图片引自记者无国界组织
本篇报导大部分由Weiping Li、Mera Szendro Bok、James Losey、Sarah Myers研究、撰写与编辑。

近日，巴基斯坦反审查活动人士证明全球与地区协作可以让世界变得不同。

上个月，巴基斯坦政府公开向全球征集提案，用以自动过滤含有“令人反感”内容的域名地址。这一请求引发了一系列的抗议活动，其源头始于当地组织Bolo Bhi，进而迅速扩散到“现在获取”（Access Now）等国际组织。参与者向技术公司CEO发函，敦促他们放弃竞标；他们还启动了网上请愿活动，并已收集了上万个签名。全球网络倡议组织（GNI, Global Network Initiative）、电子前沿基金会（EFF, Electronic Frontier Foundation）、普罗字节（Bytes for All）、记者无国界（RSF, Reporter Without Borders）以及商业与人权资源中心（Business & Human Rights Resource Centre），都发布声明，敦促技术公司考虑这项提案对巴基斯坦公民人权的影响。

几家公司接受并采纳了这些组织的提议。在被倡议的家公司中，有五家承诺不会参与巴基斯坦政府的审查招标，它们是Websence、 Cisco（思科）、Verizon（威瑞森）、Sandvine和McAfee。但是在3月16日招标截止前，华为、Blue Coat、Netsweeper和中兴（ZTE）并没有回复倡议团体的请求。目前，据快捷论坛（Express Tribune）报导，巴基斯坦政府有可能收回这一审查计划。

针对更广泛的议题，巴基斯坦人权委员会表达了更多的忧虑，比如言论自由面临的挑战以及巴基斯坦政府审查媒体与互联网的计划：“在任何法条修改之前，政府必须咨询媒体、民间组织和普通民众。媒体应该更积极地对抗激进和不宽容的行为。但是我们遗憾地看到，滥用亵渎罪名以及官方对极端分子的漠然处之和息事宁人的态度，依旧毫无改观。”

网络审查

3月12日被定为世界反网络审查日，当天，记者无国界组织发布了《互联网的敌人》年度报告，指出若干国家在网络审查方面的做法臭名昭著。巴林、白俄罗斯、缅甸、中国、古巴、伊朗、北朝鲜、沙特阿拉伯、叙利亚、土库曼斯坦、乌兹别克斯坦和越南榜上有名。包括澳大利亚和法国在内的14个国家则被列为“实施监控的国家”，意为这些国家的公民正在面临日益严重的审查。

虽然记者无国界没有对“互联网的敌人”进行排序，但来自这一组织德国分支的马地亚斯·斯皮尔卡普（Mattias Spielkamp）在接受德国之声采访时谈到，中国和叙利亚可以“跻身前三名”。

在纪念日当天，一些组织和公司也发布了反审查声明，比如巴林人权中心和Google（谷歌）。

伊朗政府正在搭建国家互联网，旨在保护伊朗人民免受“有害”信息的侵袭。大赦国际最近发表了一篇简明报告，概述了伊朗政府如何收紧网络监管。

塔吉克政府要求本国的网络服务提供商屏蔽Facebook和四家新闻网站。据媒体报导，此次屏蔽源于这些网站刊登的批评该国政府的文章。

针对Facebook（脸书）和Google（谷歌）上异议内容的案件已经在印度开庭审理。

根据卡耐基梅陇大学（CMU）的一项研究，中国针对微博的审查机制相当灵活而机动。这项研究首次揭示了在新媒体平台上，审查机制是如何运作的。

微博母公司新浪估计，在3月16日官方截止日之前，60%的微博用户将完成实名注册。

PayPal（贝宝）之前宣布了一项新条款，对色情电子书的交易不予处理。但是这一决定引起了言论自由倡议团体的反对。面对实施审查的指责，PayPal最终让步，决定支持买卖含有色情内容的合法出版物。

