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09.08.14

Links 8/9/2014: Linux 3.17 RC 4, Switzerland Welcoming Snowden

Posted in News Roundup at 6:21 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

GNOME bluefish

Contents

GNU/Linux

  • Linux workshop in Udupi

    The student chapter of Indian Society for Technical Education (ISTE) of SMV Institute of Technology and Management conducted a two-day workshop on Linux operating system for final year Electronics and Communications students at Bantakal in Udupi district on August 22 and 23.

    Edwin, a former professor of Electronics Engineering at Spring Garden College, Philadelphia, U.S., was the resource person.

    Prof. Edwin said that Linux, which was a free operating system and free from viruses, had been adapted by more computer hardware platforms than any other operating system.

  • Munich Library Now Offers Free Ubuntu 12.04 CDs for People with Windows Systems

    The city of Munich is now providing free Ubuntu 12.04 LTS (Precise Pangolin) CDs for the citizen of the city, in an effort to increase the adoption of open source software.

  • CBI demands high-end gadgets

    Use of LINUX technology at its forensic lab is also the top priority of the agency.

  • Server

    • Cloud Host Linode Adds Professional Services Support Option

      The move follows Linode’s announcement earlier this summer that it would slash cloud-hosting prices and introduce high-end hardware to its storage and computing infrastructure, which transformed the company from a cloud host focused on providing Linux-based infrastructure that would appeal to a technically savvy crowd committed to open source hardware, to one that now offers broader hosting options and is seeking to stand out from the crowd through high-end infrastructure and sophisticated support solutions.

  • Kernel Space

    • The release of 3.16 Linux Kernel – the kernel column

      As we were going to press, Linus Torvalds announced the 3.16 Linux kernel, saying “So nothing particularly exciting happened this week [since the final 3.16 Release Candidate 7 from a week prior], and 3.16 is out there.” In his announcement email, Linus noted that the timing of 3.16 was, perhaps, a little unfortunate for the impact upon the merge widow for 3.17. The “merge window” is the period of time early in a (roughly) two month kernel development cycle during which disruptive kernel changes are allowed to take place. Typically, the merge window is capped at a couple of weeks, and it immediately follows a final release (from the previous kernel development cycle). Therefore, the merge for 3.17 is open just as Linus (and others) are preparing to head to Chicago for the 2014 Kernel Summit (and LinuxCon conference). Linus says, “So we’ll see how the next merge window goes, but I’m not going to worry about it overmuch. If I end up not having time to do all the merges, I might delay things into the week of the Kernel Summit, but I’ll hope to get most of the big merging done this upcoming week before any travel takes place.”

    • 9-Way File-System Comparison With A SSD On The Linux 3.17 Kernel

      Each file-system was tested with its stock mount options on the Linux 3.17 Git kernel. No kernel modifications were made to this system under test. The new AMD FX-8370 system was used for the Linux benchmarking system in this article. All of our disk / file-system tests are facilitated by the Phoronix Test Suite.

    • Colourful ! systemd vs sysVinit Linux Cheatsheet

      There are a lot of new systemd commands available on rhel / centos 7.0 version that would replace sysvinit commands.

    • Linux 3.17-rc4 Is A Pretty Calm Release
    • Linus 3.17-rc4

      For a short while there, this week was really nice and calm, but that
      was mostly because the “linux-foundation.org” entry fell off the DNS
      universe, and my mailbox got very quiet for a few hours. The rest of
      the week looked pretty normal.

      “Pretty normal” isn’t bad, though, and I’m not complaining. There is
      nothing particularly big or scary going on – we had a quick scare
      about a stupid compat layer bug, but it seems to have been just a
      false positive and resulted in some added commentary rather than any
      real code changes.

      The diffstat is pretty reasonable, and it’s fairly spread out. We have
      the usual arch and driver updates, but there’s actually more changes
      under fs/ than under either of those. That’s largely due to just a
      late f2fs update, which I decided I couldn’t be bothered to get too
      upset about, most of it being pretty clear-cut fixes, with just a few
      cleanups mixed in.

      And really, if the f2fs changes look biggish, it’s mostly because the
      rest is pretty small.

      Let’s hope it all stays calm. I do note that neither Greg nor Davem
      ended up sending me anything for rc4, which is probably the _real_
      reason why it’s pretty calm and small.

      Linus

    • Intel’s UXA Acceleration Now Supports DisplayPort MST

      David Airlie on Sunday added support for DisplayPort Multi-Stream Transport (DP MST) to Intel’s X.Org driver for the UXA-accelerated code-paths.

    • Graphics Stack

      • Mesa’s Top Contributors This Summer

        With a fresh run of GitStats over the Mesa mainline Git code-base as of this morning, the Mesa source tree is up to 1,439,880 lines of code spread across 4,298 files. There’s been 65,193 commits to Mesa, which averages out to 14 commits per active day. A total of 648 contributors have been detected within the Mesa code-base.

  • Applications

  • Desktop Environments/WMs

    • K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt

      • KDE PIM Newcomers

        With Akademy in full swing, we thought we’d treat you all on a conversation with a handful of newcomers to the KDE PIM team. The conversation took place both online over the last months and offline at Akademy yesterday. Let’s start with introductions, in order of their replies.

      • The Luminosity Of Free Software, Episode 20

        The time has arrived for the new series of Luminosity to start! The next episode will be this Thursday, September 11th at 18:00 UTC. As in the past, it will be recorded live on Google+ Hangouts and carried on my Youtube channel both live and for viewing later. You can also join the discussion live on #luminosity on irc.freenode.net.

      • KDE Arrives in Brno for Akademy

        Yesterday KDE contributors from around the world arrived in Brno for Akademy, our annual meeting. Over the next week, we will share ideas, discover common problems and their solutions, and rekindle offline friendships for another year. We have traveled from around the world to work on free software in the spirit of community and cooperation. This year we can celebrate the success of the last 12 months when we released major new versions of our platform—KDE Frameworks—and our desktop—Plasma 5. This work has been well received by the press and our community of users, but we know there is much more to do to keep KDE Software relevant for the years to come in a world where desktops are only one way of using computer software. We’ll be discussing and planning how to make the best desktop software for Linux and how to expand to new platforms.

      • Akademy 2014 Day 1

        Today, Akademy 2014 kicked off hard. As always, there is a lot of excitement. The first Akademy day is always overwhelming. Meeting old friends, making new ones, learning new things and sharing what you know. To keep things a simpler, we started this year with a single track in the morning, with two tracks in the afternoon. With all attendees in one room listening to 10 minute fast track presentations, there are plenty of topics to talk about during the breaks.

      • Akademy Day 0 Photo Blog
      • Akademy Day 1 Photo Blog
      • Blip.tv screencasts moved

        Blip.tv has decided to narrow its focus, and isn’t interested in hosting my screencasts any more.

    • GNOME Desktop/GTK

      • A Life Worth Living

        So here enters your protagonist. I’ve left a good job simply for the satisfaction in doing what I think is important.

        Let’s be honest. I’m terrified. This is the most exciting thing I’ve ever done. I guess that is what is so attractive to me, adrenaline junkie and all. Will I make it a year? Will I finish what I’m setting out to? Will I let everyone down? Will people hate me because they don’t agree with what I think is important? All of these questions, playing like tapes in the back of my consciousness.

        The GNOME community has always felt like home to me. Some people leave their jobs and do the start-up thing. That’s fun and all, but I’d rather just write software for my friends. Nothing brings me more satisfaction than contributing to this group of people. And like Luis said so many years ago, GNOME is about people.

      • SYSTEMD IN GNOME 3.14 AND BEYOND

        Before the start of the GNOME 3.14 cycle, Ryan Lorty announced his intention to make most GNOME modules depend on a logind-like API. The API would just implement the bits that are actually used. According to Ryan, most GNOME modules only use a selection of the logind functionality. He wanted to document exactly what we depend on and provide a minimal API. Then we could write a minimal stub implementation for e.g. FreeBSD as we’d know exactly what parts of the API we actually need. The stub would still be minimal; allow GNOME to run, but that’s it.

