Centre for Internet and Society

69a-draft-rules-v-69-official-rules 4

praskrishna — 2013-04-26T15:50:31Z

69a-draft-rules-v-69-official-rules 4

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69a-draft-rules-v-69-official-rules 3

praskrishna — 2013-04-26T11:06:48Z

69a-draft-rules-v-69-official-rules 3

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69a-draft-rules-v-69-official-rules 2

praskrishna — 2013-04-26T10:00:24Z

69a-draft-rules-v-69-official-rules 2

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69a-draft-rules-v-69-official-rules

praskrishna — 2013-04-26T09:19:30Z

69a-draft-rules-v-69-official-rules 1

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69A vs. 69A - Chart 2

praskrishna — 2013-04-26T07:34:37Z

69A vs. 69A - Chart 2

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69A vs. 69A - Chart 1

praskrishna — 2013-04-26T07:27:49Z

69A vs. 69A - Chart 1

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66A DEAD. LONG LIVE 66A!

praskrishna — 2015-04-01T02:11:27Z

Last Tuesday, Twitter CEO Dick Costolo walked into Prime Minister Narendra Modi's office. India's most compulsive and most-followed tweeter, Modi, as Gujarat chief minister, had protested when the Manmohan Singh government blocked the micro-blogging site of a few journalists. Modi had blacked out his own Twitter profile and tweeted: “May God give good sense to everyone.”

The article by Soni Mishra was published in the Week on March 28, 2015. T. Vishnu Vardhan gave his inputs.

Today, with 11 million followers on Twitter, and 27.6 million likes on Facebook, Modi rules the virtual world and India. He received Costolo warmly and told him how Twitter could help his Clean India, girl child and yoga campaigns. Impressed, Costolo told Modi how Indian youth were innovating on Twitter.

But, the greatest and the most fundamental boost for all social media in India was being effected a few minutes drive away from the PMO. Ironically, in the Supreme Court of India, Modi's lawyers were defending a law made by the United Progressive Alliance government—section 66A of the Information Technology Act, which curbed free speech on social media.

Anything posted on the internet can go viral worldwide and reach millions in no time, argued Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta. While the traditional media is ruled by licences and checks, social media has nothing, he said. Finally, Mehta made an impassioned plea that the government meant well. Section 66A will be administered reasonably and will not be misused, he assured the court.

It seemed he, and the government, had forgotten an old saying: if there is a bad law, someone will use it. Luckily for India, and its liberal democracy, the judges saw a bad law and struck it down. “If section 66A is otherwise invalid, it cannot be saved by an assurance from the learned additional solicitor general,” said the bench comprising Justice Rohinton Nariman and Justice J. Chelameswar.

The fact is that 66A was knee-jerk legislation. Almost as thoughtless and compulsive as a netizen's derisive tweet. On December 22, 2008, the penultimate day of the winter session, the UPA government had got seven bills passed in seven minutes in the Lok Sabha; the opposition BJP had played along.

One of the bills was to amend the IT Act. It went to the Rajya Sabha the next day, when members were hurrying to catch their trains and flights home for the year-end vacation. They just okayed the bill and hurried home.

The argument then was that there was no need to discuss the bill as it had been examined by a standing committee of Parliament. Indeed, it had been. But, the committee, headed by Nikhil Kumar of the Congress, had met only for 23 hours and five minutes. Nine of its 31 members had not attended a single meeting. Ravi Shankar Prasad, the current Union minister for IT, was one among the 31.

Apparently, everyone wanted the bill, so did not bother to apply their minds. Only a CPI(M) member, A. Vijayaraghavan, had a few dissenting suggestions to the committee report. No one else bothered to mull over a law that was “unconstitutional, vague” and which would have a “chilling effect” on free speech.

Once the law was made, it was constable raj across India. Shaheen Dhada from Palghar simply commented on Facebook about a Shiv Sena bandh on the death of Bal Thackeray. Her friend Rinu Srinivasan liked it. The two teenagers were bundled into a police station. Rinu still remembers with a chill how “a mob of about 200 people gathered outside the police station that day.” This was when the Congress was ruling Maharashtra.

