Dear all,
We finally witness the return of the in-person Wikimania!
Below is a curated list of some of the sessions that the WMF Global Advocacy team has added to our short-list of sessions to watch. Those marked with ** include members of the Legal Department, whether Human Rights, Trust and Safety, or Global Advocacy.
Please note some of these may only be available in-person, while others may be hybrid of live-streamed. All times are in local time. You can check all session details on the official schedule [1].
Enjoy Wikimania,
Ziski
[1]https://wikimania.wikimedia.org/wiki/2023:Program
- - - - - -
THURSDAY
START END
10:00 11:00 AI advancements and the Wikimedia projects
10:00 11:00 **Legal concerns: how the Movement can get the most out of WMF’s Legal team
10:40 11:00 Regional Grants Committees
11:15 11:35 Empowering Participation: A User-Centered Approach to Low-Stakes Edit-a-thons
11:15 12:00 **Evolving Legal and Human Rights Trends: a review of the risks and threats facing the movement
12:00 12:45 When the communities speak for themselves - how bring knowledge equity into policy discussions and advocacy activities?
14:15 14:55 OpenStreetMap and Wikimedia: Awesome Together!
14:15 15:15 **Passion and Perspectives: Policy Challenges and Opportunities for the Wikimedia Communities in the ESEAP
15:30 16:30 Building capacity: designing a train the trainer programme for your affiliate or community group
15:30 16:00 **What exactly does Trust and Safety do? A background, history, and explainer
16:00 16:30 **IP Masking: Big Change to Protect Editor Privacy
18:00 19:00 **Digital Safety Clinic
FRIDAY
START END
10:00 11:00 Changemaker's toolbox - brainstorming introductory resources to campaigning and advocacy
10:00 10:10 What makes some wiki communities more subject to governance capture
10:00 10:40 The future of CC licenses and public domain tools
10:40 11:00 From State Censorship to State Sponsorship: How We Organized a Seven-Month Edit-a-Thon with a State Agency
11:15 11:45 When public becomes private and everybody is a suspect - freedom of expression in early 21st century
11:15 11:35 Internet Archive: The Annual Wikimania Update
14:15 15:15 **Open up! Stories and lessons from copyright advocacy across the Wikimedia movement
14:15 14:45 Beyond editing – How visible are multipliers, community leaders and organizers, why are they importany, how can their visibility be increased?
15:50 16:30 Joining forces: Partnering with intergovernmental organizations creates new opportunities for the Wikimedia movement
17:45 17:50 A Survey of Freedom Of Panorama (FOP) in the Philippines
17:55 18:00 Age-Verification on Wikimedia Projects
SATURDAY
START END
10:00 10:30 What we can learn from large commercial users
10:30 11:00 Lift Wing: WMF's machine learning model serving infrastructure
11:15 12:00 Exploring the Values That Will Shape AI for a Better internet
15:50 16:10 Wikipediplomacy: the story of Philippine diplomatic missions on Wikipedia, and how you can write them too!
Dear colleagues,
We are contacting you because Wikimedia Chile is planning to organize an
event on Advocacy & Public Policy for the Wikimedia community, within the
framework of UNESCO's conference for Press Freedom that will be held in
Santiago in early May 2024.
Within this context, we invite you to fill out this form
<https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfTWK1ptdVs6tNLXX2BF1pzIPYaYJiyq-W…>
(available in English, but that can be answered in Spanish), which will
help us to better outline the event and the application to the funds to
make this happen.
The survey is open and anonymous and anyone from the movement can answer
it. It would also be very helpful if you could share it with whom you
consider would be interested.
We remain available to any questions or comments.
Warm regards from Chile,
WMCL Team
<http://www.avg.com/email-signature?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_cam…>
Libre
de virus.www.avg.com
<http://www.avg.com/email-signature?utm_medium=email&utm_source=link&utm_cam…>
<#DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2>
Hi all!
