COMPUTER PROFESSIONALS for SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Board Elections
• Opportunities
• Expertise Sought and Shared

Board Elections

If you have not already, please remember to add your votes for seven candidates for the CPSR Board of Directors.

• David Casacuberta
• William J. Drake
• Paul Hyland
• Hans Klein
• Lisa Koonts
• Veni Markovski
• Adrian Pintilie
• Madan Rao
• Stuart S. Shapiro
• Nancy White

Candidate Statements are online at http://www.cpsr.org/cpsr/candidates_03.html

The President and Chair will be selected by and from the Board this year.

Ballots must be postmarked back to the CPSR office no later than May 1, 2003.

CPSR 2001-2002 ANNUAL REPORT

The 2001-2002 Annual Report is available in PDF. It gives a story and context to the year - a snapshot that merges the external events with the ebb and flow of CPSR efforts and finances. It is unique, among CPSR reports, in explaining how we got where we are. See http://www.cpsr.org/publications/annreports/2001-02.pdf If you cannot access the PDF or want the Annual Report sent by postal mail, please contact evoy(a)cpsr.org.

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Opportunities

CPSR Research Triangle Park, NC forum on the privacy and civil liberty implications of the design and deployment of surveillance and profiling systems by the US government April 25th at Duke University.

Confirmed Speakers:

• Dr James Boyle - Duke Law School
• Wayne Crews - CATO Institute
• Dr. Edward F Gehringer - NCSU
• Christopher A. Ford - former General Counsel to the U.S. Select Committee on Intelligence
• David Sobel - EPIC

Donations to help with expenses can be made via http://cpsr.org/membership (noting 4/25 RTP Event). See http://www.rtp.nc.us/events.htm

The CPSR Essay Contest submission deadline is May 1st. See http://www.cpsr.org/essays/2003/contest.html

The Tech Museum Awards seeks nominations for innovators around the world who are using technology to benefit humanity. See http://techawards.thetech.org/nominations.cfm

The SC2003 "Igniting Innovation" Education Program seeks applicants wanting support to attend. See http://www.sc-conference.org/sc2003/education/edu_appinst.html

Digit World Contest for Internet sites in the sector of conservation, promotion, and defence of cultural and/or artisitc heritage is accepting submissions to their contest. See http://expo4art.com/contest

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Expertise Sought and Shared

CPSR signed onto a letter and petition initiated by EPIC to require accuracy for the United State's largest criminal justice database (NCIC). See http://www.epic.org/actions/ncic

CPSR signed onto a letter urging U.S. Representatives to support legislation from Rep. Rick Boucher that would strike out the repressive portions of the DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act), and "directs the Federal Trade Commission to undertake a rulemaking to assure adequate notice to the public of any lack of functionality which may attend the purchase of copy protected CDs."

Jimmy Hale and Chris Gray updated the webpage for the Weapons & Peace Working Group. See http://www.cpsr.org/program/peace

CPSR called on the Internet community to protest malicious hacking of Arab and foreign news web sites in a press release initiated by Glenn Manishin. See http://www.cpsr.org/program/peace/jazeera.html Carles Sadumi, CPSR-Spain, translated it into spanish for http://www.spain.cpsr.org

CivSoc of CPSR co-sponsored a Teach-in on the War in Iraq at Georgia Tech on Friday, April 11. For information, contact: hklein(a)cpsr.org

Hans Klein of CivSoc of CPSR published a website, which serves as an information portal on the War in Iraq, with special focus on the local Atlanta peace movement. See http://www.AtlantaGrassroots.org

CivSoc of CPSR is supporting a Georgia Tech study on the practical opportunities presented by the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS). The study will review previous world summits (on development, racism, women, environment, etc.) for lessons about what might be achieved at WSIS. For information, contact: hklein(a)cpsr.org

Robert Guerra, founder of CPSR's Privaterra project, in his work on the Program Committee for CFP 2003 (Computers Freedom & Privacy Conference), was quoted in "Net-Privacy Activists Bemoan Anti-Terror Agenda" as saying - "The mood is more somber. . . In prior years, people were caught up in all the ways technology could fix social problems. What we are seeing now, with focus on security, is that technology is fixing things, but in the wrong direction." The Reuter's piece was picked up by CNN and others, including the Hindustani Times. See http://edition.cnn.com/2003/TECH/ptech/04/03/tech.privacy.reut

The San Francisco Chronicle captured the atmosphere and atmospherics at CFP 2003 in "War on Electronic Privacy: Attendees of Computers, Freedom and Privacy Conference Fight for High Tech Civil Liberties." In it, Simson Garfinkel is quoted, the best post CFP party is credited to Jo Hastings (of CPSR's Privaterra Project), and Robert Guerra got more coverage about Privaterra. See http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/gate/archive/2003/04/>10 /cfp.DTL

Jason Young's ongoing efforts, as a CPSR-Canada member and one of Privaterra's directors, to raise the level of available information in the lawful access debate in Canada, were reported in "Powers Snoop More, Explain Why Less" in The Toronto Star on March 24, 2003. See: http://www.thestar.com http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1035779780457&call_pageid=968350072197&col=9690488638 51

Christian Sandvig, for CPSR, submited -Expand Unlicensed Spectrum, But Retain Public Interest Review and Dedicated Uses - in response to the prompt by the Congressional Internet Caucus Sell it, Lease it, or Give It Away -- How Can Spectrum Reform Best Promote Wireless Internet Deployment? See http://www.cpsr.org/program/access/spectrumreform.html Rudy Godoy, CPSR-Peru, translated it into spanish See http://www.peru.cpsr.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=30&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0

CPSR Palo Alto is supporting the Palo Alto Human Rights Commission's resolution protesting the USA Patriot Act's assault on civil liberties.

