Legal and regulatory issues

Audiovisual

• CoE - Options for the review of the TV Convention  +/-

  (Council of Europe) Dr. Andreas Grünwald, consultant on the impact of convergence on the European Convention on Transfrontier Television, has delivered a report covering the possible options to review the Convention. Suggestions on how to define new media services are made in the report, as is the question of whether such new services should fall under the scope of the Convention. The report also points to the need to reconsider or re-interpret many of the substantive provisions in the Convention in the light of market and technological developments. Comments can be addressed to the Media Division by 15 September 2003.

• FR - Le CSA encadre plus strictement la diffusion d'émissions pornographiques et violentes  +/- Translate

  (droit-technologie.org) par Etienne Wery. Le Conseil Supérieur de l'Audiovisuel a arrêté les nouveaux principes qui guident la diffusion des films violents ou pornographiques.

Competition

• US - Microsoft to pay AOL $750 million  +/-

  (CNET News.com) Microsoft is paying $750 million to AOL Time Warner as part of a wide-ranging settlement that also calls for the companies to jointly cooperate on software distribution and digital media. The companies will drop pending litigation, including an antitrust complaint filed by AOL Time Warner's Netscape Communications unit in January 2002 against Microsoft. AOL also agreed to a seven-year royalty-free license of Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser.

Computer crime

• IT - La Cour de cassation crée une différence entre la diffusion de pédo-pornographie via chat-room et via le web  +/- Translate

  (droit-technologie.org) Dans un arrêt n. 4900 du 3 février 2003, la Cour de Cassation italienne s'est prononcée dans une affaire de divulgation de matériel pornographique représentant des mineurs engagés dans des activités sexuelles entre eux, ainsi qu’avec des adultes. Pour la Cour, l'envoi des photos dans la chat-room est une communication one-to-one et non une diffusion.

• NO - The Internet causes sexual abuse of children  +/-

  (Nettavisen) According to Norwegian police, the Internet is responsible for an increase in the production and distribution of child pornography, making it easier for paedophiles to live out their fantasies.

• US - Child-Porn Collectors Using Pocket-Size Devices  +/-

  (Mercury News) Portable storage drives are becoming increasingly popular among child pornography collectors, Bay Area high-tech detectives say. The average drive today holds 128 megabytes of data and costs from $70 to $100. Think of it as a floppy disk, except with several hundred times the capacity. With names that reflect their compact size -- ThumbDrive and Cigar Drive -- the devices plug directly into most PCs, and are capable of storing movies or hundreds of digital photos.

Content regulation

• CN - China Sentences 4 in Internet Dissent  +/-

  (Washington Post) Four Chinese intellectuals accused of criticizing the government on the Internet and setting up a democracy study group have been sentenced to up to ten years in prison for subversion, a human rights group reported.

• US - New Laws, New Questions About Pornography Online  +/-

  (GigaLaw.com) by Doug Isenberg. A new and little-noticed law, the PROTECT Act, includes two important restrictions on online pornography. But, the law raises questions about whether it complies with the First Amendment. In this column, Doug Isenberg discusses the PROTECT Act's provisions on domain names and so-called "virtual" child porn while noting the free-speech issues they create.

Convergence of telecommunications, media and information technology

• US - FCC Plan to Alter Media Rules Spurs Growing Debate  +/-

  (Washington Post) Substantial grass-roots resistance to the Federal Communication Commission's plans to relax or eliminate several major media ownership rules has been building in recent weeks, turning a numbers-crunching bureaucratic process into a growing debate on free speech.

Copyright, trademarks and patents

• US - Jury Rules Against EBay in Patent Suit  +/-

  (Washington Post) An entrepreneur won a $35 million judgment against eBay, prevailing in a patent dispute that could cause the online auction giant to change some of its business practices.