The European Parliament is off on its summer break and won’t be back until
the end of August. Other institutions are also winding down for the next
few weeks. Here’s a last update of what was achieved in the last weeks and
where we will pick up in September.
Dimi & Michele
=== EMFA ===
Some updates concerning the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA), which is an
attempt to foster pluralism and journalistic independence across the EU.
Council adopted its general approach
<https://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-10954-2023-INIT/en/pdf>
last June, Parliament is actively working to swiftly adopt its position
(the vote in plenary should take place in October). The Internal Market
Committee
<https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/IMCO-AD-742456_EN.pdf> (IMCO
has shared competence on the whole text) and Civil Liberties Committees
<https://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2014_2019/plmrep/COMMITTEES/LIBE/DV…>
(LIBE has exclusive competence on Articles 4(2) and 20(3)) adopted their
respective opinions. On 18 July, shadow rapporteurs in the Culture and
Education Committee (CULT is the lead committee) struck a deal on the text
<https://politico-uploads-production.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/editorial_do…>
and agreed to maintain the original schedule of the vote, which is foreseen
for the next 7th of September.
—
The focus of our attention is on Article 17 of the proposal that aims at
introducing the so-called "media exemption". The different political groups
tabled several amendments and some had the result to include Wikipedia
within the scope of this Article by deleting the reference to "online
intermediation services" or adding a reference to DSA provisions. We
informed lawmakers of the effect of their changes and a clarification was
added in a recital which shadow rapporteurs agreed to include it. At the
end of August, there will be a technical meeting to formalise all recitals
including the one containing the carveout. Of course, the original
definition, as proposed by the Commission and the Council, remains our main
preference. We hope this recital remains a secondary safety net.
—
In addition, we signed two letters addressed to the LIBE Committee MEPs
asking for a complete ban on the possible use of spyware against
journalists (you may find them here
<https://edri.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Open-Letter-Council-Protection-…>
and here
<https://edri.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Letter-to-MEPs-before-LIBE-vote…>
).
—
If Parliament manages to adopt its position in October, as it seems the
case, trilogue negotiations will start immediately after. The goal of
lawmakers isto approve the new law before the end of the term and ahead of
European elections that will take place in June 2024.
=== Political Advertising Regulation ===
Negotiations on this important piece of legislation
<https://oeil.secure.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/popups/ficheprocedure.do?refere…>,
that aims to frame clear rules for political advertising online across the
block, have been halted given that Parliament and Council could not find an
agreement on the use of sensitive data in targeting and micro-targeting
techniques. The Spanish Presidency seems not ready to resume negotiations
immediately despite its position being closer to the one of Parliament.
Speculations suggest that negotiations will restart only in October. It is
therefore unclear if the new regulation will be adopted before the end of
the term and will be applied during the 2024 EU elections.
—
Wikimedia projects should be safely out of scope of this file, but this can
sometimes quickly change as lawmakers make edits to the definitions.
Wikimedia also cares about privacy and worries about the tracking of users
online. These are the two aspects we concentrate on within this file.
=== SLAPP Case Against Wikipedia in Portugal ===
In an ongoing lawsuit, the court in Portugal ordered the Wikimedia
Foundation to delete
<https://diff.wikimedia.org/2023/07/27/high-stakes-for-the-wikimedia-project…>
well-sourced, publicly available and relevant information about a notable
person, and to disclose user data. We believe this is a so-called SLAPP
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation>
case and incompatible with EU law, including the Digital Services Act
currently being implemented.g. The Wikimedia Foundation is appealing and
hasn’t provided any data in this case.
—
The European Union is currently debating a proposed “anti-SLAPP Directive”
- full title Directive on protecting persons who engage in public
participation from manifestly unfounded or abusive court proceedings
<https://oeil.secure.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/popups/ficheprocedure.do?refere…>
.
—
We are making sure that lawmakers involved in these procedures are aware of
of the Portuguese case, as well as the case involving User:Kruusamägi in
Estonia
<https://news.err.ee/1608852323/businessman-wikipedia-must-be-responsible-fo…>
.
