Statement of Korean Civil Society Network for WSIS

Statement of Korean Civil Society Network for WSIS

This statement has been prepared after diverse issues regarding information society were reviewed and discussed at Korean civil society workshop for the world summit on the information society (WSIS), and contains the common consensus of Korean civil societies to information society. The groups and individuals who signed at the bottom are those who support this statement. And this statement is open to criticism and will be updated continuously.

I. Vision of Information Society

The information society should be based on human rights, peace, social justice, human development and sustainability. Although information and communication technologies (ICTs) can be used as a useful tool for human development, cultural and economic development and progress of democracy, it itself does not guarantee these development. For these, there should be first legal and structural mechanisms that enable such development and progress, and also there should first be the right social mind and culture.
The information society should continue in the efforts to address solution of poverty, abolition of discrimination, respect for human rights, maintenance of peace, protection of the environment and the progress of democracy while ICTs needs to be served for such purpose. Furthermore, ICTs does not always contain in itself positive aspects. In the process of the introduction of new technologies, inequality can accelerate and human rights can be violated, which is to be taken seriously. This is why it is important that the development and introduction of ICTs should be taken into consideration of social and cultural values and the aspects of human rights, not just zooming-in on productivity and efficiency.

II. Principles

A. Respect for Human Rights

1. Respect for Human Rights
Respect for human rights should be one of the basic principles upheld by the people in the information society. In particular, the notion of human rights in the information society needs to be re-defined, and any effects that these processes of “informitization” have influenced on the human rights should be reviewed.

2. Protection of the Socially Marginalized People
Special measures are required to protect the rights of such socially underprivileged people as women, children, disabled people, and irregular·migrant workers.

B. Freedom of Expression

3. The information society has expanded opportunities and areas for the general public to express themselves thanks to the emergence of various information and communication medium such as the Internet. The increased opportunities and various media for freedom of expression should be pro actively respected and perfectly guaranteed in the information society.

4. The information society should be free from the government’s
censorship. Unfortunately, however, being exposed to open criticism through the Internet, the government and national authorities are trying to limit the freedom of expression on the Internet, saying that it is subversive or harmful to minors. The international laws and constitution dictate that the limitation of the freedom of expression must be kept to the minimum based on clear legal basis and such principle should continue to be upheld. On the Internet in particular, not only regulations as defined in dictionaries but also all activities that limit the freedom of expression must be prohibited.

5. Government should pro-actively protect the freedom with which people
can express their opinions anonymously, which means freedom of anonymity, in the information society. The development of ICTs is increasing surveillance and censorship, and threatening the freedom of communication which is fully guaranteed by the international laws and the Constitution.

6. It should be noted that the censorship and surveillance by the government and private sector which is rising with the advent of advanced ICTs can limit the freedom of expression and thoughts. All censorships and surveillance which limit the freedom of expression and thoughts must be banned.

7. As ICTs is being increasingly used for commercial purposes and intellectual property rights regimes on the Internet is getting strict, the cases in which the access to and utilization of the media for communication and expression is limited because of economic reasons and lack of education are increasingly seen. This leads to a rise in social and economic discrimination and therefore should be prevented through public efforts.

8. The statements that discriminate the socially marginalized people and social minorities should be regulated as an act of discrimination. The discriminatory statements of the people with vested rights in this society who have easier access to and utilization of the ICT media indirectly violate the freedom of expression of the socially marginalized and minorities.

C. Establishment of ICT Infrastructure and Sustainablity

9. ICT infrastructures should be established based on the principles of ‘Universal Service’ and ‘Public Access’.

10. The government should guarantee that everybody can have access to information at low price through public access point.

11. The principle of universal service should be continuously applied to such traditional media as TV, radio and moving video.

12. Investment in Infrastructure and Universal Service
– The investment in infrastructures should expand in a way that the principles of fair market competition, public and universal service are respected.
– The establishment of infrastructures must neither only rely on the free market nor ignore the principles of ‘universal service’. Each nation can adopt their own mechanism suited to their own social and economic situations. For instance, a democratic institution can establish infrastructures with the participation and supervision of workers’ unions and civil societies.

13. Establishment of Infrastructures based on Sustainablity
– The development of ICTs should be based on sustainability. Environmental pollution must be minimized and efforts to make the information society environmentally friendly through the development that is not harmful to the health of the public are necessary.
– When used computers are transported to the third world, the effects of electronic wastes on the environment must be considered.
– Since environmental problems are not confined with the borders of one nation, international efforts are required across the borders to address such problems in the information society.

