Too secure for its own good

The BlackBerry (BB) is under fire. Security issues have prompted countries around the world to consider taking measures that will limit the use of the smartphone.

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) announced in early August that, as from 11 October, BB users in the UAE will no longer be able to check their email, browse the internet or use instant messaging services. Saudi-Arabia (SA) had announced to do the same, although it has, for now, withdrawn a ban. Indonesia said on 4 August it is considering following the UAE’s move and India has indicated it might do the same. On 11 August, the German Interior Minister revealed that the German IT security agency has advised German Government officials not to use the BB any longer.

The reasoning behind this is that BB data is encrypted and routed overseas, sent through servers in Canada, where the BB manufacturer Research In Motion (RIM) is based. Since users need a national telecom provider in their country to access the RIM server, the UAE has banned its national operators to offer BB online services. 

The BB is much more secure than other phones, since it makes messages far harder to monitor than those sent through domestic servers that authorities can tap into. So its excellent security features have actually become a security issue for a number of governments, for different reasons. The UAE wants a local BB server and data sharing deal so it can monitor its citizens’ messaging traffic, something RIM has – so far – refused. The German Government is uneasy about all its data passing through the RIM centre in Canada. India thinks terrorists use the BB because Indian security services cannot intercept the messages.

The matter has exposed the increasingly cross-border character of online technology. If the controller of a server or website does not wish to share its users’ data, governments hardly have any other possibilities than an outright ban.

RIM now faces the choice to switch to national servers, which governments can tap and which keep data in the home territory, or to hold on to its encrypted messaging server system through Canada, and potentially lose a lot of business.

If, for example, SA imposes a BB internet ban after all, it is expected millions of Saudis will switch to phones that do offer online services. As a result BB sales will drop and with more than 45 million BB users in SA alone, that is not something RIM is looking forward to.

Published in the August issue of E-Commerce Law & Policy Magazine. Copyrights apply.

Tag me if you dare

In July, the social networking website Facebook celebrated the milestone figure of 500 million users, meaning that one in 12 people in the world have a Facebook account. For many people, Facebook has become a part of their daily life and the website’s growing importance has raised legal issues.

Although Facebook often escapes liability thanks to its Terms of Use (posts should not be ‘threatening, unlawful, defamatory, infringing or abusive’), the website has become a fertile ground for legal claims. Users against users. Apart from the ongoing discussion about its Terms of Use and privacy settings, one case in particular deserves attention.  

The High Court of England and Wales awarded, on 27 July, £10,000 in libel damages to Raymond Bryce. Bryce took offence when a former friend posted an image of child sex abuse on Bryce’s Facebook page with the comment ‘Ray, you like kids’. Although the picture was removed within 24 hours, the image was ‘tagged’ (linked) to Bryce’s and 11 other profiles, allowing thousands of ‘friends’ to see the picture for hours after it had been posted.

Dr Ian Brown, from the Oxford Internet Institute, said: “This is worse in some ways than putting offensive posters on lamp posts because it’s going directly to your friends or colleagues. It is almost impossible not to see it”.

The case comes a year after the High Court awarded £22,000 to a businessman whose personal details were made public in a fake Facebook profile, created by a former friend. Although cases like these are still relatively rare - and it is not easy to build a libel case - the rulings emphasise that what is posted online has consequences. There is a very fine line between libeling someone and just poking fun at a friend or colleague, when innocent banter turns into libellous smear. Jeremy Clarke-Williams, Partner at Russell, Jones and Walker, said: “What a lot of people do not realise, users of Facebook and other social networking sites can be just as much subject to the laws of libel as other media outlets if the information, as in this case, is published online for third parties to view”.

However, even if someone has been subject to defamation, suing is not always the best option, according to Louise Fullwood, Legal Director at Pinsent Masons: “Going so far as to sue may be counterproductive in both drawing more attention to the comments made and often provoking ill-feeling and further actions”.