迫害

阿联酋伊斯兰活动人士因通过Twitter呼吁政治改革而被政府指控，其罪名为煽动犯罪。他也在Twitter发布自己被捕的消息。

沙特阿拉伯记者哈马扎·卡什噶里（Hamza Kashgari）因在Twitter上发布有关先知莫哈默德的言论而被定罪，一度面临死刑，但有消息称他即将被释放。同样在沙特阿拉伯，三名新闻网站的经理被监禁，原因是报导呼吁改革的抗议活动， 。

网络监控

根据路透社报导，通过第三方的协助，伊朗政府依然可以获取监控公民的技术，即使这些产品在美国被限制出口。来自中国的中兴通讯已向伊朗最大的通讯公司出售了监控系统。这套系统的软件和硬件产品部分来自美国公司，比如Microsoft（微软）、HP（惠普）、Oracle（甲骨文）、Cisco（思科）、Dell（戴尔）、Juniper Networks（瞻博网络）和Symantec（赛门铁克）。伊朗领导人继续推进监控政策，要求成立新的监控部门，用以提高监控该国人民网络活动的能力。

紧跟阿尔巴尼亚、葡萄牙和西班牙，法国国民议会通过一项法律，计划换发新的身份证，并在其中存储生物计量信息。一些法国议会成员强烈反对这一新政，并将意见提交到法国宪法委员会，等待其做出最终决定，判断新政是否违宪。

据来自电子前沿基金会的伊娃·盖普林（Eva Galprin）报导，最近发现的恶意软件会监视用户的电脑活动，并将信息传送到位于叙利亚的IP地址。同时她也教给用户如何诊断自己的电脑是否感染，以及如何应对感染。

据报导，法国技术公司Amesys曾经为卡扎菲政府研发监控系统，最近已将网络拦截项目出售，但未公布买家。

网民活动

叙利亚公民记者被记者无国界组织授予2012年度大奖，赞赏他们报导叙利亚人民的斗争。

半岛电视台启动了名为“乌干达有话说”（Uganda Speaks）的网络平台，以帮助乌干达人民直接表达自己的看法，并参与有关“科尼2012”的讨论。《纽约时报》发现，观看“科尼2012”视频的次数日益增加，在四周内冲破了一亿人次，与此相关的Twitter讨论也持续发酵。

艾力克‧霍德（Alex Howard）以“凶杀警戒”（Homicide watch）网站为例，探讨新闻与资料之间的关系。“凶杀警戒”是个“资料新闻学”的计划，从原始表格起家，最后变成社区成员分享正在调查中的凶杀案件资讯平台。

美国康涅狄格州国会议员提议，对收费网络下载征收6.35%的消费税。

国家政策

电子前沿基金会警告，美国众议员迈克·罗杰斯（Mike Rogers）和众议员达奇·卢博斯伯格（Dutch Ruppersberger）提出的《2011网络信息共享与保护法案》（H.R. 3523），有可能让公司及政府以“网络安全”的名义，绕过现有法律去监视用户通讯、过滤内容、甚至切断在线服务连接。

与此同时，美国白宫宣布修改出口控制，以改善伊朗的网络自由状况。为了“推进信息自由流向伊朗公民”，并考虑到美国对伊朗的制裁依然有效，美国财政部拟定了新的规定，阐明哪些软件和服务可以提供给伊朗，前提是必须免费。这一列表涵盖了在线聊天软件等通讯软件、Dropbox等网络云存储服务、火狐和谷歌Chrome等网络浏览器、文档阅读软件和接收新闻聚合RSS的软件。

泰国政府屏蔽了5000个网页，因为它们包含亵渎皇室的内容。

上周，德国汉堡法院判定热门的文件存储网站RapidShare必须过滤用户上载的文件。

隐私

Google要求移动设备用户必须打开cookies设置才能登录。

隐私倡议团体催促美国联邦交易委员会调查Google绕过Safari浏览器隐私设置的问题，因为Google发现了如何在用户关闭cookies之后，依然向他们发布广告。

