- CH - Raids lift lid on child porn +/-
(ZDNet) A cross-border European swoop on child pornography rings that hit staid Switzerland has revealed a sordid Internet underworld of sexual exploitation which belies the apparent respectability of those involved. Police officers, judges and schoolteachers are among those unmasked in Europe, after nations across the continent followed up US leads emerging from a probe of credit card holders who paid to view child pornography on the Internet.
- CoE- Convention on Cybercrime +/-
(Council of Europe) Definitive text signed at Budapest, 23.XI.2001.
- DE - German crackdown on child porn +/-
(Reuters) German police have searched the homes of about 1,400 people suspected of having paid money to view child pornography websites, the country's federal crime-fighting agency BKA says. Police confiscated about 47,000 computer disks and 25,000 videos in recent days. Two cases of alleged sexual abuse also came to light.
- DE - Kinderpornografie: Massenhafte Hausdurchsuchungen in Deutschland +/-
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(Spiegel) In mehreren Bundesländern durchsuchten die Polizeibehörden am Dienstag und Mittwoch zahlreiche Wohnungen und Büros. Allein in Niedersachsen und NRW klingelte es an über 160 Türen. Das, verspricht das LKA Niedersachsen, sei noch nicht das Ende der Aktion.
- IT - Pedofilia, arresti e sequestri di siti +/-
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(Punto Informatico) Due persone arrestate dalla Polizia Postale per diffusione di materiale pedo-pornografico e adescamento di minore. Sotto sequestro computer e siti.
- Japan - Police establishes system to tackle child porn on Net +/-
(Japan Times) The National Police Agency has set up an automated system to find child pornography on the Internet. The system is based on an NPA host computer that "patrols" the Internet periodically, checking sites for child pornography and cross-checking their images against an NPA database of images confiscated across the nation.
- NO - Police drop half of all child porn cases +/-
(Aftenposten) Norway's state statistics agency reports that roughly half of all child pornography cases go unresolved. Both the police and prosecutors claim they often end up lacking evidence. The head of Norway's local "Save the Children" organization told Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) that she was surprised so many child pornography suspects avoid prosecution.
- UK - Man held over £65m computer virus +/-
(Evening Standard) A man suspected of inventing the Lion Worm computer virus which cost US companies and government agencies up to £65 million has been arrested after a joint operation by the Metropolitan Police and the FBI. Officers from the Computer Crime Unit swooped on a house in Surbiton and seized equipment.
- UK - Police powerless to snare porn users +/-
(Observer) Police have accused the Home Office of not providing enough resources to allow them to arrest hundreds of probable child abusers. The Observer has learnt that the email addresses and credit card details of more than 7,000 British-based users of illegal child porn have been uncovered by American investigators. But their British counterparts complain they are unable to act on the information because of a chronic lack of resources. More than one year after the information was received, there have been only 80 arrests in Britain.
- UK - Scotland - Police to quiz 70 over child porn +/-
(Scotsman) About 70 suspected paedophiles in the Lothians and Borders are facing arrest as part of the biggest-ever crackdown by police on child pornography. It is understood that Lothian and Borders Police have been given the names of people suspected of buying child pornography over the internet. The 70 under suspicion form part of a 7000-strong list of suspected British paedophiles handed over to the UK authorities by the FBI.
- US - Caught in the Kid Porn Crusade +/-
(Wired) The United States of America v. Adam Vaughn. He was a stand-up Marine, a beloved cop, and a local hero - until the government branded him part of the largest kid porn ring in history. Inside Operation Candyman, the FBI's crusade to sweep the Net clean of child abuse.
- US - Searching and Seizing Computers and Related Electronic Evidence Issues +/-
(Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section (CCIPS) Revised July 2000. This publication provides a comprehensive guide to the legal issues that arise when federal law enforcement agents search and seize computers and obtain electronic evidence in criminal investigations. The topics covered include the application of the Fourth Amendment to computers and the Internet, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, workplace privacy, the law of electronic surveillance, and evidentiary issues. This updated version includes discussion of significant changes to relevant Federal law arising from the USA PATRIOT Act of 2001.
- GR - Reprieve for Greek gamers +/-
(BBC) The Greek Government has backed down over its blanket ban on computer games. The law, rushed through the Greek parliament in record time, was intended to tackle the problem of illegal gambling. But the failure to distinguish between electronic gambling and computer games outraged the gaming community. Now the government has decided to clarify the law, issuing guidelines that make it clear that only games related to gambling are covered by the legislation. see also Greek cybercafe owners face prosecution as landmark ruling quashed (Yahoo UK). An appeals court has revived Greece's controversial new gaming law. A lower court decision rejected the case against two Thessaloniki cybercafe owners and an employee. It argued the law, which effectively bans all electronic games in any public business establishment, violates the constitution. But the appeals court judge has disagreed and ordered a retrial.
