The Information Commissioner's Office is now advising schools with fingerprint systems to ask the child's and parents' permission before taking fingerprints.
"A spokesman for the Information Commissioner's Office said: "Because of the sensitivity of the issue, we are recommending that schools follow best practice and ask permission of parent and pupil before they take a fingerprint."
However, he said: "There's nothing in the act that makes that clear," and could not explain what would happen to schools that failed to follow this advice. Neither could he say at what age a child could assume legal responsibility for its own behaviour, without seeking parental advice...
This was the basis on which the ICO worked till now. Last September when the ICO guidance on school fingerprinting was said to be just weeks away from publication, David Smith, now deputy commissioner, said that schools could fingerprint children without parental consent under the Data Protection Act. As long as kids were deemed to be old enough to make their own minds up, the school could ask them and keep parents out of the loop."
Friday, February 02, 2007
Truth, lies and the law, US style
There is a high profile trial going on in the US at the moment which won't have registered with too many people on this side of the pond. Sooter Libby, former chief of staff of Vice Presient Cheney, is charged with lying to federal prosecutors investigating the Bush administration's leak of the identity of CIA operative, Valerie Plame. Plame's husband, Joseph Wilson, had publicly criticised the administration for claiming that Iraq had been seeking weapons grade Uranium in Niger. In the light of the Libby trial, Edward Lazurus has been thinking about how the law in the US treats the telling of truth and lies.
"At the Top of the Hierarchy: The Lies (and Truths) For Which We Jail the Tellers
At the top of the punishment pyramid are those lies we consider so reprehensible that we will send people to jail for telling them.
Among current news stories, the Libby trial is the most obvious example. Society places a very high value on telling the truth to government investigators, or to grand juries investigating crimes. The same is true of sworn statements in court; if false, they constitute the crime of perjury. In such circumstances, deliberately misrepresenting the truth is a felony.
By the same token, however, you can also go to jail for telling the truth - at least if you aren't forthcoming about how you came by the truth.
Consider the BALCO steroids scandal, in which a federal grand jury has been considering whether to indict a variety of professional athletes, including baseball star Barry Bonds, in connection with their alleged use of illegal performance-enhancing drugs. Not long ago, a couple of enterprising reporters wrote a very well-received book about the scandal, based in part on secret grand jury testimony that had been leaked to them.
It isn't a crime to receive or to publish such grand jury testimony (though it is a crime to leak it). Moreover, no one has suggested that the two journalists somehow misreported or distorted what was said in the grand jury. And it's pretty hard to argue that the journalists' work was not of substantial public interest. But - like journalists across the country who come into possession of information relevant to whether someone else has committed a crime -- they've been threatened over and over again with jail for refusing to reveal their sources. "
Ironically in the steroids case the journalists look like the only ones in the entire affair in danger of being jailed and yet they were the ones who exposed the wrongdoing.
"At the Top of the Hierarchy: The Lies (and Truths) For Which We Jail the Tellers
At the top of the punishment pyramid are those lies we consider so reprehensible that we will send people to jail for telling them.
Among current news stories, the Libby trial is the most obvious example. Society places a very high value on telling the truth to government investigators, or to grand juries investigating crimes. The same is true of sworn statements in court; if false, they constitute the crime of perjury. In such circumstances, deliberately misrepresenting the truth is a felony.
By the same token, however, you can also go to jail for telling the truth - at least if you aren't forthcoming about how you came by the truth.
Consider the BALCO steroids scandal, in which a federal grand jury has been considering whether to indict a variety of professional athletes, including baseball star Barry Bonds, in connection with their alleged use of illegal performance-enhancing drugs. Not long ago, a couple of enterprising reporters wrote a very well-received book about the scandal, based in part on secret grand jury testimony that had been leaked to them.
It isn't a crime to receive or to publish such grand jury testimony (though it is a crime to leak it). Moreover, no one has suggested that the two journalists somehow misreported or distorted what was said in the grand jury. And it's pretty hard to argue that the journalists' work was not of substantial public interest. But - like journalists across the country who come into possession of information relevant to whether someone else has committed a crime -- they've been threatened over and over again with jail for refusing to reveal their sources. "
Ironically in the steroids case the journalists look like the only ones in the entire affair in danger of being jailed and yet they were the ones who exposed the wrongdoing.
More evoting problems in Florida in 2006
Ed Felten says:
"The big e-voting story from November’s election was in Sarasota, Florida, where a congressional race was decided by about 400 votes, with 18,412 undervotes. That’s 18,412 voters who cast votes in other races but not, according to the official results, in that congressional race. Among voters who used the ES&S iVotronic machines — that is, non-absentee voters in Sarasota County — the undervote rate was about 14%. Something went very wrong...
Several explanations have been proposed, but only two are at all plausible: ballot design and machine malfunction. The ballot design theory says that the ballot offered to voters on the iVotronic’s screen was misdesigned in a way that caused many voters to miss that race. Looking at screenshots of the ballot, one can see how voters might miss the congressional race at the top of the second page...
It’s one thing to say that ballot design could have caused some undervotes, but it’s another thing entirely to say it was the sole cause of so elevated an undervote rate...
The malfunction theory postulates a problem or malfunction with the voting machines that caused votes not to be recorded. There are many types of problems that could have caused lost votes...
If we had a voter-verified paper trail, we could immediately tell which theory is correct, by comparing the paper and electronic records. If the voter-verified paper records show the same high undervote race, then the ballot design theory is right. If the paper and electronic records show significantly different undervote rates, then something is wrong with the machines. But of course the advocates of paperless voting argued that paper trails were unnecessary — while also arguing that touchscreen systems reduce undervotes."
Felten will be offering some more thoughts on the problem over the next week or so.
"The big e-voting story from November’s election was in Sarasota, Florida, where a congressional race was decided by about 400 votes, with 18,412 undervotes. That’s 18,412 voters who cast votes in other races but not, according to the official results, in that congressional race. Among voters who used the ES&S iVotronic machines — that is, non-absentee voters in Sarasota County — the undervote rate was about 14%. Something went very wrong...
Several explanations have been proposed, but only two are at all plausible: ballot design and machine malfunction. The ballot design theory says that the ballot offered to voters on the iVotronic’s screen was misdesigned in a way that caused many voters to miss that race. Looking at screenshots of the ballot, one can see how voters might miss the congressional race at the top of the second page...
It’s one thing to say that ballot design could have caused some undervotes, but it’s another thing entirely to say it was the sole cause of so elevated an undervote rate...
The malfunction theory postulates a problem or malfunction with the voting machines that caused votes not to be recorded. There are many types of problems that could have caused lost votes...
If we had a voter-verified paper trail, we could immediately tell which theory is correct, by comparing the paper and electronic records. If the voter-verified paper records show the same high undervote race, then the ballot design theory is right. If the paper and electronic records show significantly different undervote rates, then something is wrong with the machines. But of course the advocates of paperless voting argued that paper trails were unnecessary — while also arguing that touchscreen systems reduce undervotes."
Felten will be offering some more thoughts on the problem over the next week or so.
Thursday, February 01, 2007
Mixers raided
From the NYT: Cracking Down on Mixtape CDs
"Not long before Christmas, Jeff Baker, the chief of police of Morrow, Ga., a small town just south of Atlanta, and one of his officers were walking through a local shopping mall when they happened to pass a kiosk hawking rap music CDs. One in particular caught their attention...
...it did not carry the name or address of the owner of the music copyrights, as Georgia law requires. Rather than arrest the kiosk vendor immediately, Chief Baker said, “We’d rather go after the source of the material. And at that point we had no idea what the source was.”
Any rap music aficionado would; the creator of the album is DJ Drama, whose real name is Tyree Simmons, arguably the nation’s most prominent producer of mixtapes, the name given to popular but largely unlicensed CDs stocked with yet-to-be released rap hits and free-style rhymes.
And many more people now know: last week, local authorities, working with the recording industry’s trade association, stunned fans and music executives alike by raiding DJ Drama’s studio in Atlanta and arresting him and a fellow D.J., Don Cannon, on racketeering charges."
Recommended reading.
"Not long before Christmas, Jeff Baker, the chief of police of Morrow, Ga., a small town just south of Atlanta, and one of his officers were walking through a local shopping mall when they happened to pass a kiosk hawking rap music CDs. One in particular caught their attention...
...it did not carry the name or address of the owner of the music copyrights, as Georgia law requires. Rather than arrest the kiosk vendor immediately, Chief Baker said, “We’d rather go after the source of the material. And at that point we had no idea what the source was.”
Any rap music aficionado would; the creator of the album is DJ Drama, whose real name is Tyree Simmons, arguably the nation’s most prominent producer of mixtapes, the name given to popular but largely unlicensed CDs stocked with yet-to-be released rap hits and free-style rhymes.
And many more people now know: last week, local authorities, working with the recording industry’s trade association, stunned fans and music executives alike by raiding DJ Drama’s studio in Atlanta and arresting him and a fellow D.J., Don Cannon, on racketeering charges."
Recommended reading.
Microsoft Vista Security Hole
From the BBC:
"Microsoft has admitted that speech recognition features in Vista could be hijacked so that a PC tells itself to delete files or folders."
"Microsoft has admitted that speech recognition features in Vista could be hijacked so that a PC tells itself to delete files or folders."
Lobbyists for HAVA and evoting
The Black Box Voting folks have been looking into who specifically did all the lobbying to get the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) passed (which basically mandates electronic voting) and seem to be a little surprised at what they have found.
"While many election reform activists are under the impression that touch-screen (DRE) voting machines were some sort of Republican plot to take over America, the truth is that lobbying for the DRE-seeking "Help America Vote Act" came primarily from the foundation of the Democratic Party itself.
Activists throughout America have expressed surprise at the Democratic Party's unwillingness to pull DREs off the shelf. One reason is simply this: To do so would damage the credibility of those who lobbied for HAVA. And those who lobbied for HAVA just happen to be the biggest funders and activist workhorses for the Democratic Party itself...
WHO INVESTED THEIR CREDIBILITY (AND MEMBERSHIP FUNDS) TO LOBBY FOR HAVA?
1. Public interest groups - mostly progressive
2. Labor unions
3. Minority rights groups
4. Disability rights groups
5. Industry
Of these, the first four tend to favor Democrats but the fifth group -- industry, the group charged with writing the computer code that counts America's votes -- is made of of vendors that are more often close to the Republican Party.
Democrats lobbied HAVA in but to a large extent, Republican-affiliated vendors executed the mechanics of the plan. Some would call this comical; others, tragic."
These stories rarely involve a simple conspiracy on the part of an easily identifiable set of bad guys though the situation could be argued to contain its fair share of those. More often than not it is a complex mess of people, organisations, issues, situations and agendas leading to a series of decisions with, as the electronic voting scenario in the US aptly demonstrates, a less than optimum outcome.
"While many election reform activists are under the impression that touch-screen (DRE) voting machines were some sort of Republican plot to take over America, the truth is that lobbying for the DRE-seeking "Help America Vote Act" came primarily from the foundation of the Democratic Party itself.
Activists throughout America have expressed surprise at the Democratic Party's unwillingness to pull DREs off the shelf. One reason is simply this: To do so would damage the credibility of those who lobbied for HAVA. And those who lobbied for HAVA just happen to be the biggest funders and activist workhorses for the Democratic Party itself...
WHO INVESTED THEIR CREDIBILITY (AND MEMBERSHIP FUNDS) TO LOBBY FOR HAVA?
1. Public interest groups - mostly progressive
2. Labor unions
3. Minority rights groups
4. Disability rights groups
5. Industry
Of these, the first four tend to favor Democrats but the fifth group -- industry, the group charged with writing the computer code that counts America's votes -- is made of of vendors that are more often close to the Republican Party.
Democrats lobbied HAVA in but to a large extent, Republican-affiliated vendors executed the mechanics of the plan. Some would call this comical; others, tragic."
These stories rarely involve a simple conspiracy on the part of an easily identifiable set of bad guys though the situation could be argued to contain its fair share of those. More often than not it is a complex mess of people, organisations, issues, situations and agendas leading to a series of decisions with, as the electronic voting scenario in the US aptly demonstrates, a less than optimum outcome.
Billion dollar pills
From the Economist: Billion dollar pills, an article wondering if the pharmaceutical industry's business model, esesntially focussing on blockbuster drugs and exploiting them to the nth degree, is suffering.
Sony settle with FTC over rootkit charges
Sony have settled with the FTC on charges related to the damage done by the drm rootkit on some of their music CDs. They have apparently agreed to pay customers up to $150 for damage to their PCs.
"According to the Federal Trade Commission, which announced the settlement, Sony BMG's anti-piracy software limited the devices on which music could be played to those made by Sony Corp., Microsoft Corp. or other Windows-compatible devices.
The software also restricted the number of copies of the music that could be made to three, the agency said, and ``exposed consumers to significant security risks and was unreasonably difficult to uninstall.''
``Installations of secret software that create security risks are intrusive and unlawful,'' FTC Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras said...
The settlement requires the company to allow consumers to exchange through the end of June the affected CDs purchased before Dec. 31, 2006, and reimburse them up to $150 to repair damage done when they tried to remove the software. It also requires Sony BMG to clearly disclose limitations on consumers' use of music CDs and prohibits it from installing software without consumer consent.
For two years, Sony BMG also must provide an uninstall tool and patches to repair the security vulnerabilities on consumers' computers and must advertise them on its Web site. The company also is required to publish notices describing the exchange and repair reimbursement programs on its Web site."
"According to the Federal Trade Commission, which announced the settlement, Sony BMG's anti-piracy software limited the devices on which music could be played to those made by Sony Corp., Microsoft Corp. or other Windows-compatible devices.
The software also restricted the number of copies of the music that could be made to three, the agency said, and ``exposed consumers to significant security risks and was unreasonably difficult to uninstall.''
``Installations of secret software that create security risks are intrusive and unlawful,'' FTC Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras said...
The settlement requires the company to allow consumers to exchange through the end of June the affected CDs purchased before Dec. 31, 2006, and reimburse them up to $150 to repair damage done when they tried to remove the software. It also requires Sony BMG to clearly disclose limitations on consumers' use of music CDs and prohibits it from installing software without consumer consent.
