Centre for Internet and Society

Use of Open Access Journals by Indian Researchers

praskrishna — 2013-06-04T04:32:11Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/blog-old/use-of-open-access-journals-by-indian-researchers

Use of Digital Technologies for Civic Engagement and Political Change: Lessons Learned

praskrishna — 2011-09-27T05:04:04Z

Concise Description:

In light of the impact of social media and other Internet tools in recent events in the Middle East and Africa, there is need to dialog on the lessons learned, and how the digital technologies, and the Internet in particular, are emerging as important tools for political change, and not just commerce, communications, and information exchange.

This proposed workshop, “Use of Digital Technologies for Civic Engagement and Political Change: Lessons Learned ” addresses the main theme of the Nairobi IGF, namely, “The Internet as a Catalyst for Change.” The proposed workshop is aimed at providing an opportunity for panelists and participants from around the world to share experiences about using digital technologies to shape civic engagement and political change.

Despite the increasing interest in the use of digital technologies for effecting change, we still lack insights into the relationships people in emerging information societies have with the technologies that are shaping their worlds. The discourse still posits the digital user as homogenized, young, middle class, Western, and (mostly) male. Furthermore, the stories about the transformative powers of the mostly young, Digital Natives often provide a monotonic, rather than varied, view of social change.

Against this background, the proposed workshop on seeks to tackle these knowledge gaps. It hopes to look beyond heroes and singular case-studies, and explore processes of change. It will also shed light on how technology serves as a catalyst for social change and political participation in the rapidly changing landscape of political action in the global South.

With panelists from Asia, Africa and Latin America, the workshop will discuss perspectives on how the Internet has been used by activists to increase citizen engagement and political change. Discussions will be focused on the following questions:

How can digital technologies help increase civic engagement, and influence political change, and do digital natives become agents of change?
What are the challenges to using digital technologies in effecting change?
How can the influence of digital technologies on political change, and the role of digital natives be enhanced?
What are the key lessons learned in using digital technologies for change, and what does the future hold?

Each of these questions will be discussed in turn by panelists, followed by brief question and answer sessions, contributions from remote participants, and finally, a wrap up by the moderator.

Which of the five broad IGF Themes or the Cross-Cutting Priorities does your workshop fall under?

Emerging Issues

Have you organized an IGF workshop before? No

If so, please provide the link to the report:

No link to this report

Provide the names and affiliations of the panellists you are planning to invite:

Nishant Shah (M) - Director Research at Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, India
Nnenna Nwakanma (F) - Nnenna.org (West Africa)
Tarek Cheniti (M) - Consultant and Researcher on Internet and Democracy, Tunisia
Luiz Fernando Marrey Moncau (M), Policy activist and researcher, Brazil Center for Technology & Society, Brazil
Orky Okello (F) - Founder, Ushahidi, and Policy Manager for Google in Africa, Kenya.

Remote Moderators

Khaled Fattal - The Multilingual Internet Group, and Ankabooot Social Network

Fieke Jansen, Hivos

Provide the name of the organizer(s) of the workshop and their affiliation to various stakeholder groups:

Katim S. Touray (M) - Council Vice Chair, Free Software and Open Source Foundation for Africa (FOSSFA), Member, ICANN Board of Directors
Nishant Shah (M) - Director Research at Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, India
Khaled Fattal (M) - The Multilingual Internet Group, and Ankabooot Social Network

Organization:Free Software and Open Source Foundation for Africa (FOSSFA)

Contact Person: Katim S. Touray
Workshop Number: 184

For details on the IGF website, click here

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/events/digital-technologies-for-civic-engagement

Use of AI and ML in Healthtech Will Not Be Limited to Services Alone, Say These Experts

praskrishna — 2018-05-06T12:17:46Z

The healthcare segment will see significant entrepreneurial activity and more investment coming in the sector.

The blog post by Sanchita Dash was published by Entrepreneur India on May 5, 2018.

