraph on July 16, 2014. Sunil Abraham gave his inputs.

If you do a Google search for journalist and television personality Barkha Dutt, a raft of scurrilous information about her pops up. It isn’t tucked away somewhere on the 10th page either — it’s all up front, right there in “autosuggest”, almost prompting you to go and check it out. And thanks to Google’s search algorithm, the more people click on that link, it further strengthens the score for that “hit”.

Dutt says she has brought the matter to the attention of Google, but to no avail. “I have lost interest in the whole struggle,” she says. “But Google definitely needs to do something about the slanderous, inaccurate, fictional information out there that creates a narrative of its own.”

Well, in Europe at least, the tech giant has taken a step in that direction. Late last month, it started erasing search results that threw up information deemed to be “irrelevant”, “outdated” or “excessive”. The move came after the European Court of Justice ruled that Internet search engines would have to allow people the “right to be forgotten” in specific cases and accordingly, take down information about them.

The European Court ruling has triggered a huge debate since an individual’s right to be forgotten seems to be at complete loggerheads with people’s right to know. Nevertheless, it’s a landmark decision when it comes to right to privacy on the Internet. After all, the online space has perma-memory and inaccurate or irrelevant or outdated information about a person can be embedded there forever, damaging him or her in manifold ways.

So how far are we in India from securing the right to be forgotten on the Internet?

The short answer to that is, very far. That is because India does not have a well-defined privacy regime wherein one could envisage a court of law handing out a similar — and some would say a somewhat radical — order on a Google or a Bing. “The right to be forgotten is a bit too advanced for us,” says Sunil Abraham, director, Centre for Internet and Society, a non-profit organisation that works on policy issues relating to freedom of expression and privacy. “After all, we are yet to come up with a privacy and data protection regime that implements the best practices of European countries.”

Adds Apar Gupta, a Delhi-based lawyer, who has written extensively on privacy issues, “Sector specific privacy legislation do exist, but they do not provide substantive rights or efficient remedy in case of violations.”
No one disputes that India should get a right to privacy law, especially one that relates to the collection, processing and use of personal data. Right now the government’s surveillance mechanisms like the Central Monitoring System and the Lawful Interception and Monitoring Systems allow security agencies and income tax authorities to intercept communication, snoop on phone conversations, read emails and SMSes with little or no safeguards for privacy protection.

A right to privacy bill has, in fact, been in the works since as early as 2011. But the government has been dragging its feet over it. Early this year, a new version of the draft bill was “leaked” to the press. But few are happy with it. On the positive side, it raises the penalty for unlawful interception of communication (from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 2 crore) and increases penalties for other offences such as obtaining personal data under false pretexts. But crucially, it almost wholly exempts intelligence agencies from the purview of the law, thereby allowing them unbridled access to personal information. Of course, no one knows if this “leaked” draft is indeed the official one.

Experts say that the government should really formulate a right to privacy law based on the recommendations of a committee chaired by Justice A.P. Shah. The report, which was published in 2012, proposes that the right to privacy be statutorily extended to all Indians. It recommends, among other things, the appointment of privacy commissioners and the formulation of certain “national privacy principles” such as taking the consent of the individual prior to the collection of data, allowing him the choice to withdraw such consent, limiting the use of personal information to the stated purpose and so on. The privacy principles would apply to all data collectors in both private and public sectors.
There are, of course, a number of provisions in existing laws that relate to privacy. For example, Rule 419A of the Indian Telegraph Rules, 1951, sets down certain privacy safeguards such as maintaining details about the officer ordering an intercept of telecommunication.

Moreover, Section 66E of the Information Technology Act, 2000, prescribes “punishment for the violation of privacy” (in the context of capturing “private” images of a person without his or her consent); Section 43A lays down that a “body corporate” will be liable to pay compensation in case it fails to protect personal data gathered in the course of its operation; and Section 79 stipulates that “intermediaries” — entities such as Google, Facebook, Twitter — would have to take down any information stored or transmitted by them that is found to be grossly harassing, defamatory, blasphemous, obscene, pornographic and so on, within 36 hours of being notified.