      • GNOME 3.14 Still Depends On ConsoleKit, More Systemd Still Planned

        Some plans for the GNOME 3.14 cycle didn’t materialize but they’re still being developed for future GNOME updates.

        For the GNOME 3.14 development cycle was a plan to make most GNOME modules depend on a systemd logind-like API that would only implement the API bits actually used by the respective pieces of GNOME software. The goal was to make this minimal API a shim between the GNOME code and logind for allowing other non-Linux platforms to write an alternative implementation against the API. The purpose of this would be for the BSDs also using GNOME to only have to write a portable implementation of the logind-derived API calls actually being used by GNOME rather than a full, drop-in replacement.

  • Distributions

  • Devices/Embedded

Free Software/Open Source

  • Git Bounty Wants To Help Open-Source Programmers Get Paid For Bug Fixes

    If you’re using open-source software, you’ve probably come across a bug that you want to fix but don’t have the expertise to do it yourself — and the original author isn’t all that interested in fixing it. With Git Bounty, which was dreamed up by a team of French Canadians (and one Frenchman) from Montreal at our Disrupt SF hackathon this weekend, you can incentivize open-source programmers to fix those bugs for you. Git Bounty lets you pick a bug you need fixed, set a reward and then publicize it.

  • Web Browsers

    • Chrome

      • Google Works To Sunset SHA-1 In Chrome

        Google will begin warning users when accessing HTTPS sites whose certificate chains are using SHA-1, due to this cryptographic hash algorithm being weak.

  • Oracle/Java/LibreOffice

    • LibreOffice For Android Should Be Ready For Usage Starting With February 2015

      For now, there are only a few Office suite available for the Android platform (WPS Office, Office Suite Pro, Google Docs and AndrOpen), but only AndrOpen has support for odt and ods files, and it has an ugly interface, making the software unusable.

      The LibreOffice developers have released a new daily build version, allowing the users to test the app.

    • Free Office Suites that Cut The Mustard

      Microsoft Office still dominates market share of office suites. Businesses have often rejected free Office alternatives. However, whether this will continue is uncertain. With the cost of a price plan for Microsoft Office, the average home user or small business will welcome a free alternative. Fortunately, there are some truly excellent free alternatives available for Linux (and other operating systems). Not all of the office suites featured here are released under an open source license, but they are all free to download and use without charge.

  • CMS

  • BSD

    • OpenBSD Made Progress On Their Systemd-Compatible Replacement

      This summer a student developer began work on DBus daemons that accept systemd calls and emulated their behavior with their own native calls, in order to make drop-in replacements for BSD platforms where systemd is not supported and the upstream systemd developers have no plans of supporting.

  • FSF/FSFE/GNU/SFLC

    • Bring the FSF to your campus!

      Software freedom and learning go hand in hand. Textbooks should be DRM-free, readily shareable, and easy to check out from the library for as long as you need them. You should be able to use whatever free operating system you choose, not forced into a contract with Microsoft (as is the case at schools like Virginia Tech). Everyone studying computer science at the college level should be able to see and learn from the code that makes their software tick. Learning is a cooperative endeavor; the tools you use to learn should promote cooperation, not proprietize human knowledge.

    • Direvent 5.0 available for download
    • GCL 2.6.11 has been released

      Greetings! The GCL team is happy to announce the release of version 2.6.11, the latest achievement in the ‘stable’ (as opposed to ‘development’) series.

    • Direvent Does Its First Release As A GNU Project

      GNU Direvent is formerly known as dircond and is a system-independent daemon that tracks file system directory changes with new additions, deletions, or modifications of files. When a file system event is detected in a pre-configured directory, the respective user-specified external program associated with that directory is signaled. This GNU Direvent daemon works on Linux along with a variety of BSD systems.

  • Openness/Sharing

    • Open Access/Content

      • Open-source texts take root at Md. colleges

        An experiment with open-source online textbooks at several Maryland universities last semester yielded promising results, and officials are preparing to expand the program this fall.

        The University System of Maryland designed the Maryland Open-Source Textbook (MOST) Initiative to evaluate the feasibility of using online materials instead of printed books to ease the cost of purchasing multiple textbooks each year.

  • Standards/Consortia

    • Sharing work is easier with an Open Document Format

      Many individuals have been using ODF for years, but the open format is also being adopted by organisations, including companies and governments.

      We often wish to share electronic documents with friends, colleagues, business or government, and the software application we use to prepare these documents will save them in a particular format.

      Any application that later loads the document will also need to be able to understand this format. If an organisation can control the format, and convince people to use it, then they can use this as a very powerful tool to create a monopoly in the market.

Leftovers

  • Science

    • Why the Computer Experience is Often Poor

      The final issue is software creep. By this I mean the continual replacement of older
      software with newer software. It seems unavoidable but it’s usually unnecessary.
      How often does one need to update their word processor? I’m using abiword on
      Linux and it seems adequate for my purposes. KDE versions after 3.5.10 do not intererest
      me. In fact I’ve switched to the lighter IceWM and I’m quite happy with it.

    • Iran arrests suspected nuclear plant saboteur

      In 2010, the so-called Stuxnet virus temporarily disrupted the operation of thousands of centrifuges, key components in nuclear fuel production, at Iran’s Natanz uranium enrichment facility. Iran says it and other computer virus attacks are part of a concerted effort by Israel, the U.S. and their allies to undermine its nuclear program through covert operations.

      The U.S. and its allies suspect Iran is covertly seeking the ability to develop nuclear weapons. Iran denies such allegations, insisting its nuclear program is entirely peaceful and aimed at generating electricity and producing medical isotopes.

  • Security

    • Doubts cast over FBI ‘leaky CAPTCHA’ Silk Road rapture

      Rather than a conspiracy involving NSA wiretaps, the FBI claims the downfall of Silk Road begun with a leaky CAPTCHA.

      Responding to a request for information from former kingpin Ross Ulbricht’s defence lawyers, the Feds says the CAPTCHA left a trail from the TOR-protected Silk Road servers to the public Internet. That revealed the location of the drug marketplace, which would otherwise have remained hidden behind TOR, according to an FBI affidavit.

  • Defence/Police/Secrecy/Aggression

    • The Atlantic Alliance’s “Holy War” against the Islamic State (ISIS): NATO’s Role in the Recruitment of Islamic Terrorists

      “They are Our Terrorists“. Without the terrorists, the “Global War on Terrorism” would fall flat.

    • Syria rebels, once hopeful of U.S. weapons, lament lack of firepower

      As the Syrian government warplane flew overhead, Malik Abu Iskandaroon ran to a storage room and grabbed a Russian-made surface-to-air missile.

      Moments later, on the roof of the three-story villa, which serves as air force headquarters for the Harakat Hazm rebel group, he squinted at the threat in the sky.

    • Tense relations between U.S. and anti-Assad Syrian rebels

      North of Aleppo, the U.S.-backed Free Syrian Army is battling the Islamic State terror group over a vital supply route.

      In Washington, the Obama administration is groping for a strategy to deal with a force that Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel says is “beyond anything we have ever seen.”

    • CIA Drone Strikes and the Public-Authority Justification

      CIA Drone Strikes Don’t Qualify as TMA: As an initial matter, I think one part of his argument depends on a mistaken assumption regarding the meaning of TMA, and that drone strikes do indeed constitute covert action within the meaning of Title 50. The TMA exception to covert action has a complicated and often-misunderstood history, which I recount in detail in this paper (pp.592-601 especially). The concept was the subject of extensive negotiations between the White House and Congress, ultimately resulting in the following agreement. An activity that otherwise would qualify as covert action would instead count as TMA, thus avoiding the requirement of a written presidential finding and reporting to SSCI and HPSCI, if the following conditions were met.

