New Canadian TPM fact sheet
p2pnet.net News:- The Privacy Commissioner of Canada has released a new fact sheet on TPMs. While explicitly not taking a position on TPMs, DRM or fair use, the Commissioner does identify some concerns with the privacy impact of the technology. In fact, the Commissioner opens the discussion by noting that:
The use of TPMs, however, can seriously affect the privacy rights of individuals, and by invading their privacy and reporting on their behaviour, impact other civil liberties such as freedom of association and freedom of expression. While rights holders have a perfectly legitimate view of the matter, it is also reasonable to expect them to enforce their rights only in a way which respects individual privacy rights.
The fact sheet proceeds to assess the privacy implications of TPMs with particular reference to the Sony rootkit case. She concludes by stating that “alternative, non-privacy invasive solutions do not appear to have been explored adequately, and this is what we must demand of DRM systems that are deployed in Canada.”
This is a welcome development as the Commissioner is an important voice on this issue who may help prod the government to factor privacy into the copyright reform mix.
Michael Geist
[Geist is the Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law at the University of Ottawa. He can be reached by email at mgeist[at]uottawa.ca and is on-line at www.michaelgeist.ca.]
If your Net access is blocked by government restrictions, try Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto’s Munk Centre for International Studies. Go here for the official download, here for the p2pnet download, and here for details. And if you’re Chinese and you’re looking for a way to access independent Internet news sources, try Freegate, the DIT program written to help Chinese citizens circumvent web site blocking outside of China. Download it here.
Also See:
China’s lead – Chinese bloggers under threat, October 24, 2006
Straits Times – Malaysia considering laws to rein in errant bloggers, December 4, 2006
Countries to watch – 15 Enemies of the Net, November 18, 2005
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