All posts by Thomas Beagle

Co-founder and spokesperson for Tech Liberty
article, filtering, privacy

Interview – Cyberdodge VPN service

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An interview with Ross from Cyberdodge, a supplier of VPN services that enables internet users to hide what they do on the internet.

What inspired you to offer the service?

People will always choose the easiest way to get the latest movies and TV shows and downloading off the internet is it. Unfortunately options are now limited to VPN tunnels not only for p2p but also for using an American IP address to get access to TV sites like www.hulu.com.

Are you getting many customers and what do they want it for?

Yes I am. VPN tunnels have a number of uses that include getting an American IP address to watch tv sites such as hulu.com, encrypt internet traffic when they are using a public WiFi point and of course hiding their real IP address.

How do you feel about the fact that some of your customers will probably be using your service to break NZ law?

No Comment.

What sort of information do you keep about your customers?

We only keep the email address.

What sort of information do you keep about your customers connections? (Such as when they connect, how long they connect for, anything they do through the service.)

We do not log what the user does or transfers over our network but we do log the time of connection and disconnection. We use this data to strategically deploy network resources. We also log the country the user is logging in from, this helps us to detect hijacked accounts and abuse. We do not log IP addresses.

Do you think your business has an obligation under the Telecommunications (Interception Capability) Act to allow the NZ police or other enforcement agencies to monitor traffic?

No, I am not a network operator. A network operator means a person who owns, controls, or operates a public telecommunications network or a person who supplies (whether by wholesale or retail) another person with the capability to provide a telecommunications service. CyberDodge does not provide anyone else with the capability to provide a service and CyberDodge is not a public telecommunications network. Public telecommunications network means a public switched telephone network and a public data network. CyberDodge is not a public switched telephone network nor a public data network. A public data network means a data network used, or intended for use, in whole or in part, by the public and includes, without limitation, the following facilities: Internet access and email access. CyberDodge requires that you have internet and email access already. This law applies to ISPs, which CyberDodge is not.

Do you think your business has an obligation under the Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Act to store customer IP addresses so that you can pass on notices?

No, I am not a IPAP. IPAP, or Internet protocol address provider, means a person that operates a business that, other than as an incidental feature of its main business activities, offers the transmission, routing, and providing of connections for digital online communications, between or among points specified by a user, of material of the user’s choosing and allocates IP addresses to its account holders and charges its account holders for its services and is not primarily operated to cater for transient users. CyberDodge does not offer the transmission nor providing of connections for digital online communications. CyberDodge only routes digital online communications. This law applies to ISPs and CyberDodge is not a ISP.

article, surveillance

Can you photograph or video the police in New Zealand?

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There has been a recent spate of people being arrested in the USA and UK for taking photos and video of the police at work. We also found anecdotal evidence of police in New Zealand exceeding their legal authority when it came to people taking photos and video of them:

“Taking photographs around Cuba Mall and a police officer approached and said ‘Would you like me to break that?’ indicating the camera. He was exceedingly hostile and it turned out it was because the officer thought he had been photographed by us.”

“Have to wonder why they confiscate cameras and tapes then. We were told we could pick the tapes up from the station… at which point any knowledge of the tapes was denied.”

The legal situation in New Zealand

Firstly, it is generally accepted that anyone can photograph or video anyone else as long as the subject wouldn’t have a reasonable expectation of privacy. There are a range of exceptions, but are the police one of them?

We wrote to both the Police Commissioner and the Minister of Police and asked them “Is it against the law in New Zealand to take photos of video of the police at work?”

The Police responded first: “No, not if the photos of video of police at work are taken in a public place, or with the landowner’s consent if on private property.”

Judith Collins, the Minister of Police, backed up the Police’s position in her response, going on to say that she saw no need to change the law and was not aware of any plans to do so.

Conclusion

It seems clear that in New Zealand the police can’t stop you from documenting what they are doing. They have no power to stop you, seize your camera or force you to delete images or video.

We believe that this is a good thing and is part of having a police force that is accountable to the people they serve. The police hold most of the cards when it comes to dealing with the public, and the prospect of being recorded should provide a brake on any temptation to abuse those powers.

However one concern remains. Police training does not cover this issue and it seems that some officers feel free to make up their own powers as they go. We recommend that the NZ Police should make sure that this is included in initial and continuing training.

Finally, we remind anyone taking photos of police at incidents to make sure that you do not get in their way or you could be arrested for obstruction.

article, copyright

Ministry of Economic Development says “ISPs” not liable for copyright infringement

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[This article has been corrected. Please see explanatory note at the end.]

Liability under the new copyright law

One of the issues that we and many others have with the new copyright law is that it unfairly penalises people for the actions of others. You’re either an IPAP (a very tight definition of ISP) or an account holder, and if you’re an account holder you’re liable for the actions of anyone using that internet account.

This means that hotels will be liable for the actions of their guests, universities for the actions of students, the person paying the bill will be liable for their flatmates, and you’d be better be careful about which of your guests you let use your internet while they visit your house.

