Incheon (UN-APCICT/ESCAP) – Looking to enhance climate change and disaster management capacity, over forty government officials and international organization representatives join Untied Nations workshop in the Republic of Korea.

The United Nations Asian and Pacific Training Centre for Information and Communication Technology for Development, a regional institute of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UN-APCICT/ESCAP), kicked off the Fourth Regional Training of Trainers Workshop in Seongnam, Republic of Korea. The five-day workshop runs 22-26 February, and will deliver training on the use of information and communication technology (ICT) for disaster risk management and climate change abatement.

As is now widely accepted by the scientific community and the general public, climate change constitutes a major threat to the earth's ecosystems and combating this threat is important to salvage our future development.  There is also general agreement about the impact climate change is having on the frequency and severity of disaster occurrences around the world. To abate climate change and manage disaster risk, there has been much interest and research in the use of ICT.

The Fourth Regional Training of Training Workshop welcomes forty-four disaster management, climate change and ICT officials and practitioners from twenty-one countries, and aims to develop a cadre of resource persons to help deliver training at the national and regional level on two, new upcoming modules of APCICT's "Academy of ICT Essentials for Government Leaders Programme" (Academy).

Academy Module 9 – ICT for Disaster Risk Management, and Module 10 – ICT and Climate Change, Green Growth and Sustainable Development are intended to provide government officials and development stakeholders with the knowledge and skills to apply ICT in national and regional disaster management and climate change abatement frameworks.

"APCICT is pleased to welcome such a group of professionals committed to developing the national and regional capacity necessary to meet the challenges presented by climate change and disaster occurrences," said Dr. Hyeun-Suk Rhee, Director of APCICT. "Understanding the strategic use and vast potential of ICT will provide participants with a valuable resource to enhance disaster management and climate abatement policies."

APCICT's Fourth Regional Training of Trainers Workshop, sponsored by the Korean International Cooperation Agency and Telecommunications Technology Association of Korea, will also serve to generate valuable participant-feedback on the new Academy modules before they are officially launched later this year.

To learn how ICT can be practically applied in the field, participants will spend half a day visiting the National Emergency Management Agency, Korea's national disaster management body, and a Green Grown Exhibition in Seoul.

"APCICT's effort to develop much needed regional resources and capacity for disaster management and climate change abatement is commendable," said Ms. Corazon Davis, Assistant Secretary of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, from the Philippines. "Academy modules 9 and 10 will be important tools for participants working to build capacity and strengthen the use of ICT in their respective national and regional climate change and disaster management frameworks."

Training on Academy Module 9 will be delivered by resource persons from the Asian Disaster Preparedness Centre, which is partnering with APCICT and consolidating contributions from other experts in the area of disaster risk reduction to develop the module.

Training on ICT and climate change and green growth will be delivered by international ICT for Development expert, Richard Labelle, who is the author of Module 10.  APCICT has previously collaborated with Mr. Labelle in the development of other Academy content.

The Academy is APCICT's flagship programme and is designed to provide government officials and development stakeholders with the necessary skills to fully leverage ICT for socio-economic development (ICTD).  The Academy curriculum currently consists of eight stand-alone, yet inter-linked training modules that cover a variety of ICTD related topics.

Academy programmes have been delivered throughout Asia and the Pacific in Afghanistan, Cambodia, Cook Islands, India, Indonesia, Kiribati, Kyrgyzstan, Lao P.D.R, Mongolia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Samoa, Tajikistan, Timor-Leste, Tonga, Tuvalu, Uzbekistan and Viet Nam.

About United Nations APCICT-ESCAP

http://www.unapcict.org

The United Nations Asian and Pacific Training Centre for Information and Communication Technology for Development (UN-APCICT/ESCAP) is a subsidiary body of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, established with a membership identical to that of ESCAP and is located in Incheon, Republic of Korea. APCICT aims to strengthen the efforts of the member countries of ESCAP to use ICT in their socio-economic development through building human and institutional capacity for ICT.

For further information, please contact:

Hyeun-Suk Rhee, Ph.D.

Director

UN-APCICT/ESCAP

Incheon, Republic of Korea

Tel: +(82) 032 245 1700

Email: director@...

(Apology for cross postings)

Dear All,

Gov2.in is a campaign initiated by Governance Now (www.governancenow.com) to
explore the power of social media in governance.  The campaign discusses growth
and reaches of Gov 2.0 in India and engages key stakeholders in government and
social media. The Gov2.in Forum is being hosted on March 11, 2011 at New Delhi.
Prominent names will converge at the event to chart out a Gov 2.0 action plan
for India.

In case you want to participate in the event, register now at www.gov2.in .
Registration will close on 4th March 2011 and participation in event will be on
first-come, first-served basis. (For Registration http://www.gov2.in/register)

Also, if you have any idea on how government can use social media, enter it in
the Gov2.in Idea Contest, and win exciting prizes. (For Idea Contest
http://www.gov2.in/idea-submission-form)

You can also nominate a government department / agency/ individual who have used
social media for delivery of government services. (For Gov2.in Awards
http://www.gov2.in/awards-nomination-form )

In case you are not able to attend the event on March 11, do join us on our
social media pages at Twitter and Facebook.

Thanks and regards,

Samir Sachdeva

Gov2.in Twitter http://twitter.com/gov2in
Gov2.in Facebook  http://www.facebook.com/pages/Gov2in/146721115386540

Dear all,
Today is the last date for comments on:

The draft rule under s.43A : Reasonable security practices and
procedures and sensitive personal information
The draft rule under s.79 : Due diligence observed by intermediaries
guidelines
The draft rule under s.79 : Guidelines for cybercafes

They are all very worrisome and disturbing.  Importantly, there is a
good case to say that they exceed the authority granted by the IT Act.
Many of the provisions in the rules on intermediaries and cybercafes,
for instance, have no nexus with s.79(2) under which they are drafted.

They text of the draft rules be downloaded from the DIT website:
http://goo.gl/qWZ8L

Comments need to be sent to Gulshan Rai: grai@...

And there's this op-ed in today's Hindu:

http://goo.gl/Yp9pu

The battle lines over encryption

APARNA VISWANATHAN

The draft Information Technology Rules provide the key to the back door
sought by the government, and leave no doubt that security concerns will
prevail over privacy.

