July 14 EDRI-gram newsletter

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                   EDRI-gram

  biweekly newsletter about digital civil rights in Europe

     Number 3.14, 14 July 2005


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Contents
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1.  Europarl protests against UK push for EU data retention
2.  New Commission directive proposal on IPR
3.  UK ISPs voluntarily preserve internetdata
4.  Two opposing court verdicts on file-sharers
5.  Germany: biometric passports in November
6.  Another Italian community server violated?
7.  EU passenger data possibly used commercially
8.  Music: Commission wants 1 internet clearing house
9.  Creative Commons festival in Spain
10. Support EDRI!
11. Agenda
12. About

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1. Europarl protests against UK push for EU data retention
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On Wednesday morning 13 July 2005 UK Home Secretary Charles Clarke met
with the European Parliament Committee on Citizens' Rights, Justice and
Home Affairs (LIBE). His plan to push through data retention during the UK
presidency of the European Council, no matter in what pillar, met with
great protest. The Social-Democrats, the Greens and the Liberals all
referred to the legal advices recommending the issue should be dealt with
in the first pillar, i.e. on a directive proposal from the European
Commission and with full co-decision from the European Parliament. The
liberal rapporteur on data retention, Alexander Alvaro, perhaps used the
strongest words when he said "the LIBE Committee was not to be pushed into
blind obedience" by the UK. The influential social-democrat vice-president
of the committee, Stavros Lambrinidis, added some very sharp questions
about the lack of proof of the effectiveness of biometrics, of ID cards
and of data retention. He also questioned the intentions of the JHA
Council to deal with data retention without the full democratic scrutiny.
Clarke said it didn't matter to him how the decision would be taken, as
long as it was during the UK presidency, i.e. before 31 December 2005. He
also explained he reached agreement with the European Commissioner for
Justice, Frattini, to jointly work out a proposal that could be adopted
within that timeframe. He didn't explain how he would deal with a possible
rejection by the European Parliament. The group coordinator from the
Greens, Kathalijne Buitenweg, immediately reminded Clarke the Parliament
would take the Council to court if they proceeded on the third pillar
path.

Later, Clarke promised he would share any research into the costs and
benefits of data retention with the parliament. So far, EDRI is only aware
of two such documents; an analysis of the Dutch usage of traffic data by
the police and a document prepared by the UK police. The latter document
has not been made publicly available, but the first document hopelessly
fails to prove the usefulness and benefits of data retention, given that
the police could obtain the necessary data in 'virtually' all investigated
files, without any legislation in the Netherlands on data retention. (See
EDRI-gram 3.13).

During the European Commission press briefing in the afternoon of 13 July
president Barroso said data retention was doubtlessly very important
against terrorism, but it had to be based on the appropriate legal basis.
Vice-commissioner Frattini explained that the Commission will present a
directive proposal on data retention early in September 2005, based on the
principles of availability and together with data protection rules about
(law enforcement) access to data. Frattini confirmed the agreement with
the UK presidency to present this proposal just before the informal JHA
Council of 8 September, with the purpose of reaching agreement in the
formal JHA Council of 12 October, and said he "was confident the package
will be approved before the end of the year." According to the press
briefing from the extra JHA council in London on 13 July, all ministers
agreed to adopt the framework decision in the meeting of 12 October 2005,
thus making it clear they would proceed in the third pillar no matter
what.

On 12 July European Digital Rights together with Privacy International
sent an urgent letter to the UK presidency and Commissioners Frattini and
Reding, urging them to show restraint and not respond to terrorism by
endangering the very freedom and democracy these acts are aimed against.
The letter was also sent to the EP members of the LIBE and ITRE (Industry)
committees. EDRI felt the need to respond urgently after the comments made
by mr Clarke in The Observer that data retention could have helped to
prevent the attacks, thus pointing at large-scale data-mining on innocent
peoples' intimate communications behaviour.

The effectiveness of ubiquitous data retention is still completely
unproven. On 13 July 2005 the Financial Times quoted a very sceptical
remark from EuroCop. "The result would be that a vast effort is made with
little more effect on criminals and terrorists than to slightly irritate
them," Heinz Kiefer, president of the European Confederation of Police,
said recently."