For two years, Sony BMG also must provide an uninstall tool and patches to repair the security vulnerabilities on consumers' computers and must advertise them on its Web site. The company also is required to publish notices describing the exchange and repair reimbursement programs on its Web site."
Britain blocks Italy's bid to ban death penalty
Hidden away on page 19 of yesterday's Independent: Britain blocks Italy's bid to ban death penalty. Last week the Italian government tried to get EU foreign ministers to support an initiative for a global ban on capital punishment. The UK scuppered the plan because they though it might have embarrassed the US. Disgraceful.
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Former NYT reporter to testify in CIA leak case
From Findlaw:
"Journalists will take center stage Tuesday at the CIA leak trial as Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald begins calling reporters as witnesses.
Fitzgerald said Judith Miller was to take the stand Tuesday, the first time the former New York Times reporter has testified publicly against the man she went to jail to protect as a source.
Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, is accused of perjury and obstruction for lying about conversations he had with journalists about outed CIA operative Valerie Plame.
Prosecutors want to show that Libby lied to investigators about his conversations with journalists regarding Plame, who believes she was outed as retribution for her husband's criticism of the Bush administration's prewar intelligence on Iraq."
"Journalists will take center stage Tuesday at the CIA leak trial as Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald begins calling reporters as witnesses.
Fitzgerald said Judith Miller was to take the stand Tuesday, the first time the former New York Times reporter has testified publicly against the man she went to jail to protect as a source.
Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, is accused of perjury and obstruction for lying about conversations he had with journalists about outed CIA operative Valerie Plame.
Prosecutors want to show that Libby lied to investigators about his conversations with journalists regarding Plame, who believes she was outed as retribution for her husband's criticism of the Bush administration's prewar intelligence on Iraq."
Monday, January 29, 2007
Information Commissioner says patients may opt out of NHS spine
Via the Register:
"The Information Commissioner has been told that patients will have the opportunity to refuse to have their details uploaded onto the new NHS medical records system. The news comes just weeks after the Department of Health refused patients that right. "
"The Information Commissioner has been told that patients will have the opportunity to refuse to have their details uploaded onto the new NHS medical records system. The news comes just weeks after the Department of Health refused patients that right. "
Patent Office Orders Re-Examination of Blackboard Patent
Pamela Jones and the Software Freedom Center (which made the formal request) report that BlackBoard's patent on elearning systems is being re-examined by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).
"In response to a formal request filed by the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC), the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) today ordered re-examination of the e-learning patent owned by Blackboard Inc.
"In response to a formal request filed by the Software Freedom Law Center (SFLC), the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) today ordered re-examination of the e-learning patent owned by Blackboard Inc.
SFLC, provider of pro-bono legal services to protect and advance Free and Open Source Software, had filed the request in November on behalf of Sakai, Moodle, and ATutor, three open source educational software projects. The Patent Office found that prior art cited in SFLC's request raises "a substantial new question of patentability" regarding all 44 claims of Blackboard's patent."
That's good news in my book and ther eis a good chance the US will now quash the indefensible patent on prior art grounds but remember it is not just in the US that BlackBoard have succeeded in securing this patent. Australia, New Zealand and Singapore have granted the patent and it is pending in the EU and various other parts of the world.Novartis v India on drug patents
From OneWorld:
"India, which amended its patent laws for TRIPS-compliance in 2005, introduced a clause to ensure that pharmaceuticals did not block the entry of low-cost generic drugs. A year ago this clause blocked Novartis’ patent application for its anti-cancer drug Gleevec. Now, in a major case that will have a profound effect on the affordability of essential medicines in India, Novartis is challenging this unique Indian provision
A division bench of the Madras High Court is set to hear a case that could potentially have a profound effect on the affordability of essential medicines in India and throughout the developing world. Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis AG is challenging the constitutional validity of a key provision in India’s Patents Act; a provision designed to ensure that frivolous 20-year patent monopolies are not granted at the cost of public health. If Novartis succeeds in this unprecedented challenge, India’s status as the primary supplier of low-cost essential medicines to the developing world will be jeopardised. More fundamentally, if it succeeds, it will mark the first time in history that a multinational corporation succeeds in legally abrogating a country’s sovereign right to implement its obligations under the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property (TRIPS) in a manner consistent with the protection of public health.
The legal provision at issue – Section 3(d) of the Patents Act – is a provision unique to Indian law, and stipulates that modifications of already-known medicines cannot be patented unless such modifications make the drugs significantly more effective. This provision was designed to prevent an all-too-common practice in the pharmaceutical industry known as ‘evergreening’, whereby patent owners patent trivial modifications of already existing drugs to artificially extend their monopolies beyond the 20-year period granted it on the original patent. Pharmaceutical companies have been engaging in such practices in other countries, effectively blocking the entry of low-cost generics for years...
Armed with this provision, the Cancer Patients Aid Association (CPAA) in September 2005 filed an opposition against Novartis’ patent application for its anti-cancer drug Gleevec, claiming that this application only concerned a modification of an already-known drug that did not improve its efficacy. Subsequently, in a landmark decision, the Patent Office in Chennai declared in January 2006 that Novartis’ patent application for Gleevec was insufficient to meet the requirements of Section 3(d), and denied Novartis a patent...
In March 2006, the Indian Network for People Living with HIV/AIDS and the Manipur Network of Positive People filed an opposition against GlaxoSmithKline’s (GSK’s) patent application for Combivir, an important fixed-dose combination of two of the most widely used antiretroviral medicines in the developing world. The substance of GSK’s patent application proved to be exceedingly silly, and is demonstrative of exactly the type of frivolous patenting that Section 3(d) was enacted to prevent. Essentially, GSK sought a 20-year monopoly for combining two already known drugs – lamivudine and zidovudine, neither of which are patentable in India – with something called a ‘glidant’, of which the preferred variety is silicon dioxide, better known to most people as sand. To be fair, it was not just sand that is the subject of GSK’s ‘invention’. It also included corn starch, talc, calcium carbonate (better known as chalk) and a host of other simple, commonplace substances that drug makers routinely add when making a drug in pill form. Remarkably enough, as with Novartis and Gleevec, GSK had already obtained a patent for this in the United States, the United Kingdom, and several other countries.
In the face of the strong opposition filed by the activist groups, and the sheer frivolity of its patent application, GSK announced in March 2006 that it would be withdrawing its patent application for Combivir, thereby allowing several Indian generic manufacturers to continue making their versions of this essential drug combination without fear of liability."
"India, which amended its patent laws for TRIPS-compliance in 2005, introduced a clause to ensure that pharmaceuticals did not block the entry of low-cost generic drugs. A year ago this clause blocked Novartis’ patent application for its anti-cancer drug Gleevec. Now, in a major case that will have a profound effect on the affordability of essential medicines in India, Novartis is challenging this unique Indian provision
A division bench of the Madras High Court is set to hear a case that could potentially have a profound effect on the affordability of essential medicines in India and throughout the developing world. Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis AG is challenging the constitutional validity of a key provision in India’s Patents Act; a provision designed to ensure that frivolous 20-year patent monopolies are not granted at the cost of public health. If Novartis succeeds in this unprecedented challenge, India’s status as the primary supplier of low-cost essential medicines to the developing world will be jeopardised. More fundamentally, if it succeeds, it will mark the first time in history that a multinational corporation succeeds in legally abrogating a country’s sovereign right to implement its obligations under the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property (TRIPS) in a manner consistent with the protection of public health.
The legal provision at issue – Section 3(d) of the Patents Act – is a provision unique to Indian law, and stipulates that modifications of already-known medicines cannot be patented unless such modifications make the drugs significantly more effective. This provision was designed to prevent an all-too-common practice in the pharmaceutical industry known as ‘evergreening’, whereby patent owners patent trivial modifications of already existing drugs to artificially extend their monopolies beyond the 20-year period granted it on the original patent. Pharmaceutical companies have been engaging in such practices in other countries, effectively blocking the entry of low-cost generics for years...
Armed with this provision, the Cancer Patients Aid Association (CPAA) in September 2005 filed an opposition against Novartis’ patent application for its anti-cancer drug Gleevec, claiming that this application only concerned a modification of an already-known drug that did not improve its efficacy. Subsequently, in a landmark decision, the Patent Office in Chennai declared in January 2006 that Novartis’ patent application for Gleevec was insufficient to meet the requirements of Section 3(d), and denied Novartis a patent...
In March 2006, the Indian Network for People Living with HIV/AIDS and the Manipur Network of Positive People filed an opposition against GlaxoSmithKline’s (GSK’s) patent application for Combivir, an important fixed-dose combination of two of the most widely used antiretroviral medicines in the developing world. The substance of GSK’s patent application proved to be exceedingly silly, and is demonstrative of exactly the type of frivolous patenting that Section 3(d) was enacted to prevent. Essentially, GSK sought a 20-year monopoly for combining two already known drugs – lamivudine and zidovudine, neither of which are patentable in India – with something called a ‘glidant’, of which the preferred variety is silicon dioxide, better known to most people as sand. To be fair, it was not just sand that is the subject of GSK’s ‘invention’. It also included corn starch, talc, calcium carbonate (better known as chalk) and a host of other simple, commonplace substances that drug makers routinely add when making a drug in pill form. Remarkably enough, as with Novartis and Gleevec, GSK had already obtained a patent for this in the United States, the United Kingdom, and several other countries.
In the face of the strong opposition filed by the activist groups, and the sheer frivolity of its patent application, GSK announced in March 2006 that it would be withdrawing its patent application for Combivir, thereby allowing several Indian generic manufacturers to continue making their versions of this essential drug combination without fear of liability."
India v Pakistan on Basmati Rice
The FT reports that the latest dispute between India and Pakistan is over intellectual property rights in Basmati rice.
Diebold Shows How to Make Your Own Voting Machine Key
From Alex Haldermann via Freedom to Tinker: Diebold Shows How to Make Your Own Voting Machine Key.
"By now it should be clear that Diebold’s AccuVote-TS electronic voting machines have lousy security. Our study last fall showed that malicious software running on the machines can invisibly alter votes, and that this software can be installed in under a minute by inserting a new memory card into the side of the machine. The last line of defense against such attacks is a cheap lock covering the memory card door. Our video shows that the lock can be picked in seconds, and, infamously, it can also be opened with a key that is widely sold for use in hotel minibars and jukeboxes...
Ross sent me his three homemade keys, and, amazingly, two of them can open the locks on the Diebold machine we used in our study!"
"By now it should be clear that Diebold’s AccuVote-TS electronic voting machines have lousy security. Our study last fall showed that malicious software running on the machines can invisibly alter votes, and that this software can be installed in under a minute by inserting a new memory card into the side of the machine. The last line of defense against such attacks is a cheap lock covering the memory card door. Our video shows that the lock can be picked in seconds, and, infamously, it can also be opened with a key that is widely sold for use in hotel minibars and jukeboxes...
According to published reports, nearly all the machines deployed around the country use the exact same key. Up to this point we’ve been careful not to say precisely which key or show the particular pattern of the cuts. The shape of a key is like a password — it only provides security if you keep it secret from the bad guys. We’ve tried to keep the shape secret so as not to make an attacker’s job even marginally easier, and you would expect a security-conscious vendor to do the same.
Not Diebold. Ross Kinard of SploitCast wrote to me last month to point out that Diebold offers the key for sale on their web site. Of course, they won’t sell it to just anybody — only Diebold account holders can order it online. However, as Ross observed, Diebold’s online store shows a detailed photograph of the key...
Could an attacker create a working key from the photograph? Ross decided to find out...Ross sent me his three homemade keys, and, amazingly, two of them can open the locks on the Diebold machine we used in our study!"
Google v Stoller
Rebecca Tushnet says Google have sued Leo Stoller the guy that claimed to have a trademark on the word "stealth." That will earn them a few brownie points in the cyber rights community.
"Here's something that will make Google very few new enemies, and perhaps some new friends: As reported by the TTABlog, Google has sued Leo Stoller, the well-known trademark "entrepreneur," for false advertising, RICO violations (the predicate acts being state-law extortion and wire and mail fraud), and unfair competition. The complaint, 222 pages including the exhibits, is here.
I've said a couple of times in this space that there's no provision in trademark law penalizing false claims of trademark ownership, or even false claims to own a federal registration, in contrast to the rule for patents. Google has brought its claims under the Lanham Act's general prohibition of false advertising; not only does it dispute Stoller's claims to own a federal registration to the mark "Google," but its allegations also encompass Stoller's claims to own common-law rights in the mark, representations that he could license the mark, representations that he'd prevailed in numerous court cases, and representations that "99% of [his] opponents opt to settle.""
Stoller also claimed to own the phrase "freedom of expression" which irritated Kimbrew McLeod, who had actually managed to get a trademark on the phrase some years previously in an exercise in demonstrating the otherworldlyness of the US system of intellectual property.
"Here's something that will make Google very few new enemies, and perhaps some new friends: As reported by the TTABlog, Google has sued Leo Stoller, the well-known trademark "entrepreneur," for false advertising, RICO violations (the predicate acts being state-law extortion and wire and mail fraud), and unfair competition. The complaint, 222 pages including the exhibits, is here.
I've said a couple of times in this space that there's no provision in trademark law penalizing false claims of trademark ownership, or even false claims to own a federal registration, in contrast to the rule for patents. Google has brought its claims under the Lanham Act's general prohibition of false advertising; not only does it dispute Stoller's claims to own a federal registration to the mark "Google," but its allegations also encompass Stoller's claims to own common-law rights in the mark, representations that he could license the mark, representations that he'd prevailed in numerous court cases, and representations that "99% of [his] opponents opt to settle.""
Stoller also claimed to own the phrase "freedom of expression" which irritated Kimbrew McLeod, who had actually managed to get a trademark on the phrase some years previously in an exercise in demonstrating the otherworldlyness of the US system of intellectual property.
Vista Red Flags
Michael Geist says the small print in Microsoft Vista's licence raises red flags.
"for the past few months the legal and technical communities have dug into Vista's "fine print." Those communities have raised red flags about Vista's legal terms and conditions as well as the technical limitations that have been incorporated into the software at the insistence of the motion picture industry.
