- Email: [email protected]
WTO agreements and commitments on CD-ROM
CLSR Briefing
which considers that the Japanese copyright law did not conform with the wrO-based rules requiring wro members to provide at least 50 years' protection for sound recordings. The lack of copyright protection has led to losses of up to 1000 million ECU a year through piracy and lost royalties, according to the European phonogram industry.
Inventory Project spins a web The Global Inventory Project (GIP), an Information Society initiative, now has its own site on the World Wide Web. GIP is coordinated by the European Commission and Japan, as one of 11 pilot projects launched by the G7 countries after the Ministerial Summit held in Brussels in February 1995. A multimedia inventory of projects, studies and other initiatives, GIP will serve as an international point of reference to assist the development of the Information Society. The Web site provides multilingual access to data, and the project is open to international organizations and to countries that are not in the G7. Its address is http:// www.GIP.int.
Other News in Brief •
WTO Director General announces progress In IT agreement - Mr Renato Ruggiero, Director General of the World Trade Organization, in congratulating Member governments on the completion of negotiations on the Basic Telecommunications Services Agreement, has also announced progress in completing the Information Technology Agreement as well. In a statement, he said: "Although we do not yet have an agreement on the removal of tariffs for trade in Information Technology products, the results of recent negotiations have certainly been very encouraging. We now have commitments from countries re presenting more than 90% of the world market in IT products, putting us over the threshold that we set for an agreement. Trade in IT products is valued at over USS500 billion, comparable with trade in
216
agriculture. But the importance of the Information Technology Agree. ment cannot be measured in numbers alone. Taken together with the historic accord on telecommunlcations, an Information Technology Agreement holds the potential to unlock enormous gain in development and growth which would benefit all countries, developed and developing alike. Knowledge is the most essential raw material of the global economy and, with the progress we have made in these negotiations, we are clearly laying the foundation for the trading system of the 21 century." Editor's Note: The Ministerial Declaration on Trade and Information Technology Products (ITA) was signed on 13 December 1996 in Singapore by 28 governments at the conclusion of the first wro Ministerial Conference. It provides for the elimination of customs duties and other charges on Information Technology products through equal annual reductions beginning on 1 July 1997 and concluding on 1 January 2000. These tariff cuts are to be implemented by participants, applicable to all wro members. The implementation of the Agree. ment is contingent on the signing. on of other participants that would result in raising the Agreement's coverage to approximate 90% of world trade in IT products. The Agreement covers five main caregorles of products: computers (Including printers, scanners, monitors, hard-disk drives, power supplies etc.), telecom products (Including telephone sets, fax mao chines, modems, pagers etc.), semiconductors (including chips and wafers); semiconductor manufacturing equipment, software (e .g. diskettes and CD-ROMs) and scientific instruments. • wro agreements and commitments on CD-ROM - The World Trade Organization has released the first ever CD-ROM, containing all the agreements of the Uruguay Round, together with the commitments on goods and services made by the bulk of the world's trading nations. The CD-ROM has two unique fea-
Computer Law & Security Report Vol. 13 no. 3 1997 ©1997, Elsevier Science Ltd.
tures. It's 104 megabytes contain the equivalent of more than 30 000 pages of legal texts and tables of commitments - over 30 volumes of printed documents representing the complete results of the Uruguay Round of trade talks - for the first time , all on a single disk. The CDROM also includes software, which allows the user to search for Information and to compare various countries' commitments to open or keep open their markets for specific goods or services. Texts can be read in any of the three official wro language, English, French and Spanish. The new product is part of the wro's effort to make information and data related to the Uruguay Round agreements more easily accessible through a range of users. It is designed for lawyers, government officials, trade consultants, non-governmental organization workers, academic researchers, students, journalists, and anyone else needing quick and simple access to details of the agreements. The disk covers all the legal texts negotiated in the Round, various decisions, undertakings and declarations related to the agreements, and the schedule of market-opening commitments that more 100 countries made on thousands of products and services. Available from: wro Publications, World Trade Organization, Centre WlIIiam Rappard, Rue de Lausanne, 154CH-1211, Geneva 21, Switzerland, price SF 1000 for a single user, SF 2000 for LAN llcence, E-mal1: pu [email protected], tel: + 41 22 7395208 or fax: +41227395792. Technical requirements: PC with 80486 processor or higher, Windows 3.1 or higher, 8MBRAM and 1 MB free disk space or more. Graphlc adaptor, mouse and printer supported by windows. CD-ROM drive. • OECD Forum on Electronic COmmerce In the Internet The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development held a forum in Paris in March to discuss the rapid Advances in IT and the dramatic increase in the commercial use of open networks, such as the Internet. Virtual shopping, digl-
CLSR Briefing