英国一项网路安全缺失导致八千多个学生的邮件地址外洩。此事件的主因是“英国学生财务”机构职员犯错而寄出大量邮件。

一份简述Facebook最新隐私条款的报告指出，为了保证用户数据及时更新，Facebook禁止用户使用假名或者申请多个帐户，同时允许用户赋予应用提供者权限，以获取其好友的数据。

欧盟委员会副主席维维安·雷登（Viviane Reding）指出，因为美国奥巴马政府监督网络服务提供商和内容提供商如何处置用户的私人数据，从而以更强硬的治理手段更好地保护了消费者。

求职者汇报，在他们求职的过程中，有意雇用他们的公司会向其索取Facebook私人帐号的密码。

奥巴马政府一边推动隐私政策改革以保护网络用户，一边为选举活动花费数百万美元，利用搜集来的私人数据挖掘潜在支持者。隐私倡议团体认为这不啻于一种信息窥探（digital snooping），同时对奥巴马为了争取连任而要求Google和Facebook修改隐私政策感到失望。

网络治理

国际电信联盟（ITU, International Telecommunications Union）从前并未针对网络治理拟定过任何条约，但是最近计划召开成员会议，讨论是否应该涉及此类条款。美国民主与技术中心警告说，自上而下的监管方式会让全球民间团体在讨论网络治理时无法发声。该组织研究员辛西娅·黄（Cynthia Wong）发布分析报告，指出ITU需要实施更好的机制，以保证民间团体更多地参与即将展开的讨论，从而有机会针对互联网治理事宜发表自己的见解。

欧洲理事会通过《互联网治理战略》，为人权事宜制定讨论框架。《战略》的既定目标包括：保护互联网通用及公开，保护互联网用户的自由，促进数据保护。《战略》也选择了若干合作伙伴：国际治理论坛（International Governance Forum），互联网名称与数字地址分配机构（ICANN, Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers），以及全球网络倡议（GNI, Global Network Initiative）。

互联网名称与数字地址分配机构（ICANN）发布公告，说明域名查封及撤销方针。这篇文章仔细阐明了域名注册的过程，也概述了如何请求域名信息和放弃域名。

版权

在美国唱片工业协会（RIAA, Recording Industry Association of America）的要求下，从7月12日开始，美国的互联网服务提供商开始监控网络数据传输， 并对警告六次仍违反者，予以不同程度的惩罚，小至警告和教育，大至关闭服务。电子前沿基金会EFF对此协议有所顾虑，因为其中并未制定处理相关问题的程序和时间表，也没有对误判的用户提供任何保护。

新西兰高等法院宣布，对Kim Dotcom和MegaUplods的财产没收行为无效，从而让这两家网站的拥有者看到了退还财产的希望。但是，还不清楚美国主管部门会如何应对，此案例对于文件存储服务商的前景仍值得关注。另外，德国法院要求RapidShare对用户上传的各类文件加强监管。

印度法院强制国内的互联网服务提供商屏蔽104家网站，因为它们提供盗版音乐。Torrent Freak报导，屏蔽措施包括过滤域名和IP地址，最终也有可能探查网络包（Packet）内部的数据。

Pinterest允许用户强调其感兴趣的媒体内容，例如产品照片，因此引来一些人的版权顾虑。但该网站辩称，版权拥有者看得到这些转载能够推动其网络流量，所以Pinterest应该受到《数字前年版权法案》中“安全港湾”（Safe Harbors）条款的保护，因此Pinterest没有违反任何版权规定。

在巴西，某表演权益组织曾试图从博客那里收取费用，但遭到强烈反对，因此最终承认这是个“错误”。在德国，互联网界正在抗议一份类似的法律草案，其目的是要求网站向媒体公司支付内容费用。

《反伪造贸易协定》（ACTA, Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement）因为过于宽泛地管制了知识产权，已经在全球各地引发了大规模的反对活动，如今正面临欧盟委员会的坚决抵制。据Techdirt报导，这一协定可能再也凑不齐足够的赞成票。

