Centre for Internet and Society

Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson (Publ) vs. Mercury Electronics and Anr

praskrishna — 2016-04-20T15:53:07Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/telefonaktiebolaget-lm-ericsson-publ-vs-mercury-electronics-and-anr

2014 showed the power of Twitter, now every Indian politician wants a handle

praskrishna — 2016-04-20T02:33:00Z

Twitter is fast turning into an effective political tool. As political parties fight another round of electoral battles, a new survey on the 2014 general elections states that those who tweeted well, fared well.

The article by T.V. Jayan, Smitha Verma,Sonia Sarkar and V. Kumara Swamy quoted Sumandro Chattapadhyay. Click to read the original published by Telegraph on April 10.

Clean image? Tick. Right caste? Tick. Money to fund an election? Tick. Good rapport with the top brass? Tick. But no followers on Twitter or other social media sites? Sorry, then you are not going to get a ticket for the Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls next year, says Bharatiya Janata Party president Amit Shah.

There was a time when Twitter was what little old ladies – purportedly – did. Now it’s a veritable tool for politicians. As states go for Assembly elections this summer, politicians and their parties are tweeting like never before.

And perhaps rightly so, for a recently published study of the 2014 general elections indicates that the more you tweet, the brighter are your chances of winning. The BJP’s victory in 2014 – which came riding a social media wave – seems to have spurred other parties on.

Twitter, for those who came in late, is the micro-blogging social site that allows you to post, repost and comment on anything under the sun. These days, Twitter in India is abuzz with electoral comments and speculation.

Hashtags related to state elections have been dominating the site. The four major players in Bengal – the Trinamul Congress (TMC), the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Congress and the BJP – have been giving updates about rallies, poll plans and issues. In Assam, the 81-year-old Congress chief minister, Tarun Gogoi, has started tweeting, too. His posts are mostly about his achievements and critical reviews of the BJP’s poll promises.

The CPI(M), which launched its Twitter handle only in February 2014, now has more than 20,000 followers, marginally more than the TMC’s approximately 19,500 followers. Party general secretary Sitaram Yechury is a relentless tweeter – posting comments on issues that range from fuel price hikes to drought and foreign policy. Other senior party leaders such as West Bengal state secretary Surya Kanta Mishra and Mohammad Salim in Bengal and Pinarayi Vijayan in Kerala have been giving regular updates of the party’s campaign on Twitter and Facebook.

“Twitter gives political organisations the ability to broadcast information on a worldwide stream (not just their subscribers), join any ongoing debates and discussions and have a two-way interaction with the public during political processes and campaigns,” notes the study – The 2014 Indian elections on Twitter: A comparison of campaign strategies of political parties. The study, conducted by researchers from the department of communications, University of California, Davis, and Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, was recently published online in the journal Telematics and Informatics.

India is the third largest user of Twitter in the world, with an estimated 23.2 million active users, up from 11.5 million in 2013. Market researcher group Emarketer estimates that Twitter will have around 40 million users in India by 2018.

That is a sizable number. No surprise then that political parties are reaching out to voters with the help of social media arms such as Twitter.

“Twitter is an important platform for the Congress to reach out to a certain section but the content has to be important,” agrees Congress leader Sachin Pilot, who joined Twitter in March 2014, but started tweeting actively four months ago. “We joined the medium late but we are using it positively and not to spread exaggerated promises or look at short-term gains,” he says.

Indeed, the Congress has been greatly outpaced by BJP in the race for tweets. According to the University of California study, the BJP posted 80,981 tweets during the 2014 elections, far ahead of any of the other political parties. The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) came next with 7,980 tweets, followed by the TMC with 3,990 and the Congress with 2,890. The CPI(M) had 402 tweets.

“The 2014 general elections was the first time social media was being used for electoral campaigning in India and hence the disparity in usage between parties,” says Saifuddin Ahmed, the corresponding author of the study. “The next general elections would be a different game as most of the parties would be well-prepared going by the success of BJP’s 2014 social media campaign.”

The study found that the BJP’s Twitter feed dealt with campaign updates (28 per cent) and criticism of other political parties or moves (24 per cent). It also posted the second-highest in proportion and the highest in absolute numbers of self-promotion tweets (19 per cent as against AAP’s 35 per cent).

