[Chapter-delegates] Privacy and the civil society Madrid Declaration

Thu Oct 29 12:49:18 PDT 2009

Veni, 

There is here a bit of breach of net-etiquette, by forwarding a message for chapters to an external party. While the archives of this list are public, I would have preferred the issue to be handled internally first. Now that the cat is out of the box, silence from ISOC is not too cool. 

Franck Martin 
http://www.avonsys.com/ 
twitter: FranckMartin 

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Veni Markovski" <veni at veni.com> 
To: "Frederic Donck" <donck at isoc.org> 
Cc: "Delegates Chapter" <chapter-delegates at elists.isoc.org> 
Sent: Thursday, 29 October, 2009 3:37:47 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern 
Subject: Re: [Chapter-delegates] Privacy and the civil society Madrid Declaration 

Dear all, 
Please, see the response from Marc Rotenberg. I am forwarding it, because I haven't seen Frederic doing it. Mr. Rotenberg's letter raises some questions, which ISOC must respond to. 

Best, 
Veni 

De : Marc Rotenberg <rotenberg at epic.org> 
Date : 29 octobre 2009 14:05:58 HNEC 
À : Frederic Donck <donck at isoc.org> 
Cc : " <madrid at mailman.thepublicvoice.org> " <madrid at mailman.thepublicvoice.org> 
Objet : [Madrid] The Madrid Declaration and ISOC 

Frederic Donck 
Director Public Policy 
Internet Society 

Dear Mr. Donck, 

We are writing in response to your note of 28 October 2009 regarding 
the Civil Society Declaration that will be released at the annual 
meeting of the privacy and data protection commissioners in Madrid 
next week. 

Let us say at the outset that we appreciate your interest in this 
undertaking. There are very few policy issues involving the Internet 
of greater concern than privacy protection. We are aware of this 
because several of us have been involved with ISOC since its 
founding, and we have participated in numerous discussions on 
everything from crypto protocols to the the WHOIS database to 
IPSec. 

You have raised several specific concerns about the Declaration. We 
will try to answer these. 

The primary objection appears to be the lack of specificity in the 
document. Regarding this concern, it is important to understand that 
the Madrid Declaration was drafted at a high-level with the goal of 
reaffirming basic principles, identifying new challenges, and 
recommending concrete actions. It is not a report or a paper; it is 
a statement of findings and principles and as such is similar to 
other international declarations. 

But that does not mean that there is not ample evidence to support 
these points. 

You object, for example, to the statement that there is "growing 
collaboration between governments and vendors of surveillance 
technology that establish new forms of social control." 

Among the many reports on this topic is the article from the New 
York Times, "China Enacting a High-Tech Plan to Track People" 
(available at 
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/12/business/worldbusiness/12security .html ) 
which describes this problem in detail. We would be pleased 
to send you other citations, but that article alone should be enough 
to establish the point. 

There is the criticism that "the document does not identify the 
privacy laws and privacy institutions which are asserted to have 
failed to take into account the described factors." In the privacy 
world, this is a non-controversial proposition. Much of the work of 
the privacy commissioners is to identify new challenges and 
recommend new solutions. In fact, that is why they meet annually and 
that is also why they have invited the input of civil society. 

You object to our claim that new strategies to pursue copyright and 
unlawful content investigation pose "substantial threats to 
communications privacy, intellectual freedom, and the due process of 
law." That is not simply our opinion; that is the view of an 
increasing number of Constitutional courts, and we would venture to 
guess ISOC members, who would recognize the risks to users. To 
reverse the proposition, is it the case that ISOC believes that 
gathering massive data on Internet users or filtering the content of 
Internet communications does * not * pose a threat to the interests 
identified in the Declaration? 

The final concern is about the moratorium provision in the 
Declaration. On this point, it is critical to note the qualifier, 
"subject to a full and transparent evaluation by independent 
authorities and democratic debate." The point is simple: before 
these "new systems of mass surveillance" are deployed we believe 
there should be evaluation and public discussion. Again, does the 
ISOC really object to that principle? 