Provisional notes from the JHA Council (13.07.2005)
http://ue.eu.int/cms3_applications/applications/newsroom/...

EDRI press release and letter (in English, French and Spanish, 12.07.2005)
http://www.edri.org/campaigns/dataretention/EDRIletter

Last UK prepared version of the JHA working document on data retention
(29.06.2005)
http://www.edri.org/docs/Data-retention-council-draft-290...

EDRI-gram 3.13, Dutch study fails to prove usefulness data retention
(29.06.2005)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number3.13/retention

FT, UK pushes emergency debate on internet data (13.07.2005)
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/503cf98a-f36b-11d9-af32-00000e25...

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2. New Commission directive proposal on IPR
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On 12 July 2005 the European Commission launched a new proposal for a
directive and framework decision on the penal enforcement of intellectual
property rights. The Commission proposes to penalise any infringements.
According to Franco Frattini, the Commissioner for Justice, "the new
measures proposed by the Commission form the criminal law front to the
fight against counterfeiting and piracy in Europe." Though officially
aimed against criminal organisations, the proposed measures applies to all
types of infringements of intellectual property rights. "All intentional
infringements of an intellectual property right on a commercial scale, and
attempting, aiding or abetting and inciting such infringements are treated
as criminal offences."

Member states must at least punish such offences with four years'
imprisonment "if the offence involves a criminal organisation or if it
jeopardises public health and safety." The applicable fine must be at
least EUR 100.000 to EUR 300.000 for cases involving criminal
organisations or posing a risk to public health and safety. The proposal
allows Member States to apply tougher penalties.

The directive is a followup to the TRIPS agreement, and supplements
Directive 2004/48/EC of 29 April 2004 on the enforcement of intellectual
property rights. This directive was the subject of intense scrutiny from
digital rights organisations and a heated debate in the European
Parliament. The harshest provisions, for example on penalising individual
file-sharers, were removed from this directive, but now they return in
full weight. The new proposal explains: "In addition to the civil and
administrative measures, procedures and remedies provided for in Directive
2004/48/EC, criminal penalties also constitute, in appropriate cases, a
means of enforcing intellectual property rights."

As with the 2004 IPR directive, the definition of 'commercial scale' is
highly ambivalent. It doesn't require financial benefit, profit, or
motive. While Article 61 of TRIPS criminalises 'intentional infringement
on a commercial scale', the proposed EU Directive would add the
"attempting, aiding and abetting, and inciting such infringements" to the
list of offences sending a person to prison. This would allow for the
prosecution of makers of file-sharing software, but possibly also to the
prosecution of leading industrials promoting a slogan like 'Rip, mix and
burn'. Free/Open source software development could be seriously
jeopardised as well as generic drug production, by strong-armed legal
hassle in stead of civil proceedings.

The proposal is supposed to be a consequence of the Charter of Fundamental
Rights of the European Union. "As regards impact on fundamental rights, it
should be emphasised that the direct objective of this initiative is to
implement Article 17(2) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights which states
that 'Intellectual property shall be protected'."

Proposal for a directive and framework decision COM(2005)276 (12.07.2005)
http://europa.eu.int/eur-lex/lex/LexUriServ/site/en/com/2...

Commmission press release (12.07.2005)
http://europa.eu.int/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?referen...

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3. UK ISPs voluntarily preserve internetdata
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Immediately after the London attacks on 7 July 2005, the National High
Tech Crime Unit sent an e-mail to the UK provider association and to the
London Internet Exchange asking for voluntary help in preserving traffic
data of telephone and internet, but also the contents of e-mails,
voice-mails and SMS. Some technicians outside of the UK responded in
outrage at this request, comparing the request to asking the Postal
Services to photocopy all post and pointed out the technical impossibility
of storing tens of millions of e-mails a day.