“We strongly believe that a message is effectively sent across when one has a credible message, a credible messenger and also a credible tool of communication. And Twitter is a credible tool,” asserts Dilip Pandey, AAP’s head of communications.

The study says the BJP often tweeted the words “thank you” while the Congress’s pet phrases included “Gandhi Gandhi” (in a single tweet). AAP used old emotional slogans such as ” Satyamev Jayate” and “Azaadi ladai”.

It concludes that the winning party’s electoral success [in 2014] is significantly associated with its use of Twitter for engaging voters.

“The BJP’s primary purpose was to use Twitter as a broadcasting medium, and they tweeted their party messages as shareable content, such as images, which users could share in their personal networks,” Ahmed points out.

Not surprisingly, others are embracing Twitter. In Maharashtra, the BJP state unit campaigned extensively on social media for Assembly elections – and ended up forming the government in the state.

“A tweet helps in changing mindset and perception. The urban population which never voted for BJP was targeted through Twitter to present the vision of our party,” says Jiten Gajaria, BJP social media head during Maharashtra elections.

Elsewhere, too, political leaders have been jumping on to the Twitter bandwagon. Nitish Kumar joined Twitter in May 2010, but remained almost inactive for most of his second term before springing back to life in 2015 before the elections. More than 95 per cent of his tweets were posted in the election year. There was even a question-answer-session with people on Twitter.

“Nitish ji in a way engaged with the media through his Twitter handle,” Janata Dal (United) spokesperson K.C. Tyagi says. “He would tweet something about the BJP or Modi and that became the talking point. The NDA was asked by the media to respond to the tweet.”

Modi joined Twitter in January 2009, and Kejriwal in 2011 before launching AAP. Among politicians, the two most active tweeters are Shashi Tharoor of the Congress and Derek O’Brien of the TMC. Rahul Gandhi’s first tweet was on May 7, 2015, about beginning a padayatra in Telangana’s Adilabad district.

Though a late entrant, the CPI(M), too, sees advantages of using the medium. “We don’t want to leave any stone unturned during the elections and being on Twitter is a part of the strategy,” says Rajya Sabha member Ritabrata Banerjee. “Although we don’t believe in hiring professionals, as the BJP does to prop itself up on Twitter, we believe people will follow us and listen to what we are saying.”

However, Sumandro Chattopadhyay, research director, Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, is sceptical about linking electoral victories to Twitter usage.

“There are many variables such as Internet penetration, media device availability and media exposure. Rich states always perform better in these parameters,” Chattopadhyay says.

Politicians also stress that Twitter is just one of the tools of a campaign. “The social media is one part of a 360-degree electoral strategy. Twitter probably is only 10 degrees of the overall electoral strategy,” O’Brien states.

And not all politicians look at Twitter as the virtual equivalent of traditional campaigns.

“What we see on Twitter is exaggerated hysteria,” says a BJP leader who is also active on Twitter. “Twitter is a double-edged sword. It is an effective tool for putting your message to an expanding and bigger audience. But at the same time, we don’t know if what we are being told is true because we cannot verify the source.”

A member of the CPI(M)’s communications team stresses that traditional modes of campaigning still outrank social media campaigns. “We believe that as far as our connection with the people is concerned, there is no alternative to the traditional way of reaching out to the masses,” he says. “Twitter can only publicise what we do on the ground.”

In the final analysis, does popularity on Twitter translate into votes? Shah seems to believe so – he is not giving away tickets to BJP members if they don’t have enough followers on Twitter or Facebook. But the Twitter-savvy BJP leader, who seeks anonymity, doesn’t agree.

“It could be one of the factors to influence voters. Maybe a fraction of voters form their opinion based on what they see on Twitter. But it is certainly not the most decisive factor,” he says.

Meanwhile, as politicians battle it out, Twitter is making the most of the poll fervour. The site has said it will launch an exclusive emoji for the Tamil Nadu Assembly elections, which will come up on counting day in May. Did we just hear Twitter crow?

– T.V. Jayan, Smitha Verma,Sonia Sarkar and V. Kumara Swamy report.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-telegraph-april-10-2016-2014-showed-the-power-of-twitter

PMO’s no to smart cards, insists on Aadhaar

praskrishna — 2016-04-20T02:19:18Z

The government has decided to stop issuing new smart cards to beneficiaries of government schemes as Aadhaar is now backed by a law.

