Do you read the License?

Open Content Movement Finds a Poster Child From MTV
In early March, the District Court of Amsterdam ruled that Dutch gossip magazine Weekend infringed the copyright in four photos which were posted on photography website flickr. Adam Curry, who, among other things, is a former MTV "video jockey," had posted the photos under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license, which allows photos to be used freely (with attribution) for non-commercial purposes, but not for commercial purposes (such as the use by Weekend). Weekend defended Curry's action by arguing that it was misled by the notice "This photo is public" that was posted with the photos, and therefore did not click on the Creative Commons "CC" symbol accompanying a "some rights reserved" notice (also posted with the photos), which led to a summary of the terms of the license. The court rejected this argument, stating that "it may be expected from a professional party like [the publisher of Weekend] that it conduct a thorough and precise examination before publishing in Weekend photos originating from the internet." The Curry decision thus holds (at least under Dutch law) that not only are Creative Commons licenses valid, but more suprisingly that publishers are under a duty to understand and investigate such licenses even in the face of a confusing statement like "This photo is public."

Source: Steptoe & Johnson LLP. Steptoe & Johnson LLP

The first move in the direction of web accessibility standards

Separating coders from cowboys with PAS 78

A guide published earlier this month about how to commission accessible websites will transform web accessibility in the UK, according to Chris Rourke of User Vision. The firm is also seeking your views in a short online survey.

P2P Crackdown - soon in South Africa?

Crackdown on corporate P2P users in Britain - Is your company addressing this risk?!

The Federation Against Software Theft is about to take action against a number of companies in the UK that have been caught making illegal copies of software available for download from their networks – which may come as a complete surprise to the companies.

IMPORTANT - Cryptography Regulations

As of Friday 10 March 2006, providers of cryptography products or services will have to register at the Department of Communications certain information before they can provide cryptography services and/or cryptography products.

It is important to know that failure to register could lead to fine or up to two years imprisonment.

If you are unclear whether you are a cryptography service / product provider - here are the definitions as per the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act 2002:

This is according to the cryptography regulations published in the government gazette on 10 March in terms of the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act of 2002 (ECT Act):
"cryptography provider" means any person who provides or who proposes to provide cryptography services or products in the Republic.

"cryptography service" means any service which is provided to a sender or a recipient of a data message or to anyone storing a data message, and which is designed to facilitate the use of cryptographic techniques for the purpose of ensuring
a) that such data or data message can be accessed or can be put into an intelligible form only by certain persons;
b) that the authenticity or integrity of such data or data message is capable of being ascertained;
c) the integrity of the data or data message; or
d) that the source of the data or data message can be correctly ascertained.

"cryptography product" means any product that makes use of cryptographic techniques and is used by a sender or recipient of data messages for the purposes of ensuring-
a) that such data can be accessed only by relevant persons;
b) the authenticity of the data;
c) the integrity of the data; or
d) that the source of the data can be correctly ascertained;

Contact van Gaalen Attorneys today to find out about their special offer to register you / your organisation as a Cryptography Service- / Product provider

Tel: 011 782 9511/2
Fax: 086 631 8898
email: info@vangaalenlaw.co.za (heading - cryptography special offer)

Security 'not a problem' for IT managers

The top two IT-related problems facing companies today are operational incidents and staffing issues, according to a study commissioned by the IT Governance Institute (ITGI).

Communications bill ushers in demise of Telkom’s monopoly

COMPETITION in the telecoms industry will get a major boost from the Electronic Communications Bill now awaiting presidential approval, the chairman of Parliament’s communications portfolio committee believes.

No TV licence fees for IPTV

Those planning to receive TV on their mobile devices or PCs using broadband technology will not have to pay a TV licence fee for this.

OSS: The alternative in digital forensics?

Open source software (OSS) tools can be credible and reliable in digital forensics, says Cobus Venter, senior researcher at The Cyber Security Science Centre, a division of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR).