Centre for Internet and Society

The world is your oyster, by invitation only

praskrishna — 2011-05-01T01:40:59Z

Recent trends show the world of social networking actually reflects the social divides and groupings in the real world. This article by Shreya Ray was published in the Livemint on April 26, 2011.

Looking for love and thinking it’s a shame someone as gorgeous as you is single? Worry not, for Beautifulpeople.com is here. The UK-based site guarantees beautiful singletons a chance to find “beautiful relationships” through their network. The homepage gives you a little snapshot into what they are all about. A cluster of model-like people, different ethnicities and yet, ironically, strikingly similar in their Anglo-Saxon good looks: high cheekbones and sharp noses. Membership is open for all with one caveat: The photo you submit must first be rated by your peer group (that is, the people already deemed “beautiful” by the website), only then do you get admission.

Based on a similar principle of peer-group approval is Facebook’s Compare People application, where you rate friends based on their smile, eyes, sex appeal, profile picture (and other school-report card qualities such as “helpfulness”). And then, of course, there are quizzes such as “How Beautiful Are You”, in which too your final score is based on where you stand vis-à-vis other people in the network.

To be fair, this isn’t just a fetish of the beautiful and those who want to officially belong to “beautiful-only” groups. Because, in just the same way, the social networking world is just as populated by people wanting to either be part of “rich-only” (Affluence.org) or “smart only” (Epernicus.com, for researchers) groups, and most recently, the India-based Vagad Visible (Vagadvisible.com, for the Vagads, a small clan within Kutchi Jains), among others. The world of social networking is about everyone wanting to be something “only” and in that sense, to quote Chicago-based social networking expert David Armano, it is “less about being social”.

Exclusivity: The invite-only system allows social networks and other Web platforms to control and stagger the growing load on their infrastructure. Raajan/Mint

Unsocial networking

One of the latest improvements on Facebook towards the end of 2010 was the option that allows you to edit friends with hyperactive user activity (people who are forever cluttering your page with Farmville updates or quizzes) and “hide” such user activity from your feed. “On Facebook, groups are smaller gatherings, individuals which are invite-only. On Twitter, users create lists to help them filter out signal from noise. Lists on Twitter are not really about exclusivity, but they do say something about how people desire to extract more value from a network,” says Armano, in an email interview.

Sunil Abraham, executive director of the research institute Centre for Internet and Society, Bangalore, says the “hierarchy on the online attention economy often reflects the class and social divides in the real world”.The term attention economy was first used by Michael Goldhaber in December 1997 to describe a new arrangement in which the “flow of attention” metaphorically replaced money as the currency of the Internet.

Quantitative research in the Philippines has shown that rich people are less likely to respond to messages that say “will you be my friend”, he adds, citing the work of researcher Raul Pertierra. “On Facebook, the act of friending someone may appear symmetric. But privacy settings on content, groups and feed configurations may be used to fine-tune the exact power dynamics of the relationship. In platforms such as Twitter, the asymmetry is explicit: For example, Twitter, where I can follow you but you need not follow me,” he says.

Technology has aided this aspect of exclusivity. “There are now beta releases of social software which typically get released to a smaller group of influential and digital savvy individuals. There are now services such as Klout that partner with brands to reward individuals who have the largest social graphs,” adds Armano. Klout measures your overall online influence using over 35 variables on Facebook and Twitter and rates you as True Reach, Amplification Probability, and Network Score.

The other way of practising exclusivity—unlike Facebook, Twitter and other “open” networks—is to just come out and say it: invite only. Beautifulpeople.com will only admit you on the basis of your looks; asmallworld (Asmallworld.net), becoming increasingly popular among the First World swish set, can only be accessed by invitation; and Affluence.org very categorically states it is a place for wealthy individuals to “connect” (membership is free but requires a verifiable minimum household net worth of $1 million, or Rs. 4.5 crore) and “engage in meaningful conversations”. There are others that are slightly work oriented: The Behance network (Behance.net) is a place for creative professionals and you have to seek a membership invitation by describing your creative work. Sermo (Sermo.com) is a place for physicians to “share medical insights”.

Vahad Visible is completely restricted to the Vahad community (a user’s credentials are authenticated by a phone interview and other records), and is social networking meets matrimonial meets classified ads.

The why

There are many reasons for this exclusivity. First, technical. “The invite-only system allows social networks and other Web platforms to control and stagger the growing load on their infrastructure,” says Abraham.

There is also a marketing and commercial aspect to it. Affluence.org, for instance, provides a forum for “exclusive, high quality content and advice from experts on subjects such as art, technology and travel”. Similarly, asmallworld has advertisements for accommodation (it also doubles up as a couch-surfing site of sorts, only these are all rich people living in the First World), among others. Both the technical and the commercial aspects, however, are tied to the larger, that is, sociological aspect of exclusivity. For instance, the “invite-only” system also creates a sense of exclusivity and then drives registrations, says Abraham.

Sociologically, the recipient of this exclusivity, according to Armano, “feels special and rewarded for their social status”. “Those who deal in exclusivity are looking to create smaller “higher quality” networks of individuals who they deem are connected in a way which benefits them,” he says. The way we configure our social network and allow access to our feeds on Twitter or the Facebook page are based on our individual priorities and objectives. “Exclusive social networks are meant for those with overlapping priorities and objectives. The generic social networking websites are meant for finding long-lost classmates and friends and weak ties in general. Exclusive social networks are for accumulating new contacts and building strong ties,” says Abraham.

The dichotomy about social networks, adds Armano, is that “in theory, they flatten social norms” and also make certain things more accessible—like personal publishing. “However, networks do not guarantee that you will find yourself in the desirable social circles. You still have to do that the old-fashioned way—networking,” he adds.

Read the original article published by Livemint here

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/world-is-your-oyster

The World Blind Union document

praskrishna — 2012-03-30T07:25:27Z

WBU Version of the Working Document

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/accessibility/wbu-document.pdf

The Working Draft of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2010: Does it exceed its Mandate in Including Provisions Relating to Other Disability Legislations?

praskrishna — 2012-12-14T10:32:18Z

The Centre for Internet and Society, Inclusive Planet and the Centre for Law and Policy Research in this legal note analyse how far the January draft of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act touches upon the provisions of the other disability legislations, namely the Mental Health Act and The National Trusts Act and thereby exceeds the mandate given by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment to amend only the Persons with Disabilities Act.

Introduction

This is a brief Note on the Working Draft of the Persons with Disabilities Act dated 1.12.2010 (“Working Draft”) on the specific issue of how it relates to the three other disability legislations being the National Trusts Act 1999, the Mental Health Act 1987 and the Rehabilitation Council of India Act, 1992.

From the Working Draft it is seen that there are several provisions which are contradictory to some of the provisions in these three legislations in significant ways. This Note also raises concerns as to whether the Working Draft has exceeded its mandate given by the Committee to only amend the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995 (“PWD Act”) by attempting to draft a comprehensive disability law which includes even the other disability legislations .

The Committee and its Mandate

The Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, through an Office Memorandum1, constituted a Committee to “draft a new legislation to replace the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995” (“Committee”). 2 The main aim of setting up the Committee was to ensure that the PWD Act was in consonance with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and not to amend any of the other disability legislations. 3

After the Committee was set up, the minutes of the meeting of the Committee dated 22-07-2010 4 show that the Chairperson reminded the Committee members of the specific purpose for which it was set up and was therefore “not going to debate on formulating one comprehensive law that would repeal all other current disability legislations such as The National Trust Act, Mental Health Act and Rehabilitation Council of India Act, etc.”5

Subsequently, the Consultant appointed by the Committee released several drafts and the latest Working Draft of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2010 is dated 01.12.2010(“Working Draft”). 6 The Working Draft surprisingly states that “the mandate of the Committee to the Consultant was to put together a comprehensive legislation which covers all rights of all persons with disabilities.” 7

Further, the Statement of Objects and Reasons of the Working Draft proposes to “replace the current disability legislations with a comprehensive law which recognizes all rights of all persons with disabilities.” 8

These statements in the Working Draft raise some confusion as to whether the mandate given by the Committee has been clearly understood before the drafting process commenced. If the mandate was indeed to only amend the PWD Act and not to amend any of the other legislations such as the National Trusts Act, the Mental Health Act and the Rehabilitation Council of India Act, then the drafting should have been restricted to amending the PWD Act to the extent possible, and not to affect the provisions of the other legislations.