在波兰成功抵制ACTA的现代波兰基金会（Modern Poland Foundation）宣布，通过举办“未来版权”大赛来激发适用于数字版权的想法和意见。

网络安全

黑客萨布（Sabu），原名Hector Xavier Monsegur，曾经是黑客组织Lulzsec的成员，后晋身为FBI情报员。最近有消息称，他曾参与1990年代的多起计算机攻击事件。路透社报导，官方已经开始关注黑客活动人士这一群体。

基于Ubuntu开发的最新Linux操作系统“匿名”（Anonymous-OS）已经发布。这一版本集成的“研究工具”可以用来攻击网站，因此有人猜测这套系统也可能包含恶意软件。

公司

摩斯拉（Mozilla）公司CEO加里·科瓦奇（Gary Kovacs）在一次会议中建议，懂得使用互联网是每个政府职员的基本技能。

中国最大的两家视频网站优酷和土豆 ，已经签署合并协议，标志着中国网络并购的趋势仍在继续。

在SXSW（西南偏南）大会上，《连线》杂志发现，由营销公司“BBH实验室”赞助的的“流浪者无线热点网络”（Homeless Hotspot）存在若干问题，并对其进行了说明。

雅虎指控Facebook滥用其专利，它们是雅虎赖以生存的“商业基石”，包括广告、隐私、社交网络、即时通讯和个性化网页。

Google在为新技术申请专利，这项技术可以根据手机用户周围的背景噪音，来选择显示的广告，

最近上线的阿拉伯Twitter受到了阿拉伯民众的欢迎，因为这个平台让当地人用阿拉伯语更方便地交流。

酷玩意儿

WordPress针对iOS研发的新应用Camera+，可以让用户把图片从手机直接上载到博客。

据《电脑世界》杂志（PC World）报导，美国城市圣何塞计划在市中心铺满免费wifi无线网。为了凑齐铺设网络的费用，圣何塞将协助当地政府在市中心的工作，并鼓励小型企业在此地发展。

在海盗湾（Pirate Bay)负责人被最终定罪，以及MegaUpload负责人被逮捕之后，文件共享服务的境况正发生巨大的转变，以致用户不得不寻求更分散更匿名的方式来存储文件——Torrent Freak认为，RetroShare是经得起时间考验的客户端软件。跟darknets一样，海盗湾也在探索发射具有GPS导航系统的低轨道遥控飞船，并在其上搭载分布式服务器系统。位于伦敦的某智囊团已经测试了这项技术。

创作公用许可证（Creative Commons Licenses）正在与具有资质的大学和技工学校寻求合作，希望它们向全世界的学生提供有正式学分的免费课程。

来自弗吉尼亚共和党的众议院多数党领导人埃里·克康托（Eric Cantor）正在Facebook上推广一个新平台，“公民共保”（Citizen Cosponsor）。通过这个平台，用户可以公开支持某项法案，并且定期收到关于此法案的最新消息。

出版与研究

• Petros Losifidis: Mapping Digital media: Digital Television, the Public Interest, and European Regulation
• Lee Rainie and Aaron Smith: Social Networking Sites and Politics
• Scott J. Shackelford: In Search of Cyber Peace: A Response to the Cybersecurity Act of 2012
• James Curran: Why Has Internet Changed So Little?
• A new study about mobile penetration in China found that the country’s rural population drove an annual 8 percent increase in mobile-only Web usage, which accounted for 38 percent of China’s Internet users in 2011.
• A report from the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications (BEREC) revealed that blocking VoIP and Peer to Peer traffic were two of the most common methods for the Internet Service Providers in Europe to manage Internet traffic.

RSF.org

Most of this report was researched, written, and edited by Weiping Li, Mera Szendro Bok, James Losey, and Sarah Myers.

Pakistan’s anti-censorship activists recently proved how coordinated, global and local action can make a real difference.

