general internet news - 22 October

[David Goldstein <goldstein_david@yahoo.com.au>]

Second world press freedom ranking Cuba second from last,
just ahead of North Korea
United States and Israel singled out for actions beyond
their borders
Reporters Without Borders is publishing its second world
press freedom ranking. As in 2002, the most catastrophic
situation is to be found in Asia, especially North Korea,
Burma and Laos. Second from last in the ranking, Cuba is
today the world's biggest prison for journalists. The
United States and Italy were given relatively low rankings.
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8247
Segunda clasificacion mundial de la libertad de prensa Cuba
penúltima, justo delante de Corea del Norte
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8251
Deuxième classement mondial de la liberté de la presse
Cuba, avant-dernier, juste devant la Corée du Nord
 http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=8240

Broadband prices plunge worldwide
Prices for DSL broadband services have dropped sharply in
the past 6 to 12 months. This is a new trend. Most
operators held prices steady or even raised them during
2001 and 2002, but there has been an international wave of
price cutting during 2003.

http://www.point-topic.com/content/dslanalysis/broadband%20prices%20analysis%20031020.htm

Germany takes cyber games crown
Germany triumphs in the Olympics of video games, topping
the medal rankings in an global gaming event.
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3206908.stm
 http://www.internet-magazine.com/news/view.asp?id=3765

Romania Emerges as Cybercrime Nexus
It was nearly 70 degrees below zero outside, but the e-mail
on a computer at the South Pole Research Center sent a
different kind of chill through the scientists inside.
"I've hacked into the server. Pay me off or I'll sell the
station's data to another country and tell the world how
vulnerable you are," the message warned.
 http://www.bizreport.com/article.php?art_id=5223

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A54265-2003Oct20.html
 http://www.msnbc.com/news/981284.asp

.au - Police ditch web auto-search
THE Australian Federal Police have decided to ditch
software used to monitor websites.

http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,7617804%5e16123%5e%5enbv%5e,00.html

Aust ISP in 'world first' music industry court case
In what is believed to be the first case of its kind in the
world, the Australian music industry has listed an Internet
service provider (ISP) as a respondent in a court case
involving music piracy.

http://www.zdnet.com.au/newstech/ebusiness/story/0,2000048590,20279975,00.htm

.au - Ballarat to trial new broadband technology
The Victorian town of Ballarat will trial a new type of
broadband technology early next year that promises to be
200 times faster than existing broadband.

http://www.arnnet.com.au/index.php?id=615241861&fp=2&fpid=1

.au - Police concerned about new video technologies and
child pornography
ABC radio transcript, also available in audio formats -
Australian police say new technology, like video phones and
smaller computers, will lead to more and more people
accessing child pornography. Internet sex crime is now an
area of policing unto itself, and keeping up with the
technology is half the battle.
But as the gadgets get smaller, and less secure, police say
there will be more offenders making use of them, and
they'll be harder to catch. But it seems no one knows how
to best regulate the technology, as Ben Knight reports.
 http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2003/s963653.htm

.us - FCC POLICIES THAT DAMAGED MEDIA NOW THREATENING
INTERNET
Commissioner Michael J. Copps, in a speech at the New
America Foundation, today warned that: “The Internet as we
know it is at risk. Entrenched interests are positioning
themselves to control the network’s chokepoints and they
are lobbying the FCC to aid and abet them. The Internet was
designed to prevent government or a corporation or anyone
else from controlling it. But this original vision of the
Internet may soon be lost. In its place a warped view that
open networks should be replaced by closed networks and
that accessibility can be superceded by a new power to
discriminate is emerging.”

http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/DOC-239795A1.pdf

.us - Alleged Internet porn traffickers indicted
Three men indicted for trafficking child pornography on the
Internet are the first to be arrested in an investigation
that could lead to charges against hundreds of people
across the country, federal prosecutors said Thursday.

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techpolicy/2003-10-17-netporn-arrests_x.htm

Vigilante websites combat solicitation of minors for sex
The online conversation is direct: A 42-year-old man
calling himself ''Justinnbos'' tells ''Bladin Bost Boi'' he
will pay $125 for sex with the 14-year-old as the two
exchange pictures, phone numbers, and hometowns.

http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/284/metro/Vigilante_websites_combat_solicitation_of_minors_for_sexP.shtml

Juzgado un joven por publicar en Internet un artículo de la
Esperanza de Triana con frases y fotos obscenas
La hermandad de la Esperanza de Triana se presentará como
acusación particular dentro del juicio que se celebrará el
próximo mes de diciembre contra un joven acusado de un
delito contra los sentimientos religiosos, según ha
informado Europa Press.