The Working Draft on Other Disability Legislations

The Working Draft does not suggest any amendments to the other disability legislations such as the National Trust Act, 1999, Mental Health Act, 1987 and Rehabilitation Council of India Act, 1992. However, as to the effect that the Working Draft should have on these other legislations, it leaves a “Pending Question” which states9:

“The issue of the induction of the National Trust and the Rehabilitation Council as separate chapters could not be attempted primarily because there was no time left to undertake a coherent and systematic exercise. It may also be noted that as the length of the statute expanded we felt a constraint of space in even incorporating all the provisions of power and accountability in the chapter on the Disability Rights Authority. It may also be noted that all significant authorities in the country have dedicated legislations around them. In this view of the matter the Committee would need to consider whether it would wish to suggest the creation of One Disability Law Code and within which have legislations on : Disability Rights; the Disability Authority; the National Trust; and the Rehabilitation Council. Or whether it would also wish to induct the National Trust and the Rehabilitation Council into this legislation?”

Added to this, the Memorandum on Disability Code (“Memorandum”) prepared along with the Working Draft explains that the reasons mentioned in the Pending Question along with the lack of time prevented the working out of the linkages between the DRA, the National Trust and the Rehabilitation Council of India.10

About the other dedicated legislations, the Memorandum states as follows11:

“Since we reached the opinion that the newly established DRA should have its own legislation we also concluded that the National Trust and the RCI should have their own legislations which should spell out the specific tasks each of those authorities should carry out to implement the rights recognized in the New Rights for Persons with Disabilities Act. The National Trust should be the authority which addresses the issue of multiple discrimination and be mandated to proactively formulate policies and programs by which to ensure the equality and non discrimination of persons with disabilities who are so disadvantaged and the RCI could work on HRD. The composition and powers and functions of the three bodies should be so created that it ensures convergence of operation.”

With regard to the Mental Health Act, the Memorandum makes the following recommendation12

“The proposed new law recognizes the paradigm of legal capacity with support. It also recognizes the right to life, liberty and integrity of all persons with disabilities. The recognition of these rights requires a re-examination of the Mental Health Act. Even if it is accepted that community living and no force are what is required for all; it is necessary to ask what should be done with the existing institutions and the inmates housed in them. The process of dismantling cannot be done without creating alternative services and there is a need to make a transit legislation which addresses this interim situation. The reason for making the transit legislation comes from the main law but to allow coherent operation and efficient implementation of these transitory measures it is better that they are contained in a separate legislation.”

These statements in the Explanatory Notes to the Working Draft shows that it not restricted itself to only amending the PWD Act as envisaged by the Mandate given by the Committee. An examination of the Working Draft shows that it has neither completely substituted the provisions of the three other disability legislations into the Working Draft, nor has it restricted itself to amending only the PWD Act - it is somewhere in the middle, where some many provisions which are covered by the three other disability legislations are significantly altered and at the same time these legislations are not sought to be amended simultaneously.

If the intention of the Working Draft is to replace all the other disability legislations, then it clearly exceeds the mandate of the Committee.

Section 7A(2) of the Working Draft

Section 7A (2) and 7B (2) in the Working Draft are included only within the chapter relating to Legal Capacity. They are phrased unusually to render any legislation, rule, notification, order, bye-law, regulation, custom and practice that deprive a person with disability from exercising his legal capacity as void.

Such a provision in one statute which declares a provision in another statute as void may not even be constitutionally permissible. The function of the legislature is to enact, re-enact, amend and repeal laws. The judiciary under Article 13 of the Constitution can exercise its powers of judicial review to render a provision which infringes on the fundamental rights as void. The legislature however, has no such power.

The Hon’ble High Court of Delhi in P.L. Mehra and Ors v. D.R. Khanna and Ors (AIR 1971 Delhi 1) held as follows:
“…the decision in Mahendra Lal Jaini's case, as to the nature of a statute becoming void under Article 13 confirms the view that the statute itself continues to exist on the statute book but has become "ineffectual, nugatory and devoid of any legal force or binding effect". The thrust of these words is that such a law cannot be given effect to by the Courts in deciding upon the rights of the parties. These words are significant only for the purposes of the Courts vis-a-vis the rights of the parties. They would be meaningless if applied to the power of the Legislature to re-enact, repeal or amend a statute. For, one can hardly say that these powers of the Legislature cannot be exercised in respect of a statute which is ineffectual, nugatory and devoid of any legal force or binding effect. Indeed, it would be all the more necessary for the Legislature to amend or cure statutes which are suffering from such defects. The nature of the defects is such that only a judicial decision can point them out. It is not by an act of Legislature but only by a judicial decision that one would know whether a statute is ineffectual, nugatory and devoid of any legal force or binding effect.”

Therefore, the declaration of a statutory provision as ‘void’ can only be done by the judiciary as “voiding” of the law only comes into question at the time of the enforcement or implementation of the law. The legislature’s function is to repair the defect in legislation by amending it or repealing the whole legislation.

The Working Draft, in declaring other legislative provisions as void is being vague as to the specific provisions of specific legislations which are to fall under the Section. The Working Draft cannot make a blanket declaration of all laws inconsistent with legal capacity as void without taking steps to identify the provisions and make amendments or deletions.

Effect of the Working Draft without amendment of other disability legislations

The provisions of the Working Draft are introduced in such a way as to affect the provisions of the other disability legislations. In light of this, the need for amending the provisions of these disability legislations is a pressing one. The inconsistencies between the Working Draft and the other disability legislations range from the definition of ‘persons with disability’ to the recognition of the basic principle of legal capacity. As detailed in the table, the National Trust Act follows a completely different basis for determining who a ‘person with disability’ is. If the definition is not amended under the National Trust Act, it results in an inconsistency in the language under the various disability legislations.

Further, the Working Draft is not correct in declaring that other legislative provisions which deprive a person of legal capacity as void. Declaration that a provision of law is void is not the function of the legislature. Its function is to adequately amend it so as to be consistent with the principles it intends to introduce and enforce. This applies to the principle of legal capacity which the Working Draft aims to bring into all the disability legislations. In order to do so, it has to amend the Mental Health Act and the National Trust Act accordingly.

The authorities under the various disability legislations have their set functions. However, the Working Draft is uncertain as to how to divide the responsibilities of the various authorities. It does not incorporate the various authorities under the Working Draft provisions itself. However, it encroaches on the powers and functions of those authorities by making the Disability Rights Authority or some other ‘delegated authority’ in charge of them. While doing so, it does not even amend the provisions of the other legislations. This is a serious discrepancy as the enforcement of rights and performance of duties under the legislations. If there is a confusion as to which authority is responsible to perform a specific function, then a person might be deprived of the very rights that the Draft seeks to enforce.

Leaving the other disability provisions unamended leads to an especially difficult situation when the courts have to determine the intention of the legislature while drafting and have to apply that intention while interpreting it. Further, it is not clear as to what rights should be enforced against which authority in court. Therefore, the merging of the areas of function between the various authorities makes the enforcement of rights itself difficult and therefore uncertain.

Conclusion

Thus, as seen from the Working Draft, it is clear that it seeks to be one comprehensive law on disability, which would encompass issues addressed by several other disability laws. The explanatory notes state that it leaves the issue of the DRA and the authorities such as the Rehabilitation Council and the National Trust as a Pending Question.

It also refers to a Disability Code, which would encompass all disability legislation within its framework and raise this as an issue for the Committee to decide, when that has never been the mandate of the Committee. The explanatory notes state that it would bring within its fold all authorities such as the Rehabilitation Council and the National Trust and that the linkages between these authorities and the new Disability Rights Authority set up under the Working Draft would have to be worked out through transit legislation. The Working Draft leaves the discretion to the Committee to come to a conclusion as to whether all the authorities have to be incorporated under the same legislations or a separate Code with all the legislations has to be prepared. Thus, the roles which the authorities have to perform are left uncertain. The Mandate of the Committee was to replace the PWD Act, 1995. Therefore, the powers and functions of authorities which are established under the other disability legislations ought to have been left untouched. Instead, the Working Draft seeks to make a comprehensive legislation covering all the disabilities while it leaves the implementation aspect uncertain and undecided.