=== France’s Tech Bill Regulating The Online Environment ===
France is working on a tech bill to regulate the entire online environment.
More precisely the projet de loi visant à sécuriser et réguler l’espace
numérique (SREN) <https://www.senat.fr/dossier-legislatif/pjl22-593.html>.
—
There are several problematic articles and aspects in the proposal that
would change how content moderation on our projects works. Such examples
are provisions aiming to keep links to “banned” media off websites (think
Russia Today) or an obligation to not allow banned users from
re-registering (which would require some sort of background check on all
new registrations).
—
Wikimédia France, Wikimedia Europe and the Wikimedia Foundation are
coordinating on this. We are also checking in with like-minded
organisations and other online projects and exploring possible
collaborations. The French legislator will resume its activities in
September.
=== Summer Reading: Italy Crusade Against the Public Domain ===
Recently the Republic of Italy is going out of its way to restrict and get
paid for re-use of public domain material. As any good tale, the stories
are scary and silly at the same time. We recommend this post by Deborah De
Angelis and Giuditta Giardini
<https://communia-association.org/2023/07/10/tales-of-public-domain-protecti…>,
as well as the case-specific articles about The Uffizi vs. Jean Paul
Gaultier
<https://communia-association.org/2022/10/25/the-uffizi-vs-jean-paul-gaultie…>
and The Vitruvian Man & Ravensburger puzzles
<https://communia-association.org/2023/03/01/the-vitruvian-man-a-puzzling-ca…>
.
--
Wikimedia Europe ivzw
Dear Friends,
We wish to bring your attention to important developments in Portugal.
We are concerned that an ongoing lawsuit against the Wikimedia Foundation in Portugal may be a strategic lawsuit against public participation (SLAPP) designed to suppress well-sourced public information.
To summarize, the court has so far ordered the Foundation to delete information from articles about the notable person who is suing us, and to identify the Wikipedians who added the content. The case could end up with a ruling that punishes individuals simply for summarizing and publishing on Wikipedia what was said about a notable person in news media. If a volunteer editor who works on an article can become liable for everything that is in the article, contributing to Wikipedia will become much more difficult not only in Portugal, but potentially elsewhere as well. This would have an undue chilling effect on freedom of expression and information worldwide.
We want to assure you that we are fighting this case for two reasons: 1) to protect the user data of volunteers contributing to political biographies; and, 2) to set an important precedent protecting the ability to write biographies of living persons. In the process, the Foundation has not provided any user data in this case. We are hopeful that the courts will agree with us on the importance of protecting freedom of information and good-faith discussion of public interest topics.
You can learn more about the details of the case and what it could mean for Wikimedia projects and volunteers in this blog post [1].
All the best,
Ziski & WMF Global Advocacy Team
-----
[1] https://diff.wikimedia.org/2023/07/27/high-stakes-for-the-wikimedia-project…
Dear free knowledge supporters,
We have exciting news. Today, the Wikimedia Foundation, in partnership with Wikimedia UK, issued an open letter calling on the UK Government to exempt Wikipedia and other public interest projects from the Online Safety Bill (UK OSB).
We would be grateful if you could help us spread the word with your channels by using these resources:
* Open letter [1]
* Social media toolkit [2]
* Blog post to learn more [3]
More about the UK Online Safety Bill:
The UK Online Safety Bill, as it’s currently drafted, would require significant changes to how Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects operate. Last month, we shared details of the threats in this blog post [4] and have written in the past about our broader UK OSB concerns [5].
In December 2022, Wikimedia UK and the Wikimedia Foundation began outreach to British regulators to educate them on how our projects work and how the Online Safety Bill would threaten them. Over the last several months, we ramped up our advocacy efforts as the bill was debated in the House of Lords. We successfully convinced key Lords and Baronesses to support our proposed amendments and built public and media attention, but the UK Government has resisted making the necessary changes.
