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Emancipation of minorsis a legal mechanism by which aminorbefore attaining theage of majorityis freed from control by their parents or guardians, and the parents or guardians are freed from responsibility for their child. Minors are normally consideredlegally incompetentto enter intocontractsand to handle their own affairs. Emancipation overrides that presumption and allows emancipated children to legally make certain decisions on their own behalf.
Depending on jurisdiction, a child may be emancipated by acts such aschild marriage, attaining economic self-sufficiency, obtaining an educationaldegreeordiploma, ormilitary service. In the United States, all states have some form of emancipation of minors.[1][2]
Even without a court proceeding, some jurisdictions will find a minor to be emancipated for purposes of making a decision in the absence of the minor's parents or guardians. For example, a child in most jurisdictions can enter into a binding contract to procure their own basic needs. However, when a child's needs are not provided by a parent, the child is often deemed a ward of the state and receives a court-appointed guardian.[citation needed]
InRoman lawthe father of the extended household, thepater familias, exercised autocratic authority throughpatria potestasincluding his wife, his children and his slaves. Such rights persisted through feudal and Englishcommon law, assigning most people the status of personal property (chattel). In common law, emancipation is the freeing of someone from this control. It grants the emancipated the ability to legally engage in civil actions, and frees the former owner of liability.
In common-law jurisdictions,chattel slaverywas abolished during the 19th century and married women were givenindependent rightsduring the 19th and at the start of the 20th century. Later during the 20th century, common law jurisdictions split over bothchildren's rightsandyouth rights; in some, such as the USA, a traditional father's control became a right to shared parental control and emancipation remained a remedy for mature minors, but in others, for example England, the idea of absolute control over minors has been repudiated; parent's responsibilities are emphasized and children's rights promoted. In these jurisdictions, the rights of minors to act on their own behalf are granted on a case-by-case basis if a minor can show the capacity and maturity to handle them, and juvenile emancipation from control is deemed unnecessary.
An emancipated minor does not simply acquire all rights of an adult; likewise, a child does not lack such rights merely because they are not emancipated. For example, in the US minors have some rights to consent to medical procedures without parental consent or emancipation, under thedoctrine of the mature minor. In England a minor may still not own and administer land.[3]Also in any jurisdiction statute law may limit action due to insufficient age, such as the purchase of alcohol or the right to drive on public roads, without regard to capacity.
Common law countries that retain the idea of control and emancipation include Canada, South Africa, and the United States. Countries that have followed the route to gradual civic rights for adolescents includeEngland and Wales, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. In these countries emancipation is unavailable. Statutory provision for juvenile emancipation has spread outside of common law jurisdictions,[citation needed]for example in Brazil.[4]
In other countries some aspects of emancipation are in force. The right to engage in civil acts as an adult are granted after marriage, as is the freedom of liability for the parent.[5]In Argentina, where there is no lower age limit on marriage, child marriage is sometimes used as a mechanism for emancipation.[6]The rights granted in such cases may not be as full as common-law emancipation.[7]
Express: When the parent(s) or legal guardian agrees with the minor that the minor can leave home, become self-sustaining, and control their own wages and assets. Courts may review. For example, elements of coercion can void the emancipation, so if a child agrees to leave because their life has been made intolerable through fault, the court may decree the parents still owe a duty of support.[8]
Implied: When circumstances dictate that a child has become emancipated, even though no explicit agreement was made. Common reasons include marriage, military service, or other reasons given by statutory definition or through case law.
Court order: A court may declare a minor to be emancipated when deciding a relevant case or following a petition of emancipation. Not all jurisdictions that support emancipation allow a direct petition to the courts; for example, in Canada only Quebec[9]does. Even in those jurisdictions that do, the court may not allow a minor to file on their own behalf (as they are not yet emancipated), nor may they directly instruct a lawyer to act on their behalf. Instead they petition through an adultnext friend. Courts decide in the minor's best interest: between parental control, care through child services (including fostering or adoption), and emancipation.
Partial: A minor may be considered emancipated for some purposes and not others. A grant of partial emancipation may, for example, be given to homeless youths to allow them to consent to state housing programs.[10]Marriage, incarceration, living apart, pregnancy and parenthood may automatically confer some of the rights of emancipation, particularly health consent and privacy in US states[11]unless the minor is younger than the absolute minimum age of emancipation in their state.
Although allowed for in common law, some of these methods could be almost impossible to use in practice in a particular jurisdiction, especially if it has no relevant statute or case law.
In general, minors are under the control of their parents or legal guardians until they attain theage of majorityor are otherwise legally emancipated, at which point they legally become adults. In most states, the age of majority is upon reaching 18 years of age. The exceptions areAlabamaandNebraska, where the age of majority is 19, andMississippiandPuerto Rico, where it is 21.[12][13][14]Depending on state laws, minors may be able to obtain medical treatment, marry, or exercise other rights (such as driving, voting, etc.) before reaching the age of majority, withoutparental consent.
In special circumstances, minors can be freed from control by their guardians (i.e. emancipated) before they reach the age of majority. In some states, marriage automatically emancipates a minor, but not inMassachusetts. In some states (includingCaliforniaandVermont), membership in the armed forces can also automatically emancipate a minor. In most states, other forms of emancipation require a court order, and some states set a minimum age at which emancipation can be granted. In general, an emancipated minor does not require parental consent to enter into contracts, get married, join the armed forces, receive medical treatment, apply for a passport, or obtain financing.
Parents have a number of legal duties while bringing up their biological or adopted child (e.g., a fiduciary duty to act in the best interest of the child). Failure to meet these requirements can result in the state taking civil and/or criminal action against the child's parent(s). When the "parent" is not the biological or adoptive parent of the child, such as a stepchild or an informal adoption (not adopted by court order), the matter is more complex; various legal doctrines, as well as statutes in many states, may impose various support obligations on step-parents.[15]Emancipation terminates these parental obligations and duties of support.
While parents may have expectations of particular conduct or contributions from their children, parents may not condition the provision of basic necessities upon the child conducting or contributing. However, they may condition other privileges on particular conduct or contribution by the child. When a child fails to conduct themselves according to rules which ensure their basic safety and the safety of those around them, a parent has recourse to petition a court to declare the child a "person in need of supervision", which essentially transfers guardianship to the state, who in turn subjects the child to supervision in the form of a group home or in foster care monitored by an officer of the court.[16]This does not necessarily discharge parents from their duty of financial support.
Children who have not reached the age of majority are generally not able to manage their property, enter into contracts (including enrollment contracts to university), or make certain life-altering decisions for themselves, such as the right to marry or to join the armed forces. Such decisions can, in some cases, be made with parental consent (e.g., the marriage of a child over age 16), and in other cases are proscribed or require a judicial consent (e.g., the marriage of a child under 13). A legal guardian (including a parent) may dispose of the property (including bank accounts) of the child, generally for the benefit of the child, including the provision of basic necessities. Wages which a child earns may be considered the child's property or may be required to be turned over to their parents to satisfy parental claims for costs associated with discharging parental responsibilities, depending on the laws of the relevant jurisdiction.
Upon emancipation, a minor will no longer be subject to claims by their parent/guardian for contribution out of their wages and will be granted full authority and legal ownership of their property and bank accounts. They would also gain the legal capacity to enter into binding contracts and have the authority to marry or join the armed forces.[17]
Emancipation laws and processes vary from state to state. In most states, minors seeking emancipation must file apetitionwith the family court in the applicable jurisdiction, formally requesting emancipation and citing reasons it is in their best interest to be emancipated, and must show financial self-sufficiency. In some states, freelegal aidis available to minors seeking emancipation, through children law centers. This can be a valuable resource for minors in framing an emancipation petition. Students are able to stay with a guardian if necessary. In some states, an emancipation petition may be filed by a parent, for example in Alabama.
Emancipation is not readily granted because of the subjectivity and narrowness of the "best interest" requirement. Some minors have been victims of abuse. In most cases, the state's department of child services will be notified of potential abuse and the child may be placed in foster care. Other minors may seek emancipation for reasons such as being dissatisfied with their parents' or guardians' rules. InCalifornia, a minor cannot use the excuse of not obeying the parent's reasonable and proper orders or directions of parents, and that minor could become a ward of the court, instead of being emancipated.[18]
Where astatute of limitationsfor bringing a legal action istolledwhile a person is a minor, emancipation will usually end that tolling.
Based on federal and state laws, those whose mental disability is so severe that they are incapable of caring for themselves may not necessarily be considered or legally viewed as emancipated, even though they have attained the age of majority. That may or may not affect legal matters related to such things as insurance benefits, SSI, SSDI, wills, tax obligations to them and theircaregivers, medical decisions, religious choices, residential and other accommodations, etc. due to their non-emancipated status.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipation_of_minors
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Secretary of the Department of Health and Community Services v JWB and SMB, commonly known asMarion's Case,[1]is a leading decision of theHigh Court of Australia,[2]concerning whether a child has the capacity to make decisions for themselves, and when this is not possible, who may make decisions for them regarding major medical procedures. It largely adopts the views inGillick v West Norfolk Area Health Authority, a decision of theHouse of Lordsin England and Wales.[3]
"Marion", apseudonymfor the 14-year-old girl at the centre of this case, suffered from intellectual disabilities, severe deafness, epilepsy and other disorders. Her parents, a married couple from theNorthern Territorysought an order from theFamily Court of Australiaauthorising them to have Marion undergo a hysterectomy and an oophrectomy (removal of ovaries). The practical effect would be sterilisation and preventing Marion from being able to have children and many of the hormonal effects of adulthood.
Under theFamily Law Actthe primary concern for matters involving children is that the court must act in the child's best interests. The majority of the High Court made it clear that it was merely deciding a point of law and that the decision about what was in the child's "best interests" would be left to the Family Court of Australia after the case.[1]: p. 229
The main legal debate that arose was who has the legal authority to authorise the operation. Three options existed: the parents (as legal guardians of their daughter), Marion or an order of a competent court, such as the Family Court of Australia. The Full Court of the Family Court was asked to decide:
1. Could the parents, as joint guardians authorize the sterilization procedure;2. If not, does the Family Court have jurisdiction to:(a) authorize the carrying out of such a procedure;(b) enlarge the powers, rights or duties of the parents to enable them to authorize such a procedure; or(c) approve the consent of the Applicants, as to the proposed procedure.
The majority of the Family Court, Strauss and McCall JJ held that the parents, as joint guardians could authorize the sterilization procedure.NicholsonCJheld that the Family Court had jurisdiction to authorize the procedure.[4]
The department, together with theAttorney-General for Australia, argued that only a court could authorize such a major operation and that the Family Court jurisdiction included any matter relating to the welfare of a child even if it was not a dispute about custody, guardianship or access.[1]: p. 222
The parents, however, "argued that the decision to sterilise a child is not significantly different from other major decisions that parents and guardians have to make for children and that the involvement of the Family Court is optional and only of a 'supervisory nature'. Their argument was that, provided such a procedure is in the best interests of the child, parents as guardians can give lawful consent to a sterilisation on behalf of a mentally incompetent child."[1]: p. 231
The High Court recognised the right of everyone to bodily integrity under national and international law, and made a distinction between therapeutic and non-therapeutic surgical procedures as well as the duty of surrogates to act in the best interests of the incompetent patient.
In the case, the High Court ruled that while parents may consent to medical treatment for their children, the authority does not extend to treatment not in the child's best interests. Also, the Court held that if medical treatment has sterilisation as its principal objective, parents do not have the authority to consent on behalf of their child.
The statement by Deane J that parents may grant surrogate consent for the non-therapeutic circumcision of male children isobiter dictumand not part of the judgment. Male circumcision was not at issue in the case and no evidence or testimony was offered regarding male circumcision.[1]: p. 297
Similarly to Re Paul [2008]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marion%27s_Case
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Gillick competenceis a term originating inEngland and Walesand is used inmedical lawto decide whether a child (a person under 16 years of age) is able to consent to their own medical treatment, without the need for parental permission or knowledge.
The standard is based on the 1985 judicial decision of theHouse of Lordswith respect to a case of thecontraceptionadvice given by anNHSdoctor inGillick v West Norfolk and Wisbech Area Health Authority.[1]The case is binding in England and Wales, and has been adopted to varying extents in Australia, Canada, and New Zealand.[2][3]Similar provision is made in Scotland by theAge of Legal Capacity (Scotland) Act 1991. In Northern Ireland, although separate legislation applies, the thenDepartment of Health and Social Servicesstated that there was no reason to suppose that the House of Lords' decision would not be followed by the Northern Ireland courts.
Gillick's case involved ahealth departmentalcircularadvising doctors oncontraceptionfor people under 16. The circular stated that the prescription of contraception was a matter for the doctor's discretion and that they could be prescribed to under-16s without parental consent. This matter was litigated becauseVictoria Gillickran an active campaign against the policy. Gillick sought a declaration that prescribing contraception was illegal because the doctor would commit an offence of encouraging sex with a minor and that it would be treatment without consent as consent vested in the parent; she was unsuccessful before theHigh Court of Justice, but succeeded in theCourt of Appeal.[4]
The issue before the House of Lords was only whether the minor involved could give consent. "Consent" here was considered in the broad sense of consent to battery or assault: in the absence of patient consent to treatment, a doctor, even if well-intentioned, might be sued/charged.
The House of Lords focused on the issue of consent rather than a notion of 'parental rights' or parental power. In fact, the court held that 'parental rights' did not exist, other than to safeguard the best interests of a minor. The majority held that in some circumstances a minor could consent to treatment, and that in these circumstances a parent had no power to veto treatment,[5]building on the judgement byLord DenninginHewer v Bryantthat parental rights were diminishing as the age of a child increases.[6][7][8]
Lord ScarmanandLord Fraserproposed slightly different tests (Lord Bridgeagreed with both). Lord Scarman's test is generally considered to be the test of 'Gillick competency'. He required that a child could consent if they fully understood the medical treatment that is proposed:
As a matter of law the parental right to determine whether or not their minor child below the age of sixteen will have medical treatment terminates if and when the child achieves sufficient understanding and intelligence to understand fully what is proposed.
The ruling holds particularly significant implications for the legal rights of minor children in England in that it is broader in scope than merely medical consent. It lays down that the authority of parents to make decisions for their minor children is not absolute, but diminishes with the child's evolving maturity. The result of Gillick is that in England and Wales today, except in situations which are regulated by statute, the legal right to make a decision on any particular matter concerning the child shifts from the parent to the child when the child reaches sufficient maturity to be capable of making up their own mind on the matter requiring decision.
A child who is deemed "Gillick competent" is able to prevent their parents viewing their medical records. Thus medical staff will not make a disclosure of medical records of a child who is deemed "Gillick competent" unlessconsentis manifest.[9]
In most jurisdictions the parent of anemancipated minordoes not have the ability to consent to therapy, regardless of the Gillick test. Typical positions of emancipation arise when the minor is married (R v D[1984] AC 778, 791) or in the military.[citation needed]
The nature of the standard remains uncertain. Thecourtshave so far declined invitations to define rigidly "Gillick competence" and the individual doctor is free to make a decision, consulting peers if this may be helpful, as to whether that child is "Gillick competent".[citation needed]
As of May 2016, it appeared to Funston and Howard—two researchers working on health education—that some recent legislation worked explicitly to restrict the ability of Gillick competent children to consent to medical treatment outside of clinical settings. For example, parental consent is required for the treatment of children withasthmausing standbysalbutamolinhalers in schools.[10]These restrictions have yet to be tested in court.
The decisionsIn re R(1991)[11]andRe W(1992)[12](especially Lord Donaldson) contradict theGillickdecision somewhat. From these, and subsequent cases, it is suggested that although the parental right to veto treatment ends, parental powers do not "terminate" as suggested by Lord Scarman inGillick. However, these are onlyobiterstatements and were made by a lower court; therefore, they are not legally binding. However, theparens patriaejurisdiction of the court remains available allowing a court order to force treatment against a child's (and parent's) wishes.[13]
In a 2006 judicial review,R (on the application of Axon) v Secretary of State for Health,[14]the High Court affirmedGillickin allowing for medical confidentiality for teenagers seeking anabortion. The court rejected a claim that not granting parents a "right to know" whether their child had sought an abortion, birth control or contraception breachedArticle 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. TheAxoncase set out a list of criteria that a doctor must meet when deciding whether to provide treatment to an under-16 child without informing their parents: they must be convinced that they can understand all aspects of the advice, that the patient's physical or mental health is likely to suffer without medical advice, that it is in the best interests of the patient to provide medical advice, that (in provision of contraception) they are likely to have sex whether contraception is provided or not, and that they have made an effort to convince the young person to disclose the information to their parents.
In late 2020,Bell v Tavistockconsidered whetherunder-16s with gender dysphoriacould be Gillick competent to consent to receiving puberty blockers. Due to the unique specifics of that treatment, the High Court concluded that in such cases the answer will almost always be 'no',a priori.[15]In late 2021, the Court of Appeal overturnedBell v Tavistock, as the clinic's policies and practices had not been found to be unlawful.[16]
During the COVID-19 pandemic, government guidance was circulated stating that some older children in secondary school would be considered Gillick competent to decide to bevaccinated against COVID-19when a parent/guardian has not consented.[17]The Green Book, the UK's guidance on immunisation, states that under 16s "who understand fully what is involved in the proposed procedure" can consent "although ideally their parents will be involved".[18]
In 1992, theHigh Court of Australiagave specific and strong approval for the application of Gillick competence inSecretary of the Department of Health and Community Services v JWB (1992) 175 CLR 189, also known asMarrion's Case. This decision introduced Gillick competence as Australian common law, and has been applied in similar cases such asDepartment of Community Services v Y (1999)NSWSC644.
There is no express authority in Australia onIn re RandRe W, so whether or not a parent's right terminates when Gillick competence is applied is unclear. This lack of authority reflects that the reported cases have all involved minors who have been found to be incompetent, and that Australian courts will make decisions in theparens patriaejurisdiction regardless of Gillick competence.
Legislation in South Australia and New South Wales clarifies the common law, establishing a Gillick-esque standard of competence but preserving concurrent consent between parent and child for patients aged 14–16 years.
On 21 May 2009, confusion[whose?]arose between Gillick competence, which identifies under-16s with the capacity to consent to their own treatment, and theFraser guidelines, which are concerned only withcontraceptionand focus on the desirability of parental involvement and the risks of unprotected sex in that area.[citation needed]
A persistent rumour arose that Victoria Gillick disliked having her name associated with the assessment of children's capacity, but an editorial in the BMJ from 2006 claimed that Gillick said that she "has never suggested to anyone, publicly or privately, that [she] disliked being associated with the term 'Gillick competent'".[19]
It is lawful for doctors to provide contraceptive advice and treatment without parental consent providing certain criteria are met. These criteria, known as the Fraser guidelines, were laid down by Lord Fraser in the Gillick decision and require the professional to be satisfied that:[20]
Although these criteria specifically refer to contraception, the principles are deemed to apply to other treatments, including abortion.[21]Although the judgment in the House of Lords referred specifically to doctors, it is considered by theRoyal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists(RCOG) to apply to other health professionals, "including general practitioners, gynaecologists, nurses, and practitioners in community contraceptive clinics, sexual health clinics and hospital services".[22]It may also be interpreted as covering youth workers and health promotion workers who may be giving contraceptive advice and condoms to young people under 16, but this has not been tested in court.[citation needed]
If a person under the age of 18 refuses to consent to treatment, it is possible in some cases for their parents or the courts to overrule their decision. However, this right can be exercised only on the basis that the welfare of the young person is paramount. In this context, welfare does not simply mean their physical health. The psychological effect of having the decision overruled would have to be taken into account and would normally be an option only when the young person was thought likely to suffer "grave and irreversible mental or physical harm". Usually, when a parent wants to overrule a young person's decision to refuse treatment, health professionals will apply to the courts for a final decision.[22]
An interesting aside to the Fraser guidelines is that many[weasel words]regard Lord Scarman's judgment as the leading judgement in the case, but because Lord Fraser's judgement was shorter and set out in more specific terms – and in that sense more accessible to health and welfare professionals – it is his judgement that has been reproduced as containing the core principles,[citation needed]as for example cited in the RCOG circular.[22]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gillick_competence
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Theage of consentis the age at which a person is considered to belegally competenttoconsenttosexual acts. Consequently, an adult who engages in sexual activity with a person younger than the age of consent is unable to legally claim that the sexual activity was consensual, and such sexual activity may be consideredchild sexual abuseorstatutory rape.[1]The person below the minimum age is considered the victim, and their sex partner the offender, although some jurisdictions provide exceptions through "Romeo and Juliet laws" if one or both participants are underage and are close in age.
The termage of consenttypically does not appear in legalstatutes.[2]: 1–2Generally, a law will establish the age below which it is illegal to engage in sexual activity with that person. It has sometimes been used with other meanings, such as the age at which a person becomes competent to consent tomarriage,[3][4]but consent to sexual activity is the meaning now generally understood. It should not be confused with other laws regarding age minimums including, but not limited to, theage of majority,age of criminal responsibility,voting age,drinking age, anddriving age.
Age of consent lawsvary widely from jurisdiction to jurisdiction,[2]though most jurisdictions set the age of consent within the range of 14 to 18 (with the exceptions ofArgentina,NigerandWestern Saharawhich set the age of consent at 13,Mexicowhich sets the age of consent between 12 and 18, and 14 Muslim states andVatican Citywhich set the consent by marriage only). The laws may also vary by the type of sexual act, the gender of the participants or other considerations, such as involving aposition of trust; some jurisdictions may also make allowances for minors engaged in sexual acts with each other, rather than a single age. Charges and penalties resulting from a breach of these laws may range from amisdemeanor, such as 'corruption of a minor', to what is popularly calledstatutory rape.
There are many "grey areas" in this area of law, some regarding unspecific and untried legislation, others brought about by debates regarding changing societal attitudes, and others due to conflicts betweenfederalandstatelaws. These factors all make age of consent an often confusing subject and a topic of highly charged debates.[2]
In traditional societies, the age of consent for a sexual union was a matter for the family to decide, or a tribal custom. In most cases, this coincided with signs ofpuberty,menstruationfor a woman, andpubic hairfor a man.[5]
Reliable data for ages at marriage is scarce. In England, for example, the only reliable data in the early modern period comes from property records made after death. Not only were the records relatively rare, but not all bothered to record the participants' ages, and it seems that the more complete the records are, the more likely they are to reveal young marriages. Modern historians have sometimes shown reluctance to accept evidence of young ages of marriage, dismissing it as a 'misreading' by a later copier of the records.[5]
In the 12th century,Gratian, the influential compiler ofcanon lawinmedievalEurope, accepted the age of puberty for marriage to be around twelve for girls and around fourteen for boys but acknowledged consent to be meaningful if both children were older than seven years of age.[6]There were authorities that said that such consent for entering marriage could take place earlier. Marriage would then be valid as long as neither of the two parties annulled the marital agreement before reaching puberty, or if they had already consummated the marriage. Judges sometimes honored marriages based on mutual consent at ages younger than seven: in contrast to established canon, there are recorded marriages of two- and three-year-olds.[5]
In China, Law Code of theQingyuan[ja;ko;zh]Reign (慶元條法事類), published in 1202 which catalogued laws that came into effect from 1127 to 1195, introduced statutory rape in the following decree: 'Successful intercourse with girls younger than 10 is considered rape in all circumstances, punishable by exile 3000li(miles) away into the uncivilized provinces; if the rape was unsuccessful, exile by 500 li; If injury occurs in process, death by hanging'.[7]
The firstrecordedage-of-consent law in Europe dates from 1275 in England; as part of its provisions on rape, theStatute of Westminster 1275made it a misdemeanor to "ravish" a "maiden within age," whether with or without her consent. The phrase "within age" was later interpreted by jurist SirEdward Coke(England, 17th century) as meaning the age of marriage, which at the time was twelve years of age.[8]
The Great Ming Code, 25th section, Criminal Code on Rape came into effect from 1373, raised the age of consent to 12 by stating 'girls younger than 12 lack rational sexual desires, therefore any intercourse with them is considered the same as rape and therefore punishable by death with hanging'.[9]
The American colonies followed the English tradition, and the law was more of a guide. For example, Mary Hathaway (Virginia, 1689) was only nine when she was married to William Williams.[10]Sir Edward Coke "made it clear that the marriage of girls under 12 was normal, and the age at which a girl who was a wife was eligible for adowerfrom her husband's estate was 9 even though her husband be only four years old."[5]
In the 16th century, a small number of Italian and German states set the minimum age for sexual intercourse for girls, setting it at twelve years. Towards the end of the 18th century, other European countries also began to enact similar laws. The first French Constitution of 1791 established the minimum age at eleven years. Portugal, Spain, Denmark and the Swiss cantons initially set the minimum age at ten to twelve years.[8]
Age of consent laws were historically difficult to follow and enforce. Legal norms based onagewere not, in general, common until the 19th century, because clear proof of exact age and precise date of birth were often unavailable.[8]
In 18th-century Australia it was thought that children were inherently sinful and vulnerable to sexual temptations. Punishment for "giving in" to these temptations was generally left to parents and was not seen as a government matter, except in the case of rape.[11]Australian children had few rights and were legally considered thechattelof their parents.[11]From the late 18th century, and especially in the 19th century, attitudes started to change. By the mid-19th century there was increased concern over child sexual abuse.[11]
A general shift in social and legal attitudes toward issues of sex occurred during the modern era. Attitudes on the appropriate age of permission for females to engage in sexual activity drifted toward adulthood. While ages from ten to thirteen years were typically regarded as acceptable ages for sexual consent inWestern countriesduring the mid-19th century,[2]by the end of the 19th century changing attitudes towards sexuality and childhood resulted in the raising of the age of consent.[8]
Englishcommon lawhad traditionally set the age of consent within the range of ten to twelve years old, but theOffences Against the Person Act 1875raised this to thirteen in Great Britain and Ireland. Early feminists of theSocial Purity movement, such asJosephine Butlerand others, instrumental in securing the repeal of theContagious Diseases Acts, began to turn towards the problem ofchild prostitutionby the end of the 1870s. Sensational media revelations about the scourge of child prostitution in London in the 1880s then caused outrage among the respectable middle-classes, leading to pressure for the age of consent to be raised again.
The investigative journalistWilliam Thomas Steadof thePall Mall Gazettewas pivotal in exposing the problem of child prostitution in the London underworld through a publicity stunt. In 1885 he "purchased" one victim,Eliza Armstrong, the thirteen-year-old daughter of achimney sweep, for five pounds and took her to a brothel where she was drugged. He then published a series of four exposés entitledThe Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon, which shocked its readers with tales of child prostitution and the abduction, procurement, and sale of young English virgins to Continental "pleasure palaces". The "Maiden Tribute" was an instant sensation with the reading public, and Victorian society was thrown into an uproar about prostitution. Fearing riots on a national scale, theHome Secretary,Sir William Harcourt, pleaded in vain with Stead to cease publication of the articles. A wide variety of reform groups held protest meetings and marched together toHyde Parkdemanding that the age of consent be raised. The government was forced to propose theCriminal Law Amendment Act 1885, which raised the age of consent from thirteen to sixteen and clamped down on prostitution.[12]
In the United States, as late as the 1880s most states set the minimum age at ten to twelve (in Delaware, it was seven in 1895).[13]Inspired by the "Maiden Tribute" articles, female reformers in the U.S. initiated their own campaign,[14]which petitioned legislators to raise the legal minimum age to at least sixteen, with the ultimate goal to raise the age to eighteen. The campaign was successful, with almost all states raising the minimum age to between sixteen and eighteen years by 1920.[8][15]
InFrance, Portugal, Denmark, theSwiss cantonsand other countries, the minimum age was raised to between thirteen and sixteen years in the following decades.[8]Though the original arguments for raising the age of consent were based on morality, since then theraison d'êtreof the laws has changed tochild welfareand a so-called right to childhood or innocence.[16]
In France, under theNapoleonic Code, the age of consent was set in 1832 at eleven,[17]and was raised to thirteen in 1863.[18]It was increased to fifteen in 1945.[19]In the 1970s,a group of prominent French intellectuals advocated for the repeal of the age of consent laws, but did not succeed.
InSpain, it was set in 1822 at "puberty age", and changed to twelve in 1870,[20]which was kept until 1999, when it became 13;[21][22]and in 2015 it was raised to 16.[23][24][25]
In the 21st century, concerns aboutchild sex tourismandcommercial sexual exploitationof children gained prominence, resulting in legislative changes in multiple jurisdictions, as well as the adoption of international laws.
TheCouncil of EuropeConvention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse(Lanzarote, 25 October 2007), and theEuropean Union'sDirective 2011/92/EU of the European Parliament and of the Councilof 13 December 2011 on combating the sexual abuse and sexual exploitation of children and child pornography[26]were adopted.
TheOptional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornographycame into force in 2002.
TheProtocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children, which came into force in 2003, prohibits commercial sexual exploitation of children.[27]
TheCouncil of Europe Convention on Action against Trafficking in Human Beings(which came into force in 2008) also deals with commercial sexual exploitation of children.
Several Western countries have raised their ages of consent in recent decades. These includeCanada(in 2008—from 14 to 16); and in Europe,Iceland(in 2007—from 14 to 15),Lithuania(in 2010—from 14 to 16),Croatia(in 2013—from 14 to 15),Spain(in 2015—from 13 to 16),Romania(in 2020 from 15 to 16) andEstonia(in 2022—from 14 to 16).
TheInternational Criminal CourtStatute does not provide a specific age of consent in its rape/sexual violence statute, but makes reference to sexual acts committed against persons "incapable of giving genuine consent"; and the explicative footnote states, "It is understood that a person may be incapable of giving genuine consent if affected by natural, induced orage-related incapacity." (see note 51)[28]
Sexual relations with a person under the age of consent is a crime in most countries; Jurisdictions use a variety of terms for the offense, includingchild sexual abuse,statutory rape,illegalcarnal knowledge,corruption of a minor,[2]besides others.
The enforcement practices of age-of-consent laws vary depending on the social sensibilities of the particular culture (see above). Often, enforcement is not exercised to the letter of the law, with legal action being taken only when a sufficiently socially-unacceptable age gap exists between the two individuals, or if the perpetrator is in a position of power over the minor (e.g. a teacher, minister, or doctor). Thesexof each participant can also influence perceptions of an individual's guilt and therefore enforcement.[2]
The threshold age for engaging in sexual activity varies between jurisdictions. Most jurisdictions have set a fixed age of consent.[29]However, some jurisdictions permit sex with a person after the onset of theirpuberty, such asYemen, but only in marriage. Ages can also vary based on the type of calendar used, such as thelunar calendar,[30]how birth dates in leap yearsare handled, or even the method by which birth date is calculated.[31]
The age of consent is a legal barrier to the minor's ability to consent and therefore obtaining consent is not in general a defense to having sexual relations with a person under the prescribed age, for example:
In some jurisdictions it is a defense if the accused can show their reasonable belief that the victim was over the age of consent. However, where such a defense is provided, it normally applies only when the victim is close to the age of consent or the accused can showdue diligencein determining the age of the victim (e.g. an underage person who used a fake identification document claiming to be of legal age).[32]
In various jurisdictions, age of consent laws do not apply if the parties are legally married to each other.Ruhollah Khomeini, firstSupreme Leader of Iran, wrote inTahrir al-Wasilahthatsexual penetrationrequires the girl to be at least 9 years old, but that other sexual acts are unobjectionable regardless their age, even if they are a "sucklinginfant".[33][34]
Some jurisdictions have laws explicitly allowing sexual acts with minors under the age of consent if their partner is close in age. InCanada, the age of consent is 16, but there are three close-in-age exemptions: sex with minors aged 14–15 is permitted if the partner is less than five years older, sex with minors aged 12–13 is permitted if the partner is less than two years older, and sex with minors aged 0–11 is permitted if the partner is 12 or 13 years of age, as long as the partner is not in a position of trust over the other minor.[35][36]
Another approach takes the form of a stipulation that sexual intercourse between a minor and an older partner is legal under the condition that the latter does not exceed a certain age. For example, the age of consent in the US state ofDelawareis 18, but it is allowed for teenagers aged 16 and 17 to engage in sexual intercourse as long as the older partner is younger than 30.[37]The law in Canada for sex between minors aged 0–11 with a partner younger than 14 also takes this form.
Other countries state that the sexual conduct with the minor is not to be punished if the partners are of a similar age and development: for instance, the age of consent inFinlandis 16, but the law states that the act will not be punished if "there is no great difference in the ages or the mental and physical maturity of the persons involved".[38]InSlovenia, the age of consent is 15, but the activity is only deemed criminal if there is "a marked discrepancy between the maturity of the perpetrator and that of the victim".[39]
Some jurisdictions, such asthe Bahamas, UK overseas territory of theCayman Islands,ParaguayandSurinamehave a higher age of consent forsame-sex sexual activity. However, such discrepancies are increasingly being challenged. WithinBermudafor example (since 1 November 2019 under section 177 of the Criminal Code Act 1907) the age of consent for vaginal and oral sex is 16, but for anal sex it is 18. In Canada, the United Kingdom and Western Australia, for example, the age of consent was formerly 21 for same-sex sexual activity between males (with no laws regardinglesbiansexual activities), while it was 16 forheterosexualsexual activity; this is no longer the case and the age of consent for all sexual activity is 16.[40]In June 2019, the Canadian government repealed the section of the criminal code that set a higher age of consent for anal intercourse.[41]
In some jurisdictions (such asIndonesia[42]), there are different ages of consent for heterosexual sexual activity that are based on the gender of each person. In countries where there are gender-age differentials, the age of consent may be higher for girls—for example inPapua New Guinea, where the age of consent for heterosexual sex is 16 for girls and 14 for boys,[43]or they may be higher for males, such as in Indonesia, where males must be 19 years old and females must be 16 years old.[42]There are also numerous jurisdictions—such as Kuwait[44]andthe Palestinian Territories[45]—in whichmarriage lawsgovern the gender-age differential. In these jurisdictions, it is illegal to have sexual intercourse outside of marriage, so thede factoage of consent is the marriageable age. In Kuwait, this means that boys must be at least 17 and girls at least 15 years old.
In most jurisdictions where the age of consent is below 18 (such as England and Wales),[46]in cases where a person aged 18 or older is in a position of trust over a person under 18, the age of consent usually rises to 18 or higher. Examples of such positions of trust include relationships between teachers and students. For example, in England and Wales the age of consent is 16, but if the person is a student of the older person it becomes 18.
In several jurisdictions, it is illegal to engage in sexual activity with a person under a certain age under certain circumstances regarding the relationship in question, such as if it involves taking advantage of or corrupting the morals of the young person. For example, while the age of consent is 14 in Germany and 16 in Canada, it is illegal in both countries to engage in sexual activity with a person under 18 if the activity exploits the younger person. Another example is in Mexico, where there is a crime called "estupro" defined as sexual activity with a person over the age of consent but under a certain age limit (generally 18) in which consent of the younger person was obtained through seduction and/or deceit. In Pennsylvania, the age of consent is officially 16, but if the older partner is 18 or older, they may still be prosecuted for corruption of minors for their corruption or tending to corrupt the morals of the younger person.
A growing number of countries have specificextraterritorial legislationthat prosecutes their citizens in their homeland should they engage in illicit sexual conduct in a foreign country with children. In 2008,ECPATreported that 44 countries had extraterritorial child sex legislation.[47]For example,PROTECT Act of 2003, a federal United States law bans sexual activity by its citizens with foreigners or with U.S. citizens from another state, if the partner is under 18 and the activity is illegal under the federal, state, or local law. This applies in cases where any of the partners travels into or out of the United States, or from one state into another, for the purpose of an illegal sexual encounter.[48][49]
There is debate as to whether the gender of those involved should lead to different treatment of the sexual encounter, in law or in practice. Traditionally, age of consent laws regarding vaginal intercourse were often meant to protect the chastity of unmarried girls.[8]Many feminists and social campaigners in the 1970s have objected to the social importance of virginity, and have also attempted to change the stereotypes of female passivity and male aggression; demanding that the law protect children from exploitation regardless of their gender, rather than dealing with concerns of chastity. This has led to gender-neutral laws in many jurisdictions.[8]On the other hand, there is an opposing view which argues that the act of vaginal intercourse is an "unequal act" for males and females, due to issues such as pregnancy, increased risk of STDs,[50]and risk of physical injury if the girl is too young and not physically ready. In the US, inMichael M. v. Superior Ct.450 U.S. 464 (1981)it was ruled that the double standard of offering more legal protection to girls is valid because "the Equal Protection Clause does not mean that the physiological differences between men and women must be disregarded".[51]
Traditionally, many age of consent laws dealt primarily with men engaging in sexual acts with underage girls and boys (the latter acts often falling undersodomyandbuggerylaws). This means that in some legal systems, issues of women having sexual contact with underage partners were rarely acknowledged. For example, until 2000, in the UK, before theSexual Offences (Amendment) Act 2000, there was no statutory age of consent forlesbiansex.[52]InNew Zealand, before 2005, there were no age of consent laws dealing with women having sex with underage boys.[53]Previously, in Fiji, male offenders of child sexual abuse could receive up to life imprisonment, whilst female offenders would receive up to seven years.[54]Situations like these have been attributed to societal views on traditionalgender roles, and to constructs ofmale sexualityandfemale sexuality; according to E Martellozzo, "[V]iewing females as perpetrators of sexual abuse goes against every stereotype that society has of women: women as mothers and caregivers and not as people who abuse and harm".[55]Alissa Nuttingargues that women are not acknowledged as perpetrators of sex crimes because society does not accept that women have an autonomous sexuality of their own.[56]
The age at which a person can be legally married can differ from the age of consent. In jurisdictions where the marriageable age is lower than the age of consent, those laws usually override the age of consent laws in the case of a married couple where one or both partners are below the age of consent. Some jurisdictions prohibit all sex outside of marriage irrespective of age, as in the case ofYemen.[57][58]
In many countries, there are specific laws dealing with child prostitution.[citation needed]
In some countries, states, or other jurisdictions, the age of consent may be lower than the age at which a person can appear inpornographicimages and films. In many jurisdictions, the minimum age for participation and even viewing such material is 18. As such, in some jurisdictions, films and images showing individuals under the age of 18, but above the age of consent, that meet the legal definition ofchild pornographyare prohibited despite the fact that the sexual acts depicted are legal to engage in otherwise under that jurisdiction's age of consent laws. In those cases, it is only the filming of the sex act that is the crime as the act itself would not be considered a sex crime. For example, in the United States under federal law it is a crime to film minors below 18 in sexual acts, even in states where the age of consent is below 18.[49]In those states, charges such as child pornography can be used to prosecute someone having sex with a minor, who could not otherwise be prosecuted for statutory rape, provided they filmed or photographed the act.[59]
Jailbait imagescan be differentiated from child pornography, as they do not feature minors before the onset of puberty, nor do they contain nudity.[60][61]The images are, however, usually sexualized,[60]often featuringtweenor young teenagers in bikinis, skirts,[62]underwear or lingerie.[63]Whether or not these images are legal is debated. When questioned regarding their legality legal analystJeffrey Toobinstated he thought it was not illegal, though legal expertSunny Hostinwas more skeptical, describing jailbait images as "borderline" child pornography which may be illegal.[64][65]
The humanimmune systemcontinues to develop after puberty.[66]The age of exposure has an influence upon if the immune system can fend off infections in general, and this is also true in the case of somesexually transmitted diseases. For example, a risk factor forHPVstrains causinggenital wartsis sexual debut at a young age;[67]if this extends to the cancer causing strains, then sexual debut at a young age would potentially also increase risk of persistence of HPV infections that cause the veryHPV induced cancersthat are being diagnosed in spiking numbers of relatively young people.[67]
Age-of-consent reform refers to the efforts of some individuals or groups, for different reasons, to alter or abolish age-of-consent laws. These efforts advocate positions such as:
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_consent
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Astroturfingis the deceptive practice of hiding thesponsorsof an orchestrated message or organization (e.g., political, economic, advertising, religious, orpublic relations) to make it appear as though it originates from, and is supported by, unsolicitedgrassrootsparticipants.[1]It is a practice intended to give the statements or organizations credibility by withholding information about the source's financial backers.
The implication behind the use of the term is that instead of a "true" or "natural" grassroots effort behind the activity in question, there is a "fake" or "artificial" appearance of support. It is increasingly recognized as a problem insocial media, e-commerce, and politics. Astroturfing can influence public opinion by flooding platforms like political blogs, news sites, and review websites with manipulated content. Some groups accused of astroturfing argue that they are legitimately helping citizen activists to make their voices heard.
While the term “astroturfing” often evokes images of corporate lobbying or political media manipulation, its function as a mechanism for manufacturing consent transcends liberal democracies. In their foundational workManufacturing Consent, Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky argue that power is reproduced not merely through censorship but through the orchestration of discourse, where the appearance of grassroots consensus is shaped by elite interests. This dynamic plays out in authoritarian contexts like China, where the state has adopted astroturfing as a strategic tool to manage, rather than suppress, online expression. As Rongbin Han documents in Manufacturing Consent in Cyberspace: China's “Fifty-Cent Army”, the Chinese government recruits and trains anonymous online commentators to seed pro-regime narratives across forums and comment sections, presenting them as spontaneous public sentiment. Far from simply muzzling dissent, this practice reflects a sophisticated state effort to simulate legitimacy and manage perception within digital public spheres. Yet ironically, as Han’s research shows, these efforts often fail due to poor coordination, lackluster incentives, and the lingering bureaucratic logic of top-down propaganda, ultimately undermining the very trust they aim to build.[2]
Many countries have laws prohibiting some astroturfing practices with various methods of enforcement. In the US, the FTC has set rules against endorsing a product without disclosing that one is paid to do so.[3]In the EU, social networking sites may be governed by theUnfair Commercial Practices Directivewhich also prohibits undisclosed paid endorsements and connected individuals from misleading readers into thinking they are regularconsumers.[4]
Various detection methods have been developed by researchers, including content analysis, linguistic analysis,authorship attribution, andmachine learning.[5]
While these approaches have been instrumental in flagging inauthentic behavior, such as bot-like posting patterns or coordinated message drops, more recent scholarship emphasizes that astroturf detection also requires interpretive analysis of messaging strategies. Brieuc Lits (2020), in his study of pro-shale gas lobbying campaigns, argues that astroturfing often succeeds not simply by masking sponsorship but by adopting discursive frames that mimic those of authentic civic groups, through what Lits terms “corporate ventriloquism,” private interests assume the voice of the public, strategically emphasizing values like economic freedom or energy independence to mask underlying industrial agendas. Lits claims that these language choices are not accidental; they are calculated to evoke grassroots legitimacy while marginalizing competing narratives, such as those centered on environmental harm or community health. As a result, detection now involves more than just identifying false identities or automation; it demands scrutiny of how language, symbols, and values are mobilized to simulate authenticity.[6]
In addition to content and linguistic cues, coordination-based detection methods have gained traction as a means of identifying astroturfing campaigns. Schoch et al. (2022) propose a scalable, network-based approach that focuses on identifying synchronized patterns of behavior, such as co-tweeting or co-retweeting identical messages within short time windows, as indicators of centralized coordination. This method, rooted inprincipal-agent theory, assumes that hired agents or campaign employees tend to “shirk,” reusing content and showing repetitive, time-bounded activity (e.g., during office hours). By mapping message coordination networks, the study was able to reliably distinguish astroturfing accounts from organic grassroots actors across dozens of global campaigns. Unlike bot-centric detection, this strategy targets behavioral traces unique to organized disinformation and has proven robust even when automated behavior is minimal or absent.[7]
Inpolitical science, it is defined as the process of seeking electoral victory or legislative relief for grievances by helping political actors find and mobilize a sympathetic public, and is designed to create the image of public consensus where there is none.[8][9]Astroturfing is the use of fakegrassrootsefforts that primarily focus on influencing public opinion and typically are funded by corporations and political entities to form opinions.[10]
The modern usage of the term "astroturf" is widely credited to former Treasury Secretary of the United States and senator from TexasLloyd Bentsen[11]in 1985, when faced with a barrage of postcards and letters facilitated by insurance companies claiming to be concerned constituents, said that “a fellow from Texas can tell the difference between grass roots and Astroturf”,[12]referencing the brand of artificial grass.