14. ICTs and Environment Protection
ICTs can be used as a tool for the protection of the environment. For instance, the destruction of environment can be prevented when information on environment-related technology and others is shared.

D. Solution to ‘Information Inequality’ and Guarantee Access to Information

15. The issue of how to reduce digital divide is becoming a great challenge to the information society. ‘digital divide’ should be
understood in broad sense. This refers not only to the inequality between the advanced countries and developing countries but also to the inequality caused by sexual, physical, regional, economic, social, political and cultural discrimination.

16. Addressing the problem of ‘digital devide’ means more than just ‘equal access to networks’. It means equal access to information in reality. It includes access to infrastructures, increase of skills and intellectual abilities (capacity building) to utilize such infrastructures, access to basic softwares and contents and production of contents the communities need. In this context, the lack of infrastructures or their high price, poor educational infrastructures, lack of systems to make public information, limited access to basic softwares and contents due to the protection of intellectual property rights, all types of social discrimination, economic structures that worsen economic hardships, ownership and control of the media can be reasons for broadening digital divide and should be recognized as obstacles to equal access to information and communication.

17. The rights of equal Access to Information
Equal and free access to information should be recognized as one of the basic human rights.

18. Protection of the Disableds’ Access to Information
– Studies have shown that access to information is affected by social and economic status. Disabled people usually suffer from poor, social and economic situations and therefore the gaps (digital divide) between these people and non-disabled people are enlarging as ICTs is progressing. This requires fundamental solutions.
– The ability to use ICTs should not have direct relationship with one’s economic and social status. Information policies and measures should be prepared in a way to make sure that everybody including the disabled people can use ICTs freely and without discrimination.

19. Nobody should be, in any case, prohibited from communicating with others and accessing all information and communication media.
– The development of ICTs should take place in a way to overcome physical obstacles of equipments, hardwares and softwares. For this, the government should make every efforts to provide full support with policies and finance.
– While the development of ICTs should consider universal services for the disabled, the difficulties that the disabled with specific handicaps such as hearing problems and blindness experience in using hardwares and softwares need to be investigated for appropriate measures.

20. Such disparity is not a problem that is only confined to South Korea.
It is a global problem caused by fast informitization all around the world. This shows an urgent need for the global community to come up with a global solution to the problem..

E. Production, Distribution and Sharing of Knowledge in the Information Society and Intellectual Property Rights

21. Information and knowledge in Information Society
– Information and knowledge are common assets and public properties shared by all mankind without any restriction in production and utilization. Therefore, information and knowledge are not ‘privately held asset’ but ‘social environment’ which everybody can enjoy.
– The intellectual property rights regime should recognize the historic and social obligation and the communities’ contribution to production of information.
– Rather than ‘the principles of market’, policy support should be applied in the production of knowledge to make sure that unique values and operating principles are respected in each of knowledge areas. A lot more support should be provided to the public production of knowledge by educational and research institutions and voluntary production areas of civil societies such as CopyLeft Movement. In addition, such knowledge as traditional medicine which is shared by the whole community should be protected.

22. The Rights of Public Access to Information and Intellectual Property Rights
– Public Domain is the most effective way to reduce digital divide within the nation and among different countries. Public domain means information which everybody can access and use equally and freely as an intellectual infrastructure. As a solution to such digital divide, the production of public information should be encouraged, and measures to improve the access to such public information should be sought out.
– Academic studies and research results from public institutions should be included in public domain.
– Open source and free software are themselves part of public domain and should be encouraged as a way to enhance the production of and access to major public information.
– Intellectual property rights must not prevail over the right to access information. Overly protected intellectual property rights infringe upon the right to access information thereby broadening digital divide.

23. The balance must be restored between intellectual property rights and users’ rights & public interests.
– The current trend of overly protected intellectual property rights seriously infringes on the rights of users stated in Article 27-1 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights(the right of citizens to participate in cultural activities, the right to enjoy benefits of development and application of science – Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.). For the purpose of finding the suitable balance between intellectual property rights and the rights of users, the existing regimes of intellectual property rights should be reviewed comprehensively.
– Fair use must be guaranteed. In the case of digital contents in particular, individuals’ use for non-commercial and personal purposes should be considered to be as fair use.
– The use of the Internet by individuals and communities should not be restricted by intellectual property rights.
– Each nation or autonomous communities should have the right to make decision freely without any outside pressure regarding intellectual property rights law and other regulations and policies to ensure progress in knowledge base and culture. For this, WTO’s TRIPS and other international regulations should be made more lenient.