The article by Somesh Jha was published in the Hindu on April 10, 2016. Sunil Abraham was quoted.

The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has issued strict instructions to the Information Technology Ministry to ensure that States and the Central governmentstop issuing smart cards for new programmes for beneficiaries, and to rely on the Aadhaar-based Direct Benefit Transfer platform instead.

The move will impact ministries such as Labour, Social Justice and Health, which are in the process or have already rolled out smart cards.

The government had said earlier that over 100 crore people, constituting 93 per cent of the adult population, had a unique identification (UID) number under the Aadhaar platform.

“The undersigned is directed to request the department to examine the need for state and central government departments to issue separate smart cards in the light of the near universal coverage of Aadhaar and the delivery of the most public welfare benefits through Aadhaar enabled platforms,” according to a directive issued by Gulzar N, Director, PMO, to Aruna Sharma, Secretary, Department of Electronics and Information Technology.

“The undersigned is also directed to request the department to prepare policy on the delivery of various public services using Aadhaar, Jan Dhan Yojana and existing platforms without the issuance of new smart cards.”

Last month, Union Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment Thaawar Chand Gehlot had announced that all differently abled persons would soon get a unique identity card to avail welfare schemes. .

State governments had also planned to use smart card technology for welfare schemes. For instance, Odisha was mulling smart cards for construction workers in the State.

The PMO sent a separate communiqué to Labour Secretary Shankar Aggarwal in the context of a proposal to issue 40 crore smart cards to informal sector workers, called the Unorganised Workers’ Identification Number (U-WIN). The UWIN cards were to be used by these workers to access benefits under schemes such as Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana , Aam Aadmi Bima Yojana , Atal Pension Yojana, Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana and Jeevan Jyoti Bima Yojana.

The PMO rejected the proposal noting that Aadhaar would act as a “universal unique identifier for each citizen.”

“Adding a UWIN number would not only duplicate work, but also introduce further problems in linking up with other databases which have already been linked with Aadhaar,” said the missive reviewed by The Hindu.

However, experts are sceptical of the government’s move.

“Smart cards are always better than biometrics. If that was not the case, the global financial infrastructure today will be working on biometrics and not on smart cards,” said Sunil Abraham, executive director of The Centre for Internet and Society.

“Why are these banks working on smart cards? Smart cards work using cryptography, which is more fool-proof than biometrics. Biometrics allow for remote, covert and non-consensual identification,” Mr. Abraham said.

Smart card vendors, however, said the move may not impact their market. “The demand for smart cards is massive in all the other segments such as for use in debit and credit cards or driving licenses and vehicle registration numbers,” said Deven Mehta, managing director of the Mumbai-based Smart Card IT Solutions.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-hindu-april-10-2016-somesh-jha-pmo-no-to-smart-cards-insists-aadhaar

Why is the UIDAI cracking down on individuals that hoard Aadhaar data?

praskrishna — 2016-04-17T16:16:26Z

Private firms' offer to print Aadhaar details on plastic card a breach of law.

The article by Alnoor Peermohamed was published by Business Standard on April 13, 2016. Sunil Abraham was quoted.

The billion-strong citizen identification system, Aadhaar, has given rise to businesses keen on illegal harnessing of this private data, say the authorities.

Outfits are offering services to print the Aadhaar details on plastic cards, something the Union information technology ministry warned against on Monday. These entities charge anywhere between Rs 50 and Rs 600, and are listed on e-commerce websites, apart from own online presence.

Under the Aadhaar law, collecting and storing of the data by private companies without the user’s consent is a crime. Monday’s warning from the ministry to e-commerce marketplaces such as Amazon, Flipkart and eBay to disallow merchants from collecting and printing such details was a result of this.

This newspaper could not find any listings of Aadhaar printing services on Flipkart but there was one on Amazon (taken down) and no less than five such listings on eBay.

PrintMyAadhaar is one of the more well organised outfits operating in this space. “Get your E-Aadhaar printed on a PVC card for easier handling,” reads their website. Users are prompted to fill their Aadhaar details on the website, pay Rs 50 and have the card sent to their houses. PrintMyAadhaar even offers discounts for bulk orders.