On the internet, "astroturfers" use software to hide their identity. Sometimes one individual operates through many personas to give the impression of widespread support for their client's agenda.[13][14]Some studies suggest astroturfing can alter public viewpoints and create enough doubt to inhibit action.[15][16]In the first systematic study of astroturfing in the United States, Oxford ProfessorPhilip N. Howardargued that the internet was making it much easier for powerful lobbyists and political movements to activate small groups of aggrieved citizens to have an exaggerated importance in public policy debates.[9]Astroturfed accounts on social media do not always require humans to write their posts; one January 2021 study detailed a "set of human-looking bot accounts" used to post political content, which was able to operate automatically for fourteen days (and make 1,586 posts) before being detected and suspended by Twitter.[17]Twitter trends are often targeted by astroturfing as they are used as a proxy for popularity. A study conducted by researchers atEPFLreported that 20% of the global Twitter trends in 2019 were fake, created automatically using fake and compromised accounts which tweet in a coordinated way to mimic grassroots organizing of regular Twitter users.[18]
Many countries have laws that prohibit more overt astroturfing practices.[19]In the United States, theFederal Trade Commission(FTC) may send cease-and-desist orders or require a fine of $16,000 per day for those that violate its "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising".[19][20]The FTC's guides were updated in 2009 to address social media and word-of-mouth marketing.[21][3]According to an article in theJournal of Consumer Policy, the FTC's guides holds advertisers responsible for ensuringbloggersor product endorsers comply with the guides, and any product endorsers with a material connection are required to provide honest reviews.[19]
In theEuropean Union, theUnfair Commercial Practices Directiverequires that paid-for editorial content in the media provide a clear disclosure that the content is a sponsored advertisement.[19]Additionally, it prohibits those with a material connection from misleading readers into thinking they are a regular consumer.[19]
TheUnited Kingdomhas theConsumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations,[4]which prohibits "Falsely representing oneself as a consumer." They allow for up to two years in prison and unlimited fines for breaches.[19]Additionally, the advertising industry in the UK has adopted many voluntary policies, such as the Code of Non-Broadcast Advertising, Sale, Promotion and Direct Marketing. A trade association, theAdvertising Standards Authority, investigates complaints of breaches. The policy requires that marketing professionals not mislead their audience, including by omitting a disclosure of their material connection.[19]
InAustralia, astroturfing is regulated by Section 18 of theAustralian Consumer Law, which broadly prohibits "misleading and deceptive conduct". According to theJournal of Consumer Policy, Australia's laws, which were introduced in 1975, are more vague. In most cases, they are enforced through lawsuits from competitors, rather than the regulatory body, theAustralian Competition & Consumer Commission.[19]There is also an International Consumer Protection and Enforcement Network (ICPEN).[22]
Legal regulations are primarily targeted towards testimonials, endorsements and statements as to the performance or quality of a product. Employees of an organization may be considered acting as customers if their actions are not guided by authority within the company.[22]
In October 2018, after denying that they had paid for people to show up in support of a controversial power plant development project in New Orleans,Entergywas fined five million dollars for using astroturf firm The Hawthorn Group to provide actors to prevent real community members' voices from being counted at city council meetings and show false grassroots support.[23]
In the bookGrassroots for Hire:Public AffairsConsultants in American Democracy,Edward Walker defines "astroturfing" as public participation that is perceived as heavily incented, as fraudulent (claims are attributed to those who did not make such statements), or as an elite campaign masquerading as a mass movement.[24]Although not all campaigns by professional grassrootslobbyingconsultants meet this definition, the book finds that the elite-sponsored grassroots campaigns often fail when they are not transparent about their sources of sponsorship and/or fail to develop partnerships with constituencies that have an independent interest in the issue. Walker highlights the case ofWorking Families for Wal-Mart, in which the campaign's lack of transparency led to its demise.
A study published in theJournal of Business Ethicsexamined the effects of websites operated by front groups on students. It found that astroturfing was effective at creating uncertainty and lowering trust about claims, thereby changing perceptions that tend to favor the business interests behind the astroturfing effort.[10]TheNew York Timesreported that "consumer" reviews are more effective, because "they purport to be testimonials of real people, even though some are bought and sold just like everything else on the commercial Internet."[25]Some organizations feel that their business is threatened by negative comments, so they may engage in astroturfing to drown them out.[26]Online comments from astroturfing employees can also sway the discussion through the influence ofgroupthink.[27]
Some astroturfing operatives defend their practice.[28]Regarding "movements that have organized aggressively to exaggerate their sway", author Ryan Sager said that this "isn't cheating. Doing everything in your power to get your people to show up is basic politics."[29]According to a Porter/Novelli executive, "There will be times when the position you advocate, no matter how well framed and supported, will not be accepted by the public simply because you are who you are."[30]
Groups likeFreedomWorksandAmericans for Prosperityassert that providing organizational structure and support to grassroots movements is essential for effective advocacy. They argue that the concept of grassroots movements being entirely spontaneous is unrealistic and that some level of organization is necessary to amplify voices and mobilize supporters effectively. These groups claim that their activities are legitimate and that they are simply providing the necessary backbone for authentic activism.[31]
Data-mining expertBing Liu(University of Illinois Chicago) estimated that one-third of all consumer reviews on the Internet are fake.[25]According toThe New York Times, this has made it hard to tell the difference between "popular sentiment" and "manufactured public opinion".[32]According to an article in theJournal of Business Ethics, astroturfing threatens the legitimacy of genuine grassroots movements. The authors argued that astroturfing that is "purposefully designed to fulfill corporate agendas, manipulate public opinion and harm scientific research represents a serious lapse in ethical conduct."[10]A 2011 report found that often paid posters from competing companies are attacking each other in forums and overwhelming regular participants in the process.[33]George Monbiotsaid that persona-management software supporting astroturfing "could destroy the Internet as a forum for constructive debate".[34]An article in theJournal of Consumer Policysaid that regulators and policy makers needed to be more aggressive about astroturfing. The author said that it undermines the public's ability to inform potential customers of sub-standard products or inappropriate business practices, but also noted that fake reviews were difficult to detect.[19]
[35]
Use of one or morefront groupsis one astroturfing technique. These groups typically present themselves as serving the public interest, while actually working on behalf of a corporate or political sponsor.[36]Front groups may resist legislation and scientific consensus that is damaging to the sponsor's business by emphasizing minority viewpoints, instilling doubt and publishing counterclaims by corporate-sponsored experts.[10]Fake blogs can also be created that appear to be written by consumers, while actually being operated by a commercial or political interest.[37]Some political movements have provided incentives for members of the public to send a letter to the editor at their local paper, often using a copy and paste form letter that is published in dozens of newspapers verbatim.[38]Mass letters may be printed on personalized stationery using different typefaces, colors and words to make them appear personal.[39]
Another technique is the use ofsockpuppets, where a single person creates multiple identities online to give the appearance of grassroots support. Sockpuppets may post positive reviews about a product, attack participants that criticize the organization, or post negative reviews and comments about competitors, under fake identities.[26][40]Astroturfing businesses may pay staff based on the number of posts they make that are not flagged by moderators.[33]Persona management software may be used so that each paid poster can manage five to seventy convincing online personas without getting them confused.[34][41]Online astroturfing using sockpuppets is a form ofSybil attackagainst distributed systems.
Pharmaceutical companies may sponsor patient support groups and simultaneously push them to help market their products.[42]Bloggers who receive free products, paid travel or other accommodations may also be considered astroturfing if those gifts are not disclosed to the reader.[43]Analysts could be considered astroturfing, since they often cover their own clients without disclosing their financial connection. To avoid astroturfing, many organizations and press have policies about gifts, accommodations and disclosures.[44]
Persona management software can age accounts and simulate the activity of attending a conference automatically to make it more convincing that they are genuine.[45]AtHBGary, employees were given separate thumb drives that contain online accounts for individual identities and visual cues to remind the employee which identity they are using at the time.[45]
According to an article inThe New York Times, the Federal Trade Commission rarely enforces its astroturfing laws.[25]Operations are frequently detected if their profile images are recognized[46]or if they are identified through the usage patterns of their accounts.[33]Filippo Menczer's group atIndiana Universitydeveloped software in 2010 that detects astroturfing on Twitter by recognizing behavioral patterns.[47][48][49]Researchers are exploring other techniques of detecting astroturfing including machine learning, linguistic analysis, and content analysis.[5]
According to an article in theJournal of Consumer Policy, academics disagree on how prolific astroturfing is.[19]
According to Nancy Clark from Precision Communications, grass-roots specialists charge $25 to $75 for each constituent they convince to send a letter to a politician.[39]Paid online commentators inChinaare purportedly paid 50 cents for each online post that is not removed by moderators,[33]leading to the nickname of the "50-cent party".[27]The New York Timesreported that a business selling fake online book reviews charged $999 for 50 reviews and made $28,000 a month shortly after opening.[25]
According to theFinancial Times, astroturfing is "commonplace" in American politics, but was "revolutionary" in Europe when it was exposed that theEuropean Privacy Association, an anti-privacy "think-tank", was actually sponsored by technology companies.[50]
Although the term "astroturfing" was not yet developed, an early example of the practice was in Act 1, Scene 2 ofShakespeare's playJulius Caesar. In the play,Gaius Cassius Longinuswrites fake letters from "the public" to convince Brutus to assassinateJulius Caesar.[22]
The term "astroturfing" was first coined in 1985 by Texas Democratic Party senatorLloyd Bentsenwhen he said, "a fellow from Texas can tell the difference between grass roots and AstroTurf... this is generated mail."[22][51]Bentsen was describing a "mountain of cards and letters" sent to his office to promote insurance industry interests.[52]
Patient advocacy groups funded by biopharmaceutical companies are common.[53][54]In 1997, Schering Plough paid a P/R firm Schandwick International, to create a national coalition of patient advocacy groups promoting Schering's Rebotron, a treatment forHepatitis C. The groups pushed increased testing as a way to manufacture cases and lobbied state legislatures to cover the $18,000 treatment. The groups also hosted telephone "information lines" with scripts written by the drug company and distributed "patient information" pamphlets promoting drug therapies over other alternatives and overstating the danger of the medical condition.[55]Manufacturers of AIDS drugs commonly fund LGBTQ organizations, which in turn, lobby to advance policies that increase AIDS drug sales. In 2019, the communications director of AIDS United, a Washington DC–based coalition of AIDS service organizations, resigned, stating such funding creates conflicts of interest among gay rights activists.[56]
In response to the passage of tobacco control legislation in the US,Philip Morris,Burson-Marstellerand other tobacco interests created theNational Smokers Alliance(NSA) in 1993. The NSA and other tobacco interests initiated an aggressive public relations campaign from 1994 to 1999 in an effort to exaggerate the appearance of grassroots support for smoker's rights. According to an article in theJournal of Health Communication, the NSA had mixed success at defeating bills that were damaging revenues of tobacco interests.[57]
Email, automated phone calls, form letters, and the Internet made astroturfing more economical and prolific in the late 1990s.[34][51]The internet in particular has made astroturfing cheaper, more widespread, and harder to detect.[35]
In 2001, asMicrosoftwas defending itself against an antitrust lawsuit,Americans for Technology Leadership(ATL), a group heavily funded by Microsoft, initiated a letter-writing campaign. ATL contacted constituents under the guise of conducting a poll and sent pro-Microsoft consumers form and sample letters to send to involved lawmakers. The effort was designed to make it appear as though there was public support for a sympathetic ruling in the antitrust lawsuit.[39][58]
In January 2018,YouTubeuser Isaac Protiva uploaded a video alleging that internet service providerFidelity Communicationswas behind an initiative called "Stop City-Funded Internet", based on how some images on the Stop City-Funded Internet website had "Fidelity" in their file names.[59]The campaign appeared to be in response to the city ofWest Plainsexpanding their broadband network, and advocated for the end ofmunicipal broadbandon the basis that it was too risky.[60][61]Days later, Fidelity released a letter admitting to sponsoring the campaign.[62]
In 2009-2010, anIndiana Universityresearch study developed a software system to detect astroturfing onTwitterdue to the sensitivity of the topic in the run up to the2010 U.S. midterm electionsand account suspensions on the social media platform. The study cited a limited number of examples, all promoting conservative policies and candidates.[47][48][49]
In 2003, GOPTeamLeader.com offered the site's users "points" that could be redeemed for products if they signed a form letter promotingGeorge Bushand got a local paper to publish it as aletter to the editor. More than 100 newspapers published an identical letter to the editor from the site with different signatures on it. Similar campaigns were used by GeorgeWBush.com, and byMoveOn.orgto promoteMichael Moore's filmFahrenheit 9/11.[38][63]TheCommittee for a Responsible Federal Budget's "Fix the Debt" campaign advocated to reduce government debt without disclosing that its members werelobbyistsor high-ranking employees at corporations that aim to reduce federal spending.[64][65]It also sent op-eds to various students that were published as-is.[66]
Some organizations in theTea Party movementhave been accused of being astroturfed.[67]Scholars have argued that while the movement presented itself as a grassroots uprising, it relied heavily on elite funding and coordination. Legal scholar Ryan D. Murphy describes the Tea Party as “constitutionalism as astroturf,” asserting that it “presents itself as spontaneous and rooted in popular sovereignty, but is in fact manufactured and directed by elites.” He argues that the movement’s appeal to constitutional principles served to “obscure its top-down nature,” allowing organizations like Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks to advance deregulatory goals under the guise of public outrage. This strategy laid the foundation for later campaigns, including the parental rights movement, which similarly mobilize populist rhetoric around freedom and individual rights while receiving support from institutional actors.[68]
In October and November 2018, conservative marketing firm Rally Forge created whatThe New Yorkerdescribed as "a phony left-wing front group, America Progress Now, which promoted Green Party candidates online in 2018, apparently to hurt Democrats in several races by relying on thespoiler candidate strategy.[69]Its ads onFacebookused socialist memes and slogans to attack Democrats and urge third-party protest voting in several tight races, including the2018 Wisconsin gubernatorial election.[70][71]
In 2018, a website called "Jexodus" claiming to be by "proud JewishMillennialstired of living in bondage to leftist politics" was set up byJeff Ballabon, a Republican operative in his mid-50s. The website was denounced as "likely a clumsy astroturf effort rather than an actual grassroots movement".[72][73][74][75]The website was registered November 5, 2018, before the congressional election, and before those representatives accused of antisemitism had even been voted in.[75]This website was later cited byDonald Trumpas though it were an authentic movement.[72]
As of 2025, Jexodus was rebranded as “The Exodus Movement” and is no longer active.
While not an astroturfing movement itself as its ties toTurning Point USAare clearly advertised, Jexodus was inspired by theBlexitMovement, led by conservative commentatorCandace Owens. Blexit, sharing similarities with The Exodus Movement intends to lead African Americans out of theDemocratic Partycoalition, claiming that the democratic party maintains a “victim mentality” among its African American base.
Despite its clear ties to right-wing figures, some argue that Blexit’s ties to right-wing donors such as Darwin Deason, a Texan billionaire and businessman, William Dunn, and Thomas W. Smith, who have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to the organization. especially leading up to the 2020 United States Presidential Election[1], qualifies Blexit as an astroturfed movement, because of its appearance as a grassroots organization dedicated to changing voting patterns among the African American demographic, a goal that, despite its large amount of funding, it has failed to achieve.
WalkAway was also found to have ties to the Russian government during the Robert Mueller Election Interference Trial, the hashtag was tweeted in large amounts in the months leading to the 2018 Midterm Elections[2]
Both movements are part of the larger WalkAway movement, although Blexit was folded into the larger Turning Point USA, a 501(c) non-profit that shares the same goals of shifting voting patterns of specified demographic groups towards the right wing, yet focusing most of its outreach on Gen Z as opposed to a specific racial demographic.[3]
In January 2021, a team led by Mohsen Mosleh conducted a politically oriented astroturfing campaign onTwitter, using "a set of human-looking bot accounts"; each bot would search for users posting links the researchers considered to befake news, and "tweet a public reply message to the user's tweet that contained the link to the false story". 1,586 spam replies were made over the course of fourteen days, until Twitter detected and suspended all of the bot accounts.[17]
Astroturfing organizations have been used by the fossil fuel industry in their fight against climate action or to propagateclimate change denial. These organizations typically use euphemistic names to disguise their sponsors and agendas and often target "green" organizations with which they can be confused. Examples for such fossil fuel funded Astroturfing organizations are theNational Wetlands Coalition, theGlobal Climate Coalition, theGreening Earth Society, theWashington Consumers for Sound Fuel Policyor theAmerican Coalition for Clean Coal Energy.[76]
The opposition to theCape Windoffshore energy project in Massachusetts has been cited as a prominent example of elite-driven astroturfing. William Koch, a billionaire energy executive and part-time Cape Cod resident, was the largest funder and chairman of the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound, contributing over $1.5 million to efforts opposing the project. While the group cited environmental and economic concerns, reports noted that Koch’s primary residence overlooked the proposed site of the wind farm, and his stated objection included the visual impact on Nantucket Sound. Additional opposition came from the Massachusetts Competitive Partnership, a coalition of influential business leaders, many of whom also owned property near the proposed wind farm site, who placed newspaper ads warning the project would harm business competitiveness. Critics argued that the campaign reflected not widespread public concern but the aesthetic preferences and property interests of a small group of wealthy individuals.
In recent years, the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound has attempted to rebrand itself with a broader conservation mission. Now focused on securing federal recognition for Nantucket Sound as a National Historic Landmark, the group emphasizes issues like water quality, habitat degradation, and climate change. While it continues to include wealthy donors among its backers, the Alliance has garnered support from Native American tribes, environmental organizations, and municipal leaders. This shift has complicated its classification as a purely astroturf organization, though its origins in elite-funded opposition to offshore wind remain central to critiques of its legacy.[77][78][79][80][81]
Corporate efforts tomobilize the public against environmental regulationaccelerated in the US following the election of presidentBarack Obama.[82]
In 2014, theToronto Sunconservative media organization has published an article accusingRussiaof using astroturf tactics to drum up anti-frackingsentiment across Europe andthe West, supposedly in order to maintain dominance in oil exports throughUkraine.[83]
Fossil fuel companyGlencoreenlisted the C|T Group to conduct a coordinated pro-coal campaign called "Project Caesar" from 2017 onwards. Drawing on an annual budget of between £4-7 million, it created what appeared to be grassroots social media pages and groups to promote anti-renewable messages.[1]
In Canada, a coalition of oil and gas company executives grouped under theCanadian Association of Petroleum Producersalso initiated a series of Canadian actions to advocate for the oil and gas industry in Canada through mainstream and social media, and using online campaigning to generate public support for fossil fuel energy projects.[84]
In 2006, twoEdelmanemployees created a blog called "Wal-Marting Across America" about two people traveling toWal-Martsacross the country. The blog gave the appearance of being operated by spontaneous consumers, but was actually operated on behalf ofWorking Families for Walmart, a group funded byWal-Mart.[85][86]In 2007,Ask.comdeployed an anti-Googleadvertising campaign portraying Google as an "information monopoly" that was damaging the Internet. The ad was designed to give the appearance of a popular movement and did not disclose it was funded by a competitor.[87]
In 2010, theFederal Trade Commissionsettled a complaint with Reverb Communications, who was using interns to post favorable product reviews in Apple'siTunesstore for clients.[88]In September 2012, one of the first major identified cases of astroturfing inFinlandinvolved criticisms about the cost of a €1.8 billion patient information system, which was defended by fake online identities operated by involved vendors.[46][89]
In September 2013, New York Attorney GeneralEric T. Schneidermanannounced a settlement with 19 companies to prevent astroturfing. "'Astroturfing' is the 21st century's version of false advertising, and prosecutors have many tools at their disposal to put an end to it," said Scheiderman. The companies paid $350,000 to settle the matter, but the settlement opened the way for private suits as well. "Every state has some version of the statutes New York used," according to lawyer Kelly H. Kolb. "What the New York attorney general has done is, perhaps, to have given private lawyers a road map to file suit."[90][91]
Moms for Libertyis an American political organization that is seen by some as an astroturfed movement, associated with theparental rights movementdedicated to “fighting for the survival of America by unifying, educating, and empowering parents to defend their parental rights at all levels of government”.[92]TheSouthern Poverty Law Centerhas categorized Moms For Liberty as an extremist “reactionary” and “conservative populist” organization. Founded on January 21, 2021, Moms For Liberty a 501(c)(4) “social welfare” nonprofit.[93]The group has ties to far-right conservative figures, politicians, and groups, most notably, Florida governorRon DeSantisandThe Proud Boys[94]
In 2023, DeSantis appointed Moms For Liberty founderTina Descovichto the Florida State Commission on Ethics.[95]Critics have derided the group's perceived meteoritic rise to fame as evidence of astroturfing. GLADD notes that only one month after the group’s formation, despite advertising themselves as a grassroots movement, garnered significant media attention from right wing circles. On January 27, 2021, the group was featured on theRush Limbaughshow and was covered by far-right news publicationBreitbartthe following month. Bridget Ziegler, one of the group's three founders, is also married to Christian Ziegler, the chair of the Florida GOP.[96]
The group participates in coordinated efforts to remove books from school curricula, otherwise known asbook banningand the “flipping” of school boards through elections to push their agenda, often funded and supported by far-right organizations such as the Cato Institute, a libertarian, right-wing libertarian think tank funded by Republican mega-donor Charles Koch, while labeling themselves as a grassroots organization.[97]
M4L's rapid rise, from its founding in early 2021 to national media exposure within weeks, has raised questions about its grassroots credentials. Scholars such as Maurice Cunningham have documented how M4L benefited from early and sustained support from organizations like the Leadership Institute and the Heritage Foundation, both of which have deep ties to right-wing donor network,s including Donors Trust and the State Policy Network. According to reporting by The Barn Raiser and Baptist News Global, M4L’s funding has included large donations from figures such as Publix heiress Julie Fancelli and GOP megadonor Richard Uihlein.[98]
These funding sources place M4L in the same donor ecosystem as Parents Defending Education (PDE), an organization run by Nicole Neily, a veteran Koch-network operative. PDE and M4L have employed similar tactics, including school board takeovers, book banning campaigns, and aggressive lobbying against DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) initiatives. Both organizations have been connected to Project 2025, a policy framework advanced by the Heritage Foundation that includes proposals to dismantle the Department of Education and redirect federal funds toward private and religious schooling.[99]
Some suggest that the strategic alignment of M4L with these networks and their advocacy reflects not only cultural grievances but also a long-term effort to undermine public education infrastructure.[4]
The group has heavily participated in the proliferation of theLGBTQ grooming conspiracy theory, frequently portraying inclusive education as a form of ideological indoctrination. Moms for Liberty has pushed to remove books they deem "pornographic,"[100]especially those addressing LGBTQ+ themes, referring to teachers' unions as “terrorist organizations” and conflating the presence of queer identities in curricula with “sexualization” of children. Two frequent targets have beenGender Queerby Maia Kobabe andThis Book is Gay by Juno Dawson.
In December 2021, the Wake County, North Carolina chapter of Moms for Liberty filed a criminal complaint against their public school system over the inclusion of Gender Queer, alleging the memoir contained obscene material unfit for students.[101]InHillsborough County, Florida, they spearheaded a formal complaint to remove This Book is Gay, ultimately succeeding in banning the book in middle schools in the county.[102]
These campaigns are part of a broader trend in whichGender Queerhas become one of the most frequently challenged books in the U.S, a part of a nationwide surge of book banning campaign, with Moms For Liberty frequently sitting at the forefront[103]Critics argue these efforts represent a modernmoral panicthat seeks to erase LGBTQ+ narratives from public education while cloaking coordinated censorship in the language of parental concern.
A precedent to the contemporary parental rights movement can be seen in The National Organization for Marriage (NOM), a nonprofit organization “with a mission to protect marriage”.[104]It has long been criticized for tactics that resemble astroturfing, such as its ties to large-scale anonymous donors,[105]as well as links to the Catholic and LDS Churches,[106]even facing allegations that its very formation was a front for the Mormon Church[107]despite its designation as a 501(c) status nonprofit. The group was formed in 2007 for the sole purpose of supporting California’s Proposition 8, a state ballot measure to prohibit same-sex marriage, and continued to run similar campaigns in Massachusetts, Maine, and Oregon.
In 2010, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) launched a website called ‘NOM Exposed’ in which they detailed NOM’s ties to the Catholic and Mormon churches, in which NOM raised nearly $10 million between its formation in 2007 and 2010, made up primarily of large anonymous private donations.[108]
Sociologists and media scholars have increasingly framed the parental rights movement, including groups like Moms for Liberty andParents Defending Educationas a contemporary example of a moral panic, a sociological phenomenon first defined by British criminologistStanley Cohenin his 1972 bookFolk Devils and Moral Panics. Cohen's framework identifies how certain marginalized or demonized groups, labeled as "folk devils," become the focus of intense public anxiety, media sensationalism, and reactive policy efforts, despite often posing no real or proportional threat.[5]
Cohen outlined five key characteristics of a moral panic:
Concern- Heightened attention to the behavior of a group believed to endanger societal norms or values.
Hostility- The targeted group is portrayed as deviant and morally corrupt.
Consensus- A significant segment of the public agrees that the threat is real and serious.
Disproportionality- The public or political reaction far exceeds the actual harm or threat posed.
Volatility- The panic emerges rapidly and may dissipate just as quickly or evolve into new forms.
Many researchers and advocacy organizations argue that the parental rights movement fits this model. LGBTQ+ youth, educators, and librarians are increasingly targeted as alleged threats to childhood innocence or parental authority. This framing, paired with viral campaigns to ban books exemplifies the disproportionate hostility characteristic of a moral panic. These movements echo historical precedents such as Anita Bryant’s “Save Our Children” campaign in the 1970s and the failedBriggs Initiative(Proposition 6) in California, both of which mobilized panic around LGBTQ+ rights by casting queer individuals as existential threats to children.
This moral panic framework has been invoked by organizations including the Southern Poverty Law Center, Human Rights Campaign, and numerous journalists and academics who have documented how these campaigns use emotionally charged rhetoric and identity-based scapegoating to drive school board takeovers, restrict curricula, and attack public education under the guise of "protecting children."[6]
AnAl JazeeraTV seriesThe LobbydocumentedIsrael's attempt to promote more friendly, pro-Israel rhetoric to influence the attitudes of British youth, partly through influencing already established political bodies, such as the National Union of Students and theLabour Party, but also by creating new pro-Israel groups whose affiliation with theIsraeli administrationwas kept secret.[109][110]
In 2008, an expert on Chinese affairs,Rebecca MacKinnon, estimated the Chinese government employed 280,000 people in agovernment-sponsored astroturfing operationto post pro-government propaganda on social media and drown out voices of dissent.[33][111]
In June 2010, theUnited States Air Forcesolicited for "persona management" software that would "enable an operator to exercise a number of different online persons from the same workstation and without fear of being discovered by sophisticated adversaries. Personas must be able to appear to originate in nearly any part of the world and can interact through conventional online services and social media platforms..."[112]The $2.6 million contract was awarded toNtrepidfor astroturfing software the military would use to spread pro-American propaganda in the Middle East, and disrupt extremist propaganda and recruitment. The contract is thought to have been awarded as part of a program calledOperation Earnest Voice, which was first developed as a psychological warfare weapon against the online presence of groups ranged against coalition forces.[34][113][114][115]
In August 2020, the US-based public relations firm,CLS Strategies, was linked to a network of accounts removed by Facebook due to violations of their policies in regards to foreign interference. 55 Facebook accounts, 42 pages, and 36 Instagram accounts were removed.[116]The information Facebook shared with investigators showed that the accounts focused on Venezuela, Bolivia, and Mexico, and included duplicate and fake accounts. Records showed connections with CLS Strategies employees, and that some of the work appeared to be at the behest of the Bolivian Government.[117]Facebook had announced the closure of the accounts, stating that they targeted politics in the region and that $3.6 million was spent on advertising in the three countries on what they determined to be disinformation. CLS Strategies claimed the accusations made by Facebook were inaccurate.[118]
On April 11, 2022, seven weeks into the2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, BBC published the results of investigation of a network of Facebook groups with the overall aim to promote the Russian presidentVladimir Putinas a hero standing up to the West with overwhelming international support. Members, activities, and interrelations in 10 pro-Putin public groups with more than 650,000 members between them in the time of writing, boasting names such asVladimir Putin - Leader of the Free World, were analyzed. Over a month, researchers counted 16,500 posts, receiving more than 3.6 million interactions. The campaign "creates the appearance of widespread support for Putin and the Kremlin in the shadow of the invasion and relies on... inauthentic accounts to accomplish its goal", according to a report. Lead researcher Moustafa Ayad described the network and its practice of using tens of duplicate accounts in potential violation of Facebook's rules on inauthentic behavior as an example ofastroturfing.[119][120]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astroturfing
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Freedom of the pressorfreedom of the mediais the fundamental principle that communication and expression through various media, including printed and electronicmedia, especiallypublished materials, should be considered a right to be exercised freely. Such freedom implies the absence of interference from an overreachingstate; its preservation may be sought through aconstitutionor otherlegalprotection and security. It is in opposition to paid press, where communities, police organizations, and governments are paid for their copyrights.
Without respect to governmental information, any government may distinguish which materials are public or protected from disclosure to the public. State materials are protected due to either one of two reasons: theclassification of informationas sensitive, classified, or secret, or the relevance of the information to protecting thenational interest. Many governments are also subject to "sunshine laws" orfreedom of information legislationthat define the ambit of national interest and enable citizens to request access to government-held information.
TheUnited Nations' 1948Universal Declaration of Human Rightsstates: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference, and to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas through any media regardless of frontiers".[1]
This philosophy is usually accompanied bylegislationensuring various degrees of freedom ofscientificresearch(known asscientific freedom), publishing, and the press. The depth to which these laws are entrenched in a country's legal system can go as far down as itsconstitution. The concept offreedom of speechis often covered by the same laws as freedom of the press, thereby giving equal treatment to spoken and published expression. Freedom of the press was formally established in Great Britain with thelapse of the Licensing Actin 1695. Sweden was the first country in the world to adopt freedom of the press into its constitution with theFreedom of the Press Actof 1766.[2]
Freedom of the press is not construed as an absence of interference by outside entities, such as a government or religious organization, but rather as a right for authors to have their works published by other people.[3]This idea was famously summarized by the 20th-century Americanjournalist,A. J. Liebling, who wrote, "Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one". Freedom of the press gives the printer or publisher exclusive control over what the publisher chooses to publish, including the right to refuse to print anything for any reason.[3]If the author cannot reach a voluntary agreement with a publisher to produce the author's work, then the author must turn toself-publishing.
Beyond legal definitions, severalnon-governmental organizationsuse other criteria to judge the level of press freedom worldwide. Some create subjective lists, while others are based on quantitative data:
Each year,The Committee to Protect Journalistsproduces a comprehensive list of all working journalists killed in relation to their employment, including profiles of each deceased journalist within an exhaustive database, and an annual census ofincarceratedjournalists (as of midnight, December 1). The year 2017 reported record findings of jailed journalists, reaching 262.Turkey,China, andEgyptaccount for more than half of all global journalists jailed.[5]
As per a 2019 special report by the Committee to Protect Journalists, approximately 25 journalists were murdered on duty in 2019.[5]The figure is claimed to be the lowest since 2002, a year in which at least 21 journalists were killed while they were reporting from the field.[6]Meanwhile,Reporters Without Borders(RSF) reported 49 killings, the lowest since 2003, when almost 36 journalists were killed. Leading press watchdogs fear persisting danger for the life of journalists. The drop in the murder of in-field journalists came across during the "global attention on the issue of impunity injournalistmurders", focusing on theassassination of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggiin October 2018 andDaphne Caruana Galizia, a Maltese blogger in October 2017.[7]
Every year, Reporters Without Borders establishes a subjective ranking of countries in terms of their freedom of the press. ThePress Freedom Indexlist is based on responses to surveys sent to journalists that are members of partner organizations of the RWB, as well as related specialists such as researchers, jurists, and human rights activists. The survey asks questions about direct attacks on journalists and the media and other indirect sources of pressure against the free press, such as non-governmental groups.
In 2022, the eight countries with the most press freedom are, in order:Norway,Denmark,Sweden,Estonia,Finland,Ireland,Portugal, andCosta Rica. The ten countries with the least press freedom are, in order:North Korea,Eritrea,Iran,Turkmenistan,Myanmar,China,Vietnam,Cuba,Iraq, andSyria.[9]
Freedom of the Pressis a yearly report by the US-based non-profit organizationFreedom House. It is known to subjectively measure the level of freedom andeditorial independencethat is enjoyed by the press in every nation and significant disputed territories around the world. Levels of freedom are scored on a scale from 1 (most free) to 100 (least free). Depending on the basics, the nations are then classified in three types:
1. "Free"
2. "Partly Free"
3. "Not Free".
A free and independent press has been theorized to be a key mechanism of a functioning, healthydemocracy.[11]In the absence ofcensorship, journalism exists as awatchdogof private and government action, providing information to maintain an informed citizenry of voters.[11]In this perspective, "government efforts to influence published or broadcasted news content, either via media control or by inducingself-censorship, represent a threat to the access of important and necessary information to the public and affect the quality of democracy".[12]An independent press "serves to increase political knowledge, participation, andvoter turnout",[11]acting as an essential driver of civic participation.
Turkey,China,Egypt,Eritrea, andSaudi Arabiaaccounted for 70% of all journalists that were imprisoned in 2018.[13]CPJ reported that "After China, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt, the worst jailers are Eritrea, Vietnam, and Iran".[14]
According toReporters Without Borders, more than a third of the world's people live in countries where there is no press freedom.[15]Overwhelmingly, these people live in countries where there is no system ofdemocracyor where there are serious deficiencies in the democratic process.[16]
Freedom of the press is an extremely problematic problem/concept for most non-democratic systems of government since, in the modern age, strict control ofaccess to informationis critical to the existence of most non-democratic governments and their associated control systems and security apparatus. To this end, most non-democratic societies employ state-run news organizations to promote the propaganda critical to maintaining an existing political power base and suppress (often very brutally, through the use of police, military, or intelligence agencies) any significant attempts by the media or individual journalists to challenge the approved "government line" on contentious issues. In such countries, journalists operating on the fringes of what is deemed to be acceptable will very often find themselves the subject of considerable intimidation by agents of the state. This can range from simple threats to their professional careers (firing, professionalblacklisting) todeath threats,kidnapping,torture, andassassination.
Central, Northern, and Western Europe have a long tradition of freedom of speech, including freedom of the press, which yet exists in the XVIII century and in the XIX century.[19]
After World War II,Hugh Baillie, the president of theUnited Presswire service based in the U.S., promoted freedom of news dissemination. In 1944, he called for an open system of news sources and transmission, and a minimum of government regulation of the news. His proposals were aired at the Geneva Conference on Freedom of Information in 1948 but were blocked by the Soviets and the French.[20]
Since 1950, theEuropean Convention on Human Rightsincludes "Article 10" related to Freedom of expression which applies toMember states of the Council of Europe.
Media freedom is afundamental rightthat applies to allmember statesof theEuropean Unionand itscitizens, as defined in theEU Charter of Fundamental Rights(since 2000) as well as the European Convention on Human Rights (since 1950).[21]: 1Within theEU enlargementprocess, guaranteeing media freedom is named a "key indicator of a country's readiness to become part of the EU".[22]
According to theNew York Times, "Britain has a long tradition of a free, inquisitive press", but "[u]nlike the United States, Britain has no constitutional guarantee of press freedom".[23]Freedom of the press was established in Great Britain in 1695, withAlan Rusbridger, former editor ofThe Guardian, stating: "When people talk about licensing journalists or newspapers the instinct should be to refer them to history. Read about how licensing of the press in Britain was abolished in 1695. Remember how the freedoms won here became a model for much of the rest of the world, and be conscious of how the world still watches us to see how we protect those freedoms".[24]
Until 1694, Great Britain had an elaborate system oflicensing; the most recent was seen in theLicensing of the Press Act, 1662. No publication was allowed without the accompaniment of a government-granted license. Fifty years earlier, at a time ofcivil war,John Miltonwrote hispamphletAreopagitica(1644).[25]In this work Milton argued forcefully against this form of government censorship and parodied the idea, writing "when as debtors and delinquents may walk abroad without a keeper, but inoffensive books must not stir forth without a visible jailer in their title". Although at the time it did little to halt the practice of licensing, it would be viewed later a significant milestone as one of the most eloquent defenses ofpressfreedom.[25]
Milton's central argument was that the individual is capable of using reason and distinguishing right from wrong, and good from bad. In order to be able to exercise this ration right, the individual must have unlimited access to the ideas of his fellow men in "a free and open encounter" Milton's writings developed the concept of the openmarketplace of ideas, the idea that when people argue against each other, good arguments will prevail. One form of speech that was widely restricted in Great Britain wasseditious libel, and laws were in place that made criticizing the government a crime. The king was above public criticism and statements critical of the government were forbidden, according to the English court of theStar Chamber. The truth was not a defense to seditious libel because the goal was to prevent and punish all condemnation of the government.
Locke contributed to thelapse of the Licensing Act in 1695, whereupon the press needed no license. Still, some libels were tried throughout the 18th century, until "the Society of the Bill of Rights" led byJohn Horne TookeandJohn Wilkesorganized a campaign to publish Parliamentary Debates. This culminated in three defeats of the Crown in the 1770 cases of Almon, Miller andWoodfall, who all had published one of theLetters of Junius, and the unsuccessful arrest ofJohn Wheblein 1771. Thereafter the Crown was much more careful in the application oflibel; for example, in the aftermath of thePeterloo Massacre,Burdettwas convicted, whereas by contrast, theJuniusaffair was over asatireand sarcasm about the non-lethal conduct and policies of the government.
In Britain's American colonies, the first editors discovered their readers enjoyed it when they criticised the local governor; the governors discovered they could shut down the newspapers. The most dramatic confrontation came in New York in 1734, where the governor broughtJohn Peter Zengerto trial for criminal libel after the publication of satirical attacks. The defense lawyers argued that according to English common law, the truth was a valid defense against libel. The jury acquitted Zenger, who became the iconic American hero for freedom of the press. The result was an emerging tension between the media and the government. By the mid-1760s, there were 24 weekly newspapers in the 13 colonies, and the satirical attack on the government became common features in American newspapers.[26]
In theVictorian era, the press became more influential than it had been previously, to the dismay of some readers.Thomas Carlyle, in his essay "Signs of the Times" (1829), said that the "trueChurch of England, at this moment, lies in the Editors of its Newspapers. These preach to the people daily, weekly; admonishing kings themselves; advising peace or war, with an authority which only the firstReformers, and a long-past class ofPopes, were possessed of". Similarly,Charles Dickens, in hisPickwick Papers(1837), caricatured the newspapers as but the "chosen organ and representative" of either theWhigsor theTories, and that they were "essentially and indispensably necessary" to the parties' operations.[27]
John Stuart Millin 1869 in his bookOn Libertyapproached the problem of authority versus liberty from the viewpoint of a 19th-centuryutilitarian: The individual has the right of expressing himself so long as he does not harm other individuals. The good society is one in which the greatest number of persons enjoy the greatest possible amount of happiness. Applying these general principles of liberty to freedom of expression, Mill states that if we silence an opinion, we may silence the truth. The individual freedom of expression is therefore essential to the well-being of society. Mill wrote:
The December 1817 Trials of writer and satiristWilliam Honefor publishing three political pamphlets is considered a landmark in the fight for a free press.
Between September 4, 1770 and October 7, 1771 the kingdom ofDenmark–Norwayhad the most unrestricted freedom of press of any country in Europe. This occurred during the regime ofJohann Friedrich Struensee, whose second act was to abolish the old censorship laws. However, due to the great amount of mostly anonymous pamphlets published that was critical and often slanderous towards Struensee's own regime, he reinstated some restrictions regarding the freedom of press a year later, October 7, 1771.[29]
After theItalian unificationin 1861, theAlbertine Statuteof 1848 was adopted as the constitution of theKingdom of Italy. The Statute granted the freedom of the press with some restrictions in case of abuses and in religious matters, as stated in Article 28:[30]
The press shall be free, but the law may suppress abuses of this freedom. However, Bibles, catechisms, liturgical and prayer books shall not be printed without the prior permission of the Bishop.
After theabolition of the monarchyin 1946 and theabrogationof the Statute in 1948, theConstitutionof theRepublic of Italyguarantees the freedom of the press, as stated in Article 21, Paragraphs 2 and 3:[31]
The press may not be subjected to any authorisation or censorship. Seizure may be permitted only by judicial order stating the reason and only for offences expressly determined by the law on the press or in case of violation of the obligation to identify the persons responsible for such offences.
The Constitution allows thewarrantlessconfiscationofperiodicalsin cases of absolute urgency, when theJudiciarycannot timely intervene, on the condition that ajudicial validationmust be obtained within 24 hours. Article 21 also gives restrictions against those publications considered offensive bypublic morality, as stated in Paragraph 6:
Publications, performances, and other exhibits offensive to public morality shall be prohibited. Measures of preventive and repressive measure against such violations shall be established by law.
In 1933, freedom of the press was suppressed inNazi Germanyby theReichstag Fire Decreeof PresidentPaul von Hindenburg, just asAdolf Hitlerwas coming to power. Hitler suppressed freedom of the press throughJoseph Goebbels'Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda.[32]The Ministry acted as a central control point for all media, issuing orders as to what stories could be run and what stories would be suppressed. Anyone involved in the film industry, from directors to the lowliest assistant, had to sign an oath of loyalty to theNazi Partydue to the opinion-changing power Goebbels perceived movies to have; Goebbels himself maintained some personal control over every single film made in Nazi Europe. Journalists who crossed the Propaganda Ministry were routinely imprisoned.
One of the world's first freedom of the press acts was introduced in Sweden in 1766 (Swedish Freedom of the Press Act), due in part toclassical liberalmember of parliament,Ostrobothnianpriest,Anders Chydenius.[2][33][34][35][36]Excepted and liable to prosecution was only vocal opposition to thekingand theChurch of Sweden. The act was largely rolled back afterKing Gustav's coup d'état in 1772, restored after the overthrowing of his son,Gustav IV of Swedenin 1809, and fully recognized with the abolition of the king's prerogative to cancel licenses in the 1840s.
The US Secretary of State,Mike Pompeo, criticizedRussiafor limiting the activities ofVOAandRadio Free Europein Russia with a governmental order demanding reviewing the subject by Moscow.[37]
On 4 March 2022, Russian PresidentVladimir Putinsigned into law a bill introducingprison sentences of up to 15 yearsfor those who publish "knowingly false information" about the Russian military and its operations in Ukraine,[38]forcing independent media in Russia to stop reporting on Ukraine or cease operations.[39]At least 1,000 Russian journalists have fled Russia since February 2022.[40]About 85% of Russians get most of their information from Russian state-controlled media.[41]
Novaya Gazeta'seditor-in-chiefDmitry Muratovwas awarded the2021 Nobel Peace Prizefor his "efforts to safeguard freedom of expression". In March 2022,Novaya Gazetasuspended its print activities after receiving a second warning from the Russian censorship apparatusRoskomnadzor.[42]
On 17 June 2024, a Moscow court issued arrest warrants forIStorieseditor-in-chief and award-winning investigative reporterRoman Aninand Ekaterina Fomina, a journalist atTV Rainand a formerIStoriescorrespondent, on charges ofdisseminating "false information"about the Russian armed forces in Ukraine. Russia's Interior Ministry added twoRussian journalists in exileto its wanted list. Fomina said the arrest warrant would affect her professional life as she would not be able to travel to many countries that could arrest her and extradite her to Russia.[43]
Until 1989,Romaniawas part of thecommunist blocas theSocialist Republic of Romania. The communist regime heavily restricted freedom of the press and other civil liberties.Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, though available to the Romanian citizenry, was highly illegal and severe repercussions for existed for listening. Directly following theRomanian Revolution, post-communist corruption was largely the subject of investigative reports. At the same time, widespread violence against journalists began. During theJune 1990 Mineriad, a series of protests against theNational Salvation Front, counter-demonstrators assaulted reporting journalists.[44]
In 1992, PresidentIon Iliescuhad a nervous meltdown when called journalistPaul Pârvuasked him if he felt guilt over Romanian deaths during the revolution.[45]During the exchange, Iliescu referred to Pârvu as an "animal". Modern, major media outlets were founded during the mid-1990s, such asAntena 1in 1994 andProTVin 1995. In 1999, the editor of aOra, a local newspaper, Tiberiu Patru, was arrested[46]before being able to publish an investigation of corruption inDolj Countyunder. In response,Oramoved its newsroom in front of the National Theater of Craiova to protest Patru's arrest.
The 2000s saw the creation of many new media outlets across television, radio, and the traditional press. In 2023,Reporters Without Bordersidentified safety as a concern for Romanian journalists.[47]
More than 120 journalists remained in prison in Turkey in 2019, making it the most prolific incarcerator of journalists in the world.[48]
In some countries, including Turkey,[49]journalists were threatened orarrestedfor theircoverage of the COVID-19 pandemic.[50]
Current general manager of Czech Television Jan Souček has courted controversy in his tenure given his attack on free media[51]and his attacks on employees of Czech Television.[52]Souček compared himself to Milada Horáková[53]after strong criticism of his managerial skills from Czech Television Council. Souček later commented that it was silly from him. In an interview on 5. 9. 2023 Souček, as the incoming director general, stated: "I am constantly asking for money. A press conference of the Ministry of Culture has been announced for Tuesday, where the ministerial commission should reveal how it envisions the reform of financing public service media. According to my information, our call will be heard for the most part.[54]" During his tenure, Souček constantly asks for more money from the public fees, however it seems that he is not able to use money economically while blacking out financial documents to hide it from the public.[55]
TheFirst Amendment of the United States Constitutionstates:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Section 2(b) of theCanadian Charter of Rights and Freedomsstates that everyone has "the freedom of thought, belief, opinion and expression, including freedom of the press and other media of communication".[56]
Theopen court principleensures thefreedom of the pressby requiring that court proceedings presumptively be open and accessible to the public and to the media.
