[Advocacy Advisors] [Wikimedia-l] WMF response to PRISM?

[Luis Villa]

On Tue, Jul 9, 2013 at 10:24 PM, Amgine <amgine at wikimedians.ca> wrote:

> On 09/07/13 02:52 PM, Luis Villa wrote:
> > It does not! I think it is more like:
> >
> > 1. Don't sign stopwatching.us, or do anything else too US-focused.
> > 2. Internally, do be careful with (or as necessary improve) WMF's own
> > privacy processes.
> > 3. Externally, do (unspecified something).
> >
> > For #2, see the discussion on the privacy policy revision:
> > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Privacy_policy/Call_for_input_%282013%29
> >
> > For #3, we're still very open to doing that unspecified something. We
> just
> > don't see any consensus on what the unspecified something is, other than
> > "not something US-focused".
> >
> > So please, we're definitely open to anything around #3 that can get
> > consensus, like (say) James' suggestion that we promote prism-break. We
> > would actively *like* to do that (several people here have signed various
> > petitions as individuals, for example). We just don't see what that is
> yet.
> >
> > Hope that helps clarify-
> > Luis
>
>
> For me, "don't be US centric" doesn't mean "don't do things oriented
> toward the USA". It means "don't *only* do things oriented toward the
> USA". This was also the impression I received reading through the
> comments; not that one should refuse to engage with US-focused actions,
> but that one should not *solely* engage with US-focused actions.
>

I should have been more specific and detailed yesterday; I apologize but
was crunched for time.

As long as most of the world's internet traffic passes through the US, we
will obviously need to do some things that are targeted at the US
government. However, there are two ways you can approach the US government
(or any government): are we asking a government to protect everyone? Or are
we asking the government to protect only their own citizens, and implicitly
or explicitly encouraging taking actions against the rest of the world?

That second category is what I think people are (rightly) concerned about.
In other words, we want to be very, very careful not to take positions that
could be seen as implicitly or explicitly saying it is OK to spy on
non-American members of our community.

For example, a letter to the US government focusing on guaranteeing us the
right to be completely transparent for everyone would likely fall into the
first category and be acceptable; a letter or petition encouraging the US
government "not to spy on American citizens" (as some of these have quite
literally been phrased) would likely fall into the latter category and so
not be acceptable.

That is what I meant by "US-focused" - I hope it clarifies.

Luis


-- 
Luis Villa
Deputy General Counsel
Wikimedia Foundation
415.839.6885 ext. 6810

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