The healthcare sector has been a witness to numerous technological advancements over the years. From bringing healthcare to your doorsteps to making a doctor’s life a tad bit easier with automation, startups have been making a difference with healthtech. Technologies like predictive artificial intelligence have been a step in the right direction for the healthcare industry.

Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning have also led to a spurt of devices which are driving the future of healthtech. A report on the Artificial Intelligence in the Healthcare Industry in India done by The Centre for Internet and Society, India, said that AI could potentially add USD 957 billion (or 15% of current gross value added) to the Indian economy by 2035 and investment in AI in the Indian healthcare industry appears to be growing. The report also states that of the USD 5.5 billion raised by global digital healthcare companies in the July-September 2017 quarter, at least 16 Indian healthcare IT companies received funding.

At a recent investment session Healthtech – Navigating the Innovation Landscapeheld by YES BANK and HealthStart Accelerator, the future of the sector was discussed. Startups and investors got together under one roof to talk about the advancements in the healthtech sector and how it’s benefiting all. We spoke to experts about how the healthtech sector is set to change in India.

Innovations of the Future

During the engaging discussion, there was one common thread – AI and ML leading the race. Pradeep K. Jaisingh from HealthStart said that the major innovations in 2018 that they look forward to are around the use of artificial intelligence AI/ML in healthcare both for services as well as devices. “Exciting possibilities are in the areas like smart diagnostics for diseases like cancer etc. Other possible areas are mental health and Neurodegenerative diseases,” he said.

Start-ups too believe in the power of AI and ML in the sector. Deepak Sahni, founder, Healthians believes that there is lot of new innovations expected in next 2-3 years in the Healthtech space. “The role AI and Machine learning is yet to show its strength in partnering with doctors for better choice of treatment and making it more personalized for patients,” he said.

What To Expect

Healthcare, like other industries, too will look at bringing convenience to the consumers. Sahni added that point of care devices are about to bring whole new spectrum to early and fast diagnostics. He believes that one can soon expect Dental, Hair, Eye and Pathology tests being done at home becoming more prevalent along with innovations to bring ECG/ ECHO/ Mammogram to become accessible at home for many. “On one side point of care will offer convenience to the urban population and on the other side it will make right diagnosis accessible and affordable for rural population as well,” he said.

Talking about the future, Sahni said that healthtech in 2018 will be much more than discovery and primary diagnosis. “The need and focus will shift to disease management and will have a holistic outcome driven treatment approach,” said Sahni.

And this change will be driven by the entrepreneurial community. Jaisingh believes that the healthcare segment will see significant entrepreneurial activity and more investment coming in the sector. “Other big development will be M&A in the Sector which will result in consolidation and a few larger players emerging in the healthcare delivery space specifically,” he said.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/use-of-ai-and-ml-in-healthtech-will-not-be-limited-to-services-alone-say-these-experts

US Privacy FTC

praskrishna — 2013-09-30T06:41:45Z

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

US and EU blocking treaty to give blind people access to books

praskrishna — 2012-08-02T13:56:36Z

Copyright fears stall talks on books being translated into braille for blind and visually impaired people in the global south.

This article by Paige McClanahan was published in the Guardian on July 30, 2012. Rahul Cherian, a Fellow at CIS is quoted.

The US and the EU are blocking a treaty that would give the world's blind and visually impaired people – 90% of whom live in the developing world – easier access to published works in formats they can use.

A "treaty for blind people" has been under discussion at the World Intellectual Property Organisation (Wipo) since 2008, but negotiations have made little progress. In the latest round of talks in Geneva, which ended on Wednesday 25 July, negotiators deferred a decision on the issue once again, to the dismay of activists.

"This is not just a legal issue – for us, this is a moral issue. It's about human rights," said Teresa Hackett, programme manager at Electronic Information for Libraries, a non-profit group based in the Netherlands.