In 2016, Reporters Without Borders rankedMexico149 out of 180 in theWorld Press Freedom Index, declaring Mexico to be "the world's most dangerous country forjournalists".[57]
SeeMass media in Guatemala
SeeFreedom of the press in NicaraguaandMass media in Nicaragua
SeeHistory of Argentina#New democracy (1983–present)andMass media in Argentina
SeeHistory of Bolivia (1982–present)andMass media in Bolivia
SeeHistory of Brazil (1985–present)
SeeHistory of Chile (1990-)
SeeHistory of Colombia#From 2004 and onandMass media in Colombia
SeeHistory of Ecuador#Instability (2000–2007)
SeeGuyana#UNASUR
SeeHistory of Paraguay#Modern ParaguayandMass media in Paraguay
SeeFreedom of the press in PeruandMass media in Peru
SeeHistory of Suriname's Independence
SeeHistory of Uruguay#Recent historyandMass media in Uruguay
SeeHistory of Venezuela (1999–present)andMass media in Venezuela
According to Reporters without Borders, a number of reporters in Bahrain were jailed. Some were also tortured or were exiled.[58]
According to the reports of the RSF in 2007, the freedom of Press in Iran ranked 166 among 169 states. The report reads the Iranian journalists face the "extreme harsh behavior of the Iranian regime that prevents them criticizing authorities or expressing political and social demands.[59]
After aUkrainian airliner was shot downin 2020 by theIslamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, agents of theIranian Ministry of Intelligenceraided the houses and offices of many Iranian journalists seeking for their PCs, cell phones, books, and documents. These journalists had revealed the lies of the Iranian regime. Some of the journalists received warnings by the authorities and were forced to shut down their accounts in Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.[60]
Demanding promotion of the global Freedom of Media, in December 1993, UNESCO called the 3rd of April as "International day for Freedom of Media". This is while the RSF reported at least 860 journalists have been detained and imprisoned from 1979 to 2009 in Iran.[61]
On April 21, 2020,Paris-basedReporters Without Borders(RSF) said in its annual pressfreedomrankings that the pandemic was "highlighting many crises" already casting a shadow onpress freedom, around the world, with authoritarian states including Iran suppressing details of the outbreak.[62]
RSF accused Iran—in 173rd place—of censoring major coronavirus outbreaks.[62]
On the occasion ofWorld Press Freedom Dayin 2020, theWriters' Association of Iranreleased a statement emphasizing the existence of censorship and violation of freedom of speech and its destructive impacts on the structure and vital foundation of the society. It noted that during the past decades, the rulers in the country imprisoned more than 890 journalists and reporters, some of whom have been executed. The Iranian Writer Association expressed its regret, when Iran ranked 173 among 180 states due to freedom of speech.[63]
On 7 February 2020, the International Federation of Journalists in a statement condemned "raiding of Iranian Security Forces upon the houses of six Iranian journalists, holding the forces of "IRGC's Intelligence" responsible for recent pressures on the journalists. The secretary-general of the federation, Anthony Blunker, said that intimidating and threatening journalists are unpleasant tools to silence the public opinion of the administration.[64]
On November 26, 2019, the RSF condemned the pressure on families of reporters by the Iranian regime, saying Iran ranked 170 among 180 states regarding Freedom of Press in 2019.[65]
In its 2019 annual report, the Committee to Protect Journalists found at least 250 journalists in jail in relation to their work and stated that the number of imprisoned journalists in Iran was 11, citing the crackdown on protests by the Iranian people over rising gasoline prices. The report named Eritrea, Vietnam and Iran as "the worst prisons for journalists" after China, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Egypt.[66][67]
On September 8, 2020, Reporters Without Borders expressed concern about the continuing detention and repression of journalists in Iran and warned for the journalists and Reporters who have been arrested for their activities and subjected to harassment. "TheHuman Rights Councilmust take more serious action to protect and defend journalists", said an official.[68]
On Monday, November 9, 2020, Ralf Nestmeyer, vice president ofPENGermany, referred to the repressive methods of authoritarian regimes: "Freedom of expression has declined in many parts of the world". He added that dictatorial regimes respond to any criticism with violence and imprisonment.[citation needed]This year the World Pen Association (Pen), will concentrate on the fate of writers in Iran, China, Turkey, Peru and Uganda.[69][failed verification]
Human Rights Watchcondemned the punishment of thedeath penaltyand demanded that it be prevented at all costs, following the December 12 execution of an Iranian dissident on vague charges. Rouhallah Zam, the founder of Telegram channelAmadnews, was allegedly detained when he was visiting Iran in October 2019. He was deported forcibly to Iran and convicted of vague national security charges, as per Human Rights Watch. Zam faced trial for his ‘activism’ after being deported to Iran. The Iranian Supreme Court confirmed his verdict on December 8 and the journalist was executed on December 12.[70]
In October 2019, thePalestinian Authorityblocked 59 websites, claiming that they were critical of the government. These websites were both Palestinian and Arabic and were identified to have been publishing material that "threaten national security and civil peace". Quds News Network, among the blocked sites, stated that the move reflected the Palestinian Authority's repression of the press.[71]
In 2023, nearly 75% of journalists killed worldwide were Palestinians who had died inIsrael’swar in Gaza.[72]According to theCommittee to Protect Journalists, Israel was the second worst country in the world for allowing the murderers of journalists to go unpunished.[73]UNESCOawarded its 2024 World Press Freedom Prize to the Palestinian journalists ofGaza.[74]
Critics argue that theCommunist Partyin China has failed to live up to its promises about the freedom of themainland Chinese media.Freedom Houseconsistently ranks China as 'Not Free'[75]in its annual press freedom survey, including the 2014 report. PRC journalistHe Qingliansays that the PRC's media are controlled by directives from the Communist Party's propaganda department and are subjected to intense monitoring which threatens punishment for violators, rather than to pre-publication censorship. In 2008,ITV Newsreporter John Ray was arrested while covering a 'Free Tibet' protest.[76]International media coverage of Tibetan protests only a few months before the Beijing Olympics in 2008 triggered a strong reaction inside China. Chinese media practitioners took the opportunity to argue with propaganda authorities for more media freedom: one journalist asked, 'If not even Chinese journalists are allowed to report about the problems in Tibet, how can foreign journalists know about the Chinese perspective about the events?' Foreign journalists also reported that their access to certain websites, including those of human rights organizations, was restricted.[77]
International Olympic CommitteepresidentJacques Roggestated at the end of the 2008 Olympic Games that "The regulations [governing foreign media freedom during the Olympics] might not be perfect but they are a sea-change compared to the situation before. We hope that they will continue".[78]The Foreign Correspondents Club of China (FCCC) issued a statement during the Olympics that 'despite welcome progress in terms of accessibility and the number of press conferences within the Olympic facilities, the FCCC has been alarmed at the use of violence, intimidation and harassment outside. The club has confirmed more than 30 cases of reporting interference since the formal opening of the Olympic media centre on 25 July, and is checking at least 20 other reported incidents.'[79]
Since the Chinese state continues to exert a considerable amount of control over media, public support for domestic reporting has come as a surprise to many observers. Not much is known about the extent to which the Chinese citizenry believe the official statements of the CPC, nor about which media sources they perceive as credible and why. So far, research on the media in China has focused on the changing relationship between media outlets and the state during the reform era. Nor is much known about how China's changing media environment has affected the government's ability to persuade media audiences. Research on political trust reveals that exposure to the media correlates positively with support for the government in some instances, and negatively in others. The research has been cited as evidence that the Chinese public believes propaganda transmitted to them through the news media, but also that they disbelieve it.
In 2012 the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights urged the Chinese government to lift restrictions on media access to the region and allow independent and impartial monitors to visit and assess conditions in Tibet. The Chinese government did not change its position.[80]
Article 19 of the constitution of the Pakistan states that: "Every citizen shall have the right to freedom of speech and expression, and there shall be freedom of the press, subject to any reasonable restrictions imposed by law in the interest of the glory of Islam or the integrity, security or defense of Pakistan or any part thereof, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, decency or morality, or in relation to contempt of court, commission of or incitement to an offence".[81]Since independence the electronic media in Pakistan remained dominated by the state-run Pakistan Television and Pakistan Broadcasting CorporationsIronically, press freedom in Pakistan flourished for the first time in 2002 during Gen R Prevaiz Musharraf's era.[82]
To a large extent the media enjoys freedom of expression in spite of political pressure and direct bans sometimes administered by political stake holders. Political pressure on media is mostly done indirectly. One tool widely used by the government is to cut off 'unfriendly' media from governmental advertising. Using draconian laws, the government has also banned or officially silenced popular television channels. ThePakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority(PEMRA) has been used to silence the broadcast media by either suspending licenses or by simply threatening to do so. In addition, media is also threatened by non-state actors involved in the current conflict.
In its 2018Press Freedom Index,Reporters Without Bordersranked Pakistan number 139 out of 180 countries based on freedom of the press. The report implied considerable improvement in the freedom of press compared to the preceding years.[83]
The press in Malaysiais controlled and journalists cannot have a conversation about certain things. For instance, a British reporter in Malaysia was arrested after she reported on the1Malaysia Development Berhad scandaland published details of the alleged transfer of $681 million from 1MDB to bank accounts held byNajib Razak.[84]
Singapore's media environmentis considered to be controlled by the government.[85][86]
Saudi Arabiadoes not tolerate dissidents and it can impose penalties on such people. Saudi Arabia is also responsible for executingSaudi Americanjournalist,Jamal Khashoggiin 2018. As he entered a Saudi embassy in Turkey, a group of Saudi assassins killed him.[87]
TheIndian Constitution, while not mentioning the word "press", provides for"the right to freedom of speech and expression"(Article 19(1) a). However, this right is subject to restrictions under sub clause, whereby this freedom can be restricted for reasons of "sovereigntyand integrity of India, the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, preserving decency, preserving morality, in relation to contempt, court,defamation, or incitement to an offense". Laws such as theOfficial Secrets ActandPrevention of Terrorist Activities Act[88](PoTA) have been used to limit press freedom. Under PoTA, person could be detained for up to six months for being in contact with a terrorist or terrorist group. PoTA was repealed in 2006, but the Official Secrets Act 1923 continues.
For the first half-century of independence, media control by the state was the major constraint on press freedom.Indira Gandhifamously stated in 1975 thatAll India Radiois "a Government organ, it is going to remain a Government organ..."[89]With the liberalization starting in the 1990s, private control of media has burgeoned, leading to increasing independence and greater scrutiny of government.
It ranks poorly at 142nd[90]rank out of 180 listed countries in thePress Freedom Index2021 released byReporters Without Borders(RSF).[91]Analytically India's press freedom, as could be deduced by thePress Freedom Index, has constantly reduced since 2002, when it culminated in terms of apparent freedom, achieving a rank of 80 among the reported countries. In 2018, India's freedom of press ranking declined two placed to 138. In explaining the decline, RSF cited growing intolerance fromHindu nationalistsupporters of Indian Prime MinisterNarendra Modi, and the murders of journalists such asGauri Lankesh.[92][93][94]
Bangladeshi mediais reportedly following self-censorship due to the controversial Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Act. Under this act, 25 journalists and several hundred bloggers and Facebook users are reportedly prosecuted in Bangladesh in 2017.[95]
Bangladesh ranks poorly at 146th rank out of 180 listed countries in thePress Freedom Index2018 released byReporters Without Borders(RWB).[91]Bangladeshi media has faced many problems in 2018. The country's most popular online newspaperbdnews24.comwas blocked for a few hours on June 18, 2018, by Bangladesh's regulatory authority. Another newspaperThe Daily Star'swebsite was blocked for 22 hours on June 2, 2018, after it had published a report about a victim of an extrajudicial execution in the southeastern city ofCox's Bazar.[96]
During theroad-safety protests in 2018, Bangladeshi government switched off 3G and 4G mobile data and also arrested a photographer namedShahidul Alamunder ICT act, after he had given an interview withAl Jazeera.[97]
As of 2018, online content providersmust be licensedand pay an annual fee to the government.[98]
Following the transition to democracy in 1994, the post-apartheidConstitution of South Africaguarantees the freedom of the press.[99]
Many of the traditional means of delivering information are being slowly superseded by the increasing pace of modern technological advance. Almost every conventional mode of media and information dissemination has a modern counterpart that offers significant potential advantages to journalists seeking to maintain and enhance their freedom of speech. A few simple examples of such phenomena include:
Governments are responding to the challenges posed by new media technologies by deploying increasingly sophisticated technology of their own (a notable example being China's attempts to impose control through a state-runinternet service providerthat controls access to the Internet).
In its 2023 report published on May 3, Reporters Without Borders evaluated the state of media freedom in 180 countries. According to this report, the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran ranks 177 out of 180 countries after North Korea, China and Vietnam, and it has also been named as one of the most dangerous countries for journalists.[101]
The World Press Freedom Index 2021, compiled by Reporters Without Borders, shows that journalism is completely blocked or severely restricted in 73 countries and restricted in 59 others. According to the report, Norway ranks first among 180 countries for the fifth year in a row. Finland is second and Sweden third. In this index, Iran is ranked 174th with a decline.Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Syria ranked consequently 150th, 177th, 170th, 166th and 173rd.[102][103]
On April 21, the RSF in its 2020 annual report published the latest ranking of Freedom of Media. TheIslamic Republic of Iranis the 173rd in the list, declining three steps compared to 2019. The three Iranian allied countries,Syria,China, andNorth Koreaare 174th, 177th, and 180th. This organization accuses China and Iran of censorship of news about an outbreak ofcoronavirus.[104]
On April 18, the RSF published its annual report, Indication for Free Media in the world. In this report, among 180 states,Norwaywas the freest and safest country in the world.FinlandandSwedenare the next. Meanwhile,Iranlost its position in the list- compare to 2018- and is among the 11 countries that suppress the freedom of the media. Iran is on the bottom of the list, ranked as the 170th state.[105]
The RSF in its annual report in 2018 documented deadly violence and misbehavior against reporters saying for one year 80 reporters have been killed, 348 detained, and 60 taken hostage which indicates an unprecedented hostility against media staff. This organization recognizes Iran as one of the five states which is called "prison of reporters" along withChina,Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Turkey. Based on this report Iran is ranked 144th and is still one of the greatest prisons for journalists.[106]
Based on the 2017 annual report on RSF, Iran along withChina,Turkey,Vietnam, andSyriaare the largest prison for reporters and media activists. The report says during 2017, among professional journalists, 50 have been killed and 326 detained; 54 reporters have been taken hostage.[107]
On December 13, 2016, the Reporters without Borders (RSF) published its annual report. The report reads: 348 journalists have been detained and 52 taken hostage in Iran in 2016. Following Turkey, the countries China, Syria,Egypt, and Iran have almost two-thirds of detainedjournalists.[108]
On February 12, 2015, theReporters without Borders(RSF) published its annual report. In this report, 180 states have been reviewed based on the freedom of press, independent media and also the situation of reporters and journalists. Iran is at the 173rd of this list that indicates, despite theRouhani's promises, freedom of speeches and journalists has not been improved; the RSF concerns continue. According to the report, Iran ranked third on the list on the imprisonment of journalists.[109]
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Afront organizationis any entity set up by and controlled by another organization, such asintelligence agencies,organized crimegroups,terrorist organizations,secret societies, banned organizations, religious or political groups,advocacy groups, orcorporations. Front organizations can act for the parent group without the actions being attributed to the parent group, thereby allowing them to hide certain activities from the authorities or the public.
Front organizations that appear to be independentvoluntary associationsorcharitable organizationsare calledfront groups. In the business world, front organizations such asfront companiesorshell corporationsare used to shield theparent companyfrom legal liability. Ininternational relations, apuppet stateis astatewhich acts as a front (or surrogate) for another state.
Intelligence agencies use front organizations to provide "cover", plausible occupations and means of income, for their covert agents. These may include legitimate organizations, such as charity, religious or journalism organizations; or "brass plate firms" which exist solely to provide a plausible background story, occupation, and means of income.
Brewster Jennings & Associateswas a front company set up in 1994 by theCentral Intelligence Agency(CIA) as a cover for its officers.
The airlineAir America, an outgrowth ofCivil Air Transportof the 1940s, andSouthern Air Transport, ostensibly a civilian air charter company, were operated and wholly owned by theCIA, supposedly to providehumanitarian aid, but flew many combat support missions and suppliedcovert operationsinSoutheast Asiaduring theVietnam War.[1]Other CIA-funded front groups have been used to spread Americanpropagandaand influence during theCold War, particularly in theThird World.[2]When intelligence agencies work through legitimate organizations, it can cause problems and increased risk for the workers of those organizations.[3]To prevent this, the CIA has had a 20-year policy (since 1976, per US Government sources) of not usingPeace Corpsmembers or US journalists for intelligence purposes.[4][5]
Another airline allegedly involved in intelligence operations was RussianAeroflotthat worked in a close coordination withKGB,SVRandGRU.[6]The company conducted forcible "evacuations" of Soviet citizens from foreign countries back to the USSR. People whose loyalty was questioned were drugged and delivered unconscious by Aeroflot planes, assisted by the company KGB personnel, according to former GRU officerVictor Suvorov.[7]In the 1980s and 1990s, specimens of deadly bacteria and viruses stolen from Western laboratories were delivered by Aeroflot to support theRussian program of biological weapons. This delivery channel encoded VOLNA ("wave") meant "delivering the material via an international flight of the Aeroflot airline in the pilots' cabin, where one of the pilots was a KGB officer".[6]At least two SVR agents died, presumably from the transported pathogens.[6]
When businessmanNikolai Glushkovwas appointed as a top manager of Aeroflot in 1996, he found that the airline company worked as a "cash cowto support international spying operations" according toAlex Goldfarb:[8]3,000 people out of the total workforce of 14,000 in Aeroflot wereFSB, SVR, or GRU officers. All proceeds from ticket sales were distributed to 352 foreign bank accounts that could not be controlled by the Aeroflot administration. Glushkov closed all these accounts and channeled the money to an accounting center called Andava inSwitzerland.[8]He also sent a bill and wrote a letter to SVR directorYevgeni Primakovand FSB directorMikhail Barsukovasking them to pay salaries of their intelligence officers in Aeroflot in 1996.[8]Glushkov was imprisoned in 2000 on charges of illegally channeling money through Andava. Since 2004 the company is controlled byViktor Ivanov, a high-ranking FSB official who is a close associate ofVladimir Putin.
TheFBIhas acknowledged using at least thirteen front companies to conceal their use of aircraft to observe criminal activity in the United States, including:[9][10]
Manyorganized crime operationshave substantial legitimate businesses, such as licensedgamblinghouses, building construction companies, hair salons and karaoke bars, engineering firms, restaurants and bars, billiard clubs, trash hauling services, or dock loading enterprises. These front companies enable these criminal organizations tolaundertheir income from illegal activities. As well, the front companies provide plausible cover for illegal activities such asillegal gambling,extortion,drug trafficking,smuggling, andprostitution.Tattooparlors are often used as fronts foroutlaw motorcycle clubs.[11]
Wherebrothelsare illegal, criminal organizations set up front companies providing services such as a "massage parlor" or "sauna" to the point that "massage parlor" or "sauna" is thought as a synonym ofbrothelin these countries.[12]
A Colombian drug cartel, theCali Cartel, in the past used Drogas La Rebaja, now a large national pharmacy store chain, as a front company in order to launder their drug trafficking earnings.[13]
The General Manager of the Pharaoh's Gentlemen's Club inCheektowaga, New York, is the international leader of theOutlaws Motorcycle Club: John Ermin. Many Outlaws MC members also work at the club. Authorities have referred to Pharaoh's as a hot spot for drug dealing and sex trafficking.[14]The club's owner is Peter G. Gerace Jr., the nephew of reputedBuffalo crime familyboss Joseph A. Todaro Jr.[15]The Outlaws Motorcycle Club, themselves, have been designated by federal law enforcement as a criminal enterprise.[16]
In the early 2000s, theBlack Mafia Familyestablished the Atlanta-basedrecord labelBMF Entertainment as a front company to launder funds that were generated from the sale ofcocaine.[17][18][19]
The boxing management companyMTK Globalis owned by the reputed Irish gang bossDaniel Kinahan. Heredia Boxing Management alleges that MTK Global was established as a front company to launder funds made from drug trafficking.[20]
During the year of 2019,ACT Policeshut down the Lakeside Tattoo Parlour inBelconnenon the grounds of it being allegedly used to launder cash for the notorious outlaw motorcycle gang,Comanchero Motorcycle Club. The money laundered through the tattoo parlor allegedly came from the club'sdrug traffickingoperations.[21][22][23]
TheChurch of Scientologyuses front groups either to promote its interests in politics, to make its group seem more legitimate, and to recruit.[24]TheFBI's July 8, 1977 raids on the Church's offices (following discovery of the Church'sOperation Snow White) turned up, among other documents, an undated memo entitled "PR General Categories of Data Needing Coding". This memo listed what it called "Secret PR Front Groups," which included the group APRL, "Alliance for the Preservation of Religious Liberty" (later renamed "Americans Preserving Religious Liberty").[25]TheCult Awareness Network(CAN) is considered by many[who?]to now be a front group for the Church of Scientology, which took the group over financially after bankrupting it in a series of lawsuits.[26][27]
Timeidentified several other fronts for Scientology, including: theCitizens Commission on Human Rights(CCHR),The Way to Happiness Foundation,Applied Scholastics, theConcerned Businessmen's Association of America, andHealthMed Clinic.[28]Seven years later theBoston Heraldshowed howNarcononandWorld Literacy Crusadewere also fronts for Scientology.[29]Other Scientology groups includeDowntown Medical,Criminonand theAssociation for Better Living and Education(ABLE).
In politics, a group may be called a front organization if it is perceived to be disingenuous in its control or goals or if it attempts to mask extremist views within a supposedly more moderate group. Some special interest groups engage inastroturfing, an attempt to mask lobbying as agrassroots movement.
South Africa'sapartheid-era government used numerous front organizations to influence world opinion and to undertakeextra-judicialactivities and the killing of anti-apartheid activists; these included[30]the following:
Communistparties (especiallyMarxist-Leninistones) have sometimes used front organizations to attract support from those (sometimes called "fellow travellers") who do not fully agree with the party's ideology but agree with certain aspects of it. The front organization often obscures its provenance and may often be a tool for recruitment. OtherMarxistsoften describe front organizations asopportunist. The concept of a front organization should be distinguished from theunited front(acoalitionofworking classorsocialistparties) and thepopular front. Both the united front and the popular front usually disclose the groups that make up their coalitions.
According to a list prepared in 1955 by the United StatesSenate Internal Security Subcommittee, theCominternset up no less than 82 front organizations in the United States in the 1930s and the 1940s.[35]
Soviet intelligenceinfiltrated many peace movements in the West. In addition to theWorld Peace Council, important communist front organizations included theWorld Federation of Trade Unions, theWorld Federation of Democratic Youth, and theInternational Union of Students.[36]Richard Felix Staarhas also suggested that these organizations were somewhat less important front organizations:Afro-Asian People's Solidarity Organisation,Christian Peace Conference,International Association of Democratic Lawyers,International Federation of Resistance Movements,International Institute for Peace,International Organization of Journalists,Women's International Democratic Federation, andWorld Federation of Scientific Workers.[37]There were also numerous smaller organizations, affiliated with the above fronts such asPugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs.[38][39]Numerous peace conferences, congresses and festivals have been staged with support of those organizations.[40]
More recently, theWorkers' World Party(WWP)[41]set up ananti-warfront group,International ANSWER. (ANSWER is no longer closely associated with WWP; it is closely associated with a WWP splinter, theParty for Socialism and Liberation, but PSL plays a more open role in the organization.) Similarly,Unite Against Fascism, theAnti-Nazi League, theStop the War CoalitionandRespect – The Unity Coalitionare all criticised as being fronts for theTrotskyistSocialist Workers Party (UK).
In 2014,Andrew Cuomoestablished a front political party, theWomen's Equality Party. The party was established to take advantage ofelectoral fusionlaws inNew York Statethat allow candidates to run on multiple ballot lines and to count all of their votes together. Critics of the party and of Cuomo have noted that there is an inherent level of deception involved in the party, as Cuomo is not a woman, the party has not favored women in its endorsement policies, and Cuomo's gubernatorial campaign fund is the primary source of revenue for the party's operations.[42]
In April 1991, theCommunist Party of the Soviet Unionleadership and theKGBcreated a puppet political party in Russia, theLiberal Democratic Party of the Soviet Union(LDPSU), which became the second officially-registered party in the country.[43]According to KGB GeneralPhilipp Bobkov, it was a "Zubatov's pseudo-party under KGB control that directs interests and sentiments of certain social groups".[44]The formerSoviet PolitburomemberAlexander Nikolaevich Yakovlevdescribed in his book how KGB DirectorVladimir Kryuchkovpresented the project of the puppet party at a joint meeting withMikhail Gorbachevand informed him about a selection of party leaders and the mechanism of funding from Communist Party money.[44]The book includes an official copy of a document providing the initial Liberal Democratic Party funding (3 million rubles) from the Communist Party's money. The Liberal Democratic leader,Vladimir Zhirinovsky, proved to be an effective media performer[43]and gained 8% of votes during the1991 presidential elections.[45]He also supported theAugust 1991 coup attempt.
Theunited frontis a political strategy and network of groups and key individuals that are influenced or controlled by theChinese Communist Party(CCP) and used to advance its interests. It has traditionally been apopular frontthat has included eightlegally permitted political parties: theChinese People's Political Consultative Conference(CPPCC), theAll-China Federation of Industry and Commerce, theChina Council for the Promotion of International Trade, theAll-China Federation of Returned Overseas Chinese, and otherpeople's organizations.[46]UnderChinese Communist Party General SecretaryXi Jinping, the united front and its targets of influence have expanded in size and scope.[47][48][49][50]The united front is managed primarily by but is not limited to theUnited Front Work Department(UFWD).
Ananti-Islamistfeministgroup in theMuslim worldhas also been accused of being a front organization. TheOrganization of Women's Freedom in Iraqhas been accused of being a front for theWorker-Communist Party of Iraq.[51][52]
Banned paramilitary organizations sometimes use front groups to achieve a public face with which to raise funds, negotiate with opposition parties, recruit, and spread propaganda. For example, bannedparamilitaryorganizations often have an affiliatedpolitical partythat operates more openly, but those parties themselves often end up being banned. The parties may or may not be front organizations in the narrow sense (they have varying degrees of autonomy, and the relationships are usually something of anopen secret) but are widely considered to be so, especially by their political opponents.
Examples are the relationship between theProvisional IRAandSinn Féinin 1980sIrelandor between theBasquegroupsETA(paramilitary) andBatasuna(party) inSpain. Similarly, in theUnited States, when theCommunist Party USAwas highly stigmatized, it often operated largely through front groups. In addition, the Provisional IRA also operated avigilantefront group,Direct Action Against Drugs.
Both Loyalist and Republican paramilitaries in Ireland duringthe Troublesused cover names when they carried out sectarian attacks against civilians.Republicangroups like the Provisional IRA and theIrish National Liberation Armyused front names like theSouth Armagh Republican Action Force,Catholic Reaction Forceand the People's Republican Army to claim responsibility for attacks on civilians,[53]Loyalistslike theUlster Volunteer Forceand theUlster Defense Associationused various front names such as theProtestant Action Force,Ulster Freedom FightersandRed Hand Defenderswhen they carried out attacks against civilians, most of which were aimed at Catholic civilians.
During theWeimar Republicin Germany, the anti-Semitic and nationalistOrganisation Consulreportedly had a front company named the Bavarian Wood Products Company.[54]
Corporations from a wide variety of different industries, such as food, pharmaceutical and energy, set up front groups to advocate on their behalf.
Some pharmaceutical companies set up "patients' groups" as front organizations that pressure healthcare providers and legislators to adopt their products. For example,Biogenset up a campaign calledAction for Access, which also claimed it was an independent organization and the voice ofmultiple sclerosissufferers. People who visited the website and signed up for the campaign did not realise that these were not genuinely independent patient groups.
Over the past 15 years, increasing concerns aboutobesityhave causedCoca-Colato experience pressure from social movement activists to reduce the sugar content in its drinks. Although Coca-Cola has publicly promoted consumer engagement in healthy lifestyles with its campaigns such as 'Coming Together', activists have also exposed that Coca-Cola has secretly fundedfront groups or organizations that criticize social movement activists and legitimize controversial corporate activities. TheCenter for Consumer Freedom(CCF) andGlobal Energy Balance Network(GEBN) are two main groups that engage activists on behalf of Coca-Cola even though they were not intended to be publicly associated with Coca-Cola as a corporation. Research has revealed that the CCF, with a mission to "promote responsibility and protectconsumer choices", uses both verbal and visual strategies to articulate obesity as "personal responsibility" to protect the industry from corporate responsibility.[55]
Tobacco companies frequently use front organizations and doctors to advocate their arguments about tobacco use although less openly and obviously than in the 1980s. TheWorld Health Organizationhas charged that the tobacco industry funded seemingly-unbiased scientific organizations to undermine tobacco control measures and cited theInternational Life Sciences Institutein particular.[56]Another way to combat public health measures against tobacco is to use lobbying and campaign contributions. For example,RJ Reynolds, the current second-largest tobacco company in the United States, created a front group named Get Government Off Our Back ("GGOOB") in 1994 to fight federal regulation of tobacco. By hiding its involvement with tobacco industry, GGOOB avoided the tobacco industry reputation for misrepresenting evidence and drew big supports from both public and legislative aspects, successfully resolving the threats from wide-reaching tobacco regulations.[57]
A list of some alleged corporate front groups active in the US is maintained by theMultinational Monitor.[58]Somethink tanksare corporate front groups. These organizations present themselves as research organizations, using phrases such as "...Institute for Research" in their names. Because their names suggest neutrality, they can present the commercial strategies of the corporations which sponsor them in a way which appears to be objectivesociologicaloreconomicalresearch rather than political lobbying.
Similarly theCenter for Regulatory Effectivenesshas been criticised as a front organization for various industry bodies which seek to undermine regulation of their environmentally damaging activities under the guise of 'regulatory effectiveness'.[59]
Astroturfing, a wordplay based on "grassroots" efforts, is an American term used pejoratively to describe formalpublic relationsprojects which try to create the impression of a groundswell of spontaneous popular response to a politician, product, service, or event. Corporations have been known to "astroturf", but are not the only entities alleged to have done so. In recent years, organizations of plaintiffs' attorneys have established front groups such asVictims and Families Unitedto opposetort reform.[60]
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Journalismis the production and distribution ofreportson the interaction of events, facts, ideas, and people that are the "news of the day" and that informs society to at least some degree of accuracy. The word, anoun, applies to theoccupation(professional or not), the methods of gathering information, and the organizing literary styles.
The appropriate role for journalism varies from country to country, as do perceptions of the profession, and the resulting status. In some nations, the news media are controlled by government and are not independent.[1]In others, news media are independent of the government and operate asprivate industry. In addition, countries may have differing implementations of laws handling thefreedom of speech,freedom of the pressas well asslanderandlibel cases.
The proliferation of the Internet andsmartphoneshas brought significant changes to the media landscape since the turn of the 21st century. This has created a shift in the consumption of print media channels, as people increasingly consume news throughe-readers,smartphones, and other personal electronic devices, as opposed to the more traditional formats of newspapers, magazines, ortelevision news channels. News organizations are challenged to fully monetize their digital wing, as well as improvise on the context in which they publish in print. Newspapers have seen print revenues sink at a faster pace than the rate of growth for digital revenues.[2]
Journalistic conventions vary by country. In the United States, journalism is produced by media organizations or by individuals. Bloggers are often regarded as journalists. TheFederal Trade Commissionrequires that bloggers who write about products received as promotional gifts, disclose that they received the products for free. This is intended to eliminate conflicts of interest and protect consumers.[3]
In the US, many credible news organizations areincorporated entities, have an editorial board, and exhibit separate editorial and advertising departments. Many credible news organizations, or their employees, often belong to and abide by the ethics of professional organizations such as theAmerican Society of News Editors, theSociety of Professional Journalists,Investigative Reporters & Editors, Inc., or theOnline News Association. Many news organizations also have their own codes of ethics that guide journalists' professional publications. For instance,The New York Timescode of standards and ethics[4]is considered particularly rigorous.[by whom?]
When crafting news stories, regardless of the medium, fairness and bias are issues of concern to journalists. Some stories are intended to represent the author's own opinion; others are more neutral or feature balanced points of view. For instance, as per theAustralian Bureau of Statistics(ABS), there are 8,469 journalists in Australia, encompassing editors as well as those working in radio, television, and print. Research reveals considering where journalists actually live gives insight into which communities have their stories told firsthand while others are told by outsiders.[5]
In a traditional print newspaper and its online version, information is organized into sections. This makes clear the distinction between content based on fact and on opinion. In other media, many of these distinctions break down. Readers should pay careful attention to headings and other design elements to ensure that they understand the journalist's intent. Opinion pieces are generally written by regular columnists or appear in a section titled "Op-ed", these reflect a journalist's own opinions and ideology.[6]Whilefeature stories, breaking news, andhard newsstories typically make efforts to remove opinion from the copy.
According toRobert McChesney, healthy journalism in a democratic country must provide an opinion of people in power and who wish to be in power, must include a range of opinions and must regard the informational needs of all people.[7]
Many debates center on whether journalism ethics require them to be objective and neutral. Arguments include the fact that journalists produce news out of and as part of a particular social context, and that they are guided by professional codes of ethics and do their best to represent all legitimate points of view. Additionally, the ability to render a subject's complex and fluid narrative with sufficient accuracy is sometimes challenged by the time available to spend with subjects, the affordances or constraints of the medium used to tell the story, and the evolving nature of people's identities.[8]
There are several forms of journalism with diverse audiences. Journalism is said to serve the role of a "fourth estate", acting as awatchdogon the workings of the government. A single publication (such as a newspaper) contains many forms of journalism, each of which may be presented in different formats. Each section of a newspaper, magazine, or website may cater to a different audience.[9][10]
Some forms include:
The rise of social media has drastically changed the nature of journalistic reporting, giving rise to so-calledcitizen journalists. In a 2014 study of journalists in the United States, 40% of participants claimed they rely on social media as a source, with over 20% depending onmicroblogsto collect facts.[13]From this, the conclusion can be drawn that breaking news nowadays often stems from user-generated content, including videos and pictures posted online in social media.[13]However, though 69.2% of the surveyed journalists agreed that social media allowed them to connect to their audience, only 30% thought it had a positive influence on news credibility.[13]In addition to this, a 2021 study done byPew Research Centershows that 86% of Americans are getting their news from digital devices.[14]
Consequently, this has resulted in arguments to reconsider journalism as a process distributed among many authors, including the socially mediating public, rather than as individual products and articles written by dedicated journalists.[15]
Because of these changes, the credibility ratings of news outlets has reached an all-time low. A 2014 study revealed that only 22% of Americans reported a "great deal" or "quite a lot of confidence" in either television news or newspapers.[16]
"Fake news" is deliberately untruthful information, which can often spread quickly on social media or by means offake news websites.
It is often published to intentionally mislead readers to ultimately benefit a cause, organization or an individual. A glaring example was the proliferation of fake news in social media during the2016 U.S. presidential election.Conspiracytheories, hoaxes, and lies have been circulated under the guise of news reports to benefit specific candidates. One example is a fabricated report ofHillary Clinton's email which was published by a non-existent newspaper called TheDenverGuardian.[18]Many critics blamed Facebook for the spread of such material. Its news feed algorithm, in particular, was identified byVoxas the platform where the social media giant exercise billions of editorial decisions every day. Social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter andTikTokare distributors of disinformation or "fake news".[19]Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook, has acknowledged the company's role in this problem: in a testimony before a combined Senate Judiciary and Commerce committee hearing on 20 April 2018, he said:
It's clear now that we didn't do enough to prevent these tools from being used for harm as well. That goes for fake news, foreign interference in elections, and hate speech, as well as developers and data privacy.[20]
Readers can often evaluate credibility of news by examining the credibility of the underlying news organization.
The phrase was popularized and used byDonald Trumpduring hispresidential campaignto discredit what he perceived as negative news coverage of his candidacy and then the presidency.[21]
In some countries, includingTurkey,[22]Egypt,[23]India,[24]Bangladesh,[25]Iran,[26]Nigeria,[27]Ethiopia,[28]Kenya,[29]Cote d’Ivoire,[30]Montenegro,[31]Kazakhstan,[32]Azerbaijan,[33]Malaysia,[34]Singapore,[35]Philippines,[36]andSomalia[37]journalists have been threatened orarrestedfor allegedly spreading fake news about theCOVID-19 pandemic.
On 4 March 2022, Russian PresidentVladimir Putinsigned into law a bill introducingprison sentences of up to 15 yearsfor those who publish "knowingly false information" about the Russian armed forces and their operations, leading to some media outlets in Russia to stop reporting on Ukraine or shutting their media outlet.[38]As of December 2022, more than 4,000 people were prosecuted under "fake news" laws in connection with theRussian invasion of Ukraine.[39]At least 1,000 Russian journalists have fled Russia since February 2022.[40]
While publications reporting the news to the general public in a standardized fashion only began to appear in the 17th century and later, governments as early asHan dynasty Chinamade use of regularly published news bulletins.[41]Similar publications were established in theRepublic of Venicein the 16th century.[42]These bulletins, however, were intended only for government officials, and thus were not journalistic news publications in the modern sense of the term.
As mass-printing technologies like theprinting pressspread, newspapers were established to provide increasingly literate audiences with the news. The first references to privately owned newspaper publishers in China date to the lateMing dynastyin 1582.[43]Johann Carolus'sRelation aller Fürnemmen und gedenckwürdigen Historien, published in 1605 inStrasbourg, is often recognized as the first newspaper in Europe.
Freedom of the presswas formally established in Great Britain in 1695, withAlan Rusbridger, former editor ofThe Guardian, stating: "licensing of the press in Britain was abolished in 1695. Remember how the freedoms won here became a model for much of the rest of the world, and be conscious how the world still watches us to see how we protect those freedoms."[44]The first successful English daily, theDaily Courant, was published from 1702 to 1735.[45]While journalistic enterprises were started as private ventures in some regions, such as theHoly Roman Empireand theBritish Empire, other countries such as France andPrussiakept tighter control of the press, treating it primarily as an outlet for government propaganda and subjecting it to uniform censorship. Other governments, such as theRussian Empire, were even more distrusting of the journalistic press and effectively banned journalistic publications until the mid-19th century.[46]As newspaper publication became a more and more established practice, publishers would increase publication to a weekly or daily rate. Newspapers were more heavily concentrated in cities that were centres of trade, such asAmsterdam, London, andBerlin. The first newspapers in Latin America would be established in the mid-to-late 19th century.
Newspapers played a significant role in mobilizing popular support in favor of the liberal revolutions of the late 18th and 19th centuries. In theAmerican Colonies, newspapers motivated people to revolt against British rule by publishing grievances against the British crown and republishing pamphlets by revolutionaries such asThomas Paine,[47][48]whileloyalistpublications motivated support against theAmerican Revolution.[49]News publications in the United States would remain proudly and publiclypartisanthroughout the 19th century.[50]In France, political newspapers sprang up during theFrench Revolution, withL'Ami du peuple, edited byJean-Paul Marat, playing a particularly famous role in arguing for the rights of the revolutionary lower classes.Napoleonwould reintroduce strict censorship laws in 1800, but after his reign print publications would flourish and play an important role in political culture.[51]As part of theRevolutions of 1848, radical liberal publications such as theRheinische Zeitung, Pesti Hírlap,andMorgenbladetwould motivate people toward deposing thearistocraticgovernments of Central Europe.[52]Other liberal publications played a more moderate role:The Russian BulletinpraisedAlexander II of Russia'sliberal reforms in the late 19th century, and supported increased political and economic freedoms for peasants as well as the establishment of aparliamentary systemin Russia.[53]Farther to the left,socialistandcommunistnewspapers had wide followings in France, Russia and Germany despite being outlawed by the government.[54][55][56]
Journalism in China before 1910 primarily served the international community. Theoverthrow of the old imperial regime in 1911produced a surge in Chinese nationalism, an end to censorship, and a demand for professional, nation-wide journalism.[57]All the major cities launched such efforts. By the late 1920s, however, there was a much greater emphasis on advertising and expanding circulation, and much less interest in the sort of advocacy journalism that had inspired the revolutionaries.[58]
The Parisian newspapers were largely stagnant after theFirst World War; circulation inched up to six million a day from five million in 1910. The major postwar success story wasParis Soir; which lacked any political agenda and was dedicated to providing a mix of sensational reporting to aid circulation, and serious articles to build prestige. By 1939 its circulation was over 1.7 million, double that of its nearest rival the tabloidLe Petit Parisien.In addition to its daily paperParis Soirsponsored a highly successful women's magazineMarie-Claire.Another magazineMatchwas modeled after the photojournalism of the American magazineLife.[59]
By 1900 popular journalism in Britain aimed at the largest possible audience, including the working class, had proven a success and made its profits through advertising.Alfred Harmsworth, 1st Viscount Northcliffe(1865–1922), "More than anyone... shaped the modern press. Developments he introduced or harnessed remain central: broad contents, exploitation of advertising revenue to subsidize prices, aggressive marketing, subordinate regional markets, independence from party control.[60]HisDaily Mailheld the world record for daily circulation until his death. Prime MinisterLord Salisburyquipped it was "written by office boys for office boys".[61]
Described as "the scoop of the century", as a rookie journalist forThe Daily Telegraphin 1939Clare Hollingworthwas the first to report the outbreak ofWorld War II.[62]While travelling from Poland to Germany, she spotted and reported German forces massed on the Polish border;The Daily Telegraphheadline read: "1,000 tanks massed on Polish border "; three days later she was the first to report theGerman invasion of Poland.[63]
During World War II,George Orwellworked as a journalist atThe Observerfor seven years, and its editorDavid Astorgave a copy of Orwell's essay "Politics and the English Language"—a critique of vague, slovenly language—to every new recruit.[64]In 2003, literary editor at the newspaperRobert McCrumwrote, "Even now, it is quoted in our style book".[64]
The first newspaper of India,Hicky's Bengal Gazette, was published on 29 January 1780. This first effort at journalism enjoyed only a short stint yet it was a momentous development, as it gave birth to modern journalism in India. Following Hicky's efforts which had to be shut down just within two years of circulation, several English newspapers started publication in the aftermath. Most of them enjoyed a circulation figure of about 400 and were weeklies giving personal news items and classified advertisements about a variety of products. Later on, in the 1800s, English newspapers were started by Indian publishers with English-speaking Indians as the target audience. During that era vast differences in language was a major problem in facilitating smooth communication among the people of the country. This is because they hardly knew the languages prevalent in other parts of this vast land. However, English became alingua francaacross the country. Notable among this breed is the one named 'Bengal Gazette' started by Gangadhar Bhattacharyya in 1816.[citation needed]
The late 19th and early 20th century in the United States saw the advent of media empires controlled by the likes ofWilliam Randolph HearstandJoseph Pulitzer. Realizing that they could expand their audience by abandoning politically polarized content, thus making more money off ofadvertising, American newspapers began to abandon their partisan politics in favor of less political reporting starting around 1900.[65]Newspapers of this era embraced sensationalized reporting and larger headline typefaces and layouts, a style that would become dubbed "yellow journalism". Newspaper publishing became much more heavily professionalized in this era, and issues of writing quality and workroom discipline saw vast improvement.[66]This era saw the establishment offreedom of the pressas a legal norm, as PresidentTheodore Roosevelttried and failed to sue newspapers for reporting corruption in his handling of the purchase of thePanama Canal.[67]Still, critics note that although government's ability to suppress journalistic speech is heavily limited, the concentration of newspaper (and general media) ownership in the hands of a small number of private business owners leads to other biases in reporting and media self-censorship that benefits the interests of corporations and the government.[68][69][70]
The rampant discrimination and segregation against African-Americans led to the founding their own daily and weekly newspapers, especially in large cities. While the firstBlacknewspapers in America were established in the early 19th century,[71]in the 20th century these newspapers truly flourished in major cities, with publishers playing a major role in politics and business affairs. Representative leaders includedRobert Sengstacke Abbott(1870–1940), publisher of theChicago Defender;John Mitchell Jr.(1863–1929), editor of theRichmond Planetand president of the National Afro-American Press Association;Anthony Overton(1865–1946), publisher of theChicago Bee, andRobert Lee Vann(1879–1940), the publisher and editor of thePittsburgh Courier.[72]
Although it is not completely necessary to have attended college to be a journalist, over the past few years it has become more common to attend. With this becoming more popular, jobs are starting to require a degree to be hired. The first school of Journalism opened as part of the University of Missouri in 1908. In theHistory Of Journalismpage, it goes into depth on how journalism has evolved into what it is today. As of right now, there are a couple different routes one can take if interested in journalism. If one wanting to expand their skills as a journalist, there are many college courses and workshops one can take. If going the full college route, the average time is takes to graduate with a journalism degree is four years.[73]
The top 5 rankedjournalism schoolsin the US for the school year of 2022 are: 1. Washington and Lee University. 2. Northwestern University. 3. Georgetown University. 4. Columbia University in the City of New York. 5. University of Wisconsin - Madison.[74]
In the 1920s in the United States, as newspapers dropped their blatant partisanship in search of new subscribers, political analystWalter Lippmannand philosopherJohn Deweydebated the role of journalism in a democracy.[75]Their differing philosophies still characterize an ongoing debate about the role of journalism in society. Lippmann's views prevailed for decades, helping to bolster the Progressives' confidence in decision-making by experts, with the general public standing by. Lippmann argued that high-powered journalism was wasted on ordinary citizens, but was of genuine value to an elite class of administrators and experts.[76]Dewey, on the other hand, believed not only that the public was capable of understanding the issues created or responded to by the elite, but also that it was in the public forum that decisions should be made after discussion and debate. When issues were thoroughly vetted, then the best ideas would bubble to the surface. The danger of demagoguery and false news did not trouble Dewey. His faith in popular democracy has been implemented in various degrees, and is now known as "community journalism".[77]The 1920s debate has been endlessly repeated across the globe, as journalists wrestle with their roles.[78]
Radio
Radio broadcastingincreased in popularity starting in the 1920s, becoming widespread in the 1930s. While most radio programming was oriented toward music, sports, and entertainment, radio also broadcast speeches and occasional news programming. Radio reached the peak of its importance duringWorld War II, as radio andnewsreelswere major sources of up-to-date information on the ongoing war. In theSoviet Union, radio would be heavily utilized by the state to broadcast political speeches by leadership. These broadcasts would very rarely have any additional editorial content or analysis, setting them apart from modern news reporting.[79]The radio would however soon be eclipsed bybroadcast televisionstarting in the 1950s.