“Collecting such information or unauthorised printing of an Aadhaar card or aiding such persons in any manner may amount to a criminal offence, punishable with imprisonment under the Indian Penal Code and also Chapter VI of The Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016,” read the statement from the ministry.

Currently, Aadhaar stores a person’s name, date of birth, sex and address, apart from their biometric data.

While the biometric data isn’t available to these PDF printing shops, the rest of the information is, according to Srikanth Nadhamuni, chief executive officer of Khosla Labs and a former head of technology at the Unique Identification Authority of India. However, collecting this data poses no security risk to the Aadhaar infrastructure, he added.

“Allowing somebody to accumulate large amounts of data from Aadhaar users in general is not a good practice. We should ensure that the Aadhaar details of people remain private and it should only be up to the discretion of the end-user to share this,” said Nadhamuni.

Some security experts say Aadhaar does pose a security risk, as it makes available an individual's details in the public domain. Several institutions are treating Aadhaar just like any other proof of identity.

“Transactions that should have been conducted using biometric authentication are being conducted just by presentation of paper documents. What is happening most commonly is that people are giving a printout or photocopy of their Aadhaar acknowledgement as their proof of identity to get a SIM card. The risk here is that somebody can get a mobile number against your name,” said Sunil Abraham, executive director of the non-profit Centre for Internet and Society.

He says the other technical issue with Aadhaar is the lack of a smart card that stores a person’s information, as in a digital signature. Due to the lack of this, people don’t know what information to keep private and what to make public. Conventional security techniques would have had a person keeping their PIN private (as with a bank account). If this personal PIN would have been saved on a smart card, which users wouldn’t have had much to worry about.

“In the case of Aadhaar, the authentication factor and the identification factor are in the public domain, because many people might have your UID number and people release their biometric data everywhere. Due to this broken technological solution, we are now through policy putting band-aids, saying people should not disclose their UID number unnecessarily,” added Abraham.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/business-standard-alnoor-peermohamed-april-13-2016-why-is-uidai-cracking-down-on-individuals-that-hoard-aadhaar-data

Adoption of Standards in Smart Cities

praskrishna — 2016-04-11T03:03:12Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/adoption-of-standards-in-smart-cities.pdf

Daunting task ahead for investigative agencies with WhatsApp's end-to-end encryption

praskrishna — 2016-04-09T09:45:12Z

Messaging service WhatsApp's decision to roll out end-to-end encryption for over 1 billion subscribers has been hailed as a positive step by users across the world, although things are set to get tougher for law enforcement and investigative agencies in India seeking to track terrorists.

The article by Neha Alawadhi was published in Economic Times on April 8, 2016. Sunil Abraham was quoted.

"It was anyway difficult to get any kind of data from WhatsApp and now it is going to be even more difficult," said a person familiar with the working of these agencies who did not wish to be identified.

Encryption scrambles data such as text messages, photos and documents and makes them unintelligible for unintended recipients. A service that is encrypted end-to-end cannot be monitored or intercepted. No one, except the people or group communicating with each other, can access the data. If telecom companies, Internet providers or even companies that run messaging services try to intercept the message, all they would get is garbled data.

While chats will not be accessible, associated information known as metadata will be available, such as when the conversations took place, the identities of senders and recipients, their locations, mobile numbers, profile photos and address books, which may be useful for security agencies.

"Definitely for law enforcement it means a big headache, but the metadata is there and with metadata, if you have a couple of other bits of information, you can piece it together," said Sunil Abraham, executive director at Bengaluru-based research organisation Centre for Internet and Society. "Agencies can get the metadata, but they won't get the payload unless they're able to compromise the device. And that intelligence agencies like NSA (National Security Agency of the US) have been able to do in the past."

While encryption offers privacy and security to users, it is the bane of law enforcement agencies globally, as exemplified most recently and notably by the Apple-FBI dispute in the US. The Federal Bureau of Investigation FBI asked Apple to weaken its encryption to access a dead terrorist's iPhone data and after the company refused, hacked into the device with help from a third party.

In India, it is difficult to bring US-based companies to the negotiating table. "We have had minimum cooperation from WhatsApp. All the data is controlled in the US and they rarely hand over the data that we request. We don't ask them for content. We only ask for metadata," said another person familiar with the process who declined to be identified.