The draft “Information Technology (Due Diligence observed by
intermediaries guidelines) Rules, 2011 circulated by the Ministry of
Communications and Information Technology on February 10, 2011, address
the issue of the liability of internet service providers (ISPs) and
other intermediaries, an issue which achieved public notoriety through
the Baazee.com case in 2004. In one master stroke, the Draft Rules
settle the dispute raging over the last year, regarding the use of
encryption techniques by the customers of BlackBerry, Google, Skype and
MSN. Yet, while doing so, the Draft Rules also reveal the fundamental
shortcomings of the IT Act even after the 2008 amendments.

The case, Avnish Bajaj v State arose out of the sale of a video clip on
the website of Baazee.com, shot on a mobile phone in MMS form, depicting
two schoolchildren indulging in an explicit sexual act. Although the
Bazee.com case was ultimately decided under the provisions of the Indian
Penal Code, the critical legal issue in civil law is to what extent ISPs
can be held liable for the content transmitted through their network.
The question, which was initially addressed by California courts in the
mid-1990s, was whether ISPs should be treated in the same manner as
newspapers or magazines publishing content and, therefore, made
potentially liable for copyright infringement, defamation, obscenity and
other civil/criminal liability, or as telephone companies which are not
liable for the content of the communications they transmit.

Since the seminal 1995 judgment of the District Court of Northern
California in the Netcom case, the view in the U.S. has been that an ISP
is a passive service provider much like a telephone company and cannot
be held liable for the content transmitted through its server. This
legal position changed in the U.S. with the passage of the Digital
Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA), which provided a “safe harbour” for
ISPs, conferring exemption from copyright liability. However, the
exemption is subject to the ISP meeting certain conditions. The ISP must
not have the actual knowledge that the material is infringing, must not
be aware of the facts and circumstances from which the infringing
activity is apparent and, in the event of having such knowledge, must
act expeditiously to disable such material. In order to avail himself of
the exemption from liability, the service provider must also not receive
a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity.

The legal position in India is similar to the DMCA in that the exemption
from liability is not absolute but is subject to meeting certain
conditions. Following the 2008 amendments, Section 79 of the IT Act,
2000 provides that an intermediary will not be held liable for any third
party information, data or communication link made available or hosted
by him. However, this exemption will apply only if the following
conditions are met.

First, the function of the intermediary must be limited to providing
access to a communication system over which information made available
by third parties is transmitted or temporarily stored or hosted. Second,
the intermediary does not initiate the transmission, select the receiver
or select/modify the information contained in the transmission. In other
words, the ISP acts like a telephone company and not like a newspaper
editor who can select or edit the information provided. The exemption
will also not be applicable if the ISP has conspired, aided, abetted or
induced the commission of the unlawful act; or upon receiving actual
knowledge that any information, data or communication link residing in
or connected to a computer resource controlled by the intermediary is
being used to commit the unlawful act, the intermediary fails to
expeditiously remove or disable access to that material. The last two
conditions are similar to those imposed under the DMCA in the U.S.

Furthermore, in order to avail himself of the exemption under Section
79, the intermediary must “observe due diligence” while discharging his
duties under the IT Act, 2000 and also observe other guidelines which
the Central government may prescribe in this behalf. For the first time,
since the 2008 amendments came into force, on February 10, 2011, the
Ministry of Communications and Information Technology circulated draft
rules regarding due diligence by intermediaries (the “Draft Rules”).

Sub-rule (2) of the Draft Rules lists the types of infringing
information which should not be transmitted by the intermediary,
including information which is 1) abusive, blasphemous, obscene, vulgar
etc., 2) infringing of IPRs, 3) sensitive personal information, and 4)
information which threatens the unity, security or sovereignty of India.
However, sub-rule (2) then tries to add in the offences which are the
instruments of modern cyber crime. The list includes any information
which impersonates another person, that is, identity theft and deceiving
or misleading the addressee about the origin of electronic messages more
commonly known as phishing. However, this list comprising identity theft
and phishing is entirely inadequate as these are only a few methods of
modern cyber crime/war. The list ignores, for example, the installation
of a program which allows an attacker to remotely control the targeted
computer otherwise known as “BOTNETS.” Another common tool of cyber
crime is the use of a software program or a device designed to secretly
monitor and log all keystrokes otherwise known as “keyloggers.” However,
neither the remote access of a computer nor the secret monitoring of a
computer resource is mentioned in sub-rule (2).

The Draft Rules also introduce a definition of “cyber security incident”
as any real or suspected adverse event in relation to cyber security
that violates an explicitly or implicitly applicable security policy
resulting in unauthorised access, denial of service or disruption,
unauthorised use of a computer resource for processing or storage of
information or changes to data, information without authorisation. In
fact, the need to include the concepts of modern cyber crime and a
definition as basic and critical as “cyber security incident” in Draft
Rules on due diligence by intermediaries shows that there is a
fundamental lacuna in the IT Act itself, namely, that it ignores the
concepts of modern cyber war altogether and is limited to the outdated
concerns of theft of software code through hacking.

The partial attempt to bring in the concepts of modern cyber crime under
the purview of the IT Act distracts attention from what is perhaps the
main objective of the Draft Rules, that is, to codify the government's
position towards service providers such as BlackBerry, Google, Skype,
and MSN Hotmail which has recently attracted much attention. Research in
Motion (RIM), the Canadian company, which operates BlackBerry, provides
its customers with their own encryption key and does not possess a
master key. According to RIM, in its system, there is no “back door”
through which either RIM or any third party can gain access to the key
or the customer's data.

However, the Indian government was concerned that this level of
encryption makes it impossible to monitor BlackBerry messages for
national security purposes and that BlackBerrry's strong encryption
technology could be used for terrorist or criminal activity. As per
newspaper reports, on August 31, 2010, the Government of India accepted
RIM's proposal for “lawful access by law enforcement agencies” of
encrypted BlackBerry data. In December 2010, RIM reportedly provided the
government a cloud computing-based system which would enable security
agencies to lawfully intercept BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) messages in a
comprehensible format but not BlackBerry Enterprise Service, that is,
corporate emails.

The Draft Rules incorporate the government's stand vis-à-vis BlackBerry
into law because they require an intermediary to provide information to
government agencies, which are lawfully authorised for investigative,
protective, cyber security or intelligence activity. In sum, the Draft
Rules provide the key to the back door long sought after by the
government and leave no doubt that security concerns will prevail in law
over the interest in privacy through use of encryption by civil society.

--
Pranesh Prakash
Programme Manager
Centre for Internet and Society
W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 40926283

Dear Tarun and all,
Thanks so much for pointing out the final date is 28th, and not as I'd
mentioned.  We don't have to work overtime tonight to wrap up our
comments. :)

I would strongly urge everyone go through all three of these and send in
comments.