Our best chance of protecting Wikipedia is to persuade the UK Government to exempt public interest projects from the OSB, so we’ve written this open letter and formed a coalition of signatories. The list is a testament to the network of allies that WMUK has established over years of promoting free knowledge in the UK. If the government fails to act, our last chance to push this exemption to protect Wikipedia is with Parliament during the Bill’s “Report Stage” voting, starting on 6 July.
Please consider using the social media toolkit to spread the word with your channels about our open letter.
If you have questions or thoughts, respond to this email!
@Lucy, please hop in if there's something I've missed or something you would like to share from WMUK's perspective.
In solidarity,
Ziski
----
[1] https://wikimedia.org.uk/2023/06/online-safety-bill-open-letter/
[2] https://docs.google.com/document/d/1kTQSQU8VPhq-_AHg95ZYcL19Vdqrqf1m2U5X7Q0…
[3] https://medium.com/freely-sharing-the-sum-of-all-knowledge/protect-the-futu…
[4] https://diff.wikimedia.org/2023/05/11/good-intentions-bad-effects-wikimedia…
[5] https://medium.com/wikimedia-policy/deep-dive-the-united-kingdoms-online-sa…
Hi everyone!
Europe is hurtling towards a mass annual summer break in August, but before
that everyone seems to be in a frenzy to get some progress done on their
files. The European Commission is consulting on -a public “content
moderation database”, France being France is trying to over-implement the
DSA and pre-implement other digital files, while Germany is asking itself
what to do with e-lending. Oh, yes, the Media Freedom Act is also moving
forward. Can’t wait for the Sommerpause!
Dimi & Michele
=== DSA: Content Moderation Database ===
The DSA obliges online platforms to submit to the European Commission
decisions to remove or disable access to information and decisions to
suspend or terminate recipient’s accounts. These shall be submitted, with
an explanation, to a publicly accessible and machine-readable database.
This obligation was inspired by the Lumen Database that aggregates such
information on a voluntary basis.
—
The Commission has published the code and documentation (on GitHub) of its
planned “DSA Transparency Database” and has opened a public consultation
until 17 July to gather feedback. [1] The consultation poses questions on
methods of submission and the precise information to be collected.
—
Wikimedia Foundation is worried about how to submit the decisions it takes
to this public database without sharing any personal data. Additionally,
protecting users is a major priority and in some sensitive cases this could
best be done by being nonspecific about the reasons for the decision. We
will provide feedback.
=== Data Act ===
It’s a wrap! Well, a deal. As you might already know if you read this list
regularly, the Data Act will give users the power to request and re-use
data generated by products or services they use. In order to achieve this,
the legislation limits the scope of the sui generis database right (SGDR)
in Article 35, so it cannot be an obstacle to such re-use. This is a win,
although we would like to see the entire SGDR reviewed and then reformed or
removed. [2]
=== EMFA ===
The European Media Freedom Act (EMFA) aims at improving the functioning of
the internal market for media services. [3] It specifically introduces
safeguards for journalists and media providers, provisions for increasing
regulatory cooperation and convergence in the media market (e.g. New Board
for Media Services, former ERGA) as well as ensuring transparency in the
allocation of economic resources (e.g. state advertising). The rationale is
that by protecting the internal market for media services the EU
fundamental values of media freedom and pluralism can thrive.
—
The focus of our attention has been Article 17 of the proposal. Indeed, it
contains a “media exemption”, introducing new obligations for providers of
very large online platforms offering “online intermediation services”: more
specifically, they will have the power to accept or refuse
self-declarations of media providers as well as to decide whether an
account or item can be restricted or deleted. Considering that the
Wikimedia Foundation does not offer “online intermediation services” as
defined in the P2B regulation (Regulation (EU) 2019/1150), such provision
will not affect Wikimedia projects, such as Wikipedia.
—
More recently, we co-signed an open letter 4[] addressed to the Council
asking for a stronger protection of journalists and their sources against
the deployment of spywares. Indeed, it is extremely important to support
the call for a strong protection of freedom of expression given that it is
the basis of Wikipedia.