24. Integrity of Life and Basic Human Rights should be put first before intellectual property rights.
– Intellectual property rights for intellectual products must not be overly protected so that basic human rights (right to access information, privacy, freedom of expression, etc) is infringed.
– Intellectual property rights which are related to discoveries and human inventions should not hurt the integrity of life and human and environment and health.
– Intellectual property rights must not be abused as a way to oppress people with different political views, the socially underprivileged and minorities.

F. Protect People’s Privacy

25. The value of privacy should be guaranteed in general. It should be fully considered first to expand the field of individual privacy; to guarantee the right to unite and struggle against surveillance authorities such as government and company; to establish the social system to weaken the surveillance powers; and to develop technical and intellectual capacity building to protect the invasion of privacy.

26. The Right to Anonymity
The right to anonymity should be guaranteed as a justifiable means not only to protect individual privacy, but also to guarantee the freedom of expression of social minorities. The right to anonymity should not be fundamentally-limited in any case. Whether to adopt real name policy or anonymity policy should depend on each community’s decision. It is desirable to develop socially-tolerant attitude to expressions by anonymity. Even if there is any ill-intentioned expressions by anonymity, it is desirable to try to make down the public confidence of that expressions.

27. Expand the capacity of individual to control over one’s own personal information: All people should have the capacity to control over their’ own personal information. Anyone who is going to collect and use others’ personal information should fully respect their rights to control over their own personal information.

① Privacy principles in accordance with at lease OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) guidelines on privacy (1. Collection Limitation Principle / 2. Data Quality Principle / 3. Purpose Specification Principle / 4. Use Limitation Principle / 5. Security Safeguards Principle / 6. Openness Principle / 7. Individual Participation Principle / 8. Accountability Principle) should be generally applied to any surveillance case regardless of public or private field, inner or outer area of organization etc.

② The government should make efforts to raise citizens’ mind and consciousness for their privacy by training system and technology, and also enforce the system and policy to protect people’s privacy.

28. Reform existing social system to expand the capacity to control one’s own private information: Structural powers of government and market tend to prevent from realizing the capacity to control people’s own personal information. Social efforts to reform existing social system should be enforced to expand the capacity to control one’s own personal information.

① Between the surveillance subject and object, there are imbalance of authority and inequality of information. This makes the object’s capacity against surveillance weakened. Surveillance objects should be able to collectively participate in the surveillance conduct and to recover their capacity to control their’ own personal information.
② Sensitive personal information such as somatic information should be absolutely protected.
③ It is difficult to distinguish whether the surveillance conduct is indispensable to develop the human dignity of surveillance object because of the information imbalance between the surveillance subject and object. Liberty of choice to avoid the surveillance conduct should be given to the surveillance object, as far as there is any other way not or lower to infringe the privacy for achieving the purpose of surveillance.
④ To recover the capacity to control one’s own personal information, imbalance of authority between surveillance subject and object should be dissolved. The surveillance authorities should be decentralized as possible.

29. Article 12 in UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights prescribes that privacy is one of basic human rights. (No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.) Privacy should be equally guaranteed regardless of nationality.

G. Security

30. Each government should establish security management system of public sectors to ensure network security. Also they should promote to develop such models as to establish self-regulation security order of private sectors and to encourage the cooperation between the government and private sectors by carrying out the following activities; to raise the mind for security of private sectors and civil societies; to encourage exchange and distribution of security information, research and investment, and providing incentives for these activities.

31. Even in security measures, personal information should be rigidly protected in accordance with the judicial procedure and institution.

32. In cyber-crime, standard to judge the intention and physical damage should be strictly limited.

H. Democratic Governance

33. Just the Development of ICTs itself cannot bring E-democracy. It is necessary to decentralize the political authorities, for example, to delegate decision making authority to pertinent communities so that members of society can actually participate in the policy and decision making processes.

34. All the policy and decision making processes in the information society should be open, transparent, democratic and participatory.
– Not government’s unilateral announcement on the policies or formal consensus structure of people’s opinion, but all members of society including women, disabled, youth and migrant workers should be able to actually participate in the policy and decision making process
– It should be open enough to allow all stakeholders’ participation in all levels of planning, decision making, implementation, monitoring and evaluation processes.

35. To guarantee the transparency in the policy and decision making process, all of the national and governmental information should be opened to the public in principle. It can be helpful to use ICTs for this purpose.

36. E-government should be aimed to realize democracy in the information society by transparently opening the administrative affairs and information to the public and guaranteeing people’s participation in the policy and decision making processes, as well as just cutting down the expenses for the service and providing convenient services. Also these should be adopted to the process in establishing e-government.

37. Market Environment
– Government should make efforts to establish fair, confidential and transparent market environment, and regulate private monopoly.
– Government should promote to spread open source and open standard for transparent and fair competition of market.
– Corporate information should be opened to the public for fair market competition.