One general idea you might all want to keep in mind is to see if there
is a nexus between each sub-rule and the parent section.  For instance,
most of the cybercafe regulations and a lot of the gen. intermediary
guidelines regulation has nothing to do at all with whether they should
or should not be held liable for user actions (which is what s.79(2),
under which they are made is about).

Regards,
Pranesh

On Friday 25 February 2011 06:35 PM, Tarun Dua wrote:
> Draft Rules under Section 43A&  Section 79 of IT Act for public comments
>
>      * The Draft rule under section 43A- Reasonable security practices
> and procedures and sensitive personal information
>      * The Draft rule under section 79-Due diligence observed by
> intermediaries guidelines
>      * The Draft rule under section 79-Guidelines for Cyber Cafe
>
> Comments are invited till 28.02.2011 which can be sent by email to:
> grai AT mit.gov.in
>
>  From the website.
>
> The intermediaries guidelines are especially worrisome. Having dealth
> first hand with the bureaucracy at CERT. It has implications for the
> nascent webhosting/hosted datacenter industry of which we are a part.
>
> -Tarun
>
> On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 1:06 PM, Pranesh Prakash<pranesh@...> 
wrote:
>> Dear all,
>> Today is the last date for comments on:
>>
>> The draft rule under s.43A      : Reasonable security practices and
>> procedures and sensitive personal information
>> The draft rule under s.79       : Due diligence observed by intermediaries
>> guidelines
>> The draft rule under s.79       : Guidelines for cybercafes
>>
>> They are all very worrisome and disturbing.  Importantly, there is a good
>> case to say that they exceed the authority granted by the IT Act. Many of
>> the provisions in the rules on intermediaries and cybercafes, for instance,
>> have no nexus with s.79(2) under which they are drafted.
>>
>> They text of the draft rules be downloaded from the DIT website:
>> http://goo.gl/qWZ8L
>>
>> Comments need to be sent to Gulshan Rai: grai@...
>>
>> And there's this op-ed in today's Hindu:
>>
>> http://goo.gl/Yp9pu
>>
>> The battle lines over encryption
>>
>> APARNA VISWANATHAN
>>
>> The draft Information Technology Rules provide the key to the back door
>> sought by the government, and leave no doubt that security concerns will
>> prevail over privacy.
>>
>> The draft “Information Technology (Due Diligence observed by intermediaries
>> guidelines) Rules, 2011 circulated by the Ministry of Communications and
>> Information Technology on February 10, 2011, address the issue of the
>> liability of internet service providers (ISPs) and other intermediaries, an
>> issue which achieved public notoriety through the Baazee.com case in 2004.
>> In one master stroke, the Draft Rules settle the dispute raging over the
>> last year, regarding the use of encryption techniques by the customers of
>> BlackBerry, Google, Skype and MSN. Yet, while doing so, the Draft Rules also
>> reveal the fundamental shortcomings of the IT Act even after the 2008
>> amendments.
>>
>> The case, Avnish Bajaj v State arose out of the sale of a video clip on the
>> website of Baazee.com, shot on a mobile phone in MMS form, depicting two
>> schoolchildren indulging in an explicit sexual act. Although the Bazee.com
>> case was ultimately decided under the provisions of the Indian Penal Code,
>> the critical legal issue in civil law is to what extent ISPs can be held
>> liable for the content transmitted through their network. The question,
>> which was initially addressed by California courts in the mid-1990s, was
>> whether ISPs should be treated in the same manner as newspapers or magazines
>> publishing content and, therefore, made potentially liable for copyright
>> infringement, defamation, obscenity and other civil/criminal liability, or
>> as telephone companies which are not liable for the content of the
>> communications they transmit.
>>
>> Since the seminal 1995 judgment of the District Court of Northern California
>> in the Netcom case, the view in the U.S. has been that an ISP is a passive
>> service provider much like a telephone company and cannot be held liable for
>> the content transmitted through its server. This legal position changed in
>> the U.S. with the passage of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA),
>> which provided a “safe harbour” for ISPs, conferring exemption from
>> copyright liability. However, the exemption is subject to the ISP meeting
>> certain conditions. The ISP must not have the actual knowledge that the
>> material is infringing, must not be aware of the facts and circumstances
>> from which the infringing activity is apparent and, in the event of having
>> such knowledge, must act expeditiously to disable such material. In order to
>> avail himself of the exemption from liability, the service provider must
>> also not receive a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing
>> activity.
>>
>> The legal position in India is similar to the DMCA in that the exemption
>> from liability is not absolute but is subject to meeting certain conditions.
>> Following the 2008 amendments, Section 79 of the IT Act, 2000 provides that
>> an intermediary will not be held liable for any third party information,
>> data or communication link made available or hosted by him. However, this
>> exemption will apply only if the following conditions are met.
>>
>> First, the function of the intermediary must be limited to providing access
>> to a communication system over which information made available by third
>> parties is transmitted or temporarily stored or hosted. Second, the
>> intermediary does not initiate the transmission, select the receiver or
>> select/modify the information contained in the transmission. In other words,
>> the ISP acts like a telephone company and not like a newspaper editor who
>> can select or edit the information provided. The exemption will also not be
>> applicable if the ISP has conspired, aided, abetted or induced the
>> commission of the unlawful act; or upon receiving actual knowledge that any
>> information, data or communication link residing in or connected to a
>> computer resource controlled by the intermediary is being used to commit the
>> unlawful act, the intermediary fails to expeditiously remove or disable
>> access to that material. The last two conditions are similar to those
>> imposed under the DMCA in the U.S.
>>
>> Furthermore, in order to avail himself of the exemption under Section 79,
>> the intermediary must “observe due diligence” while discharging his duties
>> under the IT Act, 2000 and also observe other guidelines which the Central
>> government may prescribe in this behalf. For the first time, since the 2008
>> amendments came into force, on February 10, 2011, the Ministry of
>> Communications and Information Technology circulated draft rules regarding
>> due diligence by intermediaries (the “Draft Rules”).
>>
>> Sub-rule (2) of the Draft Rules lists the types of infringing information
>> which should not be transmitted by the intermediary, including information
>> which is 1) abusive, blasphemous, obscene, vulgar etc., 2) infringing of
>> IPRs, 3) sensitive personal information, and 4) information which threatens
>> the unity, security or sovereignty of India. However, sub-rule (2) then
>> tries to add in the offences which are the instruments of modern cyber
>> crime. The list includes any information which impersonates another person,
>> that is, identity theft and deceiving or misleading the addressee about the
>> origin of electronic messages more commonly known as phishing. However, this
>> list comprising identity theft and phishing is entirely inadequate as these
>> are only a few methods of modern cyber crime/war. The list ignores, for
>> example, the installation of a program which allows an attacker to remotely
>> control the targeted computer otherwise known as “BOTNETS.” Another common
>> tool of cyber crime is the use of a software program or a device designed to
>> secretly monitor and log all keystrokes otherwise known as “keyloggers.”
>> However, neither the remote access of a computer nor the secret monitoring
>> of a computer resource is mentioned in sub-rule (2).
>>
>> The Draft Rules also introduce a definition of “cyber security incident” as
>> any real or suspected adverse event in relation to cyber security that
>> violates an explicitly or implicitly applicable security policy resulting in
>> unauthorised access, denial of service or disruption, unauthorised use of a
>> computer resource for processing or storage of information or changes to
>> data, information without authorisation. In fact, the need to include the
>> concepts of modern cyber crime and a definition as basic and critical as
>> “cyber security incident” in Draft Rules on due diligence by intermediaries
>> shows that there is a fundamental lacuna in the IT Act itself, namely, that
>> it ignores the concepts of modern cyber war altogether and is limited to the
>> outdated concerns of theft of software code through hacking.
>>
>> The partial attempt to bring in the concepts of modern cyber crime under the
>> purview of the IT Act distracts attention from what is perhaps the main
>> objective of the Draft Rules, that is, to codify the government's position
>> towards service providers such as BlackBerry, Google, Skype, and MSN Hotmail
>> which has recently attracted much attention. Research in Motion (RIM), the
>> Canadian company, which operates BlackBerry, provides its customers with
>> their own encryption key and does not possess a master key. According to
>> RIM, in its system, there is no “back door” through which either RIM or any
>> third party can gain access to the key or the customer's data.
>>
>> However, the Indian government was concerned that this level of encryption
>> makes it impossible to monitor BlackBerry messages for national security
>> purposes and that BlackBerrry's strong encryption technology could be used
>> for terrorist or criminal activity. As per newspaper reports, on August 31,
>> 2010, the Government of India accepted RIM's proposal for “lawful access by
>> law enforcement agencies” of encrypted BlackBerry data. In December 2010,
>> RIM reportedly provided the government a cloud computing-based system which
>> would enable security agencies to lawfully intercept BlackBerry Messenger
>> (BBM) messages in a comprehensible format but not BlackBerry Enterprise
>> Service, that is, corporate emails.
>>
>> The Draft Rules incorporate the government's stand vis-à-vis BlackBerry into
>> law because they require an intermediary to provide information to
>> government agencies, which are lawfully authorised for investigative,
>> protective, cyber security or intelligence activity. In sum, the Draft Rules
>> provide the key to the back door long sought after by the government and
>> leave no doubt that security concerns will prevail in law over the interest
>> in privacy through use of encryption by civil society.
>>
>> --
>> Pranesh Prakash
>> Programme Manager
>> Centre for Internet and Society
>> W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 40926283
>>
>>