- UK - Host pulls satire site after police 'incitement' claim +/-
(The Register) A satirical Web site that attempted to parody concerns over child safety has been shut down following the intervention of police. Thinkofthechildren.co.uk was pulled after officers from the Metropolitan Police Service's Obscene Publications and Internet Unit contacted the site's hosts alleging that that it could incite others to violence.
- US - Court OKs Student Expulsion Over Derogatory Web Site +/-
(Legal Intelligencer) The Bethlehem Area School District did not violate a student's First Amendment rights under the U.S. Constitution when it expelled him for creating a derogatory Web site, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has ruled.
- US - Group seeks ban of adult films from hotels +/-
(USA Today) A group that helped pull the plug on explicit adult movies at three Cincinnati-area hotels met in Washington, D.C., with 14 other grassroots organizations in hopes of X-ing out such entertainment at lodgings nationwide.
- US - Net archive silences Scientology critic +/-
(CNET News.com) Buckling under pressure from the Church of Scientology, the Internet Archive has removed a church critic's Web site from its system. The Internet Archive, a site that preserves snapshots of old Web pages and bills itself as "a library of Internet sites and other cultural artifacts in digital form," no longer contains links to archival pages of Xenu.net. Instead, surfers are pointed to a page telling them the site was taken down "per the request of the site owner." see also item by Ernest Miller (LawMeme).
- US - Scholars File Brief Opposing Video Game Law +/-
(Reuters) A group of international scholars have filed a brief urging a federal appeals court to strike down a St. Louis ordinance restricting children's access to violent video games, calling the law and other proposals like it "profoundly misguided." Thirty-three scholars, representing institutions such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of California at Los Angeles and London University, filed the brief organized by the Free Expression Policy Project in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in St. Louis, Missouri.
- US - Thorny legal issues raised by effort to ban child modeling sites on Internet +/-
(AP) The photos on the Web sites portray no nudity and no sex, yet men by the thousands pay to ogle them -- shots of preteen girls posing in bikinis and halter tops. Defended as free speech by some, such pictures are being blasted as a "fix for pedophiles'' by a congressman who is waging an uphill campaign to banish them from the Internet.
- At the center of the patent storm +/-
(CNET News.com) The latest controversy for the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the standards body responsible for shepherding Web technologies like XML and HTML, is about its policy of only recommending royalty-free technologies. Interview with Danny Weitzner.
- Cable and Satellite Directive review +/-
(European Commission) Report on the application of Council Directive 93/83/EEC on the coordination of certain rules concerning copyright and rights related to copyright applicable to satellite broadcasting and cable retransmission Brussels, 26.07.2002 COM(2002) 430 final.
- DK - Dänemark geht hart gegen eDonkey-Betreiber vor +/-
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(Heise) Die dänische Polizei ist erstmals gezielt gegen Serverbetreiber des File-Sharing-Programmes edonkey vorgegangen. So traf es einen Betreiber namens Siffan, der auf seiner Webseite über den Vorfall ausgiebig berichtet.
- Is self-regulation a legitimate approach to protecting copyright on the internet? +/-
(spiked) This spiked-debate aims to untangle the legal, political, technical and creative problems surrounding copyright regulation in the digital age. Does regulation place too many restrictions upon new technology, or is it essential to prevent theft? Which authorities should apply copyright regulation to the internet, and how - if at all?
- UK - EasyInternetCafe faces gag in CD-burning row +/-
(Yahoo UK) EasyInternetCafe has been threatened with a gagging order as the ongoing piracy dispute between the company and the British music industry remains unresolved. Lawyers acting on behalf of the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) contacted EasyInternetCafe, warning that they plan to apply for an injunction that would stop EasyInternetCafe talking to the press about the row.
- UK - Music industry funds piracy post +/-
(BBC) The UK music industry is to co-fund a new post at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) to act as a link with the government in the struggle with music piracy.
- US - Operation Buccaneer +/-
(Cybecrime.gov) Operation Buccaneer is an ongoing international copyright piracy investigation and prosecution undertaken by federal law enforcement. On December 11, 2001, in a coordinated international effort, the U.S. Customs Service and the Department of Justice executed, or caused to be executed, more than 65 searches in the U.S. and five foreign countries. As of July, 2002, 16 defendants have been convicted in the U.S. of felony criminal copyright offenses, including conspiracy to commit those offenses, and nine defendants have been sentenced to federal prison terms ranging in length from 30 to 46 months.