These statements along with some of the specific provisions mentioned in the table above show clearly that the Working Draft aims to be some kind of a comprehensive code to bring in all disability legislations within its fold and not only to amend the PWD Act, which was its specific mandate. For these reasons, the Working Draft has exceeded the mandate given to it. This has been suggested even by some members of the Committee. 13

Further, the Working Draft by only including Section 7A(2) in its chapter relating to Legal Capacity, which would render all other legislation in contravention to it as void, is not suitable and adequate. There would be adverse consequences if the other legislations are not suitably amended. For example, the entire Mental Health Act would need an overhaul if the right to legal capacity is introduced in the Working Draft. The local committees set up under the National Trusts Act would have to be completely abolished as their only role is to appoint guardians, which is completely done away with in the Working Draft. Thus, the mere inclusion of Section 7A (2) is not sufficient and workable, nor is it within the powers of the legislature to include.

The Working Draft has listed in Schedule 1 the amendments suggested to other legislations. This Schedule is incomplete and the specific provisions relating to the National Trusts Act 1999, the Rehabilitation Council of India Act 1992 and the Mental Health Act 1987 are also legislations which need amendment and should be included in this Schedule.

It is crucial that there is clarity on these important issues as to what exactly is being proposed to be amended. Whether it is only the PWD that is sought to be replaced or all other disability legislations are to be replaced by a Disability Code need to be understood by the drafters. If the mandate is only to amend the PWD Act, then it is important that we restrict ourselves to this mandate so as to ensure that other disability legislations are not affected. The other legislations can be amended at their own time, after the present PWD Act has been revised as per the mandate of the Committee.

Download the working draft in the format you may prefer:

For word, click here
For pdf, click here

Notes

1GOVERNMENT OF INDIA. DEP’T OF SOCIAL JUSTICE AND EMPOWERMENT, OFFICE MEMORANDUM FOR THE CONSTITUTION OF A COMMITTEE TO DRAFT A NEW LEGISLATION TO REPLACE THE PWD ACT, 1995., F.No. 16-38/2006-DD.III, (30th April 2010).

2 id

3See id

4See MINUTES OF MEETING, 2ND MEETING OF THE COMMITTEE TO DRAFT NEW LEGISLATION FOR PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES., ( 22nd July 2010).

5See id at Page 1.

6See Working Draft of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2010, available at http://www.disabilitystudiesnalsar.org/newlaw.php. (Last visited on 24-01-2011).

7See id at Explanatory Note.

8See id at Statement of Objects and Reasons.

9Explanatory Notes: Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act Working Draft, Part IV, available at http://www.disabilitystudiesnalsar.org/explanatory-notes.php. (Last visited on 24-01-2011)

10See Memorandum on Disability Code, Background, available at http://www.disabilitystudiesnalsar.org/bcp-disability-code.php. (Last visited on 24-01-2011)

11See id at Dedicated Legislations.

12See id at Transitory Measures

13“Crisis hits panel on new Disability law” Available at http://www.tribuneindia.com/2010/20101224/main5.htm

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/accessibility/blog/working-draft

The Wikimedia India Program Trust

praskrishna — 2011-11-13T07:58:38Z

A new entity, the “Wikimedia India Program Trust”, has now been formed and registered (in Delhi.) This will be the organization that will eventually drive India programs and house the team in India.

For some time, efforts have gone into creating an organization that would provide an appropriate structure to support Wikimedia program activities in India. Aspects such as the current regulatory framework (regarding funding, taxation, etc.) as well as the legal protection for the India team have been considered to determine this structure. In this context, a host of options (e.g. subsidiary, branch, Section 25) were evaluated and a determination was made towards an independent non-profit public trust. Legal advice has been taken at every stage in this decision.

Why an Independent Public Trust?

The Trust will provide an effective vehicle within India to marshal resources to support programs and partner with local institutions. The objective of the Trust is to promote the objectives of the Wikimedia movement and work closely with the Wikimedia community on various projects with an India focus. It is important to understand that the Trust will not have any editorial control over content on any of the Wikimedia projects. The Trust is a not for profit organization.

Introduction of Trustees

Trustees have been identified based upon their support for Wikimedia movement's principles and plans in addition to having reputations for good governance and management. Sunil Abraham and Rahul Matthan have been requested to be the initial Trustees. Both are friends of Wikipedia and have extensive experience.

Sunil is Executive Director of the Centre for Internet & Society (CIS), is a long term advocate of free software and IP reform and has been supporting the Wikimedia community and movement for some time now.

Rahul is a partner and heads the technology practice at Trilegal. He brings deep expertise and relationships that will be valuable for the Trust.

These initial Trustees will serve for a term of three years at the maximum. All additional or subsequent Trustees will serve on rotation in accordance with a trustee selection plan that will be prepared.

Trustees will not be compensated for their services. Governance, Funding, Financial Standards & Communications of the Trust. The Trust will be governed by Trustees who will provide oversight and guidance regarding the operations and governance of the Trust. Since the Trust is an independent organization, it will require funding for its operations which is in compliance with the legal and regulatory framework in India. It will seek funding from private donors within India as well as external sources.

The Trust has the support of the Wikimedia Foundation which is a United States based non-profit foundation. However, in India all non-profit organizations need to be in existence for 3 years before they can receive funding from sources outside India. In the interim, they can apply for prior-permission under the FCRA regulations to help expedite the process. As a result, the Trust will shortly be applying for approval to receive funds from the Wikimedia Foundation in the future.

As a Trust, we are required to have an independent external auditor. We have appointed KPMG. KPMG is experienced in auditing non-profit companies and are also auditors for the Wikimedia Foundation. Annually, the Trust will publicly disclose it's independently audited financial statements.

The Trust will publish a monthly newsletter outlining its current activities and future plans. This will commence in December 2011.

Operations of the Trust

The trust deed under which the Trust must operate clearly states that the purpose of the Trust is to independently promote the growth of volunteer activities within India in support of effective and unrestricted dissemination of free knowledge to the public. Hisham will serve as the Executive Director of the Trust. Once it is possible, additional employees will be brought on to the Trust. The Trust will eventually have an office in Delhi. In the interim, a temporary office space has been set up to facilitate establishing the Trust and its mission. It is located at Top Floor, G-15, Hauz Khas, New Delhi - 110 016. It's a couple of minutes walk away from IIT Flyover and Hauz Khas Metro. Do drop in! It's a small but cozy place and we'd love to have you over!

Conclusion

We continue to make progress in setting up program activities to support the growth of Wikimedia in India. We have a long way to go, but are glad that we are starting to build a solid foundation. The following link is for FAQs on this (and related) topics:
http://goo.gl/8Rdr2

As always, do reach out if you have any comments or questions.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/announcement-of-wikimedia-india-program-trust

The War for India's Internet

praskrishna — 2012-06-14T09:12:34Z

Why is the world's biggest democracy cracking down on Facebook and Google? Rebecca Mackinnon's article was published in Foreign Policy on June 6, 2012.

"65 years since your independence," a new battle for freedom is under way in India -- according to a YouTube video uploaded by an Indian member of Anonymous, the global "hacktivist" movement. With popular websites like Vimeo.com blocked across India by court order, the video calls for action: "Fight for your rights. Fight for India." Over the past several weeks, the group has launched distributed denial-of-service attacks against websites belonging to Internet service providers, government departments, India's Supreme Court, and two political parties.

Street protests are being planned for this coming Saturday, June 9, in as many as 18 cities to protest laws and other government actions that a growing number of Indian Internet users believe have violated their right to free expression and privacy online. A lively national Internet freedom movement has grown rapidly across India since the beginning of this year. The most colorful highlight so far was a seven-day Gandhian hunger strike, otherwise known as a "freedom fast," held in early May on a New Delhi sidewalk by political cartoonist Aseem Trivedi and activist-journalist Alok Dixit. Trivedi's website was shut down this year in response to a police complaint by a Mumbai-based advocate who alleged that some of Trivedi's works "ridicule the Indian Parliament, the national emblem, and the national flag."