--
Pranesh Prakash
Programme Manager
Centre for Internet and Society
W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 40926283

http://www.wipo.int/pressroom/en/articles/2011/article_0005.html

WIPO Director General Addresses the Future of Copyright

Geneva, February 24, 2011
PR/2011/679

WIPO Director General Francis Gurry today said that copyright needs to
evolve to current technological realities or risk becoming irrelevant.
Speaking at a conference hosted by Australia’s Faculty of Law of the
Queensland University of Technology (QUT) on the future of copyright,
Mr. Gurry said there is no “single magical answer” to the development of
a successful policy response to the challenges facing copyright in the
digital age, but a combination of “law, infrastructure, cultural change,
institutional collaboration and better business models.”

Mr. Gurry said the central question facing the evolution of copyright
policy is how to maintain a balance between availability of cultural
works at affordable prices while assuring a dignified economic existence
for creators and performers. Digital technology is having a radical
impact on those balances. “Rather than resist it, we need to accept the
inevitability of technological change and to seek an intelligent
engagement with it,” he said. “There is, in any case, no other choice –
either the copyright system adapts to the natural advantage that has
evolved or it will perish.”

The Director General said there are three main principles that should
guide the development of a successful policy response. The first is
“neutrality to technology and to the business models developed in
response to technology.” He said the purpose of copyright is not to
influence technological possibilities for creative expression or the
business models built on those technological possibilities, nor to
preserve business models established under obsolete technologies.   “Its
purpose is…to work with any and all technologies for the production and
distribution of cultural works and to extract some value from the
cultural exchanges made possible by those technologies to return to
creators and performers and the business associates engaged by them to
facilitate the cultural exchanges through the use of the technologies.
Copyright should be about promoting cultural dynamism, not preserving or
promoting vested business interests.”

A second principle, he said is “comprehensiveness and coherence in the
policy response.” Mr. Gurry recognized the limitation of law to provide
a comprehensive answer and said that “infrastructure is as important a
part of the solution as law.” In this respect, he said collective
management societies “need to re-shape and to evolve“ as their present
infrastructure is out-dated as “it represents a world of separate
territories and a world where right-holders expressed themselves in
different media, not the multi-jurisdictional world of the Internet or
the convergence of expression in digital technology.”

“We need a global infrastructure that permits simple, global licensing,
one that makes the task of licensing cultural works legally on the
Internet as easy as it is to obtain such works there illegally,” he said.

In this respect, Mr. Gurry said “an international music registry -- a
global repertoire database -- would be a very valuable and needed step
in the direction of establishing the infrastructure for global
licensing. And, secondly, in order to be successful, future global
infrastructure must work with the existing collecting societies and not
seek to replace them.”

The culture of the Internet also needs to be taken into consideration.
Referring to the high rates of illegal downloading, Mr. Gurry said “In
order to effect a change in attitude, I believe that we need to
re-formulate the question that most people see or hear about copyright
and the Internet. People do not respond to being called pirates…They
would respond, I believe, to a challenge to sharing responsibility for
cultural policy. We need to speak less in terms of piracy and more in
terms of the threat to the financial viability of culture in the 21st
Century, because it is this which is at risk if we do not have an
effective, properly balanced copyright policy.”

The third guiding principle for a successful response to the digital
challenge is the need more simplicity in copyright. Mr. Gurry said
“Copyright is complicated and complex, reflecting the successive waves
of technological development in the media of creative expression from
printing through to digital technology, and the business responses to
those different media, “ warning “We risk losing our audience and public
support if we cannot make understanding of the system more accessible.”