Starting in the 1940s, United States broadcast television channels would air 10-to-15-minute segments of news programming one or two times per evening. The era of live-TV news coverage would begin in the 1960s with the assassination ofJohn F. Kennedy, broadcast and reported to live on a variety of nationally syndicated television channels. During the 60s and 70s, television channels would begin adding regular morning or midday news shows. Starting in 1980 with the establishment ofCNN, news channels began providing 24-hour news coverage, a format which persists through today.
The role and status of journalism, as well as mass media, has undergone changes over the last two decades, together with the advancement of digital technology and publication of news on the Internet. This has created a shift in the consumption of print media channels, as people increasingly consume news throughe-readers,smartphones, and other electronic devices. News organizations are challenged to fully monetize their digital wing, as well as improvise on the context in which they publish in print. Newspapers have seen print revenues sink at a faster pace than the rate of growth for digital revenues.[2]
Notably, in the American media landscape,newsroomshave reduced their staff and coverage as traditional media channels, such as television, grappling with declining audiences. For example, between 2007 and 2012,CNNedited its story packages into nearly half of their original time length.[80]The compactness in coverage has been linked to broad audience attrition.[80]According to the Pew Research Center, the circulation for U.S. newspapers has fallen sharply in the 21st century.[81]Digital-first,non-profit newsroomshave grown in response to the need for high-quality information that the private sector has been struggling to provide.[82][83]
The digital era also introduced journalism whose development is done by ordinary citizens, with the rise ofcitizen journalismbeing possible through the Internet. Using video camera-equipped smartphones, active citizens are now enabled to record footage of news events and upload them onto channels like YouTube (which is often discovered and used by mainstream news media outlets). News from a variety of online sources, likeblogsand other social media, results in a wider choice of official and unofficial sources, rather than only traditional media organizations.
A worldwide sample of 27,500 journalists in 67 countries in 2012–2016 produced the following profile:[84]
While various existing codes have some differences, most share common elements including the principles of –truthfulness,accuracy,objectivity,impartiality,fairnessand publicaccountability– as these apply to the acquisition of newsworthy information and its subsequent dissemination to the public.[85][86][87][88][89]
Bill Kovachand Tom Rosenstiel propose several guidelines for journalists in their bookThe Elements of Journalism.[90]Their view is that journalism's first loyalty is to the citizenry and that journalists are thus obliged to tell the truth and must serve as an independent monitor of powerful individuals and institutions within society. In this view, the essence of journalism is to provide citizens with reliable information through the discipline of verification.
Some journalistic Codes of Ethics, notably the European ones,[91]also include a concern withdiscriminatoryreferences in news based onrace, religion,sexual orientation, and physical or mentaldisabilities.[92][93][94][95]TheParliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europeapproved in 1993 Resolution 1003 on the Ethics of Journalism which recommends journalists to respect thepresumption of innocence, in particular in cases that are stillsub judice.[96]
In the UK, all newspapers are bound by the Code of Practice of theIndependent Press Standards Organisation. This includes points like respecting people's privacy and ensuring accuracy. However, the Media Standards Trust has criticized the PCC, claiming it needs to be radically changed to secure the public trust of newspapers.
This is in stark contrast to the media climate prior to the 20th century, where the media market was dominated by smaller newspapers and pamphleteers who usually had an overt and often radical agenda, with no presumption of balance or objectivity.
Because of the pressure on journalists to report news promptly and before their competitors, factual errors occur more frequently than in writing produced and edited under less time pressure. Thus a typical issue of a major daily newspaper may contain several corrections of articles published the previous day. Perhaps the most famous journalistic mistake caused by time pressure was theDewey Defeats Trumanedition of theChicago Daily Tribune, based on early election returns that failed to anticipate the actual result of the 1948 US presidential election.
There are over 242 codes of ethics in journalism that vary across various regions of the world.[97]The codes of ethics are created through an interaction of different groups of people such as the public and journalists themselves. Most of the codes of ethics serve as a representation of the economic and political beliefs of the society where the code was written.[97]Despite the fact that there are a variety of codes of ethics, some of the core elements present in all codes are: remaining objective, providing the truth, and being honest.[97]
Journalism does not have a universalcode of conduct; individuals are not legally obliged to follow a certain set of rules like a doctor or a lawyer does.[98]There have been discussions for creating a universal code of conduct in journalism. One suggestion centers on having three claims forcredibility, justifiable consequence, and the claim ofhumanity.[99]Within the claim of credibility, journalists are expected to provide the public with reliable and trustworthy information, and allowing the public to question the nature of the information and its acquisition. The second claim of justifiable consequences centers on weighing the benefits and detriments of a potentially harmful story and acting accordingly. An example of justifiable consequence is exposing a professional with dubious practices; on the other hand, acting within justifiable consequence means writing compassionately about a family in mourning. The third claim is the claim of humanity which states that journalists are writing for a global population and therefore must serve everyone globally in their work, avoiding smaller loyalties to country, city, etc.[99]
Governments have widely varying policies and practices towards journalists, which control what they can research and write, and what press organizations can publish. Some governments guarantee the freedom of the press; while other nations severely restrict what journalists can research or publish.
Journalists in many nations have some privileges that members of the general public do not, including better access to public events, crime scenes and press conferences, and to extended interviews with public officials, celebrities and others in the public eye.
Journalists who elect to coverconflicts, whether wars between nations orinsurgencieswithin nations, often give up any expectation of protection by government, if not giving up their rights to protection from the government. Journalists who are captured or detained during a conflict are expected to be treated as civilians and to be released to their national government. Many governments around the world target journalists for intimidation, harassment, and violence because of the nature of their work.[101]
Journalists' interaction with sources sometimes involvesconfidentiality, an extension of freedom of the press giving journalists a legal protection to keep the identity of aconfidential informantprivate even when demanded by police or prosecutors; withholding their sources can land journalists in contempt of court, or in jail.
In the United States, there is no right to protect sources in afederalcourt. However, federal courts will refuse to force journalists to reveal their sources, unless the information the court seeks is highly relevant to the case and there is no other way to get it. State courts provide varying degrees of such protection. Journalists who refuse to testify even when ordered to can be found incontempt of courtand fined or jailed. On the journalistic side of keeping sources confidential, there is also a risk to the journalist's credibility because there can be no actual confirmation of whether the information is valid. As such it is highly discouraged for journalists to have confidential sources[102]
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Journalistic ethics and standardscomprise principles ofethicsand good practice applicable tojournalists. This subset ofmedia ethicsis known as journalism's professional "code of ethics" and the "canons of journalism".[1]The basic codes and canons commonly appear in statements by professional journalism associations and individualprint,broadcast, andonlinenews organizations.
There are around 400 codes covering journalistic work around the world. While various codes may differ in the detail of their content and come from different cultural traditions, most share common elements that reflect Western values, including the principles oftruthfulness,accuracyand fact-based communications, independence, objectivity,impartiality, fairness, respect for others and publicaccountability, as these apply to the gathering, editing and dissemination of newsworthy information to the public.[1][2][3][4]Such principles are sometimes in tension with non-Western and Indigenous ways of doing journalism.[5]
Like many broader ethical systems, the journalism ethics include the principle of "limitation of harm". This may involve enhanced respect for vulnerable groups and the withholding of certain details from reports, such as the names ofminor children, crime victims' names, or information not materially related to the news report where the release of such information might, for example, harm someone's reputation or put them at undue risk.[6][7]There has also been discussion and debate within the journalism community regarding appropriate reporting of suicide and mental health, particularly with regard to verbiage.[8]
Some journalistic codes of ethics, notably some European codes,[9]also include a concern withdiscriminatoryreferences in news based onrace,religion,sexual orientation, and physical or mentaldisabilities.[10][11][12][13]TheParliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europeapproved (in 1993) Resolution 1003 on the Ethics of Journalism, which recommends that journalists respect thepresumption of innocence, in particular in cases that are stillsub judice.[14]
Despite modern journalism going back as far as 400 years ago, journalism became more of a necessity in some views in the 1900s.[15]Newspapers function with the ideal of presenting "unbiased' information for the masses. The continual evolution of journalism, media and society as a whole, means that journalism will continue to face challenges in the pursuit of that ideal, and the unbiased presentation of information must be a constant topic in editorial meetings and in frequent discussions between editors and reporters.[15]
Every country presents its own unique aspects and sometimes challenges as far the codes correlated with Journalism codes today. "Truth", "accuracy", and "objectivity" are cornerstones of journalism ethics.[16]Journalists are encouraged to maintain a degree of detachment from the religions, groups, or countries they are associated with, in order to minimize potential biases in their reporting. This separation is intended to mitigate the influence of personal biases on their journalistic writing.
Certain countries prefer to only have certain information put out and in certain contexts. In Islamic countries there is growing suspicion that journalism is fixed to only be positive for Islam, prompting Islam itself as the one and only truth its people should believe in.[17]
While journalistsin the United Statesand European countries have led the formulation and adoption of these standards, such codes can be found in news reporting organizations in most countries withfreedom of the press. The written codes and practical standards vary somewhat from country to country and organization to organization, but there is substantial overlap between mainstream publications and societies. TheInternational Federation of Journalists(IFJ) launched a globalEthical Journalism Initiativein 2008 aimed at strengthening awareness of these issues within professional bodies. In 2013 the Ethical Journalism Network was founded by former IFJ General Secretary Aidan White. This coalition of international and regional media associations and journalism support groups campaigns for ethics, good governance and self-regulation across all platforms of media.
One of the leading voices in the U.S. for journalistic standards and ethics is theSociety of Professional Journalists. The Preamble to its Code of Ethics states:
[P]ublic enlightenment is the forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy. The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues. Conscientious journalists from all media and specialties strive to serve the public with thoroughness and honesty. Professional integrity is the cornerstone of a journalist's credibility.
TheRadio Television Digital News Association, an organization exclusively centered on electronic journalism, has a code of ethics centering on public trust, truthfulness, fairness, integrity, independence, and accountability.[18]
Another view is offered by Jesse Hearns-Branaman, he describes the basis of journalistic professionalism as a combination of professional socialisation and the capability for self criticism and scepticism while still following the idealised goals of journalism.[19]
The primary themes common to most codes of journalistic standards and ethics are the following.
During the normal course of an assignment a reporter might go about gathering facts and details, conductinginterviews, doingresearchandbackground checks, takingphotos, and recordingvideoandsoundin search of justice. Harm limitation deals with the questions of whether everything learned should be reported and, if so, how. This principle of limitation means that some weight needs to be given to the negative consequences of full disclosure, creating a practical andethical dilemma.The Society of Professional Journalists' code of ethics offers the following advice, which is representative of the practical ideas of most professional journalists. Quoting directly:[4]
In addition to codes of ethics, many news organizations maintain an in-houseombudsmanwhose role is, in part, to keep news organizations honest and accountable to the public. The ombudsman is intended to mediate in conflicts stemming from internal or external pressures, to maintain accountability to the public for news reported, to foster self-criticism, and to encourage adherence to both codified and uncodified ethics and standards. This position may be the same or similar to thepublic editor, though public editors also act as a liaison with readers and do not generally become members of theOrganisation of News Ombudsmen.
An alternative is anews council, an industry-wide self-regulation body, such as thePress Complaints Commission, set up by UK newspapers and magazines. Such a body is capable of applying fairly consistent standards and of dealing with a higher volume of complaints but may not escape criticisms of being toothless.
One of the most controversial issues in modern reporting ismedia bias, particularly with political issues, but also with regard to cultural and other issues. Another is the controversial issue ofcheckbook journalism, which is the practice of news reporters paying sources for their information. In the U.S., it is generally considered unethical to pay sources for information, with most mainstream newspapers and news shows having a policy forbidding it. Meanwhile, tabloid newspapers and tabloid television shows, which rely more onsensationalism, regularly engage in the practice.[26]
There are also some wider concerns as the media continues to change that the brevity of news reports and use ofsoundbiteshas reduced fidelity to the truth, and may contribute to a lack of needed context for public understanding. From outside the profession, the rise ofnews managementcontributes to the real possibility thatnews mediamay be deliberately manipulated. Selective reporting (spiking,double standards) are very commonly alleged against newspapers.
The Action Plan proposed by the EU authorities is meant to propose a guide for identifying misinformation. The project seeks to target misinformation and produce unbiased and professional informational postings.[21][27]
Advocacy journalists—a term of some debate even within the field of journalism—by definition tend to reject "objectivity", while at the same time maintaining many other common standards and ethics.
Civic journalismadopts a modified approach to objectivity where instead of being uninvolved spectators, the press is active in facilitating and encouraging public debate and examining claims and issues critically. This does not necessarily imply advocacy of a specific political party or position.
Creative nonfictionandliterary journalismuse the power oflanguageand literary devices more akin tofictionto bring insight and depth into the often book-length treatment of the subjects about which they write. Such devices asdialogue,metaphor, digression and other such techniques offer the reader insights not usually found in standard news reportage. However, authors in this branch of journalism still maintain ethical criteria such as factual and historical accuracy as found in standard news reporting. They venture outside the boundaries of standard news reporting in offering richly detailed accounts. One widely regarded author in thegenreisJoyce Carol Oates, as with her book on boxerMike Tyson.
Cosmopolitan Journalism- The cosmopolitanism imperative that our primary ethical allegiance is to a borderless, moral community of humankind is often misunderstood. Therefore, it is important to say what it implies and what it does not. The claim of humanity is not the cognition of a cold abstract principle. It is the 14 Global Journalism Ethics ability to perceive and value our common humanity in the situations of life. It is respect for mankind's rational and moral capacities wherever and however, they are manifest. It is in our concrete dealings with others that we recognize humanity's common aspirations, vulnerabilities, and capacities, as well as its potential for suffering. In a fragmented world, cosmopolitanism focuses on what is fundamental—a common aspiration to life, liberty, justice, and goodness.[28]
Investigative journalismoften takes an implicit point of view on a particularpublic intereststory by asking pointed questions and intensely probing certain questions. With outlets that otherwise strive for neutrality on political issues, the implied position in an investigative story is often uncontroversial—for example, that political corruption or abuse of children is wrong and perpetrators should be exposed and punished, that government money should be spent efficiently, or that the health of the public or workers or veterans should be protected.
Advocacy journalists often use investigative journalism in support of a particular political position, or to expose facts that are only concerning to those with certain political opinions. Regardless of whether or not it is undertaken for a specific political faction, investigative journalism usually puts a strong emphasis on factual accuracy, because the point of an in-depth investigation of an issue is to expose facts that spur change.
Not all investigations seek to expose facts about a particular problem. Some data-driven reporting provides a deep analysis and presents interesting results for the general edification of the audience, which might be interpreted in different ways or contain many facts across different potential problems. A factually-constrained investigation with an implied public-interest point of view may also find that the system under investigation is working well.
New JournalismandGonzo journalismalso reject some of the fundamental ethical practices and abandon the technical standards of journalisticprosein order to write expressively and reach a particular audience or market segment. These favor a subjective perspective and emphasize immersive experiences over objective facts.
Tabloid journalistsare often accused of sacrificing accuracy and the personal privacy of their subjects in order to boost sales. The 2011News International phone hacking scandalis an example of this.Supermarket tabloidsare often focused on entertainment rather than news. Tabloid news often have "news" stories that are so outrageous that they are widely read for entertainment purposes, not for information. Some tabloids do purport to maintain common journalistic standards but may fall far short in practice. Others make no such claims.
Some publications deliberately engage insatire, but give the publication the design elements of a newspaper, for example,The Onion, and it is not unheard of for other publications to offer the occasional, humorous articles appearing onApril Fool's Day.
In countries withoutfreedom of the press, the above-described standards of journalism are less relevant for reporters than rules surrounding censorship and avoiding politically sensitive or taboo topics. Non-free media may be prohibited from criticising the national government, serve as a de facto distributor ofpropaganda, and/or engage inself-censorship. Various other forms ofcensorshipmay restrict reporting on issues the government deems sensitive. Similarly, media outlets reliant on corporate sponsorship,sponsored content, or corporate owners may prioritise the financial interests or political viewpoints of their owners, advertisers, or sponsors and self-censor information that contradicts those viewpoints. In states with strongdefamationlaws, the risk of lawsuit may also have achilling effecton journalists. By interfering with the aforementioned obligations of journalistic ethics, these factors illustrate the extent to which ethics in journalism are shaped by the law surrounding journalism.
Freedom of the press is expressly protected bysection 2 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedomsand section 16 of theSouth African Bill of Rights,[29]and is protected as part of freedom of expression underArticle 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights. In Canada, freedom of the press and other Charter rights are subject tosection 1 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedomswhich provides that rights are subject to such restrictions as can demonstrably be justified in a free and democratic society, from which courts have developed theOakes test. The South African Bill of Rights, and the constitutions of countries like Kenya which were inspired by the post-Apartheid constitution of South Africa, provide for rights to be limited in a similar manner to the Oakes test, as codified in section 36 of the South African Bill of Rights. In South Africa and the signatories to the ECHR, freedom of the press is also subject to specific enumerated limits prohibiting hate speech, propaganda for war, and defamation.
In the United States, freedom of the press is protected under theFirst Amendmentin the Bill of Rights.[30]Under the First Amendment, the government is not allowed to censor the press. Unlike modern bills of rights like the Canadian Charter or the South African Bill of Rights, the rights enumerated in the US Constitution are written so as to be absolute.
There are a number of finer points of journalistic procedure that foster disagreements in principle and variation in practice among "mainstream" journalists in the free press. Laws concerning libel and slander vary from country to country, and local journalistic standards may be tailored to fit. For example, the United Kingdom has a broader definition of libel than the United States.[citation needed]
Accuracy is important as a core value and to maintain credibility, but especially in broadcast media, audience share often gravitates toward outlets that are reporting new information first. Different organizations may balance speed and accuracy in different ways.The New York Times, for instance, tends to print longer, more detailed, less speculative, and more thoroughly verified pieces a day or two later than many other newspapers.[citation needed]24-hour television news networks tend to place much more emphasis on getting the "scoop". Here, viewers may switch channels at a moment's notice; with fierce competition for ratings and a large amount of airtime to fill, fresh material is very valuable. Because of the fast turn-around, reporters for these networks may be under considerable time pressure, which reduces their ability to verify information.
Laws with regard to personalprivacy, official secrets, and media disclosure of names and facts fromcriminalcases and civillawsuitsdiffer widely, and journalistic standards may vary accordingly. Different organizations may have different answers to questions about when it is journalistically acceptable to skirt, circumvent, or even break these regulations. Another example of differences surrounding harm reduction is the reporting of preliminary election results. In the United States, some news organizations feel that it is harmful to the democratic process to report exit poll results or preliminary returns while voting is still open. Such reports may influence people who vote later in the day, or who are in western time zones, in their decisions about how and whether or not to vote. There is also some concern that such preliminary results are often inaccurate and may be misleading to the public. Other outlets feel that this information is a vital part of the transparency of the election process, and see no harm (if not considerable benefit) in reporting it.
Objectivity as a journalistic standard varies to some degree depending on the industry and country. For example, the government-fundedBBCin the United Kingdom places a strong emphasis on political neutrality, but British newspapers more often tend to adopt political affiliations or leanings in both coverage and audience, sometimes explicitly.[31]In the United States, major newspapers usually explicitly claim objectivity as their goal in news coverage, though most have separate editorial boards that endorse specific candidates and publish opinions on specific issues. Adherence to a claimed standard of objectivity is a constant subject of debate. For example, mainstream nationalcable newschannels in the United States claim political objectivity but to various degrees, Fox News has beenaccused of conservative biasand MSNBCaccused of liberal bias. The degree to which these leanings influence cherry-picking of facts, factual accuracy, the predominance of non-news opinion and commentators, audience opinion of the issues and candidates covered, visual composition, tone and vocabulary of stories is hotly debated.
News valueis generally used to select stories for print, broadcast, blogs, and web portals, including those that focus on a specific topic. To a large degree, news value depends on the target audience. For example, a minor story in the United States is more likely to appear onCNNthan a minor story in the Middle East which might be more likely to appear onAl Jazeerasimply due to the geographic distribution of the channels' respective audiences. It is a matter of debate whether this means that either network is less than objective, and that controversy is even more complicated when considering coverage of political stories for different audiences that have different political demographics (as with Fox News vs. MSNBC).
Somedigital mediaplatforms can use criteria to choose stories which are different from traditional news values. For example, while theGoogle Newsportal essentially chooses stories based on news value (though indirectly, through the choices of large numbers of independent outlets), users can setGoogle Alertson specific terms which define personal subjective interests.Search engines, news aggregators, andsocial networkfeeds sometimes change the presentation of content depending on the consumer's expressed or inferred preferences or leanings. This has both been cheered as bypassing traditional "gatekeepers" and whatever biases they may have in favor of audience-centric selection criteria, but criticized as creating a dangerousfilter bubblewhich intentionally or unintentionally hides dissenting opinions and other content which might be important for the audience to see in order to avoid exposure bias andgroupthink.[32]
Audiences have different reactions to depictions of violence, nudity, coarse language, or to people in any other situation that is unacceptable to or stigmatized by the local culture or laws (such as the consumption ofalcohol,homosexuality,illegal drug use,scatologicalimages, etc.). Even with similar audiences, different organizations and even individual reporters have different standards and practices. These decisions often revolve around what facts are necessary for the audience to know.
When certain distasteful or shocking material is considered important to the story, there are a variety of common methods for mitigating negative audience reaction. Advance warning of explicit or disturbing material may allow listeners or readers to avoid content they would rather not be exposed to. Offensive words may be partially obscured or bleeped. Potentially offensive images may be blurred or narrowly cropped. Descriptions may be substituted for pictures; graphic detail might be omitted. Disturbing content might be moved from a cover to an inside page, or from daytime to late evening when children are less likely to be watching.
There is often considerable controversy over these techniques, especially concern that obscuring or not reporting certain facts or details isself-censorship, which compromises objectivity and fidelity to the truth, and does not serve thepublic interest.
For example, images and graphic descriptions of war are often violent, bloody, shocking and profoundly tragic. This makes certain content disturbing to some audience members, but it is precisely these aspects of war that some consider to be the most important to convey. Some argue that "sanitizing" the depiction of war influences public opinion about the merits of continuing to fight, and about the policies or circumstances that precipitated the conflict. The amount of explicit violence and mutilation depicted in war coverage varies considerably from time to time, from organization to organization, and from country to country.
Reporters have also been accused of indecency in the process of collecting news, namely that they are overly intrusive in the name of journalistic insensitivity.War correspondentEdward Behrrecounts the story of a reporter during theCongo Crisiswho walked into a crowd ofBelgianevacuees and shouted, "Anyone here been raped and speaks English?"[33]
Many print publications take advantage of their wide readership and print persuasive pieces in the form of unsignededitorialsthat represent the official position of the organization. Despite the ostensible separation between editorial writing and news gathering, this practice may cause some people to doubt the political objectivity of the publication's news reporting. (Though usually unsigned editorials are accompanied by a diversity of signed opinions from other perspectives.)
Other publications and many broadcast media only publish opinion pieces that are attributed to a particular individual (who may be an in-house analyst) or to an outside entity. One particularly controversial question is whether media organizations should endorse political candidates for office. Political endorsements create more opportunities to construe favoritism in reporting, and can create a perceived conflict of interest.
Investigative journalismis largely an information-gathering exercise, looking for facts that are not easy to obtain by simple requests and searches, or are actively being concealed, suppressed or distorted. Where investigative work involvesundercover journalismor use ofwhistleblowers, and even more if it resorts to covert methods more typical ofprivate detectivesor even spying, it brings a large extra burden on ethical standards.
Anonymous sources are double-edged—they often provide especially newsworthy information, such as classified or confidential information about current events, information about a previously unreported scandal, or the perspective of a particular group that may fear retribution for expressing certain opinions in the press. The downside is that the condition ofanonymitymay make it difficult or impossible for the reporter to verify the source's statements. Sometimesnews sourceshide their identities from the public because their statements would otherwise quickly be discredited. Thus, statements attributed to anonymous sources may carry more weight with the public than they might if they were attributed.
TheWashingtonpress has been criticized in recent years for excessive use of anonymous sources, in particular to report information that is later revealed to be unreliable. The use of anonymous sources increased markedly in the period before the2003 invasion of Iraq.[34]
One of the primary functions of journalism ethics is to aid journalists in dealing with manyethical dilemmasthey may encounter. From highly sensitive issues ofnational securityto everyday questions such as accepting a dinner from a source, putting a bumper sticker on one's car, publishing a personal opinionblog, a journalist must make decisions taking into account things such as the public's right to know, potential threats, reprisals and intimidations of all kinds, personal integrity, conflicts between editors, reporters and publishers or management, and many other such conundra. The following are illustrations of some of those.
The growing presence ofartificial intelligence (AI)and social media in journalism has reshaped how news is produced, personalized and distributed. While these technologies have increased efficiency and expanded access to information, they have also introduced a range of ethical considerations. Scholars and journalists alike have raised concerns regarding transparency, accountability, bias and the preservation of core journalistic values.
AI tools are now used throughout the news cycle, from data gathering and analysis to content generation and recommendation. News organizations have employed AI to automate repetitive tasks such as transcriptions, translations, headline generation and financial reporting. For example, theAssociated Pressleveraged the Wordsmith platform to increase its quarterly earnings report output from 300 to nearly 3,700.[37]Similarly,Reutersimplemented the Lynx Insight tool to identify patterns in large datasets and assist reporters in discovering potential stories.[37]
The use of AI in journalism varies widely, ranging from basic automation tools like transcription software to more complex systems involving content generation.[38]Scholars note that the term "artificial intelligence" itself is often misunderstood and overhyped, leading to confusion about what AI can realistically achieve in journalism.[39]In reality, most AI tools today are narrowly focused on pattern recognition and automation, rather than mimicking human intelligence.[39]These systems can draft summaries, reframe stories in various styles and generate personalized article recommendations. However, most news organizations currently use generative AI sparingly and primarily for low-risk tasks, rather than full article writing.[37][40]According toone study,[41]such tools are used in over half of surveyed newsrooms for automation tasks like tagging and copyediting.[38]However, researchers caution that AI-generated content, if not transparently labeled and verified, may blur the lines between fact and fabrication, especially in the context ofdeepfakesor manipulated audio and video.[40]The Associated Press Stylebookalso advises clearly labeling AI-generated material to maintain transparency and trust with audiences.[42]
Social mediaplatforms and AI-based recommendation engines have transformed how news is disseminated to the public. These systems often prioritize engagement metrics, tailoring content to individual users' behavior and preferences. While this personalization can enhance user experience, it also risks reinforcing ideological echo chambers and limiting exposure to diverse viewpoints.[37]This algorithmic filtering may conflict with journalistic goals of inclusivity and democratic deliberation.[40]
News recommender systems, widely used on platforms such asFacebook,Google Newsand proprietary publisher apps, have been shown to contribute to the formation of "filter bubbles," where users are shown content that aligns with their existing beliefs.[38]Researchers argue that this limits pluralism and weakens public discourse, especially when AI systems operate without clear editorial oversight.[40]
AI in journalism introduces several ethical dilemmas.
A common concern is the "black box" nature of AI algorithms, which makes it difficult for both journalists and the public to understand how editorial decisions are made.[40]Transparency efforts include clearly labeling AI-generated content and disclosing how algorithms influence reporting and recommendations.[38]
As AI systems assume greater editorial functions, questions arise regarding who is responsible for errors, misinformation or bias in algorithmic output. Scholars emphasize the need for human oversight and institutional mechanisms to monitor and audit AI performance.[37]
AI systems may replicate or amplify societal biases found in training data. For instance, researchers have found that language and image models can reinforce gender, racial and political stereotypes. These risks are particularly acute when AI is used for content selection or framing.[40]
Automation has raised concerns over the reduction of editorial staff and the potential devaluation of traditional journalistic skills. Although AI may enhance productivity, scholars warn that over-reliance on technology could compromise investigative depth and ethical judgment.[37]
In response to these challenges, several media organizations and academic institutions have begun to develop AI-specific ethical guidelines. These guidelines typically emphasize fairness, transparency, data governance and human oversight.[40]TheBBC, for example, has implemented machine learning principles grounded in its public service values, offering teams a checklist for ethical AI use.[38]
Nonetheless, scholars note that there is limited empirical evidence on how widely such guidelines are enforced in practice. There are also concerns that guidelines may be used more for public relations purposes than for genuine accountability, a phenomenon known as "ethics washing."[40]
Despite advances in AI, experts agree that human journalists remain essential. AI still struggles with understanding nuance, cultural context and emotional tone, all of which are critical to ethical and effective reporting.[37]Therefore, many scholars and professionals advocate for a "human-in-the-loop" model, where AI tools augment rather than replace journalists’ work.[38][40]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Journalism_ethics_and_standards
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Journalistic ethics and standardscomprise principles ofethicsand good practice applicable tojournalists. This subset ofmedia ethicsis known as journalism's professional "code of ethics" and the "canons of journalism".[1]The basic codes and canons commonly appear in statements by professional journalism associations and individualprint,broadcast, andonlinenews organizations.
There are around 400 codes covering journalistic work around the world. While various codes may differ in the detail of their content and come from different cultural traditions, most share common elements that reflect Western values, including the principles oftruthfulness,accuracyand fact-based communications, independence, objectivity,impartiality, fairness, respect for others and publicaccountability, as these apply to the gathering, editing and dissemination of newsworthy information to the public.[1][2][3][4]Such principles are sometimes in tension with non-Western and Indigenous ways of doing journalism.[5]
Like many broader ethical systems, the journalism ethics include the principle of "limitation of harm". This may involve enhanced respect for vulnerable groups and the withholding of certain details from reports, such as the names ofminor children, crime victims' names, or information not materially related to the news report where the release of such information might, for example, harm someone's reputation or put them at undue risk.[6][7]There has also been discussion and debate within the journalism community regarding appropriate reporting of suicide and mental health, particularly with regard to verbiage.[8]
Some journalistic codes of ethics, notably some European codes,[9]also include a concern withdiscriminatoryreferences in news based onrace,religion,sexual orientation, and physical or mentaldisabilities.[10][11][12][13]TheParliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europeapproved (in 1993) Resolution 1003 on the Ethics of Journalism, which recommends that journalists respect thepresumption of innocence, in particular in cases that are stillsub judice.[14]
Despite modern journalism going back as far as 400 years ago, journalism became more of a necessity in some views in the 1900s.[15]Newspapers function with the ideal of presenting "unbiased' information for the masses. The continual evolution of journalism, media and society as a whole, means that journalism will continue to face challenges in the pursuit of that ideal, and the unbiased presentation of information must be a constant topic in editorial meetings and in frequent discussions between editors and reporters.[15]
Every country presents its own unique aspects and sometimes challenges as far the codes correlated with Journalism codes today. "Truth", "accuracy", and "objectivity" are cornerstones of journalism ethics.[16]Journalists are encouraged to maintain a degree of detachment from the religions, groups, or countries they are associated with, in order to minimize potential biases in their reporting. This separation is intended to mitigate the influence of personal biases on their journalistic writing.
Certain countries prefer to only have certain information put out and in certain contexts. In Islamic countries there is growing suspicion that journalism is fixed to only be positive for Islam, prompting Islam itself as the one and only truth its people should believe in.[17]
While journalistsin the United Statesand European countries have led the formulation and adoption of these standards, such codes can be found in news reporting organizations in most countries withfreedom of the press. The written codes and practical standards vary somewhat from country to country and organization to organization, but there is substantial overlap between mainstream publications and societies. TheInternational Federation of Journalists(IFJ) launched a globalEthical Journalism Initiativein 2008 aimed at strengthening awareness of these issues within professional bodies. In 2013 the Ethical Journalism Network was founded by former IFJ General Secretary Aidan White. This coalition of international and regional media associations and journalism support groups campaigns for ethics, good governance and self-regulation across all platforms of media.
One of the leading voices in the U.S. for journalistic standards and ethics is theSociety of Professional Journalists. The Preamble to its Code of Ethics states:
[P]ublic enlightenment is the forerunner of justice and the foundation of democracy. The duty of the journalist is to further those ends by seeking truth and providing a fair and comprehensive account of events and issues. Conscientious journalists from all media and specialties strive to serve the public with thoroughness and honesty. Professional integrity is the cornerstone of a journalist's credibility.
TheRadio Television Digital News Association, an organization exclusively centered on electronic journalism, has a code of ethics centering on public trust, truthfulness, fairness, integrity, independence, and accountability.[18]
Another view is offered by Jesse Hearns-Branaman, he describes the basis of journalistic professionalism as a combination of professional socialisation and the capability for self criticism and scepticism while still following the idealised goals of journalism.[19]
The primary themes common to most codes of journalistic standards and ethics are the following.
During the normal course of an assignment a reporter might go about gathering facts and details, conductinginterviews, doingresearchandbackground checks, takingphotos, and recordingvideoandsoundin search of justice. Harm limitation deals with the questions of whether everything learned should be reported and, if so, how. This principle of limitation means that some weight needs to be given to the negative consequences of full disclosure, creating a practical andethical dilemma.The Society of Professional Journalists' code of ethics offers the following advice, which is representative of the practical ideas of most professional journalists. Quoting directly:[4]
In addition to codes of ethics, many news organizations maintain an in-houseombudsmanwhose role is, in part, to keep news organizations honest and accountable to the public. The ombudsman is intended to mediate in conflicts stemming from internal or external pressures, to maintain accountability to the public for news reported, to foster self-criticism, and to encourage adherence to both codified and uncodified ethics and standards. This position may be the same or similar to thepublic editor, though public editors also act as a liaison with readers and do not generally become members of theOrganisation of News Ombudsmen.
An alternative is anews council, an industry-wide self-regulation body, such as thePress Complaints Commission, set up by UK newspapers and magazines. Such a body is capable of applying fairly consistent standards and of dealing with a higher volume of complaints but may not escape criticisms of being toothless.
One of the most controversial issues in modern reporting ismedia bias, particularly with political issues, but also with regard to cultural and other issues. Another is the controversial issue ofcheckbook journalism, which is the practice of news reporters paying sources for their information. In the U.S., it is generally considered unethical to pay sources for information, with most mainstream newspapers and news shows having a policy forbidding it. Meanwhile, tabloid newspapers and tabloid television shows, which rely more onsensationalism, regularly engage in the practice.[26]
There are also some wider concerns as the media continues to change that the brevity of news reports and use ofsoundbiteshas reduced fidelity to the truth, and may contribute to a lack of needed context for public understanding. From outside the profession, the rise ofnews managementcontributes to the real possibility thatnews mediamay be deliberately manipulated. Selective reporting (spiking,double standards) are very commonly alleged against newspapers.
The Action Plan proposed by the EU authorities is meant to propose a guide for identifying misinformation. The project seeks to target misinformation and produce unbiased and professional informational postings.[21][27]
Advocacy journalists—a term of some debate even within the field of journalism—by definition tend to reject "objectivity", while at the same time maintaining many other common standards and ethics.
Civic journalismadopts a modified approach to objectivity where instead of being uninvolved spectators, the press is active in facilitating and encouraging public debate and examining claims and issues critically. This does not necessarily imply advocacy of a specific political party or position.
Creative nonfictionandliterary journalismuse the power oflanguageand literary devices more akin tofictionto bring insight and depth into the often book-length treatment of the subjects about which they write. Such devices asdialogue,metaphor, digression and other such techniques offer the reader insights not usually found in standard news reportage. However, authors in this branch of journalism still maintain ethical criteria such as factual and historical accuracy as found in standard news reporting. They venture outside the boundaries of standard news reporting in offering richly detailed accounts. One widely regarded author in thegenreisJoyce Carol Oates, as with her book on boxerMike Tyson.
Cosmopolitan Journalism- The cosmopolitanism imperative that our primary ethical allegiance is to a borderless, moral community of humankind is often misunderstood. Therefore, it is important to say what it implies and what it does not. The claim of humanity is not the cognition of a cold abstract principle. It is the 14 Global Journalism Ethics ability to perceive and value our common humanity in the situations of life. It is respect for mankind's rational and moral capacities wherever and however, they are manifest. It is in our concrete dealings with others that we recognize humanity's common aspirations, vulnerabilities, and capacities, as well as its potential for suffering. In a fragmented world, cosmopolitanism focuses on what is fundamental—a common aspiration to life, liberty, justice, and goodness.[28]
Investigative journalismoften takes an implicit point of view on a particularpublic intereststory by asking pointed questions and intensely probing certain questions. With outlets that otherwise strive for neutrality on political issues, the implied position in an investigative story is often uncontroversial—for example, that political corruption or abuse of children is wrong and perpetrators should be exposed and punished, that government money should be spent efficiently, or that the health of the public or workers or veterans should be protected.
Advocacy journalists often use investigative journalism in support of a particular political position, or to expose facts that are only concerning to those with certain political opinions. Regardless of whether or not it is undertaken for a specific political faction, investigative journalism usually puts a strong emphasis on factual accuracy, because the point of an in-depth investigation of an issue is to expose facts that spur change.
Not all investigations seek to expose facts about a particular problem. Some data-driven reporting provides a deep analysis and presents interesting results for the general edification of the audience, which might be interpreted in different ways or contain many facts across different potential problems. A factually-constrained investigation with an implied public-interest point of view may also find that the system under investigation is working well.
New JournalismandGonzo journalismalso reject some of the fundamental ethical practices and abandon the technical standards of journalisticprosein order to write expressively and reach a particular audience or market segment. These favor a subjective perspective and emphasize immersive experiences over objective facts.
Tabloid journalistsare often accused of sacrificing accuracy and the personal privacy of their subjects in order to boost sales. The 2011News International phone hacking scandalis an example of this.Supermarket tabloidsare often focused on entertainment rather than news. Tabloid news often have "news" stories that are so outrageous that they are widely read for entertainment purposes, not for information. Some tabloids do purport to maintain common journalistic standards but may fall far short in practice. Others make no such claims.
Some publications deliberately engage insatire, but give the publication the design elements of a newspaper, for example,The Onion, and it is not unheard of for other publications to offer the occasional, humorous articles appearing onApril Fool's Day.
In countries withoutfreedom of the press, the above-described standards of journalism are less relevant for reporters than rules surrounding censorship and avoiding politically sensitive or taboo topics. Non-free media may be prohibited from criticising the national government, serve as a de facto distributor ofpropaganda, and/or engage inself-censorship. Various other forms ofcensorshipmay restrict reporting on issues the government deems sensitive. Similarly, media outlets reliant on corporate sponsorship,sponsored content, or corporate owners may prioritise the financial interests or political viewpoints of their owners, advertisers, or sponsors and self-censor information that contradicts those viewpoints. In states with strongdefamationlaws, the risk of lawsuit may also have achilling effecton journalists. By interfering with the aforementioned obligations of journalistic ethics, these factors illustrate the extent to which ethics in journalism are shaped by the law surrounding journalism.
Freedom of the press is expressly protected bysection 2 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedomsand section 16 of theSouth African Bill of Rights,[29]and is protected as part of freedom of expression underArticle 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights. In Canada, freedom of the press and other Charter rights are subject tosection 1 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedomswhich provides that rights are subject to such restrictions as can demonstrably be justified in a free and democratic society, from which courts have developed theOakes test. The South African Bill of Rights, and the constitutions of countries like Kenya which were inspired by the post-Apartheid constitution of South Africa, provide for rights to be limited in a similar manner to the Oakes test, as codified in section 36 of the South African Bill of Rights. In South Africa and the signatories to the ECHR, freedom of the press is also subject to specific enumerated limits prohibiting hate speech, propaganda for war, and defamation.
In the United States, freedom of the press is protected under theFirst Amendmentin the Bill of Rights.[30]Under the First Amendment, the government is not allowed to censor the press. Unlike modern bills of rights like the Canadian Charter or the South African Bill of Rights, the rights enumerated in the US Constitution are written so as to be absolute.
There are a number of finer points of journalistic procedure that foster disagreements in principle and variation in practice among "mainstream" journalists in the free press. Laws concerning libel and slander vary from country to country, and local journalistic standards may be tailored to fit. For example, the United Kingdom has a broader definition of libel than the United States.[citation needed]
Accuracy is important as a core value and to maintain credibility, but especially in broadcast media, audience share often gravitates toward outlets that are reporting new information first. Different organizations may balance speed and accuracy in different ways.The New York Times, for instance, tends to print longer, more detailed, less speculative, and more thoroughly verified pieces a day or two later than many other newspapers.[citation needed]24-hour television news networks tend to place much more emphasis on getting the "scoop". Here, viewers may switch channels at a moment's notice; with fierce competition for ratings and a large amount of airtime to fill, fresh material is very valuable. Because of the fast turn-around, reporters for these networks may be under considerable time pressure, which reduces their ability to verify information.
Laws with regard to personalprivacy, official secrets, and media disclosure of names and facts fromcriminalcases and civillawsuitsdiffer widely, and journalistic standards may vary accordingly. Different organizations may have different answers to questions about when it is journalistically acceptable to skirt, circumvent, or even break these regulations. Another example of differences surrounding harm reduction is the reporting of preliminary election results. In the United States, some news organizations feel that it is harmful to the democratic process to report exit poll results or preliminary returns while voting is still open. Such reports may influence people who vote later in the day, or who are in western time zones, in their decisions about how and whether or not to vote. There is also some concern that such preliminary results are often inaccurate and may be misleading to the public. Other outlets feel that this information is a vital part of the transparency of the election process, and see no harm (if not considerable benefit) in reporting it.
Objectivity as a journalistic standard varies to some degree depending on the industry and country. For example, the government-fundedBBCin the United Kingdom places a strong emphasis on political neutrality, but British newspapers more often tend to adopt political affiliations or leanings in both coverage and audience, sometimes explicitly.[31]In the United States, major newspapers usually explicitly claim objectivity as their goal in news coverage, though most have separate editorial boards that endorse specific candidates and publish opinions on specific issues. Adherence to a claimed standard of objectivity is a constant subject of debate. For example, mainstream nationalcable newschannels in the United States claim political objectivity but to various degrees, Fox News has beenaccused of conservative biasand MSNBCaccused of liberal bias. The degree to which these leanings influence cherry-picking of facts, factual accuracy, the predominance of non-news opinion and commentators, audience opinion of the issues and candidates covered, visual composition, tone and vocabulary of stories is hotly debated.
News valueis generally used to select stories for print, broadcast, blogs, and web portals, including those that focus on a specific topic. To a large degree, news value depends on the target audience. For example, a minor story in the United States is more likely to appear onCNNthan a minor story in the Middle East which might be more likely to appear onAl Jazeerasimply due to the geographic distribution of the channels' respective audiences. It is a matter of debate whether this means that either network is less than objective, and that controversy is even more complicated when considering coverage of political stories for different audiences that have different political demographics (as with Fox News vs. MSNBC).
Somedigital mediaplatforms can use criteria to choose stories which are different from traditional news values. For example, while theGoogle Newsportal essentially chooses stories based on news value (though indirectly, through the choices of large numbers of independent outlets), users can setGoogle Alertson specific terms which define personal subjective interests.Search engines, news aggregators, andsocial networkfeeds sometimes change the presentation of content depending on the consumer's expressed or inferred preferences or leanings. This has both been cheered as bypassing traditional "gatekeepers" and whatever biases they may have in favor of audience-centric selection criteria, but criticized as creating a dangerousfilter bubblewhich intentionally or unintentionally hides dissenting opinions and other content which might be important for the audience to see in order to avoid exposure bias andgroupthink.[32]
Audiences have different reactions to depictions of violence, nudity, coarse language, or to people in any other situation that is unacceptable to or stigmatized by the local culture or laws (such as the consumption ofalcohol,homosexuality,illegal drug use,scatologicalimages, etc.). Even with similar audiences, different organizations and even individual reporters have different standards and practices. These decisions often revolve around what facts are necessary for the audience to know.
When certain distasteful or shocking material is considered important to the story, there are a variety of common methods for mitigating negative audience reaction. Advance warning of explicit or disturbing material may allow listeners or readers to avoid content they would rather not be exposed to. Offensive words may be partially obscured or bleeped. Potentially offensive images may be blurred or narrowly cropped. Descriptions may be substituted for pictures; graphic detail might be omitted. Disturbing content might be moved from a cover to an inside page, or from daytime to late evening when children are less likely to be watching.
There is often considerable controversy over these techniques, especially concern that obscuring or not reporting certain facts or details isself-censorship, which compromises objectivity and fidelity to the truth, and does not serve thepublic interest.
For example, images and graphic descriptions of war are often violent, bloody, shocking and profoundly tragic. This makes certain content disturbing to some audience members, but it is precisely these aspects of war that some consider to be the most important to convey. Some argue that "sanitizing" the depiction of war influences public opinion about the merits of continuing to fight, and about the policies or circumstances that precipitated the conflict. The amount of explicit violence and mutilation depicted in war coverage varies considerably from time to time, from organization to organization, and from country to country.
Reporters have also been accused of indecency in the process of collecting news, namely that they are overly intrusive in the name of journalistic insensitivity.War correspondentEdward Behrrecounts the story of a reporter during theCongo Crisiswho walked into a crowd ofBelgianevacuees and shouted, "Anyone here been raped and speaks English?"[33]
Many print publications take advantage of their wide readership and print persuasive pieces in the form of unsignededitorialsthat represent the official position of the organization. Despite the ostensible separation between editorial writing and news gathering, this practice may cause some people to doubt the political objectivity of the publication's news reporting. (Though usually unsigned editorials are accompanied by a diversity of signed opinions from other perspectives.)