Ministry of Economic Development advises differently

However, it seems that the Ministry of Economic Development has a different interpretation of the law. The owner of a homestay, concerned that as the account holder he would be liable for his guests, recently contacted the Ministry of Development.

The advice he received from the Ministry was that if he is providing internet services but does not meet the requirements to be an IPAP under section 122, then he must be an ISP and would be safe from liability according to section 92B.

Furthermore, if he received an infringement notice he just had to respond and say that he ran a homestay and that would be the end of it. As he observed, “What’s to stop anyone claiming that their house is a homestay?”

Our interpretation

We don’t find this interpretation particularly convincing (nor did we find it convincing when the NZCS made a very similar argument in their submission (PDF) to the MED).

The intent of the Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Act seems to be to catch everyone. If we accept the MED interpretation, the definition of ISP in the Copyright Act is so wide that anyone who shared their internet connection with another would thereby be able to claim immunity under it. The law would be fatally undermined.

While we think that this wouldn’t be a bad thing, as it would remove liability from account holders who shared their internet and thus avoid the problem of punishing people for the actions of others, it seems clear that this is not the intention of the law makers.

Ultimately this argument will be tested at the Copyright Tribunal and possibly in court, but for now we caution against relying on this advice from the Ministry of Economic Dvelopment. This means that you should assume that the account holder will be liable for any infringing file sharing performed over their internet connection.

[Correction: The article as originally posted said that the advice was from the Ministry of Justice. The MoJ contacted us to deny giving advice to anyone. We followed up with our original source and managed to establish that the advice was actually from the Ministry of Economic Development. We apologise for the error.]

article, copyright

Rights holders to develop centralised infringement notice system?

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An update on the enforcement provisions of the Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Act.

Where are the notices?

We’ve not received one notice in response to our request for copies of copyright infringement notices sent under the new law. From speaking to ISPs, it seems that very, very few notices have been received at all.

What are the rights holders doing?

Secondly, we heard some very interesting rumours about what the major rights holders organisations are doing. (Please note that this is rumour – but from a source that we trust.)

No one will be surprised to hear that the rights holders were very unhappy about the $25 per notice fee set in the regulations. NZFACT (NZ branch of the US MPAA) believes that they should be “just a matter of cents”.

Indeed, we’ve been told that they’re not going to be sending out any notices even though they heralded the law as a vital protection for their NZ$2.5 billion industry.

Instead they are talking to ISPs and offering to fund a centralised system for the management of the infringement notice process. This is obviously with the aim of making it much cheaper for the ISPs, so that they can go back to the Ministry of Economic Development to get the per notice fee reduced at the six-monthly review.

Some questions

This raises a number of questions:

  • How will the centralised notice system work?
  • Who will have access to the system and under what terms? Is it just for the major rights holders or will it be open to everyone?
  • It will be necessary for any system to have some account holder details included (for matching purposes) – who will have access to this information? Won’t this circumvent the law’s careful approach to maintaining account holder privacy?
  • And finally, what’s in it for the ISPs?

Contact us

If you know anything about this proposal we’d love to hear more.

article, copyright

Send us your copyright infringement notices!

September 1st is the start of the new copyright regime, where rights-holders can send infringment notices to people they accuse of infringing their copyright.

We would like copies of those notices. This will allow us to help monitor how the law is being used, including:

  • assessing the quality of the notices
  • finding out who is sending them and for what sort of works
  • help us detect anyone abusing the system

Please email your notices to notices@techliberty.org.nz. Feel free to include other information including whether you deny the allegation or not. We promise to keep your name and other identifying details private.

article, copyright

The Infringing File Sharing Act starts today

Welcome to the new world of the Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Act.

This is the law that:

  • Makes internet account holders liable for the actions of others, even when there is no reasonable expectation that they could control their behaviour.
  • Will make it very hard for anyone, including universities, libraries, motels and cafes, to offer internet access to their patrons as they can’t risk penalties of up to $15,000.
  • Can fine people for downloading material that isn’t even available for purchase in New Zealand.
  • Takes away the right to be assumed innocent until proven guilty, by assuming that complainants are telling the truth, leaving people having to prove that they didn’t do something.

While the law comes into effect on September 1st, notices can be sent for activity up to 21 days earlier. This means that you could get a notice for any activity from August 11th onwards – today.

What’s covered?

The law is meant to be aimed at people infringing copyright by downloading material without permission over peer to peer (P2P) file sharing – BitTorrent, eDonkey, etc. However it is written in such a way that it might be possible to use it for other forms of online infringement such as downloading from websites or watching streaming video. We’ll be testing that further from September 1st.

Who is at risk?

The person whose name is on the internet account. They’re liable for the actions of all people who use that internet account.

What can I do to protect myself?

If you’re the account holder, make sure you know what everyone who uses your internet is doing. Don’t let people use your account if you don’t trust them not to download infringing material via file-sharing.

More information

article, commentary, privacy

Customs testing body scanners

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New Zealand Customs have been trialling body scanners at Auckland Airport and are now working on plans to implement them.

