[kictanet] [GENDER CENTRED] Cybercrime legislations]

Mon Aug 25 17:39:26 EAT 2008

(apologies for cross-posting)
--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
*GENDER CENTRED: A GenderIT.org thematic bulletin*
--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
*Cybercrime legislations and gender*

I. SMALL THOUGHTS AROUND…Cybercrime legislations and gender
II. NEW ARTICLES
II. FEATURED RESOURCES
IV. JARGON
V. WHO'S WHO
VI. DID YOU KNOW…

--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
I. SMALL THOUGHTS AROUND…Cybercrime legislations and gender
by Flavia Fascendini

This edition of GenderIT.org examines the issue of cybercrime
legislation through a gendered perspective and its implication on women,
in collaboration with  the ICT Policy Monitor Latinamerica and the
Caribbean team of the Association for Progressive Communications. The
focus of this edition was catalysed by issues and questions raised by
our readers on the increasing pervasiveness of cybercrime legislations
in different regions, and their potential impact on women's
communication rights.

As always, we began to investigate the issue with many questions: What
is meant by “cybercrime”? In what kinds of spaces would cybercrimes be
considered as being committed? How do they differentiate and affect
ideas of the public and the private? How can this affect women as users
and developers of the internet, e-mail, cell phones and other
information and communication technologies (ICT)? Can cybercrime
restrict the exercise of individual rights to privacy, freedom of
expression and civil liberties? Can the rhetoric of fighting cybercrimes
in effect be used to restrict the exercise of women’s communication
rights? How can the issue of cybercrimes be analysed from a feminist
perspective? Is this issue currently part of the women's movement's
agenda? How the criminalisation of  online sexual expression and
practices as well as the sex trade affect the sexual rights of women?

In this edition of GenderIT.org, our team of writers together with the
APC Policy Programme in Latin America Minitor team present the many
facets of this challenging policy area. Their different approaches and
stances clearly demonstrate the difficulty of drawing a clear line
between protection of women's rights from violation and empowering their
status as users and definers of ICT and the information society.  The
articles portray the current cybercrime landscape, arising issues and
their gendered dimensions in different regions of the world – including
India, Burkina Faso, USA, Chile, Brazil, Venezuela and Bolivia. We
invite your reflections on this subject that remains contentious  and
sometimes directly absent.

Read the full version of this editorial in the Feminist Talk section:
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?apc=f--e--1&x=96162 
<http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?apc=f--e--1&x=96162>

--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
II. NEW ARTICLES

*Finding a difficult balance*
*Human rights, law enforcement and cyber violence against women*
GenderIT writer Mavic Cabrera-Balleza probed on new analytical
frameworks of violence against women taking into account cyber violence
and the challenges and dilemmas women activists confront as they
struggle to address this relatively new dimension of gender injustice.
She spoke with two women activists who are at the forefront of advocacy
on violence against women at the national and international levels -
Lesley Ann Foster, founder and Executive Director of Masimanye Women’s
Support Network in South Africa and Charlotte Bunch, founder and
Executive Director of the Center for Women’s Global Leadership at
Rutgers University in New Jersey, USA.
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?w=a&x=96169 
<http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?w=a&x=96169>

*Cybercrime laws are not enough, there is also a need for education*
The different forms of online violence against women should be covered
by criminal legislation to provide adequate protection and redress.
However, laws are not enough. There is also a need for education,
prevention, the development of defence mechanisms and a legal system
that is capable of addressing these issues without subjecting the
victims to further victimisation. Carlos Gregorio, a researcher at the
Research Institute for Justice (Instituto de Investigación para la
Justicia) in Buenos Aires, Argentina, shares his views on a number of
issues related to cybercrime.
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?w=a&x=96159 
<http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?w=a&x=96159>

*Unequal protection, cyber crime and the internet in India*
In assessing cyber crime legislation, policy makers and gender and
development advocates must carefully consider the implications for
privacy and information security. On the one hand, ICT have created
opportunities to combat inequality through movements and communities
against issues that were once deemed 'private', such as domestic
violence and sex trafficking. On the other hand, ICT exacerbate existing
structures of inequality by enabling cyber criminals to access and
misuse private information to target vulnerable groups. As ICT blur the
lines between personal and public, the nature of the internet and cyber
crime - including how they affect human rights and social justice - must
be questioned. Weiting Xu casts a gendered lens on cybercrime laws in India.
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?w=a&x=96161 
<http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?w=a&x=96161>

*Dealing with fraud and internet "love": women and cybercrime in Burkina
Faso*
Fraud, data piracy, seeking partners on the internet: Ramata Soré
discovers that women in Burkina Faso are as much victims as
perpetrators. From Ouagadougou to Banfora via Bobo-Dioulasso, and from
Ouahigouya to Dori, all towns with an internet connection are affected
by this phenomenon. However, the fight against this crime is in the
tentative stages, if not altogether non-existent. Legislation is still
under development.
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?w=a&x=96160 
<http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?w=a&x=96160>