Last month, Pakistan’s government publicly solicited proposals from companies around the world to create an automatic URL filtering system to block “objectionable” content. The request triggered a wave of protests which began with the local group Bolo Bhi and spread quickly to international groups like Access Now who wrote letters to tech companies’ CEOs urging them not to bid on the project, and launched online petitions which gathered tens of thousands of signatures. The Global Network Initiative (GNI), Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Bytes for All, Reporters Without Borders (RSF), Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, all issued statements urging technology companies to consider the impact of the tender on the human rights of citizens in Pakistan.

Their message was received and absorbed at least by some. Five of the eight companies petitioned, including Websense, Cisco, Verizon, Sandvine and McAfee, have declined join the Pakistan government’s censorship attempt. On the other hand, Huawei, Blue Coat, Netsweeper, and ZTE did not respond to calls from the advocacy groups before the deadline of the proposal on March 16. Now the Express Tribune has reported that as a result of the protests, the Pakistani government may step back from its censorship plans.

More broadly, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has voiced its concern over challenges to freedom of expression and the Pakistani government’s plans to censor the media and the Internet. It “demands the media, civil society and the people in general must be consulted before any changes are considered in the law. The media should do more to counter radicalisation and intolerance. It regrets that the misuse of blasphemy laws and the official apathy and appeasement of extremists have continued.”

More censorship news

March 12, marked the World Day Against Cyber Censorship, and the publication of the annual “Enemies of the Internet” report by Reporters Without Borders (RSF). According to the list, Bahrain, Belarus, Burma, China, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Vietnam were named as the worst offenders in online censorship, while other 14 countries, including Australia and France, are “countries under surveillance”, which means that the citizens of these countries are also facing increased censorship.

Although RSF does not rank the countries listed as the “Enemies of the Internet”, Matthias Spielkamp from the German branch of Reporters Without Borders pointed out in an interview by Deutsche Welle that China and Syria “would be candidates for a top 3”.

Some organizations and companies such as The Bahrain Center for Human Rights and Google also released statements against censorship in observance of the day.

The government of Iran is moving forward with plans to build a domestic Internet meant to shield the Iranian people from “harmful” content online. Amnesty International recently published a briefing paper outlining the tightened cyber control by Iranian government.

The Tajik government requested the country’s Internet Service Providers block Facebook and four news websites. According to media report, the blocking was the result of the publication of some sensitive articles which criticized the government.

Facebook and Google have begun their trial in India over the objectionable content on their websites.

According to a study conducted by Carnegie Mellon University, the Chinese censorship mechanism used on the popular microblog platform Weibo has been quite nimble and adaptive. The study outlines for the first time the ways in which the censorship system functions on this new media platform.

Sina Corp, the company which owns Weibo, estimated that 60% of its microblog users will complete the real-name registration process by the deadline of March 16.

PayPal announced a policy that it would not process transactions for ebooks which contain erotic content. However, the decision spurred a backlash from free speech advocacy groups. Facing the criticisms of conducting censorship, PayPal finally stepped back and allowed sale of legal fiction with erotic materials.

Thuggery

A UAE Islamic activist who advocates for political change over Twitter has been charged by the government with incitement, and tweeted about his being arrested.

Hamza Kashgari, the Saudi journalist who was facing the death penalty for his tweet about the Prophet Muhammad, is reported to be released soon. Also in Saudi Arabia, three managers of news websites have been held in prison for covering pro-reform protests.

Surveillance

According to Reuters, a document revealed that through a third party, Iran still can obtain equipment that allows the country to surveil its citizens, which is currently banned as an export by the United States (U.S.) government. The Chinese company ZTE Corp has sold surveillance systems to Iran’s largest telecoms firm. The surveillance system consists of hardware and software products from American companies such as Microsoft Corp, Hewlett-Packard Co, Oracle Corp, Cisco Systems Inc, Dell Inc, Juniper Networks Inc and Symantec Corp. Iranian leaders have pushed further to demand a new institution to police the Internet to increase the country’s capacity to surveil its peoples’ online activity.