Escalating political and legal battles over Internet regulation in India are the latest front in a global struggle for online freedom -- not only in countries like China and Iran where the Internet is heavily censored and monitored by autocratic regimes, but also in democracies where the political motivations for control are much more complicated. Democratically elected governments all over the world are failing to find the right balance between demands from constituents to fight crime, control hate speech, keep children safe, and protect intellectual property, and their duty to ensure and respect all citizens' rights to free expression and privacy. Popular online movements -- many of them globally interconnected -- are arising in response to these failures.

Only about 10 percent of India's population uses the web, making it unlikely that Internet freedom will be a decisive ballot-box issue anytime soon. Yet activists are determined to punish New Delhi's "humorless babus," as one columnist recently called India's censorious politicians and bureaucrats, in the country's media. Grassroots organizers are bringing a new generation of white-collar protesters to the streets to defend the right to use a technology that remains alien to the majority of India's people.

The trouble started with the 2008 passage of the Information Technology (Amendment) Act, whose Section 69 empowers the government to direct any Internet service to block, intercept, monitor, or decrypt any information through any computer resource. Company officials who fail to comply with government requests can face fines and up to seven years in jail. Then, in April 2011, the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology issued new rules under which Internet companies are expected to remove within 36 hours any content that regulators designate as "grossly harmful," "harassing," or "ethnically objectionable" -- designations that are open to a wide variety of interpretations and that free speech advocates argue have opened the door to abuse. It is thanks to these rules that the website of the hunger-striking cartoonist, Trivedi, was taken offline. Also thanks to the 2011 rules, Facebook and Google are facing trial for having failed to remove objectionable content. If found guilty, the companies could face fines, and executives could be sentenced to jail time.

Saturday's protesters are calling for annulment of the 2011 rules and the repeal of part of the 2008 act. They are also calling for Internet service companies to reverse the wholesale blocking of hundreds of websites, including the file-sharing services isoHunt and The Pirate Bay, as well as the video-sharing site Vimeo and Pastebin, which is primarily used for the sharing of text and links. Internet service providers were responding to a court order from the Madras High Court demanding the blockage, which is aimed at preventing the online distribution of pirated versions of one particular film. The Internet companies, fearing that they would not be able to catch every individual instance on every possible site they host, instead chose to block entire services along with all of their content -- which had nothing to do with the film in question.

Such "John Doe" orders, named because they are directed against unknown potential offenders in the present and future, are characterized "by their overly broad and sweeping nature," argue lawyer Lawrence Liang and researcher Achal Prabhala, which extends "to a range of non-infringing activities as well, thus catching a whole range of legal acts in their net." More broadly, as Delhi-based journalist Shivam Vij wrote in a recent essay: "The current mechanisms of internet censorship in India -- blocking, direct removal requests to websites, intermediary rules -- are draconian and unconstitutional. They need to be replaced with a new set of rules that are fair, transparent and accessible for public scrutiny. They should not be amenable to misuse by the powers-that-be for their own private interests."

Not only are the rules abused, but researchers find that they are causing extralegal censorship by companies that overcompensate in order to err on the side of caution. Last year, the Bangalore-based Centre for Internet and Society performed an experiment in which it sent "legally flawed" takedown demands to seven companies that provide a range of online services, including search, online shopping, and news with user-generated comments. The legal flaws in the notices were such that the companies could have rejected them without being in breach of the law. Yet "of the 7 intermediaries to which takedown notices were sent, 6 intermediaries over-complied with the notices, despite the apparent flaws in them," reads the Centre for Internet and Society report.

Despite the growing public opposition, a motion to annul the 2011 rules was defeated by voice vote in the upper house of Parliament last month. Yet the criticism was sufficiently sharp that Communications Minister Kapil Sibal announced that he will hold consultations with all members of Parliament, representatives of industry, and other "stakeholders" to discuss the law's problems and how it might be revised. Many of the law's critics, however, are skeptical that this will eliminate the law's deep flaws and loopholes for abuse, especially given the government's failure to listen so far. Comments on the 2011 rules submitted last year by the Centre for Internet and Society were not even acknowledged as having been received by the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology. "Sibal uses the excuse of national security and hate speech," says the center's director, Sunil Abraham, "but that is not what is happening."

Abraham worries that what is really happening is a government effort at Internet "behavior modification" through a process akin to an experiment involving caged monkeys, bananas, and ice water. Put four monkeys in a cage and hang a bunch of bananas on the ceiling. Every time one of them climbs up to reach the bananas, you drench all of them with ice water. Soon enough, the monkeys will start policing themselves -- attacking anybody who tries to reach the bananas, making it unnecessary for their masters to deploy the ice water. "This is why the government is being so aggressive so early on, with only 10 percent of India's population online," says Abraham. "If you start the drenching early on, by the time you get to 50 percent [Internet penetration], every one will be well-behaved monkeys." Companies will act as private Internet police for fear of legal punishment before the government is called upon to step in and enforce the law. If it works, Indian politicians could have fewer reasons to worry about online critiques or mockery, because companies fearing prosecution will proactively delete speech that could potentially be designated "harassing" or "grossly harmful."

India is not China or Iran, however. Its politicians may be corrupt, and most of its voters may not understand why Internet freedom matters because they've never used the Internet. But it still has an independent press and boisterous civil society that are not going to give up their critiques and protests anytime soon. India also has a strong, independent judiciary, with a record of ruling against censorship and surveillance measures when a strong case can be made that they conflict with constitutional protections of individual rights. "On free speech I have high faith in the Indian judiciary," says Abraham. "There is a good chance to launch a constitutional challenge."

If Google and Facebook lose at their impending trial -- now scheduled for July -- they will most certainly appeal, which activists hope could provide just such an opportunity to prevent the sort of "behavior modification" process that Abraham warns against. Now India's burgeoning Internet freedom movement needs its own reverse "behavior modification" strategy -- imposing consistent and regular doses of political and legal ice water upon India's bureaucrats, politicians, and companies whenever they do things that threaten to corrode the rights of India's Internet users. Saturday's protest is just the beginning.

Sunil Abraham is quoted in this article. Read the original here

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/war-of-india-internet

The Walls Have Ears

praskrishna — 2011-07-06T06:26:25Z

The proposed Privacy Bill seems skewed towards the state rather than the citizen, writes Saikat Datta. This news was published in the Outlook magazine, issue, July 11, 2011.

Sometimes the best of intentions can camouflage the worst of motives. On the face of it, the government’s bid to bring in a privacy bill is a welcome move, a long-overdue measure. But after an initial approach paper prepared by lawyers and bureaucrats in November last year, the government went into a secretive huddle. Now a leaked April 19, 2011, version of the bill raises several disturbing questions.

"The idea behind it was to protect privacy but not short-circuit the current systems to combat terror."

K.M. Chandrashekhar, Ex-cabinet secretary

While recognising the need for privacy, the government has also slipped in several clauses that could severely restrict the freedom of the press if enacted in its current form. Worse, it could actually make journalists liable for prosecution as well as imprisonment up to five years. And if that was not bad enough, it does little or nothing to prevent the government from invading a citizen’s privacy. In fact, it will legitimise all forms of intrusion by the state and collection of a wide variety of data from individuals.

TV news channels could be the most affected by this. Sting operations could become a very risky thing in the future, with section four of the proposed bill saying that any form of filming/recording can be deemed as surveillance and anyone doing so without proper authorisation would be liable for prosecution. So if someone was to secretly catch on camera MPs accepting cash for posing questions in Parliament, or record a bureaucrat demanding bribes, chances are he/she will be doing time in jail.

While the proposed draft draws a distinction between data and personal information, it still leaves little room for journalists. For instance, if a reporter were to use "personal information" of an individual for an article without his/her written consent, it will amount to a civil offence and immediately attract a penalty of up to Rs. 1 lakh. If the journalists were to repeat the "offence" by publishing another story using the same material, the penalty goes up to Rs. 5 lakh. So, is the UPA government, under the scanner for a plethora of scams, trying to muzzle the media? It certainly seems so.

"The bill, in its current form, brings an element of pre-censorship that violates our right to speech. It’s disturbing."

