Original news and analysis on international IP policy
After a report by the Register's Kieren McCarthy on a postponement of the inaugural meeting of the NetMundial Initiative (NMI) Council discussions were revived over the need for the new body in several mailing lists.
On 28 January 2015, the Brazilian Ministry of Justice launched public consultations involving two key pieces of legislation, namely: the decree that will regulate the Marco Civil da Internet or the Brazilian Civil Rights Framework for the Internet (the "Internet Legal Framework"); and the Draft Bill for the Protection of Personal Data ("Draft Bill"). A consultation period is being conducted in relation to these two laws via online platforms set up by the government.
The European Parliament today adopted a resolution calling on the UN General Assembly to renew the mandate of the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), while strengthening its resources and the multi-stakeholder model of internet governance.
At the opening of this week’s 52nd meeting of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) in Singapore, the ICANN leadership supported by former President Bill Clinton aide Ira Magaziner, pushed for urgency in finalising the proposal for the future oversight of the private names and numbers regime.
A Geneva expert has offered his view on the top internet governance issues likely to come up in 2015. These include: cybersecurity, privacy, internet neutrality, and the proposed transition of control over a key underlying aspect of the internet.
Is it possible to fully comply with all the laws surrounding online communication? Michel Jaccard, founder of id est avocats says, “The answer is, ‘no.’” Speaking last week at the Club Suisse de la Presse, Jaccard made the case that when it comes to the online world, we should look beyond legal compliance and start thinking more strategically.
For many years Electronic Frontier Foundation Policy Analyst Jeremy Malcolm has been predicting the next year would be the pivotal year for the UN-led Internet Governance Forum (IGF). With the NetMundial Initiative being constructed these coming months and governments having not yet agreed to prolong the IGF mandate, the decade-old forum might be challenged to either move or become just one of many internet governance conference venues. And while some hope the future oversight over the internet’s underlying IANA function could become an experiment in shared global governance, others point out that more and more of the interesting questions of internet politics are decided elsewhere: national governments, trade negotiators, big data giants and cyberdominance strategists.
All year long, Intellectual Property Watch expends great energy and resources to bring hundreds of carefully written, detailed stories on policymaking - technical committee meetings, legislation, negotiations, legal cases, and latest reports and papers. But in what is perhaps typical of readers everywhere, many of the best-read IP-Watch stories of 2014 were those few that involved elections and personnel issues and India, followed by a range of hot button issues such as high-priced medicines, copyright and knowledge access, patent valuation, or internet surveillance.
By Pamela Passman Economic globalization and digitization of information have revolutionized business and allowed for efficiency that was unimaginable a few decades ago. The ability to share information remotely means companies can coordinate with partners remotely, integrate suppliers, track shipments…
“Internet Governance at a Crossroads” was the title of the Geneva Internet Conference, which took place in Geneva this week for the first time.
This week, the International Telecommunication Union is holding an event highlighting the UN agency's entry into what it describes as the growing problem of counterfeit and fake information and communication technology (ICT) products. Officials from the neighbouring World Intellectual Property Organization and World Trade Organization remarked during the meeting that counterfeit relates to an intellectual property right infringement, which is a different issue from substandard products.
The Net Mundial initiative of the World Economic Forum represents the first time that such a corporate-led venue – although sold as multistakeholder, open, and voluntary, among others – is positioned as being 'the' mechanism for global governance in a specific sector, the Just Net Coalition writes.