A report from CFP2002 on the tension between making fair use clear and retaining ambiguity to facilitate the application of fair use to future technologies. --- Lots of good papers available from the Fair Use By Design workshop and the conference in general.

12th Conference on Computers, Freedom & Privacy - Proceedings of CFP 2002.

CNN.com - Hidden sex cameras may soon be banned.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -- Hidden video cameras in bedrooms, bathrooms and other private places would be outlawed under a bill introduced in Congress Tuesday that would also limit pornographic Web sites to an online red-light district.

Television star Angie Harmon and privacy activist Susan Wilson joined Louisiana Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu to announce a bill that would make it illegal to film someone for a "lewd or lascivious purpose" without that person's consent.

Violators would face an unspecified fine and up to three years of jail time, or 10 years if the filmed subject was under 18.

The bill would not apply to security cameras in private places such as department store dressing rooms, nor would it penalize those filming on city streets or other public places where privacy does not exist.

Landrieu said she wrote the bill after hearing from Wilson, a Monroe, Louisiana, homemaker who found hidden video cameras above her bed and in her shower nearly four years ago.

Slashdot | Senate Bill Would Make Clandestine Video Taping Illegal.

CNET NEWS.COM - Survey: Passport required--not appealing.

Microsoft has doubled the number of people signed up for its Passport authentication service, but the majority of people are doing so because of product requirements rather than the allure of new features, Gartner said Wednesday.

The number of Passport users jumped to 14 million from 7 million between last August and February, according to the research group. Passport authentication, which is a central element of Microsoft's .Net software-as-a-service strategy, offers a single sign-on that gives people access to Web sites without the need for multiple IDs and passwords.

But most people are not choosing Passport for convenience' sake, Gartner said. Use is rising because the authentication service is required to use some Windows XP features, along with Hotmail e-mail, Microsoft's developer site and other Microsoft products. During the last six months or so, Microsoft has moved the Microsoft Developer Network, bCentral small-business services Web site, and online game Zone to Passport authentication.

CNET NEWS.COM - Despite law, few people use e-signatures.

Most people are still putting pen to paper these days, despite a law signed by former President Clinton nearly two years ago that made electronic signatures the legal equivalent of traditional signatures.

Electronic signatures were supposed to wipe out the need for time-consuming and costly efforts to sign certain documents. Bank loans, refinancing paperwork and legal documents were all targeted by backers of electronic signatures, with the idea of eliminating the need for meetings, notary publics or overnight deliveries to validate signatures.

The technology certainly exists, but the promise of e-signatures has fizzled in the face of security concerns, competing e-signature standards and the fact that, when it comes to big deals, people still like to handle paper.

"I think a lot of people, even e-savvy people, are frankly more comfortable in document-intensive transactions having a stack of paper to look at, review and sign with someone present," said Ian Ballon, an attorney who focuses on Internet and e-commerce law at Manatt, Phelp & Phillips, in Palo Alto, Calif.

Slashdot | Peer-to-Peer Networks Blocked in NZ.

New York Times - free registration required Democrats Say Bush Revisions Ruin Medical Privacy Rules. Democratic senators harshly criticized President Bush for proposing to roll back certain protections for the privacy of medical records.

Democratic senators harshly criticized President Bush today for proposing to roll back certain protections for the privacy of medical records, but a Bush administration official defended the White House plan, saying privacy was less important than access to high-quality care.

The comments, at a Senate hearing, indicated that medical privacy was emerging as a political issue in this election year.

Mr. Bush campaigned two years ago on a promise to increase privacy protections. But Al Gore, who lost that election, said over the weekend that the Bush administration proposals would "dismantle the medical privacy of American citizens."

Terry McAuliffe, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, and his pollsters said privacy was likely to become an issue in many House and Senate campaigns this fall because voters cared deeply about it.

President Bush took political credit when he allowed expansive privacy rules issued by President Bill Clinton in December 2000 to take effect a year ago. After listening to the concerns of health care companies, the Bush administration concluded that major provisions were unworkable. The Bush administration proposed to drop the consent requirement while retaining other provisions, often in a revised form.