Of course, this section of the IT Act has been roundly criticised as arbitrary and Draconian, but that is another story.
The point is that despite the fair number of privacy provisions, in the absence of a comprehensive law, the untrammelled and unauthorised use of personal data cannot be ruled out. “Every country in the world collects personal data. But once the data are collected for a particular purpose they should not be used for any other purpose. The law has to be in a position to catch the violators,” says Kamlesh Bajaj, CEO of Data Security Council of India, an organisation that works to promote data protection and privacy best practices.

As always, the key issue is that an individual’s right to privacy has to be balanced with public interest. And it is in that context that experts feel that even if India were to have a privacy law, it is probably not ready for something akin to the European Court ruling on the right to be forgotten. As Gupta says, “It raises a real danger of public personalities blocking legitimate journalism on grounds of privacy. This is specially true in a country like India which permits a high degree of illegality in the name of secrecy and confidentiality.”

Abraham agrees with that view. “I’m not sure if the right to be forgotten will enhance privacy or usher in a level of censorship,” he says.

As Europe grapples with that debate, India’s privacy warriors are asking for something far more fundamental — a comprehensive law that guarantees the right to privacy to all.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/the-telegraph-july-16-2014-living-in-a-fish-bowl

Open Access: Students help revive and digitize rare books for Malayalam Wiki Library

praskrishna — 2014-07-28T08:50:07Z

The blog post that quotes Centre for Internet and Society was published in SPICY IP on July 15, 2014.

The New Indian Express reports that in a terrific effort, more than 1000 school students and 234 members of the public across the state of Kerala digitized, proof-read and uploaded more than 150 rare and out-of-copyright Malayalam books as part of a digitization contest organized to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Wiki Source project by the Centre for Internet and Society, the state government run IT@School project, Swanthanthra Malayalam Computing and the Kerala Sahitya Akademi online library.

While these rare books were already in the public domain, the importance of preserving them in an accessible format cannot be emphasised enough. Books published as early as 1772 are now available on Wiki Grandhasala, the Malayalam wiki library to which these digitized copies have been uploaded. As they have been digitized rather than simply scanned, one can also search through them for keywords/phrases. If I’m not mistaken, OCR solutions for Indian languages either do not exist or are not of reliable quality. This would mean that much of the over 13,000 pages were typed out! I understand that these articles will also be used to cross reference wikipedia articles as well.

A big round of applause to all the involved parties for organizing and participating in this great effort at preserving as well as making accessible local literature and culture, that could otherwise be at a risk of getting lost amongst unhelpful copyright laws and/or tarnished or lost physical copies amongst other risks.

(I’m not sure if these overlap but as we reported here, there also seems to be the Kerala State Central Library that makes rare books available as well).

Can this effort be replicated in other states? I know the Panjab Digital Library is another resource that looks to do something similar. Their mission statement includes: to locate, digitize, preserve, collect and make accessible the accumulated wisdom of the Panjab region, without distinction as to script, language, religion, nationality, or other physical condition. There is also the Digital Library of India, hosted by IISC Bangalore, which states that they are trying to digitize all the significant works of mankind! If our readers know of other such databases, please do let us know in the comments.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/spicy-ip-swaraj-paul-barooah-july-15-2014-open-access-students-help-revive-and-digitize-rare-books-for-malayalam-wiki-library