Published previously in the July issue of E-Commerce Law Reports, London 2010 - (c) 2010 CP Publishing

The 'other' side of London

1200 pictures of the 'other' side of London, the ugly side that is. And since the city is so big, we divided the vast amount of images in different categories. Explore the city of Britan's capital you never saw before, from Bermondsey to Waterloo, and from Harrow to Lewisham, the decline cannot be avoided. The pictures were taken by Paul Talling (c) 2010.

• Shops
• Pubs
  
• Houses
• Cafes
  
• People
  
• Post offices
• Power stations
  
• Pools
  
• Cinemas
  
• Markets
• Churches
  
• Graffiti
  
• Hospitals
  
• Public transports
  
• Musical history landmarks
  
• Rats, pigeons and foxes
• Sports grounds
  

Oman to equip ID card with electronic payment features

The Sultanate of Oman is going to link e-payment options to national ID Cards, the Oman Information Technology Authority (ITA) has announced. 

Under the 'e-Purse system', introduced last year to promote cashless and electronic payments in the Sultanate, ID cards will be equipped with payment features using an embedded application in the Smart chip on the ID card. According to Muhanna Moosa Baqer, ITA’s e-Payments Manager, “ID cards can soon be used for paying fees, driving licences, shopping, phone subscriptions, visa applications, parking and tollgate fees”. 

“[Oman] puts a contactless e-purse on the national ID card as a way to kick-start the shift to cashless environments”, said David Birch, Director of Consult Hyperion. “As well as providing an alternative to debit and credit cards, it will help government departments to collect their payments.” The e-Purse system was introduced in May 2009. The first phase of this national e-wallet system began in July last year, allowing Omani citizens and residents to upload and store money on their national ID cards, in order to pay government and police bills. In the next few months, the system will be rolled out further.  ITA stated that all major banks in Oman are participating so retailers will be able to collect payments via the ID card. “This is a prime example of how government agencies and private institutions can partner to improve services to the public”, said Bruce Palmer, Managing Partner of Curtis, Mallet-Prevost’s Muscat office. Abdullah Al Kalbani, Captain of the Royal Oman Police, said: “Since it is mandatory for every adult resident in Oman to have a national ID card this will help those citizens in Oman who have no bank accounts, who do not carry debit or credit cards”. 

Mr Kevin Wong, General Manager of Astute Pte Ltd, the Singaporean company that is behind the development of the new Omani ID card, said: “The company is in discussions with the governments of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain and Jordan for a similar service”.  

“The future of payments is the future of identity”, adds David Birch. “One could envisage, whether you think it is a good idea or not, a simple universal payment scheme that is linked to a single universal identity, a kind of galactic PayPal in which everyone participates.”

Michiel Willems (c) 2010 - Published earlier in E-Finance & Payments Law & Policy, July 2010 issue. London, UK

Review: Blackberry Stains

Watched this short film recently, and I must say, what a nice piece of work! Genuinely enjoyed every minute of it. An intense story with an emotional feel, but brought lightly and realistic, that gives this short film its charm and makes it convincing and credible.

In short: two boys are abused by their teacher, the parents do not notice anything. In the end, of the boys kills the teacher by pushing him off a ladder.

The actor who plays the teacher/pedophile does a very impressive job, especially the scene in the car when one of the young boys (the friend of the main character) is so nervous ("sir, sir, sir") and knows what is coming. Truly heartbreaking and you feel a genuine need you wish you could punch that old pervert in the face, so he does an amazing job and manages to convince the viewer he is value for money.

The camera team managed to reach a professional level with some amazing shots. A few scenes in particular: where the boy is washing his face in the white bathroom - at the end of the film - or when the camera slowly approaches the car from the side, very nicely done for a (relatively) small budget film like this.

You can tell someone did spend time thinking about the right music. It suits the different scenes - different feelings and emotions - very well. It is present, but not mostly not dominating and that gives the movie a great feel. In particular, the transition from the last scene to the credits should be remembered, the music and the images seem to become one.

