[ORG PM] ORG's Policy Update for the week beginning 15/09/2015

[Alexandra Stefanou]

This is ORG's Policy Update for the week beginning 15/09/2015

See the wiki version here :
https://wiki.openrightsgroup.org/wiki/ORG_policy_update/2015-w21
 Government Bills GHCQ staff can now lawfully break into electronic systems

It was only discovered
<http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/may/15/intelligence-officers-have-immunity-from-hacking-laws-tribunal-told?CMP=share_btn_link>last
week that modifications to the Computer Misuse Act 1990, enacted by royal
assent on the 3rd of March 2015, protected law enforcements officials from
prosecution for breaking into electronic systems such as laptops, servers
or smartphone, as long as the device belongs to a “suspected criminal”. For
this purpose, Government Communications Headquarters' (GHCQ) staff do not
require a warrant or a court order. This amendment came into effect while
the NGO Privacy International and seven Internet Service Providers are
challenging the legality of GHCQ hacking in front of the Investigatory
Powers Tribunal. The hearing is due this autumn. In a blog post
<https://www.privacyinternational.org/?q=node/584>, Privacy International
asserted that this change was made in an “undemocratic manner”, without a
proper debate in Parliament. However, Home Office refuted
<http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/uk-government-rewrites-surveillance-law-to-get-away-with-hacking-and-allow-cyber-attacks-campaigners-claim-10253485.html>
that
this change expanded the ability of intelligence agencies.

 National Development "Brexit" referendum could be held in 2016

It was one of David Cameron campaign's promises to hold a referendum on the
United Kingdom exiting the European Union before 2017, and it now seems
that it could be as soon as 2016, in order to avoid clashing
<http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/may/11/david-cameron-european-union-referendum>
with
major German and French elections in 2017. In the meantime, the Prime
Minister has already started
<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/eureferendum/11617592/David-Cameron-will-hold-EU-referendum-before-2017-Europe-minister-David-Lidington-suggests.html>
discussing
with European leaders and will meet Angela Merkel, Germany's Chancelor,
next month . The Conservative government renegotiation of the UK
membership should
focus on
<http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/may/11/david-cameron-european-union-referendum>
greater
power to national parliaments, independence from the eurozone influence and
a tightening conditions of access to benefits for EU migrants.

Several points are yet to be made clear, such as who would vote in this
referendum, and how would a government operate if the ministers have
different opinions on it. David Cameron is expected to address the
referendum in his Queen's Speech, on Tuesday, May 27th.


 International Developments Pirate Bay loses original URL, gain six new ones

The Stockholm District Court ruled
<https://torrentfreak.com/key-pirate-bay-domains-must-be-seized-court-rules-150519/>
on
Tuesday, May 22nd, that two key domains owned by The Pirate Bay, including
the original ThePirateBay.se, will be “confiscated”. A statement posted on
that day on the website read “No torrent files are saved at the server.
That means no copyrighted and/or illegal material are stored by us. It is
therefore not possible to hold the people behind The Pirate Bay responsible
for the material that is being spread using the site.” The site also
displayed a new logo
<https://cdn.mediaworks.co.nz/3news/AM/2013/2/27/288327/hydra11.jpg?width=700>,
where an six-headed hydra came out of a pirate ship, with six different top
level domain names written on it. As a matter of fact, the site is now
hosted elsewhere, such as .mn for Mongolia.

This shutting down comes only a week after the European Commission's Joint
Research Center issued a paper on “Online Copyright Enforcement, Consumer
Behavior, and Market Structure
<http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2604197>”, which
analysed the legal shutdown of a German video streaming website and
concluded that, although it had a significant impact on piracy levels, this
effect was very short-lived. The report also mentioned the adverse effect
that it prompted the apparition of several websites taking the place of the
original one, thus making the overall piracy market more resistant.
 Facebook's Internet.org under heavy criticism

An open letter
<https://www.facebook.com/notes/accessnoworg/open-letter-to-mark-zuckerberg-regarding-internetorg-net-neutrality-privacy-and-/935857379791271>
 to Facebook ,signed by more than sixty civil society organisations,
expresses concerns about the launch and expansion of Facebook platform
Internet.org . This project <https://www.internet.org/about> intends to “
give the unconnected majority of the world the power to connect”. It does
so thanks to partnership with telecom companies in various countries
through zero-rating, a commercial practice in which the telecom companies
do not count the data spent on certain websites as part of a user's data
cap. In the open letter, the organisations argue that this process is
contrary to the principle of Net neutrality, as it creates “walled garden
in which the world's poorest people will only be able to access a limited
set of [...] websites and services”. They criticise the lack of security
brought by the latest update which prohibits technology such as Secure
Socket Layer of HTTP Secure. It also takes issue with the nomenclature, the
name of the project describing as “internet” what only amounts to a tiny
fraction of it.


