News digest | Open Society Information Program | Week ending 13 January 2017

News digest | Open Society Information Program | Week ending 13 January 2017
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The Information Program NEWS DIGEST, published the second and fourth Thursdays of each month, aims to update colleagues in the Open Society Foundations and friends further afield about the news, opinions and events the Program team have been watching this fortnight. The views expressed in these stories do not necessarily reflect those of the Information Program or the OSF. Prepared by Wendy M. Grossman.
 
Our staff, advisers and major grantees tweet at http://bit.ly/13j5fjq. Current and former grantees featured in this issue: EDRi, OKFN, R3D.
 
PROGRAMME NEWS
 
Correction
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The report on an OKFN blog posting on the Open Government Partnership in the NEWS DIGEST for the week ending December 23 2016 misspelled Mor Rubinstein's last name and misreported her gender. We apologize for the error.
OKFN: http://bit.ly/2iavapN
 
Life in a Quantified Society
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The Open Society Foundation has published a basic guide to its work on the Quantified Society, explaining the underpinning technologies and their impact on individuals' everyday lives. Topics include pervasive data collection, algorithmic decision-making, and the problems these pose for accountability and open access to information.
https://osf.to/2hTp3Ub
 
 
NEWS
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For breaking news stories, visit: http://pinboard.in/u:osi_info_program/t:news/
 
US formally accuses Russians of hacking the November elections
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Writing for the NYU Law School Just Security blog, Ronald Deibert calls the joint FBI-Department of Homeland Security report on Russian cyber interference in the 2016 US election "badly constructed". Deibert complains that the White House fails to present the evidence linking the cyber espionage operations to Russia and that much of the critical evidence vital to the public interest is being kept secret, either by the National Security Agency or by private cyber security firms. At Esquire, Kings College professor Thomas Rid outlines the background of 20 years of Russian hacks of the US and discusses the role Wikileaks played in publishing the results. The New York Times calls the situation the realisation of "Julian Assange's years-old vision". Bruce Schneier discusses the problem of attribution in cyberspace. 
JustSecurity: http://bit.ly/2iP7G6u
Esquire: http://bit.ly/2jqZ0nl
NY Times: http://nyti.ms/2j7u0Jr
Schneier: http://bit.ly/2iP9qwt
 
EU: European Commission launches e-privacy directive
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EDRi reports that the European Commission has released its proposals for the e-privacy directive, which EDRi argues needs substantial improvement. It consists of three elements: a legislative proposal for replacing regulation 2001/45; a communication on the "data economy", and a communication on exchanging and protecting international data flows in a globalized world. The EC's press conference to discuss the announcement will be live-streamed on January 17.
EDRi: http://bit.ly/2iOYLBR
EC (press release): http://bit.ly/2irF0Tj
EC (regulation): http://bit.ly/2j7vKCI
EC (data economy): http://bit.ly/2jf5hoE
EC (data flows): http://bit.ly/2iP4PdX
 
US: Police subpoena Amazon Echo data in murder case
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The Center for Democracy and Technology reports that police investigating a murder in Bentonville, Arkansas ended 2016 by issuing a warrant to Amazon to demand that the company turn over audio recordings from an Echo home automation device. Amazon has refused to comply, and it is not clear which aspects - wiretap, stored communications, or trap and trace - of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act apply to the snippets of voice recording retained by the company. The Register reports that when a TV reporter, discussing the story of a child who accidentally ordered her family's Alexa device to order her a dollhouse, repeated on-air the command, "Alexa, order me a dollhouse", Echo devices around the country began attempting to fulfill the order. Online purchasing is turned on by default on these devices. 
CDT: http://bit.ly/2ik9PLa
Register: http://bit.ly/2iP59JA
 
Australia: Commission recommends adoption of fair use
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InfoJustice summarizes the report issued at the end of December 2016 by the Australian Government Productivity Commission has recommended the introduction of fair use into copyright law, along with other changes on patents, copyright, and enforcement. The Commission has warned that copyright is too restrictive, in both scope and length of term, and proposes introducing a system of user rights. TechDirt lists the main points and reposts the entire 766-page report, which was released under a CC-BY license.
InfoJustice: http://bit.ly/2irDiBe
TechDirt: http://bit.ly/2jE2FO0
 
New York proposes mandating passenger GPS coordinates
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Freedom to Tinker reports that New York City's Taxi and Limousine Commission has proposed a new rule that would require car service platform companies such as Lyft and Uber to add GPS coordinates of customers' drop-off and pick-up points to existing requirements. New York's Freedom of Information law would make the bulk data subject to full public release. The stated justification is to combat "driver fatigue" and improve safety; however, the rule does not match the purpose and raises serious threats to passenger privacy. 
Freedom to Tinker: http://bit.ly/2irFHvI
 