    • Predator Drone Reportedly Spotted Over ISIS Hotbed in Syria; Airstrikes Hit ISIS Targets

      A predator drone was reportedly seen by both sides of the Syrian conflict hovering over Raqqa, Sryria, close to where U.S. special operations forces tried to rescue ISIS hostages last July.

    • Isis will not be beaten by a kneejerk reaction from the west

      Military responses as a quick fix won’t defeat the terrorists. Their ideology and influence need to be undermined

    • McGill researchers allegedly committed ethical breach in psychology study

      Researchers from the psychology departments at McGill and Carleton University allegedly breached research ethics in a study conducted in 2012 and funded by the Canadian military, according to findings released on August 28 by campus group Demilitarize McGill. The researchers, which included McGill psychology professor Donald M. Taylor and then-PhD student Michael King, failed to inform the research subjects of the funder and intended counterinsurgency applications of the research.

    • Did Israel Execute Jihadists in Gaza?

      While official investigations are stalled, The Daily Beast reveals important new details about the apparent summary execution of Palestinian combatants.

  • PR/AstroTurf/Lobbying

    • When the push polling has to stop

      YouGov stood to have its reputation shattered if it continued to put out polls showing ten point leads for No, when Yes is very obviously headed for a majority.

    • Steve Hayes Doesn’t Remember When He Beat The Drums Of War With Syria

      Fox’s Juan Williams pointed out the increased calls for war during the September 7 edition of Fox’s Media Buzz, suggesting that media seem to consistently favor war over peace, perhaps for a ratings boost that international conflicts could bring television news. Williams noted that today’s calls seem to parallel media’s eagerness for military intervention in Syria back in 2013, over human rights abuses from the Bashar al-Assad regime.

  • Censorship

    • Turkey should prioritize freedom of speech: EU official

      Turkey should prioritize the right to freedom of speech to achieve improvement in its bid to join the European Union, according to Neelie Kroes, the vice president of the EU Commission.

      “We should take into account for membership to the European family, it is absolutely a must that freedom of speech and media are guaranteed,” she said after the three-day Internet Governance Forum (IGF) last week, Hurriyet Daily News reported.

    • INTERNET ISSUES DISCUSSED IN INTERNET UNGOVERNANCE FORUM

      The ‘Internet Ungovernance Forum’ seeking to provide a sphere for journalists and internet experts for a discussion over internet issues across the world as well as Turkey was held between Sept. 3 and Sept 4 at the main Campus of İstanbul Bilgi University.

  • Privacy

    • Fake Cellphone Towers–Sales Scam Or Real Hack?

      Whoever is running the program (detected during a CryptoPhone 500 customer’s drive between Florida and the Carolinas) remains unknown but—for once—has nothing to do with the NSA, whose digital arsenal has no need of off-the-shelf tech such as the VME Dominator. Personally, I (mostly) concur with author William Gibson’s Twittered take: “That fake cell tower story looks pretty dodgy, really.” Just because I’m paranoid doesn’t mean…you know.

    • Chick Wit: Don’t want your nude selfies hacked? Don’t take any!

      Everyone is buzzing with the news that there are hundreds of leaked celebrity nude selfies being posted on the Internet.

    • Meet the spooky tech companies getting rich by making NSA surveillance possible

      Wildly profitable companies like Neustar, Subsentio, and Yaana do the feds’ dirty work for them, slurping huge amounts of unconstitutionally requisitioned data out of telcos’ and ISPs’ data-centers in response to secret, sealed FISA warrants — some of them publicly traded, too, making them a perfect addition to the Gulag Wealth Fund.

    • The Gulag Wealth Fund and Toll Booths in Outer Space

      Although some ISPs have wanted to fight tooth and nail, they have not had the money to hire a top-secret cleared attorney to argue their case. Instead, they have invoked their interpretation of the First Amendment — the right to free speech — to disclose that they have received a FISA warrant, despite the secrecy and gagging clauses that come with them.

      Others, like Cbeyond, “haven’t examined simply saying ‘no’ and challenging them,” said the person with direct knowledge of the warrants served on the ISP.

    • Legal memos released on Bush-era reasons for warrantless wiretapping

      The Justice Department released two decade-old memos Friday night, offering the fullest public airing to date of the Bush administration’s legal justification for the warrantless wiretapping of Americans’ phone calls and emails – a program that began in secret after the 2001 terrorist attacks.

    • 2004 memos released on warrantless wiretaps

      The Justice Department released two decade-old memos Friday night, offering the fullest public airing to date of the Bush administration’s legal justification for the warrantless wiretapping of Americans’ phone calls and e-mails – a program that began in secret after the 2001 terrorist attacks.
      Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/news/nation_world/20140907_2004_memos_released_on_warrantless_wiretaps.html#Ts3GzSa4CcgmpVXV.99

    • Just-Released Bush Memos Show the White House Barely Able to Justify Spying on Us
    • Obama Administration Still Keeping Much Secret About Bush’s Warrantless Wiretapping Program
    • Bush-era memos justify NSA wiretaps
    • Redactions in U.S. Memo Leave Doubts on Data Surveillance Program
    • Meet Zelda, the unlikely ‘Dear Abby’ of NSA
    • Feds say NSA “bogeyman” did not find Silk Road’s servers

      The FBI easily found the main server of the now-defunct Silk Road online drug-selling site, and didn’t need the National Security’s help, federal prosecutors said in a Friday court filing.

    • Spying on friends: strange bedfellows

      Even the smallest bit of information that is seemingly unrelated to the business at hand could one day give us a competitive advantage against our competitors. This is true for business as well as the affairs of government. Experts in the field define information gathering as nothing but a mind game: collect every possible piece of information about everything concerning your national interest. The range of information gathering covers every aspect of the concerned “target” and the target can be any individual or organization, including private citizens, heads of state, a niche technology company or a foreign government. When engaging in information gathering activities, there is only one unbreakable rule which explains the spying game: Use your wits and do not get caught, no matter what. This rule especially applies among friends.

    • Fake cell towers allow the NSA and police to keep track of you

      The Internet is abuzz with reports of mysterious devices sprinkled across America, many of them on military bases, that connect to your phone by mimicking cell phone towers and sucking up your data. There is little public information about these devices, but they are the new favorite toy of government agencies of all stripes; everyone from the National Security Agency to local police forces are using them.

    • Leaked documents shed light on US, British spying in Turkey

      America’s National Security Agency (NSA) and the British intelligence and security agency GCHQ both spied on Turkey, while helping Ankara fight Kurdish separatists, according to the secret documents leaked by Edward Snowden – the former US government contractor behind the biggest security leak in United States

    • NSA Reform Will Likely Have to Wait Until After the Election

      Legislation to reform the government’s surveillance programs looks destined for a lame-duck session of Congress—and might not get touched at all until next year.

    • Nude leaks expose need for caution

      The discussion should not revolve around preventative measures, rather, we must focus on the creepiness factor — the questions that arise regarding privacy and security. For better or for worse, the cloud is omnipresent and hoards more photos and videos than we’d like to believe. Unbeknownst to many, most cellphones store user data on cloud by default, and deleting a photo from a phone doesn’t necessarily delete it from a cloud. Especially in light of last year’s NSA scandal, the lack of public education about the cloud’s capabilities is concerning. We wonder: Who is watching? What are they looking at? Feeling the constant gaze of this anonymous eye may also have societal implications, creating an uncomfortable hyperawareness surrounding every decision made.

    • No pity for nude selfies [Letter]

      Jennifer Lawrence, Kate Upton and the “dozens of other beautiful celebrities” who posted nude photos of themselves in digital airspace should read “No Place to Hide” by Glenn Greenwald. The book outlines how little privacy there is online and explains in detail what Edward Snowden revealed about the NSA.

