Earlier this month Yahoo! launched a new Business & Human Rights Program, intended to formalize its commitment to human rights, starting with full-fledged support at the highest levels of the company. The program also aims to build a culture within the company to identify and manage human rights risk associated with delivery of its services in difficult markets.

Yahoo! learned the hard way that inattention to human rights can have devasting consequences. While some may see the new program as no more than an effort to restore the company’s reputation, we strongly applaud this new effort. Companies have an obligation to respect human rights and rigorous due diligence and risk assessment are the right place to start. Recently, John Ruggie, the U.N. Special Reporter on Business and Human Rights released a proposed framework for Business and Human Rights which strongly endorses this approach.
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Today, CDT posted an updated memorandum on the most recent version of the Global Online Freedom Act (”GOFA”). GOFA was first introduced by Rep. Christopher Smith (R-NJ) several years ago in response to troubling reports of company complicity in Internet censorship and cooperation in prosecutions of dissidents who posted political material online. The late Rep. Tom P. Lantos, (D-Ca) took up the cause last year and the bill was reported out of the Committee on Foreign Affairs late last year. Industry opposition to the bill has been fierce and efforts to bring the bill to the floor on suspension have thus far been thwarted.

CDT strongly believes that technology companies doing business in countries that broadly surveil and censor the Internet must take serious steps to identify and minimize the human rights risks associated with providing services and technology solutions in those countries. For several years, we have been co-facilitating a multi-stakeholder initiative aimed at developing global principles to guide ICT companies facing free expression and privacy challenges. We remain hopefully that these principles will grow into a global industry standard that will give the industry a road map for collective action in this area.

We also believe that companies must not hide from these challenges. They should advocate for changes in public policy that protect the rights of their users, challenge laws where possible and collaborate with human rights groups and other stakeholders to build support for an open Internet that supports human rights. (more…)

Many kind words have been said in the last 24 hours about the life and legacy of Congressman Tom Lantos, a champion of human rights who died over the weekend. It’s difficult to add anything meaningful to those tributes. But since this is an Internet policy blog, it is worth adding a postscript about Rep. Lantos’ role in the last few years of his life as an advocate for global Internet freedom. Lantos understood that the Internet was a transformative tool for human rights and he insisted that government and industry use every available means to keep the medium from being twisted into an instrument of government repression.

To be sure, he was sometimes harsh in the tactics and rhetoric he used with respect to the conduct of the U.S. Internet industry in China, as well as in the policy prescriptions he advocated, most importantly H.R. 275, the Global Online Freedom Act (“GOFA”). While CDT believes that some provisions of GOFA are unworkable and unwise (CDT analyzed the law when it was introduced in 2006), there is no question that Lantos’ passion and resolve made a difference. Indeed, the Bush Administration has already embraced key parts of GOFA. The State Department launched a Global Online Freedom Initiative and human rights country reports now include assessments of Internet freedom. Countries like China are on notice that at least some leaders in the United States government are ready to take this issue seriously.

More importantly, the attention he brought to the issue of global Internet freedom. His ideas added fuel the ongoing dialogue among Internet companies, human rights groups, social investors and others, aimed at drafting robust human rights principles to guide the sector when faced with government demands to censor content or access users’ personal information. That process, facilitated by CDT and Business for Social Responsibility, should reach a conclusion in the next few months, and there is hope that it will produce principles that will take root as a global standard and help companies respond more effectively to threats to Internet freedom around the world.

This year, North America joins 27 European countries to celebrate Data Privacy Day. Beginning January, 28th, the week-long event is punctuated by several efforts looking to raise the visibility of privacy issues at home and abroad. The International Association of Privacy Professionals has put together some nice resources for the occasion.

CDT will be involved in several relevant events:

CDT is participating by co-sponsoring today’s conference at Duke University entitled Data Privacy in Transatlantic Perspective.

CDT President Leslie Harris will moderate a panel on Health IT discussing medical privacy issues at the Congressional Internet Caucus Advisory Committee’s State of the Net Conference on Wednesday.