There are about 256 million visually impaired people in the developing world, according to an estimate by the World Health Organisation. In many rich countries, blind people have ready access to works that have been translated into braille and other accessible formats such as audio and large-print books, although, according to the EU, only 5% of books are accessible to blind people in wealthy states.

However, under existing copyright law, poorer countries can't access those translations without getting the express permission of the copyright holder. Few developing country governments have managed to do that, meaning that their blind and visually impaired populations are left with barely anything to read. The EU estimates that less than 1% of books are accessible to blind people in poorer countries.

"The Spanish organisation Once has well over 100,000 [translated] books that they would like to send to Latin American countries, but they can't simply because of this copyright barrier," said Dan Pescod of theRoyal National Institute of Blind People. Libraries in five Latin American countries – Colombia, Nicaragua, Mexico, Uruguay and Chile – have fewer than 9,000 accessible books between them, he said.

A treaty at WIPO could change that. A binding agreement would mean people in the global south could get immediate access to books that have already been translated into accessible formats in other countries. A treaty would also lead to enormous cost savings, as expensive translation has to be replicated in every country that wants to produce an accessible form of a given book.

The European parliament passed a resolution in February calling on the EU to support a binding treaty for the blind, but it does not appear to be having much impact. "The EU and the Americans are blocking the treaty – that's what's going on," said James Love, director of Knowledge Ecology International (KEI). "It's shameful what they're doing." He added that the administration of President Barack Obama has changed its position on the treaty over the past few years. In 2008 Obama's transition team were making positive noises, but since then the administration has become less enthusiastic.

Europe and the US are home to some of the world's biggest publishing companies, many of which don't like the idea of an international treaty that would restrict their intellectual property rights. Observers speculate that the Obama administration may be loth to upset the publishing industry, a major campaign supporter, this late in an election year. "What we can see in the [negotiating] room is that primarily it's the business interests that dominate," said Hackett.

Activists are hoping for a legally binding treaty, but US and European delegates have been pushing for a softer "instrument" that would offer only guidelines and recommendations.

"We really don't want to establish a precedent of developing a series of treaties that specifically focus on … limitations and exceptions to the rights of copyright owners," said Alan Adler of the Association of American Publishers, in an online interview with KEI. Discussions are due to begin again in November, after the US election.

Despite the setback, activists insist they will keep lobbying for a binding treaty. "We in developing countries have found our voice and we are not going to back down," said Rahul Cherian, of Inclusive Planet, an Indian nonprofit, in a statement to Wipo delegates last week. "When people are demanding their basic rights, no power in the world is strong enough to stop them getting what they want."

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/us-and-eu-blocking-treaty

Uploaded and blocked, a daylong battle rages on the web over BBC documentary

praskrishna — 2015-03-10T02:37:04Z

It was a daylong tussle between uploads and takedowns. Netizens kept uploading the controversial BBC documentary, 'India's Daughter', on video-sharing websites even as several of them were blocked within hours on Thursday. By 9pm, the hour-long film had been removed from at least four locations on YouTube. One of them had already gathered over 1.04 lakh views by then. The documentary which deals with the December 16 Nirbhaya rape case was still available on another video-sharing website, dailymotion.com, where two of three such uploads even had an advertisement preceding the video. It could also be seen on vimeo.com, another video-sharing service.

The article by Kim Arora was published in the Times of India on March 6, 2015. Rohini Lakshane is quoted.

Around 4.30pm, the video on the channel "Game Pundits" titled 'India's Daughter: Indian rapist BBC Documentary Delhi Nirbhaya Full HD' was removed by YouTube. It instead carried the message: "This content is not available on this country domain due to a court order." The video here had gathered over 3,500 views.

By late evening, the video uploaded from an account by the name of Robin Kankerwal was taken down, displaying the same message. On channels "7thave" and "Kate Bevan" the videos were taken down over a copyright violation claim by BBC itself.