Jadavpur University professor Ambikesh Mahapatra was picked up by the police in Trinamool Congress-ruled West Bengal in April 2012, for posting a cartoon ridiculing Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. “I was thrashed several times in police custody,” said the professor, who got relief from the West Bengal Human Rights Commission.

Vickey Khan, 22, was arrested in Rampur, UP, for a Facebook post on Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan. Rampur is, of course, Khan's pocket borough. The Uttar Pradesh Police, controlled by the Samajwadi Party government, also arrested dalit writer Kanwal Bharti from Rampur for criticising the UP government's suspension of IAS officer Durga Shakti Nagpal in 2013.

At least 30 people in AIADMK-ruled Chennai have been booked under 66A; four of them this year. Ravi Srinivasan, general secretary of the Aam Aadmi Party in Puducherry, was picked up in October 2012 for his tweets on Karti Chidambaram, son of then Union home minister P. Chidambaram. “He was not even in India when I tweeted,” said Ravi. “He sent the complaint by fax from abroad and everything happened [fast] as Puducherry is a Union Territory and can be controlled by the home ministry.”

Whistleblower A. Shankar of Chennai was pulled up by the Madras High Court for the content on his blog, Savukku. The Orissa Police, controlled by the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) government, took Facebook to court in 2011 asking who created a Facebook page in the name of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. It is another thing that the page had no content.

Indeed, there had been stray political voices opposing the law. In Parliament, the CPI(M)'s P. Rajeeve, the BJD's Jay Panda and independent MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar pushed several times for scrapping 66A. Panda moved a private members bill, and Rajeeve moved a resolution. “I only wish we in Parliament had heeded the people's voice and repealed it, instead of yet again letting the judiciary do our work for us,” Panda said after the law was scrapped.

Finally, it was left to a young law student, Shreya Singhal, to move the Supreme Court on behalf of the Palghar girls. Singhal pointed out that several provisions in 66A violated fundamental rights guaranteed by article 19(1)(a)—the right to freedom of speech and expression. Several more cases followed and, finally, the court heard them together.

Indeed, Justices Nariman and Chelameswar have been extremely restrained in their comments. But, the fact that Parliament had not applied its mind comes through in the judgment.

The court “had raised serious concerns with the manner in which section 66A of the IT Act has been drafted and implemented across the country,” pointed out Supreme Court lawyer Shivshankar Panicker. Added Kiran Shanmugam, a cyber forensic expert and CEO of ECD Global Bengaluru: “The law lacked foresight in estimating the magnitude of the way the electronic media would grow.”

Apparently the government, too, knew it was defending the indefensible, and tried to win the case highlighting the benign nature of the democratic state. But, the court was not impressed. “Governments may come and governments may go, but section 66A goes on forever,” the judges noted. “An assurance from the present government, even if carried out faithfully, would not bind any successor government.”

Clearly, Mehta was defending the indefensible, a law that, the court found, would have a “chilling effect on free speech”. Moreover, as the judges found out, the new law did not provide even the safeguards that the older Criminal Procedure Code had provided. “Safeguards that are to be found in sections 95 and 96 of the CrPC are also absent when it comes to section 66A,” the judges said. For example, according to the CrPC, a book or document that contained objectionable matter could be seized by the police, but it also allowed the publisher to move court. The new law did not provide even such a cushion.

All the same, the court was careful and did not overturn the entire law. It scrapped section 66A, and section 118(D) of the Kerala Police Act, but upheld section 69A and section 79 of the IT Act, which too had been questioned by the litigants (see box on page 45).

The judgment has set the cyberworld rocking. “I am so happy now, I do not know how to express it,” said Rinu, now an audio-engineering student in Kerala. Shaheen is married and lives in Bengaluru. Vickey Khan is relieved. “Some people had told me that I could be jailed for three years,” he said. But, Azam Khan took it out on the media and said it “favours criminals”.

Karti, who claims to be a votary of free speech, however, wants “some protection” against defamation. “I filed a complaint in an existing provision of law,” he said. “If that provision is not available, then I will have to seek other provisions to safeguard my reputation.”