Green Party MP Keith Locke says that using such equipment is illegal as they are banned by the Aviation Crimes Act.

with respect to a person searched under subsection (1), a member of the police, an aviation officer, a Customs officer, or an agent of the carrier authorised by the carrier for the purpose may not use an aid or device that produces an unclothed image of the person.

We also had concerns about both the desirability and legality of this body scanning technology and wrote to the Minister of Customs, Maurice Williamson, earlier this year expressing our concerns. He responded (PDF) that while it was illegal to use body scanners for the purposes of aviation security, it was allowed under the Customs and Excise Act 1996 for the purpose of searching for contraband.

However, Keith Locke responds that the language used when the Aviation Crimes Act was amended in 2007 very clearly showed that Parliament’s intention was to “…prevent any production of an unclothed image … there was no hint of any exception.”

Maurice Williamson says that he is not aware of any plans to further amend the Aviation Crimes Act.

article, conference, TPP

TPPA Forum – video of presentations

The TPP Forum held in Wellington a week ago was a great success with over 130 people turning up to find out more about the Trans Pacific Partnership free trade agreement and what it means for New Zealand.

The speeches have now been uploaded to YouTube.

Jane Kelsey put the TPP in an international and historical context and talked about the impact it would have on New Zealanders.

Thomas Beagle from Tech Liberty gave a presentation on how the TPP was an attempt to circumvent New Zealand’s democracy in the formation of law around intellectual property.

Des O’Day, lecturer in health economics from Otago University, gave some background on Pharmac, how it worked to save New Zealand money, and how it would be at risk from the TPP. Due to technical difficulties Des’s presentation was not videoed.

article, copyright

Recommended copyright regulations released

The Ministry of Economic Development has published the recommendations for regulations for the Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Act. Some interesting points:

  1. The cost of making a complaint will be $25 (rights-holders argued for $2, ISPs for higher). This is to be reviewed after 6 months. (Minister recommended $20, Cabinet raised it to $25.)
  2. The paper recognises that this fee will not allow for full cost-recovery by the IPAPs and will therefore push up internet costs for subscribers (point 25 on page 7).
  3. Rights-holders can appoint an agent to act on their behalf to send notices.
  4. Rights-holders must use any automated system provided by an IPAP (ISP) to receive notices.
  5. Complaints from rights-holders must be signed and include a statement that, to the best of their knowledge, the information given is correct. Whether this will be enough to limit false accusations is unknown.
  6. Complaints must include the name of the work, the protocol being used and the NZ time/date.
  7. Notices passed on to account holders must include all of the information submitted by the rights-holder. (This is important to give people a chance to defend themselves.)
  8. Rights-holders will pay $200 to take a complaint to the Copyright Tribunal.
  9. The Copyright Tribunal has discretion to set penalties up to $15k as it sees fit, based on the cost of the material and any aggravating factors.
article, copyright

What you need to know about the new copyright law

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Parliament has passed the Copyright (Infringing File Sharing) Act.

Here’s 10 things that you need to know about it:

  1. What: Infringing file sharing is the act of downloading or uploading copyrighted content without permission. This can apply to any content, e.g. movies, TV shows, music, pictures, books, games or software.
  2. When. The new law comes into effect from September 1st 2011. You can receive a notice for infringing file sharing that took place from any time from August 10th (21 days before Sept 1st). Mobile phones are excluded until 30 September 2013.
  3. Who. The account holder (the person who pays for the internet conection) is the one who is legally responsible for any infringing file sharing occurring over that connection. You are not legally liable if you use someone else’s internet connection, although they won’t be very happy about it and may be able to come after you.
  4. Getting caught. You are most likely to get caught if you use peer-to-peer file-sharing software (e.g. BitTorrent, emule, etc). This is because peer to peer works by you sharing the file with a whole lot of other people – if one of them works for the copyright-holders they can get enough information to make a complaint.
  5. Not getting caught. You are not likely to get caught if you copy files from friends, download from file-sharing websites (that don’t use torrent software), or watch videos on YouTube or similar sites.
  6. Notices. If caught infringing, you will initially receive a Detection Notice, followed by a Warning Notice, then an Enforcement Notice. There must be at least three weeks between notices. (Each copyright-holder making complaints will follow the same progression – you could have a Warning Notice from one and a Detection Notice from another).
  7. Challenging notices. You can respond with a challenge to any notice. The copyright-holder gets to decide whether your challenge will be accepted or not. There are no agreed grounds for challenges yet.
  8. Personal details. The copyright-holder will not be given your name, address and other contact details. All communication is handled by your internet provider.
  9. Copyright Tribunal. Once you have received an Enforcement Notice the matter will go to the Copyright Tribunal. They can levy of a penalty of up to $15,000 that has to be paid to the copyright-holder. They will normally make decisions based on written submissions, but either party can request a hearing. Lawyers are not allowed at the hearing.
  10. Account suspension. The provision in the law allowing for an internet account to be cut-off is currently suspended.