While the Indian IT Act gives wide-ranging powers to the government to ask for access to encrypted information, very few requests for information, very few requests for information take the legal route. One reason is the long time that it takes to process such requests - on average, over three years - and the other, especially in the case of WhatsApp, is little or no cooperation, according to government officials.

WhatsApp, based in Mountain View, California, did not respond to an email request for comment. The messaging company was acquired by Facebook in 2014.

How security and investigative agencies in India use the data they access is also a grey area. "We do not have a privacy legislation here which will take care of the concerns that people have with respect to use of data. If the government needs to have access to communications, they also need to ensure there are adequate safeguards in place," said Prasanth Sugathan, counsel at Software Freedom Law Centre.

"In practice, end-to-end encryption will bring the end user and the device into focus, rather than WhatsApp or any particular messaging service. This should be a trigger for greater clarity on India's data protection policy," said Arun Mohan Sukumar, who heads the cyber security and internet governance initiative at think tank Observer Research Foundation.

In India, requests for information from companies such as WhatsApp and Google are handled by the Ministry of Home Affairs or the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team. Emails to both were unanswered at the time of going to print.

The Indian government was involved in a long-standing dispute with BlackBerry over access to encrypted data on its messenger and corporate email service. BlackBerry set up servers in Mumbai to comply with local regulations, but said it could not access encrypted data on its enterprise servers.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/economic-times-april-8-2016-neha-alawadhi-daunting-task-ahead-for-investigative-agencies-with-whatsapp-end-to-end-encryption

India's biometric database crosses billion-member mark

praskrishna — 2016-04-07T02:54:08Z

India's biometric database notched up one billion members on Monday, as the government sought to allay concerns about privacy breaches in the world's biggest such scheme.

The news by AFP was published by Daily Mail, UK on April 4, 2016. Sunil Abraham gave inputs.

The database was set up seven years ago to streamline benefit payments to millions of poor people as well as to cut fraud and wastage. Under the scheme, called Aadhaar, almost 93 percent of India's adult population have now registered their fingerprints and iris signatures and been given a biometric ID, according to the government.

IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad hailed it as "an instrument of good governance" at a ceremony in New Delhi marking the crossing of the one-billion member mark.

Prasad said the initiative, inherited from the previous left-leaning Congress government, had enabled millions to receive cash benefits directly rather than dealing with middlemen.

He said the government had saved 150 billion rupees ($2.27 billion) on its gas subsidy scheme alone -- by paying cash directly to biometric card holders instead of providing cylinders at subsidised rates.

He also said all adequate safeguards were in place to ensure the personal details of card holders could not be stolen or misused by authorities given access to the database.

"We have taken all measures to ensure privacy. The data will not be shared with anyone except in cases of national security," Prasad said.

His comments come after parliament passed legislation last month giving government agencies access to the database in the interests of national security.

It was passed using a loophole to circumvent the opposition in parliament, where the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) lacks a majority in the upper house.

The way it was passed, as well as the legislation itself, raised concerns about government agencies accessing private citizens' details.

Internet experts have also raised fears about the safety of such a massive database, including hacking and theft of details.

"It was as if Indian lawmakers wrote an open letter to criminals and foreign states saying, 'we are going to collect data to non-consensually identify all Indians and we are going to store it in a central repository. Come and get it!'," Sunil Abraham, executive director of the Centre for Internet and Society, wrote in India's Frontline news magazine.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/daily-mail-april-4-2016-afp-india-biometric-database-crosses-billion-member-mark

The Panama Papers and the question of privacy

praskrishna — 2016-04-24T14:03:35Z

This statement was originally published on privacyinternational.org on 4 April 2016.

Read the entry by Claire Lauterbach published in Big News Network on April 6, 2016. Sunil Abraham was quoted.

We do agree with Ramon Fonseca about one thing: that "Each person has a right to privacy, whether they are a king or a beggar."

But that's where our commonality with co-founder of disgraced Panama law firm Mossack Fonseca ends.

Last year, a whistleblower leaked 11.5 million documents about the firm's business brokering offshore companies, details of which were published yesterday. Reportedly the largest leak in journalistic history, the cache reveals hidden assets by a dozen current and former world leaders, and scores of celebrities and tycoons, some of which are linked to high level corruption scandals.

