Dear IDgang members,<br><br>This new (virtual) personality fundamental right may be the most significant cyber related development in the first years of the XXI century...!, because it is the first significant step on the natural process of extending human rights to cyberspace.<br>
<br>This new fundamental (human) right, fully extended(**), will bring not just more rightīs and protection, but also will create more value, specially at the individual level (people owning, developing and <u><b><i>transacting </i></b></u>with his virtual personality) , which will generate economic development. Also it will affect contracts between companies and users, that sometimes will imply changing the business model...(***)<br>
<br>The people (not just the citizens...) living in Germany today, are the
most cyber protected legally. And since Germany is in legal
developments, what Brasil is in football, it is just a question of time
for this new fundamental right to be replicated in other countries. :-)<br><br><b>It is no coincidence that I visited the German Constitutional Court in
2004, at Karlsruhe, immediately after the the virtual personality fundamental right was presented in the Costa Rican
Congress. <br><br></b>Obviously, the main reason for the proliferation of this new human right, is that worldwide, there is a need to
extend fundamental rights to cyberspace, and Germany now is speeding
this process.<br><br>Well, letīs continue enjoying this very long process.... ;-)<br><br>Below, some comments to this thread.<br><br>(**) By fully extended I mean the <i>Costa Rican Congress virtual personality fundamental right version</i>, which besides <b>data (content)</b>, includes (virtual) <b>presence</b> and <b>projection, </b>and the right to exist in cyberspace. <br>
<br>An example of implementing <b>presence</b>, is extending the Federal Junk Fax Law <a href="http://www.keytlaw.com/faxes/junkfaxlaw.htm">http://www.keytlaw.com/faxes/junkfaxlaw.htm</a> to all other channels, like telephone, email, SMS, MMS, blogs, social networks, voicemail, etc, but also RFID, cellular tracking and alike. This extension means not just protecting more channels, but protecting it as a fundamental right, which needs the US Supreme Court or US Congress involvement.<br>
<br>An example to the right to exist in cyberspace is giving bank accounts (a bank account is a subcomponent of a virtual personality) to the poorest people in the planet so they can have more probability to get funds. All this of course as a component of an integral process to fight extreme poverty. More here: <a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20070704102907/http://virtualrights.org/files/project_overview_latest.pdf">http://web.archive.org/web/20070704102907/http://virtualrights.org/files/project_overview_latest.pdf</a><br>
<br>More about projection here:<a href="http://wiki.idcommons.net/index.php/Virtual_personality">http://wiki.idcommons.net/index.php/Virtual_personality</a> <br>Paul Trev., if possible, please be kind to update the links, because when moving to the wiki, the links where not updated.<br>
<br>(***) For an example of how MSN, Hotmail and Google may need to change their user contracts, read the study I sent in this mailing list.<br><br>============================================================<br>Tim<br> Just curious: Does anyone have any thoughts on what impact (if any) a basic human right to use a computer without fear of being observed may have on identity management?<br>
Jaco: It will make identity management more mainstream!. <br>Anything that is a fundamental right becomes massive and mainstream.<br><br>Tim:Will developers and vendors have to react?<br>Jaco:Yes.<br><br>Tim:Is OpenID the right answer? <br>
Jaco:Yes, but also any others that promote and enhance this new human right!. <br><br><br>Tim: And also: Will courts and lawmakers in other countries evetually follow suit?<br>Jaco: Yes, because worldwide there is a need to extend human (fundamental) rights to cyberspace.<br>
<br>Tim:Or is this just another example of German perfectionism (or is it paranoia?) at work?<br>Jaco:No. It just happens that Germans are the leaders in legal developments, and later, other countries follow them.<br> <br>
====================================================================<br>Tim:<br>> As many of you will have heard the German Consitutional Court just ruled that law enforcers need judicial approval before spying on the PCs and emails of citizens. <br>
<br>Tony:<br>This is pretty much the norm in most Western countries.<br>The "best protected" characterization seems to ignore<br>the facts here. <br> <br>Tim: <br>The important issue is that the court draws a clear line in the sand about "core privacy" which no one, under any circumstances, may infringe upon. By defining this as a basic right of every citizen, they give it enormous legal weight and in effect make it part of what German law defines as "human dignity", which is the supreme principle (article 1!) of the German Constitution. <br>
<br>Jaco:<br>Exactly. For example, the USA has the Federal Junk Fax Law, which protect the virtual presence (virtual personhood = content + presence + projection), but it is not a fundamental right..., yet!.<br><br>Tim:<br>
Other European states are much more cavalier about stuf like this, and from what we hear about the US where a President can get away with just about anything in the line of surveilance, it does seem as though Germany has gone one step further.<br>
<br>Jaco:<br>Definitely!. Germany is the first country in the world, again..., in implementing such a big legal step further, and like the other legal developments it has made, it is just a question of time for others to implement. <br>
