[3810] in WWW Security List Archive
Germany bans cookies! (and a whole lot more)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (John Anonymous MacDonald, a remail)
Mon Dec 16 06:03:01 1996
Date: Sun, 15 Dec 1996 23:48:32 -0800
To: www-security@ns2.rutgers.edu
From: nobody@cypherpunks.ca (John Anonymous MacDonald, a remailer node)
Errors-To: owner-www-security@ns2.rutgers.edu
web servers within Germany anyway... as of August 97... see below
Germany Passes Sweeping Cyberspace Law
The German government approved a bill Wednesday aimed at
regulating the Internet and protecting user privacy while banning
smut, pro-Nazi content and online fraud. The so-called
"multimedia law" essentially extends current German laws to the
dominion of cyberspace, placing responsibility for suspect
content on suppliers, but without clearly defining whether a
supplier could also be construed to make a carrier -- such as an
online service like CompuServe or AOL Bertelsmann Online --
also liable.
The law is scheduled to take effect in August 1997, prior to the
1998 deregulation of the European telecommunications market.
Under the law, online services could be held responsible for
illegal material if they have the technology to block transmission
of such content, and after notification, still disseminate the
objectionable content.
The law also calls for content to be tagged electronically if
unsuitable for minors to ensure it could be filtered out --similar
to the V-chip television initiative in the U.S. The law would also
>>>>>>>>>>>> prohibit "cookies" -- tiny programs that trace a user's path
through the Net, recording what they visit, examine and
purchase. Instead, the law would require that services give users
the opportunity to use a site or service anonymously.
The German law also puts into place the idea of so called "digital
signatures" -- a string of coded information which would clearly
identify the origin of messages, files and images shipped via the
Net. Such signatures would use a central authority to prevent
fraudulent commercial transactions on the computer network by
matching a publicly accessible data string with a confidential
string of numbers, also called a key.
www.mediacentral.com/Magazines/MediaDaily/Archive/1996121207.html/634827