‘ಕನ್ನಡ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ’ಕ್ಕೆ ಇನ್ನು ಲೈಸೆನ್ಸ್ ಹಂಗಿಲ್ಲ

praskrishna — 2014-07-14T07:55:12Z

ಮೈಸೂರು ವಿಶ್ವವಿದ್ಯಾಲಯ ಇದೇ ಮೊದಲ ಬಾರಿಗೆ ತನ್ನ ಮೂರು ದಶಕಗಳಷ್ಟು ಹಳೆಯ ‘ಕನ್ನಡ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ’ದ ಮೊದಲ ಆರು ಸಂಪುಟಗಳನ್ನು ‘ಕ್ರಿಯೇಟಿವ್ ಕಾಮನ್ಸ್ ಲೈಸನ್ಸ್’ನಡಿ (ಮುಕ್ತ ಪರವಾನಗಿ) ಅಂತರ್ಜಾಲದ ವಿಕಿಪೀಡಿಯಾದಲ್ಲಿ ಬಿಡುಗಡೆ ಮಾಡಲಿದೆ

Click to read the original published in Prajavani on July 14, 2014 here.

ಇದಕ್ಕೆಂದೇ ಕಳೆದ ಫೆಬ್ರುವರಿಯಲ್ಲಿ ವಿಶ್ವವಿದ್ಯಾಲಯವು ಸಿಐಎಸ್‌ (ಸೆಂಟರ್ ಫಾರ್ ಇಂಟರ್‌ನೆಂಟ್‌ ಅಂಡ್ ಸೊಸೈಟಿ) ನೊಂದಿಗೆ ಒಪ್ಪಂದ ಮಾಡಿಕೊಂಡಿದ್ದು, ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶದ ಆರು ಸಂಪುಟಗಳು ಇದೀಗ ಸಂಪೂರ್ಣ ಉಚಿತವಾಗಿ ಅಂತರ್ಜಾಲ ಓದುಗರಿಗೆ ಲಭ್ಯವಾಗುತ್ತಿವೆ.

ಇದೇ ರೀತಿ ಕನ್ನಡ ವಿಶ್ವವಿದ್ಯಾಲಯವು ಕೂಡ ತನ್ನ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶಗಳನ್ನು ಕ್ರಿಯೇಟಿವ್ ಕಾಮನ್ಸ್‌ನಲ್ಲಿ ಬಿಡುಗಡೆ ಮಾಡಬೇಕೆಂದು ಕನ್ನಡ ವಿಕಿಪೀಡಿಯಾ ಸಮೂಹವು ಕೋರಿದೆ. ಆದರೆ, ಅದಕ್ಕೆ ವಿ.ವಿ ಇನ್ನೂ ಒಪ್ಪಿಗೆ ಸೂಚಿಸಿಲ್ಲ. ಎಲ್ಲ ವಿ.ವಿ., ಅಕಾಡೆಮಿ, ಪರಿಷತ್ತು ಕನ್ನಡ ಸಾಹಿತ್ಯ ಪರಿಷತ್ತುಗಳು ತಯಾರಿಸಿದ ಮತ್ತು ಸರಕಾರದಿಂದ ಅನುದಾನ ಪಡೆದು ತಯಾರಾದ ಎಲ್ಲ ಮಾಹಿತಿ ಸಾಹಿತ್ಯಗಳನ್ನು ಕ್ರಿಯೇಟಿವ್ ಕಾಮನ್ಸ್ ಪರವಾನಗಿಯಲ್ಲಿ ಬಿಡುಗಡೆ ಮಾಡಬೇಕು ಎಂಬುದು ಬಹುತೇಕರ ಒತ್ತಾಯವಾಗಿದೆ.

ಜುಲೈ 15ರಂದು ಮೈಸೂರು ವಿಶ್ವವಿದ್ಯಾಲಯದ ಕುವೆಂಪು ಕನ್ನಡ ಅಧ್ಯಯನ ಸಂಸ್ಥೆಯಲ್ಲಿ ನಡೆಯುವ ‘ಮುಕ್ತ ಜ್ಞಾನ ದಿನಾಚರಣೆ’ ಕಾರ್ಯಕ್ರಮದಲ್ಲಿ ಕುಲಪತಿ ಡಾ.ಕೆ.ಎಸ್. ರಂಗಪ್ಪ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶವನ್ನು ಅಂತರ್ಜಾಲದಲ್ಲಿ ಲೋಕಾರ್ಪಣೆ ಮಾಡುವರು.