The net effect of these concerns may constitute the real Vista revolution as they point to an unprecedented loss of consumer control over their own personal computers. In the name of shielding consumers from computer viruses and protecting copyright owners from potential infringement, Vista seemingly wrestles control of the "user experience" from the user.
Vista's legal fine print includes extensive provisions granting Microsoft the right to regularly check the legitimacy of the software and holds the prospect of deleting certain programs without the user's knowledge...
Vista also incorporates Windows Defender, an anti-virus program that actively scans computers for "spyware, adware, and other potentially unwanted software." The agreement does not define any of these terms, leaving it to Microsoft to determine what constitutes unwanted software. Once operational, the agreement warns that Windows Defender will, by default, automatically remove software rated "high" or "severe,"even though that may result in other software ceasing to work or mistakenly result in the removal of software that is not unwanted."
"for the past few months the legal and technical communities have dug into Vista's "fine print." Those communities have raised red flags about Vista's legal terms and conditions as well as the technical limitations that have been incorporated into the software at the insistence of the motion picture industry.
The net effect of these concerns may constitute the real Vista revolution as they point to an unprecedented loss of consumer control over their own personal computers. In the name of shielding consumers from computer viruses and protecting copyright owners from potential infringement, Vista seemingly wrestles control of the "user experience" from the user.
Vista's legal fine print includes extensive provisions granting Microsoft the right to regularly check the legitimacy of the software and holds the prospect of deleting certain programs without the user's knowledge...
Vista also incorporates Windows Defender, an anti-virus program that actively scans computers for "spyware, adware, and other potentially unwanted software." The agreement does not define any of these terms, leaving it to Microsoft to determine what constitutes unwanted software. Once operational, the agreement warns that Windows Defender will, by default, automatically remove software rated "high" or "severe,"even though that may result in other software ceasing to work or mistakenly result in the removal of software that is not unwanted."
Intelligent caring teens
There is a wonderful letter in today's Independent from an inner city school teacher, Brian Collier (scroll down to Blair's distortions and 'respect zones'). He questions Tony Blair's demonisation of today's teenagers.
"I am a year older than the PM, and I remember the "Wilful Damage" posters on the wall of my primary school in Bury, Lancashire. I remember my parents lamenting the lack of manners of young people in the Fifties and Sixties. I remember gangs of "teddy boys" with razor blades and bicycle chains fighting in the centre of town on Friday night. I remember football hooliganism on a scale that would fuel our worst nightmares now...
Young people today are more caring, more questioning, more intelligent and less racist than they've ever been. I should know, I teach A-levels to an extremely diverse groups of teenagers in an inner-city further education college."
It's good to see someone who works with and understands young people speaking out on their behalf.
"I am a year older than the PM, and I remember the "Wilful Damage" posters on the wall of my primary school in Bury, Lancashire. I remember my parents lamenting the lack of manners of young people in the Fifties and Sixties. I remember gangs of "teddy boys" with razor blades and bicycle chains fighting in the centre of town on Friday night. I remember football hooliganism on a scale that would fuel our worst nightmares now...
Young people today are more caring, more questioning, more intelligent and less racist than they've ever been. I should know, I teach A-levels to an extremely diverse groups of teenagers in an inner-city further education college."
It's good to see someone who works with and understands young people speaking out on their behalf.
Sunday, January 28, 2007
Head of the Youth Justice Board Edged out for being off message
From ARCH:
"The head of the Youth Justice Board, Rod Morgan, has resigned after the Home Office decided to advertise his job rather than simply renew his contract. He isn’t going quietly. In a Newsnight interview to be shown tonight, he says of the 26% increase in children entering the criminal justice system that:
"The head of the Youth Justice Board, Rod Morgan, has resigned after the Home Office decided to advertise his job rather than simply renew his contract. He isn’t going quietly. In a Newsnight interview to be shown tonight, he says of the 26% increase in children entering the criminal justice system that:
government targets for bringing offences to justice were having “perverse consequences” by swelling prisoner numbers unnecessarily.
Minor offences that used to be dealt with informally or out of court were now being pushed into an overstretched criminal justice system, and work to improve regimes in young offender institutions was being “undermined”
Predictably, the Home Office has a two-fingered response:
“We refute the claim that young people are being demonised and criminalised. Considerable emphasis has been placed on providing activities for young people.”
As we mentioned a couple of weeks ago, the Home Office is already pretty cheesed about the YJB report on ASBOs, so their decision to re-advertise Rod Morgan’s job in an attempt to find someone holding the right song-sheet was always on the cards.
It was less than 6 months ago that Rob Allen came to the end of his contract with the YJB, and sounded off about:
elements which are deeply disappointing: the increasing criminalisation of young people involved in minor delinquency, and the stubbornly high use of custodial remands and sentences.
‘And there are some developments of which we really should be ashamed, in particular aspects of the way we lock up children, the demonisation of young people involved in anti-social behaviour and the coarsening of the political and public debate about how to deal with young people in trouble.’
Meanwhile, YJB board member Howard Williamson grits his teeth and hangs on but for how long, who knows? He has already deplored the
Pardon the apoplexy, but what depths have we plumbed when a government prefers appeasing tabloids by getting macho with children rather than listening to its own"increasingly authoritarian and interventionist state
Friday, January 26, 2007
ID card for immigrants to make employers border police
John Lettice takes no satisfaction from having one of his many predictions about ID cards coming to pass.
"
"
Immigration minister Liam Byrne has taken the wraps off the long-predicted (in these parts, at least) plan to hit immigrants in the first wave of ID cards, and to force employers to police the system. David Blunkett first trailed this scheme in November 2004, (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/12/03/business_immigrant_checks/) while an IPPR report last year (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/31/ippr_irregular_migration/) recommended hitting immigrants with ID cards by 2008.
Notice the organisation Blunkett was speaking to? There's a coincidence. Liam "Charlie" Byrne (the Home Office's very own round-headed kid), trailing the proposed Borders Bill on Radio 4's Today programme, essentially followed the script of Blunkett's 2004 IPPR speech. There have for some years now been legal provisions for heavy penalties for companies hiring illegal immigrants, and it is the employer's responsibility to ensure that employees have the right to work in the UK. These provisions have however been virtually unenforceable, because of the number of different documents which can be used to 'prove' right to work, and the relative ease with which these can be forged. Byrne this morning told us that there were currently over 60 documents which could be used, and that biometric ID cards for immigrants would provide employers with "a fail-safe, easy method to check whether someone is here legally."
EU 'e-health'
Via Glyn on the ORG list, ZDNet reports:
"The European Commission is about to call for proposals on how patients' medical details would be shared between its member states, with the UK almost certain to be included in the scheme.
Within the next few days, an initiative called the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP) will be adopted as part of Framework 7, a massive drive by the EU to fund research and development, with e-health being a major beneficiary.
One requirement of the CIP will be to establish interoperability between member states' healthcare IT systems, such as the NHS' so-called "Spine", which is the new UK database of patient care records.
This aim was outlined in a document published in September last year, entitled Connected Health: Quality and Safety for European Citizens. In this document, the Commission's ICT for Health unit called for interoperability between nations' healthcare systems, arguing that "health, social care and other providers must no longer work in isolation, but need to collaborate as a team, if necessary beyond their national and linguistic borders".
I'm glad to see Ross Anderson is in fighting spirit over the idea. When ZDnet asked him for his thoughts he said:
"If you're somebody with information that should be known, at present you will carry either a bracelet or a card in your wallet to say so. It is foolish to move to a computer for the simple reason that, if you have the information either on an online database or sitting on a smartcard, then the computer could be down. Human-readable information which you can carry is the most appropriate technology... I sincerely hope it's another round of something that's never going to happen. If it comes to the point that every one of the five million people working in healthcare in Europe, plus the CIA and hackers, can access the information, then I'll stop using the health service"
"The European Commission is about to call for proposals on how patients' medical details would be shared between its member states, with the UK almost certain to be included in the scheme.
Within the next few days, an initiative called the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP) will be adopted as part of Framework 7, a massive drive by the EU to fund research and development, with e-health being a major beneficiary.
One requirement of the CIP will be to establish interoperability between member states' healthcare IT systems, such as the NHS' so-called "Spine", which is the new UK database of patient care records.
This aim was outlined in a document published in September last year, entitled Connected Health: Quality and Safety for European Citizens. In this document, the Commission's ICT for Health unit called for interoperability between nations' healthcare systems, arguing that "health, social care and other providers must no longer work in isolation, but need to collaborate as a team, if necessary beyond their national and linguistic borders".
I'm glad to see Ross Anderson is in fighting spirit over the idea. When ZDnet asked him for his thoughts he said:
"If you're somebody with information that should be known, at present you will carry either a bracelet or a card in your wallet to say so. It is foolish to move to a computer for the simple reason that, if you have the information either on an online database or sitting on a smartcard, then the computer could be down. Human-readable information which you can carry is the most appropriate technology... I sincerely hope it's another round of something that's never going to happen. If it comes to the point that every one of the five million people working in healthcare in Europe, plus the CIA and hackers, can access the information, then I'll stop using the health service"
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Norwegian Ombudsman: iTunes illegal
This story has been doing the rounds for the past week or so, so it is interesting the FT should pick it up now.
"Apple was dealt a blow in Europe on Wednesday when Norway’s powerful consumer ombudsman ruled that its iTunes online music store was illegal because it did not allow downloaded songs to be played on rival technology companies’ devices.
"Apple was dealt a blow in Europe on Wednesday when Norway’s powerful consumer ombudsman ruled that its iTunes online music store was illegal because it did not allow downloaded songs to be played on rival technology companies’ devices.
The decision is the first time any jurisdiction has concluded iTunes breaks its consumer protection laws and could prompt other European countries to review the situation."
Text is free, we make our money on volume(s)
James Boyle is on the money yet again in the FT.
" The internet makes copying cheap. Businesses that see their livelihood
as dependent on the restriction of copying – concentrated in the
recording, film, publishing and software industries – are understandably
upset. Their goal is to have the same ability to control their content
as they had in an analog world but to keep all the benefits of
pervasiveness, cost saving, and viral marketing that a global digital
network brings. To that end, they have moved aggressively to change laws
worldwide, to introduce stiffer penalties, expand rights, mandate
technological locks, forbid reverse engineering, and increase
enforcement. It is not so much a case of wanting to have their cake and
eat it, as to have their cake and make your cake illegal.
Yet there are hints in each of these industries of a different business
model, one that aims to encourage, rather than to forbid copying. At the
moment, the hints are only that – a scattering of anecdotes suggesting
alternative ways of supporting creativity. It is not clear if they will
thrive or even survive, still less whether they can “scale” to a broader
audience. Still, if the alternative plan is to make the internet illegal
or sue grandmothers for downloading, it might be worth taking a look at
them."
James has recently published a new book called The Shakespeare Chronicles, a novel he has apparently been working on sporadically for 20 years. He's also, naturally given his stance on intellectual property, making it available freely via the Net.
" The internet makes copying cheap. Businesses that see their livelihood
as dependent on the restriction of copying – concentrated in the
recording, film, publishing and software industries – are understandably
upset. Their goal is to have the same ability to control their content
as they had in an analog world but to keep all the benefits of
pervasiveness, cost saving, and viral marketing that a global digital
network brings. To that end, they have moved aggressively to change laws
worldwide, to introduce stiffer penalties, expand rights, mandate
technological locks, forbid reverse engineering, and increase
enforcement. It is not so much a case of wanting to have their cake and
eat it, as to have their cake and make your cake illegal.
Yet there are hints in each of these industries of a different business
model, one that aims to encourage, rather than to forbid copying. At the
moment, the hints are only that – a scattering of anecdotes suggesting
alternative ways of supporting creativity. It is not clear if they will
thrive or even survive, still less whether they can “scale” to a broader
audience. Still, if the alternative plan is to make the internet illegal
or sue grandmothers for downloading, it might be worth taking a look at
them."
James has recently published a new book called The Shakespeare Chronicles, a novel he has apparently been working on sporadically for 20 years. He's also, naturally given his stance on intellectual property, making it available freely via the Net.
AAP hire PR 'pit bull' to discredit open access
With pressure of other things I've been failing badly to keep up with Peter Suber's fantastic Open Access News. I'm glad I looked this morning, though, since Peter has pointed to a report in Nature suggesting the American Association of Publishers have decided to hire a prominent public relations firm to spread untruths about the idea of open access.
"The consultant advised them to focus on simple messages, such as "Public access equals government censorship". He hinted... also recommended joining forces with groups that may be ideologically opposed to government-mandated projects such as PubMed Central, including organizations that have angered scientists. One suggestion was the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a conservative think-tank based in Washington DC, which has used oil-industry money to promote sceptical views on climate change."
Peter himself has a remarkably measured response:
"
"The consultant advised them to focus on simple messages, such as "Public access equals government censorship". He hinted... also recommended joining forces with groups that may be ideologically opposed to government-mandated projects such as PubMed Central, including organizations that have angered scientists. One suggestion was the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a conservative think-tank based in Washington DC, which has used oil-industry money to promote sceptical views on climate change."
Peter himself has a remarkably measured response:
"
- I've read this several times and still find it incredible. Why would the AAP pay $300-500k for advice on how to misrepresent the issue? The next time you see an AAP press release on OA, ask yourself this question.
- Does the AAP even need the advice? It has been falsely identifying government archiving with government censorship, and falsely identifying threats to publisher revenue with threats to peer review, at least since the debate over the NIH policy in 2004. For a more recent example, see its May 2006 public statement opposing FRPAA. (Also see my rebuttal.)
- I hope that publisher-members of the AAP will disavow these tactics and that journalists and policy-makers will understand the difference between intellectual debate and media massage.
- Kudos to Nature for uncovering and reporting this story."
CIA Facebook recruits
Wired News reports that the CIA have been recruiting via Facebook.com.
"Since December 2006, the Central Intelligence Agency has been using Facebook.com, the popular social networking site, to recruit potential employees into its National Clandestine Service. It marks the first time the CIA has ventured into social networking to hire new personnel.