Germany, Peru, Taiwan: Scientists lose access to Elsevier journals
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Nature reports on the alternatives being pursued by scientists in Germany, Peru, and Taiwan now that their access to Elsevier journals has ended. Peru's government has terminated funding to pay for a license. Contract negotiations in Germany and Taiwan broke down in December; because negotiations resumed in Taiwan in early January, Elsevier has granted a one-month extension to the Taiwanese universities that had canceled their subscriptions.
Nature: http://go.nature.com/2jeF7Tq
 
Iran: Pornography filter breaks browsers across the world
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The Verge reports that 256 websites, many of them pornographic, were blocked for users from Russia to Hong Kong when Iran activated a censorship filter using a technique called BGP hijacking that directs computers to phony routes. Iran's national telecom company is pivotal to the transit of data through the region. The situation began to resolve after approximately 28 hours. At its blog, Dyn has more detail and background on BGP hacking in general and Iranian censorship in particular.
Verge: http://bit.ly/2jeNezz
Dyn: http://bit.ly/2inpZi1
 
AI research fund founded to promote research into the public interest
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TechCrunch reports that LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman and eBay founder Pierre Omidyar have each put $10 million into seeding the $27 million Ethics and Governance of Artificial intelligence Fund to promote research into artificial intelligence in the public interest. As algorithms make an increasing range of key decisions with ramifications throughout society, the Fund's founders believe it's crucial that AI research should include input from many disciplines, including social science, law, ethics, and religion. The founding academic institutions will be the MIT Media Lab and Harvard's Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society. 
TechCrunch: http://tcrn.ch/2jeGAJo
 
FEATURES AND ANALYSIS
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For more features and analysis selected by the Program team, visit:
http://pinboard.in/u:osi_info_program/t:oped/
 
Chaos Computer Congress 33
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In this Guardian piece, Alex Hern lists five key technologies talks at the 2016 Chaos Computer Congress identified as broken: intercoms, boarding cards, smart meters, elections, and random number generators. At his blog, Edward Hasbrouck discusses the boarding card issues - which he highlighted more than 15 years ago - in greater detail. CCC-TV makes available video of the conference talks; EDRi's page highlights those given by its members and observers on topics such as German state surveillance, the state of internet politics in Austria, and the issues surrounding law enforcement hacking. Among notable talks is Aylin Caliskin's discussion of prejudice in word embeddings - language models that translate words into numeric vectors for uses such as web search, sentiment analysis, and machine learning. 
Guardian: http://bit.ly/2irLcdV
Hasbrouck: http://bit.ly/2jLU8Ne
C3: http://bit.ly/2iP3ZO8
EDRi: http://bit.ly/2ikipcT
C3 (Caliskin): http://bit.ly/2ikbyQK
 
Building the LibreRouter
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In this interview at Global Voice, published in Spanish and English, Gui Iribarren, vice-president of AlterMundi, discusses the LibreRouter project, which aims to make it easier to get online without relying on a corporate hardware manufacturer and build community networks. AlterMundi expects to delivery the first version of this router to community networks in Argentina and South Africa.
Global Voices: http://bit.ly/2jr3tGL
 
(Dis)Information mercenaries
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In this posting at Medium, University of Zurich mathematician and PersonalData.io founder Paul-Olivier Dehaye studies the methodology of Cambridge Analytica, which has been widely reported to have helped the Trump campaign micro-target messages based on the thousands of data points it claims to have on every American. Dehaye reports that the same vendor and its affiliates have built "PSYOPS" dashboards to manipulate populations in Libya, Afghanistan, and countless other countries. In a YouTube talk, Cambridge Analytica founder Alexander Nix discusses the power of big data.
Medium: http://bit.ly/2j7IhGa
YouTube: http://bit.ly/2ikeFbe
 
The real name fallacy
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In this Coral Project blog posting, J.Nathan Matias dissects the fallacy that requiring real names will end bad online behavior. Among his points: most online attackers are already known to their targets in real life; identity protection is important for vulnerable people; and many hate groups seek legitimacy by operating openly. Design alone is not a solution, and the outcomes of such efforts should be systematically tested.
Coral Project: http://bit.ly/2jDUf9s
 
The new world
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In this series of radio programs the BBC explores aspects of "The New World" such as globalisation, changing demographics, the rise of anti-elitist populism, the balance of power, and the "post-truth" world. Each piece traces its topic back to the roots of the change, seeking to answer the main question, "When did this happen?"
BBC: http://bbc.in/2ik4gfL
 
Cyberwar for sale
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In this piece from the New York Times magazine, Mattathias Schwartz explores the activities of the privately-owned Milan-based surveillance software maker Hacking Team as revealed by documents made public after the company was itself hacked. The Mexican civil liberties group R3D, for example, was able to use the leaked documents to unveil surveillance in the state of Puebla; Mexico is Hacking Team's largest export market. Hacking Team has fewer than 50 employees, but its global roster of companies include the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration, Egypt, Honduras, Uzbekistan, Turkey, and Sudan. Once surreptitiously installed on a target's computer or phone, Hacking Team's Remote Control System software can secretly eavesdrop on location data, text messages, email, phone, and Skype calls, grabbing the data before it can be encrypted. The article also explores the spread of the belief that "privacy is secrecy and secrecy is terrorism".
NY Times: http://nyti.ms/2ik90SC
 
 
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DIARY
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To see more events recommended by the Information Program team, visit:
https://pinboard.in/u:osi_info_program/t:events/. If you would like your event listed in this mail, email info.digest@opensocietyfoundations.org.
 