Mahapatra is still apprehensive. “The government will still try to harass me,” he said. “But I know that in the end I will win.” Shankar of Chennai called it “a huge relief for people like me, who are active on social media.” Ravi Srinivasan, who locked horns with Karti, said he felt “relieved and happy”.

The hard rap on the knuckles for their legislative laxity has sobered the political class. The Congress, the progenitor of 66A, admitted that the vagueness of the law was its undoing. “If in a particular area, the local constabulary took action to stifle dissent, it was never the purpose of the act,” said Congress spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi. The Modi government officially welcomed the judgment, and its spokespersons are blaming the UPA for the law.

Apparently, the scrapped law was made after a series of grossly offensive posts appeared on the social media five years ago. “If such content is not blocked online, it would immediately lead to riots,” said a law ministry official, who said the posts had been shown to the court, too. He said the government would take some time to draft a new law.

But, is a new law required? Opinion is still divided. What if someone is defamed on the net? “There are defamation laws which can deal with these,” said T. Vishnuvardhan, programme director, Centre for Internet and Society, Bengaluru. “Also, the IT Act has various provisions. If somebody misuses your picture on social media, you can report it to the website immediately. The website is liable to take action on it within 36 hours.”

Smarika Kumar of Bengaluru-based Alternative Law Forum said the scrapping of 66A does not mean one can post anything online. “The Supreme Court has said that speech can be censored when it falls under the restrictions provided under article 19(2) of the Constitution,” she said. “But, if you prevent speech on any other ground, it is going to be unconstitutional.”

But, even critics of 66A think a replacement law is needed. Said Rajeev Chandrasekhar: “The government needs to act quickly and create a much more contemporaneous Act, via multi-stakeholder consultations, general consensus and collaboration, so that there is less ambiguity and freedom of expression is preserved.”

Senior Supreme Court advocate Pravin H. Parekh said, “As the cyberworld is growing day by day and there is increase in the number of social media users, we do require a proper mechanism which can regulate the expression of views on the internet.”

The government is putting forth the argument of national security. “If the security establishment says the present act is not sufficient, we will look into it. The government will consider it, but only with adequate safeguards,” said Ravi Shankar Prasad.

That will call for a legislative process undertaken in a cool and calm house, and not hurried through when the members are ready to hurry home.

Sound judgment

Thumbs down
The Supreme Court set aside section 66A of the IT act, which says any person who sends offensive, menacing or false information to cause annoyance, inconvenience, danger, obstruction, insult, injury, criminal intimidation, enmity, hatred or ill will, or uses email to trouble its recipient or deceive him/her about the origin of such messages, can be punished with a jail term up to three years and a fine.

The court also struck down section 118(d) of the Kerala Police Act, which says any person who makes indecent comments by calls, mails, messages or any such means causing grave violation of public order or danger can be punished with imprisonment up to three years or a fine not exceeding Rs10,000, or both.

Thumbs up
The Supreme Court upheld section 69A of the IT act, which allows the government to block the public's access to information in national interest and penalise intermediaries [telecom or internet service providers and web hosting services] who fail to comply with the government's directives.

Section 79 of the IT Act, which deals with intermediaries' exemption from liability in certain cases, too, was upheld.

With R. Prasanan, Mini P. Thoma, Ajay Uprety, Lakshmi Subramanian, Rabi Banerjee and Sharmista Chaudhury

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-week-march-28-2015-soni-mishra-66a-dead-long-live-66a

66A ‘cut & paste job’

praskrishna — 2012-12-11T05:43:50Z

The controversial Section 66A of the Information Technology Act has borrowed words out of context from British and American laws, according to lawyers here who are calling it a “poor cut-and-paste job”.

GS Mudur's article was published in the Telegraph on December 3, 2012. Pranesh Prakash and Snehashish Ghosh are quoted.

Section 66A, passed by Parliament in December 2008, draws on laws passed in the UK in 1988 and 2003 and the US in 1996. But some lawyers say that, unlike 66A, those foreign laws impose only reasonable restrictions on freedom of speech.