38. Open standard
Technology standard cannot be unilaterally fixed by specific company or government. The standard should be fixed on the basis of open and full participation of all stakeholders from the first step to prepare and make.

I. Roles of government and civil society

39. Roles of government
– Government should manage separately following the two; the policy to develop technology and promote industry, and the policy to guarantee the citizens’ freedom and rights and to keep the public accountability.
– Government should make efforts to establish fair, confidential and transparent market environment, and regulate private monopoly.
– Government should provide training system to understand human rights in the information society and make efforts to create proper culture for human rights.
– Government should not play the role of regulators of information flow and content on the internet arbitrarily.
– National decision-maker for information and communication policies should be free from any private interest relationship which can influence on specific policy.

40. Roles of civil society
– Civil society should make efforts to establish self governance system of each community and to create and activate autonomous policies and cultures.
– Civil society has a rights to participate in the policy and decision making processes at national and international levels as a stakeholer.
Civil society should play a role to protect human rights and public values from government’s arbitrary authorities and market interests.

J. Education on Human Rights and Educational Informatization

41. Human being should not be considered as a mere human resource, and education should not focus on just developing human resources. Education should be the process to understand society and people, to make social relationship, and to realize one’s abilities and ambitions.

42. ICTs can contribute to better education through using multi-media and intensifying educational information in quantity and quality. All people should be able to make practical implications of ICTs without any discrimination. In order to do that, education which can enhance the capacity to use ICTs should be included in the curriculum of public education and social re-training system.

43. An information society is not attained just by the development of technology itself, and it needs to switchover people’s mind. Entire education procedures including public education and social re-training system should hold the curriculum of ‘human rights in the information society’. Also, the management of education should be based on the human rights in principle.

44. Inequality in education has the danger to cause social discrimination. Thus, government should make efforts to minimize the information inequality of students.

K. Strengthening Public Value and Diversity of Culture

45. Culture should be based on the public value and diversity, and developed in the principle of cultural democracy. Culture should be a subject to approach on the views of human development, creativity, social support, diversities & differences, and usage & enjoyment.

46. Culture should be understood on the basis of identity, tradition and particularity of the corresponding country and its communities. The progress of ICTs should contribute to developing quality of lives through coexistence and exchange between various cultures.

47. Government should reinforce the principle of cultural democracy through the development of ICTs for harmony among the cultural, social, ethical, productive, political and economical functions in the society.

48. Culture is not a tool or means for economy, nor can it be limited to a commercial product. Culture is a process of forming the identities of every individual and group belonging to its society, which preconditions maintaining variety of life. As ICTs progress, culture should also be newly understood as a function for coexistence and cultural exchange from that of old industries and trades.

49. In the field of health and education, in particular, a public investment is needed to promote easy-access to confidential contents on the internet.

L. Safe Labor Environment and Securing Workers’ Rights

50. Workers’ Rights of Having Access to information
– Workers’ rights of unhindered access to communication media and information sources in their workplaces should be protected as one of workers’ basic rights.
– Special attention and effort for marginalized people such as irregular workers, women, disabled people, and migrant workers are necessary to guarantee their equal access to information.

51. Banning Surveillance on workers
– Workers’ privacy and dignity should be secured in any workplaces and they have the rights to be treated fairly in workplace. As ICTs is getting developed, it becomes difficult to distinguish between official work and private life, by the hour or space. Currently, surveillance equipment and system have also become more developed. The conduct of companies to supervise its workers is definitely controlling workers and infringing their privacy.
– When a company collects private information on a worker, consent from the worker should be mandatory. Whenever collecting the approved information, it should be carried out on the basis of principle which follows at lease OECD guidelines on privacy.
– When a company is going to implement a machine or a policy that can infringe workers’ privacy, a prior notice should be clearly delivered to the workers or the representative of the union, and workers or representative should have the rights to participate in the decision making process.
– Articles that can regulate or restrict surveillance on workers should be added to the privacy protection act or labor standard act.

52. Education on Workers
When the environment of workplace changes due to the implementation of new ICTs, workers have the right to learn the new system.

M. Global Cooperation and Support on the Least Developing Countries (LDCs)

53. International system in the information society should be not subordinated to unilateralism, militarism and each country’s economic interests. Each country should develope an equal, cooperative relationship. It is important to considerate more of the needs of the developing countries than the advanced countries. This means technical and financial support from the advanced countries should be extended upon the developing countries. Developing countries should be able to participate in the decision making process for global policy in principle.