Privacy Camp
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January 24, 2017
Brussels, Belgium
Co-organised by EDRi, Privacy Salon, USL-B, and VUB-LSTS, the fifth annual Privacy Camp brings together civil society, policy makers, and academia to discuss existing and looming problems for human rights in the digital environment.
http://bit.ly/2evfpa9
 
Computers, Privacy, and Data Protection
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January 25-27, 2017
Brussels, Belgium
The tenth CPDP's main theme is artificial intelligence. The conference is accepting proposals for panels in April (from academic consortia, research projects, think tanks, and other research organisations) and May (from individuals wishing to present academic research papers).
http://bit.ly/1OrQSv6
 
Internet Freedom Festival
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March 6-10, 2017
Valencia, Spain
The Internet Freedom Festival gathers the community keeping the Internet open and uncensored for a week of free-form multidisciplinary collaboration intended to help groups achieve their goals. Attendance is free and open to the public.
http://bit.ly/2dI8EV1
 
Rightscon 2017
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March 29-31, 2017
Brussels, Belgium
RightsCon will tackle the most pressing issues at the intersection of technology and human rights. 
http://bit.ly/I2ZAUZ
 
We Robot
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March 31-April 1, 2017
New Haven, Connecticut
The sixth annual We Robot will be held at Yale Law School and will focus on the coming legal and policy conflicts as robots and AI become part of daily life.
http://bit.ly/2fVF2SI
 
TICTeC 2017
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April 25-26, 2017
Florence, Italy
This will be the third mySociety conference on the impacts of civic technology.
http://bit.ly/2e5NifJ
 
2017 IFLA International News Media Conference
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April 27-28, 2017
Reykjavik, Iceland
This conference will examine issues and challenges in collecting and preserving the news and making it available to users. Do access and preservation have different prerequisites? In addition, the conference will explore how news media is used and transformed by researchers and the public. Can we recognize variable user needs? Do we offer the most suitable APIs? 
http://bit.ly/2gjYmu2
 
Creative Commons Global Summit
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April 28-30, 2017
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
This event will gather a global community of technologists, academics, activists, creatives, and legal experts to work together on the expansion and growth of the commons, open knowledge, and free culture for all. 
http://bit.ly/2cO3x0P
 
MetLib 2017
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Montreal, Quebec, Canada
The 2017 programme theme is "Partnerships: Creating a new vision for libraries". Among the subthemes will be discussions of how and why to use, form, and manage partnerships, management tools, and best practices. 
http://bit.ly/2ghPOPp
 
4th Africa Library Summit and 2nd AfLIA conference
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May 14-20, 2017
Yaounde, Cameroon
Moved from Ethiopia to the site of the second bidder due to safety concerns, this conference co-locates the fourth Africa Library Sumit and the second African Library and Information Associations and Institutions conference.
http://bit.ly/2hsw64E
 
IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy
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May 22-24, 2017
San Jose, California
The 38th annual meeting will present developments in computer security and electronic privacy, and for bringing together researchers and practitioners in the field. 
http://bit.ly/2hsqUhj
 
Workshop on Technology and Consumer Protection 
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May 22-24, 2017
San Jose, California
Co-hosted with the IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy, ConPro will explore computer science topics with an impact on consumers. This workshop has a strong security and privacy slant, with an overall focus on ways in which computer science can prevent, detect, or address the potential for technology to deceive or unfairly harm consumers. 
http://bit.ly/2fJ6ShN
 
Next Library Festival 2017
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June 11-14, 2017
Aarhus, Denmark
Next Library 2017 will offer a "patchwork" of co-learning, co-creative, participatory, engaging, pluralistic and interactive meetings, and lots of parallel sessions, keynote speakers, wildcard sessions, demos/exhibitions, gaming, Networking Dinner Party, Get2Gether, Social un-conferences, alternative events and surprises.
http://bit.ly/2hHNt4W
 
Open Repositories 2017
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June 26-30, 2017
Brisbane, Australia
The annual Open Repositories Conference brings together users and developers of open digital repository platforms from higher education, government, galleries, libraries, archives and museums. The Conference provides an interactive forum for delegates from around the world to come together and explore the global challenges and opportunities facing libraries and the broader scholarly information landscape.
http://bit.ly/2aOCiGp
 
IFLA World Libraries and Information Congress
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August 19-25, 2017
Wroclaw, Poland
The theme of the 83rd annual IFLA congress will be "Achieving a healthy future together: diverse and emerging roles for health information professionals". 
http://bit.ly/2gErkVa
 
Privacy + Security Forum
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October 4-6, 2017
Washington, DC
The conference breaks down the silos of security and privacy by bringing together leaders from both fields. 
http://bit.ly/1PZhExo
 
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