"Since December 2006, the Central Intelligence Agency has been using Facebook.com, the popular social networking site, to recruit potential employees into its National Clandestine Service. It marks the first time the CIA has ventured into social networking to hire new personnel.
The CIA's Facebook page (login required) provides an overview of what the NCS is looking for in a recruit, along with a 30-second promotional YouTube video aimed at potential college-aged applicants. U.S. citizens with a GPA above 3.0 can apply."
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
Limiting the risks of government data sharing
There are some smart people in the civil service, like Owen Barder, the Director for Global Development Effectiveness at DfID, the UK Department for International Development, the department charged with fighting global poverty, who makes some succinct points about government data sharing on his blog:
"The UK Government is going to consult more widely on its proposals for data sharing within government.
"The UK Government is going to consult more widely on its proposals for data sharing within government.
A national identity register that allows data sharing across government could be the technological underpinning of a huge improvement in the provision of government services. (It is important that the technology will not transform the services: it is a platform on which government processes can change).
Those of us who understand the technology and care about our civil liberties should not adopt a luddite stance of opposition: we should send a clear, consistent and simple message about the safeguards we need so that we get the benefits of joined up services without the risks to our freedoms.
I propose the following five, readily understandable safeguards. The government should commit itself to each of these, or offer an extremely good reason why not:
- government data should be stored in decentralized databases that can communicate with each other on a need to know basis, not in shared data warehouses;
- citizens should have access to all data held about them by government
- citizens should be able to see a complete log of every access to their personal data by all public servants
- an independent information security ombudsman should police the systems
- there should be no identity cards and no collection of biometric data"
Survey: 25% support torture
The Guardian reports on the British Social Attitudes survey (3,000 inrterviews by the National Centre for Social Research). Apparently a third of those questioned think banning peaceful protests and 25% think torture is a price worth paying to fight terrorism.
William Heath reckons that means "a quarter of us are evil and a third deeply misguided." I think too many people have been watching the US drama 24, where the hero Jack Bauer at some point in his busy days always ends up torturing somebody to get the crucial information save the world.
"About 80% said electronic tagging of terrorist suspects was "a price worth paying" to combat terrorism. The same proportion backed home curfews, travel restrictions and detention without charge for more than a week. Less than a quarter of the population said torturing terror suspects would be "a price worth paying" and only 35% would accept a ban on peaceful protests and demonstrations. But the nation is almost equally divided on whether people charged with terrorism-related crime should be denied a jury trial - with 50% finding that acceptable and 45% unacceptable.
Conor Gearty, professor of human rights law at the London School of Economics and joint author of the report's civil rights chapter, said: "The very mention of something being a counter-terrorism measure makes people more willing to contemplate the giving up of their freedoms. It is as though society is in the process of forgetting why past generations thought these freedoms to be so very important." "
Conor's right and I'm reminded of Martin Niemoeller's poem...
First they came for the communists but I wasn't a communist so I didn't do anything
Then they came for the social democrats but I wasn't a social democrat so I didn't do anything
Then they came for the trade unionists but I wasn't a trade unionist so I didn't do anything
Then they came for the Jews but I wasn't a Jew so I didn't do anything
Then they came for the Catholics but I was a protestant so I didn't do anything
Then they came for me and there was no one left to defend me.
William Heath reckons that means "a quarter of us are evil and a third deeply misguided." I think too many people have been watching the US drama 24, where the hero Jack Bauer at some point in his busy days always ends up torturing somebody to get the crucial information save the world.
"About 80% said electronic tagging of terrorist suspects was "a price worth paying" to combat terrorism. The same proportion backed home curfews, travel restrictions and detention without charge for more than a week. Less than a quarter of the population said torturing terror suspects would be "a price worth paying" and only 35% would accept a ban on peaceful protests and demonstrations. But the nation is almost equally divided on whether people charged with terrorism-related crime should be denied a jury trial - with 50% finding that acceptable and 45% unacceptable.
Conor Gearty, professor of human rights law at the London School of Economics and joint author of the report's civil rights chapter, said: "The very mention of something being a counter-terrorism measure makes people more willing to contemplate the giving up of their freedoms. It is as though society is in the process of forgetting why past generations thought these freedoms to be so very important." "
Conor's right and I'm reminded of Martin Niemoeller's poem...
First they came for the communists but I wasn't a communist so I didn't do anything
Then they came for the social democrats but I wasn't a social democrat so I didn't do anything
Then they came for the trade unionists but I wasn't a trade unionist so I didn't do anything
Then they came for the Jews but I wasn't a Jew so I didn't do anything
Then they came for the Catholics but I was a protestant so I didn't do anything
Then they came for me and there was no one left to defend me.
HughesDirect drm mini saga concluded
It looks like my drm mini saga has come to a satisfactory conclusion. I've had an email today saying HughesDirect have refunded the money I paid out for the faulty DVD player, returned via City-Link on Monday. Well done and thank you to the folks at HughesDirect for being so helpful and professional in dealing with the problem.
Police struggle with 'cybercrime'
The Independent is reporting this morning that a new report from the Metropolitan Police says the police are struggling to cope with the rise of cybercrime (which they also call e-crime). Firstly let me get my usual irritation about e-things out of the way. There is no such thing as 'e-crime'. It is just that criminals now have access to these not-so-newfangled-anymore tools called computers. The police, however, have nothing like the resources or personnel with the experience or skills required to tackle the numbers of crimes that now incorporate a computing element.
That constitutes a failure of police management and of government. If police management were not so blindly focussed on artificial simplistic targets, then maybe, as the Met report concludes, "The ability of law enforcement to investigate all types of e-crime locally and globally" would "be 'mainstreamed' as an integral part of every investigation, whether it be specialist, or murder, robbery, extortion demands, identity theft or fraud." Maybe too, when the local vandals engage in another round of boredom, drugs or alcohol induced criminal damage, we could get a real police officer to investigate and catch the perpetrators, rather than having to phone a supposedly local number, which diverts to a call centre where the operator doesn't even know the location of your town and is only empowered to provide you with a crime number and no more. (Interestingly enough when the then Mayor's wall was damaged some time ago the police were round doing door to door inquiries asking if we had seen anything).
If the government weren't so intent on headline-reflex legislating and pouring billions of pounds into ill thought out information systems to 'solve' everything from NHS waiting lists to immigration and terrorism, then maybe a fraction of those wasted resources could be diverted to support the difficult jobs that the police and intelligence services have to do, with, of course, the appropriate checks and balances. The real work of policing and intelligence, though, is difficult and complex, often tedious, time consuming and dangerous. Sadly for the people involved in such jobs this process has the rather serious political drawback of not being constantly, spectacularly and superficially newsworthy. So whilst the politicians chase headlines and police management chase targets, those who have to do the real work just do their best.
That constitutes a failure of police management and of government. If police management were not so blindly focussed on artificial simplistic targets, then maybe, as the Met report concludes, "The ability of law enforcement to investigate all types of e-crime locally and globally" would "be 'mainstreamed' as an integral part of every investigation, whether it be specialist, or murder, robbery, extortion demands, identity theft or fraud." Maybe too, when the local vandals engage in another round of boredom, drugs or alcohol induced criminal damage, we could get a real police officer to investigate and catch the perpetrators, rather than having to phone a supposedly local number, which diverts to a call centre where the operator doesn't even know the location of your town and is only empowered to provide you with a crime number and no more. (Interestingly enough when the then Mayor's wall was damaged some time ago the police were round doing door to door inquiries asking if we had seen anything).
If the government weren't so intent on headline-reflex legislating and pouring billions of pounds into ill thought out information systems to 'solve' everything from NHS waiting lists to immigration and terrorism, then maybe a fraction of those wasted resources could be diverted to support the difficult jobs that the police and intelligence services have to do, with, of course, the appropriate checks and balances. The real work of policing and intelligence, though, is difficult and complex, often tedious, time consuming and dangerous. Sadly for the people involved in such jobs this process has the rather serious political drawback of not being constantly, spectacularly and superficially newsworthy. So whilst the politicians chase headlines and police management chase targets, those who have to do the real work just do their best.
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Kahle v Gonzales: Court upholds copyright in orphan works
Via Michael Geist:
"A U.S. appeals court has rejected a bid by Internet activists to roll back federal laws that extended copyright protection over orphan works, or books and other media that are no longer in print. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed a lower court decision to dismiss Kahle v. Gonzales, which argued that legal changes made in the 1990s had vastly extended copyright protections at the expense of free speech rights."
The decision is available at http://www.ninthcircuitopinions.com/2007/01/22/kahle-v-gonzales
Larry Lessig argued the case before the court in November and there are further details on the case at the Stanford website.
"In this case, two archives ask the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California to hold that statutes that extended copyright terms unconditionally — the Copyright Renewal Act and the Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA)— are unconstitutional under the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment, and that the Copyright Renewal Act and CTEA together create an “effectively perpetual” term with respect to works first published after January 1, 1964 and before January 1, 1978, in violation of the Constitution’s Limited Times and Promote...Progress Clauses. The Complaint asks the Court for a declaratory judgment that copyright restrictions on orphaned works — works whose copyright has not expired but which are no longer available — violate the constitution."
Well the court rejected the argument. I guess there will be plenty of commentary from the usual suspects in due course.
"A U.S. appeals court has rejected a bid by Internet activists to roll back federal laws that extended copyright protection over orphan works, or books and other media that are no longer in print. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed a lower court decision to dismiss Kahle v. Gonzales, which argued that legal changes made in the 1990s had vastly extended copyright protections at the expense of free speech rights."
The decision is available at http://www.ninthcircuitopinions.com/2007/01/22/kahle-v-gonzales
Larry Lessig argued the case before the court in November and there are further details on the case at the Stanford website.
"In this case, two archives ask the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California to hold that statutes that extended copyright terms unconditionally — the Copyright Renewal Act and the Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA)— are unconstitutional under the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment, and that the Copyright Renewal Act and CTEA together create an “effectively perpetual” term with respect to works first published after January 1, 1964 and before January 1, 1978, in violation of the Constitution’s Limited Times and Promote...Progress Clauses. The Complaint asks the Court for a declaratory judgment that copyright restrictions on orphaned works — works whose copyright has not expired but which are no longer available — violate the constitution."
Well the court rejected the argument. I guess there will be plenty of commentary from the usual suspects in due course.
Speaking of ignoring evidence...
Not only have government been ignoring evidence pointing out the nature of the problems with their NHS IT systems but it seems they have been actively trying to hide at least some of these problems according to John Young:
"The UK government's Department of Health has removed the following three embarrassing documents from its website. Two of them describe the 'sealed envelope' mechanism proposed to protect the privacy of medical records in their proposed national medical records database, while the third is a consultancy report saying that sensitive information would be better held in local systems."
nhs-sealed-pr.doc (Connecting for Health's own Risk Analysis: Confidentiality problems will cause risk to Health)
nhs-sealedenvs2.doc (Sealed Envelopes - Guiding Principles Document)
nhs-sealedenvs1.doc (Sealed Envelopes briefing paper)
Thanks to HJ Affleck at FIPR for the pointer.
"The UK government's Department of Health has removed the following three embarrassing documents from its website. Two of them describe the 'sealed envelope' mechanism proposed to protect the privacy of medical records in their proposed national medical records database, while the third is a consultancy report saying that sensitive information would be better held in local systems."
nhs-sealed-pr.doc (Connecting for Health's own Risk Analysis: Confidentiality problems will cause risk to Health)
nhs-sealedenvs2.doc (Sealed Envelopes - Guiding Principles Document)
nhs-sealedenvs1.doc (Sealed Envelopes briefing paper)
Thanks to HJ Affleck at FIPR for the pointer.
Disproportionate and special interest lawmaking
With government spokespeople complaining all over the place about the police investigating cash for honours, it seems fairly clear that when they were introducing over 3000 new crimes during the past ten years, these crimes weren't meant to apply to themselves, the good guys. Don't the police realise that these laws were supposed to help them tackle the bad guys and if some innocent people get caught up in the process then that was the price of public safety, as long as none of the elite are amongst those caught in the net, of course.
In any case, the 'trust me because I'm a good guy who sincerely believes he is doing the right thing' approach to government is completely unsustainable when it involves unquestioning faith in a ruling elite engaged in perennially and systematically ignoring mass quantities of evidence contrary to their worldview. Clifford's essay, 'The Ethics of Belief' comes back to mind here.
I don't know whether the New Labour insiders who have been arrested in the cash for honours investigation or whether the New Labour friends about be prosecuted in the BAe-Saudi arms affair, before the government terminated the case, have engaged in criminal behaviour. I do believe that a government that sails to power on the promise of being "tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime", introduces new sweeping criminal justice legislation on average every two months for ten years and then implies that they themselves are outside of the reach of such laws, blast a huge hole in their own ship way below the credibility line. The rather unfortunate fall out for those like Lord Levy who have been subject to investigation is that if they are not subsequently prosecuted due to lack of evidence or incontrovertable evidence of innocence, it will be too easy to believe that some other member of the elite protected them - the no smoke without fire syndrome - and Levy and others might not get a chance to clear their names.
An approach to criminal justice legislation which involves a constant legislating reflex response to the latest headlines, based on a belief about what the police or security services want and only what they want, is also unsustainable. It is indicative of governing through laws written by and for powerful special interest groups, both within and outwith government. (The police and security services should have all the resources and tools they need to do the difficult job they have to do but with the appropriate checks and balances in place to ensure we don't creep down the road of a police state. (You only have to look at today's headlines about the complicity of the RUC in loyalist murders to see how it can so easily get out of control). Even the head of MI6 said last week that the government had gone too far in implying the BAe-Saudi case had been shut down at his request.)
Larry Lessig makes pretty much the same point in the closing chapter of the second edition of Code, in the context of copyright legislation:
"In the last ten years Congress has passed exactly one bill to deal with the problem of spam - the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003. OVer the same period, Congress has passed 24 laws affecting copyright...
This pattern is not an accident. In a political world that is dominated as ours is, lawmaking happens when special interests benefit. It doesn't happen when special interests oppose. And in these two instances, the lack of regulation and the plethora of regulation is explained by this point precisely. There have been 24 bills about copyright because rock stars lobby for them. There has been one bill about spam because the direct mailers (and many large companies) testified against them."