"The text of 66A seems to be the result of a cut-and-paste job done without applying the mind," said Snehashish Ghosh, a lawyer with the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), a non-government organisation in Bangalore.

Some of the language in Section 66A is taken from Britain’s Malicious Communications Act (MCA) of 1988, which begins with the words: "Any person who sends to another person...."

This provision in MCA 1988, Ghosh said, is intended to curb malicious messages from one person to another. "It does not cover a post on a social website or an electronic communication broadcast to the world."

Section 66A has also borrowed words from Britain’s Communications Act of 2003 which, Ghosh said, is intended to prevent abuse of public communication services and does not directly deal with messages sent by individuals.

Government officials have said that 66A has also plucked language from the US Telecommunications Act of 1996.

This was a landmark legislation that overhauled America’s telecommunication law by taking into account the emergence of the Internet and changing communications technologies. Among other things, it made illegal the transmission of obscene or indecent material to minors via computers.

"Section 66A in its current form fails to define a specific category (context) as defined in the laws from where it has borrowed words," Ghosh said. "This is what has led to its inconsistent and arbitrary applications."

Ghosh and his colleagues say that 66A, through an "absurd" combination of borrowed and ambiguous language, curbs freedom of expression and threatens people with three years’ imprisonment for certain offences that would otherwise, under existing Indian Penal Code (IPC) provisions, draw a fine of only Rs 200.

Section 66A(b), for example, clubs together the offences of persistently repeated communications that might lead to "annoyance", "inconvenience", "danger", "insult", "injury", "criminal intimidation", "enmity", "hatred", and "ill-will".

This is "astounding and unparalleled", said Pranesh Prakash, policy director at the CIS, who has posted an analysis of Section 66A on the NGO’s institutional blog.

"We do not have such a provision anywhere but in India’s information technology law."

This is “akin to... providing equal punishment for calling someone a moron (insult) and threatening to kill someone (criminal intimidation),” Prakash wrote in the blog, where he has listed existing IPC provisions that can deal with the offences that 66A seeks to cover.

Lawyers have also questioned 66A’s effect of criminalising what the existing IPC would label as civil offences. For example, Prakash said, while the punishment under IPC for criminal nuisance is Rs 200, the penalty imposed by 66A is jail for up to three years.

Several sections in the IPC, they said, can effectively address offences that 66A attempts to address exclusively for electronic communications. For example, the IPC has sections for defamation (499 and 500), outraging religious sentiments (295) and obscenity (292).

"We do not require extraordinary laws when existing laws suffice," Ghosh said.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/telegraphindia-december-3-2012-gs-mudur-66a-cut-and-paste-job

25th WIPO SCCR Agenda

praskrishna — 2016-12-16T22:44:14Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/25-wipo-sccr-agenda.pdf

25 Indians to watch

praskrishna — 2012-11-30T04:46:38Z

From a political scion and an attacking batsman to a crusading web entrepreneur and a ‘Potato Prince’, these are India’s rising stars.

The article was published in the FT Magazine on November 16, 2012. Sunil Abraham is one among the 25 rising Indian stars to watch out for.

Politics

	Priyanka Gandhi Vadra The charismatic scion of India’s pre-eminent political dynasty has shied away from the family business, preferring to raise her children and study Buddhism. But her election-time appearances for mother, Sonia, and brother, Rahul – and her resemblance to her grandmother, former prime minister Indira Gandhi – keep Indians tantalised over a potential entry into full-time political life.

Priyanka Gandhi Vadra

The charismatic scion of India’s pre-eminent political dynasty has shied away from the family business, preferring to raise her children and study Buddhism. But her election-time appearances for mother, Sonia, and brother, Rahul – and her resemblance to her grandmother, former prime minister Indira Gandhi – keep Indians tantalised over a potential entry into full-time political life.

Arvind Kejriwal

A former tax inspector turned right-to-information activist, he was the driving force behind India Against Corruption, last year’s campaign for a new anti-graft law. Aiming to tap middle-class disillusionment with existing political parties, he is now forming his own.

