August 2009 Archives
I do not post that I am going on holiday to any social networking site. Nor do I stand on my rooftop and shout it through a loud speaker there either. The second statement sounds obvious, but @EnglishFolkFan is quite right - people freely do this on the internet. This is far from ‘digital gumption’, more a lack of education.
The firms that have made the internet what it is today, allowing users to express themselves, do so in the knowledge that they will one day be able to earn from people’s disclosures through trending analysis and the like. Why educate to change behaviour when it will affect your bottom line? The privacy groups stance has typically been to lobby government and corporations, where the more effective solution may be to petition the user.
Social networking sites may feel much of this burden of responsibility as it is through their services that such information is relayed. However, with the controversy over Facebook’s agreements this is unlikely to happen soon. Besides…. any blogger can simply state all of this information wherever they are! Right? Wrong. Sort of.
This goes back to educating the user. If the user is educated, they won’t publish information. If they are educated, they may still publish the information if they feel ‘safe’ in the online environment where they are sharing. This may again be argued as a failure of education. For example, a Facebook event is posted online, assuming that only friends and associated people will see it, and then the Police turn up. They saw it on Facebook as did potentially many delinquents. Now there presents a problem - too much suspicion in these social services and they become unusable; too little and disaster may ensue. The trick in online privacy is attaining the correct balance of usability and privacy where you trust the provider.
Of course, if you have a virus on your computer, all of this may be useless advice.
Posted in response to BBC Digital Revolution Blog
If one is to take the narrow, technical definition, the ‘internet’ is a series of (essentially) peer-to-peer systems which communicate as defined by the TCP/IP protocol. So in this respect, as long as two or more systems are connected and not controlling, the internet exists. Assuming the broader definition of internet - the many layers and international free-flow of information and global access, it is therefore not unreasonable to assert that the internet (and web) as we perceive it could well be ‘switched off’ internationally. This may be achieved through denial of service attacks or cables being cut (the FLAG FEA, SMW4, and SMW3 lines as example last year http://bit.ly/r0O8). But more simply through political intervention.
The example which I cite is Turkey, where approximately 2,000 websites have now been blocked through the courts. This is achieved by banning ISPs from delivering certain content. And let us not forget the “Great Firewall of China”. But what many people don’t realise is that the UK’s IWF provides a list of websites which are voluntarily opted in to by most ISPs. Similar services exist in other countries too. This societal desire to restrict content to users enforces the views of a few onto the many. Is this merely switching people off, or is it switching off nations to content?
Whilst China seems to be relaxing internet access controls, many (if not most) are increasing controls to access. We don’t live in a world of free information and access, we live in one which can be restricted nationally or completely switched off by ISPs, Governments or anyone with a good hacksaw.
Prepared in response to BBC Digital Revolution Post
Quick note on the BBC News article, “US man ‘stole 130m card numbers’”
This article outlines how relaxed US institutions are when it comes to security. It will be interesting to find out how much social engineering was employed in gaining information. But to the point of this comment, ignore all paraphrasing in the article which concerns how the attack was carried out. The author should read some of the following articles:
For the code savvy who want to see worked examples
Preventing SQL attacks - Paper from Univ. Columbia
(NB: We don’t condone hacking!)
In response to the @BBCDigRev BBC Digital Revolution blog post, “The rise of the eNation”, cyberissues.eu has posted the following response;
There are many arguments against the view that eBay has become a nation state.
Firstly, the communications platform, Skype is governed by the jurisdiction of each nation under which its various legitimate entities are registered. In the UK, Skype Limited is registered in Luxembourg and so are bound by the domestic courts. Furthermore, if the assets are distributed globally, the nation which houses the controlling firm (i.e. eBay US) has a wide span of control for controlling and taxing the activities of its subsidiaries. Whilst the firm can exert pressure on some nations by way of avoiding or changing regulation, it can only do so within a certain framework, typically akin to the regulations of the ‘top’ host nation. Where eBay has its main advantage is that it can, in theory, change its ‘top’ host nation to a ‘friendly’ jurisdiction (think tax breaks from Eastern European countries after the fall of the command economies).
However, for Paypal to operate in each jurisdiction, it must comply with local regulations, hence why there are various incarnations of Paypal worldwide. HMRC and others are right to be concerned, but it Paypal presents no more concern for legitimate or illegitimate business than other tax avoidance techniques. Merely the medium has changed. Of course in Europe, Paypal is a bank and is (again) registered in Luxembourg having formerly been registered in the UK. This jurisdiction choosing may have short term advantages, but in the long run are still constrained by the laws of nation states.
It should be noted that Paypal does not operate its own currency; accounts are linked to banks and the exchange rates are determined by the market. This is by no means similar to World of Warcraft banking.
And finally, the fostering of a community does not incur a nation state. It has been found time and again by Sociologists, Psychologists and Anthropologists that the differences within a society are far greater than the differences found between societies. It therefore makes sense that a close community of people all brought together through choice are from different places.
However, trans-national firms are brining a homogeneity toward the jurisdictional difficulties of the internet. Eventually, nations will be forced to operate in a similar fashion to one another. For instance in the UK, recent legislation (such as the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008) is tending toward applying the onus on the consumer rather than the producer of materials. This allows the courts to prosecute domestic individuals where previously the foreign perpetrator would have gone unpunished. In an ever changing digital world, the battle for retaining hetrogeny between societies will be the difficult task, especially where firms such as eBay as attempting to impose their self-defined standards across the globe.
Piracy has existed for centuries, and is often not just a case of who created the work, but more often, who has paid for the rights form the original copyright owner. Many argue that record labels are getting too excited about piracy on the internet because it has happened for as long as the industry has been alive; “backing up” of cassettes and CDs between friends and the like. However, internet piracy differs dramatically from “traditional” piracy.
The internet issue is twofold. Firstly, the perceived anonymity of the internet leads users to publish carelessly. The internet, particularly the web, is rarely anonymous. This enables firms to be able to track perpetrators, but also track losses with greater accuracy.
The second problem, particularly for firms and copyright holders is mass replication with a single publication. This is something that was rarely achieved by traditional methods, particularly in music and film without professional equipment. This also extends to distribution, as there is a negligible cost for spreading illegal content on the internet where in ‘physical’ examples there are considerable costs.
There are then a few questions. Is piracy a problem of the web / internet medium? Not particularly, but free and easy distribution is. Is piracy a problem of attitude by industry and copyright owners? Perhaps, but only in commercial terms. Recognition is something easily removed by the web, but it also serves to promote. The first single by La Roux and its Skream Dub-Step remix is a case in point. So is piracy a problem of consumer attitudes? Probably.
Certainly there is a learning curve for all stakeholders, one which is unlikely to be resolved in the foreseeable future. Piracy is not unique to the web, or indeed the internet. It has become the latest medium by which the practise has emerged.
This is a short piece which will have a full paper written about it soon! It will include a discussion of UK copyright law, the US cases and contract law consideration