http://delitosinformaticos.com/noticias/106659923175072.shtml

.fr - Google pays for selling ads on trade marked terms
Google France has been ordered to pay damages of €70,000 by
the Lower Court of Nanterre for allowing advertisers to
sponsor certain terms that are protected by registered
trade marks. The company argued that the trade marks were
not valid.

http://www.out-law.com/php/page.php?page_id=googlepaysforsell1066667917
 http://www.internet-magazine.com/news/view.asp?id=3763

.us - Woman Sentenced for Invading E-Mail Privacy
A judge sentenced an Arizona woman to 60 days of home
detention for intercepting her husband's ex-wife's e-mail,
saying the penalty is a warning to others.

http://www.latimes.com/technology/la-na-briefs20.3oct20,1,3830933.story

The New Civic Virtue of the Net: Lessons from Models of
Complex Systems for the Governance of Cyberspace by David
Post & David Johnson.
Who should the law-makers of cyberspace be? Who should be
setting the rules that apply to conduct in the new global
medium of cyberspace? In this new working paper, Professors
Post and Johnson argue that the most obvious answer to this
question -- existing territorial sovereigns -- may well be
wrong. They describe how the new science of complex systems
gives us reason to hope that an overall system of
governance of the net that reconnects rulemaking for online
spaces with those most affected by those rules will create
a new form of civic virtue for the net.

http://stlr.stanford.edu/STLR/Working_Papers/97_Post_1/index.htm

In Search of Fair Housing in Cyberspace: The Implications
of the Communications Decency Act for Fair Housing on the
Internet by Jennifer C. Chang
As one commentator has noted, '[t]he Internet was the
equivalent of two tin cans and a string when the Fair
Housing Act was passed back in 1968.? In the years since,
the Internet has become a mainstay of the housing market,
providing new opportunities for promoting diverse
communities as well as new forums for bigotry and
exclusion. Just as the United States Department of Housing
and Urban Development has taken to cyberspace to improve
its fair housing enforcement efforts, real estate brokers,
landlords, and other housing service providers are flooding
onto the Internet as well, compiling disappointing records
with respect to fair housing mandates. In particular, the
rapid development of the Internet has been accompanied in
recent years by its increased use by housing providers to
post notices of housing availability. Online service
providers (OSPs) make available toInternet users a variety
of classified services that enable individual housing
providers to post advertisements. Numerous housing
consumers now rely upon listing services such as Yahoo!
Rentals, AOL ClassifiedPlus, and Craigslist as their
primary means of searching for vacant housing. In 2001,
Homestore.com Network, one online housing services
provider, boasted more than 6 millionapartment listings, as
well as 1.7 million homes for sale accessed by more than
10.6 million different Internet users.
 http://lawreview.stanford.edu/content/vol55/3/Chang.pdf

Freedom of Speech, Cyberspace, and Harassment Law  by
Eugene Volokh, Professor of Law, UCLA Law School
This article presents four cyberspace speech controversies
that involve hostile environment harassment law. The author
uses these examples to draw two conclusions. First, in most
of the controversies, the result should largely be driven
not by the medium, but by relatively medium- independent
underlying free speech principles. Second, in a system
built on precedent and on litigation by many plaintiffs in
many courts, speech restrictions accrete over time, with
each victory for restriction laying the groundwork for
broader restrictions in the future. This tendency can, of
course, be resisted--but it ought not be ignored.
 http://stlr.stanford.edu/STLR/Articles/01_STLR_3/index.htm

Securing Privacy in the Internet Age - CALL FOR PAPERS - A
Stanford Law School Symposium: Securing Privacy in the
Internet Age
What legal regimes or market initiatives would best prevent
the unauthorized disclosure of private information while
also promoting business innovation? March 13-14, 2004,
Stanford Law School
The Center for Internet and Society (CIS), a part of the
Law, Science & Technology Program (LST) at Stanford Law
School, announces an open call for papers addressing the
ways in which application of various legal doctrines could
induce software vendors, hardware companies and system
administrators to adopt security-enhancing practices,
report unauthorized disclosures of private information, and
properly value and remedy harm flowing from privacy
breaches, while promoting vigorous competition and
innovation.

http://www.law.stanford.edu/programs/academic/lst/newsletter/01/privacy.htm

Cybersecurity, Research and Disclosure - Stanford Law
School - November 21-22, 2003
Upcoming Conference to Explore Relationship Between
Computer Security, Privacy, and Disclosure of Information
About Security Vulnerabilities

http://www.law.stanford.edu/programs/academic/lst/newsletter/01/cybersecurity.htm

Microsoft offers e-mail controls
The days when you could forward an embarrassing e-mail to
your colleagues could be a thing of the past.
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3207258.stm