But the UK ISP world remained extremely silent. Now it turns out the
preservation was voluntarily offered by UK ISPA and it also turns out this
is not the first time UK ISPs have voluntarily preserved massive amounts
of sensitive data on all their customers. After the New York attacks, on
14 September 2001 the UK ISPA already recommended giving in to a
preservation request from the Crime Unit. As one anonymous UK ISP remarked
in a technical conversation: "they took six months to get back to us,
without even mentioning they wanted the data." After that, the ISP deleted
the records, because of the massive amount of necessary hard-disk space.

Telephony and internet providers were asked to store the content of email
servers; email server logs; radius or other IP address to user resolution
logs; pager, SMS and MMS Messages currently on the network's platform;
content of voicemail platforms; call data records (includes mobile, fixed
line, international gateways & VoIP) and subscriber records.

The explanation offered was: "The investigation into this crime will take
many months and it is likely that the significance of specific
communications data and current stored content will not become immediately
apparent and there is a real risk that important evidence could be lost."

Now that the individual suiciders have been identified within a few days
and general investigation is making rapid progress, hopefully the Crime
Unit will quickly follow-up on the request and make sure these extremely
sensitive data are not stored any longer than necessary for acceptable
business purposes.

Unconfirmed rumour has it that Belgian ISPs received a similar request
from the UK Crime Unit. It is unlikely they will voluntarily co-operate.
Storing the content of communications is in utter violation of EU privacy
legislation. Only upon court order may an ISP preserve specified data from
individual suspects, if the cybercrime treaty has been implemented. There
is no legitimacy in any kind of voluntary preservation, also given the
immense privacy and security risks of collecting such massive amounts of
data.

In the UK ISPs have been bullied into voluntary data retention measures,
in spite of extremely critical comments from the Information Commissioner.
In response to a government consultation in 2003 about the government
proposal for voluntary retention he said only a statutory obligation would
comply with data protection laws, but added "However, the Commissioner is
yet to be convinced that there is a need for a communications service
provider (CSP) to retain data routinely for the prevention of terrorism,
for any longer than the data would be normally retained for its own
business purposes."

When the UK failed to pass a specific data retention law through the
normal democratic procedures, it seems they managed to convince ISPs they
would risk their reputation if they did not voluntarily collaborate with
essentially unlawful retention measures. Their attempt to bully the
Brussels institutions into legalising this national practice hopefully
meets with louder public resistance.

Net industry urged to co-operate following London bombings (11.07.2005)
http://www.theregister.com/2005/07/11/ispa_preservation/

Response Information Commissioner (June 2003)
http://www.informationcommissioner.gov.uk/cms/DocumentUpl...

Summary of other responses to the proposal for voluntary data retention
(11.09.2003)
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/docs2/vol_retention_comms_da...

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4. Two opposing court verdicts on file-sharers
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While the Irish High Court set a precedent on 9 July by ordering two ISPs
to hand-over the name and address data of 17 file-sharers, a few days
later a Dutch judge forbade the hand-over of contact details of 41
customers. In both cases the music industry used the services of the
US-based company MediaSentry.

The Irish High Court allowed for the demand from the Irish Recorded Music
Association (IRMA) on behalf of record majors. The ruling is not available
online yet, but the Irish Times reports the judge "noted an undertaking by
the record companies that the information would be used only for the
purpose of seeking redress for alleged infringement of the copyright of
sound recordings and granted the order on that basis." The Irish Times
also reports that the judge was not impressed by BT's policy to
immediately forward any complaints to their customers, with a demand to
desist any future activity. Such a policy couldn't 'deprive the plaintiffs
of their entitlement to seek damages'. It is expected that IRMA will now
write to the 17 individuals accusing the recipient of illegally sharing
music using the internet, seeking damages of up to 6.000 euro from each
person for breaching copyright law and threatening legal action against
anyone who refuses to pay.