Nitish Kumar

Chief minister of Bihar since 2005, this veteran socialist politician has brought economic growth, law and order and hope to what was one of India’s poorest, most-backward and worst-governed states. His humble persona combined with a strong track record on development mean that many see him as a potential future prime minister in a coalition government.

Anurag Thakur

Former cricketer and BJP member of parliament since 2008, Thakur’s ascent through the party’s ranks to the presidency of BJP’s youth wing put him in the spotlight in 2012. The BJP is said to be grooming him to take on Rahul Gandhi of the Congress party, particularly since Varun Gandhi, another scion within the BJP’s fold, has proved rather ineffective.

Sports

No one can replace Sachin Tendulkar, but the arrival of this dashing young batsman has softened the blow of the great cricketer’s impending retirement. With Bollywood looks to match his bold stroke play, the 24-year-old Kohli helped his cricket-mad country win last year’s World Cup – and raised hopes of more to come.

Saina Nehwal

This small-town girl from the northern state of Haryana is a formidable youth icon. Her many international titles have changed the face of Indian badminton and a bronze medal at the London Olympics this year raised hopes for Rio 2016. Will she be able to break through the Chinese wall?

Entertainment

Anurag Kashyap

India’s answer to Quentin Tarantino, Kashyap makes gritty, personal films about the country’s underbelly: terrorist attacks in Mumbai for Black Friday; drug use and prostitution in Dev D; and eastern India’s brutal coal mafia in this year’s two-part epic Gangs of Wasseypur. He cut his teeth writing Water, Canadian director Deepa Mehta’s Oscar-nominated film, among others.

Sneha Khanwalkar

A film composer who eschews the usual Bollywood penchant for cheesy pop, Khanwalkar favours “found sound”, which she gathers by travelling the Indian countryside and picking up on obscure – and not-so-obscure – folk traditions. She hosts MTV’s Sound Trippin, in which she recreates that experience for viewers more used to Celebrity Big Brother knock-offs. Not yet 30, Khanwalkar already claims two of the best modern Bollywood scores, for 2008’s Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye! and Gangs of Wasseypur.

	India’s greatest graphic novelist, whose project “Gallery of Losers” was shown on billboards across London during the Olympics. A Goldsmiths college graduate, his books – 2004’s Corridor and 2007’s The Barn Owl’s Wondrous Capers – detail alienation in both modern and old India and have set the standard for a burgeoning art form on the subcontinent.

Irrfan Khan

In a sea of “heroes” – as Bollywood’s buffed-up supermen are called – Khan stands out as an actor. A master of subtlety and character, he has found crossover success in Hollywood in films including Slumdog Millionaire (he played the cop), A Mighty Heart (with Angelina Jolie) and The Amazing Spider-Man. Up next is a role in Ang Lee’s adaptation of the Man Booker prize-winning Life of Pi.

Rohini Devasher

A painter and printmaker trained in New Delhi and the UK, Deveshar uses printmaking and video to explore the rhythms of growth in the natural world, and their digital echoes. Her work, shown widely at home and internationally, stands at the intersection of art and science and is influenced by her passion for astronomy.

Gauri Shinde A director of more than 100 advertising films for major Indian brands, Shinde put her focus on the big screen this year with her writing and directorial debut, English Vinglish, a blockbuster hit about the massive social fault line in India between those who speak English and those who don’t.

Gauri Shinde

A director of more than 100 advertising films for major Indian brands, Shinde put her focus on the big screen this year with her writing and directorial debut, English Vinglish, a blockbuster hit about the massive social fault line in India between those who speak English and those who don’t.

Social/Academia

Gita Gopinath

One of the youngest women to win a tenured economics professorship at Harvard, Gopinath uses complex maths to probe one of the world’s most pressing problems: how to solve sovereign debt crises. Still only 40, she appears frequently as a commentator back home, calling for a radical overhaul of her own government’s increasingly precarious financial position.