    • HOW YOUR INNOCENT SMARTPHONE PASSES ON ALMOST YOUR ENTIRE LIFE TO THE SECRET SERVICE

  • Civil Rights

    • IRS says five more staffers lost emails

      The agency has told lawmakers that it found around 24,000 of Lerner’s missing emails through a similar process. Lerner, who once headed an IRS division overseeing tax-exempt groups, became the first agency official to acknowledge the IRS’s improper scrutiny of Tea Party groups in May 2013. She has since been held in contempt of Congress and has been referred to the Justice Department for criminal prosecution.

    • Exclusive: Dr. Cornel West Talks Protest, War Crimes, NDAA & Snowden [Video]

      In a wide-ranging conversation, West professed support for Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden, prophesying that the NSA whistleblower will one day be vindicated and slamming the government for prosecuting the very people, like Manning, who reveal what he said are war crimes and then fail to hold the perpetrators accountable; expressed concern over the ever-growing national security state; decried drone strikes as war crimes; and conveyed his concern about the disintegration of Americans’ civil liberties under the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which some have argued gives the president carte blanche to detain US citizens, sans a trial or judicial review.

    • The European Court Confirms : The CIA’s ‘Black Sites’ Operated in Poland

      The secret is officially out: CIA’s black sites operated in Poland. Earlier this summer, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) issued a ruling confirming the existence of such prisons on Polish territory. While international human rights organizations have praised the ruling, some Polish officials and journalists are calling it unfair towards Poland. Others say the formal revelation might be an opportunity for Poland to resolve some of its current governance issues.

    • Kill the Messenger: A Crack Thriller

      Dedicated to the upcoming Gary Webb biopic, dir. by Michael Cuesta and starring Jeremy Renner. KILL THE MESSENGER comes by way of Webb’s own first-person report in his book, DARK ALLIANCE.

      Evocative of policiers such as the 1982 film starring Sissy Spacek and Jack Lemon, MISSING, and the iconic ALL THE PRESIDENT’S MEN, KILL THE MESSENGER announces its aim right from the gate, which is perhaps its only misstep. Kill the messenger tells us too much, too soon, since we are all familiar with the Greek-tradition from which that phrase hails. Famously scripted by Shakespeare in Henry IV (1598) and later in Antony and Cleopatra (1607). Prior to that, a similar sentiment was heard in Sophocles’ Antigone: “No one loves the messenger who brings bad news.”Messengers with bad tidings from the war front breach the invisible code of conduct, where commanding officers were expected to accept and return emissaries or diplomatic envoys sent by the enemy unharmed. UnKumbaya warrior leaders, of course, never got the memo. Ancient messenger job definitions often failed to add that the job description had unexpected short-range expiry dates.

      [...]

      Most Americans wondered why all of a sudden a crack epidemic burst all over the news; now we know. It was engineered and massaged by lawless Big Feet who needed lots of do-re-mi to fund their pet contras. In the event, millions of young men and women died. Millions of minority kids spent their youths out-smoking their educations and incomes and career aspirations.

    • CIA emails expose access journalist at work

      I have mentioned before that more than 90 per cent of reporters are in some sense “access journalists” – that is, they rely on the active help of the key figures on their “beat”. Usually the people they regularly need to access are in power: crime correspondents need help from the police, much less so than criminals; diplomatic correspondents need the help of diplomats more than they need the help of drone strike victims, and so on.

    • Support Robert MacLean, Patriot Whistleblower

      Jim Murtagh, the President of the International Association of Whistleblowers (IAW), called today for increased vigilance against terrorist attacks on the thirteenth anniversary of the worst disaster in U.S. history. “The 9-11 warnings of federal air marshal Robert J. MacLean have come true. The reduction of air marshals on commercial airliners has led to increased risks to the American public from ISIS and Al Qaeda today,” Murtagh said.

    • U.S. security team from secret CIA annex: We were told to stand down in Benghazi

      In an interview ahead of the release of a new book “13 Hours: The Inside Account of What Really Happened in Benghazi,” security contractors Kris Paronto, Mark Geist, and John Tiegen spoke publicly about the attack with Fox News. Four diplomats were killed that night, including U.S. Ambassador Chris Stephens.

    • US commandos claim CIA station chief delayed Benghazi rescue [everything to distract from the real scandal]
    • Switzerland ‘won’t extradite Snowden’ in return for NSA testimony

      Switzerland has reportedly decided it will not extradite National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden to the US if he comes to testify against the NSA’s spying activities, Swiss media said.

    • Snowden to receive Swiss asylum if testifies against NSA

      US whistleblower Edward Snowden will not be deported to the United States if he travels to Switzerland to testify against his country’s National Security Agency (NSA), the SonntagsZeitung newspaper reported Monday.

    • No eternal allies or enemies, just interests

      The first step towards transparency in international relations came from Julian Assange, when he published leaked military and diplomatic secret documents from the United States on his WikiLeaks website in 2010. But the more significant step in this direction came when Edward Snowden, a contractor for the US’s National Security Agency (NSA), handed over intelligence documents to the Guardian newspaper for publication in June 2013.

    • Swiss will grant asylum if Snowden testifies on U.S. espionage

      Swiss media reports indicate Switzerland would grant asylum to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden if he agrees to testify about foreign espionage activities within Switzerland.

    • Dianne Feinstein denounced treachery, torture and spying on Congress

      Sen. Dianne Feinstein is one of the most stalwart supporters in Congress of the National Security Agency’s sweeping surveillance activity. She’s also leading an epic constitutional showdown with the CIA over torture.

      Those closest to the California Democrat don’t see a disconnect. The longtime defense hawk takes her job of overseeing the intelligence community seriously and says the CIA shouldn’t get away with hiding its darkest secrets behind a national security shield.

  • Internet/Net Neutrality

    • Reasons why you should be using Gandi
    • Big tech companies plan “Internet Slowdown” to fight for net neutrality

      Next week, some of the biggest tech companies will lead a symbolic “Internet Slowdown” to protest the Federal Communications Commission’s network neutrality proposal.

      “Several top websites—including Etsy, Kickstarter, Foursquare, WordPress, Vimeo, reddit, Mozilla, Imgur, Meetup, Cheezburger, Namecheap, Bittorrent, Gandi.net, StartPage, BoingBoing, and Dwolla—announced that they will be joining more than 35 advocacy organizations and hundreds of thousands of activists in a day of action that will give a glimpse into what the Internet might look like if the FCC’s proposed rules go into effect,” a blog post today from the advocacy group “Fight for the Future” said.

  • DRM

    • Google, Browsers & DRM

      A recent brouhaha concerning Google comes from an item that made the rounds in the last week or so regarding older browsers and Google search. It seems that some users of older browsers have been receiving an outdated version of Google’s homepage when attempting to make a search. Evidently, Google searches made using these browsers returned results just fine, using Google’s current results page, but users needed to return to the search engine’s homepage to conduct another search. The browsers affected are primarily older versions of Opera and Safari.

  • Intellectual Monopolies

    • It Appears Mickey Mouse May Have Picked An Intellectual Property Fight With The Wrong Mau5

      I actually don’t think that Disney’s trademark opposition to Deadmau5′s attempt to trademark his mouse-shaped helmet thing is that crazy. Disney hasn’t gone after Deadmau5/Joel Zimmerman all these years for using it. They’re just saying “hey, maybe he shouldn’t have a registered trademark on that.” And they may have a point. Yes, the designs are different, and no, there isn’t likely to be much confusion between Deadmau5 and Mickey, but why is Deadmau5 seeking to get a registered trademark on this in the first place?

