Topic: Leaked TISA Documents Reveal Privacy Threat (Read 517 times)

Obama admits that climate change will be in Obamatrade



In a speech on the Senate floor on May 22, Democratic senator Ron Wyden of Oregon ridiculed those who thought climate change regulation would be part of Obamatrade:

We’ve heard suggested, for example, that it’s a backdoor route to immigration reform or action on climate change…. My sense is that the rate these hypotheticals are going, you’re bound to hear that a future president working on a trade deal might have second thoughts about the Louisiana purchase.

But in an interview on NPR’s Marketplace yesterday (June 3), President Obama said that enforcing climate change regulations will indeed be part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the Obamatrade pact that he is currently negotiating with Malaysia and 10 other countries.  He said:

If we want to solve something like climate change, which is one of my highest priorities, then I’ve got to be able to get into places like Malaysia, and say to them, this is in your interest. What leverage do I have to get them to stop deforestation? Well part of the leverage is if I’m in a trade relationship with them that allows me to raise standards.

In December, Obama will negotiate a multi-country climate agreement in Paris.  We already know from Obama’s joint announcement with China that he will commit the United States to a huge reduction in carbon emissions of 26%-28% from 2005 levels, but he will let China, already a much larger carbon emitter, continue to expand its carbon emissions until 2030.

Obama would not need to get Congress to approve the unfair climate change treaty terms that he negotiates.  Instead, he could get the Commission set up by the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement to add those terms to the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

After that, the Investor-State Dispute Settlement Provisions, set up by that agreement, could enforce Obama’s terms through the threat of multi-billion-dollar fines upon the U.S. government.



http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/06/obama_admits_that_climate_change_will_be_in_obamatrade.html

Leaked trade deal stops countries from saying where your data goes

There's been a fair share of leaked trade deals raising hackles in recent memory, but the latest could have some big repercussions for your data privacy. WikiLeaks has slipped out details of the in-progress Trade in Services Agreement (TISA), and one of its clauses would prevent the US, European Union and 23 other nations from controlling both where your data is stored as well as whether or not it's accessible from outside of the country. Germany, for example, couldn't demand that Facebook and Google store residents' account information on local servers.

The pact might also be bad news if you're a big fan of open source programs. One article would ban countries from requiring access to the code of "mass-market" software in order to provide services related to that software. A TISA partner could still use Linux, OpenOffice and other software with easy-to-dissect code, but it couldn't require that kind of software.

Negotiations for TISA are happening behind closed doors, and it's not clear whether or not these measures would make the final cut. However, they're definitely problematic. The restrictions on exports would prevent Russia-like control over data that makes it easier to censor and snoop on your communications, but they'd also make it hard to stop your info from traveling overseas. Likewise, while the open source clause would allow for more flexibility in software, it also risks weakening security by making it harder to check for spy agency back doors. As a whole, the agreement's tech-related elements favor businesses over privacy rights and transparency.

http://www.engadget.com/2015/06/03/tisa-limits-data-exports-and-open-source/

WikiLeaks releases documents related to controversial US trade pact
Document dump regarding Trade in Services Agreement comes day after organization put $100,000 bounty on documents from series of US trade treaties

WikiLeaks on Wednesday released 17 different documents related to the Trade in Services Agreement (Tisa), a controversial pact currently being hashed out between the US and 23 other countries – most of them in Europe and South America.

The document dump comes at a tense moment in the negotiations over a series of trade deals. President Barack Obama has clashed with his own party over the deals as critics have worried about the impact on jobs and civil liberties.

On Tuesday, WikiLeaks put a $100,000 bounty on documents relating to the alphabet soup of trade treaties currently being negotiated between the US and the rest of the world, particularly the controversial Trans-Pacific trade agreement (TPP). The offer, announced yesterday, has already raised more than $33,000.

Wednesday’s leak is the third time that WikLeaks has published sections from secret trade agreements. In January it leaked a chapter from the TPP related to the environment. In November 2013 it made public a draft of the agreement’s intellectual property chapter, containing proposals that Wikileaks founder Julian Assange said would “trample over individual rights and free expression”.

More...http://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/jun/03/wikileaks-documents-trade-in-services-agreement

Yeah, pretty sure I didn't say that, so either try reading for comprehension or don't intentionally misrepresent what I wrote.



Viewed through a very statist lens, which clearly was not what I was supporting. Somebody in this thread said "government should get out of the way of peaceful transactions between consenting adults..." oh, wait, that was me. Not sure how your extradition fantasy is supported by government staying out of the way.



I guess you missed the "this is not the kind of discussion that should be done in haste and in private" part. And you might want to grok individual sovereignty and natural rights before making comments about how a treaty between nations could "change" individual sovereignty.

And these so-called trade partnerships will get rid of the last vestiges of manufacturing in the US which was originally started by the Clinton regime of the 90s w/ NAFTA. All of these supranational trade deals have always been shit for the american worker and were/are largely engineered by international corporate interests along w/ their globalist minded/paid for politicians.

There's been a fair share of leaked trade deals raising hackles in recent memory, but the latest could have some big repercussions for your data privacy. WikiLeaks has slipped out details of the in-progress Trade in Services Agreement (TISA), and one of its clauses would prevent the US, European Union and 23 other nations from controlling both where your data is stored as well as whether or not it's accessible from outside of the country. Germany, for example, couldn't demand that Facebook and Google store residents' account information on local servers.