CPSR Palo Alto has also been approached by the MidCoast Community Council to support a San Mateo County resolution protesting the USA Patriot Act's expanded "government powers of secret surveillance, search and seizure and detention without due process in a manner which threatens fundamental civil rights." See http://mcc.sanmateo.org/MCC_USAPA_Resolution.pdf

Herb Kanner, Marianne Mueller, and Susan Evoy met with a delegation from Kyrgyzstan visiting Palo Alto. As with last year's visitors from Turkmenistan, the Kyrgs wanted to learn about CPSR, and also were keenly interested in CPSR's views about ICANN and domain name issues.

Andy Oram was quoted in "Legacy: A Brave new World Wide Web" on CNET News.com. Andy gave his affiliation as "a member of the activist group Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility," and we even got a link -- something we would like to see more of. See "http://news.com.com/2009-1032-995680.html

Todd Davies organized "Broadband and the Digital Future - Who is in Control?" at Stanford, that included as speakers Dorothy Kidd, Art McGee, and Peter Neumann. See http://www.linefeed.org/~mic/labortech

The Internet Caucus Advisory Committee's debate on "Government Pattern Analysis: Securing Terrorists While Preserving Privacy ?" is available. See http://www.netcaucus.org/events/2003/surveillance

The new PPI Technology Project report "The Battle over Spam" lays out a legislative agenda for getting spam under control. See http://www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm?knlgAreaID=140&subsecID=288&contentID=2

Madan Rao's new book "The KM Chronicles, Travelogue 1: Knowledge Management in Global Infotech Companies" See: http://www.tatamcgrawhill.com/digital_solutions/madan .

Rep. Bernie Sanders' (I-VT.) the "Freedom to Read Protection Act," legislation designed to exempt libraries and booksellers from provisions of the USA Patriot Act that allow the federal government to search their records without a traditional search warrant. This is the first legislation introduced in the House of Representatives that would amend the Patriot Act. See http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d108:H.r.1157

CPSR-Spain Report by David Casacuberta

Since the begining of Februrary we are an observer member of European Digital Rights (EDRi) a coalition of NGOs that aims at establishing a common strategy for all the cyberrights groups in the European Union. This is key as all the laws related to telecomunications in all the European nations must adapt to the European directives approved by the European Comission. One of our main involvements wihtin this coalition is to translate into Spanish ERDi-Gram a by-weekly newsletter devoted to cyberrights in the EU. So far it is the only periodical publication devoted to that subject in the EU and therefore becomes a basic tool to know what is happening in the EU.

All these translations are sent to cpsr-es(a)barrapunto.com, a mailing list devoted to cyberrights in Spain and can also be downloaded from our web at http://www.spain.cpsr.org

The 20th of Februrary we wrote an in-depth analysis of the Spanish reformulation of the IP law, describing some articles which could jeopardize several civil rights and freedoms, specially fair use of copyrighted material. This analysis was distributed as a press release where our main points were expresesed. The text of the law has to be discussed in the Parliament. Depending on the final text of the law, we will arrange new activities.

The third of March we distributed tomaTAZo http://www.spain.cpsr.org/tomatazo ; It is a game in Flash, under GPL license distributed as a mean to critisize our own electronic commerce directive the LSSICE which may become an important instrument for censorship in the future. The slogan is ìif you can not fight against, at least have a laugh at it and it is a simple flash application where you throw tomatoes against our minister of Science and Technology Josep PiquÈ. Nevertheless, the game includes a reivindicative side. Once you won the game, the program tries to log to a page called ìno a la LSSI within the website of the ministry of Science and Technology. This page of course does not exist, so within the logs of the website the protest is registered. The program only tries the connection once, so it is not a DOS attack; only a way to leave a mark in the website as a protest.

The 30 of March we released a new version of the anti-retention script, a more stable one. This script masks the traffic data when we are accessing a website and it is another way of protestinga against the European Directive and the LSSICE that want to keep traffic data of all the Internet users.

Finally last week we distributed a press release against the article 36 of the new telecommunications law in Spain. This article included a clausule to create a key escrow system in Spain, reformulating and making more precise similar observations within article 52 of the former law. We are very happy to announce that thanks to this press release, today April 3,2003 the government has rewritten the draft law and all the references to key scrow have been erased. We consider it a clear victory of CPSR-Spain and other cyberrights organisations in Spain.

The CPSR Compiler is a monthly notice with short updates on recent activities of our members and opportunities to engage in the development of the public voice through CPSR projects.

To report news for future issues, send a sentence or two (and URL if available) to cpsr(a)cpsr.org

CPSR provides a discussion and project space where individuals can contribute to the public debate and design of our global digital future. Through CPSR's chapters and working groups, members focus on regional and civic issues developing the public voice. To insure a democratic future in a time of intense globalization, the voice of the public must command a prominent position on the world stage. CPSR frames and channels the public voice.

(c) Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility 2003.

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Susan Evoy * Managing Director

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Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility

P.O. Box 717 * Palo Alto * CA * 94302

Phone: (650) 322-3778 * (650) 322-4748 (fax)

Email: evoy(a)cpsr.org

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