For further information, please contact the Media Relations Section at WIPO:
Tel: (+41 22) - 338 81 61 or 338 95 47
Fax: (+41 22) - 338 82 80

--
Pranesh Prakash
Programme Manager
Centre for Internet and Society
W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 40926283

APCICT to extend ICT capacity development programme to more beneficiaries in Myanmar and the Philippines

APCICT to enhance the ICTD capacity of government officials in Myanmar and raise ICTD awareness among academics

On 07-12 March, the Asian and Pacific Training Centre for Information and Communication Technology for Development (UN-APCICT/ESCAP), a regional institute of ESCAP, will organize the Second ICT Capacity Building Workshop at the Central Institute of Civil Service in Phaunggyi, Myanmar, in partnership with the Civil Service Selection and Training Board (CSSTB).

The workshop will deliver training on the ¡®technical cluster¡¯ of modules of the ¡°Academy of ICT Essentials¡± (Academy) programme to 50 mid-level government officials and trainers from over 18 ministries.  The Academy¡¯s ¡®technical cluster¡¯ of modules cover emerging trends for government leaders, information security in today¡¯s digital age, and ICT project management frameworks.

CSSTB, in partnership with APCICT, plans to deliver Academy content in annual workshops designed to strengthen Myanmar¡¯s ICT human resources and institutional capacity.  To facilitate use of the Academy, CSSTB has already translated the first 3 modules of the Academy and plans to translate the rest.

The Workshop builds upon last year¡¯s successful launch of the Academy in Myanmar, which sensitized government officials and trainers on the foundational concepts of use of ICT for socio-economic development (ICTD).

APCICT will also be partnering with CSSTB to co-organize an "Awareness Lecture on ICT for Development¡± on 7-8 March targeting 1,000 lecturers, professors, and other representatives from academia to help bring the benefits of ICTD learning to students and youth in Myanmar.  The two-day lecture will highlight the linkage between ICT and socio-economic development and is part of CSSTB¡¯s month-long refresher course regularly offered to academics in Myanmar.

APCICT to partner with the Government of the Philippines to deliver ICTD training to a wider range of government officials

On 24 March, APCICT and the National Computer Institute (NCI), of the National Computer Center under the Commission of Information and Communications Technology of the Philippines, will welcome over 100 national, provincial and local government officials in Quezon City to launch the Academy programme.

The launch of the Academy in partnership with NCI is designed to bring Academy content and training to local and provincial leaders in the Philippines.
NCI is the training arm of the National Computer Center with a mandate to strengthen the ICT capacity of government officials and public servants in education sector.

The Academy programme in the Philippines was first launched in 2009, in partnership with the Career Executive Service Board (CESB), which has a mandate to train senior-level government officials.  CESB has gone on to integrate the Academy in its capacity building framework and train over 500 government officials based on Academy content. 

APCICT and NCI will also co-organize an inception meeting on 25 March with over 30 University and College Presidents to discuss strategies to implement APCICT¡¯s "Strengthening ICTD Education in Institutions of Higher Learning¡± project to strengthen the ICTD component in educational curricula in the Philippines.

To achieve the countries development goals of the coming decades, the future leaders and workforce of the Philippines will need to have a strong understanding of ICTD.

The Resilience 2011 Daily http://paper.li/tag/Resilience2011
More from http://twitter.com/#search?q=Resilience2011

Markets are needed. Not just "free" markets. Can't monetise
everything. Prices need to be properly fixed. Rights of people.

Markets need to be regulated well to support resilience building in
the context of changing climate.

conference paper now online at: http://paper.li/tag/Resilience2011

Warming Planet demands we have open minds! We can't adapt 2 climate
change with so much ideological baggage & biases!

Development community didn't seize #mobile phone potential for a long
time. It was a market phenomenon that people adopted.

Angelica Ospina presents new framework on ICTs & Climate Adaptation &
Resilience at #Resilience2011.
See also http://niccd.wordpress.com/

Healthy skepticism about ICTs is good & needed. But why do some people
keep flogging a dead horse

Development Myth persists at #Resilience2011: as if all/most Asian
poor are rural & all farmers. When are we going to be evidence based?

Can we EVER discuss poverty & development issues without romanticising
about traditional knowledge & rural farmers?

"Because of donor money, even flooding in Bihar (which is a 30 year
old issue) is shown as a climate change issue..."

Isn't a black/white board an ICT (information and communication
technology) too?

The hegemony of the info source has to be decodified. Where does it
come from? Whom does it serve?

Let `medium' not be construed for the `message'

Read The #Resilience2011 Daily â–¸ today's top stories via @sudhiren â–¸
http://t.co/WNO31D2

Flip side to overwhelming presence of digital technology in our lives
http://www.d-sector.org/article-det.asp?id=765

#Resilience2011 is mentioned http://paper.li/mediamentor

Things have improved. But in the best areas, there are still gaps.
Take the case of cyclone warning in #Andhra, TN, #B'desh.

Weather information, which does not say what kind of pest certain
weather will ignite, is hardly useful information.

"#Mobile is instantaneous, it can be parcelised. It's the cheapest
tool to get across information."

Technology (ICT) makes people `vulnerable' at a `different' level

"People mostly just react (to tech). When it comes to survival, then
they start reacting..."

"We seem to lack the abilities to capture and disseminate information
(in a crisis)."

"Tho we say 90% penetration of mobiles (touted as a success story in
India), the degree of comfort with tech is not there."

Tools an obsession for some. Tools need to be understood by end user,
and may not be affordable. --Vijay Pratap Singh Aditya

In the ICT (info-comm tech) world, emphasis is more on the tools
rather than the information. --Khilesh Chaturvedi

Obsession for mobiles are destroying traditional means of
communication & knowledge exchange, making users less intelligent

Mobiles deepen existing gaps in society

do ICTs have a role in adaptation....answers Angelica Valeria Ospina
of Univ. of Manchester

Powerful these may be, mobiles are ecologically hazaradous - sparrows
have been their first victims

Resilience is robustness rapidity scale redundancy flexibility
diversity selforganisation learning & equality rolled 2gether

None of the primitive tribes in Andaman-Nicobar islands lost life
during Tsunami......did they posess better ICT tools?

Change not reflected in your `balance sheet' is at best cosmetic, an
aspect rarely accounted in resilience discussions

Livelihood not limited to income generation activities. Involves
asserting health, education, other rights to be fully human

Conflict and riots is also considered as disaster..