ಏನಿದು ಕ್ರಿಯೇಟಿವ್ ಕಾಮನ್ಸ್ ಲೈಸೆನ್ಸ್?: ಜ್ಞಾನ ಯಾರ ಸ್ವತ್ತೂ ಅಲ್ಲ. ಅದೊಂದು ಮುಕ್ತ ಹಾಗೂ ಸುಲಭದಲ್ಲಿ ಎಲ್ಲರಿಗೂ ದಕ್ಕುವಂಥದ್ದಾಗಿರಬೇಕು. ಇದಕ್ಕೆಂದೇ ಅವತಾರವೆತ್ತಿದ್ದ ಅಂತರ್ಜಾಲ ‘ಲೈಸೆನ್ಸ್’ ಎಂಬ ಯಮಪಾಶಕ್ಕೆ ಸಿಕ್ಕಿ ನರಳುತ್ತಿದೆ. ಇದಕ್ಕೆ ಎಬೆನ್ ಮೊಗ್ಲೆನ್ ಎಂಬುವರು ‘ಕ್ರಿಯೇಟಿವ್ ಕಾಮನ್ಸ್ ಲೈಸೆನ್ಸ್’ ಎಂಬ ಹೊಸ ಚಳವಳಿಯನ್ನೇ ಜಾಗತಿಕವಾಗಿ ಹುಟ್ಟು ಹಾಕಿದ್ದು, ಲೈಸೆನ್ಸ್ ಎಂಬ ಪರಿಕಲ್ಪನೆಯನ್ನೇ ತೊಡೆದುಹಾಕಲು ಶ್ರಮಿಸುತ್ತಿದ್ದಾರೆ.

ಇದರಡಿ ಮೈಸೂರು ವಿಶ್ವವಿದ್ಯಾಲಯ ಇದೇ ಮೊದಲ ಬಾರಿಗೆ ವಿಕಿಪೀಡಿಯಾಗೆ ತನ್ನ ಆರು ಸಂಪುಟಗಳನ್ನು ಜಾಗತಿಕ ಶಿಷ್ಟತೆಯಾದ ಯೂನಿಕೋಡ್‌ನಲ್ಲಿ ಮುಕ್ತಗೊಳಿಸಲಿದೆ.

ಏನಿದು ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ?: ದೃಶ್ಯ ಮಾಧ್ಯಮಗಳ ಹಾವಳಿಯಲ್ಲಿ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶಗಳು ಎಂದರೆ ಏನು ಎಂದು ಕೇಳುವ ಯುವಜನರೂ ನಮ್ಮ ನಡುವೆ ಇದ್ದಾರೆ. ಗ್ರಂಥಾಲಯಗಳಲ್ಲಿ ದೂಳು ತಿನ್ನುತ್ತಾ ಎತ್ತರದ ಕಪಾಟುಗಳಲ್ಲಿ ಇಂದಿಗೂ ಇವುಗಳನ್ನು ಕಾಣಬಹುದು. ಜ್ಞಾನದ ವಿವಿಧ ಶಾಖೆಗಳ ವಿವೇಚನೆಯುಳ್ಳ, ಸಾಮಾನ್ಯವಾಗಿ ಬಿಡಿ ಲೇಖನಗಳನ್ನು ಅಕರಾದಿಯಾಗಿ ಒಳಗೊಂಡ ಭಂಡಾರವೇ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ.