—
Currently, Council adopted (21st June 2023) its general approach and
Parliament (CULT, IMCO & LIBE committees) is working on its position, which
should be adopted after the summer (concerning the media exemption,
Parliament looks more keen to introduce a stronger version of it).
Trilogues are supposed to normally start at the end of the year, e.g. November
2023, under the Spanish Presidency. The goal is to have this new
legislation in place before the 2024 elections, which will be held in June
(therefore the Belgian Presidency will probably wrap the dossier up).
=== Political Advertising Regulation ===
The main goal of the Regulation on transparency and targeting of political
advertising, which was put forward in November 2021 [5], is to ensure the
proper functioning of the internal market for political advertising. The
proposal was a political priority of the EU Commission and was inspired by
the scandal of Cambridge Analytica. The proposal introduces, on the one
hand, a set of obligations ensuring a higher level of transparency of
advertising and related services and, on the other hand, specific rules on
the possibility of using special categories of personal data when targeting
and amplification techniques are used when offering this kind of services.
—
Wikimedia is not directly affected by the new rules given that it does not
offer political advertising services. Furthermore, its services are
advertising free. Nevertheless, the definition of what constitutes a
political advertising service is very broad, especially with regard to the
“issue based advertising”. In light of that, we asked to introduce a
carveout for “unremunerated services acting in a non-commercial purpose
capacity”. In addition, we have signed an open letter [6] asking for the
restriction of the scope of the definition of political advertising as well
as the ban of the possible use of sensitive personal data with regard to
targeting techniques.
—
Currently, trilogue negotiations have been suspended sine die: Parliament
and Council could not find an agreement on the use of sensitive personal
data concerning targeting and ad delivery techniques. This is a very
sensitive aspect since it calls into question the interplay with the DSA
horizontal rules (especially Article 26) and positions fundamentally
diverge (Council is more prone to allow the use of sensitive data in
targeting techniques).
The Spanish Presidency should resume negotiations and seems more open to
accept Parliament’s position. In any case, it seems very difficult that the
regulation will be in force for the 2024 elections.
=== France’s Tech Bill Regulating The Online Environment ===
France is working on a tech bill to regulate the entire online environment.
More precisely the de loi n° 593 visant à sécuriser et réguler l’espace
numérique (SREN). [7] In theory this is a transposition of some of the DSA
provisions, but France being France it is much more and way more French.
—
In particular, the bill introduces new criminal sanctions. In practice,
this will result in: 1) allowing courts to to impose up to six-month-long
social media bans for users convicted of harassment, cyberbullying, apology
of terrorism. This will oblige online projects to monitor the registrations
of new accounts and block people who were previously banned from
re-registering.
2) Introduction of a criminal sanction (1 year jail and a fine up to 4% of
turnover) for online platforms that do not respect the order of the online
regulatory authority (ARCOM) to remove pedopornographic content within 24
hours.
On the other hand, it confers to ARCOM additional powers to issue orders
for content removal when a sanction is taken according to Article 215 TFEU,
a provision introduced following the difficulties faced in blocking all RT
and Sputnik links as well as mirrors.
—
Wikimedia projects would be fully in scope, which is problematic with at
least a few of the proposed obligations. Wikimédia France has commissioned
a legal analysis and the Wikimedia Foundation has also checked the text. A
position is being written and the rapporteur in the French National
Assembly will be approached.
=== Germany’s E-Lending Consultation ===
Four German organisations, GFF, Wikimedia Deutschland, OKF Deutschland and
AlgorithmWatch contributed to the German government consultation on
e-lending. [8] They are criticising that e-lending in Germany is much
harder than the lending of physical books and that libraries regularly are
blocked from doing it, because publishers refuse to licence this activity.
=== Switzerland’s Press Publisher Right Proposal ===
The Swiss government is mulling over a press publisher's right and has
shared a draft. [9]
One interesting thing about the Swiss approach is that they want to
establish a universal right for everyone to share snippets of press
articles. In a second step, they want to oblige only commercial online
platforms that are used by more than 10% percent of the Swiss population to
enter agreements with the press publishers’ collecting societies and pay
licence fees.