===============================================================================================<br><br><br>:<br>Tim Cole wrote:<br>>> And also: Will courts and lawmakers in other countries evetually<br>>> follow suit? Or is this just another example of German perfectionism<br>
>> (or is it paranoia?) at work?<br><br>Tony wrote:<br>> The latter<br><br>Ralf wrote:.<br>I am not so sure about this. Don't forget, Germany invented the concept of<br>"data protection" in 1970, and it has spread all over the world now. Also,<br>
the 1983 construction by the German constitutional court of a basic right<br>to "informational self-determination" is behind many current debates, e.g.<br>the "7 laws of identity" or even the attempt to write a charter of rights<br>
for users of social networks.<br><br>I think that the German court was just the first one that officially<br>acknowledged that parts of our central nervous system, including our<br>memory, but also our ability to hear, see and so on, are increasingly<br>
taken over / enhanced by or integrated with computer systems. Protecting<br>our hard drives is similar to protecting our thoughts.<br><br>Jaco:<br>Ralf, you also did not mention that the Corporation legal fiction was invented in Germany in the XVI century.<br>
======================================================================<br><br>Tony wrote:<br>> The rather unique German construct will also likely change fast after<br>> the next major attack.<br>Ralf wrote:<br>Sorry about that, Tony, but the fundamental rights spelled out in the<br>
first 20 articles of our constitution are not subject to change. The court<br>has made this clear in a number of occasions over the last decades.<br><br>Jaco: Yes, the same is true for most countries. The next step will be EU adoption, later, adoption by countries heavily influenced by the German and European legal developments and finally all the others.<br>
<br>======================================================<br> <br> <br><br><br>Tim wrote<br>> and does it's protection extend to other areas and devices (the court<br>> only talks about "PCs in private homes",<br>
Ralf wrote:<br>No. They also mention laptops, PDAs and mobile phones. It does not matter<br>where the information is stored, that is also a very important point in<br>the decision, because it goes beyond the protection of the home and<br>
acknowledges that in an interconnected world, the data itself is<br>protected, not only the private physical space.<br><br>Jaco: Great!, this brings ubiquity, a basic component of virtuality. The data (content) ubiquity protection, is a step forward to arrive to ubiquity (virtual) presence protection.<br>
============================================================================<br><br>Ralf wrote:<br>I strongly recommend to our German-speaking colleagues to actually *read*<br>the decision. It is pretty long (108 pages or so), but very clear and<br>
really worth it.<br><<a href="http://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/entscheidungen/rs20080227_1bvr037007.html">http://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/entscheidungen/rs20080227_1bvr037007.html</a>><br>Jaco: It is interesting to note that both the German text and the Costa Rican text use the term "personality" and not "identity" or other. <br>
=====================================================================<br><br>I wrote an english summary of the most important points:<br><<a href="http://bendrath.blogspot.com/2008/02/germany-new-basic-right-to-privacy-of.html">http://bendrath.blogspot.com/2008/02/germany-new-basic-right-to-privacy-of.html</a>><br>
Jaco: Thank you Ralf!!. :-)<br>====================================<br><br>Tony wrote:<br>> Your summary seems to suggest this is a constraint on<br>> German government action. Does it apply to private action<br>
> as well? Companies? Individuals outside Germany?<br>Ralf wrote:<br>In Germany, fundamental rights do have an influence on the relations<br>between private parties, as I just learned from a lawyer. Not sure how far<br>
this goes and how courts deal with it, but it certainly is not irrelevant.<br><br>Jaco: Worldwide fundamental (human) rights influence not just Governments, but also <br>Companies, NGOīs and people.<br>======================================================<br>
Tony wrote:<br>> Can a citizen waive these rights?<br>Ralf wrote:<br>I don't know.<br>Jaco: Yes, and not just citizens, also humans/people who are not citizens. Thatīs why it is called human rights and not citizens rights... ;-)<br>
==============================================<br><br><br>Tony wrote:<br>> may be an effective isolation of German<br>> citizens as others around the world refuse to deal with<br>> them for fear of impacting their "fundamental digital<br>
> privacy right."<br>Ralf wrote:<br>I expect other countries and supreme courts to follow this line of<br>reasoning instead.<br><br>Jaco: Yes Ralf, this will happen. Worldwide there is a need to extend fundamental (human) rights to cyberspace.<br>
<br>============================================================== <br> <br>PB wrote:<br>Essentially one is<br>building conditional access into one's data, and defining which parts<br>need to be private. If all goes well,<br>
then a space is established in which one can work within, and gives one<br>the ability to create value,<br>which in turn benefits society as a whole. <br><br>Jaco: Yes!, thatīs why this fundamental right will deeply affect not just privacy, but also the economy!, because of the incredible amount of value that it will generate and create!. <br>
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