Data Protection (privacy)

• EU - Privacy International criticises EP over EU Data Protection Supervisor  +/-

  (Media Release) The global civil liberties watchdog Privacy International has strongly criticised the European Parliament over its decision to recommend the appointment of an "unknown" Spanish magistrate for the influential post of European Data Protection chief. In a secret ballot of the Committee on Citizens' Freedoms and Rights, Justice and Home Affairs of the EP, Joaquín Bayo Delgado was selected as primary candidate for the post of "Data Protection Supervisor" for Europe. Privacy International's Director, Simon Davies, said Joaquín Bayo Delgado was completely unknown to any privacy or data protection advocate in Europe. "To the best of our knowledge he has never written about the subject, nor spoken about it in any public presentation".

• EU / US - Security Plans Threatens EU Privacy  +/-

  (Reuters) U.S. plans to set up a system of global electronic surveillance to fight terrorism in the Internet age threaten the basic privacy rights of European Union citizens. Stefano Rodota, chairman of the EU's national privacy watchdogs, said the a project -- recently renamed Terrorist Information Awareness - evoked the specter of George Orwell's Big Brother and called on EU member states to raise the issue at an EU-U.S. summit in June.

• JN - Japan Passes Privacy Protection Law  +/-

  (APOnline) Japanese lawmakers voted into law a set of privacy protection bills that have been criticized as potentially restricting freedom of speech. The legislation gives individuals the right to obtain information companies have collected about them and puts restrictions on the use and sharing of such personal data. Government bureaucrats are similarly regulated.

Domain names

• Safety Patrol Readied for Dot-Kids  +/-

  (Washington Post) Web site operators who want to run sites for children will be able to buy special "kids.us" addresses. NeuStar, which operates dot-us, plans to use a combination of technology and human supervision to patrol the kids.us space. The company has enlisted Cyveillance to perform routine scans of kids.us addresses using its "spidering" technology. Cyveillance will flag questionable material and send it to NeuStar for review. Depending on how badly the material violates the rules, NeuStar either will shut down the offending site immediately or give operators a few hours to remove the material on their own. To foot the bill for site surveillance, NeuStar will charge an annual $250 content review fee for each kids.us address. The company also has set the wholesale price of a kids.us domain at $65 a year, more than 10 times the $6 wholesale cost of a dot-com address. Operators who have their sites taken down for content violations will have to pay $400 to get back online.

e-Government

• US - Pennsylvania Stonewalls on Content Blocking Scheme  +/-

  (CDT) The Pennsylvania Attorney General has denied an administrative appeal that CDT filed challenging the AG's refusal to disclose the Internet web sites that he has blocked under a controversial state law. Since mid-2002, the Attorney General has issued over 300 secret censorship orders, with no judicial oversight or public review whatsoever. The orders require ISPs to block web sites that perhaps contain child pornography, but the orders also have resulted in the blocking of hundreds or thousands of legitimate web sites that share the same "IP address" as the illegal sites.

Mobile and wireless

• AU - Govt to ban mobile phone ID hacking  +/-

  (CNETAsia) It will soon be illegal in Australia to hack into a mobile phone to change its hardware serial code, an attempt by the government to stay one step ahead of tech-savvy crooks. The code, known as the International Mobile Equipment Identification (IMEI) number is broadcast to the network when a phone is use. Mobile operators can use it to block phones listed as stolen.

• UK - Court gives church phone masts the go-ahead  +/-

  (Ripon and Leeds Church News) An ecclesiastical court has granted permission for mobile phone masts to be erected within two church towers in Yorkshire. The Chancellor of the Diocese of Ripon and Leeds, who heard expert evidence on the health risks of mobile phone base stations at a Consistory Court hearing, has delivered his judgment that the masts may be erected subject to conditions, including iv) That Vodafone use reasonable endeavours, so far as technology allows, to prevent the use of the Equipment for sending a message or other matter that is grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character, or for any purpose referred to in section 43 of the Telecommunications Act 1984 or which might otherwise be contrary to English law.

Protection of minors

• US - Video games 'good for you'  +/-

  (BBC) US scientists have found that regular players of shoot-em-ups, such as Half-Life and Medal of Honour, have much better visual skills than most of the population. The researchers have shown that gamers were particularly good at spotting details in busy, confusing scenes and could cope with more distractions than average. The two scientists also found that with a little game playing the visual skills of anyone can be improved.