tal contracts and electronic payment systems offer consumers a wide range of benefits. However, open networks are a fertile environment for fraud and misconduct, raising a number of consumer protection issues. The OECD believes that electronic business will not prosper until these issues have been addressed: "Uncertainty in the 'lawless' world of cyberspace has fuelled consumer fears with respect to the inadequacy of security measures, the protection of personal information, the use of transactional data and product liability protection. The borderline nature of the emerging virtual world requires that these concerns be dealt with at the international level"
The Forum, which attracted leading IT policy experts, consumer advocates and key players from the private sector, was organized by the OECD Committee on Consumer Policy, along with the OECD Committee for Information, Computer and Communications Policy. It is hoped that by studying the emerging electronic commercial environment that governments will be in a better position to agree on measures that will inspire greater confidence in the cyber-marketplace. Consumer policy delegates examined the evolving role of government, industry and consumer organizations, and the progress made in developing a unified response to these challenges. General enquiries to the OECD Communication Division, tel: + 33 1 45248091 or fax: + 33 1 45248003. • rru to release report on trade In telecommunications - The international Telecommunications Union has released the 1996/97 version of its annual market analysis report, The World Telecommunication Development Report (WTDR). The report tracks global changes in the telecommunications sector, and includes extensive analysis of market trends, as well as comprehensive statistical information on various market segments. Prepared by the Organization's Telecommunication Development Bureaux and Strategic Planning Unit, the theme
of this year's WIDR is Trade in Telecommunications. The report shows that telecommunications trade in 1995 amounted to US$96 billion, compared with less than US$50 billion at the start of the decade, and it will have passed the US$100 billion mark during 1996. Equipment trade is booming, with global export of equipment reaching USS58 billion in 1995, an increase of more than 20% over the previous year and a more than twofold rise since 1990. Exports now account for around one third of the total telecommunication equipment market, and this share is continuing to rise steadily. The boom in export trade has been largely driven by growth in demand for telecommunication services, which is in tum driving the construction and modernization of networks, both traditional fixed line networks and other types of network, such as cellular or the Internet. The telecommunications services market has grown from just under USS400 billion in 1990 to over US$600 billion in 1995. Until recently, though, opportunities for trade in telecoms services have been more limited than for equipment, due to governmental regimes which maintained monopoly service provision by a national carrier. The global trend now is towards a freeing up of markets, and this is expected to lead to strong growth in international trade in services. Four modes of delivery have been identified by which services can be traded: cross-border supply, com mercial presence, consumption abroad and movement of staff. Of these, the WIDR shows that crossborder provision of services is by far the most important International telephone calls have risen from under 4 billion minutes in 1975 to over 60 billion minutes in 1995, representing a growth rate of 15% a year. In 1995, international telephone calls generated USS53 billion in retail revenues, corresponding to 8.7% of the global telecoms service market. According to the report, direct commercial presence is the second most important way in which tele-
corns services are traded. Opportunities for foreign investment are now increasing as foreign investors take stakes in privatized operators, establish local subsidiaries, or participate in joint ventures. Mobile communications, in particular, have seen spectacular growth in many countries as governments have permitted the licensing of additional operators and the introducing of new services. Finally, while the percentage of telecom services trade generated from consumption abroad or the movement of staff is currently smaIl, the report shows it is growing as customers take up new service option, such as calling cards and mobile roaming, and as telecommunications consultancy activities increase. The report, World Telecommunication Development Report, is available through the IT Sales Services on tel: + 41 22 7306141, price 120 Swiss Francs. An executive summary of the report is available on the World Wide Web at httpi//www. Itu.lnt/lndlcators. • Recent decisions of the Canadian Information and Privacy Commissioner - Three decisions of the Information and Privacy Commissioner for British Colombia, David Flaherty, have raised issues of interest to other jurisdictions. In one case he upheld a decision by the Ministry of Social Services to withhold from an applicant records containing the identities and Identifying information of individuals who lodged chIld abuse complaints with the Ministry about the applicant's father. The applicant had requested, with the consent of her father, all records containing the nature and source of allegations or complaints made against him. The Ministry disclosed numerous records, but refused to disclose the identities of, or Identifying information about, the complainants, stating that it would reveal confidential sources of law enforcement lnformation and would be an unreasonable invasion of the complaInants' personal privacy. In another decision, the Commls sioner ruled that correspondence
Computer Law & Security Report Vol. 13 no. 3 1997
©
1997, Elsevier Science Ltd.