Is overlap a bad thing? When we overlap, we are communicating with
each other -- Rusty

We're all using the same terms, but they mean different things in
different disciplines...

Ability of community to withstand, recover, adapt, potentially change
to external pressure

isn't `adaptation' an excuse for engaging into infrastructure
development at the cost of ecosystems yet again? Contentious!

In buffer zone (Sri Lanka), CRZ (India)... what about incoming
threats? We need to look at future time-line models.

We never discussed with the communities of how changing ecosystems
were affecting them, and how they were coping...

Tsunami helped us understand the importance of mangroves, better ecosystems...

Resilience is non-negotiable! George Bush, Sr., he said at the Rio
Summit `Americam lifestyle is non-negotiable!'

VIDEO: http://www.youtube.com/user/StayingLive
BLOG: http://www.cemart.co.in/conf/blog

Kuala Lumpur, March 4, 2011.

The link says:
"Draft Rules under Section 43A & Section 79 of IT Act - Public Comments
Invited by February 25, 2011"
while the text on the page says "28.02.2011"

Hence the confusion.

On Friday 25 February 2011 07:26 PM, Pranesh Prakash wrote:
> Dear Tarun and all,
> Thanks so much for pointing out the final date is 28th, and not as I'd
> mentioned. We don't have to work overtime tonight to wrap up our
> comments. :)
>
> I would strongly urge everyone go through all three of these and send in
> comments.
>
> One general idea you might all want to keep in mind is to see if there
> is a nexus between each sub-rule and the parent section. For instance,
> most of the cybercafe regulations and a lot of the gen. intermediary
> guidelines regulation has nothing to do at all with whether they should
> or should not be held liable for user actions (which is what s.79(2),
> under which they are made is about).
>
> Regards,
> Pranesh
>
> On Friday 25 February 2011 06:35 PM, Tarun Dua wrote:
>> Draft Rules under Section 43A& Section 79 of IT Act for public comments
>>
>> * The Draft rule under section 43A- Reasonable security practices
>> and procedures and sensitive personal information
>> * The Draft rule under section 79-Due diligence observed by
>> intermediaries guidelines
>> * The Draft rule under section 79-Guidelines for Cyber Cafe
>>
>> Comments are invited till 28.02.2011 which can be sent by email to:
>> grai AT mit.gov.in
>>
>> From the website.
>>
>> The intermediaries guidelines are especially worrisome. Having dealth
>> first hand with the bureaucracy at CERT. It has implications for the
>> nascent webhosting/hosted datacenter industry of which we are a part.
>>
>> -Tarun
>>
>> On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 1:06 PM, Pranesh
>> Prakash<pranesh@...> wrote:
>>> Dear all,
>>> Today is the last date for comments on:
>>>
>>> The draft rule under s.43A : Reasonable security practices and
>>> procedures and sensitive personal information
>>> The draft rule under s.79 : Due diligence observed by intermediaries
>>> guidelines
>>> The draft rule under s.79 : Guidelines for cybercafes
>>>
>>> They are all very worrisome and disturbing. Importantly, there is a good
>>> case to say that they exceed the authority granted by the IT Act.
>>> Many of
>>> the provisions in the rules on intermediaries and cybercafes, for
>>> instance,
>>> have no nexus with s.79(2) under which they are drafted.
>>>
>>> They text of the draft rules be downloaded from the DIT website:
>>> http://goo.gl/qWZ8L
>>>
>>> Comments need to be sent to Gulshan Rai: grai@...
>>>
>>> And there's this op-ed in today's Hindu:
>>>
>>> http://goo.gl/Yp9pu
>>>
>>> The battle lines over encryption
>>>
>>> APARNA VISWANATHAN
>>>
>>> The draft Information Technology Rules provide the key to the back door
>>> sought by the government, and leave no doubt that security concerns will
>>> prevail over privacy.
>>>
>>> The draft “Information Technology (Due Diligence observed by
>>> intermediaries
>>> guidelines) Rules, 2011 circulated by the Ministry of Communications and
>>> Information Technology on February 10, 2011, address the issue of the
>>> liability of internet service providers (ISPs) and other
>>> intermediaries, an
>>> issue which achieved public notoriety through the Baazee.com case in
>>> 2004.
>>> In one master stroke, the Draft Rules settle the dispute raging over the
>>> last year, regarding the use of encryption techniques by the
>>> customers of
>>> BlackBerry, Google, Skype and MSN. Yet, while doing so, the Draft
>>> Rules also
>>> reveal the fundamental shortcomings of the IT Act even after the 2008
>>> amendments.
>>>
>>> The case, Avnish Bajaj v State arose out of the sale of a video clip
>>> on the
>>> website of Baazee.com, shot on a mobile phone in MMS form, depicting two
>>> schoolchildren indulging in an explicit sexual act. Although the
>>> Bazee.com
>>> case was ultimately decided under the provisions of the Indian Penal
>>> Code,
>>> the critical legal issue in civil law is to what extent ISPs can be held
>>> liable for the content transmitted through their network. The question,
>>> which was initially addressed by California courts in the mid-1990s, was
>>> whether ISPs should be treated in the same manner as newspapers or
>>> magazines
>>> publishing content and, therefore, made potentially liable for copyright
>>> infringement, defamation, obscenity and other civil/criminal
>>> liability, or
>>> as telephone companies which are not liable for the content of the
>>> communications they transmit.
>>>
>>> Since the seminal 1995 judgment of the District Court of Northern
>>> California
>>> in the Netcom case, the view in the U.S. has been that an ISP is a
>>> passive
>>> service provider much like a telephone company and cannot be held
>>> liable for
>>> the content transmitted through its server. This legal position
>>> changed in
>>> the U.S. with the passage of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA),
>>> which provided a “safe harbour” for ISPs, conferring exemption from
>>> copyright liability. However, the exemption is subject to the ISP
>>> meeting
>>> certain conditions. The ISP must not have the actual knowledge that the
>>> material is infringing, must not be aware of the facts and circumstances
>>> from which the infringing activity is apparent and, in the event of
>>> having
>>> such knowledge, must act expeditiously to disable such material. In
>>> order to
>>> avail himself of the exemption from liability, the service provider must
>>> also not receive a financial benefit directly attributable to the
>>> infringing
>>> activity.
>>>