A YouTube spokesperson told TOI over email: "While we believe that access to information is the foundation of a free society, and that services like YouTube help people express themselves and share different points of view, we continue to remove content that is illegal or violates our community guidelines, once notified."

With the rising crescendo of the debate around the documentary, experts point to what is known as the "Streisand effect" on the internet, which is, the attempt at censoring or hiding something leading to increased discussion and exposure of the subject. #IndiasDaughter was among the top trends on both Facebook and Twitter on Thursday.

"My research shows that such content is virulently shared online and offline—through peer-to-peer sharing networks, popular messaging services such as WhatApp, through DVDs, through video-sharing and file-sharing websites. Even when it is taken down from the place where it was first posted, it stays on in assorted web archives and caches. The usual methods of weeding out web search results and directing ISPs to block URLs are mostly ineffectual. There is an indelible digital footprint," says Rohini Lakshane, a researcher at Bangalore-based Center for Internet Society.

The online discussion around the film centered along three threads. There were those who wanted it made freely available and the rapists publicly shamed, those who wanted it to not be aired for fear of giving a rapist an international platform, and others who pointed to the complex legal problems associated with the convicted rapist's interview since his appeal is still pending before the SC.

The top rated comment on Bevan's YouTube video was by one Tushar Lall, who wrote: "I'm from India...They've banned this documentary. I'm sure this will get taken down really soon. I might not be able to watch it again. But thanks to you, [name withheld]'s story is out there." Dhirajj Kumar wrote: "I don't kno y dis documentary is ban on air. India hav right to know, wat rapist think abt girl. thanks bbc (sic)."

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/times-of-india-march-6-2015-uploaded-and-blocked-a-daylong-battle-rages-on-web-over-bbc-documentary

Upload Kannada

praskrishna — 2015-09-13T05:50:44Z

Upload Kannada

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/UploadKannada.png

Updated Aadhaar Report

praskrishna — 2017-05-16T16:37:30Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/files/updated-aadhaar-report.pdf

UP family business 4

praskrishna — 2017-12-21T16:17:17Z

UP family business 4

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/UPfamilybusiness4.jpg

UP family business 3

praskrishna — 2017-12-21T16:16:12Z

UP family business 3

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/UPfamilybusiness3.jpg

UP family business 2

praskrishna — 2017-12-21T16:14:30Z

UP family business 2

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/UPfamilybusiness2.jpg

UP family business 1

praskrishna — 2017-12-21T16:12:42Z

UP family business 1

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/UPfamilybusiness1.jpg

Untangling the web of India's 'ungovernable' Net

praskrishna — 2013-04-16T06:06:20Z

India sells itself as a tech hub, outsourcing IT experts to the world. At home, it dreams of "equity on the Net." But millions remain unconnected and digital surveillance is on the rise.

This was published in Deutsche Welle on April 15, 2013. Sunil Abraham is quoted.

The Indian government has a dream. It dreams of the "Equinet" - a time when "there shall be equity on the Net."

"The Internet must not just be a platform for the privileged - the Internet must become an inclusive platform," India's communications minister Kapil Sibal says. "In fact, my vision is that the Internet should ultimately become the Equinet. In other words, all those, no matter which station in life they belong to, should have access to the Internet, and that can only happen if all the elements of the Internet are such that people can access them at affordable costs."

India has the third highest number of people on the Net, with about 150 million people connected.

But with a population of 1.2 billion, 150 million is not that many. Internet penetration languishes at around 10 percent, while in the United States and China - the top two countries in world rankings - Internet penetration is at 78 and 40 percent, respectively.

Like in America… in 1994

It's a fact that Google chairman Eric Schmidt highlighted on a recent tour of India, among other Asian countries.

"The Internet feels [in India] like in America in 1994," he says. "It is crucial for India to invest and enable fast fiber Internet connectivity within the country, between the country and the other countries."


