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Howard Schdmit, The Whitehouse's Cybersecurity coordinator has revealed the US Government's plans for tackling attacks on it's networks. He has promised transparency. The official announcement (this bookmark) is very vague in it's initiatives. It will be interesting to see whether their can really separate US government networks from other parts of the Internet.  Cyber attacks are definitely increasing and play a major part in conflicts between countries. China amongst others is said to have attacked & attempted to hack and launch DoS attacks on US government networks and Russia shut down the Georgian communications infrastructure during the last week between the two countries et. )

"The invisible shareholders, who are either money launderers, drug dealers or some people using government money, pick the directors of the banks because of their holdings, but have refused to disclose their identities," he said.

SeeClickFix is a free mobile phone and web app that enables citizens to take care of their neighborhoods by seeing non-emergency issues in their neighborhoods, clicking to create 'tickets' describing the issue and how to resolve it, and fixing the issue or reporting it to whoever can. This article discusses the technology and tools working to help citizens get involved in their communities and their governments. It also discusses the Gov 2.0 Expo held recently in the US. I found the discussion of mobile citizen governance apps particularly interesting, as it would be something that could be rolled out fairly easily.

SMH article about the Australian government's "Gov2.0" initiative which encourages government employees to use social media more.  

The White House will now archive its tweets. Wonder what role Twitter will play in the not-so-far-away 2012 US presidential campaign. If Obama runs for re-election... will he start the race ahead?

This article cogently describes the current US govt approach to policy and call for an Internet Policy 3.0. Also clarifies points and describes the issues in regulation and governance that are raised in response.

A conversation between two leading authorities about how governments are using the internet and ICTs to advance their political agendas and policies.

"Let us all renounce the harsh rhetoric about the POTUS [president of the U.S.]. Several, including myself, hv used inappropriate language. Let's remain civil! #tcot." See full article from DailyFinance: http://srph.it/dCqW2m

Australian government is planning to accedeto the concil of Europe's Convention on Cybercrim, to further govern online content. several opinons appeared, one is saying that "age-appropriate" filtering is more effective than compelling ISPs to provide access to stored electronic communications for foreign law enforcement pruposes.

The US government is being encouraged by various committees and "experts" to increase regulation of the Internet. The Internet is compared industry to the car industry before regulation was introduced to make cars safer. Apparently the "Internet Wild West" is over!

"Some criticize me, others insult me. I don't care," he said. "It's a form of contact with the world." The president joined Twitter on April 27 in an attempt to counter adversaries who have actively used the site to make accusations of human rights violations, organize protests and - above all - ridicule Chavez. I found this interesting for many reasons - Chavez's use of Twitter as a communication mode but also to counter criticism of his government and person.

The Pew Research Center is not as unbiased a source of information as they'd like to portray but they are used as the source for much of the statistics that will get passed around. Haven't finished this paper yet but looking forward to the section on control and governance.

The Pew Research Center is not as unbiased a source of information as they'd like to portray but they are used as the source for much of the statistics that will get passed around. Haven't finished this paper yet but looking forward to the section on control and governance.

In the words of one infamous US President, Australia - "you are either with us or against us". Australia's proposed mandatory filtering laws runs contrary to stated US foreign policy championing an open internet. Read US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton's remarks on internet freedom.

This article introduces another 'body' called auDA the Australian domain name administrator. The article discusses a complaint from the president of the Australian Web Site Developers Association after 500 sites he had set up, and $100K later were just switched off by the auDA bases on their assessment of use. Perhaps the auDA needs its own audit and regulation over policy approval!

The increasing use of 'free' webmail services, and indeed full office suites, from online providers by business and governments means an increasing amount of funding for encryption and ad free internets. This potentially leads to a new digital divide. The corporate or private internet of the wealthy, and the hyper surveilled commercial internet of the many.

International network, local lawsuit and regulation. The Australian Government is asked to justify the business deal with Google for it's privacy issue. Since google revealed to mistakenly capture private information from it's street scanning.

The US regulator for the communications industry is expected to announce it will extend the rules currently governing telephone service provision to apply to ISPs in a bid to set net-neutrality rules that would bar companies from favoring their own Web content and services.

Government and industry leaders in the US call for international cooperation on internet security. The three-day conference discussed issues ranging from cyberterrorism to organised cybercrime. Measures suggested included "cyber defense exercises" and enlisting the support of the private sector.

Good article on the social and political uses of social media (sic.) in Indonesia. There have been attempts to filter/censor content, but so far they have been avoided. Uses of Twitter, Facebook by politicians is also described. 

Interesting data on how and why British politicians are slow in the use of social media for political campaigning. They still trust other more traditional channels. Interesting data: Europeans are lagging behind American policy makers in their use of Twitter and other means of digital communication. Might the higher age average of European citizens have something to do with it?