On Thursday, CDT will also host the 4th Anti-Spyware Coalition Public Workshop.

Yesterday, the FBI announced success in its efforts to shut down Bot Nets, going after a bunch of different “botherders” based in the US. In the process, the Bureau identified more than 1 million botnet crime victims. The FBI also has been working internationally with its counterparts to shut down botnets around the world. This is an important and encouraging story on the role of law enforcement in preventing major Internet crime such as identity theft and spyware installation.

I have nothing against the French. I never ordered “Freedom Fries” with my hamburger; the French Foreign Legion helped fuel my adolescent fantasies of adventure and wanderlust; and much later Brigitte Bardot helped fuel my… well, you get my drift. But I admit to being peeved at them for the hubris contained in the recent announcement of a three-way pact among the French government, Internet Service Providers, and the entertainment industry to try and crack down on illegal file sharing.

The agreement puts ISPs at the forefront of a scheme requiring the companies to monitor each citizen’s online activity on the chance that illegal file sharing might be happening, an act that instantly turns ISPs into a de facto cyber-police force.
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As the old saying goes, “Information is power.” So it is no surprise that the free media is often the first to go when dictatorial regimes – or even ostensibly “democratic” governments – find themselves in power struggles with the people they govern.

Last month, we called on the U.S. and other democratic countries to speak out against Burma’s shutting down of the Internet and other media in an attempt to quell the pro-democracy protests led by the country’s Buddhist monks.

Now this week – in a shocking dictatorial double-play – both Pakistan and Georgia declared emergency rule (effectively, martial law), suspending their constitutions and clamping down on independent media. Pakistan’s President, General Pervez Musharraf, asserted his need to fight terrorists – but it seems clear that he’s made a desperate move to retain power midst increased calls for his ouster, or at least the shedding of his military uniform. In recent months, lawyers have been the heroes of Pakistan, taking the lead in protesting Musharraf’s longtime military rule, and the current state of emergency.

The Washington Post reported that Musharraf “moved quickly to control the media, which he said was partly to blame for the current crisis. Authorities have blacked out TV networks and threatened broadcasters with jail time, but so far have spared the Internet and most newspapers. Most people in Pakistan, where illiteracy is rife, get their news from TV or radio.” Unlike in Burma last month, that the Internet has been spared in Pakistan is, fortunately, enabling at least some people to communicate with each other and get information out about what is happening in their country.

It was also reported that the pro-Western, formerly Soviet country of Georgia shut down private TV stations this week in a claimed attempt to combat Russia’s efforts to undermine the fledging democracy. Even if Georgia’s president is right about Moscow’s intentions, Georgia will never be a “beacon of democracy” (as U.S. President George Bush has said) if it employs Stalinistic tactics to control its people.

A free and independent media is the cornerstone of a free society. To Westerners, this truism is often taken for granted. But savvy rulers are all too conscious of it. It was Joseph Stalin who said, “Ideas are more dangerous than guns.” What better way to control ideas than to control the media? As with Burma, democratic nations around the world must decry, in words and deeds, emergency rule and the suppression of independent media – such actions have no place in a free society.

Earlier today I had the opportunity to participate in the 3rd Joint London Action Plan-Contact Network of Spam Authorities Workshop, which also featured joint sessions with the Messaging Anti-Abuse Working Group. Every LAP-CNSA conference includes a panel on organizational updates, and I was pleased to provide an update on the activities of the Anti-Spyware Coalition. The ASC has been hard at work this year, finalizing its Best Practices and Conflict Resolution documents and organizing a successful public workshop of its own in June.

Bigger news from the event came yesterday when Federal Trade Commission Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras announced that a district court judge has put a halt to an international spamming operation that deceptively promoted drugs for weight loss and aging reversal. This is the first case in which the FTC has made use of the U.S. SAFE WEB Act, a law passed late last year to make cross-border enforcement easier for the agency. Allowing cooperation with other nations is an absolute necessity in an age where cross-border networks make multi-national scams a routine occurrence.