III. Action Plan

A. Freedom of Expression

1. No Censorship by the Government
– Contents regulation system conducted by the government with its arbitrary judgement is to infringe the freedom of expression, and governmental institute to regulate internet contents such as Information and Communication Ethics Committee in South Korea should be abolished.
– To restrict the contents regulation of Administrative Branches, any internet contents which is the subject to regulate should be clearly prescribed by the law at a minimum level.
– Regulation of illegal conducts on the internet should be enforced according to the fair judgement and process by the existing law system.
– When new act and system are introduced, it should be first assessed what influence shall they potentially effect to freedom of expression and human rights.
– However it needs to regulate the contents on the internet, it should be conducted transparently and freely on the basis of the democratic governance structure with the full participation of stakeholders including civil society, users and consumers. It shall not be caused to absolutely cut off the common people’s access to any internet contents due to such reason of protecting minors and youth.

2. Guarantee the free expression by anonymity and no surveillance
– The expression by anonymity is to protect the expression of social minorities and marginalized people. It can make the interior discloser more active. Anonymity should be fully guaranteed. The system to disclose the users’ identity on the internet which is conducted by the government shall not be approved.
– Any lawful, systematic and technical conducts to monitor the expression on the internet such as the system to disclose the users’ identity or network monitoring & surveillance system shall not be approved.

3. Protect socially marginalized people and social minorities
– It should be necessary to promote the social and cultural policy to loosen the violence and discrimination on social minorities and marginalized people in internet.
– It should be necessary to promote the fair participation of social minorities and marginalized peopleincluding women in the decision making process for the media and international communication system.
– The education to respect others’ expression and human rights, and to express sensibly should be included in the system of public education and re-training program.

B. To Establish the Information and Communication Infrastructure and Sustainable Development

4. The government should enforce regulation policies on key telecommunication business not to abuse their monopolistic position. To the key business, a policy of sharing the circuit lines should be based thoroughtly on the principle of fair competition, public and universal service.

5. Public Access Point : The government should promote to establish the public access points so that local residents can easily use the internet with low price. Public institutions such as public libraries and schools can be the public access points. And the governments should support to establish multi-media center in public. It should be promoted to expand public service zone even in wireless services.

6. ICTs should be used to develop a global early warning system so as to avoid natural disaster.

7. International cooperation, and expansion and dispersion of environmental information
– Since environmental problems are not confined with the borders of one nation, international efforts are required across the borders to address such problems in the information society. To offer the right environmental information to the third world can be the means to solve the significant environmental problems.
– Experience, technique, and information of environment should be expanded and dispersed globally so that energy policies such as nuclear industry can be converted into reproducible energy policy.
– It should be promoted to establish the online service to provide the diverse environmental information for practical uses.
– It needs to make domestic and global networks in order to immediately  ope with environmental issues in each country. To solve environmental problems ultimately, it should be dealt at a global level.

8. ICT Waste Treatment
– The exact statistical treatment for ICT waste should be developed, for example, how much ICT waste is usually generated from all the process of production, and they managed.
– It is urgent to develop techniques to recycle ICT waste.

9. New products should ensure the backward compatibility.

10. Hardware or software companies should continue the after-service for the existing products, even if they does not produce them any more.

C. Solve the information inequality and guarantee the right of access to information

11. Lawful amendment and systematic improvement to solve the information inequality
The rights of disabled’s access to information should be concretely described in the law. And the ordinance and principles for enforcement should be amended concretely.

12. To bridge the digital divide, it should be expanded to provide all sorts of information and communication facilities for the low-earning disabled people.

13. To promote the disabled’s access to ICTs, it needs to develop and provide facilities and softwares following as the types of each difficulty, and to strengthen the education of ICTs for the disabled.

① Visual handicap
: hardware – phonetic composition facility, braille printer, CCTV
: software – audio output program
② Auditory handicap
: communication field – special phone, interpretation by the finger language, subtitle broadcasting, communication based on the text, hearing aid etc.
: software – voice■text and interpretation program by the finger language
③ Difficulties of limb and body, and brain disease
: solution of the barrier of physical spaces – to expand the digital library and guarantee easy use
: hardware – to promote the development of diverse in&output equipments for the disabled who is not comfortable with both hands(glasses mouse etc.)
: software – to promote the development of diverse programs to provide in & output equipments including substitutional communication program to help brain disease people to understand each other, and guarantee the compatibility with the OS of each program

14. The rights of disabled’s access to information should be guaranteed, and it needs to carefully try not to hamper existing social relationship.