Now when it comes to the government’s right to invade a citizen’s privacy, the proposed legislation offers little immunity. It will uphold all existing laws of phone-tapping, interception of communications, collection of statistics and personal data with impunity. "The proposed bill doesn’t change any system or structure of surveillance that are in place today," says Usha Ramanathan, a law researcher who has worked extensively on privacy issues. "Look at the Collection of Statistics Act passed by Parliament last year. You can be penalised for not sharing the information that the government seeks from you. This is very disturbing."

Usha Ramanathan, Law Researcher

Ramanathan’s discomfiture has its reasons. "In the past three years, the government has become far more intrusive than it ever was. All this is asserting the sovereignty of the state over the citizen when the Constitution says that the citizen is supreme. This bill, in its current form, also brings in an element of pre-censorship that violates our fundamental right to speech as well as several judgements of the Supreme Court that ruled against pre-censorship."

On the other hand, former cabinet secretary K.M. Chandrashekhar, a prime mover behind the bill during his tenure, feels that the security needs of the state warrant "lawful" intrusion by it. “The idea was to protect privacy but not short-circuit the current surveillance systems in place for combating terrorism."

"While we accept the primacy of public interest, we must be very, very careful about what is public interest."
Satyananda Mishra, CIC

As far as protecting privacy is concerned, of course all is not bad with the proposed bill. Prashant Iyengar, a researcher with the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), a Bangalore-based NGO that has played a leading role in shaping the public discourse on this issue, is hopeful. "For the first time, this bill creates a strong liability for the government. This means that the government can be held liable and penalised for the violation of privacy. It also establishes a routine civil liability against the government for all its lapses in protecting the privacy of citizens... which is very good.” But Prashant also feels that the bill has a long way to go before it resolves some inherent contradictions. “The proposed Act must recognise the concept of public interest while it protects privacy. That is an element missing from the current discourse."

Satyananda Mishra, the chief information commissioner and a former secretary, DoPT, has a nuanced view of the proposed bill. He feels public interest must outweigh privacy in every case. "But while we accept the primacy of public interest, we must be very, very careful about what is public interest," he says.

Mishra, in many ways the country’s biggest trustee of transparency in public life today, suggests a few key modifications in the conditions in the proposed legislature. "We need to understand that after the enactment of the RTI Act, it has become incumbent upon us to have some form of inherent disclosure in all our public dealings. This will also safeguard our privacy from the government."

The relationship between citizen and government, says Mishra, is guided by a social contract. "People elect governments and trust them with their lives and liberty in the promise that the government will exercise its powers for their welfare. But there could be instances where the government breaks that promise. It could legitimately tap someone’s phone through legal means, but with malicious intent."

To prevent this, Mishra suggests a modification to the proposed Privacy Act. "Let there be disclosure of all such events, after a reasonable period of time, of any effort by the government to invade the privacy of citizens. For instance, if it needs to tap the phones of a person, then it must be disclosed after a period of time. After all, phones can be tapped legally only to protect the interests of the state. So it should either lead to a criminal prosecution or a disclosure after a reasonable amount of time has elapsed. That is the only way we will be able to curb the intrusive powers of the state and protect the privacy of citizens." Prashant of CIS agrees with Mishra’s suggestion. "In the United States, all wire-tapping laws have a clause for disclosure. This way, a citizen will know if his privacy has been violated lawfully or not."

Now if a reporter were to use "personal info" without consent, it will mean a civil offence, a penalty of Rs. 1 lakh.

While the government will take its time to introduce the bill in Parliament, it needs to be more transparent in its deliberations. Right now two ministries are working simultaneously on the same bill. While the ministry of law and justice under Veerappa Moily is busy shaping its draft, the ministry of personnel, training and public grievances under the prime minister is busy formulating its own version. While they work on it, what both ministries must recognise is that nothing is private about public policy.

Click here to see the story originally published by Outlook

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/walls-have-ears

The Utility Model Framework (1).pdf

praskrishna — 2016-05-19T15:18:02Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/The%20Utility%20Model%20Framework%20-1.pdf

The Utility Model Framework

praskrishna — 2016-05-01T07:11:01Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/blogs/the-utility-model-framework

The Unsocial Network

praskrishna — 2011-08-19T06:47:33Z

Has social media become a threat to democratic states even as it serves as a vehicle against totalitarian regimes? Its abuse during the London riots has reopened the question.

Power of the the people is a double- edged sword. Power to the people is positively divisive. Especially, when the people become a mass, masked mob on the internet, using the power of proliferation of social networking sites to support, express – and, sometimes, incite. As was evident in the recent Tottenham riots, which have cast a shadow over BlackBerry Messenger and Twitter because of the way they have been used by ‘goons in the hood’ to beat the police. While BlackBerry messages appealed people to arm themselves with hammers to loot stores and bring cars along to carry the stolen goods, many tweets were posted to unite rioters.

Have social networks become a Frankenstein’s monster, which is being abused by anti-social elements for their nefarious ends? Media reports in London said that eight people in Cheshire had been arrested as suspects for encouraging rioting via the social media. Can social networks become a real threat to democratic states, even as they serve as vehicles for revolutions against totalitarian regimes? Should they be subjected to state scrutiny? “If social media shows a negative tendency, as was evident with the riots spreading to other parts of England, then it is symptomatic of an actual problem on the ground. A problem which has not been addressed by the state. The solution lies in solving that problem, social media is only an indicator,” says Anivar Aravind, IT consultant and commentator.

When it comes to social networking media, people’s messages are conveyed without censorship – as opposed to being edited before being delivered to the public in conventional media such as newspapers, magazines and even television, Aravind points out. Which is why social networking should be treated no differently than any other form of communication, says Jonathan Crossfield, social media expert and community manager at Ninefold, a cloud platform provider in Australia.

"There are checks and balances in the legal systems of most democracies that allow appropriate investigation. For example, being able to subpoena phone records in a criminal investigation, while preserving the rights of the user as much as possible," says Crossfield. WHILE, reportedly, police in London have vowed to track down those suspected of stirring violence through Twitter, they mainly blamed BlackBerry Messenger. "Everyone watching these horrific actions will be struck by how they were organised via social media. Free flow of information can be used for good. But, it can also be used for ill,” British Prime Minister David Cameron told Parliament. But, there is no reason social networking should be treated more harshly or subdued in a graver way than any other form of communication, says Crossfield, as they these are not the real threat to the state. "It’s important to remember that social networks are neutral -- just a medium to connect people. The paper you write on is not at fault for the words you use," he says, "If any state, democratic or otherwise, decides to categorise social networks as a threat, what it really means is that they feel threatened by what people are saying and the ideas that are being discussed among them. And that leads to censorship, not democracy." But not just during civil unrest, BlackBerry encrypted messaging service was used by terrorists during 26/11 terrorist attacks in Mumbai to communicate as other services were blocked by the state. Since then, the Indian government has been urging Research-In-Motion (RIM), the maker of BlackBerry, to provide them with messages in a readable format or stop services.

"It is legal to intercept a communication made on a social media in India under the Telegraph Act and the IT Act, which is partially a limitation on privacy," says Sunil Abraham, executive director, Center for Internet and Society. But, Abraham adds, this censorship should not be generalised and the group concerned needs to be targeted and it should not target any specific ethnic group for what their peers have done.

"This has nothing to do uniquely with social networking. Any technology can be used for both good and bad purposes. Totalitarian regimes can use social networking to establish their agendas, while the same platform can be used by the protesters," says Balaji Parthasarathy, professor at International Institute of Information Technology-Bangalore. It can also be used, as was seen during the recent blasts on July 13 in Mumbai, in helping friends and family of victims when cellular networks had been jammed for security reasons. The Twitter tag ‘#here2help’ was one messaging vehicle that urged hundreds of netizens to help victims stranded after the blast. Which is why, says Parthasarathy, if social networking or even a telephony service poses serious threats to a democratic state, there should be clear-cut guidelines from the government.

This article by Ayan Pramanik and Shayan Ghosh was published in Mail Today on August 14, 2011. The original story can be read here [page 28]

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/unsocial-network

The Uncertain Future of India's Plan to Biometrically Identify Everyone

praskrishna — 2014-09-08T05:31:28Z

Last Sunday an 11-year-old boy in Andhra Pradesh, a state in southeast India, hung himself from a ceiling fan as his family slept.