In any case, the 'trust me because I'm a good guy who sincerely believes he is doing the right thing' approach to government is completely unsustainable when it involves unquestioning faith in a ruling elite engaged in perennially and systematically ignoring mass quantities of evidence contrary to their worldview. Clifford's essay, 'The Ethics of Belief' comes back to mind here.
I don't know whether the New Labour insiders who have been arrested in the cash for honours investigation or whether the New Labour friends about be prosecuted in the BAe-Saudi arms affair, before the government terminated the case, have engaged in criminal behaviour. I do believe that a government that sails to power on the promise of being "tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime", introduces new sweeping criminal justice legislation on average every two months for ten years and then implies that they themselves are outside of the reach of such laws, blast a huge hole in their own ship way below the credibility line. The rather unfortunate fall out for those like Lord Levy who have been subject to investigation is that if they are not subsequently prosecuted due to lack of evidence or incontrovertable evidence of innocence, it will be too easy to believe that some other member of the elite protected them - the no smoke without fire syndrome - and Levy and others might not get a chance to clear their names.
An approach to criminal justice legislation which involves a constant legislating reflex response to the latest headlines, based on a belief about what the police or security services want and only what they want, is also unsustainable. It is indicative of governing through laws written by and for powerful special interest groups, both within and outwith government. (The police and security services should have all the resources and tools they need to do the difficult job they have to do but with the appropriate checks and balances in place to ensure we don't creep down the road of a police state. (You only have to look at today's headlines about the complicity of the RUC in loyalist murders to see how it can so easily get out of control). Even the head of MI6 said last week that the government had gone too far in implying the BAe-Saudi case had been shut down at his request.)
Larry Lessig makes pretty much the same point in the closing chapter of the second edition of Code, in the context of copyright legislation:
"In the last ten years Congress has passed exactly one bill to deal with the problem of spam - the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003. OVer the same period, Congress has passed 24 laws affecting copyright...
This pattern is not an accident. In a political world that is dominated as ours is, lawmaking happens when special interests benefit. It doesn't happen when special interests oppose. And in these two instances, the lack of regulation and the plethora of regulation is explained by this point precisely. There have been 24 bills about copyright because rock stars lobby for them. There has been one bill about spam because the direct mailers (and many large companies) testified against them."
Monday, January 22, 2007
Identity Crisis
Kim Cameron has been reading Jim Harper's book Identity Crisis.
"Jim Harper really understands identification. And he is better than anyone at explaining what identification systems won’t do for us - or our institutions. He carefully explains why many of the proposed uses of identification are irrational - delivering results that are quite unrelated to what they are purported to do. In my view, getting this message out is just as important as explaining what identity will do...
I have only one criticism of the book. I would like to see us separate the notion of identity, on the one hand, and individual identification (or identifiers) on the other. We need return to the original meaning of identity: the fact of being who or what a person or thing is.
"Jim Harper really understands identification. And he is better than anyone at explaining what identification systems won’t do for us - or our institutions. He carefully explains why many of the proposed uses of identification are irrational - delivering results that are quite unrelated to what they are purported to do. In my view, getting this message out is just as important as explaining what identity will do...
I have only one criticism of the book. I would like to see us separate the notion of identity, on the one hand, and individual identification (or identifiers) on the other. We need return to the original meaning of identity: the fact of being who or what a person or thing is.
As a simple example, suppose I’m a service provider building a chat room for children, and want to limit participation to children who are between 12 and 15. Let me contrast two ways of doing this.
In the first, all the children are given an identifier. To get into the room, they present their identifier and prove they are the person to whom that identifier was given. Then the chatroom system does a lookup in some public system linking identifier and age to make the access control decision.
In the second, the children are given a “digital claim” that they are of some age, and a way to prove they are the person to whom that ”claim” was given. The chatroom system just queries the claim to see if it meets its criteria. There is no reference to any public or even private identifier.
My point is that the first mechanism involves use of an identifier. The second still involves identity - in the sense of being what a person is - but the identification, so rightly put into question by Jim’s book, has been put into the trashcan where it belongs.
The use of an identifier in our first example breaks the second Law of Identity (Data Minimization - release no more data than necessary). It breaks the third Law too (Fewest Parties - since it discloses use of information to a central database unnecessary to the transaction). Finally, it breaks the Fourth Law (using an omnidirectional identifier when none is required)."
The case against secrecy in voting system testing
Joseph Lorenzo and Aaron Burstein have written a persuasive opinion piece in Roll Call explaining the damage that secrecy in electronic system oversight does to the election process.
"The Election Assistance Commission has some explaining to do. The secrecy that pervades the EAC, which oversees testing and certification of voting systems, holds dire consequences for our electoral system. Both chambers of Congress need to work to dispel this culture of secrecy.
A recent case illustrates why secrecy is a fundamental problem at the EAC. Last summer the EAC prohibited a lab run by Ciber Inc. from testing new voting systems due to inadequate test plans and documentation. Nonetheless, the voting systems that Ciber previously has tested remained certified and were used in elections in November. The EAC has not disclosed which voting systems Ciber tested using faulty procedures, but according to our calculations, nearly 70 percent of registered voters in the 2006 general elections voted on equipment qualified by Ciber...
consider that the public and voting officials learned of the Ciber de-accreditation not from the EAC last summer, but from The New York Times two weeks ago...
Secrecy is pervasive in voting system development and testing. As one test lab representative testified before the EAC in October, their procedures must be kept secret because their clients — voting system vendors — require confidentiality and “own” the test results. Though this secrecy might protect some proprietary information, or prevent embarrassing information from coming to light, it is inimical to proper oversight of the election system.
Last month, when the EAC adopted its new testing and certification policy, it left the major elements of voting system testing secrecy in place. For example, the EAC’s new policy will continue to allow voting system manufacturers to select, pay and communicate confidentially with test labs, thus diminishing the labs’ independence. Under its new rules, the EAC will not receive manufacturers’ technical data packages, which are documents crucial to understanding a voting system...
In addition, the EAC failed to ensure that election officials, as well as the public, can assess the sufficiency of the test labs’ work. Under its new policy, the EAC will publish test labs’ reports about systems that gain certification. The EAC, however, will not publish the details about what a lab did to test a system, the so-called test plan. Keeping the test plan secret will make it difficult for anyone other than the EAC, the labs and the vendors to judge the conclusions presented in the report. As the experience with Ciber shows, knowing how a test lab evaluates a voting system is just as important as knowing what conclusions the lab reaches.
This secrecy works against voting integrity. Test labs, after all, are charged with determining whether voting systems satisfy standards, all of which are public. Test plans simply put the rubber to the road, and the system benefits by having a common understanding of what kinds of tests are sufficiently rigorous. Keeping this information secret only protects labs with lax procedures. Greater transparency, on the other hand, would encourage all test labs to develop more rigorous procedures."
"The Election Assistance Commission has some explaining to do. The secrecy that pervades the EAC, which oversees testing and certification of voting systems, holds dire consequences for our electoral system. Both chambers of Congress need to work to dispel this culture of secrecy.
A recent case illustrates why secrecy is a fundamental problem at the EAC. Last summer the EAC prohibited a lab run by Ciber Inc. from testing new voting systems due to inadequate test plans and documentation. Nonetheless, the voting systems that Ciber previously has tested remained certified and were used in elections in November. The EAC has not disclosed which voting systems Ciber tested using faulty procedures, but according to our calculations, nearly 70 percent of registered voters in the 2006 general elections voted on equipment qualified by Ciber...
consider that the public and voting officials learned of the Ciber de-accreditation not from the EAC last summer, but from The New York Times two weeks ago...
Secrecy is pervasive in voting system development and testing. As one test lab representative testified before the EAC in October, their procedures must be kept secret because their clients — voting system vendors — require confidentiality and “own” the test results. Though this secrecy might protect some proprietary information, or prevent embarrassing information from coming to light, it is inimical to proper oversight of the election system.
Last month, when the EAC adopted its new testing and certification policy, it left the major elements of voting system testing secrecy in place. For example, the EAC’s new policy will continue to allow voting system manufacturers to select, pay and communicate confidentially with test labs, thus diminishing the labs’ independence. Under its new rules, the EAC will not receive manufacturers’ technical data packages, which are documents crucial to understanding a voting system...
In addition, the EAC failed to ensure that election officials, as well as the public, can assess the sufficiency of the test labs’ work. Under its new policy, the EAC will publish test labs’ reports about systems that gain certification. The EAC, however, will not publish the details about what a lab did to test a system, the so-called test plan. Keeping the test plan secret will make it difficult for anyone other than the EAC, the labs and the vendors to judge the conclusions presented in the report. As the experience with Ciber shows, knowing how a test lab evaluates a voting system is just as important as knowing what conclusions the lab reaches.
This secrecy works against voting integrity. Test labs, after all, are charged with determining whether voting systems satisfy standards, all of which are public. Test plans simply put the rubber to the road, and the system benefits by having a common understanding of what kinds of tests are sufficiently rigorous. Keeping this information secret only protects labs with lax procedures. Greater transparency, on the other hand, would encourage all test labs to develop more rigorous procedures."
Gutmann Vista and DRM: Microsoft Response
Microsoft have posted a response to Peter Gutmann's cost analysis of the insane digital restrictions being built into Microsoft's new operating system, Vista. The response pened by Dave Marsh, a Lead Program Manager for video, basically confirms Gutmann's concerns, as the intro. demonstrates:
"Windows Vista includes content protection infrastructure specifically designed to help ensure that protected commercial audiovisual content, such as newly released HD-DVD or Blu-Ray discs, can be enjoyed on Windows Vista PCs. In many cases this content has policies associated with its use that must be enforced by playback devices. The policies associated with such content are applicable to all types of devices including Windows Vista PCs, computers running non-Windows operating systems, and standalone consumer electronics devices such as DVD players. If the policies required protections that Windows Vista couldn't support, then the content would not be able to play at all on Windows Vista PCs. Clearly that isn't a good scenario for consumers who are looking to enjoy great next generation content experiences on their PCs...
It's important to emphasize that while Windows Vista has the necessary infrastructure to support commercial content scenarios, this infrastructure is designed to minimize impact on other types of content and other activities on the same PC. For example, if a user were viewing medical imagery concurrently with playback of video which required image constraint, only the commercial video would be constrained -- not the medical image or other things on the user's desktop. Similarly, if someone was listening to commercial audio content while viewing medical imagery, none of the video protection mechanisms would be activated and the displayed images would again be unaffected...
The paper implies that Microsoft decides which protections should be active at any given time. This is not the case. The content protection infrastructure in Windows Vista provides a range of à la carte options that allows applications playing back protected content to properly enable the protections required by the policies established for such content by the content owner or service provider. In this way, the PC functions the same as any other consumer electronics device."
Another demonstration of the insanity of complex organisations and the restraints they place on the largely rational people who work for them. I'm sure Dave Marsh would much rather be focussing on delivering and loudly proclaiming fantastic new video functionality, than having to find explanations via carefully constructed language about third party contraints the company has accepted they need to build into the technology. I don't envy him that job in the slightest.
Update: Some of the comments at the end are really worth reading (though some are the usual Microsoft bashing for the sake of Microsoft bashing), like this one from a doctor pointing out the impact of lack of interoperability on patient care:
"Since when did you think that DRM would not apply to medical imaging. Speaking as a physician, we ALREADY have this problem. The medical image DICOM format has been split into various flavors by competing software vendors who do their best to make sure that you have to have THEIR viewer in order to see files saved in their version of the format.
Further competing hospitals are choosing not to install viewers that would allow MD's to look at films that were taken at their competition ( or perhaps their IT staff can't be bothered to install them -- either way the result is the same). This proprietary behavior is already hindering patient care."
Technically this isn't necessarily drm the doc is complaining about but lack of interoperability, (which drm will also impede).
"Windows Vista includes content protection infrastructure specifically designed to help ensure that protected commercial audiovisual content, such as newly released HD-DVD or Blu-Ray discs, can be enjoyed on Windows Vista PCs. In many cases this content has policies associated with its use that must be enforced by playback devices. The policies associated with such content are applicable to all types of devices including Windows Vista PCs, computers running non-Windows operating systems, and standalone consumer electronics devices such as DVD players. If the policies required protections that Windows Vista couldn't support, then the content would not be able to play at all on Windows Vista PCs. Clearly that isn't a good scenario for consumers who are looking to enjoy great next generation content experiences on their PCs...
It's important to emphasize that while Windows Vista has the necessary infrastructure to support commercial content scenarios, this infrastructure is designed to minimize impact on other types of content and other activities on the same PC. For example, if a user were viewing medical imagery concurrently with playback of video which required image constraint, only the commercial video would be constrained -- not the medical image or other things on the user's desktop. Similarly, if someone was listening to commercial audio content while viewing medical imagery, none of the video protection mechanisms would be activated and the displayed images would again be unaffected...
The paper implies that Microsoft decides which protections should be active at any given time. This is not the case. The content protection infrastructure in Windows Vista provides a range of à la carte options that allows applications playing back protected content to properly enable the protections required by the policies established for such content by the content owner or service provider. In this way, the PC functions the same as any other consumer electronics device."
Another demonstration of the insanity of complex organisations and the restraints they place on the largely rational people who work for them. I'm sure Dave Marsh would much rather be focussing on delivering and loudly proclaiming fantastic new video functionality, than having to find explanations via carefully constructed language about third party contraints the company has accepted they need to build into the technology. I don't envy him that job in the slightest.
Update: Some of the comments at the end are really worth reading (though some are the usual Microsoft bashing for the sake of Microsoft bashing), like this one from a doctor pointing out the impact of lack of interoperability on patient care:
"Since when did you think that DRM would not apply to medical imaging. Speaking as a physician, we ALREADY have this problem. The medical image DICOM format has been split into various flavors by competing software vendors who do their best to make sure that you have to have THEIR viewer in order to see files saved in their version of the format.
Further competing hospitals are choosing not to install viewers that would allow MD's to look at films that were taken at their competition ( or perhaps their IT staff can't be bothered to install them -- either way the result is the same). This proprietary behavior is already hindering patient care."
