Category Archives: Privacy
Three-Strikes to Banish Europeans and Americans from the ‘net?
America: this problem is now officially on your shores, and while neither AT&T or Comcast are admitting to having cut people off from the telco networks because of a three-strikes rule, it has been noted that this is likely only because three notices haven’t been sent to any one household. … To group (b), I would want to maintain there there is real symbolic value in the parliament denouncing a three-strikes rule, though I would tend to agree that if this issue is placed on the third pillar that the parliament (as I understand it) will be relatively impotent. … Three-strikes laws are the tip of a particularly nasty iceberg that we’ve been cruising towards for the past few years, and like the one that ‘met’ the Titanic, we won’t realize the magnitude of the catastrophe unless we get serious about copyright and IP law before it’s too late. Continue reading
Note: EDLs in New Brunswick and Nova Scotia?
(I lack anything that would substantiate or disprove the claim that New Brunswick’s interest has waned; I also don’t know what the report stated and so can’t know if it would influence the government’s position.) … In particular, the author fails to identify what data is contained within, or emitted from, the EDL (i.e. the proxy identifier), fails to accurately identify the privacy risks that advocates have noted, and implies that EDLs will speed up border crossing times (to date, it looks like it only shaves about .8 seconds off each border cross). My problem is that while the author makes it seem like EDLs are particularly risky from a privacy point of view (which they are), what he is actually talking about are ePassports (and similar smart cards). Continue reading
Ontario Information and Privacy Commissioner, and DRM
In the interview, the Commissioner discusses the use of self-encrypting/decrypting security systems that are meant to meet her ‘PET Plus’ program; she wants to ensure that measures are embedded in surveillance technologies that secure individuals’ privacy while at the same time enabling police to perform their duties. … What I don’t think that the Commission is suggesting is that private security groups will be required to adopt her measures – as I understand it, that would be the ideal situation, but presently she wants to address public cameras. … Maybe what makes me feel most uneasy about all of this is the way that the discussion is being framed – I don’t think that associating the Commissioner’s proposals with DRM is necessarily the right tactic, and worry that in casting it as such a resentement develops towards a technology that is meant to address many of the privacy-associated concerns with CCTV. Continue reading
Update: More on Quebec EDLs
* Says he: “If there are five people, five kids and two parents, if they had to all pay for a passport it would be an expensive requirements for them to come here” ( Source ) Not withstanding Charest’s poor math (I count seven people in his ‘equation’), the costs that he is referencing are for the people coming to Quebec, not the costs of Quebecer’s traveling to the US. … We believe we need to do what has to be done to protect the privacy of individuals” ( Source ) In light of this, one has to ask: if the Quebec premier recognizes privacy as such a serious issue, then why isn’t the Quebec information commissioner’s privacy assessment available to the public? … March 24, 2009 from 9:00 to 12:00 Ottawa Library Auditorium, 120 Metcalfe Street The aim of this public forum is to increase the awareness of policy makers, Parliamentarians, the media, and the public regarding the concerns associated with the introduction of a new Enhanced Driver’s Licence in most Canadian provinces. Continue reading