The casting was pretty good. I must admit I had to get used to Matthew's character the first few minutes, but the way he expresses himself and his body language suit the film very well. Although the young boys are clearly not experienced actors, Matthew's friend (the main character's friend) manages to move the viewer. The teacher is a truly impressive actor, it is difficult to deny he portrays a true creep and he is someone you want to keep away from your kids. The interaction between the preys and the hunter feels natural and not scripted. You can perfectly imagine how uncomfortable the boys must have felt. You forget they are on a script, and they manage to make the viewer feel genuinely angry and disgusted when you watch the unhealthy moments they go through. The mother does a decent job as well. It is a pity - but nicely played - she does not really pick up what Matthew says or what he is going through.

The tragic end is very understandable. It kind of seems to answer the desire of the viewer ('pull the ladder under the dirt bag's legs'), without being over the top. And it is a smart end to a short story. No happy ending, no police involvement or a teacher who gets away with it, but the anger built within which eventually finishes off this failed and morally lost teacher.
One of One Eyed Dog's finest productions.

http://www.one-eyed-dog-films.com/

Latest radio 1 show

My latest radio show in Holland, about attempts by the Mayor to get more Londoners to cycle. Click on the link and my item starts straight away (in Dutch)

http://player.omroep.nl/?aflID=11202701&start=01:21:30

www.radio1.nl
www.bnntoday.nl

South Africa celebrates: Nelson Mandela turns 92

Former South Africa President Nelson Mandela turns 92 today. Mandela, in South Africa better known as Madiba, released a statement asking people around the world to spend at least 67 minutes doing something useful in their community today, especially for the less fortunate.

In South Africa, and around the world, Madiba has become a symbol of equality, forgiveness and humanity.

The life and times of Madiba

1918: Born in Eastern Cape
1964: Charged with treason and sentenced to life
1990: Freed from prison
1993: Wins Nobel Peace Prize

1994: Elected the first black president of South Africa
1999: Steps down as president
2001: Diagnosed with prostate cancer
2004: Retires from public life
2005: Announces his son has died of an HIV/Aids-related illness
2010: Turns 92

Read more

Liberal confusion: why Nick Clegg is losing credibility

The Digital Economy Act (DEA), aimed at regulating digital media and reducing copyright infringements, officially came into force on 12 June. Although there was no reference to the DEA in the Coalition Agreement, it is known Nick Clegg opposes the Act in its current form.

On Sunday 16 May, the Liberal Democrat Party released a statement after its party conference, calling on the coalition government to repeal the website-blocking and three-strikes disconnection elements of the DEA. During the party  conference, the party voted on a motion dealing with the DEA.

In its statement, the Party said ‘the Conference urges Liberal Democrat Ministers and MPs to take all possible steps to ensure the repeal of those sections of the DEA which are inconsistent with policy motion “Freedom, Creativity and the Internet” as passed at Spring Conference 2010’. The policy motion in question condemned website blocking and disconnecting internet connections as a response to copyright infringement. At the same conference, the Lib Dems denounced the DEA as a whole for ‘focusing on illegal file sharing rather than on nurturing creativity’.

Even though there is no political support for the DEA within at least one political party, it is unlikely the Party’s latest motion will change anything. Even the fiercest critics do not have the illusion the DEA - or parts of it - will be revoked anytime soon. Unless sudden action is taken by the Lib Dems Ministers - which does not seem likely - it is status quo for the DEA.

The party’s recent statement might bring hope among the DEA’s critics there is no longer credible political consent for these sections of the law within at least one government party, but whether that anticipation is genuine remains to be seen. It is unlikely the DEA - or parts of it - will be revoked anytime soon. Lib Dems Ministers do not seem too keen on making this a political hot potato, unlike their time in opposition.

Bastille Day

It is that time of the year again, Bastille Day, the 14th of July, formally called La Fête Nationale and known as le quatorze juillet (14th of July). It celebrate the storming of the Bastille prison on 14 July 1789, the start of the French Revolution, the beginning of the ‘liberte, fraternite, egalite’ (freedom, brotherhood and equality) era, which meant the end of the Kingdom of France and the beginning of La Republique Francaise. Today, festivities take place all over the country and the highlight is a parade with President Sarkozy in central Paris.