217
which considers that the Japanese copyright law did not conform with the wrO-based rules requiring wro members to provide at least 50 years' protection for sound recordings. The lack of copyright protection has led to losses of up to 1000 million ECU a year through piracy and lost royalties, according to the European phonogram industry.
Inventory Project spins a web The Global Inventory Project (GIP), an Information Society initiative, now has its own site on the World Wide Web. GIP is coordinated by the European Commission and Japan, as one of 11 pilot projects launched by the G7 countries after the Ministerial Summit held in Brussels in February 1995. A multimedia inventory of projects, studies and other initiatives, GIP will serve as an international point of reference to assist the development of the Information Society. The Web site provides multilingual access to data, and the project is open to international organizations and to countries that are not in the G7. Its address is http:// www.GIP.int.
Other News in Brief •
WTO Director General announces progress In IT agreement - Mr Renato Ruggiero, Director General of the World Trade Organization, in congratulating Member governments on the completion of negotiations on the Basic Telecommunications Services Agreement, has also announced progress in completing the Information Technology Agreement as well. In a statement, he said: "Although we do not yet have an agreement on the removal of tariffs for trade in Information Technology products, the results of recent negotiations have certainly been very encouraging. We now have commitments from countries re presenting more than 90% of the world market in IT products, putting us over the threshold that we set for an agreement. Trade in IT products is valued at over USS500 billion, comparable with trade in
216
agriculture. But the importance of the Information Technology Agree. ment cannot be measured in numbers alone. Taken together with the historic accord on telecommunlcations, an Information Technology Agreement holds the potential to unlock enormous gain in development and growth which would benefit all countries, developed and developing alike. Knowledge is the most essential raw material of the global economy and, with the progress we have made in these negotiations, we are clearly laying the foundation for the trading system of the 21 century." Editor's Note: The Ministerial Declaration on Trade and Information Technology Products (ITA) was signed on 13 December 1996 in Singapore by 28 governments at the conclusion of the first wro Ministerial Conference. It provides for the elimination of customs duties and other charges on Information Technology products through equal annual reductions beginning on 1 July 1997 and concluding on 1 January 2000. These tariff cuts are to be implemented by participants, applicable to all wro members. The implementation of the Agree. ment is contingent on the signing. on of other participants that would result in raising the Agreement's coverage to approximate 90% of world trade in IT products. The Agreement covers five main caregorles of products: computers (Including printers, scanners, monitors, hard-disk drives, power supplies etc.), telecom products (Including telephone sets, fax mao chines, modems, pagers etc.), semiconductors (including chips and wafers); semiconductor manufacturing equipment, software (e .g. diskettes and CD-ROMs) and scientific instruments. • wro agreements and commitments on CD-ROM - The World Trade Organization has released the first ever CD-ROM, containing all the agreements of the Uruguay Round, together with the commitments on goods and services made by the bulk of the world's trading nations. The CD-ROM has two unique fea-
Computer Law & Security Report Vol. 13 no. 3 1997 ©1997, Elsevier Science Ltd.
tures. It's 104 megabytes contain the equivalent of more than 30 000 pages of legal texts and tables of commitments - over 30 volumes of printed documents representing the complete results of the Uruguay Round of trade talks - for the first time , all on a single disk. The CDROM also includes software, which allows the user to search for Information and to compare various countries' commitments to open or keep open their markets for specific goods or services. Texts can be read in any of the three official wro language, English, French and Spanish. The new product is part of the wro's effort to make information and data related to the Uruguay Round agreements more easily accessible through a range of users. It is designed for lawyers, government officials, trade consultants, non-governmental organization workers, academic researchers, students, journalists, and anyone else needing quick and simple access to details of the agreements. The disk covers all the legal texts negotiated in the Round, various decisions, undertakings and declarations related to the agreements, and the schedule of market-opening commitments that more 100 countries made on thousands of products and services. Available from: wro Publications, World Trade Organization, Centre WlIIiam Rappard, Rue de Lausanne, 154CH-1211, Geneva 21, Switzerland, price SF 1000 for a single user, SF 2000 for LAN llcence, E-mal1: pu [email protected], tel: + 41 22 7395208 or fax: +41227395792. Technical requirements: PC with 80486 processor or higher, Windows 3.1 or higher, 8MBRAM and 1 MB free disk space or more. Graphlc adaptor, mouse and printer supported by windows. CD-ROM drive. • OECD Forum on Electronic COmmerce In the Internet The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development held a forum in Paris in March to discuss the rapid Advances in IT and the dramatic increase in the commercial use of open networks, such as the Internet. Virtual shopping, digl-
CLSR Briefing