Safer Internet awareness

• EU - Safer Internet Action Plan extended  +/-

  (RAPID) As part of Europe's determined effort to tackle illegal and harmful content on the Internet and new delivery platforms such as mobile phones, a two year extension to the Safer Internet Action Plan has been adopted by the European Parliament and Council upon the proposal of the European Commission. see also EU - Ministers adopt Decision on safer use of Internet (EurActiv.com).

• UK - ITC launches media literacy workshops  +/-

  (Press Release) The Independent Television Commission (ITC) is launching a series of nation-wide media literacy workshops aimed at equipping teachers, care workers and those involved with young people aged between 10 and 15 with the knowledge they need to protect the vulnerable from harmful material on the Internet.

Market & Technology

Internet access and use

• IR - Blogs Opening Iranian Society?  +/-

  (Wired) Iranians are using the latest technology to modernize their society and adopt Western ways without giving up their heritage. There are now roughly 12,000 Farsi blogs created by Iranians, with more coming online every day.

Junk mail (spam)

• DE - Eco-Kampagne: Surfer sollen Spammer melden  +/- Translate

  (Spiegel) Die Werbemüll-Lawine rollt, und bisher scheint kein Kraut dagegen gewachsen. Der eco-Verband der Internet-Wirtschaft ruft nun zur Selbsthilfe auf: Mit einem Leitfaden sollen Surfer lernen, Spam zurück zu verfolgen - und die Spammer bei ihren Providern zu melden.

• How to spot and stop spam  +/-

  (BBC) Unsolicited e-mails now infuriatingly clutter many inboxes, just as paper junk mail buried many a front door map. But is smart technology set to save us from spam?

• Spam blockers may wreak e-mail havoc  +/-

  (CNET News.com) by Declan McCullagh . Here's an unhappy prediction: The explosion of spam-blocking technology could herald the death of much legitimate e-mail. I wrote about patents relating to this technology, known as challenge-response technology. In theory, well-designed challenge-response utilities won't challenge mail from known correspondents or mail that you've actually asked to receive. Unfortunately, many current challenge-response systems are poorly designed, which could wreak havoc on mailing lists and other legitimate communications. This could make e-mail far less useful than it is today.

Market

• DE - Software Group Threatens to Sue SCO on Linux  +/-

  (Reuters) A German software group threatened to take U.S. software firm SCO Group to court if it did not withdraw from a worldwide attack on Linux, the free computer operating system. Linuxtag, a German Linux lobbying association, said it may seek a German court order against SCO because of threats made against 1,500 of the world's most important Linux supporters, including International Business Machines Corp. see also Microsoft's new Linux gambit (CNET News.com)

• Online music price war begins  +/-

  (BBC) The cost of downloading songs from the internet has been cut in the first round of a price war. Listen.com, which provides internet radio broadcasts for $9.95 (£6 ; 8 euros) a month, is slashing the price for burning music onto CDs from 99 cents to 79 cents (48 pence). This comes just a month after Apple Computers launched its online iTunes music store, which allows Mac users to download songs for 99 cents with no monthly subscription fee.

Mobile and wireless

• Move over 3G: here comes 4G - Wireless telecoms  +/-

  (Economist) Third-generation (3G) mobile-phone networks face a new rival: so-called 4G. And, astonishingly, the new networks may even be profitable. There is no formal definition of 4G, but what such technologies have in common is that they are high-speed wireless networks covering a wide area, designed above all for carrying data.

• EU - Mobile gadgets offer new lessons  +/-

  (BBC) Using mobile phones and handheld computers to teach basic skills could help a generation of youngsters turned off by traditional education. That is the hope of those involved in the 4.5m euro (£3m) m-learning project, an EU-backed initiative taking place in the UK, Sweden and Italy.

Portals, browsers and search engines

• Big Changes for Search Engines  +/-

  (WIred) Fast, smart, personalized to suit every user's needs. And pretty. That's what the search engine of the near future will be. Tweaking existing search engines and developing new ways to find specialized data were the subjects of two dozen papers presented at this week's 12th International World Wide Web Conference in Budapest.