Yesterday I was on the phone with a colleague in Montpellier, Southern France, and he wondered “really, what is there to celebrate? French is disappearing as a world language and the new generation barely speaks English, the pension age unlikely to be changed anytime soon (currently 60, the lowest in Europe), the Culture Minister is openly a pedophile, and last weeks hundreds of millions of cuts were announced to the corps diplomatiques (their foreign ministry and army of diplomats), meaning France will unavoidably diminish its power worldwide. Not to mention how France was a complete joke at the world cup, its main players being haunted by stories they slept with a minor and only last week, the President was exposed as a corrupt out-of-control leader who takes cash in envelopes from old, rich ladies”.

When I tried to interrupt and was thinking of something positive, he continued “oh stop it, I did not even mention the banlieues nor France’s lovely Algerian community, or kids playing the healthy game Le Jeu du Foulard (intentionally cutting off oxygen to the brain with the goal of inducing euphoria).”

It made me wonder whether France (considers itself) to be in the worst state in decades. Perhaps it’s time to get the weapons out again?

“Aux armes, citoynes,
Formez vos bataillons,
Marchons! Marchons!
Qu’un sang impur
Abreuve nos sillons”

Vive La France, Vive La Republique Francaise!
Happy Bastille Day

FT: 'Dutch footballers shed moral superiority'

This morning an editorial comment in the Financial Times (page 10, World news section) caught my attention:

Dutch footballers shed moral superiority

It was partly the sight of John Heitinga blindly thumping balls out of the Dutch penalty area. Partly it was Khalid Boulahrouz passing back to his keeper whenever he managed to find him. Even though the Dutch scored three goals against Uruguay on Tuesday and reached the World Cup final, they were again pretty dull.

Dutch football used to strive for beauty, but has now shed its moral superiority. Off the field, so has the Netherlands itself.

The Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant phrased it well on Wednesday. “Good football is apparently no longer necessary to reach the World Cup final,” it said, and dismissed most of the team’s playing as “repugnant and irritating”. “Really nobody played very well, and that’s not many for the semi-final of a World Cup.”

Yet as these words were being written Dutch people were cheerfully waving goodbye to their tradition of beautiful football.

The tradition began at the World Cup of 1974. Admittedly the coach at that tournament, Rinus ‘The General’ Michels, cared only about winning, but he won with gorgeous attacking “total football”. The Dutch, who had never done anything at World Cups, surprised themselves by reaching the final. There they lost to West Germany, but won global praise. So Dutch football’s founding myth was glorious defeat.

In the next World Cup final, in 1978, a moderately glorious team suffered another defeat, and the tradition was cemented.

Gradually the Dutch came to glorify glorious defeat. Johan Cruyff, the star of 1974, was arguing decades later that the Netherlands had actually won that World Cup. How so? Well, said Cruyff, people still talked about their glorious football, and that represented a victory. While other teams competed to win the World Cup, the Netherlands pursued moral superiority. They were the one just man who would have saved Sodom and Gomorrah.

The Dutch breached their own tradition by becoming European champions with glorious football in 1988, but otherwise they competed only for moral awards. Before playing Brazil in the World Cup semi-final of 1998, the Dutch coach, Guus Hiddink, proclaimed from his pulpit: “Brazil, sadly, is no longer swinging and flaming. I see defenders boot the ball away shamelessly. Holland must never play like that. If we did, people would murder me, and they would be right to do so.” Brazil won on penalties.

In these decades the Netherlands was pursuing moral superiority off the pitch too. A favourite phrase in Dutch political discourse from the 1960s was “Netherlands, guide land”. It expressed the idea that the most perfect democracy on earth should be a light unto backward countries. Paul Scheffer, a Dutch political thinker, notes that it is easier for a small country to be good than strong. So the Dutch tried to teach foreigners euthanasia and gay rights.

