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Britain's privacy rules are under assault by rambunctious journalists, Twitter users and even sports fans, as thousands defy a judge's order keeping the name of a well-known soccer star secret. The disclosure of the sportsman's identity has made a mockery of recently introduced rules protecting public figures' privacy, raising questions about whether it was desirable - or even possible - to order journalists to keep a secret in an age where a single rogue tweet can be read around the world.Britain's privacy rules are under assault by rambunctious journalists, Twitter users and even sports fans, as thousands defy a judge's order keeping the name of a well-known soccer star secret. The disclosure of the sportsman's identity has made a mockery of recently introduced rules protecting public figures' privacy, raising questions about whether it was desirable - or even possible - to order journalists to keep a secret in an age where a single rogue tweet can be read around the world.

KOLKATA: The Indian government will shortly impose hefty penalties on business process outsourcing (BPO) firms that compromise on the data privacy of individual customers. It is likely to tighten the provisions linked to data privacy and data protection in the Information Technology (IT) Act, 2000, and is working closely with the US to emulate existing global best practices in the realm of data security and privacy, a senior official in the communications ministry told ET. There is a view in sections of the government that the present IT Act, 2000, does not adequately address data privacy concerns of individuals . And hence the need for more stringent legislation by way of penal provisions to effectively deal with companies passing on sensitive personal in-formation of individuals to third-parties without prior consent.

"NEW DELHI: "Right to privacy," like other fundamental rights in the Constitution and statutory rights under various laws, will soon become a reality. Union Law Minister Veerappa Moily indicated that a bill in this regard would be introduced in the monsoon session. The Right to Privacy Bill (a copy is with The Hindu) is to provide for such a right to citizens of India and to regulate collection, maintenance, use and dissemination of their personal information. Talking to The Hindu, Mr. Moily said the bill also provided for penal action for violation of such right."

The law ministry is working on a proposal to make right to privacy a fundamental right in the Indian Constitution. The right to privacy would include the right to confidentiality of communication, confidentiality of private or family life, protection of his honour and good name, protection from search, detention or exposure of lawful communication between individuals, privacy from surveillance, confidentiality of banking, financial, medical and legal information, protection from identity theft of various kinds, protection of use of a person's photographs, fingerprints, DNA samples and other samples taken at police stations and other places and protection of data relating to individual.

"Worried about the negative impact of the leakage of intercepted conversations, the Centre has begun working on codifying privacy laws in the country. The new law will frame rules for monitoring phone and the Internet and for providing a redressal mechanism in case of breach of privacy. "

Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, obtained phone records of a whistleblower professor's conversations with journalists without his consent or the sanction of a court or investigative agencies, to charge the faculty member with violating service rules. IIT Kharagpur obtained call details of conversations between computer science professor Rajeev Kumar and journalists from two leading English dailies, drawing allegations of violation of both law and privacy. Other than a customer, only government probe agencies and courts - and not employers in general - can demand call details or records from telecom service providers in India. Service providers also swear to ensure customer privacy in their license agreement with the government.

SAN FRANCISCO: An internet privacy group that prodded US regulators to scrutinize Google Inc is miffed about getting cut out of a class action settlement over the search behemoth's Buzz social network. The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) objected to the settlement in a court filing this week, claiming Google and others decided to fund groups already benefiting from the company's largesse.

IT is 30 years since a Congress Member of Parliament, V.N. Gadgil, suggested an Act for the protection of privacy, designed, no doubt, to curb press exposure of the wrongdoings of politicians. In reality, it is all but impossible to draft a statute that strikes a fair balance between people's right to know and the protection of a person's privacy. In India, as in the United Kingdom, there is no tort of privacy. India's law of torts (that is, civil wrongs punishable in damages) is based on case law, English and foreign. However, the Supreme Court of India has inferred right to privacy from the ones explicitly guaranteed. Article 21 of the Constitution contains a guarantee of personal liberty and it is obvious that personal liberty also involves the right to privacy.

Search giant Google Inc has settled with US regulators investigating privacy problems that cropped up in its botched roll-out of social network Buzz, the Federal Trade Commission said. Under the deal, Google agreed to have independent privacy audits every two years for the next 20 years. "This order technically applies only to Google but we think that many of the provisions of the order are good business practices" that the rest of the industry should follow, said Jessica Rich, deputy director of the FTC's Consumer Protection Bureau.

Industrialist Ratan Tata has questioned in the Supreme Court the lackadaisical attitude of the Centre in allowing free distribution and publication of his private conversations with lobbyist Nira Radia recorded by the Directorate General of Income Tax without taking any steps to retrieve the stored material or to find out the source of leakage. Mr. Tata, who filed a writ petition alleging that the publication of the tapes had infringed his right to privacy, in his supplementary affidavit said that the power of the law enforcement agencies to record telephone conversations itself "constitutes a serious encroachment upon the right of privacy guaranteed by Article 21 of the Constitution." He made it clear that the present petition was not designed to somehow keep back from publication any conversation to which he allegedly was a party for any oblique purpose. It was filed to seek redress of a wholesale violation of the constitutional rights of a large number of persons, including the petitioner and including a host of corporate entities by the indiscriminate publication of wiretrap material procured by questionable means.