    • Trademarks

      • Disappointing That Twitter Threatened Twitpic, But Story Doesn’t Add Up

        A few days ago, Twitpic, which was the original third party service for hosting images for your tweets, announced that it was shutting down “unexpectedly” because Twitter was threatening to pull its API access if the company didn’t drop its trademark application for Twitpic — an application that had been pending since 2009. Considering that Twitpic was one of the earliest of many third party services built on top of Twitter that helped make Twitter so valuable in the early days, it’s certainly disappointing to see it go. It’s also something of a legacy reminder that Twitter has been slowly, but surely, destroying all such third party services that helped make it so popular. That’s disappointing, if not all that surprising. Platforms all too frequently end up swallowing those who rely too strongly upon them — and, these days, to be honest, there’s little reason to use Twitpic instead of Twitter’s own image hosting (or some other options as well).

    • Copyrights

Suspicion of High-Level Corruption at the European Patent Office (EPO): Part I

Posted in Europe, Patents at 4:48 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

Željko Topić
Image from jutarnji.hr

Summary: The European Patent Office (EPO) Vice-President has a background of corruption and his appointment to the EPO too is believed to be reliant on systemic corruption

Who is Željko Topić? A lot of our readers probably never heard of him. The Western media has paid almost no attention to this bully, who in his own country had become the subject of much hate. His page at WIPO (patents maximalist) says “Appart [sic] of [sic] his expirience [sic] in the State Intellectual Property Office of the Republic of Croatia, Mr. Topić was Managing Partner in Korper, Haramija & Topic Ltd.”

Putting the poor English aside, how did this man become a top executive at the EPO? A lot of people have wondered that, including his colleagues. Wikipedia says:

Topić’s appointment as EPO Vice-President has been controversial. Following the announcement of his appointment in March 2012, a number of critical news reports appeared in the Croatian media. These reports referred to a series of alleged irregularities which were said to have occurred during his period of office as Director-General of the State Intellectual Property Office and which it was claimed had not been properly investigated by the competent state authorities.[14][15][16][17] In response, the State Intellectual Property Office issued a press release on 30 April 2012 attributing the media reports to what it called “unprofessional journalism” and dismissing the allegations raised against Topić as “arbitrary”, “unfounded” and based on “malicious accusations”.[18]

A complaint which Topić filed in reaction to an article written by the journalist Slavica Lukić for “Jutarnji list” was, however, rejected by the Ethics Council of the Croatian Journalist’s Association (Croatian: Hrvatsko Novinarsko Društvo or HND) in September 2012. The Ethics Council found that Lukić had verified the relevant information with the appropriate official institutions and that the disputed article was not written with the intention of defaming anyone but rather in defence of the public interest.[19][20]

In December 2013, a Croatian NGO Juris Protecta raised questions about Topić’s EPO appointment and submitted a petition to the European Parliament calling for an independent investigation into the matter.[21][22]

This controversial appointment goes a couple of years back and in order to understand it we needed to read dozens of pages of articles, mostly automated translations. This case has been reported on extensively in the Croatian media over the last few years, but there has been complete silence in the Western European media and no coverage at all in English-speaking media such as Australia’s and north America’s. Surprisingly, despite covering the subject of patents in Europe for nearly a decade, we never wrote about Topić. There seems to be reluctance to look into the scandals, perhaps knowing how litigiously aggressive Topić has historically been.

The corporate media should have the guts to at least mention what happened with Topić. There’s not mere speculation but well-documented (by courts) evidence — one that only local press seems to have taken an interest in. Hence it was virtually impossible to become aware of this and openly discuss this where it matters. As Topić now works in an institution which affects the European Union and the world at large, a broader debate is needed. Topić is in a position of high power and as we have shown in recent years, the EPO is full of abuses. It’s a face, it is a swindle. This latest about Topić may be just one of the lesser-known ones.

Our sources say the only coverage (so far) outside of Croatia that they are aware of has been put out by IP Watch, a site critical of patents on software and other such matters, with focus on Europe. Earlier this year the site stated:

While it’s unclear whether either of these efforts will succeed, Topić’s suitability for office “is a fairly contentious issue” inside the EPO, the source said. Given the various accusations, and apparently uncontested press reports, the general feeling among EPO staff is that there are unanswered questions about Topić’s appointment,” the source said. Employees are also dissatisfied about what they see as an inadequate official response to the situation and believe “some kind of genuinely independent investigation would be required to clear the air,” he said.

The EPO Administrative Council (AC) “has maintained complete silence” and taken no official position on the situation, which is strange given that it’s responsible for the appointment and the organ of the EPO that exercises disciplinary authority over the president and vice-presidents, the source, who asked not to be identified out of fear of retribution, said. The absence of a position was confirmed by EPO.

[...]

Topić should not have been reappointed due to his previous track record which, “if it had been properly taken into consideration, would have resulted in him being deemed unfit for public office,” Stilin said. The irregularities under his management at SIPO have not been properly investigated and the government wasn’t properly informed about them, she said. In addition, the procedure leading to his reappointment “was tainted by a whole series of flaws and irregularities, some of these involving actions which were prima facie [evidence]” of a type of person, she said.

Stilin applied for Topić’s position but was unsuccessful. Once reappointed, Topić dismissed Stilin and abolished her department, an action that was “a completely arbitrary and unjustified measure involving an egregious abuse of authority,” Stilin said. She filed a series of complaints in the Croatian courts, all of which were dismissed, after which she sought relief from the ECtHR. That case, filed in 2011, remains unresolved.

“What amazes us about this media silence,” said our sources, “is that many German journalists have been well-informed about the affair for at least a year now but due to some kind of peculiar “self-censorship” or an inability to carry out proper cross-border investigative journalism they have not managed to publish a single line about it.”

An introduction to the EPO “Topić Affair” was sent to us anonymous by a source familiar with Topić’s track record at home (Croatia) and abroad. It is written clearly enough to be quoted verbatim below:

Background

The first Director General (DG) of the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO) was Mr. Nikola Kopčić: http://www.forinpro.hr/index.php/our-team

He held this position from 1992 to 2002. From 1998 onwards, at the same time as he was SIPO DG, Kopčić was also a representative of his own private company (ForInPro) before the SIPO. This amounted to an undeclared conflict of interest which was in breach of official regulations. In December 2001, the Ministry of Science recommended Kopčić’s dismissal after having investigated the situation which had been brought to its attention. The decision to dismiss Kopčić as SIPO DG was taken by the Croatian Government on 10 January 2002. Kopčić was also expelled from the AIPPI (International Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property) on the grounds that he had brought the Association into disrepute.

Following Kopčic’s dismissal as DG, the SIPO was under the direction of Mr. Hrvoje Junaševic from 2002 to 2004.

One of the persons instrumental in bringing about Kopčic’s dismissal was Ms. Vesna Stilin who was a career civil servant and one of the founding members of the Croatian SIPO. As an apparent act of revenge against Stilin who had also raised allegations about certain abuses of authority, Kopčic engineered her dismissal from the SIPO in 1999. However, she was reinstated at the SIPO in 2004 as an Assistant Director responsible for Copyright and Related Rights.

Appointment of Željko Topić as SIPO DG in 2004 In 2004, Željko Topić was appointed as the new SIPO DG for an initial four-year term. He had previously worked at the SIPO from about 1992 onwards but moved to the private sector in 2003 where, according to his CV, he worked in the field of “IP Management” as a Director of a company called Korper, Haramija & Topić Ltd. During his first term as SIPO DG, Topić clashed with Stilin over a number of issues including the implementation of the “Public Lending Right” (PLR) for writers in Croatia. Stilin claims that Topić blocked her efforts to implement the PLR. Stilin also raised concerns about issues falling within her remit relating to musical copyright royalties. According to press reports, she came into conflict with Topić after the Tax Office had sent an inquiry to the SIPO expressing doubts about the legality of business affairs between the SIPO and Emporion, a company involved in the collection and distribution of musical royalties which was owned by the entrepreneur Mark Vojković, a close associate of the Croatian President Ivo Josipović.