New York Times - free registration required 'Virtual' Child Pornography Ban Overturned. The Supreme Court struck down provisions of a federal law that made it a crime to create, distribute or possess "virtual" child pornography.

Affirming that free speech principles apply with full force in the computer age, the Supreme Court today struck down provisions of a federal law that made it a crime to create, distribute or possess ``virtual'' child pornography that used computer images of young adults rather than actual children.

The law, the Child Pornography Prevention Act of 1996, ``prohibits speech that records no crime and creates no victims by its production,'' Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote for the majority in the court's latest decision upholding First Amendment protections online.

Instead, he said, ``the statute prohibits the visual depiction of an idea - that of teenagers engaging in sexual activity - that is a fact of modern society and has been a theme in art and literature throughout the ages.''

CIO Magazine - Continental Divide - PRIVACY Q&A . While Europe has adopted strict privacy regulations, U.S. companies are still collecting and trading their customers' info like it's going out of style.

[ ... ]

CIO recently spoke with Davies about why Europe and the United States have a hard time agreeing on a privacy standard, the effect it is having on free trade, and what CIOs in the United States can do to avoid losing money and business overseas.

IDG.net/ CIO Magazine (CIO Special Advertising Supplement Copyright and probably paid for by Cisco) - Privacy, Security, Personal Health Records and the Enterprise .

SecurityFocus - Privacy Worries, Net Activism Top Privacy Show Agenda.

Concern about the gradual erosion of Internet privacy safeguards and the desire to figure out the legal boundaries of using the Internet as an activism tool will rank among the most important topics being discussed this week as Internet civil liberties groups convene at the Computers, Freedom and Privacy 2002 conference in San Francisco.

As with most facets of American life nowadays, the discussion of what Internet privacy is in the 21st century is inexorably linked to the conditions of the post Sept. 11 world, when the very nature of strong Internet privacy runs counter, some government officials believe, to insuring a strongly secure country against terrorism.

[ ... ]

In the past CFP often has served as a platform for ardent free speech activists to plead their cause for unrestricted speech and strong privacy online, but this year, Cohn said, there should be a good opportunity to hear from the "other side of the hard core privacy debate." She added that now is the time that people have passed beyond the "knee jerk reactions" to the Sept. 11 terrorist incidents, and are ready to return to the debate of what Americans should be able to expect when it comes to Internet privacy.

InformationWeek > Privacy > Employees Trust The Boss (At Least With Personal Data).

According to a new survey, 76% of the 1,258 people surveyed believe their companies have "pretty good to excellent privacy rules and policies" governing employees.

TelecomClick - Hidden bedroom cameras inspire video privacy ....

Hidden video cameras in bedrooms, bathrooms and other private places would be outlawed under a bill introduced in Congress on Tuesday that would also limit pornographic Web sites to an online red-light district.

Television star Angie Harmon and privacy activist Susan Wilson joined Louisiana Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu to announce a bill that would make it illegal to film someone for a "lewd or lascivious purpose" without that person's consent.

Political News from Wired News - Security Cams Not OK in Canada?. A former Canadian Supreme Court judge says surveillance cameras violate the Canadian Charter of Rights

[ ... ]

While La Forest's report only qualifies as an opinion, it could become the basis for a successful legal challenge to the use of the surveillance camera in Kelowna. If that happens, other police forces will have to to take down security cameras across Canada, ranging from red light cameras to other municipally operated cams.

Seibel said that in the next couple of weeks, the privacy commissioner, the solicitor general and the RCMP commissioner might revisit the issue. He noted any decision would affect other cameras. "I would say we're the case law," Seibel said. "If there's a particular set of circumstances and a decision made that would apply to others in the same position."

Political News from Wired News - Supremes Support 'Virtual' Porn.

The Supreme Court struck down a congressional ban on virtual child pornography Tuesday, ruling that the First Amendment protects pornography or other sexual images that only appear to depict real children engaged in sex.