The Supreme Court on Monday issued notice to the Centre and the Telecom Ministry on a petition for a direction to frame guidelines for telephone tapping without infringing on the right to privacy of citizens. A Bench of Justice G. S. Singhvi and Justice A. K. Ganguly issued notice on the public interest litigation petition filed by advocate Ravinder Kumar, seeking direction that interceptions which were purely private in nature should be kept out of the ambit of tapping. The Bench directed the matter to be tagged with the petition filed by industrialist Ratan Tata, which alleged that publication of his private conversations with corporate lobbyist Nira Radia tapes had infringed his right to privacy.

Industrialist Ratan Tata on Thursday accused the government of adopting a "lackadaisical" manner in protecting the right to privacy, citing his case as an apt example. "Today my concern is that government is not giving serious consideration and attention to the issue. There may be other CDs which can be leaked and brought into public domain. There is a lackadaisical approach on the part of the government," senior Advocate Harish Salve, appearing for Tata in the Supreme Court, contended. Tata's concerns prompted the Bench of Justices G S Singhvi and A K Ganguly to remark that though the government " have the right to tap but they also have the duty to protect it and ensure that it is not leaked". "They have to safeguard it (the tapes) effectively. In the fast-changing time and developing technology, privacy is virtually disappearing and is being diluted," the court observed.

"The Supreme Court will take up on Tuesday Tata Group Chairman Ratan Tata's plea on the right to privacy after the leakage of his telephonic conversations with corporate lobbyist Niira Radia tapped by the Income Tax Department. A bench headed by Justices G S Singhvi will examine the issues raised by Tata, including the questions of right to privacy and right to freedom of speech and expression as envisaged under the Constitution. Tata, in his petition, has said that several parts of the conversations were purely private in nature which were spoken casually and could not be taken seriously. He pleaded the online portals and the news media should be restrained from making his conversations public. "

The country's top planning body the Planning Commission is working on a national privacy policy following fears of the civil society that the government was trying to get private information of individuals without enough safeguards. The plan panel has constituted an expert group under the chairmanship of former chief justice of Delhi high court AP Shah to draft a legislative framework to ensure technical safeguards against misuse of the private information sought by the government for grounds of national security or delivery of welfare measures.

New Delhi: Indian citizens won't be shielded from prying by government agencies if the Union home ministry gets its way with the proposed privacy law. The ministry is insisting that intelligence and law enforcement agencies be kept out of the purview of the proposed Act, and allowed to continue monitoring the activities and carry out electronic surveillance of citizens, officials familiar with the situation said.

Facebook has quietly expanded the availability of technology to automatically identify people in photos, renewing concerns about the privacy practices of the world's top social networking service. The feature, which Facebook automatically enabled for Facebook users, has been expanded from the US to "most countries", Facebook said on its official blog. Its "Tag Suggestions" feature uses facial recognition technology to speed up the process of labeling friends and acquaintances that appear in photos posted on Facebook.

The Supreme Court today said it will hold final hearing on a day-to-day basis from April 19 on Tata Group chairman Ratan Tata's plea to bar online portals and electronic media from airing his phone conversation with corporate lobbyist Nira Radia tapped by the income tax department. A bench of Justice GS Singhvi and Justice AK Ganguly will examine the issues raised by Tata including the questions of right to privacy and right to freedom of speech and expression as envisaged under the Constitution.

London, Dec. 19 : The Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), Britain's privacy watchdog, has launched an investigation into claims that vital emails between senior executives and journalists on the News of the World have been "lost" while being transported to India."

Google Inc will not share the encryption keys of its email service with Indian security agencies as it would compromise the privacy rights of millions of Gmail users worldwide, a top company executive said. The Union home ministry, intelligence agencies and the telecom department are collectively exploring mandatory sharing of software by all communication service companies in India, a sensitive issue with global firms. Some firms have already been asked to comply and Canada's Research In Motion (RIM) is edging closer to January 31, 2011, deadline to hand over the encryption keys for its popular BlackBerry messaging services to intelligence agencies. "

The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation has decided to construct, for the first time, exclusive women's toilets at public places in the city. Charminar and Birla Mandir are among several locations where these conveniences will be constructed. There will be no charge for use of the toilets. The decision has been welcomed by women's welfare organisations and the medical fraternity involved in women's health problems. But they have warned that unless the toilets are clean and hygienic, with sufficient water supply, privacy and security and are easily accessible, they will meet the same fate of disuse and decay as other public toilets in the city.