This scandal isn't about privacy, though. If anything, it's about the need for transparency about how the powerful wield their power. We need transparency - and good solid investigation - to understand where and how our right to privacy is eroded.

Privacy and transparency are not opposites. They are two sides of the same coin. As privacy advocates, we use transparency capabilities to investigate surveillance. Meanwhile, privacy as a right requires transparency from the institutions that gather and use our data.

Privacy International, like other human rights groups, conducts investigations in the public interest. That allows us to understand, for example, how Colombia built a shadow surveillance system despite evidence of illegal interceptions, or how UK police appear to be collecting private communications data at protests, according to a Vice News investigation.

Many of the Panama Papers' revelations are in the public interest insofar as they concern the transformation of public assets - like taxpayers' money and state funds - into private gains, and allow the powerful to avoid scrutiny. Privacy and transparency are not opposites. They are two sides of the same coin.

Fonseca called journalism around the leaked files an "international campaign against privacy".

But what Fonseca is really doing is advocating a status quo of 'privacy for the kings, and transparency for the beggars'. Or rather, privacy for the business moguls, politicians, corporations and government agencies, and transparency for the citizens, consumers, activists and journalists.

For the public, our financial systems are now surveiled by design. Our transactions are labelled as suspicious and sent for mining by intelligence agencies. We need IDs to open accounts, and our records are profiled by credit agencies who facilitate key decisions about us and our families. Secretive institutions collate this information to decide whether or not we are terrorists. While a certain degree of this is necessary for public order, what's clear is that we are watched while the 'kings' are able to circumvent many of these measures and escape scrutiny. We should never make the mistake of conflating the right to privacy for the individual with the desire to hide shadowy, ethically dubious, borderline-or-actual illegal activity for the immensely wealthy and powerful.

The real issues around privacy include: the spreading of draconian laws, from the UK, to Pakistan, to Kenya, that sanction warrantless surveillance and online monitoring, with insufficient protection for the public. It's the intrusive biometric registration of some of the most desperate people, like refugees from Dadaab to Calais, desperate for food and medical care. It's the instrumentalisation of consumer data to draw conclusions about us, with or without our consent. It's also the parallel trend of rolling back Freedom of Information laws (see: UK and United States). And, as the Panama Papers show, it is allowing transfers of public funds for private gain to be obscured.

That is the real "campaign against privacy" - not public interest journalism.

As our friend and partner Sunil Abraham, Executive Director of the Centre for Internet and Society in India states succinctly, the right to privacy should "be inversely proportionate to power and almost conversely the requirement of transparency to be directly proportionate to power."

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/big-news-network-april-6-2016-claire-lauterbach-panama-papers-and-question-of-privacy

CIS Mobile Device Patent Landscape

praskrishna — 2016-04-06T00:19:31Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/cis-mobile-device-patent-landscape

CoinFest 2016

praskrishna — 2016-04-04T15:19:28Z

Coinsecure and India Bitcoin have joined hands to organize to organize CoinFest at the Centre for Internet & Society's Bangalore office on Saturday, April 10, 2016, from 4.00 p.m. to 7.00 p.m.

CoinFest 2016

CoinFest 2015 was a stunning success, taking Canada’s crypto holiday to countries around the world. CoinFest 2016 is building on that momentum, preparing a series of events for April with over two dozen cities planning to participate. This year's CoinFest will celebrate Bitcoin & educate participants about its uses & benefits. Come learn about bitcoin, blockchain, and other digital currencies! Find out how to use them and how this technology is having a positive impact globally!

Speakers

Coinsecure - Benson Samuel & team will be talking about journey of Bitcoin in India.
Airbitz - Meghan Kellison-Lords & Factom - Paul Snow will also be participating via Hangouts.

Follow the event on Facebook

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/openness/events/coinfest-2016

Brainstorming Workshop on PG Programme on Media Studies for UGC E-Pathshala Programme

praskrishna — 2016-04-02T07:00:42Z

Nehaa Chaudhari will be speaking at this conference to be organized by Jamia Milla Islamia on April 5, 2016 in New Delhi.