In testimony before Congress earlier this year, CDT expressed the hope that the FTC would make increasing use of its new SAFE WEB Act powers. Because the Commission is not required to report to Congress about its usage of the new law for three years, monitoring how the Act is affecting cross-border enforcement is difficult unless the FTC volunteers this information. In this case, the Commission chose to do just that, much to CDT’s delight.

We are pleased to see that the FTC is both making use of its new cross-border powers and disclosing the fact that it has done so. We hope this trend will continue.

Last week, several news outlets reported that Google will alter the version of its Street Views product that it plans to launch in Canada. To comply with Canadian privacy law, the images of Canadian cities available through Street Views – photos of public places taken at eye-level to give the perspective of a pedestrian – will have human faces and vehicle license plate numbers blurred. Google decided to take this step after receiving a letter from Canadian privacy commissioner Jennifer Stoddart, who raised concerns about whether the product would respect national privacy laws.

This incident reveals one of many useful functions that a national privacy commissioner performs. By having an independent privacy entity with the appropriate authority and expertise, the privacy of Canadian consumers is proactively protected. In contrast, privacy policy in the U.S. suffers from a crisis-driven approach – with each new privacy-invasive technology or sector-specific issue that arises, reactions and solutions are tailor-made to manage the particular problem at hand. Commissioner Stoddart was able to identify a potential privacy threat ahead of time, and the pressure her authority provides will hopefully result in a privacy-protective outcome for Canadian consumers as Google Street Views is rolled out in Canada. Unfortunately, we are not so lucky in the United States to have a federal official whose job it is to protect our privacy interests.

Going back nearly a decade, CDT has promoted the creation of an independent privacy entity within the federal government empowered with the scope, expertise, and authority to guide our nation’s policies on privacy. This entity would not only monitor commercial and technological developments with respect to privacy, but could also conduct research, recommend new policies, and provide oversight for government agency privacy compliance. Our neighbors to the north seem to have embraced this concept, and perhaps one day soon we will follow their lead.

Last Friday it was reported that the government of Burma government had shut down the Internet and cell-phone service in an attempt to quell the pro-democracy protests led by the country’s Buddhist monks. The sharp drop in reporting on the peaceful demonstrations over the weekend seems to indicate that the government has been successful in shrouding the country in electronic silence. There are no dramatic pictures of monks being beaten by the military. There are no first-hand accounts of protesters being text-messaged around the world.

Burma has withdrawn from the 21st century and, in doing so, deprived its citizens of their human rights, and the world a fair account of events. Has the country’s military dictatorship in fact crushed the protests and restored order? Or are the demonstrations still ongoing? What has happened to the countless of people who have been arrested, including scores of monks? By denying Burma’s citizen journalists and activists the tools necessary to communicate with the world through the Internet, the regime is free to peddle its own, heavily edited version of events with little fear of the truth ever being revealed.

The right to live, of course, is the ultimate human right. President Bush and the State Department joined leaders from around the world in rightly issuing strong statements condemning the military junta’s violent and sometimes deadly response to the protests.

However, it is surprising that the more democratic nations around the world have not specifically condemned the blackout of the Internet by the Burmese government. Freedom of speech, which includes the rights to express oneself, communicate with others, share and receive information, hold and state opinions, and even freely associate, is a fundamental human right, recognized by Articles 19 and 20 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Freedom of speech is essential for government accountability and the achievement of human potential, and the Internet facilitates free expression like never before.

While private actors such as business, academia and Internet users themselves have a role to play, they alone will not be successful in advancing “Internet Human Rights” around the world. An open Internet is a human rights issues, thus the U.S. and other democratic countries must vehemently denounce any attempt by governments to interfere with their citizens’ legitimate and rightful use of this powerful medium. Burma, by silencing its people has violated their human rights and ours.