Visit the collection of a wide variety of other articles and resources
related to this issue in the violence against women section:
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?apc=i90501-e--1

--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
III. FEATURED RESOURCES

*Take Back The Tech: Reclaiming ICT to end violence against women*
Take Back The Tech! is a yearly 16-day campaign that aims to engage
greater participation by all civil society, especially grrls and women
ICT-users, to think about the issue of violence against women and ICT in
diverse contexts and realities. By calling for all users to reclaim
control over technology, the campaign is asking for the right to define,
access, use and shape ICTs for its potential to transform power
relations, towards a vision and reality of equality.
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?apc=r90501-e96196-1

*Online Harassment/Cyberstalking Statistics*
Cyberstalking statistics have been collected by Working to Halt Online
Abuse (WHOA) - a US-based online safety organisation - over the period
of eight years, from  2000 till 2007.  Data is gathered from survivors
through the demographic questionnaire published on the WHOA web site at
haltabuse.org . The released data are based on a total of 2,285
completed questionnaires. One interesting finding reveals that although
women are still the primary victims, with men as the primary harassers,
male victims and female harassers have significantly increased over the
years.
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?apc=r90501-e96137-1

*CyberStalked: Our Story*
The story of Cynthia Armistead, the founder of the site Cyberstalked
(www.cyberstalked.org). The site originally began as a place to refute
the defamation spread about Cynthia and her family across the internet.
In this story, Cynthia shares the experiences of her and her daughter as
targets of online harassment and stalking over period of several years.
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?apc=r90501-e96138-1

--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
IV. JARGON

*Cybercrime*
Cybercrime (or e-crime) refers to criminal offences which are committed
with the aid of ICTs (e.g. internet, mobile phone). Cybercrime laws may
encompass broad range of issues, including such activities as hacking,
intellectual property violations, dissemination of 'harmful' content
such as child pornography or racist and xenophobic materials. Some
experts divide cybercrime into three major categories, those committed
against persons (e.g. online harrasment or pornography distribution over
internet), cybercrimes against property (e.g. illegal sharing of
copyrighted movies and music in peer to peers networks or software
piracy), and cybercrimes against government (e.g. cyber terrorism).  In
many  countries, cybercrime bills focus merely on economic and state
security threads, and fail to recognise cybercrimes against persons,
including serious forms of crimes against women, such as cyberstalking
or cyber harassment.

At the international level, cybercrime is addressed in the Convention on
Cybercrime that attempts to harmonise national laws, improve
investigative techniques and increase cooperation among nations. Human
rights advocates criticize the failure of this treaty to protect
privacy, freedom of expression and civil liberties.

To understand unfamiliar ICT or gender terms visit the Jargon section:
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?apc=j--e--1

--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
V. WHO'S WHO

*EPIC:Electronic Privacy Frontier*
A public interest research center established in Washington in 1994.
EPIC focus on emerging civil liberties issues, such as protection of
privacy or freedom of expression in the information age. EPIC activities
involve policy research, public education, conferences, litigation,
publications, and advocacy.  Among other, EPIC runs 'Domestic Violence
and Privacy'  project aimed to help practitioners with privacy issues
their clients may face. As the part of this project, EPIC along with
domestic violence advocates recommended to include strong privacy
protections of online court records, which may put in risk domestic
violence survivors, into the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), the
first federal legislation specifically addressing domestic abuse in USA.
In their Gender and Electronic Privacy study, EPIC also examimes privacy
issues from gender perspective.
EPIC website: http://epic.org/
Gender and Electronic Privacy: http://epic.org/privacy/gender/
Domestic Violence and Privacy Project: http://epic.org/privacy/dv/

To find out more about key stakeholders in the field of ICTs, visit the
Who's Who in Policy section:
http://www.genderit.org/en/index.shtml?apc=w--e--1

--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
VI. DID YOU KNOW...

*Gender Centred Archive*
You can now check all editions of GenderIT.org thematic bulletin,
published since 2006, in Gender Centred Archive:
http://www.genderit.org/archive/?q=en/bulletin

*Sign up for Gender Centred thematic bulletin*
You can sign up for Gender Centred thematic e-bulletin focused on
topical gender and ICT policy themes and issued in average four times
per year: http://www.genderit.org/archive/?q=en/subscribe-bulletin
--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---
*CopyLeft. 2008 APC Women's Networking Support Programme (APC WNSP)*
Permission is granted to use this document for personal use, for
training and educational publications, and activities by peace,
environmental, human rights or development organisations. Please provide
an acknowledgement to APC WNSP.
--- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---

Sylvie Niombo
Brazzaville, Congo

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Envoyé avec Yahoo! Mail 
<http://us.rd.yahoo.com/mailuk/taglines/isp/control/*http://us.rd.yahoo.com/evt=52423/*http://fr.docs.yahoo.com/mail/overview/index.html>.
Une boite mail plus intelligente. --- You are currently subscribed to 
aisi-l as: [alice at apc.org] To unsubscribe, forward this message to 
leave-aisi-l-84914M at lyris.bellanet.org