 European Union Commission presents the Digital Single Market to Parliament
against rumour that it wants to weaken“We need change. And that change is
digital.” stated
<http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_SPEECH-15-4999_en.htm> Andrus Ansip,
Vice-President of the European Commission in charge of the Digital Single
Market (DSM), in a speech delivered to the European Parliament on Tuesday,
May 19th. During the plenary session, Kaja Kallas, an Estonian Member of
European Parliament, voiced
<http://www.euractiv.com/sections/infosociety/ansip-denies-rumours-encryption-backdoors-eus-digital-plan-314696>
the
concern that the DSM could contain a provision to create backdoors into
encrypted means of communication. Commissioner Ansip responded that the
rumours were unfounded, and stated that the European Commission “never had
and doesn't have plans to create backdoors on identification systems”. In
the United Kingdom, in January, British Prime Minister David Cameron voiced
his wish
<http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/jan/13/david-cameron-encrypted-messaging-apps-ban>
to
introduce backdoors in applications such as WhatsApp or Snapchat allowing
government to access encrypted communications.

Coincidentally, on the same day, several major Internet companies, experts
and civil society organisations addressed an open letter
<https://static.newamerica.org/attachments/3138--113/Encryption_Letter_to_Obama_final_051915.pdf>
to
President Obama, asking him to “adopt policies that promote rather than
undermine the widespread adoption of strong encryption technologies”,
following concerns that appeared after the Federal Bureau of Investigation
asked
<http://www.techworld.com/news/apps/ec-digital-commissioner-say-no-encryption-back-doors-3612415/>
Congress
to make encryption back doors in mobile devices mandatory.
 Belgian Data Protection asserts that Facebook is breaking EU law

According to a report
<http://www.privacycommission.be/fr/plug-ins-sociaux-de-facebook-des-recommendations-pour-les-internautes-et-proprietaires-de-sites>
commissioned
by the Belgian Data protection authority, Facebook tracks without their
consent any internet users that have visited anyFacebook pages, even if he
is logged off or not a member of Facebook. It does so thanks to cookies and
plugins such as “Like” or “Share” present on numerous websites, and can
then obtain a precise portrait
<http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/mar/31/facebook-tracks-all-visitors-breaching-eu-law-report>
of
a person's online behaviour in order to target advertising The Belgian
privacy watchdog has issued an opinion in which it asks Facebook to stop
this practice that it deems contrary to European and Belgian law, for
Facebook doesn't have the consent of the people it tracks. It recommends
that Facebook uses
<http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/may/15/facebook-must-stop-tracking-users-non-users-legal-action>
session
cookies which expires when the user disconnect and that are not created for
internet users not logged into Facebook.

“It’s make or break time”, asserted the president of the Belgian
agency, whothreatens
to sue
<https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/facebook-scoffs-at-european-privacy-rules-claims-regulator-1.2213724>
Facebook
if the recommendations are not followed . However,Facebook replied that
<http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/may/15/facebook-must-stop-tracking-users-non-users-legal-action>,
even if it will look into the recommendations, it only needs to comply with
its “European regulator, the Irish Data Protection Commissioner", given
that his European office is in Ireland. The Article 29 Data Protection
Working Party, a reunion of European Data protection authorities, has
mentioned, without further details, the possibility of an European data
protection authority for some times now.
 EU members to impose bigger fines for companies breaching "right to be
forgotten"

Latvia, head of the European Union's rotating presidency, has drafted
<http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/05/20/us-eu-dataprotection-fines-idUSKBN0O529X20150520>
a
proposal with provisions for stiffer fines for companies breaching the
rules specified by the European Court of Justice last May in its famous “right
to be forgotten” ruling
<http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document_print.jsf?doclang=EN&text&pageIndex=0&part=1&mode=DOC&docid=152065&occ=first&dir&cid=437838>
.
European citizens now have the right to ask search engines to de-index
results from research including their names if those results are outdated
or irrelevant informations. The fine could amount up to 2 percent of a
firm's annual worldwide turnover. European Union members' ministers are
expected to endorse the text in mid-June. This could help the data
protection authorities, and possibly change the attitude of Google, who
only complies with the ruling in its European websites, such as google.co.uk,
but not in others, such as google.com.



 ORG Media coverage

See ORG Press Coverage for full details.
 2015-05-22 – Ars Technica - How we’re fighting back against the UK
surveillance state—and winning
<http://arstechnica.co.uk/tech-policy/2015/05/how-were-fighting-back-against-the-uk-surveillance-state-and-winning/>
Author:
Glyn Moody Summary: Mentions ORG challenging GHCQ participation in PRISM
programme 2015-05-18 – Tech City News - Chair of Tech City UK to Lead on
Hacking and Cybersecurity
<http://techcitynews.com/2015/05/18/chair-of-tech-city-uk-to-lead-on-hacking-and-cybersecurity/>
Author:
Kirsty Styles Summary: Jim Killock quoted on the Snoopers' Charter

   - ORG contact details

   Staff page <http://www.openrightsgroup.org/people/staff>
   - Jim Killock, Executive Director
      <http://www.openrightsgroup.org/people/staff#jim>
      - Javier Ruiz, Policy
      <http://www.openrightsgroup.org/people/staff#javier>
      - Ed Paton-Williams, Campaigns
      <http://www.openrightsgroup.org/people/staff#ed>
      - Lee Maguire, Tech <http://www.openrightsgroup.org/people/staff#lee>
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