But from about 2000, moral superiority withered. In football the Dutch suffered a few too many glorious defeats, most recently at Euro 2008. Hiddink, who supplanted Cruyff as father of Dutch football, began advocating the revolutionary notion that winning was nice. Moral superiority crumbled off the field too. In 2001 many Dutch began voting for anti-immigrant populists. The ideals-free technocrat Jan Peter Balkenende has been prime minister since 2002. In the parliamentary elections of June 9, the “Ban the Koran” man Geert Wilders won 16 per cent of he vote.

Today’s Netherlands is just another country, and its football team just another team. The players retain the Cruyffian qualities of passing and positional sense, but now they mostly defend.

Their only aim here is victory on Sunday. They need to win, because otherwise hardly anyone will remember anything about this team.

Please note: Financial Times 2010, written by Simon Kuper, published in the FT on Thursday 8 July 2010, page 10, World News section, 'Dutch moral superiority is shed on and off the field'.

http://cachef.ft.com/cms/s/0/aa82ff1a-89e9-11df-bd30-00144feab49a.html

Head coach orders Nigerians to stay at home

Can you imagine David Cameron suspending Wayne Rooney or John Terry for two years due to their bad performance, or Sarkozy ordering the French team to stay at home after losing a couple of games? Well, In Nigeria it is certainly possible. That is where Presidents are not leaders, they are still rulers, the Head Coach of the nation's national sport.

President Goodluck Jonathan has suspended the national players from international competition for the next two years after they performed so badly at the World Cup in South Africa. The ‘Super Eagles’ – who turned out to be everything but super – were eliminated in the first round, finishing behind South Korea, Greece and Argentina with just one point.

A Spokesman for the Nigerian President released a statement this morning, saying ‘the President has directed that Nigeria will withdraw from all international football competition for the next two years to enable Nigeria to reorganise its football. 'This directive became necessary following Nigeria's poor performance in the ongoing FIFA World Cup'. So how will these guys be fit and ready for action if they cannot participate in the Africa cup nor play any friendly matches? Perhaps Goodluck has given Nigerian football the final push by his decision today.

China confirms strict policy on internet use

The Chinese Government has published a White Paper reaffirming the need for strict policies aimed at limiting access to certain types of online content.

Although the report The Internet in China, published by the State Council Information Office on 8 June, highlights the importance of freedom of speech, the document confirmed the ‘continued need for the use of technology to stop illegal information dissemination’.

The Chinese Government will continue to prevent the spread of information that can ‘harm national security, upset public order or harm minors’ by using legal and technical measures. Internet service providers (ISPs) are responsible for the online content, the document said.

Since 1997, the internet in China is subject to strict regulation. Last February, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology introduced rules to ban online pornography. In March, Google withdrew from the Chinese market after refusing to give in to demands to restrict its search engine results.

With an internet population of over 400 million users, China has become the largest online market in the world.

Cumbria massacre

My latest radio 1 show in Holland, about the recent shootings in Cumbria.

Click on - or copy/paste - the link and my item starts straight away:

http://player.omroep.nl/?aflID=11032949&start=00:06:27

www.radio1.nl

www.bnntoday.nl

Latest Radio 1 show

My latest Radio 1 show in the Netherlands, about the new BBC show 'Autistic Superstars'. Click on the link and my item starts straight away - in Dutch:

http://player.omroep.nl/?aflID=11009383&start=01:25:02

www.radio1.nl

www.bnntoday.nl

Chinese secrets

The Chinese Government has issued new rules defining when corporate data should be regarded as a commercial secret. 

The guidelines - published by the State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC) on 26 April and aimed to protect Chinese businesses - classify information such as financial data, resource reserves, merger information and strategic plans as a corporate secret. A commercial secret is ‘information unknown to the public that can bring economic benefit to state-owned companies’, according to the SASAC. 

Additionally, under the rules commercial secrets can be classified as state secrets, which means commercial secrets could soon fall within the scope of the Law on Guarding State Secrets. 

On 26 April, an amendment to this law was submitted to the National People's Congress Standing Committee for a third review. The amendment would require telecom and internet service providers (ISPs) – domestic as well as international ISPs operating in China – to notify and cooperate with public security and state security authorities if they detect any disclosure or sharing of state secrets on their networks.

Michiel Willems - 2010