UK MPs and campaigners are debating a Digital Bill of Rights to protect citizens’ privacy.
Liberal Democrats in the House of Commons have taken World Wide Web founder Sir Tim Berners Lee’s suggestion of a ‘Magna Carta for the internet’ and drafted a new law which could become part of their manifesto for the general election in 2015. Future Intelligence and its parent body the Cyber Security Research Institute are starting an ongoing debate to provoke national and international dialogue about state surveillance (revealed by the US National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden) and the power of the big internet companies to harvest and market personal data. Home Affairs spokesman for the Lib Dems, the Cambridge MP Dr Julian Huppert, believes passionately in the need to codify the rights and responsibilities of state, citizens and the technology industry. He is leading the debate and backbench MPs and peers of all parties are expected to support it.
Rights
The original Magna Carta (pictured above) was signed by King John in 1215 after twenty-five noblemen
led an armed uprising against him. The King was forced to agree a long list of basic freedoms which are now taken for granted in the UK (which has no written Bill of Rights) and also formed the basis of the United States Constitution. Magna Carta guarantees the rule of law, stating that those accused of crime have the right to due process and must be tried by a jury of their peers. And it limits the power of the monarch to levy taxes or to interfere with the workings of the Catholic church. The basic premise is that citizens have rights that must be respected by their rulers.
Revenge porn
Eight hundred years later, the Magna Carta is being re-imagined for the online space. Britain’s Liberal Democrats have formulated a set of principles. And they have already forced a change in the new Serious Crime Bill, campaigning for a clause that explicitly makes ‘revenge pornography’ an arrestable crime. ‘Revenge porn’ consists of intimate pictures from a broken relationship that are posted on social media to embarrass the former partner. The LibDems are junior partners with the Conservatives in Britain’s ruling coalition government. They championed the cause after ‘Hannah’ a young woman wrote to her MP for help after she was targeted on Facebook by her former boyfriend.
http://www.libdems.org.uk/ban_revenge_porn
Congressman
In the USA Republican Congressman Darrell Issa, who has just been named Chairman of the House of Representatives Intellectual Property Subcommittee, has penned his own version of what a Digital Bill of Rights would contain…
The Digital Bill of Rights
461. Freedom – digital citizens have a right to a free, uncensored internet
202. Openness – digital citizens have a right to an open, unobstructed internet
223. Equality – all digital citizens are created equal on the internet
234. Participation – digital citizens have a right to peaceably participate where and how they choose on the internet
255. Creativity – digital citizens have a right to create, grow and collaborate on the internet, and be held accountable for what they create
256. Sharing – digital citizens have a right to freely share their ideas, lawful discoveries and opinions on the internet
317. Accessibility – digital citizens have a right to access the internet equally, regardless of who they are or where they are
178. Association – digital citizens have a right to freely associate on the internet
509. Privacy – digital citizens have a right to privacy on the internet
4810. Property – digital citizens have a right to benefit from what they create, and be secure in their intellectual property on the internet
Congressman Issa is a former CEO of an electronics company and he himself owns 37 patents, so intellectual property rights will figure strongly in his thinking.
Surveillance
In the UK the emphasis is more likely to be on surveillance and big data, as the Conservative-Liberal Democrat Coalition Government continues to pass ever stricter anti-terrorism laws – such as the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (200) or RIPA and the DRIP (Data Retention and Investigatory Powers) which was rushed through Parliament and onto the statute book in just a few days in July 2014 with only 47 dissenting backbenchers voting against it. These measures give British police and security services wide-ranging powers to obtain and retain personal information. Home Secretary Teresa May tabled new laws allowing for wider scrutiny of potential terrorism suspects in November 2014.
Future Intelligence editor Peter Warren says:
” The bond of trust between the people and the authorities has been broken by what Edward Snowden revealed and we need to find a way to restore that trust.”
Wikileaks
At an anti-surveillance conference in London, campaigners gathered to watch video-link contributions from Wikileaks website founder Julian Assaange and Laura Poitras. Assange is currently unable to leave the Ecuadorean Embassy because there is a warrant for his arrest to answer two complaints of sexual abuse in Sweden. He fears that if he leaves the embassy, where Ecuador guarantees his safety and asylum, he will be extradited and may be sent to the United States where he is wanted in connection with the Wikileaks publication of military secrets smuggled out of Iraq by Private Chelsea Manning (formerly Bradley Manning). Wikileaks spokesman Kristinn Hrafnsson, the award-winning Icelandic journalist, told Future Intelligence: “I would welcome a digital Bill of Rights. Wikileaks exposed the lack of privacy and security in the digital world.” Hear the full interview here:
Laura Poitras is an award-winning film-maker who helped NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden to reach a global audience with his revelations of mass surveillance of innocent citizens by the NSA and Britain’s GCHQ. Her film ‘Citizenfour‘ narrates the events leading up to the leak, and Snowden’s subsequent escape to Russia where he now lives with his girlfriend in political asylum. Poitras is an American citizen but now lives in Berlin, Germany and has been advised by her lawyers not to travel to the UK.