The pact might also be bad news if you're a big fan of open source programs. One article would ban countries from requiring access to the code of "mass-market" software in order to provide services related to that software. A TISA partner could still use Linux, OpenOffice and other software with easy-to-dissect code, but it couldn't require that kind of software.

Negotiations for TISA are happening behind closed doors, and it's not clear whether or not these measures would make the final cut. However, they're definitely problematic. The restrictions on exports would prevent Russia-like control over data that makes it easier to censor and snoop on your communications, but they'd also make it hard to stop your info from traveling overseas. Likewise, while the open source clause would allow for more flexibility in software, it also risks weakening security by making it harder to check for spy agency back doors. As a whole, the agreement's tech-related elements favor businesses over privacy rights and transparency.



http://www.engadget.com/2015/06/03/tisa-limits-data-exports-and-open-source/


-------------------------------------------------------
Pushing for closed source software... I wonder why...

You are all for a secret contract made by people who do not respect you as a person because you'll get one new client for your book in france and another one in dubai? "Screw national sovereignty" you say. OK. So your book is a big success in dubai because it is critical of how they abuse their migrant workers. Now dubai is not happy about that and wants you to travel to their court and face their justice system. Because of some secret deal made in that secret contract the US and dubai sovereignty are now equal. The concept of an extradition is no more as we all are living in a village... Would you still call for help?

The thing is we do not know what they are putting in this "contract". No one can be sad or happy yet. Although wouldn't it be more prudent to be skeptical of people who deal in secret; deals that will change your individual sovereignty forever?

This is an anti-protectionism clause.

I'm a service supplier, I help indie authors format their books so they're ready to publish on Amazon and elsewhere. It's all digital. This is 2015, I can easily work with people around the world. I'm in the US, one of my clients is in Dubai. It looks like I'm about to gain a new client in France. Why should that person who wants to use my service be denied that, and why should I be denied the opportunity to provide that service, simply because I don't use computing facilities in France (or Germany, or whatever other country wanted to impose such a condition)?

From a libertarian perspective, government should get out of the way of peaceful transactions between consenting adults (whatever those transactions may be).

Screw national "sovereignty" how about individual sovereignty? Saying "you must use our computing facilities to do business here" is like saying "you must use our currency to do business here" -- not something I'd expect to see support for on a Bitcoin-focused forum! It's statist bullshit, to put it bluntly.

Are there privacy implications? There might be. And I agree that this is not the kind of discussion that should be done in haste and in private. But at least with respect to giving individuals the ability to do business without protectionist governments getting in the way, I'm all for it.

Yep.

All of these legal constructs they are making under the guise of maritime law to strip national sovereignty and common law are nothing short of treason.

Under the draft provisions of the latest trade deal to be leaked by Wikileaks, countries could be barred from trying to control where their citizens’ personal data is held or whether it’s accessible from outside the country.

Wikileaks has released 17 documents relating to the Trade in Services Agreement (TISA), currently under negotiation between the US, the European Union and 23 other nations. These negotiating texts are supposed to remain secret for five years after TISA is finalized and brought into force.

The deal, which has been under discussion behind closed doors since early 2013, is intended to remove barriers to trade in services. It’s a sort of companion piece to the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which cover trade in goods – but potentially far bigger, with Wikileaks claiming that ‘services’ now account for nearly 80 per cent of the US and EU economies.

Like TTIP and TPP, TISA could be sped through Congress using Trade Promotion Authority (TPA), also known as fast-track authority, which has been passed by the US Senate and may be taken up in the House this month. Under TPA, Congress is barred from making amendments to the trade deals, and most simply give yes-or-no approval.

And the contents of TISA make interesting reading, particularly for anybody concerned about privacy. Under the draft agreement, the EU would be barred from requiring the personal data of its citizens to be held within European borders, an idea currently under discussion in Germany.

“No Party may require a service supplier, as a condition for supplying a service or investing in its territory, to: (a) use computing facilities located in the Party’s territory,” the leaked draft stipulates.

“No Party may require a service supplier, as a condition for supplying a service or investing in its territory, to: (a) use computing facilities located in the Party’s territory.”

These rules could in some ways have a beneficial effect: they could, for example, be used to outlaw state censorship.

However, there are clear implications for privacy – as well as security from hacking. EU privacy regulations currently require companies to store EU citizens’ personal data locally, to make sure they comply with the region’s strict legal requirements for data processing. Tech companies like Facebook, Google, and internet advertising networks would be delighted to see such rules relaxed.

It’s a complicated issue, and one that should really be discussed in public, before any agreement is reached. As Maira Sutton of the Electronic Frontier Foundation has previously noted, “Negotiators should be working to reconcile this tension between powerful private and public actors who may have conflicting stances on major human rights issues such as privacy and free expression.

“That in turn, will require open public participation from a variety of stakeholders. By contrast, TISA’s language reflects the concerns of the internet industry, and not necessarily the interests of internet users as a whole.”

Wikileaks has previously leaked parts of the TPP deal, and on Tuesday, announced plans to try and raise $100,000 to be used as a reward for the remaining chapters.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/emmawoollacott/2015/06/04/leaked-tisa-documents-reveal-privacy-threat/2/