Software Freedom Law Center

March 29, 2010 by Lysandra Ohrstrom

Free Software: Phase Two

Free software is ubiquitous. It runs everywhere on (almost) everything. The question that dominated most of the discussions at the Libre Planet Conference in Boston about a week ago is what now? How can the community capitalize on its achievements to make the movement more inclusive and reconceive the relationship between free software and privacy?

Most attendees seem to agree that it's time to proselytize to the non-hacker masses and get them to care about the privacy, freedom, and control they sacrifice when buying proprietary technology. At John Gilmore's group discussion on the future of free software Saturday morning, people proposed making the user interface more friendly; addressing freedom in the browser space; developing a solid gaming platform for free software. "My experience is that if you give people who play games the option to improve them they will," one attendee said. "I know people who became programmers so they could improve the games they played."

The SFLC's founding director, Eben Moglen, said in his talk that the movement has reached "a point of inflection." The challenge it will face in "Free Software: Phase Two" is to explain the relationship between privacy, the integrity of human personality, and free software. The movement will have to figure out how to convince people they need a solution to a problem they don't know exists, he said. "It's not about we're done. The war is over. It's about, what's next."

I think ordinary people who don't write computer code or think about the consequences of proprietary technology are aware that there is a problem; that they are forfeiting too much control over the tasks and relationships that make-up daily life to unknown forces in the digital world. The cyber security threats, malicious hacker attacks in China, car malfunctions, and voting booth problems that dominate the news cycle can all be traced back to potential software glitches. People know about these problems. They just don't know how the problems are connected or how to fix them.

The challenge facing the free software community is to explain how the Toyota recall and Google's withdrawal from China can be traced to one cause: namely giving for-profit companies monopolistic access to the source code of the thousands of software programs that we are increasingly reliant upon. What's lost in the mainstream media coverage of these seemingly unrelated events is an explanation of a solution that already exists: open, auditable source code that anyone can view and detect flaws in.

The first step for the SFLC and attendees of Libre Planet is to connect the various news headlines to a central problem: restricted access to source code. Then explain that it doesn't have to be this way. The technology wasn't designed to infantilize users. It was designed to give users a set of tools to collaborate and communicate in a digital world.

I think the long-term challenge facing the free software community is even more fundamental than telling people they need a solution to a problem they did not know existed. You need to remind people that they don't know how the machines they interact with every day work. You need to open the doors of the community to the end-users for whom the difference between C++ and Java Script is as foreign as Dari and Pashto. The challenge is to encourage people who are used to having a passive relationship with the technology they use to search inside their computers; to show them that digital citizenship is about more than curating the photos you post on Facebook and limiting the information you transmit online. It's about self-sufficiency. It's about first understanding how computers work and customizing them, and then taking control of your own information and the activities you have entrusted to Wizard of Oz-type entities for no other reason than you didn't think you had a choice.

Posted by Lysandra Ohrstrom on March 29, 2010

Tags: technology, community, free software, Social Networking, Software Freedom Law Center, Technology Policy, Eben Moglen, Online Privacy, John Gilmore, Free Software Foundation, Libre Planet

March 12, 2010 by James Vasile

New Export Rules Promote Internet Freedom

Earlier this week, the Office of Foreign Assets Control announced the relaxation of rules prohibiting export of software to Iran and Sudan. The new exemptions build on a recent easing of some rules governing exporting telecommunications technology to Cuba. These moves are surely an attempt to capitalize on the Iranian election demonstrations last summer that some called the "Twitter Revolution". They are also a sign that the Obama Administration is carrying out its plans to make internet freedom a pillar of US diplomacy.

I hope the revised OFAC rules are the beginning of a broad and nuanced re-examination of US technology export policy. They are certainly good news for Free Software developers who are currently prohibited from distributing their software in embargoed countries.

Generally speaking, US companies have been prohibited from trading with Iran and Sudan, despite some exemptions for humanitarian and medical reasons. To my knowledge, those exemptions have never been applied to Free Software. Against that backdrop of general prohibition, OFAC promulgated new exceptions allowing the exportation of "certain services and software incident to the exchange of personal communications over the Internet." As examples, OFAC lists "instant messaging, chat and e-mail, social networking, sharing of photos and movies, web browsing and blogging."

That list, however, is not exhaustive. The exemption is broad and applies to a wide range of technology. I asked an OFAC representative how broadly to interpret "incident to," and he confirmed that the exemption includes such software as web servers, content management systems or operating systems on which one could run an IM client. If those are incident to personal communication, presumably much other Free Software is too.

Though the decision to loosen export regulations is a step in the right direction, it falls far short of what the Free Software world really needs: permission to publicly distribute Free Software everywhere on the planet without jumping through invisible and innumerable hoops. First, the new rules are limited to Iran and Sudan. Other embargoed countries are still off limits. Second, while "incident to personal communication" applies to a lot of software, it does not describe everything, and its limits are unclear. Third, the exception is limited to software that is publicly available at no cost to the user.

This last point deserves some extra attention. If you charge for Free Software, the exemption does not apply. Also, other export controls are still in effect. This is true no matter how you structure it. A download fee to recoup the cost of distribution would be a problem. A paid service agreement to support the software would be a problem. Accepting donations from embargoed countries could be problematic. In other words, if your project gives away software but raises money by accepting money for ancillary goods or services, those ancillary charges can run afoul of the embargo rules.

Other caveats exist (especially regarding software that does encryption), and this post isn't meant to be legal advice on how to comply. My objective is to shed light on a decision that could signal the beginning of a gradual shift in US technology policy and a shift in the Free Software development landscape. If your project is trying to comply with export regulation, you should seek legal advice.

Export regulation is a patchwork quilt of mystifying rules. Most projects are wholly unaware that putting their code on the web might put them at risk of violating export laws they've never heard of. Those that try to comply face many difficulties. It's heartening to see inter-agency cooperation aimed at simplifying the legal environment for Free Software developers. By broadening exemptions to include certain communication technologies, the government acknowledges that internet access is a fundamental human right. These are welcome signs for the SFLC and the free software community overall. I hope the Commerce Department joins in and extends the personal communication technology exemption to include trade with Cuba and Syria as well.

Posted by James Vasile on March 12, 2010

Tags: encryption, Export, Sanctions, Embargo, Social Networking, Internet Freedom, Cuba, Iran, Sudan, James Vasile, OFAC, EAR, Twitter, Software Freedom Law Center, Technology Policy, Obama