15. Guarantee the rights of disabled’s participation in the decision making process of ICT policies for disableds.

D. Creation, Distribution and Sharing of Knowledge in Information Society and Intellectual Property Rights

16. Governments should provide proactively policy and financial support to civil societies organizations which are working to promote, for instance, open source softwares and free softwares and Copyleft Movement with a strong belief in creation of public domain and information sharing.

17. Knowledge created by national universities and research institutes that receive public financial support should not be kept by individuals but shared by the public as public domain.

18. Public information, academic findings, medical and educational knowledge, legal information, and corporation information related to public interests are considered to belong to public domain by their very nature, and for this reason, access to and utilization of these information should not be restricted by the intellectual property rights including copyrights.

19. Open Source Software and Free Software
– In order to facilitate the development of such open source softwares and free softwares as Gunu/Linux System, UN and other international organizations and each nation need to provide aggressively financial and policy support.
– For such reasons as escape from powerful vendor ownership, information security, cost savings, governments and public organizations should introduce open source softwares and free softwares and come up with legal and institutional framework.

20. Open Access
– Financial support is required to encourage non-commercial open access journals and publications.
– Studies and academic findings which have been accomplished with the public support should be made public.
– Efforts should be made at international level to promote open access archive movements which are aimed at facilitating search for and access to public information.
– Public organizations need to strive to establish open archives for public information and relevant public knowledge.

21. Database, regardless of creativity, should be excluded from the realms of protection by intellectual property rights as it is not the result of artistic creations but the functional outputs. The database is the output centered around data collection and rather than creativity.

22. Various technological protection measures designed to protect copyrights of digital information should be nullified once they expire after a certain period and are no longer effective.

23. Internet domains are not just another form of ‘trademarks’ but are being used among diverse groups for political, economic and personal purposes. Therefore, these values should not be disregarded by trademarks in internet-related domains.

24. Web-sites of all public organizations should be designed in a way that free access is available through all types of browsers including free software browser.

25. Computer programs considered to belong to public domain such as on-line banking program, public organizations’ internet service program, softwares for accessing public information database should be made to allow free use and installation in all types of operating systems and browsers.

26. Internet service providers (ISPs) and other third parties should not be held responsible for violating copyrights in a effort to protect copyrights. ISPs are not the right parties to make legal judgements and if they are held responsible for violating copyrights, it would cause the daily surveillance and controls on information users.

27. Digital libraries are an important tool to reduce information gaps.
Public information in the digital libraries should be accessed first on line. And the right of readers( downloading and print out) to access other information should not be limited. However, technological and financial solutions can be found not to excessively limit originators’ rights.

28. Supports from governments in the form of new business model development and public policy are necessary for helping creators continue their creation activities without relying on intellectual property rights.

29. Non-commercial use of digital contents and individual reproduction should be regarded as fair use and thus be protected. In this context, Non-commercial exchanges among individuals of files on the internet through the utilization of P2P technology must be protected.

30. In the event that the domain names and URL of original websites on the internet, hyperlink, frame link, mirroring and other rights should not be restricted.

31. International conventions governing copyrights, patents and trademarks should keep to minimum their restrictions regarding effective periods and contents to allow each nation to have freedom with which they can take steps suited to their own situations. WTO’s TRIPS and WIPO, which impose intellectual property rights system on each nation, should be reviewed or scrapped to give the nations more freedom. Furthermore, advanced nations should not exert pressure on developing countries or the least developing countries.

32. Such policies as the restriction of patent holders, for examples, compulsory license and parallel import, which is intended to serve public interests should be implemented without interference of other nations.

33. Effective periods of patent and copyright should be decided in a way to find the right balance between patent and copyright holders’ interest and public interests.. Given fast technological developments, the reduction of effective patent and copyright periods need to be considered, and international conventions should reduce their roles in order to allow each nation to freely decide the effective patent and copyright periods.

34. Computer programs are different from other cultural and artistic creations(They are more functional and modifications are required for different user environments. And the computer programs require steady upgrades and there is no benefits returned to society after patents expire due to fast technological developments). Therefore, the computer programs should not be protected in the same way as other creations are protected, and should be excluded from the realms of patents or the protection period should be reduce in reality.

35. Attempts to make the realm of patents go beyond all human activities including abstract ideas should stop and the patents already issued to the aforementioned areas should be made nullified. For instance, software algorithm, business model and medical treatment should not be protected with patents.

36. Legal frameworks are needed for the protection of local knowledge and intellectual properties and in this, the contribution of local communities should be acknowledged.

37. Living organisms existing in nature should be excluded from patents whether they are separated and verified. They are the common assets of the mankind and for this reason, the separation and verification of the living organisms should not be the subject of patents.