Other publications and many broadcast media only publish opinion pieces that are attributed to a particular individual (who may be an in-house analyst) or to an outside entity. One particularly controversial question is whether media organizations should endorse political candidates for office. Political endorsements create more opportunities to construe favoritism in reporting, and can create a perceived conflict of interest.
Investigative journalismis largely an information-gathering exercise, looking for facts that are not easy to obtain by simple requests and searches, or are actively being concealed, suppressed or distorted. Where investigative work involvesundercover journalismor use ofwhistleblowers, and even more if it resorts to covert methods more typical ofprivate detectivesor even spying, it brings a large extra burden on ethical standards.
Anonymous sources are double-edged—they often provide especially newsworthy information, such as classified or confidential information about current events, information about a previously unreported scandal, or the perspective of a particular group that may fear retribution for expressing certain opinions in the press. The downside is that the condition ofanonymitymay make it difficult or impossible for the reporter to verify the source's statements. Sometimesnews sourceshide their identities from the public because their statements would otherwise quickly be discredited. Thus, statements attributed to anonymous sources may carry more weight with the public than they might if they were attributed.
TheWashingtonpress has been criticized in recent years for excessive use of anonymous sources, in particular to report information that is later revealed to be unreliable. The use of anonymous sources increased markedly in the period before the2003 invasion of Iraq.[34]
One of the primary functions of journalism ethics is to aid journalists in dealing with manyethical dilemmasthey may encounter. From highly sensitive issues ofnational securityto everyday questions such as accepting a dinner from a source, putting a bumper sticker on one's car, publishing a personal opinionblog, a journalist must make decisions taking into account things such as the public's right to know, potential threats, reprisals and intimidations of all kinds, personal integrity, conflicts between editors, reporters and publishers or management, and many other such conundra. The following are illustrations of some of those.
The growing presence ofartificial intelligence (AI)and social media in journalism has reshaped how news is produced, personalized and distributed. While these technologies have increased efficiency and expanded access to information, they have also introduced a range of ethical considerations. Scholars and journalists alike have raised concerns regarding transparency, accountability, bias and the preservation of core journalistic values.
AI tools are now used throughout the news cycle, from data gathering and analysis to content generation and recommendation. News organizations have employed AI to automate repetitive tasks such as transcriptions, translations, headline generation and financial reporting. For example, theAssociated Pressleveraged the Wordsmith platform to increase its quarterly earnings report output from 300 to nearly 3,700.[37]Similarly,Reutersimplemented the Lynx Insight tool to identify patterns in large datasets and assist reporters in discovering potential stories.[37]
The use of AI in journalism varies widely, ranging from basic automation tools like transcription software to more complex systems involving content generation.[38]Scholars note that the term "artificial intelligence" itself is often misunderstood and overhyped, leading to confusion about what AI can realistically achieve in journalism.[39]In reality, most AI tools today are narrowly focused on pattern recognition and automation, rather than mimicking human intelligence.[39]These systems can draft summaries, reframe stories in various styles and generate personalized article recommendations. However, most news organizations currently use generative AI sparingly and primarily for low-risk tasks, rather than full article writing.[37][40]According toone study,[41]such tools are used in over half of surveyed newsrooms for automation tasks like tagging and copyediting.[38]However, researchers caution that AI-generated content, if not transparently labeled and verified, may blur the lines between fact and fabrication, especially in the context ofdeepfakesor manipulated audio and video.[40]The Associated Press Stylebookalso advises clearly labeling AI-generated material to maintain transparency and trust with audiences.[42]
Social mediaplatforms and AI-based recommendation engines have transformed how news is disseminated to the public. These systems often prioritize engagement metrics, tailoring content to individual users' behavior and preferences. While this personalization can enhance user experience, it also risks reinforcing ideological echo chambers and limiting exposure to diverse viewpoints.[37]This algorithmic filtering may conflict with journalistic goals of inclusivity and democratic deliberation.[40]
News recommender systems, widely used on platforms such asFacebook,Google Newsand proprietary publisher apps, have been shown to contribute to the formation of "filter bubbles," where users are shown content that aligns with their existing beliefs.[38]Researchers argue that this limits pluralism and weakens public discourse, especially when AI systems operate without clear editorial oversight.[40]
AI in journalism introduces several ethical dilemmas.
A common concern is the "black box" nature of AI algorithms, which makes it difficult for both journalists and the public to understand how editorial decisions are made.[40]Transparency efforts include clearly labeling AI-generated content and disclosing how algorithms influence reporting and recommendations.[38]
As AI systems assume greater editorial functions, questions arise regarding who is responsible for errors, misinformation or bias in algorithmic output. Scholars emphasize the need for human oversight and institutional mechanisms to monitor and audit AI performance.[37]
AI systems may replicate or amplify societal biases found in training data. For instance, researchers have found that language and image models can reinforce gender, racial and political stereotypes. These risks are particularly acute when AI is used for content selection or framing.[40]
Automation has raised concerns over the reduction of editorial staff and the potential devaluation of traditional journalistic skills. Although AI may enhance productivity, scholars warn that over-reliance on technology could compromise investigative depth and ethical judgment.[37]
In response to these challenges, several media organizations and academic institutions have begun to develop AI-specific ethical guidelines. These guidelines typically emphasize fairness, transparency, data governance and human oversight.[40]TheBBC, for example, has implemented machine learning principles grounded in its public service values, offering teams a checklist for ethical AI use.[38]
Nonetheless, scholars note that there is limited empirical evidence on how widely such guidelines are enforced in practice. There are also concerns that guidelines may be used more for public relations purposes than for genuine accountability, a phenomenon known as "ethics washing."[40]
Despite advances in AI, experts agree that human journalists remain essential. AI still struggles with understanding nuance, cultural context and emotional tone, all of which are critical to ethical and effective reporting.[37]Therefore, many scholars and professionals advocate for a "human-in-the-loop" model, where AI tools augment rather than replace journalists’ work.[38][40]
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Media biasoccurs whenjournalistsandnews producersshowbiasin how they report and cover news. The term "media bias" implies a pervasive or widespread bias contravening ofthe standards of journalism, rather than the perspective of an individual journalist or article.[1]The direction and degree of media bias in various countries is widely disputed.[2]
Practical limitations tomedia neutralityinclude the inability of journalists to report all available stories and facts, and the requirement that selected facts be linked into a coherentnarrative.[3]Governmentinfluence, including overt and covertcensorship, biases the media in some countries, for exampleChina,North Korea,SyriaandMyanmar.[4][5]Politics and media bias may interact with each other; the media has the ability to influence politicians, and politicians may have the power to influence the media. This can change the distribution of power in society.[6]Marketforces may also cause bias. Examples include bias introduced by the ownership of media, including aconcentration of media ownership, the subjective selection ofstaff, or the perceivedpreferencesof an intendedaudience.
Assessing possible bias is one aspect ofmedia literacy, which is studied at schools of journalism, university departments (includingmedia studies,cultural studies, andpeace studies). Other focuses beyond political bias include international differences in reporting, as well as bias in reporting of particular issues such as economic class or environmental interests. Academic findings around bias can also differ significantly from public discourse and understanding of the term.[7]
In the 2017 Oxford Handbook of Political Communication, S. Robert Lichter described how in academic circles, media bias is more of a hypothesis to explain various patterns in news coverage than any fully-elaborated theory,[7]and that a variety of potentially overlapping types of bias have been proposed that remain widely debated.
Various proposed hypotheses of media bias have included:
An ongoing and unpublished research project named "The Media Bias Taxonomy" is attempting to assess the various definitions and meanings of media bias. While still ongoing, it attempts to summarize the domain as the distinct subcategories linguistic bias (encompassing linguistic intergroup bias, framing bias, epistemological bias, bias by semantic properties, and connotation bias), text-level context bias (featuring statement bias, phrasing bias, and spin bias), reporting-level context bias (highlighting selection bias, coverage bias, and proximity bias), cognitive biases (such as selective exposure and partisan bias), and related concepts likeframingeffects, hate speech, sentiment analysis, and group biases (encompassing gender bias, racial bias, and religion bias). The authors emphasize the complex nature of detecting and mitigating bias across different media content and contexts.[29][better source needed]
John Milton's 1644 pamphletAreopagitica, a Speech for the Liberty of Unlicensed Printingwas one of the first publications advocatingfreedom of the press.[30]
In the 19th century, journalists began to recognize the concept of unbiased reporting as an integral part ofjournalistic ethics. This coincided with the rise of journalism as a powerful social force. Even today, the most conscientiously objectivejournalistscannot avoid accusations of bias.[31][page needed]
Like newspapers, the broadcast media (radio and television) have been used as a mechanism forpropagandafrom their earliest days, a tendency made more pronounced by the initial ownership ofbroadcast spectrumby national governments. Although a process of media deregulation has placed the majority of the western broadcast media in private hands, there still exists a strong government presence, or even monopoly, in the broadcast media of many countries across the globe. At the same time, theconcentration of media ownershipin private hands, and frequently amongst a comparatively small number of individuals, has also led to accusations of media bias.[citation needed]
There are many examples of accusations of bias being used as a political tool, sometimes resulting in government censorship.[original research?][globalize]
Not all accusations of bias are political. Science writerMartin Gardnerhas accused the entertainment media ofanti-sciencebias. He claimed that television programs such asThe X-Filespromote superstition.[9]In contrast, theCompetitive Enterprise Institute, which is funded by businesses, accuses the media of being biased in favor of science and against business interests, and of credulously reporting science that shows that greenhouse gasses cause global warming.[39]
While most accusations of bias tend to revolve around ideological disagreements, other forms of bias are cast as structural in nature. There is little agreement on how they operate or originate but some involve economics, government policies, norms, and the individual creating the news.[40]Some examples, according to Cline (2009) include commercial bias, temporal bias, visual bias, bad news bias, narrative bias, status quo bias, fairness bias, expediency bias, class bias and glory bias (or the tendency to glorify the reporter).[41]
There is also a growingeconomicsliterature on mass media bias, both on the theoretical and the empirical side. On the theoretical side the focus is on understanding to what extent the political positioning of mass media outlets is mainly driven by demand or supply factors. This literature was surveyed byAndrea Pratof Columbia University and David Stromberg of Stockholm University in 2013.[42]
When an organization prefers consumers to take particular actions, this would be supply-driven bias.
Implications of supply-driven bias:[15]
An example of supply-driven bias is Zinman and Zitzewitz's study of snowfall reporting. Ski attractions tend to be biased in snowfall reporting, reporting higher snowfall than official forecasts.[43][better source needed]
David Baron suggests a game-theoretic model of mass media behaviour in which, given that the pool of journalists systematically leans towards the left or the right, mass media outlets maximise their profits by providing content that is biased in the same direction as their employees.[44]
HermanandChomsky(1988) cite supply-driven bias including around the use of official sources, funding from advertising, efforts to discredit independent media ("flak"), and "anti-communist" ideology, resulting in news in favor of U.S. corporate interests.[45]
Demand from media consumer for a particular type of bias is known as demand-driven bias. Consumers tend to favor a biased media based on their preferences, an example ofconfirmation bias.[15]
There are three major factors that make this choice for consumers:
Demand-side incentives are often not related to distortion. Competition can still affect the welfare and treatment of consumers, but it is not very effective in changing bias compared to the supply side.[15]
In demand-driven bias, preferences and attitudes of readers can be monitored on social media, and mass media write news that caters to readers based on them. Mass media skew news driven by viewership and profits, leading to the media bias. And readers are also easily attracted to lurid news, although they may be biased and not true enough.
Dong, Ren, and Nickerson investigated Chinese stock-related news and weibos in 20132014 from Sina Weibo and Sina Finance (4.27 million pieces of news and 43.17 million weibos) and found that news that aligns with Weibo users' beliefs are more likely to attract readers. Also, the information in biased reports also influences the decision-making of the readers.[46]
In Raymond and Taylor's test of weather forecast bias, they investigated weather reports of the New York Times during the games of the baseball team the Giants from 1890 to 1899. Their findings suggest that the New York Times produce biased weather forecast results depending on the region in which the Giants play. When they played at home in Manhattan, reports of sunny days predicting increased. From this study, Raymond and Taylor found that bias pattern in New York Times weather forecasts was consistent with demand-driven bias.[43][better source needed]
Sendhil Mullainathan and Andrei Shleifer of Harvard University constructed a behavioural model in 2005, which is built around the assumption that readers and viewers hold beliefs that they would like to see confirmed by news providers, which they argue the market then provides.[47]
Demand-driven models evaluate to what extent media bias stems from companies providing consumers what they want.[48]Stromberg posits that because wealthier viewers result in more advertising revenue, the media as a result ends up targeted to whiter and more conservative consumers while wealthier urban markets may be more liberal and produce an opposite effect in newspapers in particular.[49]
Perceptions of media bias may also be related to the rise of social media. The rise of social media has undermined the economic model of traditional media. The number of people who rely upon social media has increased and the number who rely on print news has decreased.[50]Studies of social media anddisinformationsuggest that the political economy of social media platforms has led to a commodification of information on social media. Messages are prioritized and rewarded based on their virality and shareability rather than their truth,[51]promoting radical, shocking click-bait content.[52]Social media influences people in part because of psychological tendencies to accept incoming information, to take feelings as evidence of truth, and to not check assertions against facts and memories.[53]
Media bias in social media is also reflected inhostile media effect. Social media has a place in disseminating news in modern society, where viewers are exposed to other people's comments while reading news articles. In their 2020 study, Gearhart and her team showed that viewers' perceptions of bias increased and perceptions of credibility decreased after seeing comments with which they held different opinions.[54]
Within the United States,Pew Research Centerreported that 64% of Americans believed that social media had a toxic effect on U.S. society and culture in July 2020. Only 10% of Americans believed that it had a positive effect on society. Some of the main concerns with social media lie with the spread ofdeliberately false informationand the spread of hate and extremism. Social scientist experts explain the growth of misinformation and hate as a result of the increase inecho chambers.[55]
Fueled by confirmation bias, onlineecho chambersallow users to be steeped within their own ideology. Because social media is tailored to your interests and your selected friends, it is an easy outlet for political echo chambers.[56]AnotherPew Researchpoll in 2019 showed that 28% of US adults "often" find their news through social media, and 55% of US adults get their news from social media either "often" or "sometimes".[57]Additionally, more people are reported as going to social media for their news as theCOVID-19 pandemichas restricted politicians to online campaigns and social media live streams. GCF Global encourages online users to avoidecho chambersby interacting with different people and perspectives along with avoiding the temptation of confirmation bias.[58][59]
Yu-Ru and Wen-Ting's research looks into how liberals and conservatives conduct themselves on Twitter after three mass shooting events. Although they would both show negative emotions towards the incidents they differed in the narratives they were pushing. Both sides would often contrast in what the root cause was along with who is deemed the victims, heroes, and villain/s. There was also a decrease in any conversation that was considered proactive.[60]
Media scholarSiva Vaidhyanathan, in his bookAnti-Social Media: How Facebook Disconnects Us and Undermines Democracy(2018), argues that on social media networks, the most emotionally charged and polarizing topics usually predominate, and that "If you wanted to build a machine that would distribute propaganda to millions of people, distract them from important issues, energize hatred and bigotry, erode social trust, undermine journalism, foster doubts about science, and engage in massive surveillance all at once, you would make something a lot likeFacebook."[61][62]
In a 2021 report, researchers at theNew York University'sStern Center for Business and Human Rightsfound that Republicans' frequent argument that social media companies like Facebook and Twitter have an "anti-conservative" bias is false and lacks any reliable evidence supporting it; the report found that right-wing voices are in fact dominant on social media and that the claim that these platforms have an anti-conservative lean "is itself a form ofdisinformation."[63][64]
A 2021 study inNature Communicationsexamined political bias on social media by assessing the degree to which Twitter users were exposed to content on the left and right – specifically, exposure on the home timeline (the "news feed"). The study found that conservative Twitter accounts are exposed to content on the right, whereas liberal accounts are exposed to moderate content, shifting those users' experiences toward the political center.[65]The study determined: "Both in terms of information to which they are exposed and content they produce, drifters initialized with Right-leaning sources stay on the conservative side of the political spectrum. Those initialized with Left-leaning sources, on the other hand, tend to drift toward the political center: they are exposed to more conservative content and even start spreading it."[65]These findings held true for both hashtags and links.[65]The study also found that conservative accounts are exposed to substantially more low-credibility content than other accounts.[65]
A 2022 study inPNAS,using a long-running massive-scale randomized experiment, found that the political right enjoys higher algorithmic amplification than the political left in six out of seven countries studied. In the US, algorithmic amplification favored right-leaning news sources.[66]
Media bias is also reflected in search systems in social media. Kulshrestha and her team found through research in 2018 that the top-ranked results returned by these search engines can influence users' perceptions when they conduct searches for events or people, which is particularly reflected in political bias and polarizing topics.[67]
Tanya Pamplone warns that since much of international journalism takes place in English, there can be instances where stories and journalists from countries where English is not taught have difficulty entering the global conversation.[68]
Language may also introduce a more subtle form of bias. The selection of metaphors and analogies, or the inclusion of personal information in one situation but not another can introduce bias, such as a gender bias.[69]
TheSatanic panic, amoral panicand episode of national hysteria that emerged in the U.S. in the 1980s (and thereafter to Canada, Britain, and Australia), was reinforced bytabloid mediaandinfotainment.[70]Scholar Sarah Hughes, in a study published in 2016, argued that the panic "both reflected and shaped a cultural climate dominated by the overlapping worldviews of politically active conservatives" whose ideology "was incorporated into the panic and reinforced through" tabloid media, sensationalist television and magazine reporting, and local news.[70]Although the panic dissipated in the 1990s after it was discredited by journalists and the courts, Hughes argues that the panic has had an enduring influence in American culture and politics even decades later.[70]
In 2012,Huffington Post, columnist Jacques Berlinerblau argued thatsecularismhas often been misinterpreted in the media as another word for atheism.[71]
According toStuart A. Wrightin 1997, there are six factors that contribute to media bias against minority religions: first, the knowledge and familiarity of journalists with the subject matter; second, the degree of cultural accommodation of the targeted religious group; third, limited economic resources available to journalists; fourth, time constraints; fifth, sources of information used by journalists; and finally, the front-end/back-end disproportionality of reporting. According to Yale Law professor Stephen Carter, "it has long been the American habit to be more suspicious of – and more repressive toward – religions that stand outside the mainline Protestant-Roman Catholic-Jewish troika that dominates America's spiritual life." As for front-end/back-end disproportionality, Wright says: "news stories on unpopular or marginal religions frequently are predicated on unsubstantiated allegations or government actions based on faulty or weak evidence occurring at the front-end of an event. As the charges weighed in against material evidence, these cases often disintegrate. Yet rarely is there equal space and attention in the mass media given to the resolution or outcome of the incident. If the accused are innocent, often the public is not made aware."[72][non-primary source needed][undue weight?–discuss]
Academic studies tend not to confirm a popular media narrative of liberal journalists producing a left-leaning media bias in the U.S., though some studies suggest economic incentives may have that effect. Instead, the studies reviewed byS. Robert Lichtergenerally found the media to be a conservative force in politics.[73]
Critics of media bias tend to point out how a particular bias benefits existing power structures, undermines democratic outcomes and fails to inform people with the information they need to make decisions around public policy.[74]
Experiments have shown that media bias affects behavior and more specifically influences the readership's political ideology. A study found higher politicization rates with increased exposure to theFox News channel,[75]while a 2009 study found a weakly-linked decrease in support for the Bush administration when given a free subscription to the right-leaningThe Washington Timesor left-leaningThe Washington Post.[76]
Perceptions of media bias and trust in the media have changed significantly from 1985-2011 in the US. Pew studies reported that the percentage of Americans who trusted that news media “get their facts straight” dropped from 55% in 1985, to 25% in 2011. Similarly, the percentage of Americans who trusted that news organizations would deal fairly with all sides when dealing with political and social issues dropped from 34% in 1985 to 16% in 2011. By 2011 almost two-thirds of respondents considered news organizations to be “politically biased in their reporting”, up from 45% in 1985.[21]Similar decreases in trust have been reported by Gallup, with In 2022, half of Americans responded that they believed that news organizations would deliberately attempt to mislead them.[77]
Jonathan M. Ladd (2012), who has conducted intensive studies of media trust and media bias, concluded that the primary cause of belief in media bias is telling people that particular media are biased. People who are told that a medium is biased tend to believe that it is biased, and this belief is unrelated to whether that medium is actually biased or not. The only other factor with as strong an influence on belief that media is biased, he found, was extensive coverage of celebrities. A majority of people see such media as biased, while at the same time preferring media with extensive coverage of celebrities.[78]
NPR's ombudsman wrote a 2011 article about how to note the political leanings of think tanks or other groups that the average listener might not know much about before citing a study or statistic from an organization.[79]
Polis(or Pol.is) is a social media website that allows people to share their opinions and ideas while elevating ideas that have more consensus.[80]By September 2020, it had helped to form the core of dozens of pieces of legislation passed in Taiwan.[80]Proponents had sought out a way to inform the government with the opinions of citizens between elections while also providing an online outlet for citizens that was less divisive and more informative than social media and other large websites.[80][81]
Attempts have also been made to utilizemachine-learningto analyze the bias of text.[82]For example, person-oriented framing analysis attempts to identify frames, i.e., "perspectives", in news coverage on a topic by determining how each person mentioned in the topic's coverage is portrayed.[83][84]
Another approach, matrix-based news aggregation can help to reveal differences in media coverage between different countries, for example.[85][non-primary source needed]
A technique used to avoid bias is the "point/counterpoint" or "round table", an adversarial format in which representatives of opposing views comment on an issue. This approach theoretically allows diverse views to appear in the media. However, the person organizing the report still has the responsibility to choose reporters or journalists that represent a diverse or balanced set of opinions, to ask them non-prejudicial questions, and to edit or arbitrate their comments fairly. When done carelessly, a point/counterpoint can be as unfair as a simple biased report, by suggesting that the "losing" side lost on its merits. Besides these challenges, exposing news consumers to differing viewpoints seems to be beneficial for a balanced understanding and more critical assessment of current events and latent topics.[83]Using this format can also lead to accusations that the reporter has created a misleading appearance that viewpoints have equal validity (sometimes called "false balance"). This may happen when atabooexists around one of the viewpoints, or when one of the representatives habitually makes claims that are easily shown to be inaccurate.[citation needed]
TheCBCandRadio Canada, itsFrench languagecounterpart, are governed by the 1991 Broadcasting Act, which states programming should be "varied and comprehensive, providing balance of information...provide a reasonable opportunity for the public to be exposed to the expression of differing views on matters of public concern."[86]
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Media manipulationrefers to orchestrated campaigns in which actors exploit the distinctive features of broadcasting mass communications or digital media platforms to mislead, misinform, or create a narrative that advance their interests and agendas.[1][2][3]
In practice, media manipulation tactics may include the use of the use ofrhetorical strategiesincludinglogical fallacies, deceptive content likedisinformation, andpropagandatechniques, and often involve thesuppression of informationor points of view by crowding them out, by inducing other people or groups of people to stop listening to certain arguments, or by simply divertingattentionelsewhere. InPropaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes,Jacques Ellulwrites thatpublic opinioncan only express itself through channels which are provided by themass mediaof communication – without which there could be no propaganda.[4]
Activism is the practice or doctrine that has an emphasis on direct vigorous action especially supporting or opposing one side of a controversial matter.[5]It is quite simply starting a movement to affect or change social views. It is frequently started by influential individuals but is done collectively throughsocial movementswith large masses. These social movements can be done through publicrallies,strikes, street marches, andsocial media.[6]
Advertising is a form of promotion that seeks to persuade a specific audience to purchase a good or service. One of the first types of marketing, it aims to influence its target market to either buy, sell, or carry out a particular action.[7]
These advertisements are not only done by businesses but can also be done by other groups. Non-commercial advertisers are those who spend money on advertising in the hope of raising awareness for a cause or promoting specific ideas.[8]
A hoax is something intended to deceive or defraud. Misleading public stunts,scientific frauds, falsebomb threatsand businessscamsare examples of hoaxes.[9]
Propagandizing is a form of communication that is aimed atinfluencingthe attitude of a community toward some cause or position by presenting only one side of an argument.Propagandais commonly created by governments, but some forms ofmass communicationcreated by other influential organizations can be considered propaganda. As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda, in its most basic sense, presents information primarily to influence an audience. Propaganda is usually repeated and dispersed over a wide variety of media in order to create the desired result in audience attitudes. While the term propaganda has justifiably acquired a strongly negative connotation by association with its most manipulative andjingoisticexamples (e.g.Nazi propagandaused to justify theHolocaust), propaganda in its original sense was neutral, and could refer to uses that were generally benign or innocuous, such as public health recommendations, signs encouraging citizens to participate in a census or election, or messages encouraging persons to report crimes to the police, among others.[10]
Propaganda uses societal norms and myths that people hear and believe. Because people respond to, understand and remember more simple ideas this is what is used to influence people's beliefs, attitudes and values.[11]
Psychological warfare is a term used to denote actions taken by governments with the aim evoking a planned psychological reaction in other people.[12]
This tactic has been used in multiple wars throughout history. DuringWorld War II, thewestern Allies, expected that theSoviet Unionwould drop leaflets on the US and England. During the conflict withIraq, American and English forces dropped leaflets, with many of the leaflets telling the people how to surrender. In theKorean Warboth sides would useloud speakersfrom the front lines.[13]In 2009 people inIsraelin theGaza warreceived text messages on theircell phonesthreatening them with rocket attacks. ThePalestinianpeople were getting phone calls and leaflets warning them that they were going to drop rockets on them. These phone calls and leaflets were not always accurate.[14]
Public relations (PR) is the management of the flow ofinformationbetween an individual or anorganizationand thepublic.[15]
Means of influence include, but are not limited to, the methods outlined inInfluence: Science and Practice, which include appealing to authority, and making the person aware of the scarcity of an offer.[16]
Astroturfing is when there is an intent and attempt to create the illusion of support for a particular cause, person, or stance. While this is mainly connected to and seen on the internet, it has also happened in newspapers during times of political elections.[17]Corporations and political parties try to imitategrassrootsmovements in order to sway the public to believing something that is not true.[18]
Clickbait refers to headlines of online news articles that aresensationalizedor sometimes whollyfake. It uses people's natural curiosity to get people to click. In some cases clickbait is used to generate income; more clicks mean more money is made with advertisers.[19]But these headlines and articles can also be used to influence a group of people onsocial media. In some cases, they are constructed to appeal to the interest group'spre-existing biasesand thus to be shared withinfilter bubbles.[20]
Information launderingis a method of using a less trusted or less popular platform to publish a story of dubious origin or veracity for the purposes of reporting on that report rather than the story itself. This technique serves to insulate the secondary, more established media from having to issue a retraction if the report is false. Generally, secondary reports will report that the original report is reporting without verifying or making the report themselves.[21]
In search engine marketing,websitesusemarket researchfrom past searches and other sources to increase their visibility insearch engine results pages. This allows them to guide search results along the lines they desire, thereby influencing searchers.[22]
Businesses have many tactics to entice customers to their websites to generate revenue, such asbanner ads,search engine optimizationandpay-per-clickmarketing tools. They all serve a different purposes and use different tools that appeal to multiple types of users. Banner ads appear on sites in an attempt to attract visitors to a linked website. Search engine optimization is a technique in which a website is optimized to received a higher ranking from the search engine, causing it to be returned more often in searches.[23][24]
Commonly known as "smoke screen", this technique consists of making the public focus its attention on a topic that is more convenient for the propagandist. This particular type of media manipulation has been referenced in popular culture. For example, the movieWag the Dog(1997) illustrates how the public can be deceitfully distracted from an important topic by presenting another whose only quality is that of being more attractive.
Politicians might distract the public from domestic issues by diverting attention to global issues in order to reduce pressure domestically.[25]
This is a variation of the traditional arguments known, inlogicasad hominemandad populumbut applied to countries instead of individuals. This technique consists of refuting arguments by appealing to nationalism or by inspiring fear and hate toward a foreign country or all foreigners. It has the potential to be important since it gives the propagandists the power to discredit any information coming from other countries.[26]
Aninformal fallacy. The "straw man" consists of appearing to refute the opponent's argument while attacking another topic. For it to work correctly the topic that was refuted and the one that should have been refuted need to be similar.
Audio manipulation is an artificially generated audio created byartificial intelligence (AI)to create a realistic-replication of someone's voice. AI uses machine learning models and can replicate the specific characteristics of a target voice, such as pitch, tone, and cadence. It is commonly used to deceive and cause disruption.[27]
Visual media can betransformedthrough photo manipulation, commonly called "photoshopping." This can make a product, person, or idea seem more appealing. Specific product features are highlighted to attract and persuade the public, and specific editing tools are used to enhance the photo. Some techniques include cropping, resizing, airbrushing, color-enhancing, and removing or adding subjects from the original image. The motivation for photo manipulation may be for pure artistic creativity or more nefarious reasons to deceive. Photo manipulation is used extensively in the advertising and fashion industry and has been the subject of controversy for its part in false advertising and promoting unrealistic images of beauty.[28]
Video manipulation is a variant of media manipulation that targetsdigital videousing a combination of traditionalvideo processingandvideo editingtechniques and auxiliary methods from artificial intelligence likeface recognition. In typical video manipulation, the facial structure, body movements, and voice of the subject are replicated in order to create a fabricated recording of the subject. The applications of these methods range from educational videos to videos aimed at (mass) manipulation andpropaganda, a straightforward extension of the long-standing possibilities ofphoto manipulation. This form of computer-generated misinformation has contributed tofake news, and there have been instances when this technology was used during political campaigns in an attempt to influence the outcome.[29]
Overviews
Case studies
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_manipulation
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Prior restraint(also referred to asprior censorship[1]orpre-publication censorship) iscensorshipimposed, usually by a government or institution, on expression, that prohibits particular instances of expression. It is in contrast to censorship that establishes general subject matter restrictions and reviews a particular instance of expression only after the expression has taken place.
In some countries (e.g.,United States,[2]Argentina[3]) prior restraint by the government is forbidden, subject to exceptions (such as classifying certain matters of national security), by their respectiveconstitutions.
Prior restraint can be effected in a number of ways. For example, the exhibition of works of art or a movie may require a license from a government authority (sometimes referred to as a classification board or censorship board) before it can be published, and the failure or refusal to grant a license is a form of censorship as is the revoking of a license. It can take the form of a legalinjunctionor government order prohibiting the publication of a specific document. Sometimes, a government or other party becomes aware of a forthcoming publication on a particular subject and seeks to prevent it: to halt ongoing publication and prevent its resumption. These injunctions are considered prior restraint because potential future publications are stopped in advance. It can also take the form of a (usually secret) policy imposed by a commercial corporation upon its employees, requiring them to obtain written permission to publish a given written work, even one authored outside of work hours produced using their own computing resources.
Not all restrictions on free speech are a breach of the prior restraint doctrine. It is widely accepted that publication of information affectingnational security, particularly inwartime[clarify], may be restricted, even when there are laws that protect freedom of expression. In many cases invocation of national security is controversial, with opponents of suppression arguing that government errors and embarrassment are being covered up; examples are given below.
Publication of information on legal cases in progress may be restricted by an injunction. (Otherwise publishing of material which may affect a case is subject to penalties, but not prevented from the outset.)
Text and video information containing illegal context, such aspornographyinvolving underage orunwillingindividuals are generally censored in order to protect the victim/s of the material, and preserve the legal and ethical standards of the country/state initiating the censorship of the offensive material.
InWilliam Blackstone'sCommentaries"Freedom of the Press" is defined as the right to be free from prior restraints. According to Blackstone, a person should not be punished for speaking or writing the truth with good motives and for justifiable ends. Truth alone, however, was not considered a sufficient justification, if published with bad motives.
The liberty of the press is indeed essential to the nature of a free state; but this consists in laying no previous restraints upon publications, and not in freedom from censure for criminal matter when published. Every freeman has an undoubted right to lay what sentiments he pleases before the public; to forbid this, is to destroy the freedom of the press; but if he publishes what is improper, mischievous or illegal, he must take the consequence of his own temerity. (4 Bl. Com. 151, 152.)
This view was the common legal understanding at the time theU.S. Constitutionwas adopted. Only later have the concepts offreedom of speechandthe pressbeen extended (in theUnited States, theUnited Kingdom, and other countries sharing their legal tradition) to protect honest error, or truth even if published for questionable reasons.[citation needed]
Prior restraint is often considered a particularly oppressive form ofcensorshipin Anglo-American jurisprudence because it prevents the restricted material from being heard or distributed at all.[4]: 318Other forms of restrictions on expression (such as actions forlibelorcriminal libel,slander,defamation, andcontempt of court) implement criminal or civil sanctions only after the offending material has been published. While such sanctions might lead to achilling effect, legal commentators argue that at least such actions do not directly impoverish themarketplace of ideas.[4]: 319Prior restraint, on the other hand, takes an idea or material completely out of the marketplace. Thus it is often considered to be the most extreme form of censorship.[4]: 319TheUnited States Supreme Courtexpressed this view inNebraska Press Assn. v. Stuartby noting:
The thread running through all these cases is that prior restraints on speech and publication are the most serious and the least tolerable infringement on First Amendment rights. A criminal penalty or a judgment in a defamation case is subject to the whole panoply of protections afforded by deferring the impact of the judgment until all avenues of appellate review have been exhausted. Only after judgment has become final, correct or otherwise, does the law's sanction become fully operative.
A prior restraint, by contrast and by definition, has an immediate and irreversible sanction. If it can be said that a threat of criminal or civil sanctions after publication 'chills' speech, prior restraint 'freezes' it at least for the time.
Also, most of the early struggles forfreedom of the presswere against forms of prior restraint. Thus prior restraint came to be looked upon with a particular horror, and Anglo-American courts became particularly unwilling to approve it, when they might approve other forms of press restriction.
The first notable case in which theUnited States Supreme Courtruled on a prior restraint issue wasNear v. Minnesota,283U.S.697(1931). In that case the Court held prior restraints to be unconstitutional, except in extremely limited circumstances such as national security issues. The ruling came about after Jay Near's newspaper,The Saturday Press, a small local paper that ran countless exposés of Minneapolis's elected officials' alleged illicit activities, includinggambling,racketeering, andgraft, was silenced by theMinnesota Gag Lawof 1925, also known asThe Public Nuisance Law. Near's critics called his paper ascandal sheet, and alleged that he tried to extort money by threatening to publish attacks on officials and others.
In the Near case the Court held that the state had no power to enjoin the publication of the paper in this way – that any such action would beunconstitutionalunder theFirst Amendment. It wrote:
If we cut through mere details of procedure, the operation and effect of the statute in substance is that public authorities may bring the owner or publisher of a newspaper or periodical before a judge upon a charge of conducting a business of publishing scandalous and defamatory matter — in particular that the matter consists of charges against public officers of official dereliction — and, unless the owner or publisher is able and disposed to bring competent evidence to satisfy the judge that the charges are true and are published with good motives and for justifiable ends, his newspaper or periodical is suppressed and further publication is made punishable as a contempt. This is of the essence of censorship.
And
The statute in question cannot be justified by reason of the fact that the publisher is permitted to show, before injunction issues, that the matter published is true and is published with good motives and for justifiable ends. ... it would be but a step to a complete system of censorship. ... The preliminary freedom, by virtue of the very reason for its existence, does not depend, as this court has said, on proof of truth.
This was an extension of the Court's earlier views, which had followed Blackstone. InPatterson v. Colorado, the Court had written: "In the first place, the main purpose of such constitutional provisions is 'to prevent all such previous restraints upon publications as had been practiced by other governments,' and they do not prevent the subsequent punishment of such as may be deemed contrary to the public welfare." (quoted in theNeardecision). TheNeardecision was the first time that it was held that even alleged untruth or malicious intent would not be sufficient reason to impose prior restraints.
Near was decided 5–4. The four dissenting justices strongly approved of the "gag law", and felt that the nature of the articles inThe Saturday Press, including their recurrentantisemitism, their frequent (allegedly false) accusations of official misconduct, and their disrespectful and confrontational tone, made them unworthy of protection. But this view did not prevail.
After theNeardecision, newspapers had a clearly established freedom to criticize public officials without fear of retribution, even when charges made by the papers could not be proven in court. Newspapers could still be punished throughlibellaws, if they published material found to be untrue. The "Gag Law" was unique in the United States at that time, and even in Minnesota had only been used on two occasions. Indeed, the Court commented on the unusual nature of the proceeding in its decision.
The Court inNearleft open the possibility of prior restraints for various exceptional purposes, such as national security, control of obscenity, and the like. It wrote:
... the protection even as to previous restraint is not absolutely unlimited. But the limitation has been recognized only in exceptional cases. 'When a nation is at war many things that might be said in time of peace are such a hindrance to its effort that their utterance will not be endured so long as men fight and that no Court could regard them as protected by any constitutional right.' (Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47, 52, 39 S. Ct. 247, 249). No one would question but that a government might prevent actual obstruction to its recruiting service or the publication of the sailing dates of transports or the number and location of troops. On similar grounds, the primary requirements of decency may be enforced against obscene publications. The security of the community life may be protected against incitements to acts of violence and the overthrow by force of orderly government.
Near's dicta suggest that, while a constitutional prior restraint can exist, the high burden of proof necessary to demonstrate constitutionality results in a presumption of invalidity, and the government bears the burden of showing the restraint's constitutionality.[4]: 321
In a later case (Nebraska Press Ass'n v. Stuart), the Court wrote:
The principles enunciated in Near were so universally accepted that the precise issue did not come before us again untilOrganization for a Better Austin v. Keefe,402U.S.415(1971). There the state courts had enjoined the petitioners from picketing or passing out literature of any kind in a specified area. Noting the similarity toNear vs. Minnesota, a unanimous Court held:
Here, as in that case, the injunction operates, not to redress alleged private wrongs, but to suppress, on the basis of previous publications, distribution of literature 'of any kind' in a city of 18,000.
. ... .
Any prior restraint on expression comes to this Court with a 'heavy presumption' against its constitutional validity.Carroll v. Princess Anne, 393 U.S. 175, 181 (1968);Bantam Books, Inc. v. Sullivan, 372 U.S. 58, 70 (1963). Respondent thus carries a heavy burden of showing justification for the imposition of such a restraint.
This shows the strong later acceptance of what had been a disputed decision when it was first handed down.
In the 2012 case ofKinney v. Barnes, Kinney, a legal recruiter, was the subject of inflammatory comments on the website of the company who previously employed him. The company claimed he received extra incentives on the job causing his termination. Kinney filed a defamation suit seeking retraction of the comments and apermanent injunctionagainst any similar future comments being made. The Supreme Court of Texas ruling specifically addressed whether future comments could be barred and whether this would constitute prior restraint.[a]Although the court ruled that the statements posted which were judged to be defamatory could be removed, they did not prohibit similar speech from being posted online at a later time. They reasoned that this would constitute prior restraint and risk producing a chilling effect. The court reasoned, in keeping with a prior decision (Hajek v. Bill Mowbray Motors, Inc., 647S.W.2d253, 255 (Tex. 1983)), that the appropriate remedy to defamatory speech was penalization of "what is wrongfully spoken" rather "denial of the right to speak".[5]
DuringWorld War I, and to a greater extent duringWorld War II,war correspondentsaccompanied military forces, and their reports were subject to advance censorship to preserve military secrets. The extent of such censorship was not generally challenged, and no major court case arose from this issue. In later conflicts the degree to which war reporting was subject to censorship varied, and in some cases it has been alleged that the censorship was as much political as military in purpose. This was particularly true during theVietnam Warand the1983 invasion of Grenada.
In thePentagon Paperscase (New York Times Co. v. United States,403U.S.713(1971)), theNixon administrationsought to enjoinThe New York TimesandThe Washington Postnewspapers from publishing excerpts from a top-secretUnited States Department of Defensehistory of theUnited Statesinvolvement in theVietnam Warfrom 1945 to 1971. The government tried to use the "national security" exception that had been suggested in theNeardecision. The Supreme Court struck down the injunctions. However, the decision was fragmented, with nine separate opinions being filed in the case. It was not clear at the time what the effect would be on future prior restraint cases.
On March 15, 1950Scientific Americanmagazine published an article byHans Betheaboutthermonuclear fusion, the mechanism by whichstarsgenerate energy and emitelectromagnetic radiation(light, etc.). Fusion is also the process which makes thehydrogen bomb(H-bomb) possible. The AEC (Atomic Energy Commission) ordered publication stopped. Several thousand copies of the printed magazine were destroyed, and the article was published with some text removed at the direction of the AEC. At this time there existed in the United States no workable design for a hydrogen bomb (theTeller–Ulamdesign would not be developed for another year), but the U.S. was engaged in a crash program to develop one.Gerard Piel, the publisher ofScientific American, complained that the AEC was "suppressing information which the American People need in order to form intelligent judgments". Bethe, however, declined to support this complaint, and the suppression of the unedited version of the article was never litigated.[citation needed]
In February 1979, an anti-nuclear activist namedHoward Morlanddrafted an article forThe Progressivemagazine, entitled "The H-Bomb Secret: To Know How is to Ask Why". The article was an attempt by Morland to publish what he thought the "H-Bomb Secret" was (theTeller–Ulam design), derived from various unclassified sources and informal interviews with scientists and plant workers. Through a number of complicated circumstances, theDepartment of Energyattempted to enjoin its publication, alleging that the article contained sensitive technical information which was (1) probably derived from classified sources, or (2) became a classified source when compiled in a correct way, even if it were derived from unclassified sources, based on the "born secret" provisions of the 1954Atomic Energy Act. A preliminary injunction was granted against the article's publication, and Morland and the magazine appealed (United States v.The Progressive, et al.). After a lengthy set of hearings (onein camera, another open to the public), and attracting considerable attention as a "freedom of the press" case, the government dropped its charges after it claimed the case became moot when another bomb speculator (Chuck Hansen) published his own views on the "secret" (many commentators speculated that they were afraid the Atomic Energy Act would be overturned under such scrutiny). The article was duly published inThe Progressive(in the November 1979 issue) six months after it was originally scheduled, and remains available in libraries. (As an aside, Morland himself decided that he did not have the secret, and published a "corrected" version a month later.)
Frequently a court will impose advance restrictions on lawyers, parties, and on the press in reporting of trials, particularly criminal trials. These restrictions are intended to protect the right to a fair trial, and to avoid interference with the judicial process. Nonetheless, they are a form of prior restraint, and the press in particular has often objected to such orders.
InNebraska Press Assn. v. Stuart,427U.S.539(1976), the United States Supreme Court overturned such a "gag order". It ruled that alternative methods to help ensure a fair trial, short of prior restraints, might have been used, and that it was not all clear, under the circumstances, that the gag order would have the desired effect even if upheld. It also made a particular point of asserting that orders restricting reporting on events that occur in open court are not permissible. It wrote:
To the extent that this order prohibited the reporting of evidence adduced at the open preliminary hearing, it plainly violated settled principles: '[T]here is nothing that proscribes the press from reporting events that transpire in the courtroom.'Sheppard v. Maxwell, (384 U.S., at 362–363).
The Court's conclusion in this case reaffirmed its general opposition to prior restraints, and indicated that judicial gag orders would be sustained only in exceptional cases. It wrote:
Our analysis ends as it began, with a confrontation between prior restraint imposed to protect one vital constitutional guarantee and the explicit command of another that the freedom to speak and publish shall not be abridged. We reaffirm that the guarantees of freedom of expression are not an absolute prohibition under all circumstances, but the barriers to prior restraint remain high and the presumption against its use continues intact.
In theUnited Kingdomjudicial gag orders are much more frequently employed, and the strong prejudice against them reflected in the above quote does not seem to be felt by British courts. Other countries also employ such orders more freely than theUnited Statesdoes.
In October 1999 theMotion Picture Association of America(MPAA) learned of the availability on the Internet ofDeCSS, a program that allowed people to view the content ofDVDsusing computers that lacked commercial DVD players, bypassing theencryptionsystem known as theContent Scrambling System(CSS) generally used on commercial DVDs. The MPAA responded by sending out a number ofcease and desistletters to web site operators who posted the software. In January 2000, a lawsuit was filed against the publisher of the magazine2600: The Hacker Quarterly, and others. This case is known asUniversal v. Reimerdes, 111 F. Supp.2d 294 (S.D.N.Y. 2000).
The suit asked for an injunction under the U.S.Digital Millennium Copyright Act(DMCA) prohibiting the2600site from posting the DeCSS code. It also asked for a prohibition on linking to other sites that posted the code.
The injunction was issued and sustained in an appeal to theU.S. Court of Appealsfor theSecond Circuitand the constitutionality of the DMCA was upheld. The district court wrote that the computer code "... does more, in other words, than convey a message" and that "... it has a distinctly functional, non-speech aspect in addition to reflecting the thoughts of the programmers." The appeals court later wrote that "Under the circumstances amply shown by the record, the injunction's linking prohibition validly regulates the Appellants' opportunity instantly to enable anyone anywhere to gain unauthorized access to copyrighted movies on DVDs" thus upholding the injunction against publishing links to the DeCSS code in these circumstances.
The appeals court did consider the prior restraint and free expression issues, but treated the DeCSS program primarily as a means of evading copyright protection, and under that theory, held that the2600site could be permanently enjoined from posting the DeCSS code, and from linking to sites that posted it in an attempt to make the code available. The case was not taken to the Supreme Court.[citation needed]
There is a long history of prior restraints on the theater; in theUnited Kingdomstage plays still required a license until 1968. This attitude was early transferred to motion pictures, and prior restraints were retained for films long after they had been dropped for other forms of publication: in some jurisdictions, a film had to be submitted to afilm censor boardin order to be approved for showing.