Jessica Mckenzie's blog post was published in Techpresident on August 28, 2014. Sunil Abraham gave his inputs.

He was allegedly driven to this act after being denied an Aadhaar card—formally known as Unique Identification (UID)—which he was told he needed to attend school. The card is one arm of India's sprawling scheme to collect the biometric data, including fingerprints and iris scans, of its 1.2 billion citizens and residents, and is quickly becoming practically, if not legally, mandatory, for nearly every aspect of life, from getting married to buying cooking gas to opening a bank account. More than 630 million residents have already enrolled and received their unique 12-digit identification number.

Since its launch in 2010, people have raised a number of questions and concerns about Aadhaar, citing its effects on privacy rights, potential security flaws, and failures in functionality. India's poor, who were supposed to be the biggest beneficiaries of the program, are actually most at risk of being excluded from UID, and there is no evidence that biometric identification has curtailed corruption. The newly-elected Prime Minister Narendra Modi lambasted the UID program as a candidate but in July did an about-face, calling for the enrollment process to be expedited and supporting a UID-linked social assistance program. In all likelihood, the world's largest experiment in biometric identification will continue.

There are still a number of unanswered questions about the future of the program. Although created in large part as a way of more efficiently and less corruptly dispersing government subsidies, last year the Supreme Court ruled that the Aadhaar card could not be made mandatory to receive government assistance. The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) operates in a kind of legal limbo. Modi is said to have instructed his Finance Minister Arun Jaitley to resolve these legal problems.

Sorting out the legal issues is imperative if UID numbers are going to be linked to Modi's proposed financial inclusion program that aims to bring 75 million additional households into the country's banking system by 2018.

There is also the possibility that UID will be merged, absorbed or superseded by the National Population Register (NPR), yet another biometric identification system. The NPR, unlike Aadhaar, is mandatory for all residents. In addition to fingerprints and iris scans, NPR collects information on familial relationships, nationality, occupation and education level. There is a great deal of overlap between the two programs, which has been a source of conflict between government agencies in the past. The home ministry, for example, argues that government subsidies should be disbursed through NPR, not UID.

There is also speculation that UID could be picked up as part of Digital India, Modi's ambitious plan to modernize India by building national broadband infrastructure, ensuring universal mobile service access, creating e-government services, and establishing a “cradle-to-grave digital identity for every citizen of the country—unique, lifelong, online and authenticable [sic].”

In spite of UID's tenuous position and uncertain future, it has become “essential” in nearly every facet of life. The Delhi government is rolling out a suite of e-government services, starting with marriage registration, that will require a UID. Fishermen in Gujarat have been told they cannot go out to sea without biometric identification.

Then there is Kora Balakrishna, the 11-year-old who committed suicide after being denied an Aadhaar card because he has webbed fingers. His school headmaster had instructed him to get one as a prerequisite for study and, per one news outlet, a mid-day meal. An investigation into the incident has been ordered. Pravin Kumar, a local administrative official, said webbed fingers are not a legitimate reason for rejection from the program.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/tech-president-jessica-mckenzie-august-28-2014-the-uncertain-future-of-indias-plan-to-biometrically-identify-everyone

The UK DNA Database and the European Court of Human Rights

praskrishna — 2012-10-10T10:19:35Z

A presentation by Dr. Helen Wallace, Director, GeneWatch, UK

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/uk-dna-database-and-european-court-of-human-rights.ppt

The Truman Show, in Kerala

praskrishna — 2011-09-23T13:42:56Z

A webcast now allows you to see the goings-on in the CMs office 24x7.The idea is to promote openness,but theres still some way to go for it to make a difference, writes Sankar Radhakrishnan in this article published in the Times of India on

Its a little past 7.30 on a Monday morning.A woman in a green sari is vigorously dusting a large glass-topped table stacked with files.She pauses for a moment to straighten the chair behind the desk,before continuing to clean the table.It is an early morning ritual that happens in offices across the country every working day.

What makes this dust-busting exercise different though is that it is happening in the office of the chief minister of Kerala and anyone in the world can view it by logging on to www.keralacm.gov.in. It was on July 1 this year that Keralas chief minister Oommen Chandy installed a webcam in his office so that everything that happens there can be seen by the public 24x7.The idea,he says,is to promote openness in government.It shows the world what goes on in my office and that I have nothing to hide, he adds.

There are actually two cameras,one that covers the chief ministers personal chamber and another that covers the office his personal staff work in.According to officials at the Centre For Development of Imaging Technology (C-DIT ),which operates the cameras,over 5,50,000 visitors had logged on to the video feed till August 29.

Since the webcam operates 24x7,the images keep streaming from the CMs office irrespective of whether he is in it or not.In fact,it produces so much footage that no steps have been taken so far to record and archive the images.

Sometimes,the video feed seems slightly voyeuristic.It does,for instance,feel a little odd to see the chief minister and his guests sit around the conference table in a corner of the room,sipping tea and nibbling on biscuits.It seems equally strange to see the cleaning lady at work apparently unaware of the fact that the world is her stage.

Chandy,though,is very aware that the webcam alone will not solve all problems,including those relating to corruption.However,he insists it is a symbol of the openness his United Democratic Front government brings to Kerala.

What happens when a confidential meeting takes place Is there anything that needs to be so confidential Chandy says.One reason the webcams do not have an audio feed is to maintain confidentiality and let people speak freely,he says.CPM leader and former Kerala finance minister TM Thomas Isaac,however,dismisses the webcam as a gimmick and a cosmetic change.He says it is meaningless for the government to talk of transparency when several of its ministers have serious corruption allegations against them.I dont see much coming out of this, he declares.

Raghavan Suresh,director,Public Affairs Centre,Bangalore,says this is the first time hes heard of an Indian politician installing a webcam in his office.It is a positive step, he adds.According to Suresh,the webcam may not eliminate corruption since it can happen outside the chief ministers office as well,but it is a measure of transparency that should be appreciated.

Sunil Abraham,executive director,Centre for Internet and Society,says the decision to install a webcam in the Kerala chief ministers office,though it is a token measure,is a good move.It brings in one level of disclosure as you get to know who his visitors are and who hangs around his office, he points out.

However,Abraham is disappointed that audio feeds are not available.An arrangement that caters to the publics need to hear what is being said in the chief ministers office,while allowing confidential discussions to remain secret,should be worked out,he believes.

I also hope it doesnt stay at the top of the pyramid but is extended to key ministries and departments, he says.

Chandy himself says having a webcam has been an interesting experience.I sometimes get calls from people viewing the webcam telling me that all the lights in my office are on even though Im not in the office.At other times,I get calls saying all the lights are off and it is not possible to see if the webcam is working, he says with a laugh.For the record,lights in the office are now dimmed when the chief minister steps out.And once he leaves for the day,a single light is usually left on so people know the webcam is working,say C-DIT officials.

The response to the webcast so far has mostly been positive,the chief minister says.The most encouraging news,perhaps,is that two of his cabinet colleagues want to install similar systems in their offices.Openness in governance,it seems,is just a webcam away at least in Kerala.

Read the original article published in the Times of India here.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/truman-show-in-kerala

The trouble with trolls

praskrishna — 2014-07-28T05:42:36Z

Social networking sites give trolls the ability to hide their real identity and cause grief to others. Here is what you need to do if you face an online attack.

The article by Vishal Mathur was published in Livemint on July 22, 2014. Sunil Abraham gave his inputs.

Social networking sites give trolls the ability to hide their real identity and cause grief to others. Here is what you need to do if you face an online attack.