===
[1]
https://ec.europa.eu/eusurvey/runner/bd32f3a5-2d69-95dc-41b2-7066e31ca8e1#p…
[2]https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_23_3491
[3]https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A52022PC0457
[4]
https://edri.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Open-Letter-Council-Protection-…
[5]https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=celex%3A52021PC0731
[6]
https://edri.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Joint-Civil-Society-Letter-on-d…
[7]https://www.senat.fr/dossier-legislatif/pjl22-593.html
[8]
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1wyKttShxuqTh4TboFCCD7Kjr1VGaw0Du/view?usp=…
[9]
https://www.admin.ch/gov/fr/accueil/documentation/communiques.msg-id-95351.…
--
Wikimedia Europe ivzw
Dear friends,
The WMF Global Advocacy team has released our "Don't Blink" monthly retrospective for May.
Every month we share developments from around the world that shape people’s ability to
participate in the free knowledge movement. In case you blinked this month, here are the
most important public policy advocacy topics that kept the Wikimedia Foundation busy in
May:
<https://diff.wikimedia.org/2023/06/27/dont-blink-public-policy-snapshot-for…>
Highlights include:
* European Commission designated Wikipedia as a “Very Large Online Platform” (VLOP) under the new Digital Services Act (DSA)
* Potential Effects of UK Online Safety Bill (OSB) on Wikimedia Projects
* Implications for the Wikimedia Model from US Supreme Court Rulings
If you want more information about any of these initiatives, or wish to share something of your own, get in touch.
We hope you enjoy the read!
Ziski & The Global Advocacy Team
Dear public policy friends and fans,
The WMF Global Advocacy team has released our "Don't Blink" monthly retrospective for April.
Every month we share developments from around the world that shape people’s ability to participate in the free knowledge movement. In case you blinked this month, here are the most important public policy advocacy topics that kept the Wikimedia Foundation busy in April:
<https://diff.wikimedia.org/2023/06/01/dont-blink-public-policy-snapshot-for…>
Highlights include:
* WMF's submission to the Global Digital Compact
* Wikimedians presenting at digital rights conferences such as RightsCon & the Digital Rights and Inclusion Forum
* Rebecca MacKinnon's talk at Yale Law School’s Information Society Project (ISP)
If you want more information about any of these initiatives, or wish to share something of your own, get in touch.
We hope you enjoy the read!
Ziski & The Global Advocacy Team
Salut la liste !
This month we were active on addressing age-verification requirements for
online platforms and talking about liability for free software. We also got
some good news on open access.
=== Age-Verification ===
France: The French legislature is discussing a law [1] that would require
online platforms, defined as “social networks”, to check their users’ age
before allowing them to access the service. The proposed definitions would
cover Wikipedia and its sister projects. For Wikimedia projects it would be
more than just a nuisance to age-gate content. Most of the proposed systems
would require gathering user data or working with third parties who do so.
It would also decrease the availability and accessibility of our projects.
—
Wikimédia France reached out to Senators, who last week debated and voted
on the proposal. An amendment was tabled that excludes “not for profit
online encyclopaedias and not for profit educational and scientific
repositories”. [2] It was supported by the rapporteur, the French
government (the Minister of Digital Transition and Telecommunications was
present) and Senators from the the left, right and centrist groups. It was
adopted by a solid majority. We have a video of the short exchange. [3]
—
UK: France is not the only country where mandatory age-gating provisions
for online platforms are currently being considered. The UK’s Online Safety
Bill would introduce such requirements. Wikimedia UK and the Wikimedia
Foundation are working intensively on advocating for various amendments to
the law. [4]
—
Brussels: The topic is also being considered at the EU level. The Digital
Services Act has a provision that requires very large online services to
protect minors, but leaves it (for now) largely up to the platforms how
they want to achieve this.