The United States Supreme Court upheld the use of a board of censors inMutual Film Corporation v. Industrial Commission of Ohio,236U.S.230(1915) by deciding that the First Amendment did not apply to motion pictures. The power of such boards was weakened when the Supreme Court later overruled itself and decided that the First Amendment does apply to motion pictures. In the case ofJoseph Burstyn, Inc. v. Wilson,343U.S.495(1952), the court decided that giving the power to forbid or restrict a film to a censorship board on the grounds a film was "sacrilegious" was far too damaging to the protections of the First Amendment.
The "death knell" for censorship boards occurred in 1965 when the U.S. Supreme Court found the Maryland law making it a crime to exhibit a film without submitting it to the censorship board was unconstitutional. InFreedman v. Maryland,380U.S.51(1965), the state's requirement that a film be presented to the board was unconstitutional as it lacked adequate procedural safeguards. While it is not necessarily unconstitutional to require films to be submitted to a censorship board, the board has extremely limited options: a censorship board has no power to prohibit a film, and, if the law grants it that power, the law is unconstitutional. The board's only options when a film is presented to it are either to grant a license for the film or immediately go to court to enjoin its exhibition.
Also, state or local censorship boards had been found to have no jurisdiction over broadcasts by television stations, even when located in the state or community where they are grounded, thus eliminating yet another reason for their existence.
Both the state ofMarylandand the province ofOntarioretained film censor boards to a particularly late date. Maryland abandoned its board in the 1980s, and a 2004 decision of the Ontario Court of Appeal, reversing a previous trend in favor of theOntario Film Classification Board's right to insist on cuts, ruled that the province had no right to insist on cuts as a condition of release asCanadianfederalobscenitylaws were sufficient to deal with obscene material. In May 2005, the Ontario government ended the power of the Classification Board to insist on cuts, requiring all films with adult content that were not judged obscene to be rated "R" for adults only.[citation needed]
In many countries, legally effectiverating systemsare in effect. SeeHistory of British Film Certificatesfor information on film restrictions in the UK.
Many industries have formulated "voluntary" codes limiting the content of expression, generally affecting perceived effects onpublic moralityrather than revelation of secrets. Examples of these include theHays Code, which affectedHollywoodfilms from the 1930s to the 1950s, and theComics Code, which was designed to deal with the rise of horror comics in the 1950s and lasted into the 1970s. The movierating systemcurrently in effect in the United States, run by theMotion Picture Association of America(MPAA) is another such industry code. Such codes have generally been adopted with the twofold purposes of forestalling possible government intervention and avoiding unfavorable publicity or boycotts. While such codes are not generally enforced by governmental action, they are generally enforced on content producers by gatekeepers in themarketingchain: studios in the case of the Hays Code, distributors in the case of the Comics Code and theater chains in the case of the MPAA rating system. Content producers have often objected to these codes and argue that they are, in effect, a form of prior restraint. However, the first amendment prohibition of prior restraint applies to government or court action and does not bind private entities such as theater chains.[citation needed]
In April 1993, Francisco Martorell published a book titled 'Impunidad diplomática' (Diplomatic Impunity) inArgentinawithEditorial Planeta. The book was about, among other things, the events that led an erstwhile Argentinian ambassador, Oscar Spinosa Melo, to leaveChile.
The book -- scheduled to start selling in Chile the day after its launch in Argentina -- met with a protection remedy by a Chilean businessman before the Santiago Court of Appeals, who argued the text injured his right to privacy. Thus, the court issued aninterlocutory injunction('orden de no innovar') that temporarily prohibited the book's entry, distribution and circulation in Chile pending a final ruling on the case.
Thereafter, several people filed complaints against Martorell fordefamation(injuria) and false imputation of a publicly actionable crime (calumnia).[6]
Subsequently, through anextraordinary remedy, Martorell appealed to theSupreme Court of Chileand invoked the constitutional guarantees of freedom of the press. But in a unanimous decision handed down on June 15, 1993, the Supreme Court denied the appeal and forbade the book's circulation, formally notifying Martorell of its decision some days later.[7]
TheInter-American Commission on Human Rights (ICHR)had to determine whether the Chilean court's decision to prohibit the entry, circulation and distribution of Martorell's Diplomatic Impunity violated freedom of expression under Article 13 of theAmerican Convention on Human Rights (ACHR), which states:
The Commission reaffirmed that freedom of expression, which it averred involves the right to express ideas and thoughts and receive them. As such, when an individual's right to express themself restricted, it also affects the public's right to receive information.
The Commission indicated that Article 13.2 of the ACHR allows certain restrictions upon one's exercise of freedom of expression and stipulates the legitimate limits and the requirements for establishing these restrictions. In this sense, the right can only be legitimately restricted through the imposition of subsequent liabilities provided for by law and deemed necessary to ensure the objectives established in the Convention. The Commission recalled that protecting 'the rights or the reputation of others' is a legitimate purpose for the Convention. However, regarding the rights of privacy, honour and dignity outlined in Article 11 of this instrument, 'the organs of the State cannot interpret the provisions of Article 11 in a manner that violates Article 13, which prohibits prior censorship'.
Accordingly, the IACHR stressed that the Convention stipulates that prior censorship is incompatible with the full enjoyment of the rights protected by this instrument. The Commission underscored ACHR as the only human rights instrument containing this prohibition, indicating the veritable importance the Inter-American system placed on the freedom of expression.
In May 1993, the Court of Appeals granted the judicial remedy brought by the Chilean businessman and affirmed the measure that 'prohibited the entrance and commercialization of the book in Chile'. A subsequent to the Supreme Court was rejected.
In the case under review, the Commission considered the decision to ban the entry, circulation and distribution of the book Diplomatic Impunity in Chile was contrary to Article 13 of the ACHR. For the Commission, this constituted an act before censorship and, thus, was not a legitimate restriction on the right to freedom of expression.[9]
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Propagandais communication that is primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda, which may not be objective and may be selectively presenting facts to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or usingloaded languageto produce an emotional rather than a rational response to the information that is being presented.[1]Propaganda can be found in a wide variety of different contexts.[2]
Beginning in the twentieth century, the English termpropagandabecame associated with amanipulativeapproach, but historically, propaganda had been a neutral descriptive term of any material that promotes certain opinions orideologies.[1][3]
A wide range of materials and media are used for conveying propaganda messages, which changed as new technologies were invented, including paintings, cartoons, posters, pamphlets, films, radio shows, TV shows, and websites. More recently, the digital age has given rise to new ways of disseminating propaganda, for example, incomputational propaganda, bots and algorithms are used to manipulate public opinion, e.g., by creatingfakeorbiased newsto spread it on social media or usingchat botsto mimic real people in discussions in social networks.
Propagandais a modern Latin word, the neuter pluralgerundiveform ofpropagare, meaning 'to spread' or 'to propagate', thuspropagandameansthe things which are to be propagated.[4]Originally this word derived from a new administrative body (congregation) of theCatholic Churchcreated in 1622 as part of theCounter-Reformation, called theCongregatio de Propaganda Fide(Congregation for Propagating the Faith), or informally simplyPropaganda.[3][5]Its activity was aimed at "propagating" the Catholic faith in non-Catholic countries.[3]
From the 1790s, the term began being used also to refer topropagandainsecularactivities.[3]In English, the cognate began taking a pejorative or negative connotation in the mid-19th century, when it was used in the political sphere.[3]
Non-English cognates ofpropagandaas well as some similar non-English terms retain neutral or positive connotations. For example, in official party discourse,xuanchuanis treated as a more neutral or positive term, though it can be used pejoratively through protest or other informal settings within China.[6][7]: 4–6
HistorianArthur Aspinallobserved that newspapers were not expected to be independent organs of information when they began to play an important part in political life in the late 1700s, but were assumed to promote the views of their owners or government sponsors.[8]In the 20th century, the term propaganda emerged along with the rise of mass media, including newspapers and radio. As researchers began studying the effects of media, they usedsuggestion theoryto explain how people could be influenced by emotionally-resonant persuasive messages.Harold Lasswellprovided a broad definition of the term propaganda, writing it as: "the expression of opinions or actions carried out deliberately by individuals or groups with a view to influencing the opinions or actions of other individuals or groups for predetermined ends and through psychological manipulations."[9]Garth Jowett andVictoria O'Donnelltheorize that propaganda
andpersuasionare linked as humans use communication as a form ofsoft powerthrough the development and cultivation of propaganda materials.[10]
In a 1929 literary debate withEdward Bernays,Everett Dean Martinargues that, "Propaganda is making puppets of us. We are moved by hidden strings which the propagandist manipulates."[11]In the 1920s and 1930s, propaganda was sometimes described as all-powerful. For example, Bernays acknowledged in his bookPropagandathat "The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of."[12]
NATO's 2011 guidance for military public affairs defines propaganda as "information, ideas, doctrines, or special appeals disseminated to influence the opinion, emotions, attitudes, or behaviour of any specified group in order to benefit the sponsor, either directly or indirectly".[13]
Primitive forms of propaganda have been a human activity as far back as reliable recorded evidence exists. TheBehistun Inscription(c.515BCE) detailing the rise ofDarius Ito thePersianthroneis viewed by most historians as an early example of propaganda.[14]Another striking example of propaganda during ancient history is the lastRoman civil wars(44–30 BCE) during whichOctavianandMark Antonyblamed each other for obscure and degrading origins, cruelty, cowardice, oratorical and literary incompetence, debaucheries, luxury, drunkenness and other slanders.[15]This defamation took the form ofuituperatio(Roman rhetorical genre of the invective) which was decisive for shaping the Roman public opinion at this time. Another early example of propaganda was fromGenghis Khan. The emperor would send some of his men ahead of his army to spread rumors to the enemy. In many cases, his army was actually smaller than his opponents'.[16]
Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian Iwas the first ruler to utilize the power of the printing press for propaganda – in order tobuild his image, stir up patriotic feelings in the population of his empire (he was the first ruler who utilized one-sided battle reports – the early predecessors of modern newspapers orneue zeitungen– targeting the mass.[17][18]) and influence the population of his enemies.[19][20][21]Propaganda during theReformation, helped by the spread of theprinting pressthroughout Europe, and in particular within Germany, caused new ideas, thoughts, and doctrine to be made available to the public in ways that had never been seen before the 16th century. During the era of theAmerican Revolution, theAmerican colonieshad a flourishing network of newspapers and printers who specialized in the topic on behalf of thePatriots(and to a lesser extent on behalf of theLoyalists).[22]Academic Barbara Diggs-Brown conceives that the negative connotations of the term "propaganda" are associated with the earlier social and political transformations that occurred during theFrench Revolutionary periodmovement of 1789 to 1799 between the start and the middle portion of the 19th century, in a time where the word started to be used in a nonclerical and political context.[23]
The first large-scale and organised propagation of government propaganda was occasioned by the outbreak of theFirst World Warin 1914. After the defeat of Germany, military officials such as GeneralErich Ludendorffsuggested that British propaganda had been instrumental in their defeat.Adolf Hitlercame to echo this view, believing that it had been a primary cause of thecollapse of morale and revoltsin theGerman home frontandNavyin 1918 (see also:Dolchstoßlegende). InMein Kampf(1925) Hitler expounded his theory of propaganda, which provided a powerful base for his rise to power in 1933. HistorianRobert Ensorexplains that "Hitler...puts no limit on what can be done by propaganda; people will believe anything, provided they are told it often enough and emphatically enough, and that contradicters are either silenced or smothered in calumny."[24]This was to be true in Germany and backed up with their army making it difficult to allow other propaganda to flow in.[25]Most propaganda inNazi Germanywas produced by theMinistry of Public Enlightenment and PropagandaunderJoseph Goebbels. Goebbels mentions propaganda as a way to see through the masses. Symbols are used towards propaganda such as justice, liberty and one's devotion to one's country.[26]World War IIsaw continued use of propaganda as a weapon of war, building on the experience ofWWI, by Goebbels and the BritishPolitical Warfare Executive, as well as the United StatesOffice of War Information.[27]
In the early 20th century, the invention of motion pictures (as in movies, diafilms) gave propaganda-creators a powerful tool for advancing political and military interests when it came to reaching a broad segment of the population and creating consent or encouraging rejection of the real or imagined enemy. In the years following theOctober Revolutionof 1917, theSovietgovernment sponsored the Russian film industry with the purpose of making propaganda films (e.g., the 1925 filmThe Battleship PotemkinglorifiesCommunistideals). In WWII, Nazi filmmakers produced highly emotional films to create popular support for occupying theSudetenlandand attacking Poland. The 1930s and 1940s, which saw the rise oftotalitarianstates and theSecond World War, are arguably the "Golden Age of Propaganda".Leni Riefenstahl, a filmmaker working inNazi Germany, created one of the best-known propaganda movies,Triumph of the Will. In 1942, the propaganda songNiet Molotoffwas made inFinlandduring theContinuation War, making fun of theRed Army's failure in theWinter War, referring the song's name to the Soviet'sMinister of Foreign Affairs,Vyacheslav Molotov.[28]In the US,animationbecame popular, especially for winning over youthful audiences and aiding the U.S. war effort, e.g.,Der Fuehrer's Face(1942), which ridiculesHitlerand advocates the value of freedom. Some Americanwar filmsin the early 1940s were designed to create a patriotic mindset and convince viewers that sacrifices needed to be made to defeat theAxis Powers.[29]Others were intended to help Americans understand their Allies in general, as in films likeKnow Your Ally: BritainandOur Greek Allies. Apart from its war films, Hollywood did its part to boost American morale in a film intended to show how stars of stage and screen who remained on the home front were doing their part not just in their labors, but also in their understanding that a variety of peoples worked together against the Axis menace:Stage Door Canteen(1943) features one segment meant to dispel Americans' mistrust of the Soviets, and another to dispel their bigotry against the Chinese. Polish filmmakers in Great Britain created the anti-Nazi color filmCalling Mr. Smith[30][31](1943) about Nazi crimes inGerman-occupied Europeand about lies of Nazi propaganda.[32]
TheWestand theSoviet Unionboth used propaganda extensively during theCold War. Both sidesused film, television, and radio programming to influence their own citizens, each other, andThird Worldnations. Through a front organization called the Bedford Publishing Company, the CIA through a covert department called theOffice of Policy Coordinationdisseminated over one million books to Soviet readers over the span of 15 years, including novels by George Orwell, Albert Camus, Vladimir Nabokov, James Joyce, and Pasternak in an attempt to promote anti-communist sentiment and sympathy of Western values.[33]George Orwell's contemporaneous novelsAnimal FarmandNineteen Eighty-Fourportray the use of propaganda in fictional dystopian societies. During theCuban Revolution,Fidel Castrostressed the importance of propaganda.[34][better source needed]Propaganda was used extensively by Communist forces in theVietnam Waras means of controlling people's opinions.[35]
During theYugoslav wars,propaganda was usedas amilitary strategyby governments ofFederal Republic of YugoslaviaandCroatia. Propaganda was used to create fear and hatred, and particularly to incite theSerbpopulation against the other ethnicities (Bosniaks,Croats,Albaniansand other non-Serbs). Serb media made a great effort in justifying, revising or denying masswar crimescommitted by Serb forces during these wars.[36]
In the early 20th century the term propaganda was used by the founders of the nascentpublic relationsindustry to refer to their people. Literally translated from theLatingerundiveas "things that must be disseminated", in some cultures the term is neutral or even positive, while in others the term has acquired a strong negative connotation. The connotations of the term "propaganda" can also vary over time. For example, inPortugueseand some Spanish language speaking countries, particularly in theSouthern Cone, the word "propaganda" usually refers to the most common manipulative media in business terms – "advertising".[37]
In English,propagandawas originally a neutral term for the dissemination of information in favor of any given cause. During the 20th century, however, the term acquired a thoroughly negative meaning in western countries, representing the intentional dissemination of often false, but certainly "compelling" claims to support or justify political actions or ideologies. According toHarold Lasswell, the term began to fall out of favor due to growing public suspicion of propaganda in the wake of its use during World War I by theCreel Committeein the United States and theMinistry of Informationin Britain: Writing in 1928, Lasswell observed, "In democratic countries the official propaganda bureau was looked upon with genuine alarm, for fear that it might be suborned to party and personal ends. The outcry in the United States against Mr.Creel'sfamous Bureau of Public Information (or 'Inflammation') helped to din into the public mind the fact that propaganda existed. ... The public's discovery of propaganda has led to a great of lamentation over it. Propaganda has become an epithet of contempt and hate, and the propagandists have sought protective coloration in such names as 'public relations council,' 'specialist in public education,' 'public relations adviser.' "[38]In 1949, political science professor Dayton David McKean wrote, "After World War I the word came to be applied to 'what you don't like of the other fellow's publicity,' as Edward L. Bernays said...."[39]
The term is essentially contested and some have argued for a neutral definition,[40][41]arguing that ethics depend on intent and context,[42]while others define it as necessarily unethical and negative.[43]Emma Briantdefines it as "the deliberate manipulation of representations (including text, pictures, video, speech etc.) with the intention of producing any effect in the audience (e.g. action or inaction; reinforcement or transformation of feelings, ideas, attitudes or behaviours) that is desired by the propagandist."[41]The same author explains the importance of consistent terminology across history, particularly as contemporary euphemistic synonyms are used in governments' continual efforts to rebrand their operations such as 'information support' andstrategic communication.[41]Other scholars also see benefits to acknowledging that propaganda can be interpreted as beneficial or harmful, depending on the message sender, target audience, message, and context.[2]
David Goodman argues that the 1936League of Nations"Convention on the Use of Broadcasting in the Cause of Peace" tried to create the standards for a liberal international public sphere. The Convention encouraged empathetic and neighborly radio broadcasts to other nations. It called for League prohibitions on international broadcast containing hostile speech and false claims. It tried to define the line between liberal and illiberal policies in communications, and emphasized the dangers of nationalist chauvinism. With Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia active on the radio, its liberal goals were ignored, while free speech advocates warned that the code represented restraints on free speech.[44]
Identifying propaganda has always been a problem.[45]The main difficulties have involved differentiating propaganda from other types ofpersuasion, and avoiding abiasedapproach. Richard Alan Nelson provides a definition of the term: "Propaganda is neutrally defined as a systematic form of purposeful persuasion that attempts to influence the emotions, attitudes, opinions, and actions of specified target audiences forideological, political or commercial purposes[46]through the controlled transmission of one-sided messages (which may or may not be factual) via mass and direct media channels."[47]The definition focuses on the communicative process involved – or more precisely, on the purpose of the process, and allow "propaganda" to be interpreted as positive or negative behavior depending on the perspective of the viewer or listener.
Propaganda can often be recognized by the rhetorical strategies used in its design. In the 1930s, the Institute for Propaganda Analysis identified a variety of propaganda techniques that were commonly used in newspapers and on the radio, which were the mass media of the time period. Propaganda techniques include "name calling" (using derogatory labels), "bandwagon" (expressing the social appeal of a message), or "glittering generalities" (using positive but imprecise language).[48]With the rise of the internet and social media, Renee Hobbs identified four characteristic design features of many forms of contemporary propaganda: (1) it activates strong emotions; (2) it simplifies information; (3) it appeals to the hopes, fears, and dreams of a targeted audience; and (4) it attacks opponents.[49]
Propaganda is sometimes evaluated based on the intention and goals of the individual or institution who created it. According to historianZbyněk Zeman, propaganda is defined as either white, grey or black. White propaganda openly discloses its source and intent. Grey propaganda has an ambiguous or non-disclosed source or intent.Black propagandapurports to be published by the enemy or some organization besides its actual origins[50](compare withblack operation, a type of clandestine operation in which the identity of the sponsoring government is hidden). In scale, these different types of propaganda can also be defined by the potential of true and correct information to compete with the propaganda. For example, opposition to white propaganda is often readily found and may slightly discredit the propaganda source. Opposition to grey propaganda, when revealed (often by an inside source), may create some level of public outcry. Opposition to black propaganda is often unavailable and may be dangerous to reveal, because public cognizance of black propaganda tactics and sources would undermine or backfire the very campaign the black propagandist supported.
The propagandist seeks to change the way people understand an issue or situation for the purpose of changing their actions and expectations in ways that are desirable to the interest group. Propaganda, in this sense, serves as a corollary to censorship in which the same purpose is achieved, not by filling people's minds with approved information, but by preventing people from being confronted with opposing points of view. What sets propaganda apart from other forms of advocacy is the willingness of the propagandist to change people's understanding through deception and confusion rather than persuasion and understanding. The leaders of an organization know the information to be one sided or untrue, but this may not be true for the rank and file members who help to disseminate the propaganda.
Propaganda was often used to influence opinions and beliefs on religious issues, particularly during the split between theRoman Catholic Churchand theProtestant churchesor during theCrusades.[56]
The sociologistJeffrey K. Haddenhas argued that members of theanti-cult movementandChristian counter-cult movementaccuse the leaders of what they consider cults of using propaganda extensively to recruit followers and keep them. Hadden argued that ex-members of cults and the anti-cult movement are committed to making these movements look bad.[57]
Propaganda against other religions in the same community or propaganda intended to keep political power in the hands of a religious elite can incite religious hate on a global or national scale. It could make use of many propaganda mediums. War, terrorism, riots, and other violent acts can result from it. It can also conceal injustices, inequities, exploitation, and atrocities, leading to ignorance-based indifference and alienation.[58]
In thePeloponnesian War, the Athenians exploited the figures from stories aboutTroyas well as other mythical images to incite feelings againstSparta. For example,Helen of Troywas even portrayed as an Athenian, whose motherNemesiswould avenge Troy.[59][60]During thePunic Wars, extensive campaigns of propaganda were carried out by both sides. To dissolve the Roman system ofsociiand the Greekpoleis,Hannibalreleased without conditions Latin prisoners that he had treated generously to their native cities, where they helped to disseminate his propaganda.[61]The Romans on the other hand tried to portray Hannibal as a person devoid of humanity and would soon lose the favour of gods. At the same time, led byQ.Fabius Maximus, they organized elaborate religious rituals to protect Roman morale.[62][61]
In the early sixteenth century,Maximilian Iinvented one kind of psychological warfare targeting the enemies. During his war againstVenice, he attached pamphlets to balloons that his archers would shoot down. The content spoke of freedom and equality and provoked the populace to rebel against the tyrants (their Signoria).[21]
Post–World War II usage of the word "propaganda" more typically refers to political or nationalist uses of these techniques or to the promotion of a set of ideas.
Propaganda is a powerful weapon in war; in certain cases, it is used todehumanizeand create hatred toward a supposed enemy, either internal or external, by creating a false image in the mind of soldiers and citizens. This can be done by using derogatory or racist terms (e.g., the racist terms "Jap" and "gook" used during World War II and the Vietnam War, respectively), avoiding some words or language or by making allegations of enemy atrocities. The goal of this was to demoralize the opponent into thinking what was being projected was actually true.[63]Most propaganda efforts in wartime require the home population to feel the enemy has inflicted an injustice, which may be fictitious or may be based on facts (e.g., the sinking of the passenger shipRMSLusitaniaby the German Navy in World War I). The home population must also believe that the cause of their nation in the war is just. In these efforts it was difficult to determine the accuracy of how propaganda truly impacted the war.[64]In NATO doctrine, propaganda is defined as "Information, especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote a political cause or point of view."[65]Within this perspective, the information provided does not need to be necessarily false but must be instead relevant to specific goals of the "actor" or "system" that performs it.
Propaganda is also one of the methods used inpsychological warfare, which may also involvefalse flagoperations in which the identity of the operatives is depicted as those of an enemy nation (e.g., TheBay of Pigs InvasionusedCIAplanes painted inCuban Air Forcemarkings). The term propaganda may also refer to false information meant to reinforce the mindsets of people who already believe as the propagandist wishes (e.g., During the First World War, the main purpose of British propaganda was to encourage men to join the army, and women to work in the country's industry. Propaganda posters were used because regular general radio broadcasting was yet to commence and TV technology was still under development).[66]The assumption is that, if people believe something false, they will constantly be assailed by doubts. Since these doubts are unpleasant (seecognitive dissonance), people will be eager to have them extinguished, and are therefore receptive to the reassurances of those in power. For this reason, propaganda is often addressed to people who are already sympathetic to the agenda or views being presented. This process of reinforcement uses an individual's predisposition to self-select "agreeable" information sources as a mechanism for maintaining control over populations.
Propaganda may be administered in insidious ways. For instance, disparagingdisinformationabout the history of certain groups or foreign countries may be encouraged or tolerated in the educational system. Since few people actuallydouble-checkwhat they learn at school, such disinformation will be repeated by journalists as well as parents, thus reinforcing the idea that the disinformation item is really a "well-known fact", even though no one repeating the myth is able to point to an authoritative source. The disinformation is then recycled in the media and in the educational system, without the need for direct governmental intervention on the media. Such permeating propaganda may be used for political goals: by giving citizens a false impression of the quality or policies of their country, they may be incited to reject certain proposals or certain remarks or ignore the experience of others.
In the Soviet Union during the Second World War, the propaganda designed to encourage civilians was controlled by Stalin, who insisted on a heavy-handed style that educated audiences easily saw was inauthentic. On the other hand, the unofficial rumors about German atrocities were well founded and convincing.[68]Stalin was a Georgian who spoke Russian with a heavy accent. That would not do for a national hero so starting in the 1930s all new visual portraits of Stalin were retouched to erase hisGeorgian facial characteristics[clarify][69]and make him a more generalized Soviet hero. Only his eyes and famous moustache remained unaltered.Zhores MedvedevandRoy Medvedevsay his "majestic new image was devised appropriately to depict the leader of all times and of all peoples."[70]
Article 20 of theInternational Covenant on Civil and Political Rightsprohibits any propaganda for war as well as any advocacy of national or religious hatred that constitutesincitementto discrimination, hostility or violence by law.[71]
Naturally, the common people don't want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship. The people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.
Simply enough the covenant specifically is not defining the content of propaganda. In simplest terms, an act of propaganda if used in a reply to a wartime act is not prohibited.[73]
Propaganda shares techniques with advertising andpublic relations, each of which can be thought of as propaganda that promotes a commercial product or shapes the perception of an organization, person, or brand. For example, after claiming victory in the2006 Lebanon War,Hezbollahcampaigned for broader popularity among Arabs by organizing mass rallies where Hezbollah leaderHassan Nasrallahcombined elements of the localdialectwithclassical Arabicto reach audiences outside Lebanon. Banners and billboards were commissioned in commemoration of the war, along with various merchandise items with Hezbollah's logo, flag color (yellow), and images of Nasrallah. T-shirts, baseball caps and other war memorabilia were marketed for all ages. The uniformity of messaging helped define Hezbollah's brand.[74]
In the journalistic context, advertisements evolved from the traditional commercial advertisements to include also a new type in the form of paid articles or broadcasts disguised as news. These generally present an issue in a very subjective and often misleading light, primarily meant to persuade rather than inform. Normally they use only subtlepropaganda techniquesand not the more obvious ones used in traditional commercial advertisements. If the reader believes that a paid advertisement is in fact a news item, the message the advertiser is trying to communicate will be more easily "believed" or "internalized". Such advertisements are considered obvious examples of "covert" propaganda because they take on the appearance of objective information rather than the appearance of propaganda, which is misleading. Federal law[where?]specifically mandates that any advertisement appearing in the format of a news item must state that the item is in fact a paid advertisement.
Edmund McGarry illustrates that advertising is more than selling to an audience but a type of propaganda that is trying to persuade the public and not to be balanced in judgement.[75]
Propaganda has become more common in political contexts, in particular, to refer to certain efforts sponsored by governments, political groups, but also often covert interests. In the early 20th century, propaganda was exemplified in the form of party slogans. Propaganda also has much in common withpublic informationcampaigns by governments, which are intended to encourage or discourage certain forms of behavior (such as wearing seat belts, not smoking, not littering, and so forth). Again, the emphasis is more political in propaganda. Propaganda can take the form ofleaflets, posters, TV, and radio broadcasts and can also extend to any othermedium. In the case of the United States, there is also an important legal (imposed by law) distinction between advertising (a type of overt propaganda) and what theGovernment Accountability Office(GAO), an arm of the United States Congress, refers to as "covert propaganda." Propaganda is divided into two in political situations, they are preparation, meaning to create a new frame of mind or view of things, and operational, meaning they instigate actions.[76]
Roderick Hindery argues[77][78]that propaganda exists on the political left, and right, and in mainstream centrist parties. Hindery further argues that debates about most social issues can be productively revisited in the context of asking "what is or is not propaganda?" Not to be overlooked is the link between propaganda, indoctrination, and terrorism/counterterrorism. He argues that threats to destroy are often as socially disruptive as physical devastation itself.
Since9/11and the appearance of greater media fluidity, propaganda institutions, practices and legal frameworks have been evolving in the US and Britain. Briant shows how this included expansion and integration of the apparatus cross-government and details attempts to coordinate the forms of propaganda for foreign and domestic audiences, with new efforts instrategic communication.[79]These were subject to contestation within theUS Government, resisted byPentagonPublic Affairsand critiqued by some scholars.[42]The National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2013 (section 1078 (a)) amended the US Information and Educational Exchange Act of 1948 (popularly referred to as theSmith-Mundt Act) and the Foreign Relations Authorization Act of 1987, allowing for materials produced by the State Department and theBroadcasting Board of Governors(BBG) to be released within U.S. borders for the Archivist of the United States. The Smith-Mundt Act, as amended, provided that "the Secretary and the Broadcasting Board of Governors shall make available to the Archivist of the United States, for domestic distribution, motion pictures, films, videotapes, and other material 12 years after the initial dissemination of the material abroad (...) Nothing in this section shall be construed to prohibit the Department of State or the Broadcasting Board of Governors from engaging in any medium or form of communication, either directly or indirectly, because a United States domestic audience is or may be thereby exposed to program material, or based on a presumption of such exposure." Public concerns were raised upon passage due to the relaxation of prohibitions of domestic propaganda in the United States.[80]
In the wake of this, the internet has become a prolific method of distributing political propaganda, benefiting from an evolution in coding called bots.Software agentsorbotscan be used for many things, including populating social media withautomated messagesand posts with a range of sophistication. During the2016 U.S. electiona cyber-strategy was implemented using bots to direct US voters to Russian political news and information sources, and to spread politically motivated rumors and false news stories. At this point it is considered commonplace contemporary political strategy around the world to implement bots in achieving political goals.[81]
Common media for transmitting propaganda messages include news reports, government reports, historical revision,junk science, books, leaflets,movies, radio, television, and posters. Some propaganda campaigns follow a strategic transmission pattern toindoctrinatethe target group. This may begin with a simple transmission, such as a leaflet or advertisement dropped from a plane or an advertisement. Generally, these messages will contain directions on how to obtain more information, via a website, hotline, radio program, etc. (as it is seen also for selling purposes among other goals). The strategy intends to initiate the individual from information recipient to information seeker through reinforcement, and then from information seeker toopinion leaderthrough indoctrination.[82]
A number of techniques based insocial psychologicalresearch are used to generate propaganda. Many of these same techniques can be found underlogical fallacies, since propagandists use arguments that, while sometimes convincing, are not necessarily valid.
Some time has been spent analyzing the means by which the propaganda messages are transmitted. That work is important but it is clear that information dissemination strategies become propaganda strategies only when coupled withpropagandistic messages. Identifying these messages is a necessary prerequisite to study the methods by which those messages are spread.
Theodor W. Adornowrote that fascist propaganda encourages identification with anauthoritarian personalitycharacterized by traits such as obedience and extreme aggression.[83]: 17InThe Myth of the State,Ernst Cassirerwrote that while fascist propaganda mythmaking flagrantly contradicted empirical reality, it provided a simple and direct answer to the anxieties of the secular present.[83]: 63
Propaganda can also be turned on its makers. For example, postage stamps have frequently been tools for government advertising, such asNorth Korea's extensive issues.[84]The presence ofStalinon numerous Soviet stamps is another example.[85]InNazi Germany,Hitlerfrequently appeared on postage stamps in Germany and some of the occupied nations. A British program to parody these, and other Nazi-inspired stamps, involved airdropping them into Germany on letters containing anti-Nazi literature.[86][87]
In 2018 a scandal broke in which the journalistCarole Cadwalladr, severalwhistleblowersand the academicEmma Briantrevealed advances in digital propaganda techniques showing that online human intelligence techniques used inpsychological warfarehad been coupled with psychological profiling using illegally obtained social media data for political campaigns in the United States in 2016 to aidDonald Trumpby the firmCambridge Analytica.[88][89][90]The company initially denied breaking laws[91]but later admitted breaking UK law, the scandal provoking a worldwide debate on acceptable use of data for propaganda and influence.[92]
The field ofsocial psychologyincludes the study ofpersuasion. Social psychologists can besociologistsorpsychologists. The field includes many theories and approaches to understanding persuasion. For example, communication theory points out that people can be persuaded by the communicator's credibility, expertise, trustworthiness, and attractiveness. The elaboration likelihood model, as well as heuristic models of persuasion, suggest that a number of factors (e.g., the degree of interest of the recipient of the communication), influence the degree to which people allow superficial factors to persuade them. Nobel Prize–winning psychologistHerbert A. Simonwon the Nobel prize for his theory that people arecognitive misers. That is, in a society of mass information, people are forced to make decisions quickly and often superficially, as opposed to logically.
According toWilliam W. Biddle's 1931 article "A psychological definition of propaganda", "[t]he four principles followed in propaganda are: (1) rely on emotions, never argue; (2) cast propaganda into the pattern of "we" versus an "enemy"; (3) reach groups as well as individuals; (4) hide the propagandist as much as possible."[93]
More recently, studies frombehavioral sciencehave become significant in understanding and planning propaganda campaigns, these include for examplenudge theorywhich was used by theObama Campaign in 2008then adopted by the UK GovernmentBehavioural Insights Team.[94]Behavioural methodologies then became subject to great controversy in 2016 after the companyCambridge Analyticawas revealed to have applied them with millions of people's breached Facebook data to encourage them to vote forDonald Trump.[95]
Haifeng Huang argues that propaganda is not always necessarily about convincing a populace of its message (and may actually fail to do this) but instead can also function as a means of intimidating the citizenry and signalling the regime's strength and ability to maintain its control and power over society; by investing significant resources into propaganda, the regime can forewarn its citizens of its strength and deterring them from attempting to challenge it.[96]
During the 1930s, educators in the United States and around the world became concerned about the rise of anti-Semitism and other forms of violent extremism. TheInstitute for Propaganda Analysiswas formed to introduce methods of instruction for high school and college students, helping learners to recognize and desist propaganda by identifying persuasive techniques. This work built upon classical rhetoric and it was informed bysuggestion theoryand social scientific studies of propaganda and persuasion.[97]In the 1950s, propaganda theory and education examined the rise of American consumer culture, and this work was popularized byVance Packardin his 1957 book,The Hidden Persuaders. European theologianJacques Ellul's landmark work,Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudesframed propaganda in relation to larger themes about the relationship between humans and technology. Media messages did not serve to enlighten or inspire, he argued. They merely overwhelm by arousing emotions and oversimplifying ideas, limiting human reasoning and judgement.
In the 1980s, academics recognized that news and journalism could function as propaganda when business and government interests were amplified by mass media. Thepropaganda modelis a theory advanced byEdward S. HermanandNoam Chomskywhich arguessystemic biasesexist in mass media that are shaped by structural economiccauses. It argues that the way in which commercial media institutions are structured and operate (e.g. through advertising revenue, concentration of media ownership, oraccess to sources) creates an inherentconflict of interestthat make them act as propaganda for powerful political and commercial interests:
The 20th century has been characterized by three developments of great political importance: the growth of democracy, the growth ofcorporate power, and the growth ofcorporate propagandaas a means of protecting corporate power against democracy.[98][99]
First presented in their bookManufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media(1988), thepropaganda modelanalyses commercial mass media as businesses that sell a product – access to readers andaudiences– to other businesses (advertisers) and that benefit from access to information from government and corporate sources to produce their content. The theory postulates five general classes of "filters" that shape the content that is presented in news media:ownershipof the medium, reliance on advertising revenue, access to news sources, threat of litigation and commercial backlash (flak), andanti-communismand "fear ideology". The first three (ownership, funding, and sourcing) are generally regarded by the authors as being the most important. Although the model was based mainly on the characterization of United States media, Chomsky and Herman believe the theory is equally applicable to any country that shares the basicpolitical economicstructure, and the model has subsequently been applied by other scholars to studymedia biasin other countries.[100]
By the 1990s, the topic of propaganda was no longer a part of public education, having been relegated to a specialist subject. Secondary English educators grew fearful of the study of propaganda genres, choosing to focus on argumentation and reasoning instead of the highly emotional forms of propaganda found in advertising and political campaigns.[101]In 2015, the European Commission fundedMind Over Media, a digital learning platform for teaching and learning about contemporary propaganda. The study of contemporary propaganda is growing in secondary education, where it is seen as a part of language arts and social studies education.[102]
Self-propagandais a form of propaganda that refers to the act of an individual convincing themself of something, no matter how irrational that idea may be.[103]Self propaganda makes it easier for individuals to justify their own actions as well as the actions of others. Self-propaganda often works to lessen thecognitive dissonancefelt by individuals when their personal actions or the actions of their government do not line up with their moral beliefs.[104]Self-propaganda is a type ofself deception.[105]Self-propaganda can have a negative impact on those who perpetuate the beliefs created by using self-propaganda.[105]
Of all the potential targets for propaganda, children are the most vulnerable because they are the least prepared with the critical reasoning and contextual comprehension they need to determine whether message is a propaganda or not. The attention children give their environment during development, due to the process of developing their understanding of the world, causes them to absorb propaganda indiscriminately. Also, children are highly imitative: studies byAlbert Bandura,Dorothea Rossand Sheila A. Ross in the 1960s indicated that, to a degree,socialization, formal education and standardized television programming can be seen as using propaganda for the purpose ofindoctrination. The use of propaganda in schools was highly prevalent during the 1930s and 1940s in Germany in the form of theHitler Youth.
InNazi Germany, the education system was thoroughly co-opted to indoctrinate the German youth withanti-Semiticideology. From the 1920s on, the Nazi Partytargeted German youthas one of their special audience for its propaganda messages.[106]Schools and texts mirrored what the Nazis aimed of instilling in German youth through the use and promotion of racial theory.Julius Streicher, the editor ofDer Stürmer, headed a publishing house that disseminated anti-Semitic propaganda picture books in schools during the Nazi dictatorship. This was accomplished through theNational Socialist Teachers League, of which 97% of all German teachers were members in 1937.[107]
The League encouraged the teaching of racial theory. Picture books for children such asTrust No Fox on his Green Heath and No Jew on his Oath,Der Giftpilz(translated into English asThe Poisonous Mushroom) andThe Poodle-Pug-Dachshund-Pinscherwere widely circulated (over 100,000 copies ofTrust No Fox... were circulated during the late 1930s) and contained depictions of Jews as devils, child molesters and other morally charged figures. Slogans such as "Judas the Jew betrayed Jesus the German to the Jews" were recited in class. During the Nuremberg Trial,Trust No Fox on his Green Heath and No Jew on his Oath, andDer Giftpilzwere received as documents in evidence because they document the practices of the Nazis[108]The following is an example of a propagandistic math problem recommended by the National Socialist Essence of Education: "The Jews are aliens in Germany—in 1933 there were 66,606,000 inhabitants in the German Reich, of whom 499,682 (0.75%) were Jews."[109]
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State mediaare typically understood as media outlets that are owned, operated, or significantly influenced by the government.[1]They are distinguished frompublic service media, which are designed to serve the public interest, operate independently of government control, and are financed through a combination of public funding, licensing fees, and sometimes advertising. The crucial difference lies in the level of independence from government influence and the commitment to serving a broad public interest rather than the interests of a specific political party or government agenda.[1][2][3]
State media serve as tools for public diplomacy and narrative shaping. These media outlets can broadcast via television, radio, print, and increasingly on social media, to convey government viewpoints to domestic and international audiences. The approach to using state media can vary, focusing on positive narratives, adjusting narratives retroactively, or spreading misinformation through sophisticated social media campaigns.[4]
State media is also referred to media entities that are administered, funded, managed, or directly controlled by thegovernmentof a country.[5]Three factors that can affect the independence of state media over time are: funding, ownership/governance, and editorial autonomy.[5]These entities can range from being completely state-controlled, where the government has full control over their funding, management, and editorial content, to being independentpublic service media, which, despite receiving government funding, operate with editorial autonomy and are governed by structures designed to protect them from direct political interference.[5]
State media is often associated with authoritarian governments that use state media to control, influence, and limit information.[6]
Its content, according to some sources, is usually more prescriptive, telling the audience what to think, particularly as it is under no pressure to attract high ratings or generate advertising revenue[7]and therefore may cater to the forces in control of the state as opposed to the forces in control of the corporation, as described in thepropaganda modelof the mass media. In more controlled regions, the state maycensorcontent which it deems illegal, immoral or unfavorable to the government and likewise regulate any programming related to the media; therefore, it is not independent of the governing party.[8]In this type of environment, journalists may be required to be members or affiliated with the ruling party, such as in theEastern Blocformer Socialist States theSoviet Union,ChinaorNorth Korea.[7]Within countries that have high levels ofgovernment interferencein the media, it may use the state press forpropagandapurposes:
Additionally, the state-controlled media may only report on legislation after it has already become law to stifle any debate.[9]The media legitimizes its presence by emphasizing "national unity" against domestic or foreign "aggressors".[10]In more open and competitive contexts, the state may control or fund its own outlet and is in competition with opposition-controlled and/or independent media. The state media usually have less government control in more open societies and can provide more balanced coverage than media outside of state control.[11]
State media outlets usually enjoy increased funding and subsidies compared to private media counterparts, but this can create inefficiency in the state media.[12]However, in thePeople's Republic of China, where state control of the media is high, levels of funding have been reduced for state outlets, which have forcedChinese Communist Partymedia to sidestep official restrictions on content or publish "soft" editions, such as weekend editions, to generate income.[13]
State media can be classified based on their relationship to the state, including factors such as ownership, editorial independence, funding, and political alignment. This framework is commonly used by media watchdogs, and international organizations to assess press freedom, transparency, and the role of media in democratic or authoritarian regimes.[14][15][1]
Two contrasting theories of state control of the media exist; the public interest or Pigouvian theory states that government ownership is beneficial, whereas the public choice theory suggests that state control undermineseconomicandpolitical freedoms.
Thepublic interest theory, also referred to as the Pigouvian theory,[16][needs update]states that government ownership of media is desirable.[17]Three reasons are offered. Firstly, the dissemination of information is a public good, and to withhold it would be costly even if it is not paid for. Secondly, the cost of the provision and dissemination of information is high, but once costs are incurred, marginal costs for providing the information are low and so are subject to increasing returns.[18]Thirdly, state media ownership can be less biased, more complete and accurate if consumers are ignorant and in addition to private media that would serve the governing classes.[18]However, Pigouvian economists, who advocate regulation andnationalisation, are supportive of free and private media.[19]Public interest theory holds that when operated correctly, government ownership of media is a public good that benefits the nation in question.[20]It contradicts the belief that all state media is propaganda and argues that most states require an unbiased, easily accessible, and reliable stream of information.[20]Public interest theory suggests that the only way to maintain an independent media is to cut it off from any economic needs, therefore a state-run media organization can avoid issues associated with private media companies, namely the prioritization of the profit motive.[21][verification needed]State media can be established as a mean for the state to provide a consistent news outlet while private news companies operate as well. The benefits and detriments of this approach often depend on the editorial independence of the media organization from the government.[22]
Many criticisms of public interest theory center on the possibility of true editorial independence from the state.[20]While there is little profit motive, the media organization must be funded by the government instead which can create a dependency on the government's willingness to fund an entity may often be critical of their work.[6]The reliability of a state-run media outlet is often heavily dependent on the reliability of the state to promote a free press, many state-run media outlets in western democracies are capable of providing independent journalism while others in authoritarian regimes become mouthpieces for the state to legitimize their actions.[20]
Thepublic choice theoryasserts that state-owned media would manipulate and distort information in favor of the ruling party and entrench its rule and prevent the public from making informed decisions, which undermines democratic institutions.[18]That would prevent private and independent media, which provide alternate voices allowing individuals to choose politicians, goods, services, etc. without fear from functioning. Additionally, that would inhibit competition among media firms that would ensure that consumers usually acquire unbiased, accurate information.[18]Moreover, this competition is part of a checks-and-balances system of ademocracy, known as theFourth Estate, along with thejudiciary,executiveandlegislature.[18]States are dependent on the public for their legitimacy that allows them to operate.[23]The flow of information becomes critical to their survival, and public choice theory argues that states cannot be expected to ignore their own interests, and instead the sources of information must remain as independent from the state as possible.[20]Public choice theory argues that the only way to retain independence in a media organization is to allow the public to seek the best sources of information themselves.[24]This approach is effective at creating a free press that is capable of criticizing government institutions and investigating incidents of government corruption.[20]
Those critical of the public choice theory argue that the economic incentives involved in a public business force media organizations to stray from unbiased journalism and towards sensationalist editorials in order to capture public interest.[25]This has become a debate over the effectiveness of media organizations that are reliant on the attention of the public.[25]Sensationalism becomes the key focus and turns away from stories in the public interest in favor of stories that capture the attention of the most people.[24]The focus on sensationalism and public attention can lead to the dissemination of misinformation to appease their consumer base.[24]In these instances, the goal of providing accurate information to the public collapses and instead becomes biased toward a dominant ideology.[24]
Both theories have implications regarding the determinants and consequences of ownership of the media.[26]The public interest theory suggests that more benign governments should have higher levels of control of the media which would in turn increasepress freedomas well as economic and political freedoms. Conversely, the public choice theory affirms that the opposite is true - "public spirited", benevolent governments should have less control which would increase these freedoms.[27]
Generally, state ownership of the media is found in poor,autocraticnon-democratic countries with highly interventionist governments that have some interest in controlling the flow of information.[28]Countries with "weak" governments do not possess the political will to break up state media monopolies.[29]Media control is also usually consistent with state ownership in theeconomy.[30]
As of 2002, the press in most ofEurope(with the exception ofBelarus,RussiaandUkraine) is mostly private and free of state control and ownership, along withNorthand South America (with the exception ofCubaandVenezuela)[31]The press "role" in the national and societal dynamics of theUnited StatesandAustraliahas virtually always been the responsibility of the private commercial sector since these countries' earliest days.[32]Levels of state ownership are higher in someAfricancountries, theMiddle Eastand someAsiancountries (with the exception ofJapan,India,Indonesia,Mongolia,Nepal, thePhilippines,South KoreaandThailandwhere large areas of private press exist.) Full state monopolies exist inChina,Myanmar, andNorth Korea.[31]
Issues with state media include complications withpress freedomandjournalistic objectivity. According to Christopher Walker in theJournal of Democracy, "authoritarianortotalitarianmedia outlets" take advantage of both domestic and foreign media due to state censorship in their native countries and the openness of democratic nations to which they broadcast. He cites China'sCCTV, Russia'sRT, and Venezuela'sTeleSURas examples.[33]Surveys find that state-ownedtelevision in Russiais viewed by the Russian public as one of the country's most authoritative and trusted institutions.[34][35]
Nations such as Denmark, Norway and Finland that have both the highest degree of freedom of press andpublic broadcastingmedia. Compared to most autocratic nations which attempt to limit press freedom to control the spread of information.[6]A 2003 study found that government ownership of media organizations was associated with worse democratic outcomes.[20]
"Worse outcomes" are associated with higher levels of state ownership of the media, which would reject Pigouvian theory.[37]The news media are more independent and fewer journalists are arrested, detained or harassed in countries with less state control.[38]Harassment, imprisonment and higher levels ofinternet censorshipoccur in countries with high levels of state ownership such asSingapore,Belarus,Myanmar,Ethiopia, thePeople's Republic of China,Iran,Syria,TurkmenistanandUzbekistan.[38][39]Countries with a total state monopoly in the media likeNorth KoreaandLaosexperience a "Castro effect", where state control is powerful enough that no journalistic harassment is required in order to restrict press freedom.[38]Historically, state media also existed during theCold Warin authoritarian states such as theSoviet Union,East Germany,Republic of China (Taiwan),Poland,Romania,BrazilandIndonesia.