Technically this isn't necessarily drm the doc is complaining about but lack of interoperability, (which drm will also impede).
Rob Glaser calls for end to DRM
I learn from Derek Slater that RealNetworks' Rob Glaser has called for an end to DRM encumbered music downloads.
"Glaser reportedly stated that he is "seeing some signs the industry is open to ... giving consumers a way to purchase music with the flexibility that you can only get if you take the DRM off.... For purchases, move away from DRM" (emphasis added). What common sense - when you buy music, you own it and should be able to make personal use of it however you want."
Btw, my own drm mini saga is still partly ongoing. The replacement DVD player got delivered and seems to work ok - it reads and plays my DVDs, or at least the three I've so far tried on it. But when City-Link delivered the new machine the van driver refused to collect the faulty one. It wasn't his job apparently. Coming up to 5pm on Friday I was getting kinda anxious that there were no further City-Link vans on the horizon - my refund on the faulty machine does not come through until Hughes-Direct get it back.
So I phoned City-Link. They had no notification of a collection from my address.
So I phoned Hughes-Direct. They assured me they had arranged for the collection and gave me a collection tracking number.
So I phoned City-Link with the number and was informed that Hughes-Direct had asked for the faulty machine to be picked up next Friday, 26th January between 10am and 5pm.
So I phoned Hughes-Direct and pointed out what I assumed to be the error. They told me they would arrange for the machine to be picked up today between 10am and 5pm Well so far no sign of the City-Link van and since my refund is dependent on the efficient expedition of the logistics between them I'm hoping I'm not going to be playing phone tag between the two firms again this evening.
Update: Well City-Link collected the faulty machine about 3.30pm and now I have to trust/make sure that the appropriate refund will be expeditiously forthcoming in the next few days.
"Glaser reportedly stated that he is "seeing some signs the industry is open to ... giving consumers a way to purchase music with the flexibility that you can only get if you take the DRM off.... For purchases, move away from DRM" (emphasis added). What common sense - when you buy music, you own it and should be able to make personal use of it however you want."
Btw, my own drm mini saga is still partly ongoing. The replacement DVD player got delivered and seems to work ok - it reads and plays my DVDs, or at least the three I've so far tried on it. But when City-Link delivered the new machine the van driver refused to collect the faulty one. It wasn't his job apparently. Coming up to 5pm on Friday I was getting kinda anxious that there were no further City-Link vans on the horizon - my refund on the faulty machine does not come through until Hughes-Direct get it back.
So I phoned City-Link. They had no notification of a collection from my address.
So I phoned Hughes-Direct. They assured me they had arranged for the collection and gave me a collection tracking number.
So I phoned City-Link with the number and was informed that Hughes-Direct had asked for the faulty machine to be picked up next Friday, 26th January between 10am and 5pm.
So I phoned Hughes-Direct and pointed out what I assumed to be the error. They told me they would arrange for the machine to be picked up today between 10am and 5pm Well so far no sign of the City-Link van and since my refund is dependent on the efficient expedition of the logistics between them I'm hoping I'm not going to be playing phone tag between the two firms again this evening.
Update: Well City-Link collected the faulty machine about 3.30pm and now I have to trust/make sure that the appropriate refund will be expeditiously forthcoming in the next few days.
Sunday, January 21, 2007
Judge allows music industry suit v XM radio to go ahead
A US District Judge has decided that the music industry's lawsuit against XM satellite radio for allowing listeners to record/store songs should be allowed to go ahead.
"A lawsuit in which record companies allege XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc. is cheating them by letting consumers store songs can proceed toward trial, a judge ruled Friday after finding merit to the companies' claims.
In a lawsuit last year, the companies said XM directly infringes on their exclusive distribution rights by letting consumers record songs onto special receivers marketed as "XM + MP3" players."
"A lawsuit in which record companies allege XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc. is cheating them by letting consumers store songs can proceed toward trial, a judge ruled Friday after finding merit to the companies' claims.
U.S. District Judge Deborah A. Batts made the finding in a case brought by Atlantic Recording Corp., BMG Music, Capitol Records Inc. and other music distribution companies against the licensed satellite radio broadcaster.
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Gonzales quized about domestic spying
US Attorney General has been questioned by the Senate Judiciary Committee about the warrantless domestic spying programme that the Bush administration has apparently agreed to subject to FISA oversight.
Friday, January 19, 2007
A deadly certitude
Steven Weinberg has been reviewing Richard Dawkins' latest book The God Delusion.
"Richard Dawkins’s even-handedness is well-intentioned, but it is misplaced. I share his lack of respect for all religions, but in our times it is folly to disrespect them all equally."
"Richard Dawkins’s even-handedness is well-intentioned, but it is misplaced. I share his lack of respect for all religions, but in our times it is folly to disrespect them all equally."
NYT Pogue Blog Ode to the RIAA
David Pogue at the NYT has composed an "Ode to the RIAA" to the tune of Village People's "YMCA". One comment suggested it should have been "Owed to the RIAA"
"You’ve just been sued by the R.I.A.A.!
You’ve just been sued by the R.I.A.A.!
Their attorneys say, you committed a crime,
And there’d better not be a next time!
They’ve lost their minds at the R.I.A.A.!
Justice is blind at the R.I.A.A….
“You’re depriving the bands! You are learning to steal,
You can’t do whatever you feel!”"
Funny.
"You’ve just been sued by the R.I.A.A.!
You’ve just been sued by the R.I.A.A.!
Their attorneys say, you committed a crime,
And there’d better not be a next time!
They’ve lost their minds at the R.I.A.A.!
Justice is blind at the R.I.A.A….
“You’re depriving the bands! You are learning to steal,
You can’t do whatever you feel!”"
Funny.
Superdatabase madness
One blogger has been pondering what life will be like for an ordinary Joe Soap in a superdatabase UK, with the government intent on demolishing all barriers to data sharing.
"Joe Soap, clean, honest living man who wanted to find new work to pay the mortgage and his bills, never been in trouble in his life, now has a criminal record, his fingerprints and DNA will stay on file for 100 years, he now has an ASBO which makes it illegal for him to do everyday things that the rest of us can do legally, he is no longer allowed to travel to London, and travel anywhere else in the UK has to be approved by the police, he is on the V&S Offenders register, and his life is under constant supervision...
By passing laws and building Databases all your eggs are now in one basket and make everyone, absolutely everyone suspicious, be the target of suspicion, and allow the lowest rated civil servant access to your very soul.
I can hear Mr Blair protesting now that this is not what all these laws are for, but Mr Blair, please understand, THIS IS HOW THEY WILL BE APPLIED, if not in a dictatorial regime, certainly one in which it is very easy to hit all your targets when the laws are all on your side."
"Joe Soap, clean, honest living man who wanted to find new work to pay the mortgage and his bills, never been in trouble in his life, now has a criminal record, his fingerprints and DNA will stay on file for 100 years, he now has an ASBO which makes it illegal for him to do everyday things that the rest of us can do legally, he is no longer allowed to travel to London, and travel anywhere else in the UK has to be approved by the police, he is on the V&S Offenders register, and his life is under constant supervision...
By passing laws and building Databases all your eggs are now in one basket and make everyone, absolutely everyone suspicious, be the target of suspicion, and allow the lowest rated civil servant access to your very soul.
I can hear Mr Blair protesting now that this is not what all these laws are for, but Mr Blair, please understand, THIS IS HOW THEY WILL BE APPLIED, if not in a dictatorial regime, certainly one in which it is very easy to hit all your targets when the laws are all on your side."
Thursday, January 18, 2007
Commission 1 Ireland 0
The EU Commission have won a case against the Irish governement on failure to properly implement an EU directive from 1992 (Council Directive 92/100/EEC of 19 November 1992 on rental right and lending right and on certain rights related to copyright in the field of intellectual property).
The Irish government's crime? IPKat explains:
"They had exempted all categories of public lending establishments from the obligation to remunerate authors for any lending carried out by them, that's what they did."
IPKat welcomes the judgement. Personally, this time, I'm on the side of the Irish government, given the nature of the potential impact on open access.
The Irish government's crime? IPKat explains:
"They had exempted all categories of public lending establishments from the obligation to remunerate authors for any lending carried out by them, that's what they did."
IPKat welcomes the judgement. Personally, this time, I'm on the side of the Irish government, given the nature of the potential impact on open access.
Minister McFadden and wibbies
William Heath wonders if there may be a minister in government now who may be prepared to listen to some wibbies on information systems and government. His officials apparently like him anyway.
Bush agrees to drop warrantless wiretapping
The Bush administration has reportedly agreed (WSJ, subscription required unfortunately) to stop the mass warrantless wiretapping that has created so much controversy over the past eighteen months. The Department of Justice has said that such activities will be brought back under the review of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. I suspect, as usual with these things, that the devil will be in the detail and Marty Lederman agrees:
"The President has "determined not to reauthorize the Terrorist Surveillance Program when the current authorization expires," and the Department of Justice will now submit its surveillance applications to the FISA Court for approval. Indeed, this volte-face apparently is the result of the fact that DOJ has convinced a FISA judge to issue "innovative and complex" orders in one precedential case already. So says a new letter from the AG to Senators Leahy and Specter.
According to the letter, the FISA court seems to have approved orders finding that at least part of the FISA statutory standard was [would be?] satisfied -- that "one of the communicants is a member or agent of Al Qaeda or an associated terrorist organization." (That's not quite the statutory standard, which requires that the target of the intercept be such an agent, and also that "each of the facilities or places at which the electronic surveillance is directed is being used, or is about to be used, by a foreign power or an agent of a foreign power.") It apparently took "considerable time and work" for DOJ to persuade the FISA judge to go along with whatever this newfangled sort of approval is. (According to Tony Snow, the FISA Court has promulgated "guidelines" and "rules" to govern this new form of approval.)
The ACLU case challenging the legality of the TSP is, at least for now, scheduled to be argued before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in two weeks...
The transcript of the background conference call with DOJ officials is here. The officials there claimed that the new procedures "will comply in all respects with the requirements of the FISA statute,"... One official did stress, however, that the orders "take advantage of . . . developments in the law before the FISA court." In other words, the FISA court apparently has been persuaded that in some respects the FISA statute is more forgiving than previously understood -- that it demands less proof or proof of a different kind than what the court once required. Orin Kerr provocatively surmises that perhaps what's going on here is a form of anticipatory warrant. It's unlikely that we'll know the details of this secret new internal law of FISA anytime soon.]...
Without knowing anything more about it, my sense is that this is probably a beneficial development, whatever its impetus might have been. I find it very difficult to imagine that the FISA court would roll over and approve an "innovative" legal theory if it were dubious -- especially not in this context, where DOJ has many incentives to get the FISA court on-board and where the congressional and public spotlight is shining so brightly. Without the New York Times, and Judge Taylor, and the 2006 election, this would never have happened. Sunshine is the best disinfectant, and all . . . . Even though the public might never find out exactly what's up here, presumably Congress and the FISA court are now acting as some not-insignificant checks. And if so -- if the extreme and unilateral positions of the Executive are a thing of the past here, the system has worked."
It looks, on the surface, like a significant reigning in of presumed Executive powers for Mr Bush to back down on something this politically sensitive. Of course Marty Lederman and others have been arguing for some time that the president has been acting outside the constitutional checks on balances of his office in relation to his actions in approving the mass warrantless surveillance at the centre of this dispute. Jack Balkan thinks the motives are political:
"in this case, the Administration insisted for months that the President did not need to follow the procedures in FISA, either because of the AUMF or because of inherent Presidential authority. Apparently, it has now retreated from that legally untenable position, hoping to moot, or at the very least disarm, federal litigation challenging the legality of the NSA program. Once again, the goal is to prevent a court from stating clearly that the President acted illegally and that his theories of executive power are self-serving hokum.
When we put these two stories together, a pattern emerges: the Administration repeatedly takes unreasonable positions about its powers. It insists that obedience to these views is necessary to the very survival of the Republic and that those who would dare to disagree are jeopardizing national security. It makes these aggressive claims repeatedly in every venue, hoping that others, cowed by its aggressive self-confidence and patriotic appeals, will be overawed and simply give in. It struts and boasts and threatens and exaggerates until its bluff is called, at which point its previous assertions simply become-- as they once put it in the Nixon Administration-- inoperative. Put another way, the Administration's stance on Presidential power has resembled nothing so much as an altogether familiar character, the neighborhood bully."
"The President has "determined not to reauthorize the Terrorist Surveillance Program when the current authorization expires," and the Department of Justice will now submit its surveillance applications to the FISA Court for approval. Indeed, this volte-face apparently is the result of the fact that DOJ has convinced a FISA judge to issue "innovative and complex" orders in one precedential case already. So says a new letter from the AG to Senators Leahy and Specter.
According to the letter, the FISA court seems to have approved orders finding that at least part of the FISA statutory standard was [would be?] satisfied -- that "one of the communicants is a member or agent of Al Qaeda or an associated terrorist organization." (That's not quite the statutory standard, which requires that the target of the intercept be such an agent, and also that "each of the facilities or places at which the electronic surveillance is directed is being used, or is about to be used, by a foreign power or an agent of a foreign power.") It apparently took "considerable time and work" for DOJ to persuade the FISA judge to go along with whatever this newfangled sort of approval is. (According to Tony Snow, the FISA Court has promulgated "guidelines" and "rules" to govern this new form of approval.)
The ACLU case challenging the legality of the TSP is, at least for now, scheduled to be argued before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in two weeks...
The transcript of the background conference call with DOJ officials is here. The officials there claimed that the new procedures "will comply in all respects with the requirements of the FISA statute,"... One official did stress, however, that the orders "take advantage of . . . developments in the law before the FISA court." In other words, the FISA court apparently has been persuaded that in some respects the FISA statute is more forgiving than previously understood -- that it demands less proof or proof of a different kind than what the court once required. Orin Kerr provocatively surmises that perhaps what's going on here is a form of anticipatory warrant. It's unlikely that we'll know the details of this secret new internal law of FISA anytime soon.]...