—
Another process that is expected to start in Brussels is a “special group
on the EU Code of conduct on age-appropriate design” [5], which Wikimedia
Europe has applied to be a member of. The group is supposed to come up with
best practice solutions on several issues, including age-verification. The
chosen participants are expected to be announced “any day now”.
=== CSAM ===
The proposal to tackle child sexual abuse material online (CSAM) [6]
foresees the possibility of "detection orders" that can be issued by courts
or relevant authorities against providers of "interpersonal communication
services" - for example, messaging apps. This is the most contentious
provision in the draft legislation, as such orders would effectively
eliminate end-to-end encrypted communications.
—
Last month, an opinion by the Council Legal Services [7] was leaked that
argues that the proposal would allow generalised access to the content of
interpersonal communications and thus fail to meet the proportionality
requirement inherent to fundamental rights. Meanwhile the European
Commission continues to argue (see a note circulated in the Council on 16
May [8]) that the proposed system of detection orders is proportionate,
because providers would be able to choose between “(i) abandoning effective
end-to-end encryption or (ii) introducing some form of 'back-door' to
access encrypted content or (iii) accessing the content on the device of
the user before it is encrypted (so-called 'client-side scanning')."
—
The Wikimedia Foundation has positioned itself on the proposal. [9]
Wikimedia already takes measures with regards to such content on its
projects and cooperates with law enforcement wherever appropriate. While
Wikimedia doesn’t operate interpersonal communication services, we worry
about putting an end to secure and private communications that can’t be
read by governments. We also worry that some anti-grooming provisions might
end up hurting already marginalised groups.
=== Liability on Free Software ===
The Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) sets out cybersecurity requirements for a
range of software products placed on the EU market. The instrument of
choice is to impose liability on developers and deployers of software. Our
main worry is how the new obligations would hinder developers, especially
volunteers, of free software. We are coordinating our position [10] and
actions with the FSFE and EDRi.
—
The Industry, Research and Energy (ITRE) committee in the European
Parliament has the lead and MEPs have tabled their amendments, which will
now be discussed in the coming weeks (see Documentation Gateway in [11]).
The good news is that most political groups are thinking about the specific
needs of free software. The challenge is that the lawmakers, including the
ones in Council, seem to be lacking a coherent vision of what a liability
system should look like. We appear to be stuck considering patches and
carve-outs. We are now going through an initial assessment of amendments
[12] and will coordinate with our allies before contacting lawmakers.
=== Open Access ===
Good news on Open Access! Under the Swedish Presidency, the
Competitiveness Council adopted conclusions on the ‘high quality,
transparent, open, trustworthy and equitable scholarly publishing’, calling
for immediate and unrestricted open access to be the norm in publishing
research involving public funds. [13] The Council calls on the European
Commission and Member States to support policies towards a scholarly
publishing model that is not-for-profit, open access and multi-format, with
no costs for authors or readers. (H/T to C4C)
===
[1]https://www.assemblee-nationale.fr/dyn/16/textes/l16b0739_proposition-loi
[2]https://www.senat.fr/amendements/2022-2023/588/Amdt_16.html
[3]https://twitter.com/juliettedlrx/status/1661280743362789379
[4]
https://diff.wikimedia.org/2023/05/11/good-intentions-bad-effects-wikimedia…
[5]
https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/news/apply-become-member-commissio…
[6]
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=COM%3A2022%3A209%3AFIN
[7]
https://www.statewatch.org/media/3901/eu-council-cls-opinion-csam-proposal-…
[8]
https://www.statewatch.org/media/3900/eu-com-csam-regulation-proportionalit…
[9]
https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/have-your-say/initiatives/1…
[10]https://wikimedia.brussels/who-should-be-liable-for-free-software/
[11]
https://oeil.secure.europarl.europa.eu/oeil/popups/ficheprocedure.do?refere…
[12]
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-9G5h-PYFgtzriuPtqgnRboe_IrDuH16kvq…
[13]https://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-8827-2023-INIT/en/pdf
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Wikimedia Europe ivzw