The public interest theory claims state ownership of the press enhancescivil and political rights; whilst under the public choice theory, it curtails them by suppressing public oversight of the government and facilitatingpolitical corruption. High to absolute government control of the media is primarily associated with lower levels of political and civil rights, higher levels of corruption, quality of regulation, security of property andmedia bias.[39][40]State ownership of the press can compromise election monitoring efforts and obscure the integrity of electoral processes.[41]Independent media sees higher oversight by the media of the government. For example, reporting of corruption increased inMexico,GhanaandKenyaafter restrictions were lifted in the 1990s, but government-controlled media defended officials.[42][43]Heavily influenced state media can provide corrupt regimes with a method to combat efforts by protestors.[6]Propaganda spread by state-media organizations can detract from accurate reporting and provide an opportunity for a regime to influence public sentiment.[20]Mass protests against governments considered to be authoritarian, such as those in China, Russia, Egypt, and Iran are often distorted by state-run media organizations in order to defame protesters and provide a positive light on the government's actions.[6][44][45][46]
It is common for countries with strict control of newspapers to have fewer firms listed per capita on their markets[47]and less developed banking systems.[48]These findings support the public choice theory, which suggests higher levels of state ownership of the press would be detrimental to economic and financial development.[39]This is due to state media being commonly associated with autocratic regimes where economic freedom is severely restricted and there is a large amount of corruption within the economic and political system.[25]
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Transparency International e.V.(TI) is a Germanregistered associationfounded in 1993 by former employees of theWorld Bank. Based inBerlin, itsnonprofitand non-governmental purpose is to take action to combat global[1]corruptionwith civil societalanti-corruptionmeasures and toprevent criminal activitiesarising from corruption. Its most notable publications include theGlobal Corruption Barometerand theCorruption Perceptions Index. TI serves as anumbrella organization. From 1993 to today, its membership has grown from a few individuals to more than 100 national chapters, which engage in fighting perceivedcorruptionin their home countries.[2][3]TI is a member ofG20Think Tanks,[4]UNESCOConsultative Status,[5]United Nations Global Compact,[6]Sustainable Development Solutions Network[7]and shares the goals of peace, justice, strong institutions and partnerships of theUnited Nations Sustainable Development Group (UNSDG).[8]TI is a social partner ofGlobal Alliance in Management Education.[9]TI confirmed the dis-accreditation of the national chapter ofUnited States of Americain 2017.[10]
According to the2016 Global Go To Think Tank Index Report, TI was number 9 of 100 in theTop Think Tanks Worldwide (non-U.S.)category and number 27 of 150 in theTop Think Tanks Worldwide (U.S. and non-U.S.)category.[11]
Transparency International was founded on 9 February 1993 inThe Hague,Netherlands; it was formally registered on 15 June 1993 inBerlin,Germany. According to political scientist Ellen Gutterman, "TI's presence in Germany, and indeed its organizational development and rise from a small operation to a prominent internationalTNGO[Transnational Non Governmental Organisation], benefited from the activities and personal connections of at least three key German individuals:Peter Eigen, Hansjoerg Elshorst, and Michael Wiehen".[12]
The founding members included:[13][14]
In 1995, TI developed the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI). The CPI ranked nations on the prevalence of corruption within each country, based upon surveys of business people. The CPI was subsequently published annually. It was initially criticized for poor methodology and unfair treatment of developing nations, while also being praised for highlighting corruption and embarrassing governments.[21]
Starting in 1999 and ending in 2011, TI published theBribe Payers Index(BPI) which ranked nations according to the perceived likelihood that a country'smultinational corporationswould offer bribes.[21]Spokesperson Shubham Kaushik said the organization "decided to discontinue the survey due to funding issues and to focus on issues that are more in line with our advocacy goals".[22]TheJournal of Business Ethicsstates "Bribery in international business transactions can be seen as a function of not only the demand for such bribes in different countries, but the supply, or willingness to provide bribes by multinational firms and their representatives. This study addresses the propensity of firms from 30 different countries to engage in international bribery".[23]
Since 2005, TI has published thirteen Exporting Corruption reports. Exporting Corruption is a research report that rates the bribery-related performance of leading global exporters, including countries that are signatories ofOECD Anti-Bribery Convention.[24]
In April 2015Russia'sMinistry of Justiceadded TI to the so-called list of"foreign agents".[25]On 6 March 2023, TI was declared anundesirable organizationinRussia.[26]
Since 2023 TI partners withChatBotand utilisesartificial intelligencetechnology on its website to enhance its digital engagement and support transparency initiatives at scale.[27]
Transparency International is the global civil society organization leading the fight against corruption. It brings people together in a powerful worldwide coalition to end the devastating impact of corruption on men, women and children around the world. TI's mission is to create change towards a world free of corruption.[28]
The organization defines corruption as the abuse of entrusted power for private gain which eventually hurts everyone who depends on the integrity of people in a position of authority.[29]It develops tools for fighting corruption and works with other civil society organizations, companies and governments to implement them. Since 1995, TI has issued an annualCorruption Perceptions Index(CPI); it also publishes aGlobal Corruption Report, aGlobal Corruption Barometer, and a Bribe Payers Index. In 2010, TI developed a five-year strategy with six strategic priorities organized by the following categories: People, Institutions, Laws, Values, Network, Impact.[30]In 2015, TI developed a five-year strategy which sets out their collective ambition for the coming years.Together against Corruption: Transparency International Strategy 2020is a strategy by and for the TI movement. This strategy is based on more than 1500 external and internal contributions addressing both the corruption environment of today and the one TI anticipates in the years ahead.[31]
The Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) ranks countries and territories based on how corrupt their public sector is perceived to be. It is a composite index – a combination of polls – drawing on corruption-related data collected by a variety of reputable institutions. The CPI reflects the views of observers from around the world.[32]
The Corruption Perceptions Index has been criticised for measuringperceptionand not "reality". The creators of the index argue that "perceptions matter in their own right, since... firms and individuals take actions based on perceptions".[33]
First held in 1983, the International Anti-Corruption Conference (IACC) is a series of internationalconferencesorganised by the IACC Council, in association with local governments and organisations, with TI as its secretariat.[34]The conferences take place every two years in different countries.
Since 2016, TI has partnered with theOrganized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project(OCCRP). The partnership enables knowledge and evidence gathered through OCCRP's corruption investigations to inform TI's policy and legal advocacy.[35]The programme is co-funded by three governments, including the US, and private donors.[36]
According to its 2012 Annual Report, Transparency International is funded by western governments (with almost €5 million from the UK government) and several multinational companies, including oil companiesExxon MobilandShell, hedge fundsKKRandWermuthAsset Management,DeloitteandErnst & Young.[42]Exxon Mobil itself was ranked in 2008 as the least transparent of 42 major oil and gas firms.[43]
TI's leadership structure includes an advisory council, a group of individuals with extensive experience in TI's work. Drawn from diverse geographical, cultural and professional backgrounds, council members are appointed by the TI board of directors to advise them and to support the work of the organization as a whole.[44]
Former head of technology Daniel Eriksson was appointed interim managing director in March 2020,[45]and became CEO a year later.[46]In October 2024, he announced he would be stepping down as CEO in January 2025.[47][48]Maíra Martini succeeded him, taking office on 1 February 2025.[49]
Transparency International consists of chapters – locally established, independent organizations – that address corruption in their respective countries. From small bribes to large-scale looting, corruption differs from country to country. As chapters are staffed with local experts they are ideally placed to determine the priorities and approaches best suited to tackling corruption in their countries. This work ranges from visiting rural communities to provide free legal support to advising their government on policy reform. Corruption does not stop at national borders. The chapters play a crucial role in shaping its collective work and realising its regional and global goals, such as Strategy 2015. Transparency International's multi-country research and advocacy initiatives are driven by the chapters.
According to the newspaperLe Monde: "In its main surveys, Transparency International does not measure the weight of corruption in economic terms for each country. It develops a Corruption Perception Index (CPI) based on surveys conducted by private structures or other NGOs: theEconomist Intelligence Unit, backed by the British liberal weekly newspaperThe Economist, the American neoconservative organizationFreedom House, theWorld Economic Forum, or large corporations. (...) The IPC ignores corruption cases that concern the business world. So, the collapse ofLehman Brothers(2008) or the manipulation of the money market reference rate (Libor) by major British banks revealed in 2011 did not affect the ratings of theUnited StatesorUnited Kingdom." The organization also receives funding from companies that are themselves convicted of corruption offences.[50]CPI's reliance on opinions of a relatively small group of experts and businesspeople, has been criticised by some. Alex Cobham, fellow at theCenter for Global Development, states that it "embeds a powerful and misleading elite bias in popular perceptions of corruption". Others argue it is not plausible to ever measure the true scale and depth of a highly complex issue like corruption with a single number, and then rank countries accordingly.[51]
At its annual members' meeting in November 2013 in Berlin, TI's national chapters from Germany and Ireland proposed a resolution calling for the "end of the prosecution ofEdward J. Snowden... He should be recognized as awhistleblowerfor his help to reveal the over-reaching and unlawful surveillance by secret services...He symbolizes the courage of numerous other whistleblowers around the world."[52]
The final resolution that was passed by the plenary excluded any reference to Snowden, and excluded a call for "comprehensive protection on whistleblowers from all forms of retaliation". The original resolution was weakened following the intervention of the USA chapter.[53]Five months earlier, in June 2013, representatives from TI met Snowden at the Moscow airport, where he asked for political asylum in Russia.[54]
In January 2015 it was reported that TI accepted $3 million from the German engineering multinationalSiemens, which in 2008 paid one of the largest corporate corruption fines[55]in history – $1.6 billion – for bribing government officials in numerous countries. In 2014, Siemens made the donation to TI after pleading guilty in 2008 to bribery charges relating to widespread corrupt practices in Greece, Norway, Iraq, Vietnam, Italy, Israel, Argentina, Venezuela, China and Russia.[56]
TI applied for and received the funding from Siemens, even though TI's due diligence procedures[57]prohibit the organization from accepting money from corporations that want to "greenwash" their reputations by making donations to TI. "If any corporate donor is accused of having been involved in corruption, the donor can expect no protection from TI," the procedures state. Transparency International received the funding from theSiemens Integrity Initiative[58]about a year after theInitiativehired former TI staffer Jana Mittermaier, raising questions of a "revolving door" that has benefited both the organization and the company.
Several of TI's national chapters also have accepted money from Siemens: $660,000 for TI USA, $600,000 for TI Italy, $450,000 for TI Bulgaria, and $230,000 for TI Mexico – each for a period of three years. "This really shows that Transparency International is not as pure as people think," a TI insider told Corporate Crime Reporter. TI's then managing director,Cobus de Swardt, said, "We did not file an application to Siemens, we applied to the Siemens Integrity Initiative. There's a difference. We have not applied to Siemens." However, according to Siemens, the money for these grants is "provided by Siemens".[59][60][61]
In August 2015 former TI staffer Anna Buzzoni went public regarding retaliation she and her colleagues faced after reporting to managers questionable financial dealings at TI's Water Integrity Network.[62]Two of Buzzoni's project responsibilities were suspended and she was transferred against her will. She left TI shortly before internal whistleblower guidelines were adopted in June 2014.[63]
Due to a "lack of confidence", TI's chapter inCroatiawas disaccredited by the organization's board of directors in November 2015.[64]The previous year, several leaders of the Croatia chapter challenged the legality of the chapter president's election. The president was accused of falsifying records,conflicts of interest, and arbitrarily expelling 10 chapter members who opposed the hiring of staff against the organization's rules. The Croatian government eventually revoked the president's appointment.[65]
In January 2017, the TI Secretariat confirmed that its International Board of Directors decided on 10 January 2017 to strip its US affiliate – Transparency International USA – of its accreditation as the National Chapter in the United States.[10]The stated basis for the dis-accreditation was the board's recognition of differences in philosophies, strategies, and priorities between the former chapter and the Transparency International Movement. Elsewhere, it was reported that TI-USA came to be seen in the United States as a corporate front group, funded by multinational corporations. TI-USA's funding was provided byBechtel Corporation, Deloitte, Google,Pfizer($50,000 or more),Citigroup, ExxonMobil, Fluor,General Electric,Lockheed Martin, Marsh & McLennan,PepsiCo,PricewaterhouseCoopers,Raytheon, Realogy, Tyco ($25,000–$49,999), and Freeport-McMoRan andJohnson & Johnson(up to $24,999).[66]TI-USA previously awarded an annual corporate leadership award to one of its big corporate funders. In 2016, this award went to Bechtel. In April 2015 the Secretariat defended the decision by TI-USA to giveHillary Clintonits Integrity Award in 2012.[67]Since January 1, 2020, Transparency International has an office in the United States.[68]
In 2017,Cobus de Swardtstood down as TI's managing director, following a dispute with the organisation's board of directors. De Swardt agreed a settlement with TI in a Labour Court in Berlin.[69]
In August 2019, accounts from seven current and former TI Secretariat staff were reported inThe Guardianalleging a "toxic" workplace culture at the organisation.[70]
De Swardt's successor,Patricia Moreira, left in 2020 after making similar accusations to those of De Swardt, accusing the Board of failing to protect whistleblowers, as well as corruption.
The German newspaperFrankfurter Allgemeine Zeitungreported that TI dismissed Moreira "without giving any reasons".[71]The article added that, "dozens of employees, including high-ranking ones, have left the organisation in recent years. Even long-standing and deeply committed employees complain that TI is involved in political intrigues in which some are only interested in their own progress. For a non-governmental organization whose goal is to fight corruption around the world, and which collects millions of dollars in funding from governments and companies every year, this is a disturbing finding."[72]Investigations specialist Harriet Witchell has stated that the TI board’s handling of the complaints process was beset by conflicts of interest and failed to address allegations of misconduct made against the board.[73]
In 2021, de Swardt published a book accusing TI ofabuse of powerand silencing whistleblowers.[74]De Swardt also presented a video published on YouTube by his publisher,Springer, criticising corruption at TI.[75]
TI's political impartiality, as well as its own transparency, have been called into question over hacked conversations of prosecutors inOperation Car Wash, leaked toThe Intercept.[76][77]In these, chief prosecutorDeltan Dallagnoland head of TI Brazil, Bruno Brandão, discuss a "backstage campaign" to "disarm resistance on the left", fund selected candidates, and target others, seen as adversaries, using social media. Plans extended to preparing a series of false accusations ("denúncias sem materialidade") intended to damage the reputation of former president and potential candidateLuiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and lead up to a chat in which participants celebrate the election ofJair Bolsonaro.[78][79]
In April 2022, Brazil's auditing court announced that it had opened an investigation against TI over the illegal imprisonment of Lula da Silva.[80]
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Ineconomics, amarketistransparentif much is known by many about: What products and services orcapital assetsareavailable,market depth(quantity available), whatprice, and where. Transparency is important since it is one of the theoretical conditions required for afree marketto beefficient. Price transparency can, however, lead to higher prices. For example, if it makes sellers reluctant to give steep discounts to certain buyers (e.g. disrupting price dispersion among buyers), or if it facilitates collusion, and pricevolatilityis another concern.[1]A high degree of market transparency can result indisintermediationdue to the buyer's increased knowledge of supply pricing.
There are two types of price transparency: 1) I know what price will be charged to me, and 2) I know what price will be charged to you. The two types of price transparency have different implications for differential pricing.[2]A transparent market should also provide necessary information about quality and other product features,[3]although quality can be exceedingly difficult to estimate for some goods, such as artworks.[4]
While the stock market is relatively transparent,hedge fundsare notoriously secretive. Researchers in this area have found concerns by hedge funds about the crowding out of their trades through transparency and undesirable effects of incomplete transparency.[5]Some financial professionals, including Wall Street veteranJeremy Frommerare pioneering the application of transparency to hedge funds by broadcasting live from trading desks and posting detailed portfolios online.[citation needed]
In theUnited States, the goal of the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) is to foster greater transparency in business ownership within the United States. By mandating companies to disclose their beneficial owners to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), the CTA aims to curb illicit financial activities such as money laundering and terrorist financing.[citation needed]This requirement seeks to enhance accountability and deter the misuse of anonymous shell corporations for unlawful purposes. Ultimately, the CTA seeks to promote integrity in corporate governance and bolster confidence in the U.S. financial system by ensuring that the true individuals behind corporate entities are known and accountable.[citation needed]
There is a rich literature in accounting that takes a critical perspective to market transparency, focusing on the nuances and boundaries.[6][7]For example, some researchers question its utility (e.g. Etzioni[8]). This also connects to the performativity of quantitative models[9]or "reactivity".[10]Specific cases include transparency in theart market.[11]There are also studies from finance that note concerns with market transparency, such as perverse effects including decreased market liquidity and increased price volatility.[1]This is one motivation for markets that are selectively transparent, such as "dark pools".[12]
Dynamics of transparency may also differ between investment markets,cambistmarkets where goods trade without being used up,[13][14]and other types of markets, e.g. goods and services.
Infair value accounting(FVA), transparency may be complicated by the fact that level 2 and 3 assets cannot strictly bemarked-to-market, given that no direct market exists, creating questions about what transparency means for these assets. Level 2 assets may bemarked-to-model, a topic of interest in thesocial studies of finance,[15][9]while Level 3 assets may require inputs including management expectations or assumptions.
There are few markets that require the level of privacy, honesty, and trust between its participants as the Forex (FX) market. This creates great obstacles for traders, investors, and institutions to overcome as there is a lack of transparency, leading to the need to develop trust with trading partners and developing these relationships through social means, such as "gifts of information", which is even seen on the trading floors of global investment banks that service institutional investors.[13]
With little to no transparency, trader's ability to verify transactions becomes virtually impossible, at least if one does not have faith that the market exchange is operating in a well-run fashion, a problem that is unlikely with the major brokerage services open to institutional investors (e.g. Reuters, Bloomberg, and Telerate). In a situation with a problematic market exchange lacking transparency, there would be no trust between the client and the broker, yet surprisingly, there is nonetheless demand to trade in dark pools.[12]This has also become an area of financial innovation.
Forex markets are now also a target for newblockchaininnovations, which would allow trading outside of centralized exchanges or change the way these exchanges operate.[16][17]
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Transparency of media ownershiprefers to the public availability of accurate, comprehensive and up-to-date information aboutmediaownership structures. A legal regime guaranteeing transparency of media ownership makes possible for the public as well as for media authorities to find out who effectively owns, controls and influences the media as well as media influence on political parties or state bodies.
Transparency of media ownership is an essential component of any democratic media system. Experts, European organisations and NGOs agree that transparency of media ownership is crucial formedia pluralismand democracy[1]as, for instance, it provides the knowledge to take steps to addressmedia concentrationandconflict of interests. Moreover, public knowledge of media owners' identities can prevent abuses of media power, such as corruption in the media system, opaquemedia privatisation,undue influences over the media, etc., and makes possible that such abuses are recognised, assessed, publicised, debated and prevented.[2]Transparency also ensures that ordinary citizens can be informed about the identity, interests and influences behind contents and news they consume, and that media market can function on a fair basis, especially, for instance, for new entrants in the market.[1]Moreover, transparency of media ownership facilitates the public knowledge on the media environment; makes possible a critical assessment of the contents produced and strengthens debate on the way the media system operates.[2]The importance of transparency of media ownership for any democratic and pluralist society has been broadly recognised by theEuropean Parliament, theEuropean Commission's High-Level Group on Media Freedom and Pluralism[1]and theCouncil of Europe. In the last years, there has been an unprecedented debate at the global level around company ownership transparency which has been addressed, for example, by theOpen Government Partnershipand by theG8governments in a 2014 statement setting the principles on media ownership transparency.[3]In 2016, following the so-called "Panama Papers" scandal, the lack of records held by the Panama-based legal firm Mossack Fonseca, transparency of company ownership gained momentum in the public debate.[4]
To ensure that the public knows who effectively owns and influences the media, national legal frameworks should ensure the disclosure of at least the following essential basic information: name and contact details of the media outlets; constitutional documents; size of shareholdings over a given threshold; name and contact details of direct owners with a given percentage of shareholding; identity of the persons with indirect control or have a significant interest in a given media company; citizenship/residence status of individuals with at least a certain shareholding percentage; country of domicile of company with at least a given shareholding percentage. Importantly, to understand who really owns and controls a specific media outlet it is necessary to check who is beyond the official shareholdings and scrutinise indirect, controlling and beneficial ownership which refers on shares of a media company hold on behalf of another person.[2]
To be meaningful and easily accessible by the citizens and national media authorities, this information should be updated, searchable, free and reusable.[2]
Transparency of media ownership remains difficult to fulfill in most of European countries.[5]While some EU member States have legislation ensuring transparency of media ownership in compliance to the best international standards, such legislation is still lacking in many member States and in some cases national legislation allows for hidden or indirect media ownership. A recent 2015 resolution by the Parliamentary Assembly of theCouncil of Europe, notes with concern that media outlets are frequently owned and controlled in an opaque-manner. This is due either to the lack of national transparency provisions or to non-transparent indirect or hidden ownership schemes, often linked to political, economic or religious interests and affiliations.[5]
Transparency of media ownership corroborates some constitutional guarantees and individual rights which are strictly related to the inclusiveness and openness of the democratic process, in particularmedia pluralismandFreedom of Expression. Even if media ownership transparency is not directly addressed in key international human rights charters, transparency is a basic precondition for the effective exercise of freedom of expression and the right to obtain information enshrined in Article 19 of theInternational Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Article 10 of theEuropean Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), and Article 11.1 of theEU Charter of Fundamental Rights.Indeed, access to information is crucial for the good functioning of democratic societies as it enables citizens to make informed decisions and choices on social, political, economic issues affecting personal and collective life. Specifically, transparency of media ownership contributes to make the public to establish who provides the information on which to shape personal and collective choices as, for instance, knowledge of the identity and interests of the messenger can help individuals in appraising the information spread through the media.
Guidelines and milestones on what media ownership transparency might entails can be found in non-bindingCouncil of Europedocuments, in particular on theCommittee of Ministers' Recommendation R(94) 13 on Measures to Promote Media Transparency and Recommendation (2007)2onMedia Pluralism and Diversity of Media Content.[6]According to this recommendations, to understand who and how effectively owns or control the media the public should be in the condition of accessing the following information:
Another non-binding document on media ownership transparency is a 2008 Resolution from theEuropean Parliamentwhich encourages the "disclosure of ownership of all media outlets to help achieve greater transparency regarding the aims and background of the broadcasters and publishers".[7]
According to experts and organisation advocating for media ownership transparency, such asAccess-Info Europe, a human rights NGO dedicated to promoting theright to access to informationin Europe, to understand who and how effectively owns or control the media, it is crucial that information provided to comprehend and assess media ownership structures are regularly updated, consistent and searchable.[8]Also, citizens should be able to get information on all types of media actors in a given countries, whether print, broadcast, or online, foreign or domestic.
In Europe, transparency of media ownership is infrequently addressed directly in domestic constitutions, and even when this happens, as in the case of Italy, Romania or Turkey, constitutional provisions do not impose a specific positive obligation on the state to ensure that citizens have access to information on media ownership. The lack ofad hoclegal provisions on media ownership transparency is partially explained with the fact that often the existing laws have been established with the aim of fulfilling other regulatory objectives, such as providing information tomedia regulatorsor for company law purposes. In many European countries,freedom of information legislationprovides the basis for requesting information from competent agencies and public bodies. As a consequence, often media ownership transparency aimed at fulfilling the objective of primarily informing the public on media ownership structure is therefore often a byproduct of other measures.
When assessing the state of media ownership transparency, five dimensions should be taken into account to establish who and how controls the media in a given country:
Operationally many options are possible to guarantee the disclosure of information on media ownership. A simple approach is to call upon media outlets to publish relevant ownership information on an accessible website displayed or linked in the organisation's publications, transmissions or website. Alternatively, or in addition, an accessible, easy-to-navigate and searchable online database on transparency of media ownership can be developed by an independent body. In both cases, to be effective and functional, databases should be regularly updated. Also, to make possible comparisons across countries, a systematic approach to collect, record and share information should be set up, connections and interoperability among national databases should be pursued and shared standards for exchanging data on transparency of media ownership should be developed.[8]
Transparency of media ownership is deeply interrelated with the concepts ofmedia pluralismandmedia concentrationand is an essential component of government obligations to guarantee a diverse and plural media environment.[9]
Specifically, media ownership transparency is crucial for promotingmedia pluralism, a principle set forth in theEuropean Convention on Human Rights(ECHR) which entails a positive obligation for the state to "put in place an appropriate legislative and administrative framework to guarantee effective pluralism".[10][11]One of the way for guaranteeing media pluralism is to ensure a wide diversity of media ownership, which is a necessary but not sufficient condition for pluralism. Media ownership is also important in terms of pluralism as it might affects media outputs and contents while transparency empowers readers to detect and appraise owners influences on the media and its contents. TheEuropean Commission's study on Indicators for Media Pluralism (2009) recognises transparency of media ownership and/or control as a key indicators of media pluralism. Also, media ownership transparency is essential for preventing concentration of media power which can unduly influence public opinion and the political debate.[12]Precisely, transparency of media ownership is a precondition for assessing levels of concentration or other dimensions of diversity in a given media system.[11]Indeed, if readers don't know who the real owners of media companies are, it is difficult to envisage measures to addressmedia concentrationsas well asconflict of interests.[9]
The need to collect and make available to the public crucial information on media ownership, in particularbeneficial ownershipwhich in this context refers on shares of a media company held on behalf of another person, is frequently debated in Europe, but there are no agreed standards or binding commitments. In June 2013, governments of theG8Group adopted the "Lough Erne Declaration" which included a commitment to make transparent thebeneficial ownershipof companies recognising the need to make this information available to relevant authorities to prevent misuse of companies. The declaration was followed by a November 2014 statement byG20leaders setting the principles on media ownership transparency. In April 2016, following the lack of records held by the Panama-based legal firmMossack Fonseca(the "Panama Papers"), the UK, Germany, France, Italy and Spain reached an agreement for easing the automatic exchange of information ofbeneficial ownershipof companies and trusts. The five countries concerned also urged the remaining G20 countries calling for progress towards a global system for exchanging such information, to be developed, for instance, by theOECD.[3][4]Even if these commitments are not specifically related to the media sector, they are important steps towards the disclosure of beneficial owners of companies, including the media ones. At theEuropean Unionlevel, theEuropean Commissionis working to improve the beneficial ownership provisions included in the4th Anti-Money Laundering Directive, adopted in 2015 and currently in the process of being transposed byEU Member Statesinto national law.[4]
There is a group of three constitutional provisions that are relevant when it comes to transparency of media ownership:
Constitutional provisions recognising freedom of speech and access to information are widely included in national constitutions across Europe, and, even if they are general in nature and scope, they potentially lay the ground for media ownership transparency legislation. For instance, this is the case ofNorwaythat shaped theNorwegian Media Ownership Acton the basis of the obligations enshrined in the constitution. In addition, constitutional provisions, which vary from country to country, do not ensure transparency of media ownership as this depends on how broadly they are construed and then implemented. This is particular relevant when the constitution does not impose a positive obligation upon the state, but simply provides the option of disclosing media ownership transparency data. Constitutions, in some cases, are more focused on disclosure of information to the government or other public body than disclosure directly to the citizens. In this case, theright to access informationbecomes highly relevant as it is the ground for accessing media ownership data.[8]
There is a noticeable variation across Europe concerning the extent and the type of the media sectors involved (i.e. the broadcasting sector; print and online sectors) in the provisions regulating media ownership disclosure to public bodies, which in many cases is a dedicated media authority. A crucial issue for media ownership transparency is whether and how the information provided to public authorities is comprehensive, meaningful, updated and easily accessible to the wider public.
Given the variability of such provisions in Europe, and given the fact that in many countries the required data disclosure is not conceived for directly addressing media transparency, the information provided are in many cases inadequate and does not serve the objective of effectively assessing whether domestic ownership limits or prohibitions are being respected. More specifically, there are at least five reasons explaining why effective media ownership transparency is limited despite the existence of specific legislation.[8]
First, European countries legislation is not homogeneous in requiring disclosure from all three media sectors (i.e. broadcasting; print and online). This, also, creates a patchwork of databases containing different type of information, making data comparison complicated.
Second, in Europe disclosure is often made to public media authorities, but in some cases disclosure is required to a specific ministry (such as the Ministry of Culture inBulgaria, or the Ministry of Justice inAzerbaijan). This can be problematic because public bodies can have discretion in authorising media services, so any links between media authorities and executive branches should be carefully reviewed to ensure their independence from political power.
Third, disclosure legislation varies extensively across Europe also in terms of the type of information required to be released (e.g. details of shareholders and size of their holdings; interests of affiliated individuals; indirect interests; interests in other media companies; sources of revenues; etc.), including different thresholds and application to different media sectors.
Forth, even if media ownership transparency information released to public authorities can in principle be accessed also by the public through freedom of information legislation, in practice, however, in many cases freedom of information is not fully implemented or reliance on it may be perceived by citizens to be excessively complex and even confrontational.[8]
Checks on the data provided and on its regular updating and accuracy, as well as sanctions for failure in reporting or updating it, can help improve the quality of recorded data, which are crucial for assessing media ownership transparency. There is great variability on these sanctions across Europe, but what is common is that sanctions are rarely implemented for a series of reasons: lack of sufficient resources; lack of expertise in the authorities that should check; an unwillingness to check organisations that might have powerful political or commercial influences, etc.
Also in terms of public accessibility there are considerable variations across Europe: for instance, countries likeNorwayand Germany developed good practices in terms of online, updated searchable databases. In particular, in Germany the competent media authorities release annual lists with data on national media outlets, including the participating interests, and publish such information on the website of the KEK, the independent Commission on Concentration of the Media. The KEK also publishes reports that are distributed to media, politicians, universities, libraries, etc. In turn, the public use of available databases depends not only on their effective accessibility, but also on factors such as public awareness and confidence in starting and handling requests.[8]
In 2021, the Polish legislature attempted to pass a law that would ban companies in countries that are not EEA members from owning a piece of any Polish media company large enough for them to control the company. However, following US pressure, the bill was vetoed by President Andrej Duda. Critics have accused the Polish government of using such legislation to target an opposition outlet and to restrict free speech in the country.[13]If it would pass, the law would allow the government to exercise a high level of control over media ownership. However, the ruling party in Poland has explained that the intention behind the law was to stop foreign autocratic influence on Polish media.[14]Another piece of proposed legislation with a similar rationale sparked protests in Georgia in 2023. If passed, nongovernmental organizations and media outlets receiving over a fifth of their funding from without Georgia would be required to register as "agents of foreign influence".[15]These two are examples of conflict between government regulation regarding the transparency of media ownership and funding on the one hand, and the prospect of media outlets being intimidated by the government and thereby possibly silenced, harming free speech on the other.
Disclosure of media ownership transparency information directly to the public can be implemented through public registers or by posting data on a media organisation's website. In Europe, disclosure directly to the citizens is often determined not for the sake of controlling or avoiding media concentration, but rather forconsumer protectionpurposes, resulting in the disclosure of information that are badly suited for revealing the true state of media ownership. In addition, as in the case of disclosure to public authorities, some problems impede the full implementation of the existing rules, in particular, lack of enforcement, inadequate oversight and minimal requirements.
Overall, the different national regimes in place in Europe, do not properly perform the function of making clear to the citizens relevant data for meeting citizens' interests in media ownership transparency.[8]
Non media-related specific transparency rules can be found in other legislative acts, such as domestic andEU competition rules, that can indirectly strengthen media ownership transparency, or company laws that require the disclosure ofshareholdingsinterests in private companies. However, while these rules can provide useful insights into company ownership, usually they do not provide real information on who actually owns and controls a media company, in particularbeneficial ownership). This is because the primary objective of rules that are not media-specific is not media ownership transparency.
Generally, these kind of provisions require to disclose data on the name and nationality of the owner's; address; shareholdings; founding capital, etc., but the exact rules, percentages and thresholds vary from country to country. Failure to provide the requested information generally leads to fines and sanctions, and invalidation of the company registration.[8]
Disclosure rules vary remarkably from country to country, and within each country for different types of companies. Consequently, the available data is both fragmented and incoherent, often technical in nature, thus making difficult for the public to understand and for experts to compare data across countries.
Several organisations provide valuable information on media ownership to the public. For example, in Italy, the Communications Regulatory Authority (AGCOM) publishes annual reports, which are presented to the parliament, explaining market shares and the main stakeholders in the media market. In theNetherlands, the Commissariat for the Media (CvdM) publishes online an annual report with information on trends and developments in themedia market, including data on ownership, market shares,media pluralism.
At theEuropean Unionlevel, theMAVISE database[16]powered by theEuropean Audiovisual Observatoryprovides information on television companies operating in Europe with the aim of enhancing transparency in the television sector.
In many European countries, academics, NGOs and civil society carry out research and mapping of media ownership, and publishad hocpublications on the topic. For instance, in Spain the platformPortal de la Comunicación[17]run by theUniversity of Barcelonaeffectively monitors the media providing data and statistics to the public. Similarly, inRomaniatheMediaindex, managed by theCentre for Independent Journalism, provides useful information on media ownership.[8]
There are also cases of media company voluntarily providing information on their financial sources and ownership structure directly to the public through their websites. This is the case, for instance, ofIl Fatto Quotidianonewspaper in Italy,the Guardianin the UK, and DV inIceland.[8]
Finally, professional and trade organisations, such as theNorwegian Press Organisationsor theSwiss Press Council, establish self-regulation provisions,codes of ethicsand guidelines calling for ownership transparency. However, they usually do not provide sufficient stimulus to reveal information that can be politically and commercially sensitive.[8]
Overall, the information provided through these kind of sources and organisations, is not enough systematic or detailed for providing an adequate account of media ownership transparency.[8]
At the EU level, the legislative competence concerning media ownership transparency is controversial.[18][19]However, theEuropean Commissionhas promoted a number of initiatives to improve citizens' awareness of media pluralism, such as theMedia Pluralism Monitor,[20]a monitoring tool for assessing risks and threats formedia pluralismin the EU member states on the basis of a set of legal, economic and socio-cultural indicators. According to theMedia Pluralism Monitorthe lack of media ownership transparency is identified as a risk for media plurality. The European Commission's High Level Group on media freedom and pluralism identified “the lack of media ownership transparency” as a key recommendation in its 2013 report.[21]Then a 2014 European Council meeting stated "transparency of media ownership and of funding sources (be) essential with a view to guaranteeing media freedom and pluralism" in guidelines issued in a 2014 Foreign Affairs Council meeting. Under the section on actions, the guidelines state that “d) Support actions by third countries to improve transparency of media ownership, the adoption of measures against media concentration and fair and transparent licensing allocation as the associated risks have grown more acute in the digital age”.[22]
In December 2020, the European Commission adopted the European Democracy Action Plan 2, at the core of which are "media freedom and pluralism."[23][24]In order to "improve the understanding and public availability of media ownership information", the Commission announced it would help finance a Media Ownership Monitoring System, setting out to create a publicly available database containing information on media ownership.[25]The project was started in September 2021, with pilot results for the Euromedia Ownership Monitor expected in September 2022.[26][27]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transparency_of_media_ownership_in_Europe
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Transparency of media ownershiprefers to the public availability of accurate, comprehensive and up-to-date information about media ownership structures to make possible for media authority and the wider public to ascertain who effectively owns and controls the media. Between 2011 and 2012, following some concerns on opaque activities which accompanied the process ofprivatisation of the media in Croatia, the government initiated the reform of the law on transparency of media ownership with the aim to avoid the concealment of information on media ownership structure.
The Croatian law provides the disclosure of information that are sufficient to establish who formally holds shares in themedia organisations operating in Croatia. However, in practice, some obstacles have been observed.[1]There are also some unclear aspects in the new legal framework which is the result of uncoordinated legal developments needed to complement the original Media Act with provisions to be applied to electronic media, which emerged several years later and that are now covered by a dedicated law, namely the Electronic Media Law.[2]In general terms, the information disclosed can be accessed by the public at large, but, as a matter of fact, this is quite uncommon. In Croatia, the public debate on media ownership transparency developed only recently, in connection with the amendments to the Media Act and Electronic Media Act.[3]
Transparency of media ownership refers to the public availability of accurate, comprehensive and up-to-date information about media ownership structures. It is an essential component of any democratic media system and its crucial formedia pluralismand democracy.[4]A legal regime guaranteeing transparency of media ownership makes available all the information needed for finding out who effectively owns, controls and influences the media as well as media influence on political parties or state bodies. The importance of transparency of media ownership for any democratic and pluralist society has been broadly recognised by theEuropean Parliament, theEuropean Commission's High-Level Group on Media Freedom and Pluralism[5]and theCouncil of Europe.
To ensure that the public knows who effectively owns and influences the media, national legal frameworks should ensure the disclosure of at least the following basic information:
Importantly, to understand who really owns and controls a specific media outlet it is necessary to check who is beyond the officialshareholdingsand scrutinise indirect, controlling andbeneficial ownershipwhich refers on shares of a media company hold on behalf of another person.[6]To be meaningful and easily accessible by the citizens and national media authorities, this information should be updated, searchable, free and reusable.[7]
In 2011, concerns about opaque media financial flows led to changes to the laws regulating media ownership transparency to make possible the identification of media owners beyond a company back to individuals. Indeed, the relevant laws have been updated to ensure better ownership transparency of media publishers, in particular to avoid the concealment of the real media ownership structure.[8]The process of privatisation of the print media in Croatia, which began in 2000, had been accompanied by corruption scandals and rumours ofmoney launderingand the involvement of criminal groups in the sales of the biggest Croatian newspapers, i.e.Jutarnji list,Večerni ListandSlobodna Dalmacija.[9]The names of the real owners of these media was hidden behind secret contracts and informal agreements involving politicians, police and other high-profile individuals.[10]Changes to the Media Act and the Electronic Media Act were very quick and passed with limited consultation by the Parliament in July 2011 for the Media Act and in June 2012 for the Electronic Media Act.[11]
Transparency of media ownership in Croatia is regulated by the Media Law (2011) and the Electronic Media Law (2012). These rules apply to all the media sectors, i.e. print, broadcast and online media which are required to regularly provide and update information on their shareholders. These laws contain provisions for disclosing ownership information to: the relevant media authorities, i.e. the Electronic Media Council in the case on online media (Electronic Media Act); to independent professional and business organisations such as the Croatian Chamber of Economy and other corporate and trade registers (Media Act); or directly to the public.[12]In general terms, the Croatian legal framework requires media to reveal enough information to make possible the identification of their owners, be it an individual or a company. This includes data on allshareholdingsover 1%, disclosure ofbeneficial ownershipand of people with indirect interests and control as well as a prohibition on "secret" ownership.[13]The information disclosed are provided directly to the public via the web and Official Gazette.
Upon request, the Croatian Chamber of Economy, which is responsible for collecting ownership data, must guaranteepublic access to the informationsubmitted to it. This is in compliance with the recognisedright of access to informationunder the Act on the Right to Access Information.[14]
The amendments have had little impact on the ownership structure of Croatian media, which remain questionable. This is because most of the privatisation, which in many cases was reported to be suspicious or controversial, were completed before the amended laws entered into force.[15]
Despite the good provisions enshrined in the reformed legal framework which built upon existing obligations, the lack of consultation that led to the amendments to the Media Act and the Electronic Media Act resulted in a series of shortcomings especially with regard to monitoring and enforcement of the laws. For instance, in practice, media companies in Croatia do not always comply with their obligation to publish information on indirect ownership and the law doesn't foresee a mechanism for monitoring, checking compliance and apply sanctions. Indeed, the Media act does not provide for effective mechanism enabling the Croatian Chamber of Economy to check that the information received are updated and correct. Given the scarcity of resources assigned to it, the Chamber has to rely on the assistance of other authorities such as the Croatian Competition Agency and the Company Register.[16]Another critical point of the Croatian system regulating transparency of media ownership is that it does not guarantee the full disclosure of information on individuals holding shares of a media company.[17]Indeed, often the name of a company is not enough for providing information on the individuals behind it. For example, on the basis of the information provided under the law regulating transparency of media ownership the media companiesEuropa digital d.o.o.,Slobodna Dalmacija,EPH MediaandGloria Groupaapparently don't have anything in common, but they are all subsidiary companies within theEPH group, owned byWAZand the businessmanNinoslav Pavić.[18]Additionally, in practice, media outlets do not always disclose information on indirect ownership as required by the law. For example, the only shareholder listed for the media companyVecernji list d.d., which issues the daily paperVecernji listis Styria Media International AG from Graz. Other relevant ownership information are not disclosed, for instance information regarding the important shareholders of Styra Media International AG or whether that company holds some shares for another person or a company.[19]Furthermore, the publication of data in the Official Gazette is not monitored and since there is not a special issue of the Official Gazette listing the updates occurred during the year the search is complex and time-consuming.[20]
In sum, despite the fact that the laws on transparency of media ownership are well defined, in practice is quite difficult to assess the actual ownership structures and reconstruct the networks of ownership and connected persons.[21]The problem is exacerbated by the fact that, according to the Croatian law, different agencies are in charge of collecting data on ownership – the Council for Electronic media is responsible for online media and the Croatian Chamber of Commerce for print media – without a unique centralised monitoring system working across print, radio, television and online media.[22]
In October 2014, the European Commission organised a consultative conference on transparency of media ownership and Croatia was mentioned as "a good practice" in this context. However, many panellists participating at the conference highlighted that it is important to insist on the improvement of the legal framework but that is not enough as, according to experts, it is more important to know who effectively controls the owners than who nominally owns the media.[23]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transparency_of_media_ownership_in_Croatia
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Transparency of media ownershiprefers to thepublicavailability of accurate, comprehensive and up-to-date information aboutmedia ownershipstructures, to make it possible for media authorities and the wider public to ascertain who effectively owns and controls the media. InRomania, transparency ofmedia ownershipis addressed directly in theConstitutionand is regulated by a media-specific law, namely the Audiovisual Law no. 504, and by nationalcompany law. As for constitutional provisions, even if Romania is among the fewEuropean countriesthat addresses the issue of media transparency directly in theConstitution, the focus is on transparency of financial sources and not on ownership.[1]Nonetheless, despite the constitutional provisions on the right to impose an obligation on the media to make public their sources of finance, theParliamenthas never enacted the applicable legislation.[1]The Romanian media-specific law requiring the disclosure of media ownership information applies only to the broadcast sector and provides the disclosure to both a public authority, namely theNational Audiovisual Council(CNA) and directly to the public. Finally, the national company law contains provisions regulating transparency of media ownership. It applies to all media which are registered companies and foresees the obligation to publish all the most relevant information on companies' ownership in the Trade Register Company. Overall, even though the Romanian legislation in the field of media ownership transparency is fully aligned with theEuropeanstandards, in practice sufficient information to assess who effectively owns and ultimately controls the media is not always available.[2]
Romanian lawon media ownership transparency only covers the broadcast sector and has no similar provision for print media, but, in practice, many Romanian newspapers make public their publishers and owners. The situation is more complicated for online media and blogs where anonymity is very common.[3]
The relevant law, named Audiovisual Law no. 504, requires the disclosure of all the information necessary to identify the owners of media companies, e.g. name and contact details of the media organization; name and contact detail of owners; country of domicile of company with an interest;citizenship/ residence status of individual with an interest beyond a given threshold. However, the disclosure requirement does not apply tobeneficial ownership, which refers to shares of a media company hold on behalf of another person. According to the law, the information must be reported to theNational Audiovisual Council, apublic regulatory authorityunder the control of theParliament. The CNA is the guarantor of the public interest in the audiovisual field.