38. ‘Supervision Technology’ which could enables automatic transmission of internet protocol address, supervision of users’ activities, accessing private information through mailbox should not be used.

39. Alterations and revision of webpages for non-commercial use should be acknowledged as freedom of expression.

40. Knowledge and technologies should be transferred to developing countries to help them be quipped with better technological capabilities and competitiveness in global markets in the form of assistance and special treatment. However technologies whose safety has not be verified should not be transferred.

E. Guarantee People’s Privacy

41. Privacy protection act (or resolution whose effects are equivalent to laws), which at least follows the OECD Guidelines on Privacy, should be enacted. In addition, all laws and international treaties concerning privacy protection should be examined for the review of compliance with the above guidelines.

42. In case of permitting the third party’s use of one’s personal information, selective consent right should be ensured for each question of what item is to be used, who will use it, which purpose it is to be used.

43. A system should be established to make sure that the details of supervision activities are disclosed regularly to those subject in surveillance.

44. National database project for personal information should be assessed in considering the risks of governmental surveillance. These databases should be reviewed in terms of public interest as well as human rights and democracy

45. Personal information databases run by the government should be set up for each individual purposes and should not be integrated.

46. Single, unique personal identifier which enables the profiling of different kind of personal information databases should not be used.

47. Opt-in policy should be used for the collection and processing of bio information like personal DNA or disease record.

48. Mandatory training program should be introduced to schools and workplaces to teach people about the right to have their privacy protected.

49. Independent privacy commission should be established and alternative dispute resolution rights must be protected for privacy protection policies and system, supervision of their implementation, investigation of privacy violation cases, suggestion of improvements and resolution of privacy violation cases.

50. The right of the Privacy Commission to suggest its opinions concerning the enactment and revision of privacy laws and regulations should be protected.

51. Privacy audit system should be introduced to guarantee consumers’ collective participation in companies.

52. The right of organisations’ members to collectively agree on such matters as company’ surveillance of workers should be protected.

53. Privacy impact assessment should be introduced at the planning stage of all privacy related public polices. And this assessment should be also applied to private company’s service practice which deals with considerable number of customer’s personal information or employ a certain number of workers.

54. The central government affairs of personal information should reviewed and transferred to municipal government offices.

55. International Cooperation
– UN should review laws and policies that infringe upon foreigners’ privacy and take measures to correct violations, for example, SEVIS(Students and Exchange and Visitor Information System) in USA.
– UN should strive to review each nation’s procedures for approving foreigners’ entry into the nation and correct the violation of foreigners’ privacy.
– The international civil society should be able to control the activities of each nation’s intelligence agencies including Echelon.

F. Security

56. The government should establish privacy violation investigation notice system, additional service and security breach incident notice system over such regulatory systems as security authentification system so that security can be maintained according to market competition mechanism. And damage claim systems should be established for security breach incidents.

57. Since ISPs have concerns about their technological investments and development and provision of additional services as far as back up data storage and maintenance period for personal information log record is concerned, the principle of best practice should apply rather than binding legal systems.

58. To ensure the stability of internet network, intergovernmental management system that could share the responsibility and cooperate together for the stable operation of hidden primary root server and its copies should be put in place.

59. In relation to cyber crimes, a third party service providers should hold users responsible for their activities. The service providers do not have the right to make legal judgement regarding users’ activities.

60. The programs to develop capacity building to use information systems should include programs designed to develop security capabilities.

G. Democratic Governance

61. If public hearings for the government’s laws and policies serve their intended purposes, rightful feedback for the suggestions and opinions should be communicated back to people. Before such policies are implemented, sufficient public discourse and discussion should take place.

62. For transparent decision making, all public and national information should be disclosed with the exception of such minimum information as national security-related confidential information and the revision of relevant laws should take place for this. Disclosed information should be available through public agencies’ websites.

63. Public institutions’ websites and all services of E-government should not exclude people using specific softwares and should be designed to enable access by anyone. Furthermore, softwares used by the public institutions should be open source and free softwares so that they do not belong to specific vendors.

64. In establishing e-government, the effects of it on human rights and democracy should be discussed. In this process, the position of stakeholders should be as much respected as possible.

65. When databases containing administrative, medical, educational and driver’s license information are established, the prior evaluation of their impacts on the public’s right to control personal information and human rights should be done. And in this process, the participation of stakeholders in the policy and decision making process should be fully guaranteed.

66. Personal information databases such as medical information database and resident information database should not be integrated for the purpose of convenience.

67. E-government means more than just electronic process of documents. E-government should be deigned in a way to encourage democratic participation and prevent human rights violation.