In 2008, Topić proposed Stilin’s dismissal from the SIPO inter alia on the grounds that the SIPO’s Copyright and Related Rights Department had been abolished and that, consequently, her position no longer existed. Although her dismissal was ultimately a decision of the Croatian Government, it was instigated and proposed by Topić. Stilin claims that the abolition of the SIPO’s Copyright and Related Rights Department which was invoked as a pretext for her dismissal was a completely arbitrary and unlawful act and that it was also in violation of formal undertakings which the Croatian authorities had given to the EU in the context of the CARDS Programme according to which the staffing of the Copyright and Related Rights Department was to be increased.

These matters are the subject of a number of pending criminal and civil lawsuits in Croatia. According to press reports, the real reason behind Stilin’s dismissal was because she had tried to warn the supervisory state institutions about irregularities occurring at the SIPO as well as the questionable relationship between the SIPO administration and Emporion. [1] Controversial re-appointment in 2008 Towards the end of 2007 and the beginning of 2008, the SIPO was subject to a number of supervisory inspections by Government Ministries which uncovered various irregularities. In particular, an investigation by the Ministry of Adminstration which took place in response to a petition by a group of SIPO employees resulted in findings that certain contested actions by Topić entailed breaches of Labour Law regulations. There was also a budgetary inspection by the Ministry of Finance which resulted in findings that there had been various irregularities in accounting practices at the SIPO. These developments gave rise to expectations that Topić’s mandate as SIPO DG would not be renewed. However, contrary to these expectations, his mandate was renewed for a further four-year term in 2008 by the Government of Ivo Sanader.

According to Stilin, Topić’s re-appointment was supported by the then Minister of Science, Dragan Primorac as a payback for the provision of an Audi 6 Quattro which had been placed at Primorac’s disposal at the expense of the SIPO. It is alleged that this arrangement between Topić and Primorac was unlawful and represented a misappropriation of public funds. In return for the alleged “favour”, Primorac is alleged to have recommended the renewal of Topić’s mandate to the Government. However, according to the applicable statute, at the time of the re-appointment Primorac was no longer competent to make such a recommendation. This is because in March 2008 the SIPO had been transferred from the remit of the Ministry of Science, Education and Sports to the remit of the Ministry of Economy, Labour and Entrepreneurship. It remained under the remit of the Ministry of Economy until December 2011 when it was transferred back to the remit of the Ministry of Science.

Topić’s re-appointment in 2008 was the subject of a challenge by Stilin in a lawsuit filed with the Administrative Court and which was finally rejected by the Croatian Constitutional Court. Following exhaustion of domestic remedies, the matter is currently the subject of an application pending before the European Court of Human Rights in Strassbourg.

The “ZAMP Affair” and appointment as EPO Vice-President The “ZAMP Affair” is a major contemporary political controversy in Croatia. The name “ZAMP” comes from the royalty collection management entity associated with the Croatian Composers Society (Croatian acroynm: HDS-ZAMP). The controversy concerns the management of royalty payments to musicians and encompasses various allegations of unlawful administrative acts, corruption, cronyism and conflicts of interest involving a clique associated with the Croatian President, Ivo Josipović, who was formerly the Secretary-General of the Croatian Composers Society. [2] Topić is perhaps a secondary figure in the “ZAMP affair” but as the former DG of the state institution which had the statutory responsibility for supervising the management of copyright and royalty payments, i.e. the SIPO, it is probable that his role as a “facilitator” was nevertheless a significant one. It has been claimed in the Croatian press and in an article published by the Deutsche Welle (in Croatian) that he enjoys the “protection” of Josipović. [3]

On 1 February 2012, the Croatian press reported that despite the controversy surrounding his management of the SIPO and ongoing official investigations into alleged irregularities, Topić had been re-appointed for a third term as SIPO DG on the recommendation of the then Minister of Science, Željko Jovanović. [4] Shortly afterwards in April 2012, it was reported that he had requested to be relieved of as his duties as SIPO DG in order to take up a more prestigious position as Vice-President of the European Patent Office in Munich. [5] Some of the articles published around this time referred to the fact that at the time of his appointment a number of criminal and civil lawsuits were pending against him in Croatia. [6]

“Dual Mandate” in April 2012

Topić took up office as EPO Vice-President on 16 April 2012. However, according to Croatian government records published in the official gazette “Narodne Novine”, his tenure as SIPO DG lasted until 30 April 2014. Thus for a period of around two weeks in April 2012, it seems that he effectively enjoyed a “dual mandate” as EPO Vice-President and SIPO DG.

In an article published by dnevno.hr in April 2013, it was claimed that one of his last actions as SIPO DG was to order the publication of a highly polemical four-page “Press Release” which he allegedly authored himself on the official website of the SIPO. [7] This “Press Release” concluded by expressing “grave concern that an extremely unprofessional media manipulation based on malicious accusations from a small number of people obviously driven by questionable motives can cause the reputation of a state institution and its Director to be called into question in such an outrageous manner, despite the notable results achieved by the Office and its professional reputation in the relevant national and international professional circles, which is incontrovertibly confirmed by the official reports of the European Commission, the international awards presented to Mr Topić and his appointment to a high executive function at the European Patent Office based inter alia upon the results achieved during his many years as the head of the Office.

We particularly regret that the competent institutions have also succumbed to this unprecedented pressure and have subordinated their actions to individual interests rather than objective reasoning based on relevant facts.” [8]

Despite the criticism of “unprofessional media manipulation” in the “Press Release”, the dnevno.hr article pointed out that a complaint against an article written by Slavica Lukić for “Jutarni list” which Topić submitted to the Croatian Journalists’ Association (HND) was dismissed by the competent “Ethics Council” of the HND in September 2012. In its conclusions the “Ethics Council” stated the following: “The Council finds that the colleague Lukić verified the relevant information with the appropriate official institutions [i.e. the Ministries of Science and Finance], so in that sense she was not under the obligation claimed by Mr. Topić [i.e. to obtain approval from him or from the SIPO]. The tone and style of the article are serious and balanced; there are no insults or muck-raking sensationalism (lit. “yellow elements”). This confirms that the article was not written with the intention of defaming anyone, but rather in defence of the public interest.” [9]

Dragan Primorac and the “Touareg affair”

One of the controversies relating to Topić’s period of office as SIPO DG, relates to alleged misappropriation of public funds to acquire expensive luxury vehicles for the use of a select group of SIPO employees and the then Minister of Science, Dragan Primorac, who exercised supervisory competence over the SIPO until March 2008. This matter was originally reported in the Croatian press in 2009 but has resurfaced recently due to a publication by the Croatian Public Sector Employees Union (SDLSN) claiming that no proper investigation into this alleged misappropriation of public funds ever took place. [10] The matter has acquired fresh relevance in Croatia in the light of pending criminal proceedings against the former Minister of Science, Dragan Primorac, in a similar case involving allegations of corruption and misuse of public funds at the National Standards Institute, another state institution which came under Primorac’s ministerial remit. In this case it is alleged that the former Director of the National Standards Institute, Dragutin Funda, provided a luxury Touareg SUV to Primorac at the expense of the Institute. The socalled “Touareg Affair” is currently the subject of court proceedings in Croatia and a hearing was held recently in May 2014. Primorac has pleaded not guilty to the charges against him whereas his co-accused, Funda, has pleaded guilty. [11] Other developments – Petition to the European Parliament In 2013, a number of letters voicing concern about Topić’s appointment as EPO Vice-President and calling for an independent investigation into the matter were submitted to the EPO’s Administrative Council by the Croatian NGO “Juris Protecta” which describes itself as an “Association for the Promotion of the Rule of Law in Croatia”. As the Administrative Council did not respond to these interventions, Juris Protecta filed a Petition with the European Parliament. The Petition has been registered with the number 2848/2013 and is expected to be examined for admissibility by the Petitions Committee during its next session, probably in September or October 2014. [12]

