I recently completed  the Diplo Foundation Internet Governance Advanced course in Privacy (Aug 2012) and the Introduction to Policy Research (Nov 2012). My project proposal sought to draw attention to the quality of the stakeholder consultation process as a precursor to legislative changes. Specific focus was given to the HIPCAR project on St. Kitts-Nevis which has resulted in proposed and in some cases actual legislative changes in the interception of communications, e-commerce, …

Just a reminder to everyone especially those of us who attended the IGF in Baku To send in their suggestions /thoughts as to how the process can be improved.

My main suggestion would be to have the plenary sessions reorganised and focus on the reports from the feeder sessions first then we can have the panelists discuss/talk amongst themselves. What is the point of having feeder sessions if the points raised In the workshop sessions have to be literally rushed…

Its been one week since I left Baku and the IGF2012. I'm still surprised that it has taken me this long to catch up on work and everything else. You may ask what does time travel have to do with Baku and the IGF. For those of us who travelled from the Caribbean it certainty felt like it. 

Travel from the Caribbean to London on an eight hour flight and Move forward four hours in real time(London is four hours ahead of the Caribbean). Then another flight of eight hours to Baku and move…

After a flurry of sessions over the last few days, I was looking for a session to attend on the last afternoon of the IGF.

Grace Githaiga of the African IGF invitied me to attend the African IGF Session that was being held that day.

What I experienced at that session was inspiring, challenging and reaffirming.

The reports from the panelists covered the state of the IGF process from an African context and while panelists appealed for greater involvement of other African…

On the third day of IGF2012 I participated in a working session 52 on the internet of Humans as one of the rapporteurs. Working session 52 was one of the feeder sessions for the main session in the afternoon. Grace Githaiga (Kenya), Deirdre Williams (St. Lucia) and myself were the rapporteurs for working session 52. As rapporteurs we were told that it was our responsibility to distill and capture the main points of the two hour workshp and prepare  a report to be presented to the main…

One of the issues I have with the IGF is that there are so many interesting workshops happening in parallel and it is physically impossible to attend all of them. Having said that, that in my view is also one of the impressive features of the IGF, the diversity of relevant issues that are being addressed simultaneously. It underscores the need for a multidisciplinary, multi dimensional approach to Internet Governance issues.

My picks for today were Internet Governance and sustainable…

Its finally here IGF2012…

One of the first things I noted during the opening ceremony was Secretary General Hamadoun Toures’ comments on WCIT 2012 and the role of the ITU and ICANN in the future of the internet. The Secretary General declared that it is not ITU’s intention to ‘takeover’ the internet but rather work collaboratively with ICANN. He further indicated that decisions at WCIT are all taken by consensus. He also noted that the mandates of ICANN and the ITU are different but…

Supreme Court to hear arguments in case of student who resold books.

A grad school student in the US got his family to purchase books overseas, ship them to him and then sold them on eBay. He was sued for copyright infringement by the publishers as the books were labelled "not for importation to or exportation from another region" and lost the case. The appeal now goes before the supreme court. Some people argue that the ruling could threaten ones right to resell items that were…

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/malte_spitz_your_phone_company_is_watching.html

German Green politician Malte Spitz went to court to obtain the information that his cell phone operator, Deutsche Telekom, gathered (and kept) about his activity. The results astonished him. Over the course of six months, they had tracked his…

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-19724403

A regional judge in Brazil orders the arrest of Brazil Google President after the company failed to take down videos.

Google is appealing, but the argument of the internet being a space where one can express themselves "freely" continues.

We increasingly ask our governments to be more open, provide us with data and information on what they are doing, be transparent. How does this conflict with the citizens right to privacy vs he public good?

http://www.zdnet.com/news/fbi-renews-push-for-ready-made-web-wiretaps/6361782?tag=nl.e589

The FBI is asking Internet companies not to oppose a controversial proposal that would require the firms, including Microsoft, Facebook, Yahoo, and Google, to build in backdoors for government surveillance.

In meetings…

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/bott/microsoft-serves-subpoenas-on-google-to-disrupt-criminal-botnet/4955?tag=nl.e589

Microsoft serves subpoenas on Google to disrupt criminal botnet

By Ed Bott | May 4, 2012, 9:34am PDT…

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-14493497

Extract from BBC Article:

"The government is exploring whether to turn off social networks or stop people texting during times of social unrest.

David Cameron said the intelligence services and the police were exploring whether it was "right and possible" to cut off those plotting violence.

...…