H. Education on Human Rights and Informatization in Education

68. Education in public education course should not be limited just to the utilization of information technology. For better understanding of information-oriented society and media literacy education and basic human rights education should be included in regular education course and re-education course. And through such education, a certain set of values should not be forced upon students and instead free discussion should be encouraged since value system is being just formed now. For this, teachers should first receive education on human rights.

69. Teachers and students alike should be better informed of their rights to information not just through regular course but also school activities and cultures. For instance, they should know that their rights are violated when their personal information is gathered and their posessions are searched without their consents and that they have a right to reject them.

70. Open and free softwares should be actively introduced for the purposes of education and research at schools.

71. Infrastructures should be provided by the government so that students can access the internet at schools.

72. In addition to regular education courses, members in society, housewives, the elderly and unemployed should be able to receive education on the utilization of information-related tools and technology. And for such education, not only technological aspects but also basic features of information based society and human rights should be taught to these unpriviledged people.

I. Public Nature of Culture and Reinforcement of Diversity

73. As we need bio-diversity in nature, we need diverse cultures. Therefore the policies designed to encourage cultural diversity should be considered as an essential element for the sustainable development of information society, and each nation should have a right to choose freely their own cultural policies and organizations.
– Production, distribution and protection of local contents including minority culture and local culture should take place in a supportive environment and diverse thoughts and opinions should be freely produced and suggested through diverse sources.
– They should be protected through education on importance of creative contents and digitization of scientific and cultural heritage.

74. In formation society, each nation should establish the principles of diverse languages and adopt polices for using various languages which prevents a certain language from growing too powerful. International organization and agencies should put emphasis on the importance of language diversity and raise strong objections to policies favoring certain languages.
– Each nation should support development of on-line translation tools which will enable access to contents written in foreign languages.
– Such tools as standardized language table and code, dictionary and general and application softwares should be developed to create contents written in local languages.
– Non-written languages should be preserved through audio support.

75. Libraries, museums and other public facilities are a very critical element for society as cultural infrastructures. The government should try to make sure that everybody can have fair and free access to cultural, knowledge and information services through cultural infrastructures.

76. Mass-media plays an important role in protecting cultural diversity, democratic discourse, media pluralism and people’s rights to access quality information and knowledge. Each nation should adopt and implement policies to reinforce the public nature of mass media services.
– Mass media services should be provided by more than one organization.

77. Production and distribution of culturally diverse contents should be guaranteed. For this, concentrated ownership of the media should be avoided and a legal framework should be established to support local media and non-commercial media.

J. Safe Labor Environment and Protection of Rights of Workers

78. Such public information infrastructures as independent media center, public channels(satellite channels, broadcasting networks, cable and frequency) should be aggressively established in order to reduce gaps in formation benefits for workers and facilitate communications.

79. Workers have a right to use intranet without any supervision of the company to freely communicate with one another and do union activities.

80. Women·migrant·disabled·irregular workers need special support to access information and communicate with one another.
– Measures should be taken for female workers not to be sexually discriminated against and projects should be undertaken for the creation of communities for female workers.
– Measures should be taken to guarantee language diversity of migrant workers and protect the right to access information.

81. Labor union websites should be made in a way to allow anyone to easily access information and have free communication and websites and bulletin board operation rules should be freely decided without any intervention. The websites should be open for criticism and run in a way to protect privacy.

82. Banning of Surveillance on workers
– What is provided for by international standards set forth by ILO should be reflected in collective bargaining agreements.
– When the company seeks consents from workers for gathering of personal information, workers should be able to choose freely based on the understanding of its impacts on themselves. They should be able to take back their consents without any disadvantages when the consents are not sought under circumstances described above.
– Even if a system has been established with the consents of workers to gather information, requests can be made for the abolition of such system if it is found that such gathering of information is not necessary. And workers can make requests to the company for information regarding the purpose of information collection, commencement date of collection and supervision period, collection system and record details and persons and department in charge.
– The company should not use gathered information for purposes other than the ones agreed upon by the workers and should not use such information as a basis to discriminate workers.

July, 2003
Korean Civil Society Network for WSIS

Endorsement:
Korean Progressive Network (Jinbonet), PeaceNet, Labor News Production, Korean Federation for Environment Movement, Korean Labor Net, People’s Solidarity for the Participatory Democracy, IPLeft, Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, Korean Christian Network, Media Center, Civil Network for Cultural Reform, Korea Women’s Association United , Citizens’Action Network, Korea Contingent Workers Center, Asia Pacific Workers Solidarity, Research Institute for the Disables’ Rights and Interest, Kangwon Branch of the Korean People’s Artists Federation

2003-07-17