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Internet Corporate Responsibility in Hong Kong Charles Mok Chairman, Internet Society Hong Kong December 18, 2007

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Possible Issues of internet companies’ corporate responsibility <ul><li>“ Users’ rights” </li></ul><ul><li>Consumer rights: price, quality etc. </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Steep rise in number of complaints </li></ul></ul><ul><li>Access </li></ul><ul><li>Openness </li></ul><ul><li>Security </li></ul><ul><li>Privacy </li></ul><ul><li>Copyright </li></ul><ul><li>Content censorship/self-censorship </li></ul><ul><li>Freedom of expression </li></ul><ul><li>Child protection? </li></ul><ul><li>Training and education </li></ul>

3.
ISPs’ Roles in Internet regulation <ul><li>Self regulation and act on complaint </li></ul><ul><ul><li>No active monitoring </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>E.g. HKISPA/TELA on obscene and indecent materials (1997), HKISPA/OFTA anti-spam self-regulation (1998) </li></ul></ul><ul><li>Generally, no Internet specific legislation or regulations </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Impossible to “keep up with technology” </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>Legislation should be technology neutral </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>Very different from the situation in China </li></ul></ul><ul><li>Anti-spam legislation </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Ordinance on Unsolicited Electronic Messages </li></ul></ul><ul><li>Customer privacy </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance </li></ul></ul>

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Case: IFPI vs. BT uploaders <ul><li>IFPI demand for HKISPA (1998) </li></ul><ul><li>Oct 2005: 古惑天皇 (Chan Nai-Ming) </li></ul><ul><ul><li>First successful case of criminal prosecution against illegal BT (bit torrent) download </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>Why did Hong Kong make “the first”? </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>Why was there no further criminal prosecution? </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>Government intervention to set a precedence for future civil cases? </li></ul></ul><ul><li>Mar 2006: IFPI takes four ISPs (PCCW/Netvigator, i-Cable, HGC, HK Broadband) to court to obtain user information </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Court complied </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>Subsequently all cases settled out of court and no civil litigation materialized </li></ul></ul>

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Case: IFPI vs. BT uploaders <ul><li>How it works </li></ul><ul><ul><li>IFPI (and later also the movie industry) and their technical consultants would conduct random and targeted checks online for alleged illegal activities, and record the alleged offenders’ “IP address” and clock the time of the offense </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>The copyright owner would be able to locate where (which ISP) the offender comes from with the IP address, and would provide the IP address and the time for the ISP to check the log of its login record, to see which user was dynamically allocated that IP address at the time of the offense </li></ul></ul>

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Case: IFPI vs. BT uploaders <ul><li>Concern 1: Privacy concern over the copyright owners’ secret surveillance </li></ul><ul><ul><li>More transparency on the methodology, scope of the surveillance, and about how the data collected is handled </li></ul></ul><ul><li>Concern 2: Technical accuracy of the copyright owners’ secret surveillance </li></ul><ul><ul><li>It was alleged that some of the IP address/time being complained produced no match – no one was using that IP address at that time </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>Poor to no synchronization of time clock on the part of the “secret police”  doubt on of technical data provided to court </li></ul></ul>

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Case: IFPI vs. BT uploaders <ul><li>Concern 3: Lack of defense effort from ISPs to protect user privacy </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Presume innocence </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>ISPs did not dispute the technical accuracy of the copyright owners’ surveillance methodology </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>Why did ISPs not defend their customers? </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><ul><li>Convenience – just want legal backup to release user data, and then hands off and shift liability </li></ul></ul></ul><ul><ul><ul><li>Most major ISPs now are also large telecom operators and also content providers, e.g. broadband TV – hence, close relations with the copyright owners </li></ul></ul></ul><ul><li>Concern 4: What is the copyright owners doing with the personal data received from the ISPs? </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Are there any cases found to be lacking evidence or a plain mistake? </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>Most/all cases settled out of court so far – scare tactic by threatening civil suits </li></ul></ul>

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Case: IFPI vs. BT uploaders <ul><li>Concern 5: Who can protect user privacy in Hong Kong, if ISPs are not taking this up? </li></ul><ul><ul><li>No organizations like EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) in the US to take class action suits on ISPs and even government to stop possible infringement of Internet user privacy </li></ul></ul><ul><li>Comments: </li></ul><ul><ul><li>More transparency from copyright owners by engaging the technical and user communities to verify and monitor their surveillance for least intrusion and better technical accuracy </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>More balanced view on copyright matters by Government and the community </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><ul><li>Promote copyleft, e.g. Creative Commons </li></ul></ul></ul>

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Who is there to protect users’ rights? <ul><li>Lack of awareness among Internet companies (ISPs and other service providers) and even lawmakers and government on cyber-rights issues </li></ul><ul><li>Lack community and civil society organization and advocacy groups targeting these issues: </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Web 2.0 – growing community of bloggers and other content creators </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>How to get them organized? </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>If users don’t care about rights, companies will not see the need for corporate responsibilities </li></ul></ul>

10.
Who is there to protect users’ rights? <ul><li>Squeezed by foreign/international copyright owners/companies </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Possible stricter legislation on digital copyright (e.g. criminalizing illegal downloading of copyrighted materials) </li></ul></ul><ul><li>PCO judgment on the Yahoo!/Shi Tao case </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Email address is not ruled to constitute personal data </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>Avoid stepping into China’s jurisdiction? </li></ul></ul><ul><li>Content regulation </li></ul><ul><ul><li>Generally no active monitoring by government or ISPs </li></ul></ul><ul><ul><li>No Internet-specific legislation: only COIAO, and other applicable laws </li></ul></ul><ul><li>Concerns over “aggressive police enforcement” </li></ul><ul><ul><li>“ Hyperlink case”: selective enforcement for testing “limits of existing law” </li></ul></ul>

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Contacts <ul><li>Charles Mok </li></ul><ul><li>[email_address] </li></ul><ul><li>www.isoc.hk </li></ul><ul><li>charlesmok.blogspot.com </li></ul>