LINKS TO ORIGINAL CROATIAN PRESS ARTICLES

[1] Articles relating to Vesna Stilin and her dismissal from the SIPO:

http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak/obratila-se-linicu-zvizdacica-iz-zavoda-zaintelektualnovlasnistvo-trazi-reviziju-slucaja-emporion/605689.aspx

http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak/vesna-stilin-ravnatelj-dziva-topic-me-oklevetao-iprevario/

609228.aspx

[2] Articles relating to the “ZAMP Affair” and Emporion:

http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak/oglusili-se-na-zahtjev-eu-ne-moze-vam-samo-jednaosoba-u-hrvatskoj-biti-nadzor-za-zamp–/609083.aspx

http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak/sukob-interesa-josipoviceva-zena-za-sve-pise-zakoneradi-u-zampuemporionu-i-svira/605429.aspx

[3] Claims that Topić enjoys the “protection” of Croatian President Ivo Josipović:

http://www.tjedno.hr/index.php/categoryblog/1471-zampili-milijardu-kuna

http://www.dw.de/hrvatski -patent -za-autorska-prava/a-16035391

[4] Controversial renewal of Topić’s mandate as SIPO DG for a third term in 2012:

http://www.jutarnji.hr/zeljko-topic–sebi-i-kolegama-isplatio-milijun-kuna-honorara–a-vladamu-dala-jos-jedan-mandat-/1003663/

[5] Croatian press commentary on Topić’s appointment as EPO Vice-President:

http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak/index-doznaje–jovanovic-istrazuje-dziv-gdje-je-milijunkuna-tko-se-vozio-u-preskupim-automobilima/611883.aspx

http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak/nagradio-ga-pantovcak-umjesto-progona-ravnateljzavoda-koji-nadzire-zamp-promoviran/608936.aspx

http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak/unatoc-nadjenim-nepravilnostima-ministar-jovanovicpustio-ravnatelja-dziva-da-ode-u-mnchen-/612175.aspx

[6] Articles with references to lawsuits against Topić at the time of his EPO appointment:

http://www.tjedno.hr/index.php/categoryblog/998-protiv-topia-se-vodi-estpostupaka

http://www.jutarnji.hr/kazneni-progon-nije-ga-zaustavio–sanaderov-kadar-zeljko-topic–smijenjen-na-vlastiti-zahtjev–dobio-jos-bolji-posao/1024680/

[7] Article mentioning Topić’s last “Press Release” as SIPO DG on 30 April 2012:

http://www.dnevno.hr/vijesti/hrvatska/85582-bivsi-ravnatelj-dziv-a-zeljko-topic-zakinuojehrvatske-knjizevnike-za-milijune-kuna.html

[8] The original Croatian version of the “Press Release” dated 30 April 2012 can be found
here: http://www.dziv.hr/files/File/novosti/Priopcenje_za_javnost_30042012.pdf

[9] Dismissal of a complaint submitted by Topić to the Croatian Journalists’ Association
against Slavica Lukic in 2012:

http://www.hnd.hr/hr/Zakljucci7sjednice2012/show/66192/

[10] Articles relating to the controversy surrounding acquisition of luxury vehicles by the
SIPO originally appeared in 2009:

http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak/strah-od-bmwa-direktor-drzavnog-zavoda-sakrioskupocjeni-mercedes/428050.aspx

http://www.nacional.hr/clanak/55956/umjesto-u-garazu-ravnatelj-svoj-luksuzni-mercedesparkira-u-arhivu

More recent articles on this subject were published in April 2014:

http://www.tjedno.hr/index.php/categoryblog/4837-uz-touareg-sporan-je-i-a6-kojim-sesluzio-bivsi-ministar

http://www.sdlsn.hr/index.php/?article=9121&category=1

http://www.dnevno.hr/vijesti/hrvatska/118172-foto-sindikalci-odabrali-zaljubljeni-pargodine-

zeljko-topic-i-njegov-a-mercedes.html

[11] A report dated 16 May 2014 relating to the recent court hearing in the “Touareg Affair” can be found here:
www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak/slucaj-touareg-dragan-primorac-se-ne-osjecakrivim/747836.aspx

[12] The Petition to the European Parliament is mentioned in the following article by
Intellectual Property Watch:

http://www.ip-watch.org/2014/05/15/epo-internal-strife-spills-over-into-europeanparliament-human-rights-court/

Here are press/news clippings [PDF] about the above items and what follows is the aforementioned petition to the European Parliament:

PETITION REF. NO.: JP-2013-0001-EPO

For the urgent attention of:
The President of the European Parliament
Rue Wiertz
B-1047 BRUSSELS

PETITION
TO THE
EUROPEAN
PARLIAMENT

Submitted in accordance with
Article 44 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union
and
Article 227 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The present Petition concerns a matter which the Petitioner considers to be indicative of a serious deficiency in the governance of the European Patent Organisation.

Notwithstanding the fact that the EPO is not an organ of the EU and, as such, lies outside of the formal jurisdiction of the European Parliament, it is submitted that the European Parliament has both a legitimate interest and an obligation to ensure that proper standards of governance prevail at the EPO in consequence of the duties entrusted to the EPO by the EU under the unitary patent scheme.

The European Parliament is therefore requested to investigate the matter detailed herein and to exert its influence on the Administrative Council of the European Patent Organisation to take appropriate corrective action with regard to the same.

I. BACKGROUND

1. The European Patent Organisation is an international organisation established under the terms of the European Patent Convention (EPC) of 1973.
The text of the EPC is accessible online at the following URL: http://www.epo.org/law-practice/legal-texts/html/epc/2013/e/ma1.html

2. According to Article 4 EPC, the organs of the European Patent Organisation (EPO) are
(a) the European Patent Office; and
(b) the Administrative Council.

3. The Administrative Council is the governing body of the European Patent Organisation and it is composed of delegates from the contracting states, i.e. the signatory states of the EPC. Pursuant to the provisions of Article 11 EPC, the Administrative Council is the appointing authority for senior employees of the EPO, in particular the President and the Vice-Presidents of the European Patent Office.

4. Whereas the EPO is not an organ of the EU, the EU has a legitimate interest in the proper governance of said Organisation. This interest derives inter alia from the following considerations:

(i) Article 17 (2) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (hereinafter CFR-EU) states that “Intellectual property shall be protected”. The EU thus has an acknowledged statutory responsibility for protecting the intellectual property rights of its citizens.

(ii) In 2012, EU Member States and the European Parliament agreed on the so-called “unitary patent package” – a legislative initiative consisting of two Regulations and an international Agreement laying the foundation for the creation of unitary patent protection in the EU. In the context of this unitary patent scheme, the EPO has been entrusted with the task of granting unitary patents. It is also foreseen that the EPO will be in charge of centrally administering the unitary patent, levying the annual renewal fees and distributing them to the participating EU member states.

5. It is evident that the protection of intellectual property prescribed under Article 17 (2) CFR-EU can only be guaranteed in an effective manner if the institutions responsible for administering intellectual property rights are subject to proper governance.

6. Notwithstanding the fact that the EPO is not an organ of the EU and, as such, lies outside of the formal remit of the European Parliament, it is submitted that the European Parliament has both a legitimate interest and an obligation to ensure that proper standards of governance prevail at the EPO in consequence of the duties entrusted to the EPO by the EU under the unitary patent scheme.

7. The submissions which follow concern the appointment of a senior official of the European Patent Office. The Petitioner is of the view that this is a matter which raises questions about the standards of governance at the European Patent Organisation and on that basis respectfully submits that this is a matter of public interest which merits investigation by the European Parliament, in particular having regard to the observations set forth under items 4 to 6 above.

8. The Petitioner has already made two submissions to the Administrative Council of the EPO concerning the matters raised in the present Petition: a first submission in advance of the Council’s October 2013 meeting and a second submission in advance of its December 2013 meeting (Annex I). No response to these submissions has been received from the Administrative Council so far.

II. DETAILS

9. The present Petition concerns the appointment of a senior official of the EPO, namely the appointment of Mr. Željko Topić as the Vice-President of Directorate-General 4 of the European Patent Office.