A completely different verdict was given in the first Dutch preliminary
proceedings against individual file-sharers. On 12 July 2005 the Utrecht
court rejected the demand on 5 ISPs to each hand over 10 names and address
data of customers suspected of unlawful file-sharing. The use of
MediaSentry's services turned out to be the major blocking issue. It is
well known, writes the court, "that the United States of America cannot
considered to be a country with a fitting level of data protection." The
company MediaSentry did not sign a safe harbour agreement, nor did the
Dutch anti-piracy organisation 'Brein' apply for a special license with
the Dutch data protection authority. MediaSentry searches all files in a
users' folder. "Amongst those can be files that do not infringe on
somebody else's rights or have a personal character," writes the court,
and this makes the data collection extra unlawful. On top of that, Brein
made terrible mistakes in the times of the alleged file-sharing. In 3
different letters, different times were mentioned with the IP-addresses,
thus possibly leading to a different customer. Since the ISPs had
immediately forwarded the first demands from Brein to their users,
possibly the wrong people received these intimidating claims.

On 16 April 2004 the Dutch DPA published a decision on the collection of
IP addresses by the Dutch anti-piracy organisation. The collection could
be lawful if Brein followed specific rules and would not engage any third
parties. According to the court under these circumstances the ISPs should
have refused the hand-over of any personal data, since they have an
obligation to guard over the personal data of their customers and not
hand-over unless justified by the law on personal data protection or upon
court order.

On the other hand, the Dutch judge also ruled private parties such as
Brein may demand personal data in civil proceedings, as long as they can
prove beyond reasonable doubt that the IP addresses relate to users that
actually offer illegal music or other files on their computer, by
meticulously mentioning date and exact time of the infringing acts.

Irish Times, Music uploaders face legal action from record firms (09.07.2005)
-premium content, not available for free-

Response IRMA (09.07.2005)
http://www.irma.ie/index2.htm.

Preliminary proceedings Brein v. 5 ISP's (in Dutch, 12.07.2005)
www.rechtspraak.nl/ljn.asp?ljn=AT9073

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5. Germany: biometric passports in November
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The German Upper House approved on 8 July the introduction of biometric
passports. The 'ePass' will contain a contactless chip (RFID) that will
hold a digital frontal picture of the bearer's face. In the future, two
fingerprints, one from each hand, will be included - probably starting in
2007. The issuing of the biometric passports is expected to begin in
November 2005.

The picture and fingerprints in the chip will be compared with those of
the holder of the passport. This will make it possible to establish that
the passport really belongs to the holder. During border checks the data
in passport can also be compared to federal police watchlists. Currently,
there is no plan in Germany to create a central database to store the
biometric data.

To facilitate privacy of the data and secure it against unnoticed reading
or capture of the transmission, public-key cryptography will be employed.
Reader devices at the border also integrate keys. These shall only live
for a few weeks, so that stolen reader devices cannot be successfully used
to steal data over a prolonged period of time.

Communication between the reader and the passport starts by optically
scanning the machine readable zone (MRZ). An access key is computed from
the MRZ and a cryptographically secured channel to the chip is opened.
Through it, data stored on the chip is read and the embedded signature
verified. Afterwards, the images are optically presented to the user.

The software used by the readers is called 'Golden Reader Tool' and is
developed by the Federal Information Security Agency (BSI - part of the
Federal Ministry of the Interior) in cooperation with the Federal Criminal
Police (Bundeskriminalamt, BKA), Bundesdruckerei (the former federal
printing office), Giesecke & Devrient GmbH (the world's largest company
for security printing specialising in ID documents and security papers),
Cryptovision and Secunet.

The German EDRI-member Chaos Computer Club (CCC) published a manual how to
fake the fingerprints used in the biometric passport. The procedure
involves coping a fingerprint from a glass and transferring it to a latex
dummy that can be used to fool the reader during border check. CCC will
demonstrate the tactic during the hacker festival What the Hack (28-31
July 2005 in the Netherlands).

Germany clears biometric passports plan (08.07.2005)
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.200507...

Bundesrat billigt Biometriepass-Verordnung (08.07.2005)
http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/61516

How to fake fingerprints? (26.10.2004)
http://www.ccc.de/biometrie/fingerabdruck_kopieren.xml?la...

What the Hack
http://www.whatthehack.org/

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6. Another Italian community server violated?
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After the recent discovery that the Italian Autistici/Inventati server had
been seized by the Italian police and a backdoor had been probably
installed to allow for easier monitoring of all communication going
through it, looks like another Italian community server could have endured
the same fate.