• Prime clicking time - Online advertising  +/-

  (Economist) At last, internet advertising that works but does not annoy. A less annoying alternative to pop-up advertisements has been found that is more effective than banner ads, which are now mostly ignored by surfers. These are simple, text-based ads that are directly linked to what people are doing online. Search firms pioneered the new form of advertising, variously known as "search-related" or "pay-per-performance".

Quality of information

• 'Of Course It's True; I Saw It on the Internet!': Critical Thinking in the Internet Era  +/-

  (Leah Graham and P. Takis Metaxas) In the past the greatest problem facing researchers was finding information; now, with the advent of the Internet, the greatest problem is evaluating the vast wealth of information available. Students in this survey placed greater emphasis on the process of finding an answer than on analyzing the actual information.

Statistics

• DE - Studie: Knapp die Hälfte der Deutschen ist online  +/- Translate

  (Heise) Eine Studie dreier Medieninstitute hat ergeben, dass 46 Prozent der Deutschen online sind. Im internationalen Vergleich liegt Deutschland damit im oberen Mittelfeld. Tendenziell sind Internetnutzer jung, haben einen hohen Bildungsabschluss und leben in Haushalten mit einem vergleichsweise hohen Einkommen. Die Studie wurde in Zusammenarbeit der Landesanstalt für Medien Nordrhein-Westfalen (LfM), des Europäischen Zentrums für Medienkompetenz GmbH (ecmc) und dem Europäischen Medieninstitut (EIM) erstellt.

• Schlechte Noten für europäischen Internet-Handel  +/- Translate

  (Heise) Der grenzüberschreitende europäische Internet- Handel hat von Verbraucherschützern schlechte Noten bekommen. Das ist das Ergebnis einer Studie, die das Europäische Verbraucherzentrum Düsseldorf (EVZ) vorgestellt hat. Von 114 Bestellungen in verschiedenen EU-Mitgliedsländern sei nur gut die Hälfte einwandfrei abgewickelt worden, sagte der zuständige Projektleiter Theo Wolsing vom EVZ. Zudem sei es schwierig, überhaupt Webseiten zu finden, die grenzüberschreitenden Handel anbieten.

• Shopping on-line in Europe: 1 in 3 goods never arrives  +/-

  (out-law.com) In a study of European e-commerce sites, one in three goods were never delivered, key information was missing from the web sites and returned goods were not reimbursed. These are the findings of research by the European Consumer Centre Network.

• UK - Technology takes hold on British life  +/-

  (BBC) A large scale study by the iSociety division of the Work Foundation, formerly the Industrial Society, of the uses that British people are making of technology has found that, for the first time, computer ownership in the UK has topped 50%. The same proportion are also regular users of e-mail.

Technology

• Documentation of Gator Advertisements and Targeting  +/-

  (Harvard Law School) by Benjamin Edelman - Berkman Center for Internet & Society. The Gator Corporation designs software to display advertisements on users' computer screens, triggered in part by the specific web sites users visit. The author has developed an automated method of determining which specific advertisements Gator has associated with which web sites, data that may be helpful to web site operators, policy-makers, and others in assessing Gator's practices.

• File swapping shifts up a gear  +/-

  (CNET News.com) A new generation of peer-to-peer tools is finding its groove on the Internet, spelling tougher times ahead for movie studios' attempts to quell online piracy. Going by names like eDonkey and BitTorrent, many of the latest generation of file-swapping tools have been designed specifically to increase the efficiency and speed of transfer for large files such as movie files. BitTorrent splits files into tiny bits. Once someone has started downloading a file, that person's computer immediately serves as an upload server for anyone else looking for the file. The technology automatically balances upload and download speeds, ensuring that people downloading give back to the network. Unlike other file-swapping networks, if the number of people searching for a single file increases, it means faster downloads. The director of worldwide Internet enforcement for the MPAA is are well aware of and are monitoring the new file-swapping technologies, but said "They still allow us to identify the IP address of a person."

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