Israel slams the door on Microsoft
Exclusive In a bold assertion of independence, Israel has
thrown the full weight of its antitrust legislation at
Microsoft.
 http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/33365.html

Microsoft answers EU antitrust charges
Despite complaining this month that it wanted more time,
Microsoft Corp. has filed its response to European Union
antitrust charges just before the deadline expired, an EU
spokeswoman says.
The EU gave the U.S. software giant an extra two weeks to
rebut the latest charges that it was illegally trying to
extend its dominance with Windows operating systems into
markets for servers and multimedia players.

http://edition.cnn.com/2003/TECH/biztech/10/20/eu.microsoft.ap/index.html

Radio Stations Must Pay Royalties for Webcasting
In a huge win for the recording industry, a federal appeals
court has refused to overturn a rule passed by the U.S.
Copyright Office that says radio stations must pay
royalties when their broadcasts are simultaneously
transmitted digitally over the Internet in a practice known
as "streaming."
 http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1066080445213

British Youth Cleared of Hacking U.S. Port Computer
A British court cleared a teen-ager Friday of hacking into
the computer of the U.S. port of Houston, Texas, after the
youth testified his own computer had been taken over by
someone else to mount the attack.
 http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml;?storyID=3637998
 http://news.com.com/2100-7349_3-5092781.html

http://news.independent.co.uk/digital/news/story.jsp?story=454585

Is Wi-Fi Bad for Your Health?
With the convenience and growing acceptance of Wi-Fi, one
can easily forget about the days of stringing cables and
being tied to a workstation. But what if Wi-Fi itself were
making you forget?
 http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/columns/article.php/3095831

Australia, South Korea sign agreement on spam regulation
Australia and South Korea have signed a memorandum of
understanding designed to promote the regulation of spam.

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/10/20/1066502122751.html

http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,7613729%5e16123%5e%5enbv%5e,00.html

Australians boast of better spam laws
Australia is leading the way on anti-spam legislation,
according to the Australians who are claiming it puts UK
and US legislation in the shade.
 http://www.silicon.com/news/165-500001/1/6480.html

Yahoo Launches Anti-Spam E-Mail Decoys
Yahoo Inc. , the Internet media and services company, on
Tuesday launched a new set of premium e-mail features that
lets users create hundreds of decoy addresses to thwart
spam mail.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=technologyNews&storyID=3652315

http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/10/21/HNyahoofeatures_1.html

Why Bayesian filtering is the most effective anti-spam
technology
This white paper describes how Bayesian mathematics can be
applied to the spam problem, resulting in an adaptive,
‘statistical intelligence’ technique that is much harder to
circumvent by spammers. It also explains why the Bayesian
approach is the best way to tackle spam once and for all,
as it overcomes the obstacles faced by more static
technologies such as blacklist checking, databases of known
spam and keyword checking. This is not to say that these
technologies are obsolete, but they cannot be used as
effectively as needed if not combined with a Bayesian
filter.
 http://www.gfi.com/mes/wpbayesian.htm

.au - Campaigner says many Telstra customers interested in
class action
The man who is asking others to register their interest in
bringing a class action against the telco for its ongoing
email problems says there is just one reason why customers
are annoyed - "they haven't told us what's really going
on."

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2003/10/21/1066631405972.html

http://australianit.news.com.au/articles/0,7204,7608314%5e16123%5e%5enbv%5e,00.html

.au - In a nutshell
Telstra's internet problems - what really happened.
 http://afr.com/articles/2003/10/20/1066631352549.html

.nl - Evaluation Ordered in Dutch Internet Case
A Dutch court on Friday ordered a psychiatric evaluation
for a man who confessed to contaminating dairy products in
an Internet extortion scheme against food companies.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-3250602,00.html

.us - My (brief) career as an ISP
The FBI is convinced that I'm an Internet service provider.
It's no joke. A letter the FBI sent on Sept. 19 ordered me
to "preserve all records and other evidence" relating to my
interviews of Adrian Lamo, the so-called homeless hacker,
who's facing two criminal charges related to an alleged
intrusion into The New York Times' computers.
 http://news.com.com/2010-7355-5089267.html

.us - Internet Tax Ban Could Drain State Coffers, Group
Says
State and local governments could lose $2 billion to $9
billion per year in tax revenue if Congress strengthens an
existing ban on Internet access taxes, a policy group said
on Monday.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=internetNews&storyID=3650100

.us - Two Agencies to Fight Online Narcotics Sales
Two federal agencies have formed a task force to crack down
on the growing tide of illicit sales of prescription
narcotics on the Internet.
 http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/18/technology/18DRUG.html


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