>Date: Wed, 19 Apr 2000 14:26:48 +0200 >From: Press Agency Ozgurluk <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > >Subject: Turkey Debates Cyberspace Controls > >http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20000416/wr/turkey_internet_1.html > >Sunday April 16 10:09 PM ET >Turkey Debates Cyberspace Controls >By Elif Unal > >ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey is considering patrolling cyberspace for threats >to its security using a powerful watchdog body which includes senior >military and intelligence officials. > >Such a move would be likely to attract further European criticism of >Turkey, which has to improve its human rights record before joining the >European Union. > >``Protection of the information base...against those with evil intentions, >terrorist activities and disasters has gained importance,'' says a Defense >Ministry draft law called the ''Bill on The National Information Security >Organization And Its Duties.'' > >For the Turkish authorities there are two main ``terrorist'' threats; the >separatist Kurdish rebel movement and militant Islamic activism. > >Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the battle with the guerrilla Kurdistan >Workers Party (PKK) was fought in the mountains of the southeast. Now, >with >the capture of PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan and crippling guerrilla defeats >at the hands of the military, PKK operations have moved, in part at least, >to cyberspace. > >Journalists can be, and are, prosecuted for citing PKK statements or >comments by PKK members. Politicians are jailed under sedition laws, >applied often in draconian fashion. > >[...] > >``Such regulation is also needed for the protection of communication among >state institutions which has to be secret,'' said Ziya Aktas, a government >MP and head of a parliamentary group on information and information >technologies. > >[...] > >The draft bill goes as far as obliging locally registered Internet >corporations, public and private, to take any measures the watchdog body >may request ``at any level of secrecy.'' This, experts say, could involve >the passing on of private e-mail correspondence and other information >submitted to the World Wide Web. > >``Those who do not fulfil their obligations will be punished with one to >five years in jail,'' it says. > >The composition of the supervisory board also raises eyebrows. > >It would be chaired by the prime minister and include intelligence >officials and relevant cabinet members as well as the secretary general of >the military-dominated National Security Council. > >[...] > >-------------------------------------------------------------------------- >POLITECH -- the moderated mailing list of politics and technology >To subscribe, visit http://www.politechbot.com/info/subscribe.html >This message is archived at http://www.politechbot.com/ >-------------------------------------------------------------------------- > __________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. Box 66 00841 Helsinki - Finland +358-40-7177941, fax +358-9-7591081 e-mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.kominf.pp.fi ___________________________________ [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe/unsubscribe messages mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] ___________________________________