Following the steps of Albania, Portugal and Spain, French National Assembly passed a law to launch a new ID card program by which the French people will be issued new ID cards with chips storing biometric information. French parliament members have expressed strong opposition to this new law and referred it to the French Constitutional Council. The Council will ultimately decide whether the new law would contradict the French Constitution.

Eva Galprin of the Electronic Frontier Foundation reported about new malware which monitors users’ computer activity and sends the information back to a Syrian IP address. Her article offers information on how to detect if your computer is infected and how to respond.

The French technology company Amesys, which developed the surveillance system for the toppled Gaddafi regime, has been reported to sell its Internet-interception business to a party which is still unknown to the public.  

Netizen activism

Syrian citizen journalists were awarded Reporters Without Borders’ Netizen 2012 Prize for shedding light on the struggle that millions of Syrians face.

Al Jazeera has launched an online platform “Uganda Speaks” to let Ugandans to speak up for themselves and offer feedback on the Kony 2012 controversy. The New York Times has analyzed the growing number of tweets and video views of the Kony 2012 video which has gained over 100 million viewers in four weeks.

Alex Howard explores the links between journalism and data in the case study of “Homicide Watch“, a data journalism project which started out as a spreadsheet and became an opportunity for community members to share info about open case homicides.

Connecticut’s lawmakers have proposed a bill which would have users pay a 6.35% sales tax on any digital downloads.

National policy

Advocates at EFF are concerned that “The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act of 2011 (H.R. 3523), introduced by Rep. Mike Rogers and Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger, allows companies or the government free rein to bypass existing laws in order to monitor communications, filter content, or potentially even shut down access to online services for “cybersecurity purposes.”

Meanwhile the White House announced export control changes to support Internet freedom in Iran. In an effort to “support the free flow of information to citizens of Iran,” the U.S. Treasury Department issued new guidelines regarding services and software that can be offered to Iranians under the current sanctions against Iran, provided they are offered free of charge. The list includes communications software for instant messaging, data storage services like Dropbox's cloud storage, browsers like Firefox and Google Chrome, document readers and RSS readers for news story feeds.

The Thai government has blocked 5,000 web pages that contain content deemed to insult the royal family.

A German court in Hamburg ruled last week that the popular file-hosting website, Rapidshare must filter files uploaded by users.

Privacy

Google requires cookies for log-ins from mobile devices.

Privacy advocates have pushed the FTC to investigate Google’s bypass of Safari privacy settings after discovering a special code which allowed ads to be served up to users after setting their browser to block cookies.

A security breach in England has compromised more than 8,000 student emails which were sent out by Student Finance England as part of a mass email distribution following a blunder by staff.

A round-up of Facebook’s new privacy rules points out bans on pseudonyms and multiple accounts, a requirement to keep your data up-to-date, and allows friends to give apps permission to access your data.

European Commissioner Vice President Viviane Reding has suggested that the Obama Administration take a stronger regulatory approach and protect consumers better by governing how ISPs and content providers handle personal data protection.

Job seekers are reporting that they have been asked by potential employers to share their personal Facebook password during the application process.

As the Obama Administration pushes for privacy reforms to protect their users the Obama reelection campaign is spending millions to gather and use personal data for the purposes of outreach to potential voters. Privacy advocates are calling this a form of digital snooping and are discouraged that President Obama’s reelection campaign is asking Google and Facebook to change their privacy policy.

Internet governance

The International Telecommunications Union (ITU), whose treaty does not include Internet governance, is planning a meeting of member nations to discuss whether it should. The Center for Democracy and Technology warns that the top-down regulatory approach would silence the voice of global civil society in Internet governance debates. Cynthia Wong of the Center for Democracy and Technology analyzes the great need for better mechanisms at the ITU so that civil society can get more involved in upcoming discussions the ITU plans to have on how the Internet will be regulated.

The Council of Europe passed their Internet Governance Strategy, a framework for discussing human rights for the Internet. The goals of the strategy include protecting the universality and openness of the Internet, protecting the freedoms of Internet users, and advancing data protection. The strategy also includes working with a range of partners, include the International Governance Forum, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and the Global Network Initiative.

