Re: [OSM-legal-talk] Warning about not mapping military areas
Am Di., 22. Dez. 2020 um 10:12 Uhr schrieb Edward Bainton < bainton@gmail.com>: > > Dangerous: I think there's a risk that by saying, "please follow local > laws" (rather than saying nothing), we open ourselves to accusations of not > policing "our" mappers properly. You can imagine the military attaché of > some country emailing OSMF to say, "That request is very weak. I think you > should toughen it up. In fact, here is a list of mappers whose edits I want > you to revert because, ***by your own policy***, they should not have > made them in breach of our laws". > question is, what would OSMF do when the Chinese government approaches them and says, "this is the list of mappers that have illegally added things to OSM, please help us identifying them by providing their email addresses, etc." and what would they do if it was the French government? Or the British? Imagine they claim it is for finding terrorists, or somehow connected to national security. Or simply an offense. We would likely not be able to reject any of these when coming from the British authorities (or from someone else proxied through them). Are there board rules how to deal with such cases? Has it ever happened so far? As far as I know (not really far actually) in Britain there is the legal possibility of gag orders, i.e. if the thing is considered "secret" authorities can order OSMF to not even speak about it. > > A warning along the lines of "Mapping military sites is sometimes illegal > under laws of that country" would be ok, but I would much prefer not even > to do that. I haven't been on the lists long, but I don't recall anyone > saying "I've just been interrogated for mapping this base without realising > that was illegal - please don't do it!" On my information there's no > problem to solve - just worries about "what ifs" - and so we should say > nothing. > In Italy I have once seen a sign which said something along the lines of "military area, survey forbidden, also by memory", while it usually says something like "no photographs". I would bet that surveying military installations in great detail is probably forbidden in any country, but the level of detail that is allowed may vary by large. It is also very common to not be able to take photographs. For instance I would guess that mapping the facilities that are blacked out in this image could get you into trouble: https://yorkshirecnd.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/sigint-cryptologic-platform-768x575.jpg Cheers Martin ___ legal-talk mailing list legal-talk@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/legal-talk
Re: [OSM-legal-talk] Warning about not mapping military areas
Hello list, some things come to mind 1) The Foundation is bound by laws that govern its own jurisdiction. (obligatory?) Other laws shall be respected to the extend the Foundation chooses to. (facultative?) 2) There are 3rd party rights, that the Foundation observes globally. Under its Contributor Terms¹ the Foundation: “respect[s] the intellectual property rights of others.” 3) I have found nothing else at first glance. I have also found no rules concerning classified material under facultative law. There is a a catch-all element that allows the Foundation to remove “incompatible” data¹. I would argue that this is mostly concerned with license compatibility or grossly misplaced contend which could not be viewed as a contribution to a map at all. Provided disputed data is not protected under some intellectual property right (I see us pretty deep into fanatasy-land already), we probably might not want to burden the Foundations guardians with becoming the wikileaks-of-maps. I do not think OSM or the Foundation should intervene and forbid the mapping of military installations, that are publicly announced and quite probably public knowledge. The argument to disallow mapping them is a very abstract threat or danger. There was no concrete way stated in which a publicly known military base would be actually vulnerable through its presence on a public map. No specific risk was named nor assessed. The abstract possibility of unknown danger is no ground to intervene, no matter how afraid or concerned one is. Such rules would be a) irrational and b) probably violating constitutional rights and the rule of law in many democratic states. Privately you may behave as irrational as you want to, but to justify common rules there’s only reason we have. Unless there is a specific danger or a substantiated request by an recognized authority, we should not intervene. 4) I agree with the notion, that the purpose of the Foundation or OSM is /not/ to advise as to possible legalities that do not concern the laws the Foundation observes (see 1) Such an advise (i.e. a warning) could be viewed as an endorsement of such laws or a certain reading. Given the multiplicity of laws around the world and the diversity of opinions about them such advice would overstretch OSMs cause greatly. I have serious doubts if any agreement could be reached about the contend of any advice. 5) I would even go so far and claim that the general advice to “stick to the law when mapping” is contrary to OSMs cause. Because OSM is about freedom. Freedom is what allows us agency. In other words: freedom allows you to state yourself as the subject and originator of our own deeds. I consider OSM to be an exercise in freedom, as sports are an exercise in equality, fairness and the principle of achievement. OSM is an endeavour to identify what freedom may look like, if taken seriously. Since Kant this freedom includes the freedom to reject a law, if considered unjust. His formulation of autonomy concludes that rational agents are bound to the moral law by their own will². Kant did not prove and did not claim to have found the free will within human beings, he states it as an aspiration, as something we wants to believe in, to view ourselves as the makers of our own history, not its victim or bystander. GWF Hegel even goes so far as to claim, without the presumption of the freedom of others, we are unable to perceive ourselves as free. To be truly free, OSM must respect the autonomy of its contributors as long as OSM itself is not in violation of the law it is bound to and its own rules. Thanks Tom ¹ https://wiki.osmfoundation.org/wiki/Licence/Contributor_Terms ² https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kantian_ethics ___ legal-talk mailing list legal-talk@openstreetmap.org https://lists.openstreetmap.org/listinfo/legal-talk