Though social networks were not designed with the intention of letting someone anonymously abuse another online, the reality is that people utilize the ability to hide behind online identities to threaten other users. These could be veiled attacks, direct abuse, or even threats to “cause bodily harm”. What can you do if you’re trolled and threatened on any social network? Follow our five-step guide. Avoid conversation if you can The responses could come in relation to something you may have just posted online. Or perhaps it could be just a random trolling attempt, to get a response from you. It is important to understand and identify such intentions. And as difficult as it may be, do not respond. Getting into a direct interaction with a bully only makes things worse. Report to the social network You should report any instance of cyber bullying or harassment to the host social network—the website or forum on which the interaction happened. There are various methods of getting in touch with the moderators—customer support email, contact submission forms or even via phone, in certain locations. Describe the problem in detail, and persist till the offending account is blocked from the platform. “Most social networks have systems that allow you to report abusive content and users. However, there is great variance in the speed with which they respond across different platforms, jurisdictions, etc.,” says Sunil Abraham, executive director at the Bangalore-based non-profit research organization Centre for Internet and Society. New Delhi-based Anja Kovacs, project director, at civil society organization Internet Democracy Project, adds: “Blocking and reporting an account can be two ways to stop harassment on some social networks, but on other platforms, such as Twitter, it is possible for the person to immediately make a new account under a different username, meaning that these measures do not necessarily stop the harassment.” Ankhi Das, director, public policy, India and South Asia at social network Facebook, says: “Every reported piece of content is reviewed. Serial offenders are notified for non-compliance.” Facebook’s Community Standards, that prevent harassment and offensive posts, have an 11-point categorization for reported content—violence and threats, hate speech, graphic content, bullying and harassment, to name some. Raheel Khursheed, head of news, politics and government at Twitter India, did not respond to our mail about how Twitter handles trolls at the time of going to press. On blogs and forums, it may be a bit easier to deal with trolling and abuse. If it is your own blog, you can delete comments and block users. If it is a forum, the administrator can do it for you. But, with social networks having millions of users, it is not possible to have one administrator managing it all. And it is not just Facebook and Twitter, all social networks have a method by which you can register your complaint. LinkedIn, for example, automatically blocks a user who gets multiple “I don’t know” responses to invitations to connect. There is a strong monitoring policy where any reported content (recommendations or direct messages) is examined and immediate warnings are sent out to offending parties. Keep a copy of the offensive posts Be it a post, or a series of posts, direct message or even an offending photograph, always save it for future reference. Never assume that the matter will end soon, and always prepare for the worst. Don’t ignore privacy settings Most people start using Facebook, Twitter and other social networks without paying much attention to the privacy settings—what content people can see on your page, and who can directly contact you. Be conservative in sharing information—the less you share, the lower the chances of someone picking on you. “Avoid friending or linking to people whom you don’t know in real life unless you are certain of the chain of trust that exists between you and the unknown person,” says Abraham. New Delhi-based cyber lawyer Apar Gupta, adds: “The privacy settings on most social networking platforms allow users to prevent (restrict) the audience for their posts as well as strangers from contacting them. This will prevent most cases of online harassment.” Get help from the law In case social networks are not able to effectively block a user, or are in some way unwilling to do so, take help from the law-enforcement authorities. File an FIR in the nearest police station. Unfortunately, the progress may not be very smooth. The reality is that not every law-enforcement officer may know about social networking sites. “You could try and go to the police, but without support from the social network platform, they are often at a loss to do much themselves,” warns Kovacs. The police may look for hints of threat to cause bodily harm or worse still, to life. In such cases, they may recommend the case to the Cyber Crime Cell of the Central Bureau of Investigation. “Generally, while the substantive offences do exist under law, the process for having them enforced is deficient. These are deeper structural problems of delay, investigation and conviction which are prevalent across criminal justice or civil litigation,” clarifies Gupta. Officials at the Cyber Crime Cell say they take up cases after reference from the local police, who file the report first and do a preliminary level of investigation. But it is important to realize that only the police and the law-enforcement agencies have the right to demand further details about the perpetrator from the social networks, starting with profile details and Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, which will help track the person down. Das clarifies: “Facebook has a point-of-contact system through which the law-enforcement agencies tell us what the actual case is, depending on severity. The police may ask us to take down particular content, or even ask for user information like IP info, to prevent real crime.” According to Facebook’s Government Requests Report for July-December 2013, the network restricted access to 4,765 pieces of content after requests from the Indian government and law-enforcement agencies.

Though social networks were not designed with the intention of letting someone anonymously abuse another online, the reality is that people utilize the ability to hide behind online identities to threaten other users. These could be veiled attacks, direct abuse, or even threats to “cause bodily harm”. What can you do if you’re trolled and threatened on any social network? Follow our five-step guide.

Avoid conversation if you can
The responses could come in relation to something you may have just posted online. Or perhaps it could be just a random trolling attempt, to get a response from you. It is important to understand and identify such intentions. And as difficult as it may be, do not respond. Getting into a direct interaction with a bully only makes things worse.

Report to the social network
You should report any instance of cyber bullying or harassment to the host social network—the website or forum on which the interaction happened. There are various methods of getting in touch with the moderators—customer support email, contact submission forms or even via phone, in certain locations. Describe the problem in detail, and persist till the offending account is blocked from the platform. “Most social networks have systems that allow you to report abusive content and users. However, there is great variance in the speed with which they respond across different platforms, jurisdictions, etc.,” says Sunil Abraham, executive director at the Bangalore-based non-profit research organization Centre for Internet and Society. New Delhi-based Anja Kovacs, project director, at civil society organization Internet Democracy Project, adds: “Blocking and reporting an account can be two ways to stop harassment on some social networks, but on other platforms, such as Twitter, it is possible for the person to immediately make a new account under a different username, meaning that these measures do not necessarily stop the harassment.” Ankhi Das, director, public policy, India and South Asia at social network Facebook, says: “Every reported piece of content is reviewed. Serial offenders are notified for non-compliance.” Facebook’s Community Standards, that prevent harassment and offensive posts, have an 11-point categorization for reported content—violence and threats, hate speech, graphic content, bullying and harassment, to name some. Raheel Khursheed, head of news, politics and government at Twitter India, did not respond to our mail about how Twitter handles trolls at the time of going to press. On blogs and forums, it may be a bit easier to deal with trolling and abuse. If it is your own blog, you can delete comments and block users. If it is a forum, the administrator can do it for you. But, with social networks having millions of users, it is not possible to have one administrator managing it all. And it is not just Facebook and Twitter, all social networks have a method by which you can register your complaint. LinkedIn, for example, automatically blocks a user who gets multiple “I don’t know” responses to invitations to connect. There is a strong monitoring policy where any reported content (recommendations or direct messages) is examined and immediate warnings are sent out to offending parties.

Keep a copy of the offensive posts
Be it a post, or a series of posts, direct message or even an offending photograph, always save it for future reference. Never assume that the matter will end soon, and always prepare for the worst.

Don’t ignore privacy settings
Most people start using Facebook, Twitter and other social networks without paying much attention to the privacy settings—what content people can see on your page, and who can directly contact you. Be conservative in sharing information—the less you share, the lower the chances of someone picking on you. “Avoid friending or linking to people whom you don’t know in real life unless you are certain of the chain of trust that exists between you and the unknown person,” says Abraham. New Delhi-based cyber lawyer Apar Gupta, adds: “The privacy settings on most social networking platforms allow users to prevent (restrict) the audience for their posts as well as strangers from contacting them. This will prevent most cases of online harassment.”

Get help from the law
In case social networks are not able to effectively block a user, or are in some way unwilling to do so, take help from the law-enforcement authorities. File an FIR in the nearest police station. Unfortunately, the progress may not be very smooth. The reality is that not every law-enforcement officer may know about social networking sites. “You could try and go to the police, but without support from the social network platform, they are often at a loss to do much themselves,” warns Kovacs. The police may look for hints of threat to cause bodily harm or worse still, to life. In such cases, they may recommend the case to the Cyber Crime Cell of the Central Bureau of Investigation. “Generally, while the substantive offences do exist under law, the process for having them enforced is deficient. These are deeper structural problems of delay, investigation and conviction which are prevalent across criminal justice or civil litigation,” clarifies Gupta. Officials at the Cyber Crime Cell say they take up cases after reference from the local police, who file the report first and do a preliminary level of investigation. But it is important to realize that only the police and the law-enforcement agencies have the right to demand further details about the perpetrator from the social networks, starting with profile details and Internet Protocol (IP) addresses, which will help track the person down. Das clarifies: “Facebook has a point-of-contact system through which the law-enforcement agencies tell us what the actual case is, depending on severity. The police may ask us to take down particular content, or even ask for user information like IP info, to prevent real crime.” According to Facebook’s Government Requests Report for July-December 2013, the network restricted access to 4,765 pieces of content after requests from the Indian government and law-enforcement agencies.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/news/livemint-july-22-2014-vishal-mathur-the-trouble-with-trolls

The Transformative Power of Online Activism

praskrishna — 2015-06-18T16:00:52Z

Rohini Lakshané was a panelist at this event organized by Hertie School of Governance on May 4, 2015.