ISOC plays a vital role in Internet policy. The ISOC chapters in 
particular reflect the diversity of local ISOC members and the 
interests of ISOC members. It is difficult to imagine that privacy 
is not a concern of ISOC or that the Madrid declaration is not a 
reasonable articulation of the views of many ISOC members. 

And of course it is the funding from the .ORG domain, the home of 
civil society on the Internet and the domain of many organizations 
that have signed the Declaration, that sustains the work ISOC. 

We hope you will reconsider your decision. We would also appreciate 
if you would forward this response to the ISOC chapters who 
received the original email. 

Sincerely, 

Marc Rotenberg 
for the Madrid Organizing Committee 

Frederic Donck wrote: 

Dear Chapter delegates and individual ISOC members, 

Recently there has been growing interest amongst our membership in 
the areas of data protection and privacy. This is also an area of 
great interest to ISOC. We are very pleased to see our Chapters and 
individual members taking such an active interest in these issues. 

Recently, The Public Voice ( www.thepublicvoice.org ) has asked 
individuals and organisations to support its Global Privacy 
Standards for a Global World The Civil Society Declaration Madrid, 
Spain 3 November 2009. This document can be viewed at 
http://thepublicvoice.org/madrid-declaration . 

As we understand it, The Public Voice proposes to formally release 
this document at a Civil Society organised conference on 3 November 
2009 entitled 
"Global Privacy Standards for a Global World" prior to the 30th 
International Conference of Data Protection and Privacy 
Commissioners in Madrid. 

Some ISOC members and Chapters have publicly expressed their support 
for the declaration. 

We would like to take this opportunity to outline the procedure 
Chapters must follow when taking public positions and/or making 
public statements. 

Specific officials of Chapters, acting on behalf of their Chapter, 
may make public statements and establish public positions as long as 
they meet the following requirements: 

1. They must advance the purposes of the Internet Society, which 
includes advancing the purposes of a Chapter in good standing. 
2. They must not be contrary to any position of the Internet 
Society. 
3. They must be prepared and presented in a professional manner. 
4. They must be clearly and unambiguously identified as originating 
from the Chapter of the Internet Society. 
5. It should be unlikely they will give rise to any significant 
legal or juridical liability. 

Where there is any question or doubt regarding the appropriateness 
of a public position or statement, a Chapter is expected to consult 
with ISOC at least one week prior to its release or announcement. 
Chapters must also notify the ISOC no later than the same day of the 
release of any public position or statement. 

ISOC Finland Chapter has asked us to advise whether ISOC will be 
supporting the Civil Society Madrid Declaration. 

ISOC does not propose to express its support for the Civil Society 
Madrid Declaration because we have some concerns about the way the 
declaration is expressed. 

We also consider that it would not be appropriate for ISOC to 
support a document which might be viewed as seeking to remind 
governments to apply their own laws and asserting without evidence 
that there "is growing collaboration between governments and vendors 
of surveillance technology that establish new forms of social 
control". 

Further, the document does not identify the privacy laws and privacy 
institutions which are asserted to have failed to take into account 
the described factors. Without knowing what these are and how they 
are said to have failed to take them into account, we cannot assess 
whether or not this statement is correct. 

It is also unclear what are the "new strategies to pursue copyright 
and unlawful content investigations" which are said to pose 
"substantial threats to communications privacy, intellectual 
freedom, and the due process of law". Without knowing what those 
strategies are, we cannot comment on whether or not they pose 
substantial threats to privacy. 

Further, whilst devices or applications that observe and/or record 
personal information may raise potential privacy issues, we do not 
agree that the response should be to impose a moratorium on the 
development or implementation of new technologies such as RFID etc. 

Accordingly, we ask that you do not express support for this 
Declaration as an ISOC member or Chapter. 

You may, of course, support the Declaration in your personal 
capacity. 

Thank you very much, 

Best Regards 
Frederic 

Frederic Donck 
Director Public Policy 
Internet Society 

www.isoc.org 

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