ICANN released guidance on the seizure or takedown of domain names. The thought paper describes the process of registering domain names and outlines questions that should be prepared in the process of requesting information about a domain or seeking removal.

Copyright

Beginning July 12, Internet Service Providers in the United States will begin policing Internet traffic at the behest of the RIAA. The system will offer six strikes with penalties beginning with warnings and education and could result in termination of service. EFF cautions that the agreement lacks due process and does not offer protections to users who may be falsely accused.

A New Zealand High Court has declared that the seizure of of Kim Dotcom and Megaupload’s asset was null and void, creating the possibility that founder could see his property returned. However, it is yet to be seen how U.S. authorities and what impact this could have on other file lockers. Additionally, a German court ruled that rapidshare must do more to monitor the types of files uploaded by end-users.

In India a court has ordered ISPs to block access to 104 websites accused of offering pirated music. Torrent Freak reports that the enforcement will include DNS and IP filtering as well as deep packet inspection as a backup. Pinterest, a popular website where users can highlight interest in media such as photos of products address copyright concerns noting that the website is protected by safe harbors in the Digital Millenium Copyright Act and rights holders recognize the website’s value in driving traffic to other websites.

A Brazilian performance rights organization tried to collect fees from bloggers, but met fierce objection from users. The organization finally admitted its “error.” In Germany the Internet community is protesting a draft law that would similarly require websites to pay media firms for content.

ACTA, a trade agreement that has received significant backlash around the world for its overbroad approach to intellectual property enforcement, is facing significant resistance by the European Commission. Techdirt reports the agreement may no longer have sufficient votes.

The Modern Poland Foundation, an organization that has pushed back against ACTA in Poland, has announced the Future of Copyright contest in order to develop ideas for a copyright system for the digital world.

Cybersecurity

More details on the Lulzsec hacker turned FBI informant have emerged including claims that Hector Xavier Monsegur, commonly known as Sabu, has been involved in computer attacks since the late 1990s. Reuters reports that Sabu’s involvement with the authorities has created created concerns in the hacktivist community.

A new Linux distribution called Anonymous-OS, an operating system built on Ubuntu, was released. The build includes “research tools” that could be used to attack websites and raised concerns that the software could include malware.

Companies

Mozilla CEO Gary Kovacs suggested in a conference that understanding how to use the Internet is a basic skill for government staff.

Two of China’s most popular video sites, Youku and Tudou, have signed an agreement to merge, as China’s web consolidation continues.

Wired explores the “Homeless Hotspots” program at SXSW, funded by a marketing firm called BBH Labs, and describes some of its problems.

Yahoo! has filed a patent lawsuit against Facebook for what infringing on what Yahoo calls the “foundations of their business” which include patents Yahoo has on technologies for advertising, privacy, social networking, messaging and allowing users to customize their Web experience.

Google has filed a patent which will allow the company to serve up ads based on background noise that can be heard on the cell phone.

Arabic Twitter has launched and is welcomed by Arabs who want to communicate easier in Arabic through the platform.

Cool things

A new feature on the WordPress app on iOS will allow bloggers to upload photos directly from the Camera+ app to their blogs.

The city of San Jose is planning to offer free wifi access throughout its downtown area, according to PC World. The city will pay for the cost of the network by helping the government’s work in the downtown area and encouraging the growth of small businesses.

The file-sharing landscape is changing in response to the final Pirate Bay verdict and arrests in the MegaUpload case, pushing users to find more decentralized and anonymous sources – RetroShare is one such future-proof client, TorrentFreak says. In addition to darknets, the Pirate Bay is exploring creating a decentralized server system though low orbit GPS enabled drones, a project that has already been tested by a London based think tank.

Creative Commons licenses are enabling partnerships of accredited universities, colleges and polytechnics to provide free learning for students worldwide with opportunities to formal academic credit.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) is promoting a new Facebook platform called “Citizen Cosponsor” which allows users to show their support of a bill and receive periodic updates on its status.

Publications and studies

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