Without knowing anything more about it, my sense is that this is probably a beneficial development, whatever its impetus might have been. I find it very difficult to imagine that the FISA court would roll over and approve an "innovative" legal theory if it were dubious -- especially not in this context, where DOJ has many incentives to get the FISA court on-board and where the congressional and public spotlight is shining so brightly. Without the New York Times, and Judge Taylor, and the 2006 election, this would never have happened. Sunshine is the best disinfectant, and all . . . . Even though the public might never find out exactly what's up here, presumably Congress and the FISA court are now acting as some not-insignificant checks. And if so -- if the extreme and unilateral positions of the Executive are a thing of the past here, the system has worked."
It looks, on the surface, like a significant reigning in of presumed Executive powers for Mr Bush to back down on something this politically sensitive. Of course Marty Lederman and others have been arguing for some time that the president has been acting outside the constitutional checks on balances of his office in relation to his actions in approving the mass warrantless surveillance at the centre of this dispute. Jack Balkan thinks the motives are political:
"in this case, the Administration insisted for months that the President did not need to follow the procedures in FISA, either because of the AUMF or because of inherent Presidential authority. Apparently, it has now retreated from that legally untenable position, hoping to moot, or at the very least disarm, federal litigation challenging the legality of the NSA program. Once again, the goal is to prevent a court from stating clearly that the President acted illegally and that his theories of executive power are self-serving hokum.
When we put these two stories together, a pattern emerges: the Administration repeatedly takes unreasonable positions about its powers. It insists that obedience to these views is necessary to the very survival of the Republic and that those who would dare to disagree are jeopardizing national security. It makes these aggressive claims repeatedly in every venue, hoping that others, cowed by its aggressive self-confidence and patriotic appeals, will be overawed and simply give in. It struts and boasts and threatens and exaggerates until its bluff is called, at which point its previous assertions simply become-- as they once put it in the Nixon Administration-- inoperative. Put another way, the Administration's stance on Presidential power has resembled nothing so much as an altogether familiar character, the neighborhood bully."
eIFL Statement at WIPO SCCR
The Electronic Information for Libraries (eIFL) have just made an eloquent and succinct statement to the WIPO committee considering the broadcast treaty, the Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights. I hope the eIFL folks don't mind me reproducing it in full here (via the A2K list):
Limitations and Exceptions for Libraries
Electronic Information for Libraries (eIFL) and the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) have argued in our previous statements that any draft treaty on the protection of broadcast organisations limits itself to its intent i.e. to prohibit signal piracy. We welcome the endeavours in the Chairs discussion non-paper that the focus should be set on the protection of the live signal and on signal theft.
Both our organisations support the Joint Statement of Certain Civil Society, Private Sector and Rightsholder Representatives. Point three of the statement argues that any treaty that allows for broader rights must be accompanied by an equally broad set of mandatory exceptions and limitations. We believe that this is a time consuming task for the purposes of this draft treaty and in the signal based approach, it is unnecessary.
The alternative rights based approach would involve crafting appropriate exceptions and limitations, an increasingly complex task for the digital age. Today we live in a global digital environment. But the exceptions and limitations with which we work were developed in an analogue world. They are paperbound. The basic format for most content has become digital. Librarians find themselves struggling with unsuitable exceptions and limitations to adequately deliver content and services in the digital age. Nowadays, libraries must adopt sometimes absurd practices in order to comply with copyright law. Libraries services are stymied when they should be expanding and developing in response to new technologies. Analysis and guidance on the issues is necessary.
The agreed statement to Article 10 of the WIPO Copyright Treaty, which states that Member States may extend existing exceptions and limitations to the digital environment and may devise new exceptions appropriate to the digital network environment, was an attempt to provide a remedy to such future issues. Ten years on, we believe that the problems faced by libraries have become too complex to be properly addressed by this general statement expressing an intention.
Exceptions and limitations are being undermined in substance because they are bound to an ageing technology. As a result of the change in format from print to digital, libraries have largely become subject to contract law instead of copyright law. Libraries experience on a daily basis how exceptions and limitations are being undermined in principle by contracts which seek to override statutory exceptions and limitations and are enforced by technological protection measures. We believe that this serves to undermine copyright law itself. Analysis and guidance on the issues is necessary.
This is why we welcome the initiative of the distinguished delegation of Chile and the support of GRULAC for this committee to consider exceptions and limitations for libraries, education and the disabled in its regular work. The proposal by Chile for a study on exceptions and limitations for libraries is therefore a welcome step.
Libraries are an essential component for education and research, the acquiring of knowledge and culture by citizens, and for the enlightenment of society. This role has traditionally been recognised through exceptions and limitations for libraries as expressed in international treaties and national copyright laws.
We would wish for the proposed study to identify the problems, illustrated by case studies from a range of real experiences, from the local public library to the worlds great research libraries. Different remedies would be analysed, followed by recommendations of practical benefit to libraries. In this way, we would hope that the role of exceptions and limitations for libraries in the digital environment would be reinvigorated.
eIFL and IFLA believe that WIPO is the natural organisation to host such a study and we would be pleased to be of any assistance in this regard.
Limitations and Exceptions for Libraries
Electronic Information for Libraries (eIFL) and the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA) have argued in our previous statements that any draft treaty on the protection of broadcast organisations limits itself to its intent i.e. to prohibit signal piracy. We welcome the endeavours in the Chairs discussion non-paper that the focus should be set on the protection of the live signal and on signal theft.
Both our organisations support the Joint Statement of Certain Civil Society, Private Sector and Rightsholder Representatives. Point three of the statement argues that any treaty that allows for broader rights must be accompanied by an equally broad set of mandatory exceptions and limitations. We believe that this is a time consuming task for the purposes of this draft treaty and in the signal based approach, it is unnecessary.
The alternative rights based approach would involve crafting appropriate exceptions and limitations, an increasingly complex task for the digital age. Today we live in a global digital environment. But the exceptions and limitations with which we work were developed in an analogue world. They are paperbound. The basic format for most content has become digital. Librarians find themselves struggling with unsuitable exceptions and limitations to adequately deliver content and services in the digital age. Nowadays, libraries must adopt sometimes absurd practices in order to comply with copyright law. Libraries services are stymied when they should be expanding and developing in response to new technologies. Analysis and guidance on the issues is necessary.
The agreed statement to Article 10 of the WIPO Copyright Treaty, which states that Member States may extend existing exceptions and limitations to the digital environment and may devise new exceptions appropriate to the digital network environment, was an attempt to provide a remedy to such future issues. Ten years on, we believe that the problems faced by libraries have become too complex to be properly addressed by this general statement expressing an intention.
Exceptions and limitations are being undermined in substance because they are bound to an ageing technology. As a result of the change in format from print to digital, libraries have largely become subject to contract law instead of copyright law. Libraries experience on a daily basis how exceptions and limitations are being undermined in principle by contracts which seek to override statutory exceptions and limitations and are enforced by technological protection measures. We believe that this serves to undermine copyright law itself. Analysis and guidance on the issues is necessary.
This is why we welcome the initiative of the distinguished delegation of Chile and the support of GRULAC for this committee to consider exceptions and limitations for libraries, education and the disabled in its regular work. The proposal by Chile for a study on exceptions and limitations for libraries is therefore a welcome step.
Libraries are an essential component for education and research, the acquiring of knowledge and culture by citizens, and for the enlightenment of society. This role has traditionally been recognised through exceptions and limitations for libraries as expressed in international treaties and national copyright laws.
We would wish for the proposed study to identify the problems, illustrated by case studies from a range of real experiences, from the local public library to the worlds great research libraries. Different remedies would be analysed, followed by recommendations of practical benefit to libraries. In this way, we would hope that the role of exceptions and limitations for libraries in the digital environment would be reinvigorated.
eIFL and IFLA believe that WIPO is the natural organisation to host such a study and we would be pleased to be of any assistance in this regard.
WIPO attempt to finalise broadcasting treaty
James Love is in Geneva watching developments at the World Intellectual Proerty Organisation as they try to finalise negotiations over the proposed broadcasting treaty.
"One faction in the negotiations wants to revamp provisions in a 1962 treaty (one that the United States and 80 other countries never signed), with new or expanded intellectual property rights for anyone who "broadcasts" third party content. Relying upon the current 108 page draft of the treaty, they propose that anyone who qualifies as a "broadcaster" or "cablecaster" would get a set of exclusive rights to prevent others from re-publishing or using the information, including on the Internet, without permission from the broadcaster or cablecaster. This right would be in addition to the rights and permissions (if any) associated with the copyright in the work, and would apply even to works that are in the public domain, or where the copyright owner was willing to freely distribute the work. It would create an entirely new set of liability problems for companies that aggregate third party content, a fact that lawyers for Yahoo and News Corp (treaty supporters) have apparently not explained to their CEOs...
Opposing this scenario are a growing group of countries that want the treaty to take a much narrower approach, only prohibiting the "theft" of programing signals, but not extending an intellectual property right in other people's copyrighted works. The problem is, no one can explain why such protection is needed, since it is already illegal to steal cable or satellite service under many existing laws, including existing copyright laws."
"One faction in the negotiations wants to revamp provisions in a 1962 treaty (one that the United States and 80 other countries never signed), with new or expanded intellectual property rights for anyone who "broadcasts" third party content. Relying upon the current 108 page draft of the treaty, they propose that anyone who qualifies as a "broadcaster" or "cablecaster" would get a set of exclusive rights to prevent others from re-publishing or using the information, including on the Internet, without permission from the broadcaster or cablecaster. This right would be in addition to the rights and permissions (if any) associated with the copyright in the work, and would apply even to works that are in the public domain, or where the copyright owner was willing to freely distribute the work. It would create an entirely new set of liability problems for companies that aggregate third party content, a fact that lawyers for Yahoo and News Corp (treaty supporters) have apparently not explained to their CEOs...
Opposing this scenario are a growing group of countries that want the treaty to take a much narrower approach, only prohibiting the "theft" of programing signals, but not extending an intellectual property right in other people's copyrighted works. The problem is, no one can explain why such protection is needed, since it is already illegal to steal cable or satellite service under many existing laws, including existing copyright laws."
Privately, Hollywood admits DRM isn't about piracy
Given my increased level of irritation with DRM at the moment you won't be surprised that I draw your attention to this.
"For almost ten years now I have argued that digital rights management has little to do with piracy, but that is instead a carefully plotted ruse to undercut fair use and then create new revenue streams where there were previously none...
In a nutshell: DRM's sole purpose is to maximize revenues by minimizing your rights so that they can sell them back to you...
There is simply no evidence whatsoever that DRM slows piracy. In fact, all of the evidence suggests the opposite, and arguments that DRM "keeps honest people honest" are frankly insulting. If they're already honest, they don't need DRM.
If we believe Ronald Grover's sources in his BusinessWeek article of last week, the problem is liberal DRM and not piracy, and this is a startling admission. According to him, an unnamed studio executive said that a major reason why studios weren't jumping on board with the iTunes Store and other similar services is that their DRM is too lax. "[Apple's] user rules just scare the heck out of us." It's not piracy that's the concern, it's their ability to control how you use the content you purchase.
As it turns out, five devices authorized for playback is too many, and the studios apparently believe that this is "just as bad" as piracy. Hollywood believes that iTunes Store customers will add their buddies' devices to their authorization list, and like evil communists, they'll share what they have purchased. This makes little sense, because the way iTunes works, you can only issue so many device authorizations at a time. You could share with a friend, but then your friend would have to be authorized to play all of your purchased content, taking up an authorization. Inconvenient, huh? But is it a big problem?
I can walk in to Best Buy right now, buy a DVD, and lend it to every person I know. Who hasn't lent a DVD to a friend or colleague? This is perfectly legal behavior, but you can see that Hollywood hopes to stop this kind of thing via DRM. Thanks to the DMCA, once copyrighted contents have been encrypted, your rights fly right out the window."
"For almost ten years now I have argued that digital rights management has little to do with piracy, but that is instead a carefully plotted ruse to undercut fair use and then create new revenue streams where there were previously none...
In a nutshell: DRM's sole purpose is to maximize revenues by minimizing your rights so that they can sell them back to you...
There is simply no evidence whatsoever that DRM slows piracy. In fact, all of the evidence suggests the opposite, and arguments that DRM "keeps honest people honest" are frankly insulting. If they're already honest, they don't need DRM.
If we believe Ronald Grover's sources in his BusinessWeek article of last week, the problem is liberal DRM and not piracy, and this is a startling admission. According to him, an unnamed studio executive said that a major reason why studios weren't jumping on board with the iTunes Store and other similar services is that their DRM is too lax. "[Apple's] user rules just scare the heck out of us." It's not piracy that's the concern, it's their ability to control how you use the content you purchase.
As it turns out, five devices authorized for playback is too many, and the studios apparently believe that this is "just as bad" as piracy. Hollywood believes that iTunes Store customers will add their buddies' devices to their authorization list, and like evil communists, they'll share what they have purchased. This makes little sense, because the way iTunes works, you can only issue so many device authorizations at a time. You could share with a friend, but then your friend would have to be authorized to play all of your purchased content, taking up an authorization. Inconvenient, huh? But is it a big problem?
I can walk in to Best Buy right now, buy a DVD, and lend it to every person I know. Who hasn't lent a DVD to a friend or colleague? This is perfectly legal behavior, but you can see that Hollywood hopes to stop this kind of thing via DRM. Thanks to the DMCA, once copyrighted contents have been encrypted, your rights fly right out the window."
Horse bolted on school fingerprinting
I reported last week a small step forward in the school children fingerprinting saga. The Register reports that the Information Commissioner reckons the horse has bolted on this and it is too late to do anything about it.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Petition for open access to scientific publications
From Ian Brown via the ORG list, JISC and others are petitioning the EU for open access to scientific publications:
In the wake of the publication of the report from the "EU Study on
the Economic and Technical Evolution of the Scientific Publication
Markets of Europe" a consortium of organisations working in the
scholarly communication arena is sponsoring a petition to the
European Commission to demonstrate support for Open Access and for
the recommendations in the report. Signatures may be added on behalf
of individuals or institutions.
Please register your support for Open Access in this way. To sign the
petition (shown below), please go to http://www.ec-petition.eu/ The sponsoring organisations are JISC (Joint Information Systems
Committee, UK), SURF (Netherlands), SPARC Europe, DFG (Deutsches
Forschungsgemeinschaft, Germany), DEFF (Danmarks Elektroniske Fag- og
Forskningsbibliotek, Denmark).