ಭರತನ ನಾಟ್ಯಶಾಸ್ತ್ರ ಬಹುಶಃ ಪ್ರಪಂಚದ ಮೊದಲ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ. ನಿಜಗುಣ ಶಿವಯೋಗಿಯ ವಿವೇಕ ಚಿಂತಾಮಣಿ ಕನ್ನಡದ ಮೊದಲ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ ಎನಿಸಿದೆ. ಇಂಗ್ಲಿಷ್‌ನ ಬ್ರಿಟಾನಿಕಾ ಎನ್‌ಸೈಕ್ಲೋಪೀಡಿಯಾ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ ಜಗತ್ತಿನಾದ್ಯಂತ ಹೆಸರುವಾಸಿಯಾಗಿದೆ. 1768–-1771ರ ನಡುವೆ ಮೊದಲ ಬಾರಿಗೆ ಪ್ರಕಟವಾದ ಅದು ವಿಶ್ವದ ಅತ್ಯಂತ ಹಳೆಯ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ ಕೂಡ ಹೌದು. 1931ರಲ್ಲಿ ಶಿವರಾಮ ಕಾರಂತರು ‘ಬಾಲಪ್ರಪಂಚ’ ಕೋಶವನ್ನು ರಚಿಸಿದ್ದರು. ಎನ್‌ಸೈಕ್ಲೋಪೀಡಿಯಾ ಬ್ರಿಟಾನಿಕ ಮಾದರಿಯಲ್ಲಿ ಮೈಸೂರು ವಿವಿಯಲ್ಲಿ ಕನ್ನಡ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ ರಚಿಸುವ ಪ್ರಯತ್ನ1954ರಲ್ಲಿ ಆರಂಭವಾಯಿತು.

ಕುವೆಂಪು ಅವರ ನೇತೃತ್ವದಲ್ಲಿ ಮೈಸೂರು ವಿವಿಯು ಯೋಜನೆ ಸಿದ್ಧಪಡಿಸಿ, ಸರ್ಕಾರಕ್ಕೆ ಸಲ್ಲಿಸಿತು. 1954ರಿಂದ 1968ರವರೆಗೆ ಈ ಯೋಜನೆ ರಾಜ್ಯ ಸರ್ಕಾರದ ಸಾಹಿತ್ಯ ಮತ್ತು ಸಂಸ್ಕೃತಿ ಅಭಿವೃದ್ಧಿ ಇಲಾಖೆಯ ಅಧೀನದಲ್ಲಿತ್ತು. ದೇಜಗೌ ಅವರು ಕನ್ನಡ ಅಧ್ಯಯನ ಸಂಸ್ಥೆಯ ನಿರ್ದೇಶಕರಾಗಿದ್ದಾಗ ಅಂದಿನ ಮುಖ್ಯಮಂತ್ರಿ ವೀರೇಂದ್ರ ಪಾಟೀಲ, ಶಿಕ್ಷಣ ಸಚಿವ ಕೆ.ವಿ.ಶಂಕರಗೌಡ ಹಾಗೂ ಹಣಕಾಸು ಸಚಿವ ರಾಮಕೃಷ್ಣ ಹೆಗಡೆ ಅವರ ಮೂಲಕ ಮೈಸೂರು ವಿವಿಯ ಶಾಶ್ವತ ಯೋಜನೆಯಾಗಿ ನೆಲೆಗೊಳ್ಳುವಂತೆ ಮಾಡಿದರು.

ಪ್ರೊ.ದೇಜಗೌ ಅವರ ಮಾರ್ಗದರ್ಶನ, ಪ್ರೊ.ಹಾ.ಮಾ. ನಾಯಕ ಅವರ ಸಾರಥ್ಯದಲ್ಲಿ ಕನ್ನಡ ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ ಪ್ರಕಟಗೊಂಡಿತು. ಇದೀಗ ಇದನ್ನು ಅಂತರ್ಜಾಲಕ್ಕೆ ಮುಕ್ತವಾಗಿ ಹಂಚಲಾಗುತ್ತಿದೆ.ಕೆಲವು ಅಂತರ್ಜಾಲ ಕೊಂಡಿಗಳು ಹೀಗಿವೆ, ವಿಕಿಪೀಡಿಯದಲ್ಲಿ ಮೈಸೂರು ವಿ.ವಿ.

ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ ಪರಿವರ್ತನೆ ಯೋಜನೆ - http://bit.ly/mysoreunivwp
ವಿಕಿಸೋರ್ಸ್‌ನಲ್ಲಿ ಮೈಸೂರು ವಿ.ವಿ. ವಿಶ್ವಕೋಶ ಲೇಖನಗಳು - http://bit.ly/mysoreuniv

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/prajavani-july-14-2014-four-volumes-of-kannada-encyclopaedia-digitised

Open Knowledge Day at Mysore

praskrishna — 2014-07-14T09:41:39Z

Mysore University along with the Centre for Internet and Society's Access to Knowledge (CIS-A2K) team invites you to an Open Knowledge Day at the University of Mysore on July 15, 2014.

We signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the University of Mysore earlier this year in January to re-release the first six volumes of their Kannada encyclopaedia under Creative Commons (CC) license.

CIS-A2K facilitated extracting the legacy text from the soft-copies, converting them to Unicode, distributing the files among volunteers and Christ University interns and uploading them to Kannada Wikisource. So far about 1200 articles have been added. These articles will feed to articles in Kannada Wikipedia.

To commemorate this, the University of Mysore and CIS-A2K is organizing this event. This will also coincide with the Open Knowledge Festival happening at Berlin from July 15 to 17, 2014.

The invitation for the Mysore program given below:

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/events/open-knowledge-day-mysore

Four volumes of Kannada Encyclopaedia digitised

praskrishna — 2014-07-14T05:49:48Z

The content is available online under Creative Commons License.

The article by R. Krishna Kumar was published in the Hindu on July 12, 2014, Dr. U.B.Pavanaja is quoted.

Articles from the Kannada Encyclopaedia (Kannada Vishwakosha) of the University of Mysore can now be accessed online under the Creative Commons License. The move to make content of the Kannada Vishwakosha accessible is part of the ongoing effort to enrich Kannada content on Internet.

The University of Mysore is working with the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) to digitise encyclopaedic publications for which the copyrights are owned by the varsity, and to re-release them under the Creative Common License.

U.B. Pavanaja of the Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, who is promoting Kannada content on the Internet, told The Hindu that of the 14 volumes, digitised content of the first four volumes has been uploaded.

And, the CIS is awaiting the release of the revised edition of the other two volumes. “Each volume has about 900 pages and hence over 3,600 pages of the Kannada Vishwakosha can now be accessed. What is significant is that people seeking quality information in Kannada can now access reliable content. It is also subject to editing in real time and hence will remain updated,” according to Mr. Pavanaja. The content was digitised and uploaded with the help of students who were interning with the CIS and included three boys and five girls, said Mr. Pavanaja.

The permission for digitising the content has been accorded for the first six volumes. However, the CIS has sought permission from the varsity for digitising the content of the other volumes, including Subject Encyclopaedia.

The Centre for Internet and Society signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the University of Mysore in February. The varsity issued a certificate to publish the work under the Creative Common License in May.

As per the plan, the digitised content will be made available for everyone through free content distribution platforms like Wikipedia, Wikisource and this is expected to enhance digital literacy in Kannada language while helping in free dissemination of knowledge in Kannada to students, academics, researchers and the general public. As of now, the articles have been uploaded on Wikisource and will shortly be migrated to Wikipedia also.

Besides, the CIS is trying to hold talks with Kannada University, Hampi, on digitising the Janapada Vishwakosha and make it available under the Creative Common License, said Mr. Pavanaja.

Niranjan Vanalli, Director of EMMRC of the University of Mysore, said digitisation of Kannada Vishwakosha has given a new lease of life to publications. “The 14-volume Kannada Vishwakosha was not available to everyone earlier and was confined to research institutions or libraries. But now that the content is available online, it is accessible to all those who are interested. And, what it is more is that most articles, especially those pertaining to history, art and culture, will be of reference quality and that will act as a major boost to the cause of Kannada language,” he added.