The 6-3 ruling is a victory for both pornographers and legitimate artists such as moviemakers, who argued that a broad ban on simulated child sex could make it a crime to depict a sex scene like those in the recent movies Traffic or Lolita.

The court said language in a 1996 child pornography law was unconstitutionally vague and far-reaching.

Privacy News from Wired News - Web Group OKs Privacy Standards.

Regardless of whether a site uses P3P, the system won't prevent sites from collecting data or sharing the information with marketers, nor would it let users negotiate with sites on how information gets used.

Just like nutrition labels, P3P is all about disclosure, and users can either take it or leave it once they find out.

Some privacy advocates have actively campaigned against P3P, calling it "Pretty Poor Privacy." They complain P3P will do nothing to protect users' privacy and may make it more difficult to win passage of privacy-protection legislation.

Computerworld - Congress eyeing uniform driver's license standards.

Sen. Dick Durbin said he plans to introduce legislation to set minimum uniform standards for driver's licenses and allow data-sharing among federal and state agencies.

[ ... ]

Large back-end systems accessible by large numbers of people would raise security issues, the report said. "Moreover, if verification of identity required an online database query at airports, a handful of 'accidents' at key places around the country (such as wires being cut at critical points in a way that appears accidental) could cripple civil aviation," the report said.

New York Times - Editorial Op-Ed: free registration required Free Speech in Cyberspace.

The Supreme Court's ruling yesterday striking down a federal ban on "virtual" child pornography sent a clear message to would-be censors: The government must be scrupulous, when regulating obscene material, not to infringe on protected speech. The decision is especially welcome now, as a three-judge court in Philadelphia is poised to rule on a federal law that seeks to force libraries to censor the Internet use of their patrons.

The restrictions that the court struck down yesterday, portions of the Child Pornography Prevention Act, were Congress's attempt to ban computer-generated images so lifelike that they appear to be of actual children. By a 6-to-3 vote, the court ruled that the restrictions on such images were so vague as to be unconstitutional.

This same sort of overbreadth is one of the central problems with the Internet law being challenged in Philadelphia. In that case, a coalition of libraries, Internet sites and civil libertarians is challenging the Children's Internet Protection Act, a federal law that withholds federal technology aid from public libraries and schools that refuse to block sites that are "harmful to minors."

Washington Post - Group OKs Web Site Privacy System.

Already, Microsoft Corp. has included a limited form of P3P in its latest browser, Internet Explorer 6. AT&T is distributing a free tool that can do more, but requires a download and installation.

The system is voluntary, and its usefulness will ultimately depend on how many sites embrace it.

Slashdot | Your Rights Online - W3C Approves Web Privacy Standard.

Slashdot | Your Rights Online - 'Virtual' Child Porn Act Ruled Unconstitutional.

"The United States Supreme Court, in a 6-3 ruling, has found the Child Pornography Prevention Act to be unconstitutionally vague and far-reaching." --- You might read the Act. There were a number of cases challenging the constitutionality of the Act; I believe three Appeals courts eventually upheld it, and one ruled it unconstitutional, guaranteeing that the Supreme Court would take one of the challenges for review. A summary of the decision is available, and see that pages for links to the majority opinion and dissenting opinions.

ABCNEWS.com : Commentary - Are Bot Buddies Ads for Children in Disguise? IM Bot Buddies Offer Kids a Computer Companion, But Also Push Products

It's called SmarterChild.com, and it's ready to deliver a whole troop of buddy bots to your family's computer desktop.

Slashdot | Your Rights Online - Instant Messenger or Instant Advertiser?

ABC News is running this moderately disturbing story about a new, highly targeted form of advertising. Two companies, SmarterChild.com and ActiveBuddy.com have teamed up to deliver interactive Instant Messenger bots that talk to children and deliver ever-so-subtle ads for various products. Just when you think market saturation has reached the limit, leave it to a greedy corporation to start targeting the most naive and vulnerable demographic there is.