Panelists

Alissa Wahid, National coordinator of the GUSDURian Network Indonesia
Renata Avila, Member of Creative Commons Board of Directors and a member of the Web Index Science Council, Guatemala
Rohini Lakshané, Researcher at the Centre for Internet and Society, India
Georgia Popplewell, Writer and media producer from Trinidad and Tobago

Moderation: Dilek Kurban J.D., Marie Curie Fellow, Hertie School of Governance

The lightning spread of communication technologies has enabled the dissemination of information and ideas that mainstream media have been unwilling or unable to publish. While the Internet empowers individuals to engage in advocating, mobilizing and reacting on behalf of the disempowered, it also raises significant issues of privacy and hate speech when used by the wrong people for the wrong reasons.

Are we at a stage where we can argue that online activism challenges the balance of power between governments and citizens, giving rise to a new form of deliberative and participatory democracy? Or is the transformative power of virtual civil disobedience blown out of proportion? To what extent is the Internet a level playing field where gender, ethnicity or class do not matter? What kinds of legal and political instruments are available to governments and corporations in their efforts to control the Internet? This panel discussion will bring together four female jury members of The BOBS Award 2015 who will seek answers to these and other questions regarding Internet activism, citizen journalism and grassroots mobilization.

re:thinking tomorrow is a discussion series hosted by Deutsche Welle and the Hertie School of Governance.

For more information see here.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-transformative-power-of-online-activism

The thrill of saving India from cybercrime

praskrishna — 2016-11-21T02:42:48Z

Geeks seize the chance to help the government, defence forces and banks draw up fences against tech crimes.

The article by Peerzada Abrar was published in the Hindu on November 20, 2016.

Saket Modi loves long flights. The 26-year-old hacker likes to do most of his reasoning while criss-crossing the world. It was on one such flight from the United States to India that the co-founder of cybersecurity start-up Lucideus Tech read about India's largest data security breaches. While surfing the in-flight Internet he came to know that the security of about 3.2 million debit cards had been compromised.

“I was not surprised but I started thinking about how it would have happened. What was the ‘exploit’ used, how long was it there,” said Mr. Modi. Soon after reaching New Delhi, he received multiple requests from several banks and organisations to protect them from the hacking incident, which is just one of the thousands of cybercrimes that the country is facing.

In India, there has been a surge of approximately 350 per cent of cybercrime cases registered under the Information Technology (IT) Act, 2000 from the year of 2011 to 2014, according to a joint study by The Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India and consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers. The Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) has also reported a surge in the number of incidents handled by it, with close to 50,000 security incidents in 2015, noted the Assocham-PwC joint study.

Ethical hackers

Mr. Modi is among a new breed of ethical hackers-turned-entrepreneurs who are betting big on this opportunity. An ethical hacker is a computer expert who hacks into a computer network on the behalf of its owner in order to test or evaluate its security, rather than with malicious or criminal intent.

“You cannot live in a world where you think that you can't be hacked. It doesn’t matter who you are,” said Mr. Modi who cofounded Lucideus four years ago. The company clocked revenues of Rs.4 crore in the last fiscal. This compares with the Rs.2.5 lakh revenues in the first year. The New Delhi-based firm now counts Reserve Bank of India, Ministry of Defence and Standard Chartered among its top clients.

Mr. Modi, who is also a pianist, discovered his skills for hacking into secure computer systems while preparing for his board exams. He hacked into his school computer and stole the chemistry question paper, after realising that he would not be able to clear the test conducted by his school. However, a guilty conscience compelled him to confess to his teacher who permitted him to still take the test. The incident transformed him to use his skills to protect and not misuse them. This year, Lucideus was hired by National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) along with other information security specialists to protect its most ambitious project, the Unified Payment Interface (UPI) platform, from cyber attacks. UPI aims to bring digital banking to 1.2 billion people in the country. Lucideus has a team of 70 people mostly fresh college graduates who do hacking with authorisation.

“The reason behind choosing Lucideus was their young, energetic and knowledgeable team," said Bhavesh Lakhani, chief technology officer of DSP BlackRock, one of the premier asset management companies. Mr. Lakhani said that India is currently the epicentre of financial and technological advancements which make it a probable target of cyber-attacks.

Hacking lifeline

Indeed, a new breed of cyber criminals has emerged, whose main aim is not just financial gains but also cause disruption and chaos to businesses in particular and the nation at large, according to the Assocham-PwC study. Attackers can gain control of vital systems such as nuclear plants, railways, transportation and hospitals. This can subsequently lead to dire consequences such as power failures, water pollution or floods, disruption of transportation systems and loss of life, noted the study.

“The hacker doesn’t care whether he is attacking an Indian or a U.S. company. It is bread and butter for him and he wants to eat it wherever he gets it from,” said Trishneet Arora, a 22-year-old ethical hacker. In an office tucked away in Mohali, a commercial hub lying adjacent to the city of Chandigarh in Punjab, Mr.Arora fights these cyberattacks on a daily basis to protect his clients. His start-up TAC Security provides an emergency service to customers who have been hacked or are anticipating a cyberattack. It alerted a hospital in the U.S. after detecting vulnerabilities in their computer network.

Mr.Arora said that the hackers could have easily shut down the intensive care unit which was connected to it and remotely killed the patients. TAC said the data server of a bank in the UAE containing critical information got hacked recently. The bank also lost access to the server. TAC said that it not only helped the organisation to get back access to the server but also traced the hacker’s identity.

A school drop out, Mr.Arora founded TAC three years ago. But he initially found it tough to convince enterprises about his special skills. “I was a backbencher in the classroom and not good in studies, but I loved playing video games and hacking,” he said. He conducted workshops on hacking and provided his expertise to law enforcement agencies such as the Central Bureau of Investigation and various State police departments. His firm now provides its services to customers such as Reliance Industries, dairy brand Amul and tractor manufacturer Sonalika.

“We were surprised by their expertise,” said R.S. Sodhi, managing director of Amul. “We wanted to be sure that the company’s vital IT infrastructure is in the right hands – the big question was, ‘Who can that be?’ In TAC, we found that team.”

TAC expects to cross revenues of $5 million (Rs.33 crore) and employ about 100 ethical hackers by next year.

Budget woes

Security watchers such as Sunil Abraham, executive director of Bengaluru-based think tank Centre for Internet and Society said that India’s cybersecurity budget is woefully inadequate when compared to the spending by other countries. In 2014-15, the government doubled its cybersecurity budget by earmarking Rs.116 crore. “We require a budget of $1 billion per annum or every two years to build the cybersecurity infrastructure. The current cyber security policy has no such budget,” said Mr. Abraham.

According to Data Security Council of India (DSCI), India's cybersecurity market is expected to grow nine-fold to $35 billion by 2025, from about $4 billion. This would mainly be driven by an ecosystem to promote the growth of indigenous security product and services start-up companies.

The Cyber Security Task Force (CSTF) set up by DSCI and industry body Nasscom expects to create a trained base of one million certified and skilled cybersecurity professionals. It also aims to build more than 100 successful security product companies from India. Investors who normally focus on e-commerce ventures or public markets are now taking note of this opportunity and are betting on such ventures. Amit Choudhary, director, MotilalOswal Private Equity and an investor in Lucideus, said he saw tremendous opportunity in the cybersecurity market as hackers are shifting their focus from developed countries to emerging countries like India.

“There is a huge opportunity. The recent security breaches of a few Indian banks are an example,” said Vijay Kedia an ace stock picker and an investor in TAC Security. He said that organisations are still unaware of the widespread damage that can be caused by hackers. “The next war will be a ‘cyberwar’,” he said.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-hindu-peerzada-abrar-november-20-2016-the-thrill-of-saving-india-from-cybercrime