10. Mr. Topić’s candidature for the aforementioned position was supported by the current President of the European Patent Office, Mr. Benoît Battistelli, and his appointment was approved by the Administrative Council of the EPO in March 2012 as announced on the official Internet site of the EPO: http://www.epo.org/news-issues/news/2012/20120328.html

11. Mr. Topić was formerly the Director-General of the Croatian State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO). He was initially appointed to that position in 2004 and was re-appointed for a second term in 2008. Shortly after being re-appointed for a third term in 2012, he resigned voluntarily from his position at the SIPO following his appointment as a Vice-President of the European Patent Office where he took up his duties in April 2012.

12. Mr. Topić’s appointment to the EPO was the subject of much critical press coverage in his home country of Croatia. For example, an article by the journalist Ms. Slavica Lukić was
published in Jutarni List on 28 April 2012: http://www.jutarnji.hr/kazneni-progon-nije-ga-zaustavio–sanaderov-kadar-zeljkotopic–smijenjen-na-vlastiti-zahtjev–dobio-jos-bolji-posao/1024680/

Mr. Topić filed a complaint about this article with the Croatian Journalists’ Association (Hrvatsko Novinarsko Društvo). However, Mr. Topić’s complaint was dismissed by the Association’s tribunal. An English language translation of the disputed article and the findings of the tribunal are provided as an annex to the present Petition (Annex II).

13. According to the information at the disposal of the Petitioner, apart from various civil proceedings, there were at least two criminal law cases pending against Mr. Topić prior to his appointment as Vice-President of the European Patent Office. One of these cases concerned the circumstances surrounding the dismissal of Ms. Vesna Stilin, a former Assistant Director-General of the Croatian SIPO, and the other one concerned matters which the Croatian Ministry of Education, Science and Sport as the government department with supervisory authority over the SIPO had failed to investigate properly despite its statutory obligation to do so. Evidence to support the foregoing assertions is provided in Annex III to the present Petition (Annex III-A1 and III-A2).

14. Concerning the first of the criminal law cases referred to above, it is noted that Ms. Stilin’s dismissal from the post of Assistant Director-General of the SIPO in 2008 was based on statements by Mr. Topić which Ms. Stilin considers to have been untrue and which prompted her to initiate criminal proceedings against Mr. Topić for defamation. In appeal proceedings held before the competent court of appeal in Croatia in December 2012, a judgment was delivered in Ms. Stilin’s favour to remit the case back to the court of first instance where it is still pending (Annex III-B).

15. Ms. Stilin additionally filed criminal charges against Mr. Topić with the Croatian State Prosecutor’s Office (Annex III-C). This case which includes a charge relating to bribery is likewise still pending before the courts in Croatia. A key accusation here is that Mr. Topić effectively “purchased” his re-appointment as Director General of the SIPO by bribing the former Minister of Education, Science and Sport, Mr. Dragan Primorac, who was responsible for proposing Mr. Topić’s re-appointment for a second term to the Croatian government in 2008 (Annex III-D). There is further extensive documentation about this matter, including a complaint which Ms. Stilin filed with the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. A copy of this documentation can be provided on request.

16. In response to the legal actions which Ms. Stilin had initiated against him, Mr. Topić belatedly filed a private action for defamation against her at the Municipal Criminal Court in Zagreb on 22 April 2013. Mr. Topić’s action was dismissed by the court which delivered its judgment in Ms. Stilin’s favour in September 2013 (Annex III-E).

17. Further documentation is available which shows that during his period of office as Director General of the Croatian SIPO Mr. Topić ignored the recommendation made by independent EU experts in field of Copyright and Related Rights in the context of the Community Assistance for Reconstruction, Development and Stabilisation (CARDS) Programme for South-Eastern Europe (Official Reference No. 96-022 and 60343) where the EU provided Croatia with about € 2 million to assist the development of the SIPO, in particular with the aim of strengthening its Copyright and Related Rights Department. At that time the number of legal staff in the Copyright and Related Rights Department was insufficient as there were only two persons at the SIPO, including Ms. Stilin, responsible for dealing with these matters. However, instead of increasing the number of legal staff in accordance with the recommendation of experts appointed by the EU to which he had formally assented in a commitment given to the EU on behalf of the Republic of Croatia, Mr. Topić proceeded to effectively abolish the Copyright and Related Rights Department, by reducing the personnel dealing with these matters to a single person. Mr. Topić’s actions in this regard were carried out without any coherent explanation and in a manner which appears to have amounted to an egregious violation of his official obligations. A copy of the relevant documentation relating to this matter can be provided on request.

18. The Petitioner respectfully submits that it would be in the public interest for the Administrative Council of the EPO to initiate an impartial and objective investigation into the circumstances surrounding Mr. Topić’s appointment as a Vice-President of the European Patent Office and, to the extent appropriate, to exercise its disciplinary authority in the matter.

19. The Petitioner has already made representations to the Administrative Council of the EPO in this regard (Annex I). However, the Council has so far given no indication that it intends to carry out an independent investigation into the matter. The lack of any substantive response on the part of the Council leads the Petitioner to fear that it may be unwilling to take appropriate action on its own initiative to face up to its public duty in this regard.

III. RELIEF SOUGHT

In view of the foregoing, the European Parliament (hereinafter “the Parliament”) is hereby petitioned to take the following action in respect of the matter detailed above:

1. The Parliament is requested to conduct its own independent investigation into the matter.

2. Insofar as this investigation may lead it to conclude that the matter warrants further action on its part, the Parliament is requested to exert its influence on the Administrative Council of the EPO to take appropriate corrective action.

3. More specifically, the Parliament is requested to adopt a resolution calling on the Administrative Council of the EPO to conduct an impartial and independent investigation into the circumstances surrounding Mr. Topić’s appointment as a Vice-President of the European Patent Office and, to the extent appropriate, to exercise its disciplinary authority with regard to the same.

The Petitioner hereby wishes to assure the Parliament of its full co-operation with any investigation which it may see fit to conduct in response to the present Petition. The Parliament is further advised that Ms. Stilin, former Assistant Director-General of the Croatian SIPO, has informed the Petitioner of her willingness to co-operate with any independent investigation to be carried out under the Parliament’s authority into the matters detailed above. In particular, Ms. Stilin has indicated that she is prepared to provide copies of any relevant documentation at her disposal which might assist the Parliament in it endeavours in this regard.

In the meantime, the Petitioner respectfully remains at the Parliament’s disposal should it have any further queries or require any further assistance in order to assess the merits of the present Petition.

Request for confidential treatment pursuant to Rule 201(11) of the Rules of Procedure of the European Parliament

In view of the fact that legal proceedings are pending in Croatia involving parties mentioned in connection with the present Petition, the Petitioner considers that it would be advisable to treat the contents of the Petition with an appropriate degree of confidentiality in order not to prejudice the interests of any of the parties to the aforementioned legal proceedings.

Accordingly, a request for confidential treatment is made pursuant to Rule 201(11) of the Rules of Procedure of the European Parliament.

The Petitioner notes in this regard that it has no objection to it being entered into the public record that the present Petition has been lodged with the Parliament. However, the Parliament is respectfully requested to consult with the Petitioner to obtain its approval in the case that it is intended to make any further details of the Petition public.

ANNEXES

I. Copies of submissions made by the Petitioner (Juris Protecta e.V.) to the Administrative Council of the EPO.

II. English language translation of an article by the journalist Ms. Slavica Lukić published in Jutarni List on 28 April 2012 accompanied by an English language translation of the findings of the tribunal of the Croatian Journalists’ Association dismissing a complaint filed by Mr. Topić against Ms. Lukić.

III. Copies of documents pertaining to alleged irregularities in the administration of the Croatian SIPO and related matters.

In the next part we are going to relate this to more abuses and swindles at the European Patent Office. █

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