Re: [OSM-legal-talk] Warning about not mapping military areas
(Frederik's came in while I was drafting this.) What was the reason for you wanting to put that warning there? Do you know of actual problems that a warning like that would have prevented, or was it (as your email suggests) "Looks like others have done this; we should to" ? With all due respect (if this reads fiercely, it's against the idea, not you) I would say the warning is unnecessary, paternalistic, and dangerous for OSM. Unnecessary: anyone in a country that makes it illegal to map military sites knows about it (or ought to know). eg, when visiting Syria I only had to reach for my camera within half a mile of a military base (some of which were "invisible", ha ha, as intelligence buildings) and my companions clamped my hands to my waist for safety. Also there's no need to remind each other to obey the law: the essence of the law is that it is to be obeyed - including laws on trespass, so I disagree with Frederik on that. Paternalistic: if, on the other hand, if someone has taken a conscious decision to map a military base in breach of their local laws, that is a decision for them, not for OSM. As Mateusz says, many countries have laws that (I would say sitting in the UK) go against the spirit of openness on which OSM is founded, and we shouldn't chill ourselves to the coldest setting out there. Dangerous: I think there's a risk that by saying, "please follow local laws" (rather than saying nothing), we open ourselves to accusations of not policing "our" mappers properly. You can imagine the military attaché of some country emailing OSMF to say, "That request is very weak. I think you should toughen it up. In fact, here is a list of mappers whose edits I want you to revert because, ***by your own policy***, they should not have made them in breach of our laws". A warning along the lines of "Mapping military sites is sometimes illegal under laws of that country" would be ok, but I would much prefer not even to do that. I haven't been on the lists long, but I don't recall anyone saying "I've just been interrogated for mapping this base without realising that was illegal - please don't do it!" On my information there's no problem to solve - just worries about "what ifs" - and so we should say nothing. On Tue, 22 Dec 2020 at 07:48, Mateusz Konieczny via legal-talk < legal-talk@openstreetmap.org> wrote: > I am strongly against anything that would imply that not following Chinese > law > is violating OSM rules. It is not, also for people under Chinese > juridistriction > > Though making people aware about such laws seems OK to me, > as long it is not done in way that suggests that OSM enforces or supports > this laws. > > Obviously, if such laws would be enacted in UK then OSMF would be legally > obligated to follow it - but we do not need to enforce Chinese or Russian > laws. > > I would propose to note that > > - mapping military installations may be dangerous, also for legal reasons > - mapping military installations is not against OSM rules > > Dec 22, 2020, 01:50 by graemefi...@gmail.com: > > Hi > > I have recently raised a proposal for mapping military bases > https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Proposed_features/Military_bases, & I > included a "warning" (*As always, if it is illegal in your country to map > military establishments, please do not do so)*, similar to warnings, & > discussions, that I have noticed on other military pages eg > https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Key:military, > > https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Talk:Key:military#.22please.2C_please_do_not_mark_military_areas.22.3F > & > https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Tag:landuse%3Dmilitary. > > My inclusion of this warning on my proposal has created some argument that > we shouldn't include such warnings, as while it may be illegal for > residents of any particular country to map military areas, it isn't illegal > for them to be added to OSM eg > > https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Talk:Proposed_features/Military_bases#Remove_claim_that_not_respecting_mapping_ban_is_against_OSM_rules > https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/tagging/2020-December/057105.html > & following posts > > My claim is not that it is not illegal - but that it is not against OSM > rules. > > - > > For reference, China makes illegal to map China without special permission > ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restrictions_on_geographic_data_in_China > ), > > India censors media with borders they dislike > > https://www.hindustantimes.com/delhi/map-of-kashmir-lands-economist-in-censor-trouble/story-0Dk3GPzysf2UhtI69cTS3K.html > > - > > But, as far as I know, violating this laws is not against any OSM rules, > also for people > within jurisdiction of this countries. > > What is not changed is that government may use their powers to punish > someone > for such cases of breaking law. > > - > > >