While touring Asia, Schmidt said India seemed to have "rested on its laurels" after early success in the IT sector

You would think that connectivity would be better in India. The country prides itself on being a tech hub, with its centers of excellence in places like Bangalore. It has outsourced information technology specialists globally for over ten years.

Communications minister Sibal insists the government is investing where it can, saying India will connect 250,000 villages with fiber optics in the "next year or so."

"The networks should be in place, the fiber optics should be in place, [connectivity] should be efficient and of high speed, and above all, the access to handsets, which is really the key - unless handsets are affordable and accessible to ordinary people, you will not get the kind of penetration that you want from the Internet," he adds.

However, for some, there are even greater challenges for India than poor connectivity and bad infrastructure.

All eyes on you

In mid-March, police in India's financial capital Mumbai launched the country's first "Social Media Lab."

Mumbai police say they will use it to monitor and track "which topics are trending among the youth so [they] can plan law and order in a good way."

The Mumbai Social Media Lab comes amid concerns over "moral policing" of the Net by Indian authorities, and censorship - especially where comments involve political figures. The Times of India reports numerous requests by authorities to have content removed by Google and Twitter. There have also been arrests under the remit of a controversial section - 66A - of India's IT Act.

Sibal denies India wants to censor the Net. If people have been arrested under Section 66A of the IT Act, it's because police officials have either misread the law, or acted independently, he says.

"Yes, but I would say, from where does this emanate? Does it emanate with a complete understanding at the top?" asks V.C. Vivekanandan, director of the Institute of Global Internet Governance and Advocacy.


Indian communications minister Kapil Sibal says "Internet governance is an oxymoron"

"There are various, multiple layers of governance in a huge country like India, where people could be enthusiastic in their own way about thinking what is right and wrong," says Vivekanandan. "So, I don't really see censorship as such, but they would like to have discourse in a model which was pre-Internet."

Tracking private lives

But in other areas, India is showing itself to be very comfortable in the Internet age - and where it has its eyes fixed on the future.

"From what I can tell, the social media monitoring cell in Mumbai is perhaps one of the more benign components because it isn't keeping track of private communications," says Sunil Abraham, executive director of the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) in Bangalore.

However, the Indian government plans to track everybody's online activities - that means anything that uses the Internet as a communication network.

"There are very many other projects like the unique identification (UID) and the National Intelligence Grid (NATGRID) that will keep track of private communications," says Abraham.

The UID is the Indian government's centralized biometric identity management system, which will connect more than 20 databases that 12 intelligence and law enforcement agencies will be able to access.

"These databases include banking records, telecommunications records and travel records [among other things]," says Abraham. "So, it's a very large scale attempt by the Indian government to place citizens under 360 degree blanket surveillance."

Internet governance is an oxymoron

But how these moves square with Sibal's vision of the Equinet is hard to see.


This Delhi laywer, Mohit Sharma, is one of only 11 percent of Indians who are connected to the Internet

The communications minister believes Indians will not be dissuaded from using the Net.

"The fact that 150 million people are on the Net is evidence of the fact that they are not scared, and if you go to Twitter today, there are more abuses on Twitter than perhaps you can find anywhere else in the world," says Sibal.

That doesn't necessarily mean that the government thinks this is a good thing. But Sibal insists he is against Internet governance - in fact, he says "Internet governance is an oxymoron."

"How can you govern something that cannot be governed? Because anybody can say anything on the Net," says Sibal. "So, there should be an element of self-regulation. Just as we interact with each other in civilized society, similarly people on the Net should also interact with each other with self-restraint."

But the CIS's Sunil Abraham isn't convinced.

"If one listens very carefully to what the minister says, he says you cannot regulate the Internet. But you can regulate what citizens do on the Internet," he says. "You can regulate what corporations do on the Internet. And you can also regulate what the government does on the Internet."