Dear Commissioner,
Our mission of disseminating knowledge is only half complete if the
information is not made widely and readily available to society. Berlin Declaration, October 2003
In January 2006 the European Commission published the Study on the
Economic and Technical Evolution of the Scientific Publication
Markets of Europe. The Study resulted from a detailed analysis of the
current scholarly journal publication market, together with extensive
consultation with all the major stakeholders within the scholarly
communication process (researchers, funders, publishers, librarians,
research policymakers, etc.). The Study noted that 'dissemination and
access to research results is a pillar in the development of the
European Research Area' and it made a number of balanced and
reasonable recommendations to improve the visibility and usefulness
of European research outputs.
Now, a year after publication of the Study, we urge the EC to endorse
the recommendations in full. In particular, we encourage you to adopt
the first recommendation as a matter of urgency:
RECOMMENDATION A1. GUARANTEE PUBLIC ACCESS TO PUBLICLY-FUNDED
RESEARCH RESULTS SHORTLY AFTER PUBLICATION
Research funding agencies have a central role in determining
researchers' publishing practices. Following the lead of the NIH and
other institutions, they should promote and support the archiving of
publications in open repositories, after a (possibly domain-specific)
time period to be discussed with publishers. This archiving could
become a condition for funding.
The following actions could be taken at the European level: (i)
Establish a European policy mandating published articles arising from
EC-funded research to be available after a given time period in open
access archives, and (ii) Explore with Member States and with
European research and academic associations whether and how such
policies and open repositories could be implemented.
We would recommend that, in accordance with the recent
recommendations from the European Research Advisory Board and the
statement of the European Research Council on Open Access, any
potential 'embargo' on free access should be set at no more than six
months following publication.
Research must be widely disseminated and read to be useful. Adopting
Recommendation A1 will immediately ensure the widest possible
readership for EC-funded research, increasing the potential benefits
resulting from the research, and promoting European scholarship both
within Europe and beyond. Evidence is accumulating to indicate that
research that is openly accessible is read more and used more and
that open access to research findings would bring economic advantage
across the European Research Area. The Commission has a unique
opportunity to place Europe at the forefront of the dissemination of
research outputs and we encourage you to adopt the Study
recommendations for the benefit of European research.
In the wake of the publication of the report from the "EU Study on
the Economic and Technical Evolution of the Scientific Publication
Markets of Europe" a consortium of organisations working in the
scholarly communication arena is sponsoring a petition to the
European Commission to demonstrate support for Open Access and for
the recommendations in the report. Signatures may be added on behalf
of individuals or institutions.
Please register your support for Open Access in this way. To sign the
petition (shown below), please go to http://www.ec-petition.eu/ The sponsoring organisations are JISC (Joint Information Systems
Committee, UK), SURF (Netherlands), SPARC Europe, DFG (Deutsches
Forschungsgemeinschaft, Germany), DEFF (Danmarks Elektroniske Fag- og
Forskningsbibliotek, Denmark).
Dear Commissioner,
Our mission of disseminating knowledge is only half complete if the
information is not made widely and readily available to society. Berlin Declaration, October 2003
In January 2006 the European Commission published the Study on the
Economic and Technical Evolution of the Scientific Publication
Markets of Europe. The Study resulted from a detailed analysis of the
current scholarly journal publication market, together with extensive
consultation with all the major stakeholders within the scholarly
communication process (researchers, funders, publishers, librarians,
research policymakers, etc.). The Study noted that 'dissemination and
access to research results is a pillar in the development of the
European Research Area' and it made a number of balanced and
reasonable recommendations to improve the visibility and usefulness
of European research outputs.
Now, a year after publication of the Study, we urge the EC to endorse
the recommendations in full. In particular, we encourage you to adopt
the first recommendation as a matter of urgency:
RECOMMENDATION A1. GUARANTEE PUBLIC ACCESS TO PUBLICLY-FUNDED
RESEARCH RESULTS SHORTLY AFTER PUBLICATION
Research funding agencies have a central role in determining
researchers' publishing practices. Following the lead of the NIH and
other institutions, they should promote and support the archiving of
publications in open repositories, after a (possibly domain-specific)
time period to be discussed with publishers. This archiving could
become a condition for funding.
The following actions could be taken at the European level: (i)
Establish a European policy mandating published articles arising from
EC-funded research to be available after a given time period in open
access archives, and (ii) Explore with Member States and with
European research and academic associations whether and how such
policies and open repositories could be implemented.
We would recommend that, in accordance with the recent
recommendations from the European Research Advisory Board and the
statement of the European Research Council on Open Access, any
potential 'embargo' on free access should be set at no more than six
months following publication.
Research must be widely disseminated and read to be useful. Adopting
Recommendation A1 will immediately ensure the widest possible
readership for EC-funded research, increasing the potential benefits
resulting from the research, and promoting European scholarship both
within Europe and beyond. Evidence is accumulating to indicate that
research that is openly accessible is read more and used more and
that open access to research findings would bring economic advantage
across the European Research Area. The Commission has a unique
opportunity to place Europe at the forefront of the dissemination of
research outputs and we encourage you to adopt the Study
recommendations for the benefit of European research.
I've been DRM'd
Well it had to happen didn't it ? After all the years of griping on this blog and other forums (including my forthcoming book) about DRM I've just been caught out by a DRM system. I bought a Panasonic DMR-EX85 DVD recorder from HughesDirect. My kids had had a giggle about Martin's Internet Nano Christmas shopping woes so had been tracking the machine's progress towards us and in that regard everything went ok and it arrived as scheduled yesterday.
I connected all the wires up and the machine went into its automatic set up routine. Again everything seemed fine and it picked up the channels etc. with no apparent difficulties. The digital signal was quite strong though it somehow picked the wrong aspect ratio, so we got an elongated picture until I adjusted it manually. We watched the end of a film on one of the digital channels and again everything was basically ok though the digital signal cut out once or twice when the wind got up later on. Then I put in one of the kids' DVDs.
We get "whirr, beep, whirr, whirr..." for about half a minute as the machine scans the disk, then the display reads “NoREAD” and a small window appears briefly on the TV screen saying “Cannot Read”. Attempting to press the “play” button on the machine or the remote control merely brings up a small red circle with a red diameter in the top right corner of the TV screen. Page 75 of the manual helpfully says this means: “The procedure is being prevented by the unit or the disc” but unhelpfully doesn't provide any remedy whatsoever.
Uh oh, I think, DRM? Well maybe I should try a different disk before jumping to conclusions. I tried six, all with the same result. Grr does this blooming machine think I'm trying to pass a US DVD off on it or something? All six were UK sourced disks though the machine is set up to play region 2 or all region encoded disks. The kids were disappointed not to be able to use the new toy right away
This morning I spoke to a very helpful and technically knowledgeable Hughes' customer service representative called Paul who immediately confirmed my suspicions about the DRM getting a bit confused. Occasionally in transit on some part of the manufacturing process or the supply chain the machine gets a bump which just knocks the drm out of synch and it "thinks" it is officiously carrying out its duty to protect the machine from playing DVDs from unapproved regions and actually it just can't read the code and recognise approved disks either. We both agreed I should send it back to them, so that is where it is going on Friday with Hughes providing a full refund. Since they didn't have any 85s left in stock I've ordered a lower spec and cheaper EX75 instead.
I connected all the wires up and the machine went into its automatic set up routine. Again everything seemed fine and it picked up the channels etc. with no apparent difficulties. The digital signal was quite strong though it somehow picked the wrong aspect ratio, so we got an elongated picture until I adjusted it manually. We watched the end of a film on one of the digital channels and again everything was basically ok though the digital signal cut out once or twice when the wind got up later on. Then I put in one of the kids' DVDs.
We get "whirr, beep, whirr, whirr..." for about half a minute as the machine scans the disk, then the display reads “NoREAD” and a small window appears briefly on the TV screen saying “Cannot Read”. Attempting to press the “play” button on the machine or the remote control merely brings up a small red circle with a red diameter in the top right corner of the TV screen. Page 75 of the manual helpfully says this means: “The procedure is being prevented by the unit or the disc” but unhelpfully doesn't provide any remedy whatsoever.
Uh oh, I think, DRM? Well maybe I should try a different disk before jumping to conclusions. I tried six, all with the same result. Grr does this blooming machine think I'm trying to pass a US DVD off on it or something? All six were UK sourced disks though the machine is set up to play region 2 or all region encoded disks. The kids were disappointed not to be able to use the new toy right away
This morning I spoke to a very helpful and technically knowledgeable Hughes' customer service representative called Paul who immediately confirmed my suspicions about the DRM getting a bit confused. Occasionally in transit on some part of the manufacturing process or the supply chain the machine gets a bump which just knocks the drm out of synch and it "thinks" it is officiously carrying out its duty to protect the machine from playing DVDs from unapproved regions and actually it just can't read the code and recognise approved disks either. We both agreed I should send it back to them, so that is where it is going on Friday with Hughes providing a full refund. Since they didn't have any 85s left in stock I've ordered a lower spec and cheaper EX75 instead.
I await the DMR-EX75, due Friday, on which hopefully the DRM will be more cooperative. Well done to HughesDirect and particularly Paul for being so helpful. My visions of being kept waiting endlessly in an automated answering queue thankfully didn't come to fruition this time.
Tuesday, January 16, 2007
An Educational Prank
Kembrew McLeod has been poking fun at his university management in order to make a serious point.
"In a groundbreaking marketing move, six corporations sponsored my undergraduate course during the fall of 2006. To be more accurate, I should say, with a wink and a nod, that they "sponsored" the course.
The troubles faced by the University of Iowa (and our nation's universities, more generally) run deeper than a mere bureaucratic squabble. This episode highlights the systemic problems that emerge when we try to turn the university into "an economic engine for the state," a term our administrators are fond of using."
"In a groundbreaking marketing move, six corporations sponsored my undergraduate course during the fall of 2006. To be more accurate, I should say, with a wink and a nod, that they "sponsored" the course.
There was no contractual exchange of money or services in this faux patronage experiment and, to be honest, some of the businesses didn't want to be involved in my scheme. (One company representative, sensing the political motivations behind my endeavor, told me via an e-mail message: "You will not use the Disney logos or any connection to the Disney Co. in your class.")
I began referring to my syllabus as a McSyllabus, and for the duration of the semester my corporately sponsored name was Professor McKembrew McLeod...
My experiment was a provocation, a quiet protest that escalated near the end of the semester after a contentious move made by the University of Iowa's Board of Regents. That body had increasingly adopted a top-down management style and embraced a corporate model for the university, and demonstrated that last November by scuttling a 10-month presidential search because it didn't like the finalists.
The board's actions inspired me to push my prank even further, and so I personally contacted each regent, telling them about my plan. It came as no surprise when one regent -- unaware of my satirical motives -- happily endorsed the idea of a corporately sponsored classroom...The troubles faced by the University of Iowa (and our nation's universities, more generally) run deeper than a mere bureaucratic squabble. This episode highlights the systemic problems that emerge when we try to turn the university into "an economic engine for the state," a term our administrators are fond of using."
"Brain fingerprinting" admissable in court
Jeff Jonas swears he is not making this up:
"Apparently, your brain creates a very specific electrical brain response, known as P300, when one is presented with information that is already contained in one’s mind. If you recognize the information (i.e., it is familiar to you), you will have a P300 response. There is no way to avoid this; it is a biological/electrical stimulus response event. Sort of like a lie detector, only (reportedly) always accurate.
"Apparently, your brain creates a very specific electrical brain response, known as P300, when one is presented with information that is already contained in one’s mind. If you recognize the information (i.e., it is familiar to you), you will have a P300 response. There is no way to avoid this; it is a biological/electrical stimulus response event. Sort of like a lie detector, only (reportedly) always accurate.
Think of this as Mind-Reading 1.0.
Question: "Did you murder John Doe?"
Answer: "No."
Question: "Have you ever been inside this house?" [While presenting a picture of the front of a house]
Answer: "No."
Question: "Did you commit this murder?" [While presenting a picture of the murder scene, which took place in the bedroom]
Answer "No."
"Sir, you are under arrest – you had a P300 response to the murder scene."
Maybe you are feeling some comfort knowing this is not being accepted in the courtroom. Think again. P300 is already being used in court as admissible evidence by both defense and prosecuting attorneys.
Now what happens when science improves and Mind-Reading 2.0 is available?...
Now juxtapose this emerging technology with how our courts have interpreted our rights against unreasonable searches and seizures guaranteed in the Fourth Amendment of our Constitution. For example, the Supreme Court long ago ruled (Smith vs. Maryland) that we have no "reasonable expectation of privacy" in telephone call header data (i.e., whom you called, on what day, and for how long).
Now that the technology exists to "read" P300 responses, I have to wonder where we are going to draw the line...
Is it possible the Supreme Court could someday rule that certain brain activity is not private? If this seems far-fetched, let me share one plausible journey that might just make this true. The Court has held (Katz vs. United States) that an expectation of privacy is not "reasonable" unless both: (1) a person can claim "a legitimate expectation of privacy" over a particular type of information; and (2) this expectation is one that society is prepared to recognize as "reasonable." And, of course, what society sees as "reasonable" changes over time..."
Scary but a nice illustration of how a series of apparently small and some moderate-impact technology and legal systems decisions, spread out over a period of time and taken without a systemic appreciation of their cummulative effect, can lead to a dangerous place.
MI6 and Blair at odds over Saudi deals
From the Guardian:
"Britain's secret intelligence service, MI6, has challenged the government's claim that a major corruption inquiry into Saudi Arabian arms deals was threatening national security.
"Britain's secret intelligence service, MI6, has challenged the government's claim that a major corruption inquiry into Saudi Arabian arms deals was threatening national security.
The attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, told parliament before Christmas that the intelligence agencies "agreed with the assessment" of Tony Blair that national security was in jeopardy because the Saudis intended to pull out of intelligence cooperation with Britain. But John Scarlett, the head of MI6, has now refused to sign up to a government dossier which says MI6 endorses this view."
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