Meanwhile, the University of Mysore and CIS will celebrate World Open Knowledge Festival on July 15 at the Kuvempu Institute of Kannada Studies from 11 a.m. to commemorate the event.

Those interested to access the Kannada Vishwakosha online can log on to: http://bit.ly/mysoreuniv

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/the-hindu-july-12-2014-r-krishna-kumar-four-volumes-of-kannada-encyclopaedia-digitised

Rethinking Privacy: The Link between Florida v. Jardines and the Surveillance of Nature Films

praskrishna — 2014-07-28T05:51:48Z

Bhairav Acharya gave a talk on "Rethinking Privacy" at an event organized by the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT-M) on July 11, 2014.

In a 2010 article in Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, Brett Mills proposed that animals have a right to privacy and that wildlife documentaries, specifically BBC's Nature's Great Events (2009), invaded this right without an examination of animal conservation ethics. In the 2013 Florida v. Jardines decision, the Supreme Court of the United States re-examined the constitutional validity of 'dog sniff laws' that permitted police animals to enter the threshold of private property to conduct 'minimally invasive warant-less searches' and 'Terry stops'; this was the latest in a long line of Fourth Amendment cases that examine the ethics of conserving and protecting public order. I attempt to draw links between the two scenarios that highlight the dissonance between sociological and jurisprudential constructions of privacy.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/rethinking-privacy

Our Certificates

praskrishna — 2024-12-02T00:31:16Z

Below are the certificates received from the Government of India:

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/about/certificates/cis-certificates

Registration under FCRA

praskrishna — 2014-07-10T05:51:37Z

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

CIS PAN Copy

praskrishna — 2014-07-10T05:49:15Z

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

CIS 12A Certificate

praskrishna — 2014-07-10T05:38:49Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/cis-12-a-certificate.pdf

Best Practices Meet

praskrishna — 2014-08-06T06:25:20Z

The Best Practices Meet 2014 is being organized by DSCI at Hotel Leela Palace on July 9, 2014. Sunil Abraham will participate as a panelist at the event.

SMAC: new paradigm for Security?

Convergence of Social, Mobile, Analytics, and Cloud, is collectively referred as SMAC technologies. The success of social media products and sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin many more has been driving organizations’ investment in social computing. Mobile is another example of how technologies invented initially for personal use, entrenched itself into the enterprise ecosystem. Social computing and mobile blurs the boundaries between personal, social and business transactions. They lead to the explosion of information, which provides interesting insights, critical for business benefits. This reflects in huge impetus that has been seen in analytics, widely known as Big Data analytics. On the other hand, cloud brings completely new paradigm of organizing entperise IT, developing new products and services and delivering consumer experiences.

Increasing adoption of SMAC stack by enterprises breaks the existing paradigm of security. The data explosion on mobile devices exposes organizations’ information to inadvertent loss of revenue and brand value. Malicious applications may steal vital information stored on an employee’s mobile device and pave the way for a major data breach. Web application attacks remain the most significant threat for environments of cloud-hosting providers, amongst other apprehensions about data security. Data sovereignty also continue to pose serious concerns, which organizations need to tackle while moving their data to the cloud. Big data facilitates advanced analytics; however, requires protection from intrusion, corruption and securing its access. Furthermore, social media platforms are continuously exploited to launch malicious content and stealthy payload on devices. Social technologies are also plagued by the use of malicious techniques to mine confidential personal information under the guise of innocuous looking web pages via social engineering techniques.

Apart from security concerns, privacy supposed to be a big causality, as each component of the SMAC stack is considered intrusive enough to compromise the personal rights. Convergence and nexus of them add to the woes.

The collaborative and cumulative effect of all of these technologies working in unison essentially magnifies the efforts of the organizations that are able to wield them effectively. This evolution is challenging the ability of current security capabilities to address business critical risks. The way forward for organizations would be to understand the perspective of end users and IT infrastructure in terms of its integration with any or all the elements of SMAC. The organizations will have to deal with the new paradigm of security that will take them to more scalable, granualar, complex, independent and diverse challenges.

