I sent the following comments to the secretariat.
Nobuo Sakiyama <sakichan@sakichan.org>
------------------------------------
Proposals for Changing The Tokyo Declaration for WSIS ver.2.1
Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility
Proposal 1:
To add the following paragraph to the end of "1. Shared Vision of the
Information Society":
It is essential for this region to share the vision of the
information society written above with democratic and inclusive
political process. ICT can be used to promote and to empower
democracy, and design decision of the information society should be
made through the democratic process.
Reason for Proposal 1:
In this section, "autonomous decision making" is written, but that is
"some decision in the society". Decision how the information society
will be is also important. The term "democracy" may be used as a type
of a political regime, but Article 24 and 25 of United Nation's
Millennium Declaration explicitly promote democracy, so "democracy"
should be acceptable for the Tokyo Declaration.
Proposal 2:
To add the following paragraph to the end of the first paragraph of
"(1) Platform for ICT development" in Section 3:
Developing intellectual commons is also crucial. Therefore, the
concept of fair use should be preserved, and intellectual property
rights should have limited duration and scope. Control over the
usage of intellectual property by the holder also should be
restricted.
Reason for Proposal 2:
Most innovation utilizes many prior arts or intellectual outcome as
its source, most of which are in the commons and can be used freely.
If intellectual property rights are too augmented, growth of commons
cannot catch up the state of the art, so ICT development will be
slowed down. More detailed and precise discussion is in the book,
"the future of ideas", written by Lawrence Lessig.
Proposal 3:
To add the following paragraph to the end of the second paragraph of
"b) Preserving linguistic and cultural diversity" in "(2) Priority
areas for action" in Section 3:
Linguistic and cultural diversity also comes from the innovation
which is created and inspired by the mixture of the existing culture
and imported one. That is the source of Asian dynamism. It is also
noted that existence of subculture and counterculture enriches
culture diversity and innovation. Therefore, free flow of
information and communication in broadband network should be
preserved.
Reason for Proposal 3:
In this section, traditional value of indigenous communities is
overemphasized. Living culture needs people who live in it, so
emphasis of traditional value easily leads to censorship and content
blocking. Many governments in Asia like such rhetoric. For example,
Japanimation is now a great outcome of popular culture in Japan, but
that was blamed as "harmful" for several decades. We should balance
the existing culture with new one, because multiple sources of
authority is crucial for democracy and innovation.
Proposal 4:
To change the first sentence of "c) Developing human resources" in
"(2) Priority areas for action" in Section 3 as follows:
For people to make the most of the information society, they must
have the appropriate levels of literacy, ICT skills, and knowledge
of what influence ICT has on the society.
Reason for Proposal 4:
This is related to Proposal 1. Sometimes each ICT has social or
political implication, so decision to adopt which ICT leads to the
different social results. It is important for people to understand the
social effects of ICT and to have a power of autonomous decision
making. Such a power may be included in ICT skills, but actually
ordinary people won't think so, thus it should be separately written.
Proposal 5:
To change the last sentence of "d) Establishing legal, regulatory and
policy frameworks" in "(2) Priority areas for action" in Section 3 as
follows:
Moreover, because the information society is, by nature, a global
phenomenon, issues such as the protection of privacy, consumer
confidence, management of domain names, facilitation of e-commerce,
freedom of expression, protection of online anonymity, political
rights, effective participation of civil society and individuals in
the global decision making, balance between intellectual property
rights and the needs of the users for information, and open source
solutions need to be addressed at an international level in
consultation with all relevant parties.
Reason for Proposal 5:
Anonymous speech is crucial for freedom of expression, but many people
try to exclude it from free speech. So protection of anonymity should
be separately written. Political rights should be added to have
respect for United Nation's Millennium Declaration.
Proposal 6:
To change the last sentence of "e) Building confidence in the security
of ICT" in "(2) Priority areas for action" in Section 3 as follows:
In regard to the security of information systems and networks, all
entities concerned with Info-communications issues should be aware
of its importance and take the necessary steps to enhance security,
user confidence and other aspects of system/network integrity that
could be seriously endangered by only one vulnerable link.
Effective security for these issues is not only a matter of
technology, but also a matter of education and training. To this
end, a "culture of security" needs to be established by the effort
of all participants. At the same time, the security of information
systems and networks should be compatible with essential democratic
values including the freedom to exchange thoughts and ideas, the
free flow of information the confidentiality of information and
communication, the appropriate protection of personal information,
openness and transparency. In addressing above issues, achievements
from international institutions, such as "OECD Guidelines for the
Security of Information Systems and Networks" should be referred
to. Each nation is required to implement the Guideline urgently on
its own and in cooperation with the regional frameworks, such as
APEC and APT, which are also active players in the e-security field.
Reason for Proposal 6:
In this proposal, phrases from "OECD Guidelines for the Security of
Information Systems and Networks" are added. Democratic values are
often forgotten in policy making of the security, so it should be
explicitly written.
Proposal 7:
To change the paragraph of "a) e-government" in "(3) Cross-sector
Programmes and Activities" in Section 3 as follows:
a) e-government
ICT networks can offer better public services to citizens by
allowing citizens to be provided more conveniently, and by improving
the accountability and transparency of public administration. In
this regard, so-called "one stop" administrative service centres can
play a useful role, by allowing people to easily gain access to
government information, official procedures and so on, at one
location. "One stop" administrative service centres should be
constructed so as not to invade privacy of people or not to break
equality. E-government also gives the opportunity for a greater
sense of community participation to be created, by establishing
online sites where citizens can input their views and exchange
ideas. Such online sites should service well-regulated critical
discussion, at the same time, they should not invade privacy of
citizen.
Reason for Proposal 7:
"One stop" administrative service centres will be convenient, but
shortedsighted designers like the idea of "National-ID", which assigns
unique identification number to each citizen and uses the number
everywhere in public administration services. Such architecture is
very vulnerable for protecting the confidence of citizens, and
achieving accountability and transparency of management of personal
data is very hard. That was what happened in Japan related to Basic
Residential Register Network.
Administration of the online discussion forum is a hard problem, but
personal data of author of ideas which may have political implication
should be considered sensitive, so the ID on the forum should not be
linked to other IDs for public administration services.
----------------------