On Monday 27 June 2005, two members of FLUG (Firenze Linux User Group)
visited the data centre of Dada S.p.a., in Milan, where the community
server of the group is physically housed, in order to move it to another
provider.

When the server was put out of the rack, however, it was discovered that
the upper lid of the server case was half-opened. At a closer inspection,
it was also discovered that the case lid was scratched, as if it had been
put out and reinserted into the rack. Worse, the CD-ROM cable was missing,
as were the screws that kept the hard disks in place.

Dada S.p.a. was immediately contacted, but its representatives denied any
fiddling with the server. Other FLUG members that could have potentially
had access to the server farm confirmed that they had not tampered with
the server.

Even though a quick forensics analysis of the system showed that no
shutdown and reboot operations, besides those that had been planned in the
past, had taken place (the hard disks were not "hot swappable", therefore
a shutdown of the machine is necessary in order to take them off the
server) FLUG decided to consider the server as compromised, as the
shutdown/reboot operations could have been erased from the logs.

What is particularly worrying is that the server hosted an anonymous
remailer, whose keys and anonymity capabilities could have been
compromised. Considering what happened to Autistici/Inventati server -
which hosted another anonymous remailer - this possibility is not so far
fetched. This begs the question whether a co-ordinated attempt at
intercepting anonymous/private communications on the Internet has been
ongoing in the past weeks and months.

An interrogation to the relevant ministries will be probably issued in the
coming days by Mr Fiorello Cortiana (Green Party).

EDRI-gram 3.13, Autistici/Inventati server seized by the Italian police
(29.06.2005)
http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number3.13/backdoor

Web page of the Firenze Linux User Group (FLUG)
http://www.firenze.linux.it/

Announcement by FLUG
http://punto-informatico.it/p.asp?i=53755

Photos of the server
http://www.firenze.linux.it/~leandro/compromissione/

(Contribution by Andrea Glorioso, Italian consultant on digital policies)

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7. EU passenger data possibly used commercially
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The US Transportation Security Administration is facing a scandal
involving data being swapped forth and back with a private company engaged
in data brokering.

As Associated Press reported, the TSA, which is an agency of the US
Department of Homeland Security, is not only storing commercial data about
domestic air passengers. It has also passed this data on to EagleForce
Associate, a company based in Virginia and engaged in data mining. This
company matched the data to other sets of data from different sources and
burnt it on CDs, which were then sent back to the TSA. The authority
reportedly used the CDs for testing terrorist watchlists. This practice
concerns only domestic US flights.

But, as part of a deal with the Commission, the Department of Homeland
Security is also receiving in advance data of EU passengers on
transatlantic flights. The US have promised to treat this data according
to EU data protection standards. The Commission has taken this promise as
a sufficient guarantee that the data will be treated adequately, which is
a legal condition for the data transfer to take place.

But the US Congress has also banned the TSA from ever using commercial
data, and the TSA even promised in a legally binding form that the testing
would be done only by its contractor. The TSA's disrespect of this promise
raises doubts about an adequate treatment of EU passengers' data, which is
subject to a similar promise from the Department of Homeland Security.

When asked by journalists, the European Commission denied any comment on
possible consequences from the US breach of confidence. According to the
press release from the JHA Council of 13 July (see first article) the
ministers of Justice and Internal Affairs "call on the Commission to bring
forward the proposal on air line passenger name records by October 2005."

EFF, Why isn't Secure Flight grounded? (16.06.2005)
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/archives/003699.php

Secure Flight Hits Turbulence (15.06.2005)
http://www.wired.com/news/privacy/0,1848,67875,00.html

Transportation Security Administration: Secure Flight Program
http://www.tsa.gov/public/display?theme=5&content=090...

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8. Music: commission wants 1 internet clearing house
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The European Commission wants to create 1 European internet rights
clearing house for internet content providers. An in-depth study into the
current collective management of copyrights shows that a company that
wishes to start an online music business has to seek clearance with 25
national copyright management organisations and has to sell no less than
4.75 million copies of a single song to just recover the cost of the
necessary licenses.

