All, An FYI: EDRI-gram biweekly newsletter about digital civil rights in Europe Number 6.12, 18 June 2008 ============================================================ Contents ============================================================ 1. EU Competition Commissioner backs open standards in eGovernment 2. France obtained ISPs support in blocking pedopornographic sites 3. UK MPs report: A Surveillance Society? 4. Italian blog closed by Police 5. OOXML standard on hold by ISO 6. British ISPs warn Internet downloaders on the risk of being prosecuted 7. Recommended Action 8. Agenda 9. About ============================================================ 1. EU Competition Commissioner backs open standards in eGovernment ============================================================ The EU Competition Commissioner, Neelie Kroes, publicly supported the use of open source software in eGovernment, in a public speech at a seminar hosted by OpenForum Europe in Brussels on 10 June 2008. Kroes encouraged the public institutions to use open standards, underlining the positive example of Munich that have implemented open standards in their local eGovernment projects. She suggested a much more active role of the European Commission in promoting open standards in eGovernment applications, by adopting an internal policy not to buy proprietary software: "The Commission must do its part. It must not rely on one vendor, it must not accept closed standards and it must refuse to become locked into a particular technology." The EU Commissioner's speech shows an indirect support to the Open Parliament petition initiated in March 2008 by OpenForum Europe, The European Software Market Association and the Free Software Foundation Europe asking the European Parliament to change its ICT system in order to allow the adoption of open standards. Also Kroes praised the benefits of open standards: "No citizen or company should be forced or encouraged to choose a closed technology over an open one, through a government having made that choice first." She also encouraged the business customers to make a difference by promoting open standards: "I know a smart business decision when I see one. Choosing open standards is a very smart business decision indeed." Kroes mentioned a number of competition cases in ICT that are investigated by the Commission in relation with ICT standards, giving as examples Apple, the mobile phone company Qualcomm and chip maker Rambus. Also she clearly referred to Microsoft when she mentioned the problems with the well- known fines against the US software producer: "The Commission has never before had to issue two periodic penalty payments in a competition case." Some MEPs wanted to go further and asked the European Commission if Microsoft could not be banned from the European public procurements, since it has been fined by the Commission. Heide Rühle, internal market policy spokeswoman for the Greens in the European Parliament, explained that there were provisions of the public procurement EU Directive that allow the exclusion of applicants from public procurement procedures if "they have been convicted of an offence concerning their professional conduct by a judgement which has the force of res judicata or they have been guilty of grave professional misconduct proven by any means which the contracting authority can justify". But the European Commission rejected these arguments in its answer explaining that, according to the directiv, the exclusion was not obligatory. EC claimed that the fine did not count as an "criminal conviction of a criminal offence by a final judgement from a Court". Also the second provision should "require a case-by-case assessment which can only be done in the framework of an on-going procurement procedure." Kroes calls for open standards in eGovernment (10.06.2008) http://www.euractiv.com/en/infosociety/kroes-calls-open-standards-egovernmen... EU's Kroes: open standards are smart business move (10.06.2008) http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUSL0935274720080610 European Commission won't exclude Microsoft from procurement procedures (13.06.2008) http://www.heise-online.co.uk/news/European-Commission-won-t-exclude-Microso... Written Question: Microsoft - Implementation of Article 93 of the Financial Regulation (21.04.2008) http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?pubRef=-//EP//TEXT+WQ+E-2008-2... EDRi-gram: European Parliament criticized for not using open standards (12.03.2008) http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number6.5/ep-open-standards ============================================================ 5. OOXML standard on hold by ISO ============================================================ International Standards Organisation (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) in Geneva have postponed the publication of the revised specification of Microsoft's Office Open XML (OOXML) document format, following complaints filed by their member organizations representing these four countries: Brazil, India, South Africa and Venezuela. The planned standard ISO/IEC DIS 29500 cannot be published until the complaints are examined by ISO and IEC who will have to give responses and comments by the end of June 2008 The four national standardization organizations have shown concerns that no consensus has been reached on changes that must be made to the 6000-page specification, during the consultation period on the numerous comments submitted at the end of February. The complaints mainly address the fact that the concrete technical objections were not individually discussed. The concerns are summarized in an open letter of a member of the technical standardisation committee in India who stated that the standard had not been properly thought out and it was not even clear what standard would result from the proceedings. The adoption of the standard in the present state would not be an open process as it would be implemented only by Microsoft. Other protests have been filed to ISO by the Danish Open Source Business Association. They claim that "the procedures and the decision conflict with ISO's rules, and the process has caused considerable damage to the reputations of Danish Standards and ISO." The letter also explains why the case should be picked up by ISO: "The process has thus been formally annulled now for two months - since March 29, at which time the specifications should have been sent to the national standardization organizations. The prerequisites for the fast-track procedure no longer exist, and, therefore, I expect that ISO recommence the case." The European Commission is also investigating the case. Competition Commissioner Kroes explained in a recent conference why the European Commission is interested in this topic: "If voting in the standard- setting context is influenced less by the technical merits of the technology but rather by side agreements, inducements, package deals, reciprocal agreements or commercial pressure, then these risk falling foul of the competition rules." In the meantime, The Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS), has invited interested parties to create a new technical committee for the "implementation, interoperability, and conformity" of the next version of the Open Document Format (ODF) which has already been certified by the ISO. Open source supporters draw the attention on a possible new alliance with Microsoft which announced its intention to support ODF and to join the technical OASIS committee in its works on the open standard. The management boards of ISO and IEC will decide, after having examined the complaints against Microsoft standard, whether the appeals should be further processed and if they decide so, the chairmen of the two boards will establish a conciliation panel that will try to resolve the appeals. ISO puts standard for Microsoft's OOXML document formats on hold (10.06.2008) http://www.heise-online.co.uk/news/ISO-puts-standard-for-Microsoft-s-OOXML-d... Four national standards bodies appeal against approval of ISO/IEC DIS 29500 (6.06.2008) http://www.iso.org/iso/pressrelease.htm?refid=Ref1136 Now an OOXML Protest from Denmark's OSL - Updated 3Xs: Official English Translation (31.05.2008) http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20080531134006167 OASIS opens discussion list for ODF Implementation, Interoperability and Conformance (3.06.2008) http://opendocument.xml.org/news/oasis-opens-discussion-list-for-odf-impleme... Microsoft will support Open Document Format (ODF) (22.05.2008) http://www.heise-online.co.uk/news/Microsoft-will-support-Open-Document-Form... EDRi-gram: OOXML adopted as a new standard by ISO (9.04.2008) http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number6.7/ooxml-adopted-iso SNIP EDRI-gram is a biweekly newsletter about digital civil rights in Europe. Currently EDRI has 28 members based or with offices in 17 different countries in Europe. 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