- FISA Court Proposes New Court RulesPublished: September 1, 2010Source: Secrecy NewsThe Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has proposed new rules to comply with the provisions of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008. The Court reviews government applications for intelligence surveillance and physical search under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). The proposed FISA Court rules (pdf) provide new procedures by which telecommunications companies can petition the Court to modify or dismiss a court order or a directive from the Attorney General or the DNI requiring them to assist in electronic surveillance, to provide “any tangible thing,” or to adhere to a no...
- Congressional Expense Reports Slowly Move Online from Dusty BasementPublished: August 27, 2010The House of Representatives took a step toward greater government transparency last year by posting its expense reports online, but the clunky PDF format makes it difficult to compare lawmakers’ outlays or to pinpoint exactly how the money is spent. The Senate, on the other hand, is moving at a glacial pace and has yet to offer details about its plan to start publishing expense reports online in 2011.
- Administration Targets High-Risk IT ProjectsPublished: August 24, 2010!--break-- The Obama administration released yesterday a list of 26 mission-critical information technology (IT) projects that will receive immediate attention from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) because they "have experienced problems such as significant cost increases or schedule delays." This reassessment process of IT projects, which is part of the administration's reform-minded 2012 budget process and their larger Accountable Government Initiative, seeks to set the programs straight before they waste any more taxpayer funds. When the administration released its FY 2012 budget...
- Consumer Safety Agency Plans Crowdsourced DatabasePublished: August 24, 2010Over the objections of manufacturers, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) will launch a searchable, online database in March that collects consumer complaints about harmful or dangerous products.
- Organizations Support Government Accountability and TransparencyPublished: August 23, 2010Source: Public Policy ConnectionsMore than 30 organizations, including SLA, wrote a letter to Representative Edolphus Towns (D-NY), Chairman of the House and Oversight and Government Reform Committee in support of H.R. 6086. The bill will eliminate broad Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) exemptions for the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) that were enacted last month when the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank Act) was signed into law. The bill strikes FOIA exemptions that were included in the Dodd-Frank Act that allow the SEC to avoid disclosing records or other information obtai...
- Advocates Call for Transparency in Development AidPublished: August 24, 2010Experts from around the world are meeting this week in London to advocate for transparency in development efforts. The Conference on Transparency, Free Flow of Information and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) is being held in advance of next month's UN Summit to review progress toward the Goals. !--break-- Established by the UN General Assembly's 2000 Millennium Declaration, the MDGs establish targets for global development by 2015 on topics such as poverty, education, maternal health, and environmental sustainability. The Obama administration has committed to the MDGs and in July relea...
- New Order on State, Local Access to Classified InfoPublished: August 23, 2010Source: Secrecy NewsThe White House issued an executive order last week to formalize procedures for sharing classified information with state, local and private sector entities. The new order does not alter or amend previous orders on national security classification or access to classified information, but it should facilitate increased sharing of classified information with non-federal officials. The closest thing to a policy innovation in the new order seems to be a provision that “a duly elected or appointed Governor of a State or territory… may be granted access to classified information without a back...
- Law.Gov Issues Principles and DeclarationPublished: August 22, 2010Source: Information Today News BreaksWill you ever get free access to the authentic primary law (acts, codes, statutes, regulations, judicial opinions) affecting your life, your business, your money and relationships?What is Law.Gov and Why Should We Care?If you have ever wondered what the law required of you, or ever looked up the vehicle code section that you allegedly violated (according to the police officer who gave you the ticket), you are not alone. Could you find it online? Was it correct, current, from a reliable source, did you even have a clue to the answers to these questions? Probably not. The founder of Law.Gov (htt...
- New Openness Rules for Finance ReformPublished: August 17, 2010Source: Sunlight FoundationOn Friday, the New York Times reported that four agencies responsible for implementing the financial reform bill are announcing new transparency policies: After passage of the law overhauling the nation’s financial regulations, the federal agencies responsible for writing the rules are striving for transparency to avoid the appearance of improper coziness with lobbyists, bankers and executives in the financial services industry. After closely tracking similar policies put in place by the Treasury to oversee the stimulus and TARP programs, we’ve started looking into just what these policies...