The Commission quotes an example from Edima, the organisation representing
online music providers. "The direct cost of negotiating one single licence
amounts to 9.500 euro (which comprises 20 internal man hours, external
legal advice and travel expenses). As mechanical rights and public
performance rights in most Member States require separate clearance, the
overall cost of the two requisite licences per Member State would amount
to almost 19.000 euro. As clearance is required in all 25 EU territories,
the cost of obtaining the necessary 50 copyright licenses would amount to
475.000 euro. On the basis that a profit of 0.10 euro can be achieved per
download, the online music provider would have to sell 4.75 million
downloads merely to recover the cost associated with obtaining the
requisite copyright licenses." (p47-48)

The European Commission now proposes a serious reform of rights clearance,
following a consultation and a communication in 2004. The Commission
concludes that the current territorial system "is a source of considerable
inefficiency." In a special feature of Single Market News, the Commission
summarises the responses to the consultation: "The 139 replies received in
response to 2004 consultation paper demonstrate that copyright is at a
crossroads. In the era of electronic dissemination of music, film or text
by means of downloading or Internet 'streaming', traditional business
models, including remuneration mechanisms that have been designed for the
analogue environment, may no longer function in an online environment.
(...) Furthermore, electronic media seem to have created a climate of
public indifference or even hostility toward the notion of copyright, an
indifference which seems to have increased with the wider dissemination of
content on the Internet." (p.2)

The new study concludes the online market in Europe is considerably
lagging behind the US, due to the inefficiency of rights clearance. While
"the available repertoire in Europe has doubled over 12 months to 1
million tracks from January 2004 to January 2005", worldwide the growth
has been much stronger, with a tenfold increase in 2004. According to the
2005 IFPI annual report, there are 150 legal music sites available in 20
EU countries, of which "30 services in the UK alone. More than 20 are
available in Germany and 10 in France." (p.20-21) But obviously, this
growth in the amount of services does not represent a similar growth in
the amount of available songs.

The Commission now proposes that every right-holder chooses a single EU
rights manager, irrespective of residence or nationality of either the
rights-manager or the right-holder. The Commission hopes this new single
channel will solve the issues of transparency, "obliging the collecting
society to distribute royalties in an equitable manner." The Commission
also wants to introduce the principle of non-discrimination, to "introduce
a culture of transparency governance as to how rights are collectively
managed across EU borders." (p.56)

Perhaps the greatest progress in the availability of online music is the
new provision that individual artists should be able to break up the
current monolithic contracts with collecting societies, for example to
carve out their internet distribution rights from the package, in order
for them to legally start their own distribution. "Right-holders should be
able to withdraw certain categories of rights (in particular categories of
rights linked to online exploitation) from their national CRMs and
transfer their administration to a single rights manager of their choice.
For that to work, these online rights must be withdrawn from the scope of
reciprocal agreements as well." (p.56)

Commission press release (07.07.2005)
http://europa.eu.int/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?referen...

Study on a community initiative on the cross-border collective management
of copyright (07.07.2005)
http://europa.eu.int/comm/internal_market/copyright/docs/...

Special feature Single Market News (May 2005)
http://europa.eu.int/comm/internal_market/smn/smn37/docs/...

Communication on the management of Copyright and Related Rights COM(2004)
261 (16.04.2004)
http://europa.eu.int/eur-lex/en/com/cnc/2004/com2004_0261...

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9. Creative Commons festival in Spain
===========================================================

>From 15 to 17 July there will be a (freely accessible) festival on
copyleft and creative commons in Barcelona, with talks by Lawrence Lessig,
Wikipedia, Cory Doctorow and John Perry Barlow and plenty of workshops,
screenings and presentations in the CCCB (Barcelona Contemporary Culture
Centre). The festival is devoted to the exploration of non-restrictive
alternatives to the current intellectual property regime, new models of
copyleft licenses, remix culture, and all the possibilities opened by free
culture creation and distribution tools. The organisers, Oscar Abril
Ascaso and the Elastico collective, write: "The effects of copyright and
the reach of intellectual property laws on the development of culture have
become one of the hottest issues in the last few years. Everybody wants to
protects culture, but from whom? From the artists? From the consumers? Is
culture a luxury item? Can culture be owned? These contradictions are
pitting governments and public institutions against each other, companies
against their own costumers, rights management societies against their own
artists."