Sunil Abraham

India’s government has developed a worrying taste for internet censorship, making plenty of work for one of the country’s most respected online civil advocates. Head of the Centre for Internet and Society, Abraham is trying to wean New Delhi off its taste for crackdowns in India’s fast-growing corner of cyberspace.

Manoj Kumar

The Naandi Foundation CEO has persuaded big Indian corporations to support programmes that battle hunger and the maltreatment of girls, raise educational standards and provide sustainable livelihoods. His Midday Meal programme feeds 1.2 million each day; and its experiments with social enterprises make it one of India’s most innovative charities.

Abhijit Banerjee A development economist at MIT and author of Poor Economics, Banerjee carries out randomised-control field trials to cut through propaganda and evaluate the real impact of programmes to help the poor.

Abhijit Banerjee

A development economist at MIT and author of Poor Economics, Banerjee carries out randomised-control field trials to cut through propaganda and evaluate the real impact of programmes to help the poor.

Susmita Mohanty

Literally a rocket scientist. A protégé of Arthur C. Clarke, with stints at Nasa and Boeing, Mohanty was the youngest ever member of the International Academy of Astronautics. She’s now an aerospace entrepreneur. Her company, Earth2Orbit, recently launched its first client satellite.

Swati Ramanathan

Could online confessions help to stop India’s corruption crisis? This thought inspired www.ipaidabribe.com, a site where those forced to pay up can tell their stories anonymously. Established as part of the Janaagraha initiative that Ramanathan co-founded to improve life in Indian cities, the project has spawned imitators in half a dozen countries.

Business

Binny Bansal

As co-CEO of Flipkart.com – the “Amazon of India” – along with Sachin Bansal (no relation), he has turned a Bangalore-based start-up into the country’s most exciting e-commerce business. They have won millions in venture funding and a loyal urban customer base by speedily delivering everything from books to kitchenware.

Phanindra “Phani” Sama

India’s buses are booming, as travel demand rockets but rail capacity stays stuck. Those seeking tickets online are most likely to do so through RedBus. Dreamt up when he couldn’t get tickets for a trip, Sama’s site stitches together the country’s disorganised bus system, and saw its 32-year-old founder sell his 10 millionth ticket this year.

	Bringing new insights to a stuffy 115-year-old Indian conglomerate isn’t easy, nor is being an openly gay man in India’s still-traditional business culture – but Parmesh Shahani manages both, in his role as the founder and head of an ideas and innovation laboratory within the $3.3bn Mumbai-based Godrej group.

Anurag Behar

Engineer and former CEO of Wipro Infrastructure Engineering – a sister company of software giant Wipro – he has previously run the group’s charitable initiatives in education. Now Wipro’s chief sustainability officer, he is driving diversifications into water and clean energy, part of a new company focus.

Cyrus Mistry The man with the biggest shoes to fill in corporate India takes the reins at Tata in late December, replacing Ratan Tata, a man viewed as close to a living saint. The first non-Tata family member to run the nation’s most important business, he faces plenty of questions about how – and whether – to continue his predecessor’s dash for global growth.

Cyrus Mistry

The man with the biggest shoes to fill in corporate India takes the reins at Tata in late December, replacing Ratan Tata, a man viewed as close to a living saint. The first non-Tata family member to run the nation’s most important business, he faces plenty of questions about how – and whether – to continue his predecessor’s dash for global growth.

Roshni Nadar Malhotra

The CEO and executive director of the $5bn Indian IT giant HCL Corporation successfully combines business, social enterprise and philanthropy. Malhotra is the driving force behind Shiv Nadar Foundation’s VidyaGyan Schools in Uttar Pradesh, providing free education to children from poor, rural families.

Jang Bahadur Singh Sangha

Known as the “Potato Prince”, Sangha oversees one of India’s largest and most modern farming operations – and has demonstrated the transformative impact of technology in a country of small-scale subsistence farms. Armed with a master’s degree in plant pathology, he has made modern farming profitable – and almost cool.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/ft-magazine-nov-16-2012-25-indians-to-watch

22 nieuwe leden voor Partnership on AI

praskrishna — 2017-05-19T06:54:20Z

Partnership on AI, een non-profit organisatie ter bevordering van het algemeen begrip van kunstmatige intelligentie en de ontwikkeling van best practices, heeft 22 nieuwe leden aangekondigd.

