xs4alllambda bulletin 3.03
Contents:
xs4all
The Dutch provider XS4ALL
has been again the target of a global online censorship from Germany. During
one week (April 11 to 22), the German academic internet provider Deutsche
Forschungsnetz (DFN) blocked, unsuccessfuly,
the whole xs4all.nl domain name from DFN servers -- and thus its
6200 private web sites -- after a new injunction from the Federal judiciary.
Reason : the leftist magazine Radikal, forbidden in Germany because of its
so-called "terrorist" tendancies, got the high-tech asylum into
xs4all's computers in Amsterdam since more than a year. Last September a
nation-wide censorship action failed because of the 40 mirror sites which
appeared in the world. A German socialist MP was sued because her homepage
showed a single hypertext link to Radikal's web site.
The Dutch company said issue no. 154 of the Radical magazine contains a "Short Guide to hindering railway transports of all kinds" a manual describing how attacks can be made on the tracks on which the nuclear waste transports to Gorleben take place. On account of the German Telecoms Bill, which received its second reading in the federal parliament on Friday, DFN was "obliged" to bar access to material on the Internet as soon as he learns of any illegal contents, but "provided this is technically feasible". Last month also, Bavarian's Attorney indicted Compuserve-Germany's boss Felix Somm for providing access to illegal material online.
"It has been demonstrated that an effective blockade of illegal information has not been within the bounds of possibility" said DFN spokesman Klaus Eckart Maass to AP news agency. "Maintaining the blockade was not feasible." "I cannot undertake anything that hampers scientific developments", he added, because three DFN users complained they were no longer able to reach archeological and other information at XS4ALL (500,000 people use DFN lines between all German universities). Protests also came from B92, as the broadcasting station found its efforts to further the cause of democracy in Serbia thwarted by the blockade, XS4ALL reported.
"I think providers should not have to make political decisions about what is on their service and what is not", Rop Gonggrijp, one of xs4all founders and technical guru said to Lambda early April (before the blockade) "...What you say on your homepage page is as much a part of your freedom of expression as what you say on the street. As we happens to clean the street or maintain the street, doesn't mean we can keep people from saying what they want."
AT THE TIME WHEN all countries are debating on whether what kind of responsability the ISP could bear, AOL-UK released a new contract that makes all things clear about your (non) privacy. These Conditions of Services (COS) will take effect this month, May 17.
Released by Yaman Akdeniz, from the Cyber-Rights & Cyber-Liberties group.
Private web sites under tight srutiny:
Hypertexts links under control -- AOL cops are watching html tags!
Hey, UK citizen, before you click, did you get your permit from the US Export Control Agency?!
The French self-regulation debate is turning to an open battleground between online services professionals and Internet users' associations - with the surrealist absence of independent and small Internet Access Providers. Opened last year after a series of indictments of IAP's officials, the debate, like in any other European country, tries to set up the dispute on whether ISPs or IAPs should be help responsible for the material they transmit, and how content-based disputes could be solved by self-regulation. The government launched a multiparty Commission last autumn, led by Antoine Beaussant, a former Minitel service provider and president of a trade group. The Commission succeeded to publish for open debate a "Charte de l'Internet", that should have been the basis for the creation of a self-regulation body called the "Conseil de l'Internet".
After two month of an online and open debate between trade groups, jurists, associations and some big ISPs like Microsoft, Grolier Interactive, France Telecom, etc, the divorce broke out between professionnals and Internet users associations, the AUI and Citadel (French affiliate of the EFF). Moreover, the AFPI, one trade group of independent IAPs - including WorldNet and FranceNet, whose directors are subject to a year-long inquiry for giving access of illegal content - decided to pull out of the meetings, pushing the government to pass a law that would clarify the limits of their responsability.
Last April, during a meeting that followed the release of the Charter, some professionnals insisted to give the "Conseil de l'Internet" more powers to block Internet access and censor Web sites content.
The AUI, backed by Citadel, denounced these censorship temptations, and wants the body to have just consultative powers, letting the courts to decide of any blockade or censorship measures. The future status of this self regulation body is to be voted in June.
For a good review of Europe's different approaches concerning Internet content regulation, see the compte-rendu of AUI's president after a March 7 meeting in Brussels (in French):
A report by Jerome Thorel
English proof-reader: Ken N.
Cukier