- EPA Seeks to Enhance Public Access to Chemical DataPublished: August 17, 2010The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has proposed several changes to its regulation of chemicals that should improve the public's access to crucial information. The improved data collected under the proposed rule will help the agency and the public identify potential chemical risks and take action to manage those risks. !--break-- The proposed rule is the latest of several actions by the EPA to use its existing authority under the nation's primary chemical law, the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), to improve the public's access to chemical data and prevent manufacturers from ina...
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Administrative Office of U.S. Courts Wants Your Feedback on PACER
From AALL’s Washington Blawg:
The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts (AO) announced on November 2 that it is looking for feedback on PACER through an online survey to assess user satisfaction with current services and generate suggestions for future improvements to the system.
From the UK – Legislation to access public’s texts and emails put on hold
From The Guardian:
Plans for a £2bn Home Office surveillance project to track details of everyone’s email, mobile phone, text and internet use have been put on hold after a consultation raised concerns over its technical feasibility, costs and privacy safeguards.
The Home Office has confirmed that legislation for the project, known in Whitehall as the “interception modernisation programme”, will not be included in next week’s Queen’s Speech and is unlikely before a general election. The fresh delay follows concerns raised by internet service providers and mobile phone operators over the project’s feasibility, and anxieties over who would foot the bill.
From the UK – Government opens data to public
From the BBC:
An ambitious website that will open up government data to the public will launch in beta, or pilot, form in December.
Reams of anonymous data about schools, crime and health could all be included.
Data.gov.uk has been developed by Sir Tim Berners-Lee, founder of the web, and Professor Nigel Shadbolt at the University of Southampton.
It is designed to be similar to the Obama administration’s data.gov project, run by Vivek Kundra.
International Activists Launch New Website to Gather and Share Copyright Knowledge
From the Electronic Frontier Foundation:
Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Electronic Information for Libraries (eIFL.net), and other international copyright experts joined together today to launch Copyright Watch — a public website created to centralize resources on national copyright laws at www.copyright-watch.org. . .
. . . Copyright Watch is the first comprehensive and up-to-date online repository of national copyright laws. To find links to national and regional copyright laws, users can choose a continent or search using a country name. The site will be updated over time to include proposed amendments to laws, as well as commentary and context from national copyright experts. Copyright Watch will help document how legislators around the world are coping with the challenges of new technology and new business models.
From India – Centre protests ‘copyright violation’ by Google Books
From the Financial Express:
Web portal Google Books’ initiative to create a digital library by scanning printed publications has triggered alarm bells in India, forcing the Centre to take up the matter with the US government. In a meeting held in the last week of October here, senior Indian officials told their US counterparts that the portal would encroach upon the copyrights of Indian authors and publishers.
Revised Google Settlement Offers Minor Changes on Antitrust Issue, No Response on Library Pricing
From Library Journal:
Shortly before midnight last night, Google, the Authors Guild, and the Association of American Publishers released a revised version (PDF) of the Google Book Search Settlement, with some clear concessions to foreign rightsholders (as noted by Publishers Weekly), a vague—and, to critics, fatally inadequate—concession on orphan works. There was also no response to library concerns about pricing of the potentially monopolistic institutional database—an issue that Google representatives say can’t be addressed in the settlement.
The one notable response to criticisms from the library community was an agreement that, as Google representatives had already stated, more than one free public access terminal per library building may be authorized.
Google Book Search Settlement Revised: No Reader Privacy Added
From the Electronic Frontier Foundation:
Late Friday night the parties to the Google Book Search class action submitted a revised settlement agreement to the federal court in New York that is hearing the case.
Unfortunately, the parties did not add any reader privacy protections. The only nominal change was that they formally confirmed a position they had long taken privately that information will not be freely shared between Google and the Registry.
Modifications to the Google Books Settlement
From the Google Public Policy blog:
The changes we’ve made in our amended agreement address many of the concerns we’ve heard (particularly in limiting its international scope), while at the same time preserving the core benefits of the original agreement: opening access to millions of books while providing rightsholders with ways to sell and control their work online. You can read a summary of the changes we made here, or by reading our FAQ.
Copyright overreach goes on world tour
From the Washington Post:
. . . We may be watching a sequel to the DMCA story today. An international copyright agreement, negotiated under unusual secrecy, could impose a further round of restrictions on our use of digital technology.
This Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, or ACTA, represents an attempt by the United States and other countries to set common rules for violations of intellectual-property laws. The United States hopes to use ACTA to export its laws, but in the process it might have to import others.