This draft policy (below) is based on the President’s Cyberspace Policy Review (bottom). I have embedded both your your convenience.
Internet filtering: 2009 in review | Berkman Center.
From the OpenNet Initiative blog:
The OpenNet Initiative is proud to release its 2009 Year in Review, a look into instances of filtering, surveillance, and information warfare around the world in 2009.
The events of 2009 demonstrated a global rise in third-generation Internet controls. Within the first two weeks of January 2009, both Pakistan and Thailand had ordered the filtering of several Web sites, and Germany announced plans to filter certain types of pornography, garnering outrage from free speech activists. By mid-year, the events surrounding the elections in Iran had taken center stage, prompting Iranian authorities to crack down on Internet use and sparking outrage throughout the world, which then rippled through social media.
The OpenNet Initiative estimates that at the end of 2009, 32% of all Internet users were accessing a filtered version of the Internet.
Jonathan Zittrain and Elizabeth Stark invite you to follow along with “Difficult Problems in Cyberlaw,” an innovative course at Stanford involving students from three leading schools. Details for the course—including a wiki and Twitter—below. I’m appearing as a guest on January 12.
“In the coming three weeks, students from Harvard, MIT, and Stanford will be tackling real-life problems of Internet commerce, governance, security, and information dissemination at Stanford Law School. This course, Difficult Problems in Cyberlaw, covers the Global Network Initiative, ubiquitous human computing, the future of Wikipedia, and cybersecurity, and is co-taught by Jonathan Zittrain and Elizabeth Stark.”
“There is overlap between these themes in areas of due process online among private sheriffs, the role of intermediaries, motivating good and bad actors, collaborating and relying on masses, and privacy and anonymity on the Internet. These problems themselves are not only conceptual issues but also identifiable struggles within their spheres. Students will engage with practitioners and academics–people who potentially hold the power to shape the future of these issues or provide the course with a sounding board to articulate better questions about the future.”
“The course will be meeting daily for the next three weeks, cramming in visits from corporate executives, artists, entrepreneurs, academics, and participants of online communities. It also includes excursions to various areas in the Silicon Valley technology community including Ebay, Facebook, and Reputation Defender. This immersion will allow students to gain a first-hand view of the environments in which these problems may arise. Since this course is designed to tackle real-life issues, and in the spirit of open access, the problems we’re exploring will be tweeted and blogged, which will serve as a forum to facilitate public generation of debate, solutions, and better questions. We invite you to explore the syllabus and participate in the course wiki athttp://cyber.law.harvard.edu/cyberlaw_winter10/Main_Page. You can also follow along and contribute at @DifficultProbs (http://twitter.com/difficultprobs) on Twitter and on the blog at http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/difficultprobs. We look forward to your input!”
via Audit Zittrain’s “Difficult Problems In Cyberlaw” | Stanford Center for Internet and Society.
Oh. Boy.
I predict that the Internet will soon implode…
The Electronic Frontier Foundation is a non-profit civil liberties organization that defends your rights in the digital world. The EFF is responsible for weighing in on some of the nations toughest issues such as network neutrality, online privacy, peer-to-peer file sharing, and intellectual property. Their contributions have also given momentum for or against certain technologies like RFID, DMCA, Real ID, DRM, and a host of others aimed at enhancing, restricting, or abusing civil liberties of the general public.
Earlier this month they helped a blogger subpoenaed by the TSA, which subsequently the TSA not only backed down but ended up buying him another computer. They also keep the public aware of what is going on behind the scenes at that place we all know and love on the Internet called “Facebook”. Who really knows who your Facebook friends are? Well read the article and find out. I am confident you’ll be shocked to find out that the place we find all warm and fuzzy is actually anything but.