- US - We Can Run, but We Can't Hide - How BayTSP is Enforcing the Digital Millennium +/-
(PBS) by Robert X. Cringely. BayTSP is paid anywhere from $200 to $50,000 per month by owners of intellectual property - primarily software companies, movie studios, and record companies - to find who is illegally copying, distributing, or helping to distribute without permission their intellectual property.
- USA - USC to Students: No Sharing Files +/-
(Wired) Students at the University of Southern California could face a school year without computer access if they are busted swapping movies and music online.
- DE - Kongress zu Gewalt und Hass im Internet +/-
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(Heise) Der Streit um das Sperren von Nazi-Webseiten ist in eine neue Runde gegangen. Wenn die Verwaltungsgerichte in Nordrhein-Westfalen der Düsseldorfer Bezirksregierung in ihrem Streit gegen Internet Service Provider Recht geben, "dann werden auch andere Verwaltungsbehörden entsprechende Maßnahmen ergreifen", sagte der Chef der Düsseldorfer Bezirksregierung Jürgen Büssow bei der Konferenz "Gewalt und Hass im Internet" in Düsseldorf. Die Bezirksregierung hatte in der vergangenen Woche den Sofortvollzug der Sperren bei zwölf widerspenstigen ISP gefordert. siehe auch
Kongress zu Hass-Sites im Web endet mit Eklat (Heise). Der Düsseldorfer Regierungspräsident Jürgen Büssow hat die Kritiker der von ihm verfügten Website-Sperrrung heftig attackiert. Die Schlussdiskussion des gestrigen Kongresses "Hass und Gewalt im Internet" geriet zum Frontalangriff auf die Sperrungsgegner. Büssow warf dem mit ihm auf dem Podium sitzenden (ICANN)-Direktor Andy Müller-Maguhn notorische Intoleranz vor und verstieg sich zu der Äußerung: "Ich habe Angst vor einem System, in dem Sie das Sagen haben."
Zentralrat der Juden für Vorgehen gegen rechtsextreme Webseiten (dpa). Der Präsident des Zentralrats der Juden in Deutschland, Paul Spiegel, hat sich dafür ausgesprochen, gegen rechtsextreme Webseiten im Internet vorzugehen. «Ich hätte mir vor 15 Jahren nicht vorstellen können, dass es heute wieder möglich sein würde, öffentlich zum Hass aufzurufen», sagte er beim internationalen Kongress «Hass und Gewalt im Internet» in Düsseldorf.
Bis zum Ende ausfechten (taz). Harald A. Summa, Geschäftsführer des Provider Dachverbandes "eco", will gegen die Verfügung der Düsseldorfer Landesregierung, rechtsradikale Webseiten zu sperren, vor Gericht ziehen.
Von Medienparadigmen und Internetsperrungen (Heise). Mit einer "Konferenz zu Informationsfreiheit, Kontrolle von Inhalten und Zensur im Internet" hat der Chaos Computer Club (CCC) in Düsseldorf seine Position im Zensurstreit mit der Bezirksregierung Düsseldorf bekräftigt. Dabei wurde die Rechtmäßigkeit der Sperrungsverfügungen bestritten.
- AU - Australian Jews win landmark web case +/-
(Reuters) Australia's Jewish community has won a landmark court case when a judge ruled a website that denied the Holocaust happened and vilified Jewish people was illegal under racial discrimination laws. In the first Australian court decision on race hate and the Internet, Federal Court Justice Catherine Branson ordered Fredrick Toben to remove offensive material from his Adelaide Institute website within the next seven days.
- CH - Schweizer Justiz erhebt keine Anklage gegen Indymedia Schweiz wegen Antisemitismus +/-
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(Heise) Es war ein Erfolg für Indymedia Schweiz. Die Schweizer Justiz stellte die Klage gegen das unabhängige, linke Internetmedium ein. Zwei Indymedia-Verantwortliche waren vom Sprecher der antifaschistischen Schweizer Initiative Aktion Kinder des Holocaust wegen Verletzung des Schweizer Antirassismusgesetzes angezeigt worden. Die Züricher Bezirksanwaltschaft sah in den die israelische Besatzungspolitik kritisierenden Indymedia-Beiträgen allerdings keine Verunglimpfung der jüdischen Bevölkerung. In den auf Indymedia-Schweiz veröffentlichten Karikaturen, die die israelische Besatzungspolitik gegenüber den Palästinensern mit der NS-Politik verglichen, konnte die Justiz keine Leugnung oder Verharmlosung des Holocaust sehen.