Among the national guests, the digital editor José Antonio Millán will
explain why the linguistic heritage should be free. The novelist Hernan
Casciari will reflect on his experience as a writer in the blogosphere.
Pablo Soto, musician, producer and creator of two of the most popular p2p
networks, will talk about file-sharing as a promotion tool for musical
artists. Bram de Jong, a legend in the field of audio programming, will
present his database of free sounds hosted by the Pompeu Fabra university
in Barcelona. Amador Fernández-Savater, publisher of Acuarela libros, will
explain how to sell books that can be freely photocopied. Jota, singer and
guitarrist of "Los Planetas", and Bea, guitarrist of "Nosoträxh", will
reveal where musical artists really get their money from. Finally, Jesús
Barahona, member of Hispalinux and founder of Barrapunto, will talk about
the importance of free software.

The festival offers a special space for downloading free music and texts
related to free music and intellectual property, where "everything can be
downloaded, burnt, reused, printed, remixed and freely distributed without
breaking the law." Another great idea from the organisers is to provide
free legal counselling. "Nine lawyers and experts on Intellectual Property
will donate an hour of their time to counsel attendants and to clarify any
doubt they may entertain about author rights, licenses and copyright."

Festival information
http://www.elastico.net/copyfight/

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10. Support EDRI!
===========================================================

European Digital Rights needs your help in upholding digital rights in the
EU. Donations allow EDRI to hire part-time professional assistance in
Brussels and invest in targeted campaigns. With the plans for mandatory
data retention and the continuous erosion of digital civil rights, your
donation could make a huge difference.

If you wish to help us promote digital rights, please consider making a
private donation, or interest your organisation in sponsorship. We will
gladly send you an invoice for any amount above 250 euro to confirm the
donation.

KBC Bank Auderghem-Centre, Chaussée de Wavre 1662, 1160 Bruxelles, Belgium
EDRI Bank account nr.: 733-0215021-02
IBAN: BE32 7330 2150 2102
BIC: KREDBEBB

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11. Agenda
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20-22 July 2005, Geneva, Switzerland
Third and final Inter-sessional Intergovernmental Meeting on a Development
Agenda for WIPO. This crucial meeting will conclude discussions held by
Member States in April and June and is key to the report which the
Secretariat must produce for the WIPO General Assemblies in September
2005. EDRI will be represented at the meeting.
http://www.wipo.int/meetings/en/details.jsp?meeting_id=8487

28-31 July 2005, Den Bosch, The Netherlands
What The Hack, major open air hacker / internet lifestyle event.
http://www.whatthehack.org/

8 September 2005, Brussels, Belgium
EuroSOCAP Workshop on confidentiality and privacy in healthcare
3 year programme to develop new ethical standards for privacy and patient
access to (electronical) files, started on 31 January 2003.
http://www.eurosocap.org/eurosocap-workshop.aspx

12-13 September 2005, Strasbourg, France
CoE Pan-European Forum on Human Rights in the Information Society
http://www.coe.int/T/E/human_rights/media/

5 October 2005, Paris, France, RFID
Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID): Applications and Public Policy
Considerations. Conference convened by the Committee for Information,
Computer and Communications Policy (ICCP) of the Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development (OECD).

1-2 December 2005, London, UK, Patenting Lives
Conference in the Queen Mary Intellectual Property Research Institute. The
call for papers closes on 26 August 2005 and invites abstracts on topics
such as Access to Knowledge, Consumer Aspects, Public Interest, Public
Goods, Public Domain and Human Rights.
http://www.patentinglives.org/conference.htm

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12. About
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EDRI-gram is a biweekly newsletter about digital civil rights in Europe.
Currently EDRI has 17 members from 11 European countries. European Digital
Rights takes an active interest in developments in the EU accession
countries and wants to share knowledge and awareness through the
EDRI-grams. All contributions, suggestions for content or agenda-tips are
most welcome.

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