The news was published by Telecom Paper on May 17, 2017.

Tot de nieuwe leden behoren eBay, Intel, McKinsey & Company, Salesforce, SAP, Sony, Zalando, Cogitai, Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence, AI Forum of New Zealand, Center for Democracy & Technology, Centre for Internet and Society – India, Data & Society Research Institute, Digital Asia Hub, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Future of Humanity Institute, Future of Privacy Forum, Human Rights Watch, Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence, UNICEF, Upturn, en de XPRIZE Foundation. Partnership on AI werd vorig jaar september opgericht. Tot de oprichters behoren onder meer Amazon, Facebook, IBM, Microsoft, Google DeepMind en Apple.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/telecom-paper-may-17-2017-22-nieuwe-leden-voor-partnership-on-ai

22 companies join Partnership on AI, begin to study AI's impact on work and society

praskrishna — 2017-05-19T05:26:09Z

The non-profit artificial intelligence organization added new groups into its fold, and announced initiatives on developing AI best practices and harnessing the technology for social good.

The blog post by Alison DeNisco was published in TechRepublic on May 17, 2017.

As artificial intelligence (AI) increasingly enters every part of our lives, from chatbots to self-driving cars to office data analysis programs, questions remain about how this technology will impact our future in terms of jobs, safety, and society.

In September 2016, Facebook, Microsoft, IBM, Amazon, and Google announced the creation of a "Partnership on AI to Benefit People and Society" (Partnership on AI), a nonprofit formed to "study and formulate best practices on AI technologies, to advance the public's understanding of AI, and to serve as an open platform for discussion and engagement about AI and its influences on people and society." Apple joined the partnership as a founding member in January 2017.

On Tuesday, the Partnership on AI shared a blog post with updates on the group's progress. Some 22 new organizations are joining the partnership, and more are expected to join in the future, according to the post. Eight are for-profit partners: eBay, Intel, McKinsey & Company, Salesforce, SAP, Sony, Zalando, and Cogitai.

Meanwhile, 14 are non-profits: The Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence, AI Forum of New Zealand, Center for Democracy & Technology, Centre for Internet and Society-India, Data & Society Research Institute, Digital Asia Hub, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Future of Humanity Institute, Future of Privacy Forum, Human Rights Watch, Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence, UNICEF, Upturn, and the XPRIZE Foundation.

"Together with the founding companies and our existing non-profit Partners (AAAI, ACLU, and OpenAI), these new Partners strengthen and broaden our representation, helping to fulfil our goal to build a diverse, balanced, and global set of perspectives on AI," the post stated.

Notable representatives from these organizations include Dr. Hiroaki Kitano, head of Sony Computer Science Laboratories and a world expert on AI robotics and human-AI collaboration, and Chris Fabian of UNICEF's Office of Innovation, who leads a group of technologists who apply machine learning, data science, and AI to societal problems.

Partnership on AI also announced plans to launch a set of initiatives based on its thematic pillars: Safety-critical AI; fair, transparent, and accountable AI; collaboration between people and AI systems; AI, labor, and the economy; social and societal influences of AI; AI and social good; and special initiatives. These early programs will focus on:

Topic-specific and sector-specific Working Groups to research and formulate best practices
The creation of a Civil Society Fellowship program aimed at assisting people at non-profits and NGOs who wish to collaborate on topics in AI and society
The formation of a cross-conference "AI, People, and Society" Best-Paper Award
The start of an AI Grand Challenges series to stimulate aspirational efforts in harnessing AI to address some of the most pressing long-term social and societal issues

The partners will work together to shape each initiative, and the group will share more information about each project soon, according to the blog post. The group also announced that it is in the process of appointing an executive director, who will oversee the organization's day-to-day operations.