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/d-w-april-15-2013-untangling-the-web-of-indias-ungovernable-net

Unsocial Network Protest

praskrishna — 2011-08-18T11:54:13Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/home-images/England.jpg

Unpacking Digital Natives from their Shiny Packaging

praskrishna — 2011-12-25T05:04:43Z

The ‘Digital natives’ concept is neither necessarily nor inherently positive, as YiPing Tsou highlights in her article Digital Natives in the Name of a Cause: From "Flash Mob" to "Human Flesh Search". The essay was published in the Digital AlterNatives with a Cause? Book 2, To Think. Argyri Panezi reviews the essay.

In this article, the writer supports that China, despite having a plethora of hacker talents, does not conform to the typical paradigm of liberal, usually anti-government, group of digital natives. She explains that the so-called “red hackers” are working hand-in-hand with the dominant ideology, fighting against the enemy abroad while hunting down the enemy within who disrupts the ‘harmony’ (of the nation). Focusing on China’s digital culture, Tsou demonstrates that digital natives, despite what is commonly thought of them as a universal group, can also engage in far from civic-minded activities. The stories of Human Flesh Search as described in the article, gives flesh to this argument.

‘Human Flesh Search’ is a Chinese phenomenon of online crowdsourcing that targets ‘morality violators’ (the modern versions of medieval witches). Most importantly, the punishment meted out to these ‘violators’ is not only harsh (the mob versus an individual) but also reaches beyond cyberspace, affecting the real lives of the one who’s hunted, even affecting the lives of their family. All the examples given, illustrate how this ‘naming-and-shaming’ trend becomes an insidious calling card of the entire hacking society in China.

As Tsou explains, Human Flesh Searches mobilize masses of people online or offline to identify certain violators of ‘morality’ that the community seeks to punish because the ‘crimes’ might not be punishable by the law. Indeed, the Human Flesh Search stories bring in mind B-grade reality shows: as the first story goes, the real identity of a woman staring in a kitten-killing video is discovered and consequently, the woman is attacked both in cyberspace (via email, social media networks) and in real space (her residence, work place). Another story seems more serious, mainly from a political and legal perspective; a student expressing himself in favor of a Korean ruling in a sports game is immediately dealt by the online community as a traitor who has to pay for what he has said online. What seems to follow, within these stories, are blatant violations of privacy and freedom of speech.

What message do the Human Flesh Searches stories convey? What are these stories teaching us? While Internet enthusiasts have connected digital natives with progressive liberal movements, it is also the case that some can be (ab)using the powers of technology, and principally the power of crowd-sourcing, engaging in phenomena that even recap medieval witch-hunt. It is clear that the rationale of the author is not to call for more regulation or censorship online, but rather to point out that technology and the Internet is merely a tool, and as every tool it can have both good and bad uses; a knife might be used safely in a kitchen, it can save lives in the hands of a doctor, and can take lives in the hand of a murderer.

Tsou cleverly alternates between the phrases ‘wisdom of the crowd’, ‘crowd-sourcing’ and ‘irrationality of the crowds’. While the majority can collaborate to get brilliant results, it can also quickly become a tyranny against anything ‘different’, ‘irregular’ or ‘immoral’. Wikipedia is a famous example of the first (a success story of mass collaboration) but also the second (see the editing wars on Wikipedia talk pages).

In all, Tsou effectively reminds us that the aspiring digital stories of peer-to-peer culture and civic empowerment, including technology-mobilized revolutions such as the recent examples in the Middle East and elsewhere, do have a counter side, what the author calls “the dark force of digital natives”. The importance of this realization is immense. Internet romanticism can be at the very least naïve, and at most dangerous as it gives space to the abusers to continue their work using a tool that is wrongly considered solely equalizing, empowering, liberating.

Argyri Panezi, a native of Greece, studied law at the University of Athens and at Harvard Law School (focusing on issues of Internet law and policy), now practicing as an attorney at law in Brussels, Belgium.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/digital-natives/unpacking-from-shiny-packaging