Session I

11:30 a.m. -1:00 p.m.
Introducing the programme: Prof. Biswajit Das
Chair: Prof. G. Ravindran
Issues and areas in communication

Panelists

Prof Biswajit Das
Dr. Durgesh Tripathi

Lunch

Session II

2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.
Chair: Vibodh Parthasarathi
Indentifying course curriculum for Moocs programme,UGC
Panelists:

Merajur Baruah
Nehaa Chaudhari

Tea

Session III

3:15 p.m. – 4:15 p.m.
Chair: Vibodh Parthasarathi
Finalization of contributors/topics for Moocs programme, UGC

Vote of Thanks – Dishanka Gogoi, Project Fellow, UGC-DRS

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/brainstorming-workshop-on-pg-programme-on-media-studies-for-ugc-e-pathshala-programme

Agenda - First Annual Round table on Innovation Intellectual Property and Competition (1).pdf

praskrishna — 2016-04-02T06:48:45Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/Agenda%20-%20First%20Annual%20Round%20table%20on%20Innovation%20Intellectual%20Property%20and%20Competition%20-1.pdf

Agenda- Fifth Annual IP Teaching Workshop 2016.pdf

praskrishna — 2016-04-02T06:46:59Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/Agenda-%20Fifth%20Annual%20IP%20Teaching%20Workshop%202016.pdf

Fifth Annual IP Teaching Workshop

praskrishna — 2016-04-02T06:53:16Z

The V Annual IP Teaching Workshop- 2016 was organised by the Centre for Innovation, Intellectual Property and Competition (CIIPC), at National Law University Delhi in association with National Academy of Law Teaching, NLU-D, on March 31 and April 1, 2016 in Delhi. Nehaa Chaudhari was a speaker.

Concept Note

The annual IP teaching workshops have previously been hosted in association with University of Washington School of Law, Seattle. In 2012, the first such workshop identified several broad challenges faced by teachers of intellectual property law in India. In 2013, the second IP teaching workshop focussed was on IP teaching techniques, use of information and communications technology in IP teaching, research and publication. The third workshop in 2014 discussed various issues initiating IP clinics in India. In 2015, the IV annual IP Teaching workshop focused on diverse issues involving curriculum development, student participation in IP activities, empirical research in IP, academic contributions to IP policy-making, and IP teaching beyond law schools. All workshops have had key speakers and resource persons from India and abroad.

By bringing together a select gathering of IP teachers and scholars from different corners of India, the 2016 workshop in its fifth edition aims to focus on developing a thematic research agenda on contemporary legal issues involving “IP interfaces”. The general approach to the study and teaching of intellectual property in India tends to look at intellectual property in isolation to other areas of law. However, many scholars and teachers of intellectual property have in the past and present eschewed such an approach since it fundamentally limits critical thinking and holistic appreciation of intellectual property law, both in theory and in practice. Recent scholarship has focussed on the overlapping nature of issues within intellectual property. However, teachers and scholars of intellectual property do regularly encounter deeper and intricate questions involving IP interfaces in terms of their symbiotic relationship shared by IP with other areas of law, both- domestic and international law.

IP interfaces looks into the complex web of legal relationships and contestations between intellectual property law in India and other areas of law viz., the law of property, constitutional law, law of contracts, tort law, criminal law, international trade law, international investment law, competition law, technology and regulatory laws. Briefly, these areas of law pose important challenges in the development of IP law, which often have specific legal consequences. Taking recourse to the study of interfaces shared by IP with other areas of law may help us in placing decisive legal limits or in advancing potential legal interpretations that may have teleological consequences for various stakeholders implicated by the IP system. These key areas of law identified above are only indicative, and hence non-exhaustive.

The academic community is invited to contemplate on the theme of the conference by framing specific and focused research questions in different areas of IP law that raise legal implications in their interaction with other areas of law. To specifically scope the thematic discussions during the workshop, we look forward to research proposals that avoid pure policy questions that may govern such interfaces. The workshop aims to focus on legal argumentation, articulation and outcome by working on specific legal questions on IP interfaces. The aim to develop a concrete research agenda in order to discern legal principles that guide such legal relationships in terms of their conflicts, complementarities and contestations of IP interfaces. This is with an exclusive focus on several key areas of Indian/international law in its interaction with intellectual property law in India, as governed by different statutes, case-law jurisprudence and common law principles.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/fifth-annual-ip-teaching-workshop

SSRN-id2756486.pdf

praskrishna — 2016-06-20T01:51:25Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/SSRN-id2756486.pdf