- DE - Verfassungsschutz befürchtet Zunahme rechtsextremer Websites +/-
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(Heise) Die Zahl der Homepages deutscher Rechtsextremisten wird nach Einschätzung des Bundesamtes für Verfassungsschutz (BfV) nach einem vorübergehenden Rückgang in diesem Jahr voraussichtlich wieder ansteigen. Im ersten Halbjahr 2002 seien bislang zwar nur rund 920 dieser Seiten im Internet gezählt worden. Mit einer erneuten Zunahme der Auftritte mit rechtsextremem Inhalt müsse aber gerechnet werden. So wichen Homepage-Betreiber erfolgreich auf Provider aus, die sich Appellen und einer Selbstkontrolle bislang verschließen.
- EFF: School Communities Give Internet Filtering Law Failing Grade +/-
(EFF) School administrators, along with students, teachers, parents, and school librarians, in San Francisco, New York, and Boston will speak out against federal mandates for Internet blocking or filtering software in public schools. see also Hey Filters, Leave the Kids Alone (Wired).
- Internet Filtering Software Wrongly Blocks Many Sites +/-
(EFF) San Francisco - The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the Online Policy Group (OPG) have released preliminary results of research on Internet blocking or filtering in schools. The research examined the effects of N2H2's Bess and SurfControl, two of the most commonly used Internet blocking software products, on Internet searches of all topics from the state-mandated curriculums of California, Massachusetts, and North Carolina.
- UK - Parents shun Web filtering tools +/-
(silicon.com) Only one-third of parents use filtering tools to control their child's access to the Web because they think they are too complicated. Instead, they opt for low-tech methods such as keeping the family PC in the living room to ensure youngsters don't see any unsuitable material. Many mums and dads also believe installing such software shows a lack of trust in their children. According to research published by the BBC, the Broadcasting Standards Commission (BSC) and the Independent Television Commission (ITC), only 32 per cent of parents currently have a filter in place on the home PC, although many feel that they will use these tools more heavily in the future. see Striking a balance: the control of children's media consumption (ITC Press Release) and Report (PDF) .
- AU - Australia records drop in subscribers and ISPs +/-
(NUA) A new report from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) indicates that there was a decline in the number of Internet subscribers and ISPs at the end of March 2002. According to the latest figures, the number of Internet subscribers in Australia fell by 43,000 in the six-month period leading to March. This represents a decline of one percent. ABS attributes the decline in Internet subscribers to a fall with free access subscriptions .
- DE - Verbreitung des Internet in Familien seit 2000 fast verdoppelt +/-
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(Heise) Für die 6- bis 13-jährigen Kinder in Deutschland gehören Computer und das Internet mittlerweile fast schon zum Alltag. Zwei Drittel der Haushalte, in denen Kinder aufwachsen, verfügen mittlerweile über mindestens einen Computer. 47 Prozent der Haushalte haben außerdem auch einen Internet-Zugang. Damit hat sich die Verbreitung des Internet in den Familien seit dem Jahr 2000 fast verdoppelt, ergibt die aktuelle Studie KIM 2002 des Medienpädagogischen Forschungsverbundes Südwest (MpFS).
- News beats porn online +/-
(BBC) Employees are far more likely to be addicted to news than to pornography, a survey has found. Websense, a San Diego-based firm which provides software to monitor web habits at work, has found that news sites are proving the real internet addiction for employees. The fact that people are looking at different sites may mean that employers need to rethink their policy on office surfing. According to Websense nearly 80% of employers block access to pornography, compared to just 4% who do not allow staff to access news sites. Whatever the content, it is all lost productivity for businesses though.
- US - Internet an integral part of college life +/-
(CNN) A new survey, by the Pew Internet & American Life Project, has confirmed what they suggest: the Internet has become an integral part of college life, and not just for studying. The survey of college students across the country found that 86 percent use the Internet, compared with 59 percent of the overall U.S. population.
- Western Europe - Mobile data services: A market of 15.4 billion EUR in 2002 +/-
(IDATE) In 2001, person to person SMS represented earnings of 9.5 billion EUR in Western Europe, or close to 85% of total revenues generated by mobile data services. While the very high growth, in terms of traffic and revenues, will gradually taper off, the development of application to person SMS services will take up the slack. The application to person SMS market could reach a total worth of 6 billion EUR in Western Europe, in 2004.