>>> The legal position in India is similar to the DMCA in that the exemption
>>> from liability is not absolute but is subject to meeting certain
>>> conditions.
>>> Following the 2008 amendments, Section 79 of the IT Act, 2000
>>> provides that
>>> an intermediary will not be held liable for any third party information,
>>> data or communication link made available or hosted by him. However,
>>> this
>>> exemption will apply only if the following conditions are met.
>>>
>>> First, the function of the intermediary must be limited to providing
>>> access
>>> to a communication system over which information made available by third
>>> parties is transmitted or temporarily stored or hosted. Second, the
>>> intermediary does not initiate the transmission, select the receiver or
>>> select/modify the information contained in the transmission. In other
>>> words,
>>> the ISP acts like a telephone company and not like a newspaper editor
>>> who
>>> can select or edit the information provided. The exemption will also
>>> not be
>>> applicable if the ISP has conspired, aided, abetted or induced the
>>> commission of the unlawful act; or upon receiving actual knowledge
>>> that any
>>> information, data or communication link residing in or connected to a
>>> computer resource controlled by the intermediary is being used to
>>> commit the
>>> unlawful act, the intermediary fails to expeditiously remove or disable
>>> access to that material. The last two conditions are similar to those
>>> imposed under the DMCA in the U.S.
>>>
>>> Furthermore, in order to avail himself of the exemption under Section
>>> 79,
>>> the intermediary must “observe due diligence” while discharging his
>>> duties
>>> under the IT Act, 2000 and also observe other guidelines which the
>>> Central
>>> government may prescribe in this behalf. For the first time, since
>>> the 2008
>>> amendments came into force, on February 10, 2011, the Ministry of
>>> Communications and Information Technology circulated draft rules
>>> regarding
>>> due diligence by intermediaries (the “Draft Rules”).
>>>
>>> Sub-rule (2) of the Draft Rules lists the types of infringing
>>> information
>>> which should not be transmitted by the intermediary, including
>>> information
>>> which is 1) abusive, blasphemous, obscene, vulgar etc., 2) infringing of
>>> IPRs, 3) sensitive personal information, and 4) information which
>>> threatens
>>> the unity, security or sovereignty of India. However, sub-rule (2) then
>>> tries to add in the offences which are the instruments of modern cyber
>>> crime. The list includes any information which impersonates another
>>> person,
>>> that is, identity theft and deceiving or misleading the addressee
>>> about the
>>> origin of electronic messages more commonly known as phishing.
>>> However, this
>>> list comprising identity theft and phishing is entirely inadequate as
>>> these
>>> are only a few methods of modern cyber crime/war. The list ignores, for
>>> example, the installation of a program which allows an attacker to
>>> remotely
>>> control the targeted computer otherwise known as “BOTNETS.” Another
>>> common
>>> tool of cyber crime is the use of a software program or a device
>>> designed to
>>> secretly monitor and log all keystrokes otherwise known as “keyloggers.”
>>> However, neither the remote access of a computer nor the secret
>>> monitoring
>>> of a computer resource is mentioned in sub-rule (2).
>>>
>>> The Draft Rules also introduce a definition of “cyber security
>>> incident” as
>>> any real or suspected adverse event in relation to cyber security that
>>> violates an explicitly or implicitly applicable security policy
>>> resulting in
>>> unauthorised access, denial of service or disruption, unauthorised
>>> use of a
>>> computer resource for processing or storage of information or changes to
>>> data, information without authorisation. In fact, the need to include
>>> the
>>> concepts of modern cyber crime and a definition as basic and critical as
>>> “cyber security incident” in Draft Rules on due diligence by
>>> intermediaries
>>> shows that there is a fundamental lacuna in the IT Act itself,
>>> namely, that
>>> it ignores the concepts of modern cyber war altogether and is limited
>>> to the
>>> outdated concerns of theft of software code through hacking.
>>>
>>> The partial attempt to bring in the concepts of modern cyber crime
>>> under the
>>> purview of the IT Act distracts attention from what is perhaps the main
>>> objective of the Draft Rules, that is, to codify the government's
>>> position
>>> towards service providers such as BlackBerry, Google, Skype, and MSN
>>> Hotmail
>>> which has recently attracted much attention. Research in Motion
>>> (RIM), the
>>> Canadian company, which operates BlackBerry, provides its customers with
>>> their own encryption key and does not possess a master key. According to
>>> RIM, in its system, there is no “back door” through which either RIM
>>> or any
>>> third party can gain access to the key or the customer's data.
>>>
>>> However, the Indian government was concerned that this level of
>>> encryption
>>> makes it impossible to monitor BlackBerry messages for national security
>>> purposes and that BlackBerrry's strong encryption technology could be
>>> used
>>> for terrorist or criminal activity. As per newspaper reports, on
>>> August 31,
>>> 2010, the Government of India accepted RIM's proposal for “lawful
>>> access by
>>> law enforcement agencies” of encrypted BlackBerry data. In December
>>> 2010,
>>> RIM reportedly provided the government a cloud computing-based system
>>> which
>>> would enable security agencies to lawfully intercept BlackBerry
>>> Messenger
>>> (BBM) messages in a comprehensible format but not BlackBerry Enterprise
>>> Service, that is, corporate emails.
>>>
>>> The Draft Rules incorporate the government's stand vis-à-vis
>>> BlackBerry into
>>> law because they require an intermediary to provide information to
>>> government agencies, which are lawfully authorised for investigative,
>>> protective, cyber security or intelligence activity. In sum, the
>>> Draft Rules
>>> provide the key to the back door long sought after by the government and
>>> leave no doubt that security concerns will prevail in law over the
>>> interest
>>> in privacy through use of encryption by civil society.
>>>
>>> --
>>> Pranesh Prakash
>>> Programme Manager
>>> Centre for Internet and Society
>>> W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 40926283
>>>
>>>
>

--
Pranesh Prakash
Programme Manager
Centre for Internet and Society
W: http://cis-india.org | T: +91 80 40926283