tal contracts and electronic payment systems offer consumers a wide range of benefits. However, open networks are a fertile environment for fraud and misconduct, raising a number of consumer protection issues. The OECD believes that electronic business will not prosper until these issues have been addressed: "Uncertainty in the 'lawless' world of cyberspace has fuelled consumer fears with respect to the inadequacy of security measures, the protection of personal information, the use of transactional data and product liability protection. The borderline nature of the emerging virtual world requires that these concerns be dealt with at the international level"
The Forum, which attracted leading IT policy experts, consumer advocates and key players from the private sector, was organized by the OECD Committee on Consumer Policy, along with the OECD Committee for Information, Computer and Communications Policy. It is hoped that by studying the emerging electronic commercial environment that governments will be in a better position to agree on measures that will inspire greater confidence in the cyber-marketplace. Consumer policy delegates examined the evolving role of government, industry and consumer organizations, and the progress made in developing a unified response to these challenges. General enquiries to the OECD Communication Division, tel: + 33 1 45248091 or fax: + 33 1 45248003. • rru to release report on trade In telecommunications - The international Telecommunications Union has released the 1996/97 version of its annual market analysis report, The World Telecommunication Development Report (WTDR). The report tracks global changes in the telecommunications sector, and includes extensive analysis of market trends, as well as comprehensive statistical information on various market segments. Prepared by the Organization's Telecommunication Development Bureaux and Strategic Planning Unit, the theme
of this year's WIDR is Trade in Telecommunications. The report shows that telecommunications trade in 1995 amounted to US$96 billion, compared with less than US$50 billion at the start of the decade, and it will have passed the US$100 billion mark during 1996. Equipment trade is booming, with global export of equipment reaching USS58 billion in 1995, an increase of more than 20% over the previous year and a more than twofold rise since 1990. Exports now account for around one third of the total telecommunication equipment market, and this share is continuing to rise steadily. The boom in export trade has been largely driven by growth in demand for telecommunication services, which is in tum driving the construction and modernization of networks, both traditional fixed line networks and other types of network, such as cellular or the Internet. The telecommunications services market has grown from just under USS400 billion in 1990 to over US$600 billion in 1995. Until recently, though, opportunities for trade in telecoms services have been more limited than for equipment, due to governmental regimes which maintained monopoly service provision by a national carrier. The global trend now is towards a freeing up of markets, and this is expected to lead to strong growth in international trade in services. Four modes of delivery have been identified by which services can be traded: cross-border supply, com mercial presence, consumption abroad and movement of staff. Of these, the WIDR shows that crossborder provision of services is by far the most important International telephone calls have risen from under 4 billion minutes in 1975 to over 60 billion minutes in 1995, representing a growth rate of 15% a year. In 1995, international telephone calls generated USS53 billion in retail revenues, corresponding to 8.7% of the global telecoms service market. According to the report, direct commercial presence is the second most important way in which tele-
corns services are traded. Opportunities for foreign investment are now increasing as foreign investors take stakes in privatized operators, establish local subsidiaries, or participate in joint ventures. Mobile communications, in particular, have seen spectacular growth in many countries as governments have permitted the licensing of additional operators and the introducing of new services. Finally, while the percentage of telecom services trade generated from consumption abroad or the movement of staff is currently smaIl, the report shows it is growing as customers take up new service option, such as calling cards and mobile roaming, and as telecommunications consultancy activities increase. The report, World Telecommunication Development Report, is available through the IT Sales Services on tel: + 41 22 7306141, price 120 Swiss Francs. An executive summary of the report is available on the World Wide Web at httpi//www. Itu.lnt/lndlcators. • Recent decisions of the Canadian Information and Privacy Commissioner - Three decisions of the Information and Privacy Commissioner for British Colombia, David Flaherty, have raised issues of interest to other jurisdictions. In one case he upheld a decision by the Ministry of Social Services to withhold from an applicant records containing the identities and Identifying information of individuals who lodged chIld abuse complaints with the Ministry about the applicant's father. The applicant had requested, with the consent of her father, all records containing the nature and source of allegations or complaints made against him. The Ministry disclosed numerous records, but refused to disclose the identities of, or Identifying information about, the complainants, stating that it would reveal confidential sources of law enforcement lnformation and would be an unreasonable invasion of the complaInants' personal privacy. In another decision, the Commls sioner ruled that correspondence
Computer Law & Security Report Vol. 13 no. 3 1997
©
1997, Elsevier Science Ltd.
217