The DSCI Best Practices Meet, 2014 brings the security community and other stakeholders together, to deliberate and ponder over these diverse set of issues and challenges. It is aimed at deliberating on the new security paradigm from the perspectives of public policy, enterprise strategies, technology and practices.

Click to download the agenda and other details here.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/best-practices-meet-2014

Wikipedia edit-a-thons to add content on LGBTs

praskrishna — 2014-07-28T06:41:42Z

From Monday, Wikipedia will hold a series of “edit-a-thons” to encourage people to add content to the site about the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community.

The article by Renuka Phadnis was published in the Hindu on July 7, 2014. T. Vishnu Vardhan gave his inputs.

It is inspired by “Wiki Loves Pride”, a global campaign to expand and improve LGBT-related content across Wikimedia projects. The campaign focuses on the June to October period, when LGBTs around the world celebrate their community.

An “edit-a-thon” is a workshop where people are trained in how to edit the Wikipedia and add content to it, usually focussing on a particular topic.

The aim is to make Wikipedia inclusive and reflect diversity by creating content on the LGBT discourse: history, culture, rights, equal opportunities and Article 377. The focus is also on generating content in regional Indian languages which do not have equivalents for terms such as “gay”, “lesbian” or “bisexual”. The website https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/India_Access_To_Knowledge/ Events/Wiki_Loves _Pride_2014 has listed 11 languages.

The edit-a-thon will culminate in two offline events in Bangalore and Delhi on July 19, creating a forum for the community. While anyone can participate in the edit-a-thon, Vishnu, programme director for Access to Knowledge at Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), Bangalore, which works on improving Indian language Wikipedias and India-related content on Wikipedia, said, “We hope the [LGBT] community takes the lead.”

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/the-hindu-july-7-2014-renuka-phadnis-wikipedia-edit-a-thons-to-add-content-on-lgbts

COAI, Centre for Internet & Society to hold pan-India meetings on privacy issues

praskrishna — 2014-07-07T07:37:34Z

In order to discuss possible legal frameworks to enable surveillance of voice and data communications in India, the Cellular Operators' Association of India (COAI) along with the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) will hold seven roundtable meetings across the country in the coming weeks on privacy and surveillance issues.

Originally published by IANS on July 4, 2014 the news was mirrored in the Times of India, NDTV, Business Standard, Economic Times, and World News on the same day. Bhairav Acharya gave his inputs.

The recommendations and dialogues from each of these roundtables will be compiled and submitted to the relevant ministries of the government, a statement issued by COAI said here on Friday.

The roundtable meetings will take place in Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Chennai and twice in New Delhi.

These roundtables are closed-door meetings involving multiple stakeholders such as the industry leaders, policy makers, and experts from the legal fraternity and civil society.

In the era of freedom, when data connectivity via the internet, has emerged as one of the most powerful tools for communications, infringement of customer privacy by government agencies through telecom networks have forced the industry to initiate discussions on the international best practices on communications privacy and surveillance, and the relevant Indian jurisprudence.

"COAI, with the Centre for Internet and Society has taken this initiative by bringing the relevant stakeholders on a common platform to discuss the matter to arrive at an acceptable conclusion," COAI Director General Rajan S Mathews said.

According to Bhairav Acharya, who advises the CIS: "Legal reform is necessary to identify the limits of permissible surveillance, the protection of privacy, the procedure of intercepting communications, the expectations of service providers, and freedom of all Indians. The law must keep up with technological advancements to create a balanced, proportionate and fair mechanism to enable and regulate surveillance. This will serve India’s national interest."

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/ians-july-4-2014-coai-cis-to-hold-pan-india-meetings-on-privacy-issues

National Level Seminar on, Computer Application and Odia Language

praskrishna — 2014-07-07T07:08:39Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/seminar-letter.pdf