INDIA: Engaging Africa With Software and Soft Power

By Ranjit Devraj

Amity University lecturer interacting with students of international
business at Makerere University via the Pan-African e-Network. / Wambi
Michael/IPS
NEW DELHI, Mar 18 (IPS) – India cannot match rival China’s massive
investments in Africa, but it is using its information technology
capabilities and its affordable university courses to stay relevant on
the continent.
“How do you matter to Africa? India cannot obviously compete with
either China or the United States, but it was this country which
inspired the anti- colonial struggles of the last century and took a
stand against apartheid,” says Ajay Kumar Dubey of the Jawaharlal
Nehru University’s department for Africa studies.
Dubey points to the Pan-African e-Network project as a classic example
of what India has been doing to win friends in Africa and to also get
a share of the continent’s markets and resources for its own expanding
economy at home.
Besides providing tele-medicine and tele-education services the
Pan-African e-Network facilitates easy video-conferencing among
African heads of states across 33 nodes.
The Pan-African e-Network is “the finest example of partnership
between India and Africa,” said Indian Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna
when he inaugurated the second phase of the 125 million dollar project
in August 2010 from the New Delhi studios of the government-owned
Telecommunications Consultants India Ltd. (TCIL).
Kicked off on Feb. 16, 2009 the first phase of the project covered
Benin, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Mauritius,
Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal and Seychelles. With the second phase,
Botswana, Burundi, Cote d’Ivoire, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Libya,
Malawi, Mozambique, Somalia, Uganda and Zambia are on board.
“We were able to prove a point with this project,” TCIL executive
Rajesh Kapoor told IPS. “Here is the practical implementation of a
simple but great idea to bring people together.”
There is reason for people like Kapoor to be upbeat. Last year the
project bagged the 2010 Hermes Prize for Innovation, instituted by the
European Institute of Creative Strategies (EICS), a think tank that
promotes strategies for innovation and renewal worldwide.
EICS described the satellite and fibre-optic communication network as
“the most ambitious programme of distance education and tele-medicine
in Africa ever undertaken: the first example of large Project
South-South development support.”
Currently some 2,000 African students are registered – through the e-
Network – with prestigious Indian educational institutions such as the
Indian Institute of Science, the University of Madras, the Delhi
University, the Indira Gandhi National Open University, the Amity
University, and the Indian Institute of Technology at Kanpur.
Partner African tele-education centres have been set up at the Kwame
Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Ghana, the Makerere
University in Uganda, and Cameroon’s Yaounde University.
Makerere University has devoted two lecture rooms to the programme.
They are fitted with state of the art e-learning technology and video
conferencing facilities linked to India’s privately run Amity
University. There is full interaction between the lecturers and the
students.
Davies Rwabu, a second year Master of International Business student
told IPS that the programme caters to busy students. “You have online
video conferencing once a week for about three hours, and then you can
still catch up with the notes online because we have a portal from
which we can pick up the notes,” Rwabu explained.
Rwabu said the system allows for offline access to the lecture
contents, which are stored in a database for review learning and
access to lecturers in India.
Students pay a subsidised fee of 200 dollars per semester at Makerere,
which compares well with the regular 1,240 dollars for comparable
courses.
Earnings from running the courses are not sent back to India, they are
used to pay local technicians running the learning centres as well as
the project’s coordinator.
Amity University courses available through the Makerere centre lead to
a diploma in information technology, and master’s degrees in financial
management and control and international business.
When the programme was launched in August 2009, 236 Ugandan students
enrolled and the number doubled the following year. A third round of
enrolment is slated for July 2011.
The current objective of the project, Kapoor said, is to assist Africa
in building capacity by imparting quality education to 10,000 students
across the continent over a five-year period.
Apart from the Pan-African e-Network, India has extended assistance to
several African nations by way of training of experts and
implementation of projects.
Over 1,000 officials from sub-Saharan Africa receive training annually
under the Indian Technical and Education (ITEC) programme and about
15,000 African students are currently enrolled in different academic
programmes in India – many of them self-financed.
There are plans in the works to establish a series of India-Africa
institutes each specialising in specific areas – foreign trade,
education, administration, diamonds, and human settlements – as part
of future capacity building.

*with additional reporting by Wambi Michael in Uganda
(END/2011)

http://www.ips.org/africa/2011/03/india-engaging-africa-with-software-and-soft-p\
ower/

Frederick Noronha :: +91-9822122436 :: +91-832-2409490

Available Now: New Working Paper on the Right to Information and Privacy

On first inspection, it would appear that the right of access to information and the right to protection of personal privacy are irreconcilable. However the reality is more complex. For the most part, these two rights complement each other in holding governments accountable to individuals. But there is a potential conflict between these rights when there is a demand for access to personal information held by government bodies.

Targeted for practitioners working in governance and transparency issues and as part of its Governance Working Paper series, the World Bank Institute has recently published a sixth working paper on ATI addressing some of these issues.

“The Right to Information and Privacy: Balancing rights and managing conflicts” by David Banisar, Senior Legal Counsel for Article XIX. Available here
http://wbi.worldbank.org/wbi/news/2011/03/10/available-now-new-working-paper-right-information-and-privacy

Focusing on the cases of Ireland, Mexico, Slovenia and the UK, while also looking at other experiences, this paper examines legislative and structural means to better define and balance the rights to privacy and to information.

For more information please contact Marcos Mendiburu or Luis Esquivel.

A Practical Guide to Online and Mobile Security

In collaboration with our partners in the  sector, we've put together a
practical guide to protecting yourself  online and while using mobile
phones geared to the millions of people  around the world who have

recently converted from citizen to activist.  The guide is available in
both Arabic and English. 

https://www.accessnow.org/pages/protecting-your-security-online


More

For Activists, Tips in Safer Use of #SocialMedia #NYT
http://ow.ly/4s6rF free information advocates have emerged to help educate
the latest generation of activists. To that end, one such group, Access,

just released its guide to maintaining online and mobile phone security,
with versions in Arabic and English

Respected Members,

Greetings from 3rd Citi Financial IT Case Competition!

The 3rd Citi Financial IT Case Competition (CFICC) aims to provide an opportunity for young and talented minds from different public and private universities in Bangladesh to compete in the development of unique software and information system solutions for the financial sector in Bangladesh and nurture future leaders of the country. It helps students improve their knowledge on the use/application of technology within the financial sector. Each team will consist of 5 team members. Four university students can form a team for the competition which will include 2 students from business and 2 from IT. In each team one faculty member either from Business or IT will play the role of Project Manager. Each team will be working on the same case till the end. The ‘3rd Citi Financial IT Case Competition’ will consist of a 1st round, 2nd round and a final round. At the end of the final round the top five teams will be awarded US$ 3,000, US$ 2,000, US$ 1,000, US$ 500 and US$ 500 respectively. Last date of registration is May 05 2011. For any query please email at cficc@...This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it . For details and registration please log on http://cficc.dnet.org.bd

Regards

Farha Sharmin
Project Director
3rd Citi Financial IT Case Competition
D.Net
6/8, Humayun Road, Block-B,  Nohammadpur, Dhaka, Bangladesh
Cell: +8801714071326
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=112537795435526
Twitter: http://twitter.com/CFICC                                  
Website: http://cficc.dnet.org.bd