Partnership on AI is not the only group examining the impact AI will have on our world. Elon Musk founded an $11 million AI safety program for funding researchers, and Eric Horvitz of Stanford University is leading the One Hundred Year Study on Artificial Intelligence. The White House released two reports in 2016 on preparing for the future of AI, and the effect of AI and automation on the economy. And a US Senate Committee also met last year to discuss the current state of AI, and its potential impact on policy and commerce.

The 3 big takeaways for TechRepublic readers

The nonprofit Partnership on AI, founded by Facebook, Microsoft, IBM, Amazon, Google, and Apple, recently announced that it was adding 22 new organizations to its ranks to research AI and formulate best practices around the technology.
The partnership also announced several initiatives, including working groups to research and create best practices, and a challenge series to inspire people to use AI to address social issues.
Partnership for AI is expected to release more information on each initiative soon, as well as appoint an executive director.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/tech-republic-may-17-2017-22-companies-join-partnership-on-ai

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praskrishna — 2012-12-02T11:50:36Z

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13 crore Aadhaar numbers on four government websites compromised: Report

praskrishna — 2017-05-03T15:19:52Z

The lack of information security practices in key government websites which hosts Personally Identifiable Information (PII) has left citizens of the country more vulnerable to identity theft and financial fraud, a research paper has argued.

The article by Akram Mohammed was published by the New Indian Express on May 2, 2017.

A paper by Amber Sinha and Srinivas Kodali of Centre for Internet and Society analysed four government websites and found that more than 13 crore Aadhaar numbers with related PII were available on the websites, exposing lax security features.

The paper published under Creative Commons is titled ‘Information Security Practices of Aadhaar (or lack thereof): A documentation of public availability of Aadhaar Numbers with sensitive personal financial information’ and was released on Monday.

Sinha and Kodali looked at databases on four government portals -- National Social Assistance Programme, National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, Chandranna Bima Scheme, Govt. of Andhra Pradesh and Daily Online Payment Reports website of NREGA, Govt. of Andhra Pradesh.

“We chose major government programmes that use Aadhaar for payments and banking transactions. We found sensitive and personal data and information accessible on these portals,” the report said.

Leaked through portals

“Based on the numbers available on the websites, estimated number of Aadhaar numbers leaked through these 4 portals could be around 130-135 million and the number of bank account numbers leaked at around 100 million.

While these numbers are only from two major government programmes of pensions and rural employment schemes, other major schemes, that have also used Aadhaar for DBT, could have leaked PII similarly due to lack of information security practices,” it said.

They fear that data of over 23 crore beneficiaries under DBT of LPG subsidies could be leaked also. Identity theft and financial fraud “risks increase multifold in India...,” they said.

Aadhaar payments unsafe

In case a financial fraud takes place through Aadhaar enabled Payment System (AePS), the consumer may not be able to assert his claims for compensation due to the terms and conditions around liabilities.

“These terms force the consumer to take liabilities onto oneself than the payment provider..... Regulations and standards around Aadhaar are at a very early and nascent stage causing (an) increase in financial risk for both consumers and banks to venture into AePS,” they added. The authors also pulled up UIDAI for their inability in providing strong legislation against such leaks.

Leaky govt portals

National Social Assistance Programme

PII available - Access to Aadhaar no., name, bank account number, account frozen status 94,32,605 bank accounts linked with Aadhaar

14,98,919 post office accounts linked with Aadhaar numbers.

Though total Aadhaar number is 1,56,42,083, not all are linked to bank accounts

NREGA

PII Details available: Job card no., Aadhaar number, bank/postal account number, no. of days worked, registration no., account frozen status

78,74,315 post office accounts of individual workers seeded with Aadhaar numbers,

8,24,22,161 bank accounts of individual workers with Aadhaar numbers.

10,96,41,502 total number of Aadhaar numbers stored by portal

Other websites

Chandranna Bima Scheme, Govt. of Andhra Pradesh

Daily Online Payment Reports website of NREGA, Govt. of Andhra Pradesh

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/new-indian-express-may-2-2017-akram-mohammed-13-crore-aadhaar-numbers-on-four-government-websites-compromised

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praskrishna — 2012-11-23T12:15:51Z

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