One of the main problem of the law concerns indirect interest: threshold for disclosing indirect interest, which is 20%, looks too high to provide proper information for assessing media ownership and guaranteeing transparency. Furthermore, getting information on individuals or companies with indirect control or significant interests in a given media company is quite time-consuming and complex as it requires in practice a step-by-step process of checking and cross-referencing of a large number of different records.[2]
With regard to constraints or costs for public access to the information held by theNational Audiovisual Councilthere are not particularly high costs or time-consuming procedures, even if, in general terms, accessing information held by public institutions often entails several barriers, such as the reluctance of public officials to reveal sensitive information and their resort to broad interpretations of the exceptions to public disclosure of information.[2]
Overall, the legal framework provides the disclosure of nearly all the information needed to identify ownership of the broadcast media in Romania. However, the threshold for reporting indirect interest (20%), the difficulties in obtaining information on entities or persons with indirect control and significant interest, abuses and poor implementation, the lack of co-operation between the CNA and other authorities leave room to abuses and insufficient disclosure.[2]
According to Article. 48 of Law 504 of 2002, media companies from the audiovisual field must also disclose the information on media ownership directly to the public through their websites. The requirement applies to all kind of information to be disclosed in accordance with the law. In particular, financial information must be updated and disclosed on an annual basis, while the other information must be always available to the public (requirement of the “permanent access” by the public, according to Article 48).[4]
In addition to theAudiovisual Law, another source of regulation for transparency of media ownership inRomaniaiscompany lawwhich contains non-media specific transparency requirements. The relevant law, which is the Law 31 / 1990 on Trading Companies is applicable to all registered media company owning a license and forbids owners' anonymity: companies are therefore obliged to publish all the main information on ownership in theTrade Register Office(TRO) and to communicate changes.[4]All the constitutive deeds and the modifications are registered in the Trade Registry and published in the Official Journal. The specific information to be disclosed depends on the legal type of the company and might be different for each type of business organizations. However, the mandatory information for all companies are: names, the date and the place of birth, the address and the citizenship of the partners / shareholders (in case of natural persons); the name, the headquarter address and the nationality of the associates (in case of legal persons); the type, name, headquarters address and the company logo; the company's field of activity; the registered capital, including the contribution of each partner in cash or in kind; the number and the face value of the shares and the number of shares given to each partners; the managers of the company and their rights; the share given to each associate in case of profit and loss; secondary headquarters.[4]
The public can directly access this data by requesting information from the Trade Registry. Also, since the constitutive documents are also published in the Official Journal, the public can consult this information through the institutional website of the Journal.[4]
Even if the law requires the disclosure of all necessary information on ownership, in fact this data have to be reported to various agencies. This might imply, for instance, a complicated step-by-step check process involving request for information from different agencies for each company in the cases of chains of ownership, such as companies owning other companies and the like.[4]Moreover, as there are minimal financial sanctions for failure to report in time, in practice few companies comply with the obligation to update ownership information.
According to some critics, the Trade Register Office shows insufficient information since the real owner of the media and who effectively controls them remain hidden.[5]In addition, although public, the access to information collected in the Register is not free of charge and can even be prohibitive.[2]Despite these limits, the TRO remains the main source of data on media ownership in Romania[5]and even if the learning process might be time-consuming, especially in the most complex cases of unclear ownership, all in all it is feasible given sufficient time and resources to collect all the needed information, includingbeneficial ownership.[2]
Despite the fact that Romanian legislation in the field of media ownership transparency is formally aligned with theEuropean standards(both theEuropean Commissionand theCouncil of Europestandards are incorporated in the national legal framework), in practice, there are some major problems. Among the main shortcomings there is the absence of the requirement to disclose all the necessary data to establish which are the owners in case of indirect control or having significant interests in themedia company. Moreover, at the practical level, the implementation of thelawleaves room for abuses and inadequate disclosure. In sum, a set of factors, including the difficulty in ascertain indirect control and significant interest, implementation problems as well as the challenges in accessing public information result in a significant difficulty for thegeneral publicin accessing all the key information to establish who effectively owns and ultimately controls amedia outlet.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transparency_of_media_ownership_in_Romania
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Autocephaly recognized by some autocephalous Churchesde jure:
Autocephaly and canonicity recognized by Constantinople and 3 other autocephalous Churches:
Spiritual independence recognized by Georgian Orthodox Church:
Semi-Autonomous:
In theEastern Orthodox Church,Catholic Church,[1]and in the teachings of theChurch Fatherswhich undergirds thetheologyof those communions,economyoroeconomy(Greek:οἰκονομία,oikonomia) has several meanings.[2]The basic meaning of the word is "handling" or "disposition" or "management" of a thing, or more literally "housekeeping", usually assuming or implyinggoodorprudenthandling (as opposed topoorhandling) of the matter at hand. In short,economiais a discretionary deviation from the letter of the law in order to adhere to the spirit of thelawandcharity. This is in contrast tolegalism, orakribia(Greek:ακριβεια), which is strict adherence to the letter of the law of the church.
The divine economy, in Eastern Orthodoxy, not only refers to God's actions to bring about the world'ssalvationandredemption, but toallof God's dealings with, and interactions with, the world, including the Creation.[3][verification needed]
According toLossky,theology(literally, "words about God" or "teaching about God") was concerned with all that pertains to God alone, in himself, i.e. the teaching on theTrinity, thedivine attributes, and so on; but it was not concerned with anything pertaining to the creation or the redemption. Lossky writes: "The distinction betweenοικονομια[economy] andθεολογια[theology] [...] remains common to most of the GreekFathersand to all of theByzantinetradition.θεολογια[...] means, in the fourth century, everything which can be said of God considered in Himself, outside of His creative and redemptive economy. To reach this 'theology' properly so-called, one therefore must go beyond [...] God as Creator of the universe, in order to be able to extricate the notion of the Trinity from the cosmological implications proper to the 'economy.' "[3]
TheEcumenical Patriarchateconsiders that through "extreme oikonomia [economy]", those who arebaptizedin theOriental Orthodox, Roman Catholic,Lutheran,Old Catholic,Moravian,Anglican,Methodist,Reformed,Presbyterian,Church of the Brethren,Assemblies of God, orBaptisttraditions can be received into the Eastern Orthodox Church through the sacrament ofChrismationand not throughre-baptism.[4]
In thecanon law of the Eastern Orthodox Church, the notions ofakriveiaandeconomia(economy) also exist.Akriveia, which is harshness, "is the strict application (sometimes even extension) of thepenancegiven to an unrepentant and habitual offender."Economia, which is sweetness, "is a judicious relaxation of the penance when the sinner shows remorse andrepentance."[5]
According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church:[6]
The Fathers of the Church distinguish between theology (theologia) and economy (oikonomia). "Theology" refers to the mystery of God's inmost life within the Blessed Trinity and "economy" to all the works by which God reveals himself and communicates his life. Through the oikonomia the theologia is revealed to us; but conversely, the theologia illuminates the whole oikonomia. God's works reveal who he is in himself; the mystery of his inmost being enlightens our understanding of all his works. So it is, analogously, among human persons. A person discloses himself in his actions, and the better we know a person, the better we understand his actions.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_(religion)
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Inethics,evasionis an act ofdeceptionwhere a true statement isirrelevantor leads to afalse conclusion. For instance, a man knows that a woman is in a room in the building because he heard her, but in answer to a question as to whether she is present, says "I have not seen her", thereby avoiding bothlyingand making a revelation.
Evasion is described[citation needed]as a way to fulfil an obligation to tell the truth while keeping secrets from those not entitled to know the truth. Evasions are closely related toequivocationsandmental reservations; indeed, some statements fall under both descriptions.
Question dodging is a rhetorical technique involving the intentional avoidance of answering aquestion. This may occur when the person questioned either does not know the answer and wants to avoid embarrassment, or when the person is beinginterrogatedor questioned indebate, and wants to avoid giving a direct response.[1]
A famous example of question dodging in a UK context occurred in 1997 whenHome SecretaryMichael Howardwas questioned byJeremy Paxmanon the BBC'sNewsnight. While discussing a meeting Howard had with the head of the Prison Service,Derek Lewis, about the possible dismissal of the head ofParkhurst Prison; Paxman asked Howard "did you threaten to overrule him?". Howard dodged the question by saying that he did not overrule him. Paxman repeatedly asked the question "did youthreatento overrule him?" a total of 12 times during the interview with Howard evading each time.[2][3]
Overt question dodging can sometimes be employed humorously, in order to sidestep giving a public answer in a political discussion: when a reporter asked MayorRichard J. DaleywhyHubert Humphreyhad lost the state of Illinois in the1968 presidential election, Daley replied "He lost it because he didn't get enough votes."[4]Similarly whenLarry KingaskedPutinwhat happened withKursk submarine, Putin answered: 'She sank'.[5]Often the aim of dodging a question is to make it seem as though the question was fulfilled, leaving the person who asked the question feeling satisfied with the answer, unaware that the question was not properly answered. A false accusation of question dodging can sometimes be made as a disingenuous tactic in debate, in theinformal fallacyof theloaded question. A common way out of this argument is not to answer the question (e.g. with a simple 'yes' or 'no'), but to challenge the assumption behind the question. This can lead the person questioned to be accused of "dodging the question".
In the context of political discourse, evasion is a technique of equivocation that is important forfacemanagement.[6]
Peter Bull identified the following evasion techniques for answering questions:[7]
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Alieis an assertion that is believed to be false, typically used with the purpose ofdeceivingor misleading someone.[1][2][3]The practice of communicating lies is calledlying. A person who communicates a lie may be termed aliar. Lies can be interpreted as deliberately false statements or misleading statements, though not allstatements that are literally falseare considered lies –metaphors,hyperboles, and other figurative rhetoric are not intended to mislead, while lies are explicitly meant for literal interpretation by their audience. Lies may also serve a variety of instrumental, interpersonal, or psychological functions for the individuals who use them.[4]
Generally, the term "lie" carries a negative connotation, and depending on the context a person who communicates a lie may be subject to social, legal, religious, or criminal sanctions; for instance,perjury, or the act of lyingunder oath, can result in criminal and civil charges being pressed against the perjurer.
Although people in many cultures believe that deception can be detected by observing nonverbal behaviors (e.g. not making eye contact, fidgeting, stuttering, smiling) research indicates that people overestimate both the significance of such cues and their ability to make accurate judgements about deception.[5][6]More generally, people's ability to make true judgments is affected by biases towards accepting incoming information and interpreting feelings as evidence oftruth. People do not always check incoming assertions against their memory.[7]
The potential consequences of lying are manifold; some in particular are worth considering. Typically lies aim todeceive, so the hearer may acquire a false belief (or at least something that the speakerbelievesto be false). When deception is unsuccessful, a lie may be discovered. The discovery of a lie may discredit other statements by the same speaker, thereby staining that speaker's reputation. In some circumstances, it may also negatively affect the social or legal standing of the speaker. Lying in a court of law, for instance, is a criminal offense (perjury).[37]
Hannah Arendtspoke about extraordinary cases in which an entire society is being lied to consistently. She said that the consequences of such lying are "not that you believe the lies, but rather that nobody believes anything any longer. This is because lies, by their very nature, have to be changed, and a lying government has constantly to rewrite its own history. On the receiving end you get not only one lie – a lie which you could go on for the rest of your days – but you get a great number of lies, depending on how the political wind blows."[38]
The question of whether lies can be detected reliably throughnonverbalbehavior has been the subject of frequent study. While people in many cultures believe that deception can be indicated by behaviors such as looking away, fidgeting, or stammering, this is not supported by research.[5][6]A 2019 review of research on deception and its detection through nonverbal behavior concludes that people tend to overestimate both the reliability of nonverbal behavior as an indicator of deception, and their ability to make accurate judgements about deception based on nonverbal behavior.[5][39]
Polygraph "lie detector" machines measure the physiologicalstressa subject endures in a number of measures while giving statements or answering questions. Spikes in stress indicators are purported to reveal lying. The accuracy of this method is widely disputed. In several well-known cases, application of the technique has been shown to have given incorrect results.[examples needed]Nonetheless, it remains in use in many areas, primarily as a method for eliciting confessions or employment screening. The unreliability of polygraph results is the basis of the exclusion of such evaluations as admissible evidence in many courts, and the technique is generally perceived to be an example ofpseudoscience.[40]
A recent study found that composing a lie takes longer than telling the truth and thus, the time taken to answer a question may be used as a method of lie detection.[41]Instant answers with a lie may be proof of a prepared lie. A recommendation provided to resolve that contradiction is to try to surprise the subject and find a midway answer, not too quick, nor too long.[42]
Utilitarianphilosophers have supported lies that achieve good outcomes – white lies.[43]In his 2008 book,How to Make Good Decisions and Be Right All the Time,Iain Kingsuggested a credible rule on lying was possible, and he defined it as: "Deceive only if you can change behaviour in a way worth more than the trust you would lose, were the deception discovered (whether the deception actually is exposed or not)."[44]
Stanford law professorDeborah L. Rhodearticulated three rules she says ethicists generally agree distinguish "white lies" from harmful lies or cheating:[45]
Aristotlebelieved no general rule on lying was possible, because anyone who advocated lying could never be believed, he said.[46]ThephilosophersSt. Augustine,St. Thomas Aquinas, andImmanuel Kant, condemned all lying.[43]According to all three, there are no circumstances in which, ethically, one may lie. Even if theonlyway to protect oneself is to lie, it is never ethically permissible to lie even in the face of murder, torture, or any other hardship. Each of these philosophers gave several arguments for the ethical basis against lying, all compatible with each other. Among the more important arguments are:
InLying, neuroscientistSam Harrisargues that lying is negative for the liar and the person who is being lied to. To tell lies is to deny others access to reality, and the harm of lying often cannot be anticipated. The ones lied to may fail to solve problems they could have solved only on a basis of good information. To lie also harms oneself, making the liar distrust the person who is being lied to.[47]Liars generally feel badly about their lies and sense a loss of sincerity, authenticity, and integrity. Harris asserts thathonestyallows one to have deeper relationships and to bring all dysfunction in one's life to the surface.
InHuman, All Too Human, philosopherFriedrich Nietzschesuggested that those who refrain from lying may do so only because of the difficulty involved in maintaining lies. This is consistent with his general philosophy that divides (or ranks) people according to strength and ability; thus, some people tell the truth only out of weakness.[citation needed]
A study was conducted by theUniversity of Nottingham, released in 2016, which utilized a dice roll test where participants could easily lie to get a bigger payout. The study found that in countries with high prevalence of rule breaking, dishonesty in people in their early 20s was more prevalent.[48]
Possession of the capacity to lie among non-humans has been asserted during language studies withgreat apes. In one instance, the gorillaKoko, when asked who tore a sink from the wall, pointed to one of her handlers and then laughed.[49]
Deceptive body language, such as feints that mislead as to the intended direction of attack or flight, is observed in many species. A mother bird deceives when she pretends to have a broken wing to divert the attention of a perceived predator – including unwitting humans – from the eggs in her nest, instead to her, as she draws the predator away from the location of the nest, most notably a trait of thekilldeer.[50]
It is asserted that the capacity to lie is a talent human beings possess universally.[53]
The evolutionary theory proposed byDarwinstates that only the fittest will survive and by lying, we aim to improve other's perception of our social image and status, capability, and desirability in general.[54]Studies have shown that humans begin lying at a mere age of six months, through crying and laughing, to gain attention.[55]
Scientific studies have shown differences in forms of lying across gender. Although men and women lie at equal frequencies, men are more likely to lie in order to please themselves while women are more likely to lie to please others.[56]The presumption is that humans are individuals living in a world of competition and strict social norms, where they are able to use lies and deception to enhance chances of survival and reproduction.
Stereotypically speaking,David Livingstone Smithasserts that men like to exaggerate about their sexual expertise, but shy away from topics that degrade them while women understate their sexual expertise to make themselves more respectable and loyal in the eyes of men and avoid being labelled as a ‘scarlet woman’.[56]
Those withParkinson's diseaseshow difficulties in deceiving others, difficulties that link toprefrontalhypometabolism. This suggests a link between the capacity for dishonesty and integrity of prefrontal functioning.[57]
Pseudologia fantasticais a term applied bypsychiatriststo the behavior of habitual or compulsive lying.Mythomaniais the condition where there is an excessive or abnormal propensity for lying and exaggerating.[58]
A recent study found that composing a lie takes longer than telling the truth.[42]Or, asChief Josephsuccinctly put it, "It does not require many words to speak the truth."[59]
Some people who are not convincing liars truly believe they are.[60]
TheOld TestamentandNew Testamentof theBibleboth contain statements that God cannot lie and that lying is immoral (Num.23:19,[61]Hab.2:3,[62]Heb.6:13–18).[63]Nevertheless, there are examples of God deliberately causing enemies to become disorientated and confused, in order to provide victory (2 Thess.2:11;[64][65]1 Kings22:23;[66]Ezek.14:9).[67]
Various passages of the Bible feature exchanges that assert lying is immoral and wrong (Prov.6:16–19;Ps.5:6), (Lev.19:11; Prov. 14:5; Prov. 30:6;Zeph.3:13), (Isa.28:15;Dan.11:27), most famously, in theTen Commandments: "Thou shalt not bear false witness" (Ex.20:2–17;Deut.5:6–21); Ex. 23:1;Matt.19:18;Mark10:19;Luke18:20 a specific reference to perjury.
Other passages feature descriptive (not prescriptive) exchanges where lying was committed in extreme circumstances involving life and death. Most Christian philosophers might argue that lying is never acceptable, but that even those who are righteous in God's eyes sin sometimes. Old Testament accounts of lying include:[68]
In the New Testament, Jesus refers to theDevilas the father of lies (John8:44) and Paul commands Christians "Do not lie to one another" (Col.3:9; cf. Lev. 19:11). In the Day of Judgement, unrepentant liars will be punished in thelake of fire. (Rev.21:8; 21:27).
Augustine of Hippowrote two books about lying:On Lying(De Mendacio) andAgainst Lying(Contra Mendacio).[70][71]He describes each book in his later work,Retractationes. Based on the location ofDe MendacioinRetractationes, it appears to have been written about AD 395. The first work,On Lying, begins:"Magna quæstio est de Mendacio"("There is a great question about Lying"). From his text, it can be derived that St. Augustine divided lies into eight categories, listed in order of descending severity:
Despite distinguishing between lies according to their external severity, Augustine maintains in both treatises that all lies, defined precisely as the external communication of what one does not hold to be internally true, are categorically sinful and therefore, ethically impermissible.[72]
Augustine wrote that lies told in jest, or by someone who believes or opines the lie to be true are not, in fact, lies.[73]
The fourth of thefive Buddhist preceptsinvolves falsehood spoken or committed to by action.[74]Avoiding other forms of wrong speech are also considered part of this precept, consisting of malicious speech, harsh speech, and gossip.[75][76]A breach of the precept is considered more serious if the falsehood is motivated by an ulterior motive[74](rather than, for example, "a small white lie").[77]The accompanying virtue isbeing honestand dependable,[78][79]and involves honesty in work, truthfulness to others, loyalty to superiors, and gratitude to benefactors.[80]In Buddhist texts, this precept is considered most important next to the first precept, because a lying person is regarded to have no shame, and therefore capable of many wrongs.[81]Lying is not only to be avoided because it harms others, but also because it goes against the Buddhist ideal of finding thetruth.[77][82]
The fourth precept includes avoidance of lying and harmful speech.[83]Some modern Buddhist teachers such asThich Nhat Hanhinterpret this to include avoiding spreading false news and uncertain information.[81]Work that involves data manipulation, false advertising, or online scams can also be regarded as violations.[84]AnthropologistBarend Terwiel[de]reports that among Thai Buddhists, the fourth precept also is seen to be broken when people insinuate, exaggerate, or speak abusively or deceitfully.[85]
InGestaþáttr, one of the sections within theEddaic poemHávamál,Odinstates that it is advisable, when dealing with "a false foe who lies", to tell lies also.[86]
Zoroaster teaches that there are two powers in the universe;Asha, which is truth, order, and that which is real, andDruj, which is "the Lie". Later on, the Lie became personified asAngra Mainyu, a figure similar to the ChristianDevil, who was portrayed as the eternal opponent ofAhura Mazda(God).
Herodotus, in his mid-fifth-century BC account of Persian residents of thePontus, reports that Persian youths, from their fifth year to their twentieth year, were instructed in three things – "to ride a horse, to draw a bow, and to speak the Truth".[87]He further notes that:[87]"The most disgraceful thing in the world [the Persians] think, is to tell a lie; the next worst, to owe a debt: because, among other reasons, the debtor is obliged to tell lies."
InAchaemenid Persia, the lie,drauga(in Avestan:druj), is considered to be acardinal sinand it was punishable by death in some extreme cases.Tablets discoveredby archaeologists in the 1930s[88]at the site of Persepolis give us adequate evidence about the love and veneration for the culture of truth during the Achaemenian period. These tablets contain the names of ordinary Persians, mainly traders and warehouse-keepers.[89]According toStanley InslerofYale University, as many as 72 names of officials and petty clerks found on these tablets contain the wordtruth.[90]Thus, says Insler, we haveArtapana, protector of truth,Artakama, lover of truth,Artamanah, truth-minded,Artafarnah, possessing splendour of truth,Artazusta, delighting in truth,Artastuna, pillar of truth,Artafrida, prospering the truth, andArtahunara, having nobility of truth.
It wasDarius the Greatwho laid down the "ordinance of good regulations" during his reign. Darius' testimony about his constant battle against the Lie is found in theBehistun Inscription. He testifies:[91]"I was not a lie-follower, I was not a doer of wrong ... According to righteousness I conducted myself. Neither to the weak or to the powerful did I do wrong. The man who cooperated with my house, him I rewarded well; who so did injury, him I punished well."
He asksAhuramazda, God, to protect the country from "a (hostile) army, from famine, from the Lie".[92]
Darius had his hands full dealing with large-scale rebellion which broke out throughout the empire. After fighting successfully with ninetraitorsin a year, Darius records his battles against them for posterity and tells us how it was theLiethat made them rebel against the empire. At the Behistun inscription, Darius says: "I smote them and took prisoner nine kings. One was Gaumata by name, a Magian; he lied; thus he said: I am Smerdis, the son of Cyrus ... One, Acina by name, an Elamite; he lied; thus he said: I am king in Elam ... One, Nidintu-Bel by name, a Babylonian; he lied; thus he said: I am Nebuchadnezzar, the son of Nabonidus. ... The Lie made them rebellious, so that these men deceived the people."[93]Then advice to his sonXerxes, who is to succeed him as the great king: "Thou who shalt be king hereafter, protect yourself vigorously from the Lie; the man who shall be a lie-follower, him do thou punish well, if thus thou shall think. May my country be secure!"[citation needed]
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Marranosis a term forSpanish and Portuguese Jews, as well asNavarrese jews, who converted to Christianity, either voluntarily or bySpanish or Portuguese royal coercion, during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, but who continued to practiceJudaismin secrecy or were suspected of it. They are also calledcrypto-Jews, the term increasingly preferred in scholarly works overMarranos.
The term specifically refers to the charge of crypto-Judaism, whereas the termconversowas used for the wider population of Jewish converts toCatholicism, whether or not they secretly still practised Jewish rites. Converts from either Judaism or Islam were referred to by the broader term of "New Christians".
The termmarranocame into later use in 1492 with the CastilianAlhambra Decree, which prohibited the practice of Judaism in Spain and required all remaining Jews to convert or leave. TheSpanish Inquisitionwas established prior to the decree, surveilled New Christians to detect whether their conversion to Christianity was sincere. The vast majority of Jews in Spain had converted to Catholicism, perhaps under pressure from theMassacre of 1391, andconversosnumbered hundreds of thousands. They were monitored by the Spanish Inquisition and subject to suspicions byOld Christiansof the secret practice of Judaism, whether or not that was the case.
In modern use,marranocan be considered offensive and pejorative, although some scholars continue to use the term interchangeably withconversoor crypto-Jew. In modern Spanish,marranomeans "pig", or, more often, "dirty person". Because of these possible meanings for the termMarranomight also be offensive to some descendants of Spanish Jews.[1]
The origin of the termMarranoas applied tocrypto-Jewsis unclear, since there have been several proposed etymologies in addition to swine.
TheHebrewword forמְשֻׁמָּדMeshumad, literally standing for "self-destroyed" or a heretic to Judaism, for a Jew who deliberately rebels against the observance of Jewish law.
The main difference between aMin, aMeshumad, and theAnusimis that the act of abandonment ofJudaismis voluntary for a Min and a Meshumad, while for the Anusim it is not.
One source of the term derives from anArabicword for "forbidden, illicit",[2]مُحَرّمٌMuḥarram.[citation needed]The Arabic word in this context means "swine" or "pork", and either expresses the same repulsion towards the converts that the converts previously had for such ritually unclean meat.[2]
However, as applied to Crypto-Jews, the term Marrano derives from the Spanish & Portuguese verb "marrar" and "amarrar" meaning "to fail", "to plan to go wrong", "to break away", "to defraud", "to target", "to tie up", "to refrain", "to deviate", "to clinch", "to moor", illuminating that those targeted and forced by the Spanish Crown had no choice but to adopt Christianity, either leave the Kingdom of Spain all while the Crown seized their property and money and gave them no support to leave, be murdered either for not showing complete loyalty to Christianity or for leaving Spain and coming back showing that these Jews were traitors to the Spanish Crown.[3][4]
It also has Arabic origin meaning "to deviate" or "to err", in the sense that they deviated from their newly adopted faith by secretly continuing to practice Judaism. A third origin has been cited fromGalician-Portuguese, wheremarrarmeans "to force" andmarranomeans "forced one", indicating the compulsory nature of the religious conversions.[1]José Meir Estrugo Hazán writes in his bookLos Sefardíes[5]that "marrano" is the term the Spanish Jews prefer.
Under state pressure in the late 14th and early 15th century, over half of Jews in theIberian Peninsulaconverted to Christianity, thus avoiding theDecree of Expulsionwhich affected Spain's remaining openly Jewish population in 1492. The numbers who converted and the effects of various migrations in and out of the area have been the subject of historical debate. Aphylogeographicstudy in 2008 of 1,150 volunteerY-chromosome DNA haplogroupsappeared to support the idea that the number of conversions has been significantly underestimated, as 20% of the tested Iberian population hadhaplogroupsconsistent withSephardiancestry. This percentage was suggested as representing the proportion of Sephardi in the population at the time of mass conversions in the 14th and 15th centuries.[6]However, the authors concede that other historical population movements from theNear Eastsuch asSyriansandPhoeniciansmay also account for these results.[7][8][9][10][11][12]
Some Portugueseconversosorcristãos-novoscontinued to practice as crypto-Jews. In the early 20th century, historian Samuel Schwartz wrote about crypto-Jewish communities discovered in northeastern Portugal (namely,Belmonte,Bragança,Miranda, andChaves). He claimed that members had managed to survive more than four centuries without being fully assimilated into the Old Christian population.[13]The last remaining crypto-Jewish community in Belmonte officially returned to Judaism in the 1970s and opened asynagoguein 1996. In 2003, theAmerican Sephardi Federationfounded the Belmonte Project to raise funds to acquire Judaic educational material and services for the Belmonte community, who then numbered 160–180.[citation needed]
Two documentary films have been made in north-eastern Portugal where present-day descendants of marranos were interviewed about their lives. In 1974 forThe Marranos of Portugal, the Israel Broadcasting Authority (IBA) sent reporterRon Ben-Yishaito conduct interviews with families about their religious practice. After being asked to prove he knew Hebrew before they would talk, he found people still reluctant to speak openly. Nevertheless, he did eventually gain a remarkable insight into their version of Jewish customs, prayers and songs. The film was commended at the 1976 Jerusalem Jewish Film and TV Festival. Another documentary,The Last Marranos, was made by the New York Jewish Media Fund in 1997.
After the expulsion of Jews and Muslims from Spain (1492) and the Forced Conversion by Portugal's KingManuel Iin Portugal (1497),conversoscontinued to be suspect in socially strained times. In Lisbon in 1506, a months-long plague caused people to look for scapegoats. Some became suspicious thatconversosmight be practicing Judaism and therefore be at fault. On April 17, 1506, severalconversoswere discovered who had in their possession "some lambs and poultry prepared according to Jewish custom; also unleavened bread and bitter herbs according to the regulations for thePassover, which festival they celebrated far into the night." Officials seized several but released them after a few days.
On the same day on which theconversoswere freed, theDominicansdisplayed a crucifix and areliquaryin glass from which a peculiar light issued in a side-chapel of their church, where several New Christians were present. A New Christian who tried to explain the miracle as due to natural causes was dragged from the church and killed by an infuriated woman. A Dominican roused the populace still more. Friar João Mocho and theAragonesefriar Bernardo, crucifix in hand, were said to have gone through the streets of the city, crying "Heresy!" and calling upon the people to destroy theconversos.[citation needed]Attracted by the outcry, sailors fromHolland,Zeelandand others from ships in the port of Lisbon, joined the Dominicans and formed a mob with local men to pursue theconversos.
The mob draggedconversovictims from their houses and killed some. Old Christians who were in any way associated with New Christians were also attacked. The mob attacked thetax-farmerJoão Rodrigo Mascarenhas, a New Christian; although a wealthy and distinguished man, his work also made him resented by many. They demolished his house. Within 48 hours, many "conversos" were killed; by the third day all who could leave escaped, often with the help of other Portuguese. The killing spree lasted from 19 to 21 April, in what came to be known as theLisbon massacre.
KingManuelseverely punished those who took part in the killings. The ringleaders and the Dominicans who encouraged the riot were also executed. Local people convicted of murder or pillage suffered corporal punishment and their property was confiscated. The king granted religious freedom for 20 years to allconversosin an attempt at compensation. Lisbon lostForal(municipal) privileges. The foreigners who had taken part generally escaped punishment, leaving with their ships.
New Christians were attacked inGouveia,Alentejo,Olivença,Santarém, and other places. In theAzoresand the island ofMadeira, mobs massacred former Jews. Because of these excesses, the king began to believe that aPortuguese Inquisitionmight help control such outbreaks.
The Portugueseconversosworked to forestall such actions, and spent immense sums to win over theCuriaand most influential cardinals. Spanish and Portugueseconversosmade financial sacrifices. Alfonso Gutierrez, Garcia Alvarez "el Rico" (the rich), and the Zapatas,conversosfrom Toledo, offered 80,000 gold crowns to Holy Roman EmperorCharles V, if he would mitigate the harshness of the Inquisition.[14]
The Mendes of Lisbon andFlandersalso tried to help. None were successful in preventing theInquisitionPapal Bull Meditatio Cordis of July 16, 1547, Inquisition in Portugal. This Bull Meditatio Cordis still did not have the "Power of Confiscation". Portuguese Marranos continued, with many bribes of the Popes in Rome, and with prolonged negotiation against this "Power of Confiscation" succeeded to delay it 32 years, but finally conceded this "deadly weapon" in 1579. The Portuguese Inquisition now had been endowed, 101 years after the Spanish Inquisition of November 1, 1478, with the same extremities of rigor as the Spanish prototype. Theconversossuffered immensely both from mob violence and interrogation and testing by the Inquisition. Attacks and murders were recorded atTrancoso,Lamego, Miranda,Viseu,Guarda, andBraga.
AtCovilhã, there were rumors that the people planned to massacre all the New Christians on one day. In 1562, prelates petitioned theCortesto requireconversosto wear special badges, and to order Jewish descendants to live inghettos(judiarias) in cities and villages as their ancestors had before the conversions.
In 1641, João IV of Portugal ennobled theCuriel family, a Marrano family who initially served the Crown of Castile, defecting to Portugal after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1498. They went on serving the King of Portugal in diplomatic positions across Europe until the late 18th century.[15]
In the 1970s, the Marranos ofBelmonteofficially rejoinedJudaismand reestablished ties with the Jews of Israel.[16]The Museu Judaico de Belmonte was opened in 2005 in Belmonte, it is the first Jewish museum in Portugal.[17]
According to historianCecil Roth, Spanish political intrigues had earlier promoted the anti-Jewish policies which culminated in 1391, when Regent QueenLeonora of Castilegave the Archdeacon ofÉcija,Ferrand Martinez, considerable power in her realm. Martinez gave speeches that led to violence against the Jews, and this influence culminated in the sack of the Jewish quarter ofSevilleon June 4, 1391. Throughout Spain during this year, the cities of Ecija,Carmona,Córdoba,Toledo,Barcelonaand many others saw their Jewish quarters destroyed and inhabitants massacred.
It is estimated that 200,000 Jews saved their lives by converting to Christianity in the wake of these persecutions.[18]Other Jews left the country altogether and around 100,000 openly practicing Jews remained.
In 1449, feelings rose againstconversos, breaking out in a riot atToledo. Instigated by two canons, Juan Alfonso and Pedro Lopez Galvez, the mob plundered and burned the houses of Alonso Cota, a wealthyconversoand tax-farmer. They also attacked the residences of wealthy New Christians in the quarter of la Magdelena. Under Juan de la Cibdad, theconversosopposed the mob, but were repulsed. They were executed with their leader. As a result, several prominentconversomen were deposed from office, in obedience to a new statute.
Nearly 20 years later in July 1467, another riot occurred where a mob attackedconversosin Toledo. The chief magistrate (alcalde mayor) of the city was Alvar Gomez de Cibdad Real, who had been private secretary to KingHenry IV of Castile. He was a protector of theconversos.Together with prominentconversosFernando and Alvaro de la Torre, Alvar wished to take revenge for an insult by the counts de Fuensalida, leaders of the Old Christians. His intention was to seize control of the city, but fierce conflict erupted. Opponents set fire to houses of New Christians near the cathedral. The conflagration spread so rapidly that 1,600 houses were consumed. Both Old Christians andconversosperished. The brothers De la Torre were captured and hanged.
Tensions arose in Córdoba between Old Christians andconversos, where they formed two hostile parties. On March 14, 1473, during a dedication procession, a girl accidentally threw dirty water from the window of the house of one of the wealthiestconversos(the customary way to dispose of it.) The water splashed on an image of the Virgin being carried in procession in honor of a new society (from whichconversoshad been excluded by Bishop D. Pedro.) A local blacksmith started arousing a rabble against the Jews, who he blamed for the insult, which immediately joined in a fierce shout for revenge.[dubious–discuss]
The mob went afterconversos, denouncing them asheretics, killing them, and burning their houses. To stop the excesses, the highly respected D. Alonso Fernandez de Aguilar, whose wife was a member of theconversofamily of Pacheco, together with his brother D.Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba("El Gran Capitán"), and a troop of soldiers, hastened to protect theNew Christians. D. Alonso called upon the mob to retire. Its leader insulted the count, who immediately felled him with his lance. Aroused, the people considered him a martyr. Incited by Alonso de Aguilar's enemy, they again attacked theconversos. The rioting lasted three days. Those who escaped sought refuge in the castle, where their protectors also took shelter. The government decreed that Jews andconversosshould remain in their neighborhood or leave the city.
In 1473, attacks onconversosarose in numerous other cities:Montoro,Bujalance,Adamuz,La Rambla,Santaella, and elsewhere. Mobs attackedconversosinAndújar,Úbeda,Baeza, andAlmodóvar del Campoalso. InValladolid, groups looted the belongings of the New Christians. AtSegovia, there was a massacre (May 16, 1474). D. Juan Pacheco, aconverso, led the attacks. Without the intervention of the alcalde, Andres de Cabrera, all New Christians might have died. AtCarmona, it was reported that not oneconversowas left alive.
Tens of thousands of Jews were baptised in the three months before the deadline for expulsion, some 40,000 if one accepts the totals given by Kamen: most of these undoubtedly to avoid expulsion,[citation needed]rather than as a sincere change of faith. Theseconversoswere the principal concern of the Inquisition; being suspected of continuing to practice Judaism put them at risk of denunciation and trial.[citation needed]
During 1492, about 12,000conversosenteredNavarrefrom Aragon's repression, where they were allowed to remain.Tudela in Navarreturned into aconversohaven. The Tudelans had already proclaimed in 1486 that "if any inquisitor enters their city, he will be thrown into theEbroriver." Later the resistance to the inquisitors was so strong that its aldermen ordered commissioners and attorneys to ask theCatholic Monarchsto limit the power of the Inquisition in 1510.[19][20][21]
The most intense period of persecution ofconversoslasted until 1530. From 1531 to 1560, however, the percentage ofconversosamong the Inquisition trials dropped to 3% of the total. There was a rebound of persecutions when a group of crypto-Jews was discovered inQuintanar de la Ordenin 1588; and there was a rise in denunciations ofconversosin the last decade of the sixteenth century. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, someconversoswho had fled to Portugal began to return to Spain, fleeing the persecution of thePortuguese Inquisition, founded in 1536. This led to a rapid increase in the trials of crypto-Jews, among them a number of important financiers. In 1691, during a number ofautos-da-féinMallorca, 37chuetas, orconversosof Mallorca, were burned.[22]
During the eighteenth century the number ofconversosaccused by the Inquisition decreased significantly.Manuel Santiago Vivar, tried in Córdoba in 1818, was the last person tried for being a crypto-Jew.[23]
Theconversosof Seville and other cities of Castile, and especially of Aragon, bitterly opposed theSpanish Inquisitionestablished in 1478. They rendered considerable service to the king, and held high legal, financial, and military positions. The government issued an edict directing traditional Jews to live within a ghetto and be separated fromconversos. Despite the law, however, the Jews remained in communication with theirNew Christianbrethren.
"They sought ways and means to win them from Catholicism and bring them back to Judaism. They instructed the Marranos in the tenets and ceremonies of the Jewish religion; held meetings in which they taught them what they must believe and observe according to the Mosaic law; and enabled them to circumcise themselves and their children. They furnished them with prayer-books; explained the fast-days; read with them the history of their people and their Law; announced to them the coming of the Passover; procured unleavened bread for them for that festival, as well askoshermeat throughout the year; encouraged them to live inconformitywith the law of Moses, and persuaded them that there was no law and no truth except the Jewish religion." These were the charges brought by the government ofFerdinand II of AragonandIsabella I of Castileagainst the Jews. They constituted the grounds for their expulsion and banishment in 1492, so they could not subvertconversos. Jews who did not want to leave Spain had to accept baptism as a sign of conversion.
The historian Henry Kamen'sInquisition and Society in Spain in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuriesquestions whether there were such strong links betweenconversosand Jewish communities. Whilst historians such as Yitzhak Baer state, "the conversos and Jews were one people",[24]Kamen claims, "Yet if the conversos were hated by the Christians, the Jews liked them no better."[24]He documented that "Jews testified falsely against them [the conversos] when the Inquisition was finally founded."[24]This issue is being debated by historians.
Although the vast majority of Spain's 250,000conversoshad abandoned Judaism and been assimilated into Spain's dominant Catholic culture, many of those continuing to secretly practice their former religion felt threatened and persecuted by the Inquisition which continued to actively persecute heresy. Some of these chose to leave Spain, in bands or as individual refugees. Many migrated to Italy, attracted by the climate, which resembled that of the Iberian Peninsula, and by the kindred language. When they settled atFerrara, DukeErcole I d'Estegranted them privileges. His sonAlfonsoconfirmed the privileges to twenty-one Spanishconversos: physicians, merchants, and others (ib. xv. 113 et seq.). A thoroughly researched history of these migrations is also contained in the book about one of their leaders Dona Gracia Nasi called, "The Woman Who Defied Kings", by the historian and journalist Andree Aelion Brooks.
Spanish and Portugueseconversosalso settled atFlorenceand contributed to makeLivornoa leading seaport. They received privileges atVenice, where they were protected from the persecutions of the Inquisition. InMilanthey materially advanced the interests of the city with their industry and commerce. AtBologna,Pisa,Naples, and numerous other Italian cities, they freely exercised the Jewish religion again. They were soon so numerous that Fernando de Goes Loureiro, an abbot fromPorto, filled an entire book with the names ofconversoswho had drawn large sums from Portugal and had openly avowed Judaism in Italy.
InPiedmont, DukeEmmanuel PhilibertofSavoywelcomedconversosfromCoímbraand granted them commercial and industrial privileges, as well as the free exercise of their religion. Rome was full ofconversos. PopePaul IIIreceived them atAnconafor commercial reasons. He granted complete liberty "to all persons from Portugal andAlgarve, even if belonging to the class of New Christians." By 1553 three thousand Portuguese Jews andconversoswere living at Ancona.
Two years later,Pope Paul IVissued orders to have all theconversosin Papal states be thrown into the prisons of the Inquisition which he had instituted. Sixty of them, who acknowledged the Catholic faith as penitents, were transported to the island ofMalta; twenty-four, who adhered to Judaism, were publicly burned (May 1556). Those who escaped the Inquisition were received atPesarobyGuidobaldo II della Rovere, Duke of Urbino. Guidobaldo had hoped to have the Jews andconversosof Turkey select Pesaro as a commercial center; when that did not happen, he expelled the New Christians from Pesaro and other districts in 1558 (ib. xvi. 61 et seq.).
Manyconversosalso went toDubrovnik, formerly a considerableCroatianseaport on theAdriatic Sea. In May 1544, a ship landed there filled with Portuguese refugees.
During the 16th and 17th centuries, someconversosmigrated tothe Americas, often the Castilian territories of the Vice-royalties ofNew Spain,Peru, and theRío de la Platain Argentina. Legal emigration to the New World was strictly controlled and required proof of three generations of Christian ascendance.[citation needed]Nevertheless, manyconversosmanaged to evade these restrictions and managed to obtain"encomiendas"papers of legal identity in the New World.
According toIsidore Loeb, in a special study of the subject in theRevue des Études Juives(xiv. 162–183), about 3,000 Jews came to Provence after theAlhambra Decreeexpelled Jews from Spain in 1492.
From 1484, one town after another had called for expulsion, but the calls were rejected byCharles VIII. However,Louis XII, in one of his first acts as king in 1498, issued a general expulsion order of the Jews of Provence. Though not enforced at the time, the order was renewed in 1500 and again in 1501. On this occasion, it was definitively implemented. The Jews of Provence were given the option of conversion to Christianity and a number chose that option. However, after a short while – if only to compensate partially for the loss of revenues caused by the departure of the Jews – the king imposed a special tax, referred to as "the tax of the neophytes." These converts and their descendants soon became the objects of social discrimination and slanders.[25]
In the "Marrano Factory: The Portuguese Inquisition and Its New Christians 1536-1765", ProfessorAntonio Jose Saraivaof theUniversity of Lisbon, writes "King Manuel theoretically abolished discrimination between Old and New Christians by the law of March 1, 1507 which permitted the departure of New Christians to any part of the Christian world, declaring that they “be considered, favored and treated like the Old Christians and not distinct and separated from them in any matter.” Nevertheless, in apparent contradiction to that law, in a letter dated Almeirim, February 18, 1519, King Manuel promoted legislation henceforth prohibiting the naming of New Christians to the position of judge, town councilor or municipal registrar in Goa, stipulating, however, that those already appointed were not to be dismissed. This shows that even during the first nine years of Portuguese rule, Goa had a considerable influx of recently baptized Spanish and Portuguese Jews."[26]
Some New Christians sought to re-join Jewish populations in India (particularly through the Jewish community inCochin), while others went on to be extremely influential in the spice trade, and the gems trade between Portugal, and India. This activity aroused the ire of the Catholic clergy. During this period, the first bishop of Goa,Gaspar Jorge de Leão Pereirawrote his anti-Semitic work "contra os Judeos" (tracts against Jews), and called for the establishment of theInquisition in Goa(which was established in 1560).
There was no significant wave of emigration ofconversosfrom Spain, the majority of Sephardic communities, such as that of Salonika having been formed as a result of the Alhambra Decree in 1492.[27]However, there was a steady trickle of crypto-Jewish marranos who wished to practice their faith freely to more liberal environments. One of their leaders who helped them get there was the Lisbon-born international banker,Gracia Mendes Nasi. They also migrated toFlanders, where they were attracted by its flourishing cities, such asAntwerpandBrussels.Conversosfrom Flanders, and others direct from the Iberian Peninsula, went under the guise of Catholics toHamburgandAltonaabout 1580, where theyestablished a communityand held commercial relations with their former homes. Some migrated as far asScotland.Christian IV of Denmarkinvited some New Christian families to settle atGlückstadtabout 1626, granting certain privileges to them and toconversoswho came toEmdenabout 1649.
The vast majority of Spain'sconversos, however, remained in Spain and Portugal and were suspected of "Marranism" by the Spanish Inquisition. Although the wealthier among them could easily bypass discriminatoryLimpieza de sangrelaws, they constituted a significant portion of the over three thousand people executed for heresy by the Spanish Inquisition.[27]In his luminous book the "Marrano Factory: The Portuguese Inquisition and Its New Christians 1536-1765", Professor Antonio Jose Saraiva[1]of theUniversity of Lisbon, writes that "After August 1531, when the establishment of the Inquisition in Portugal was in the offing and especially after June 14, 1532 when New Christian emigration from Portugal became a capital offense, anti-New Christian sentiment surged on all sides. The New Christians were panic-stricken and emigrants, legal or clandestine, headed for Flanders, Italy, the Ottoman Empire, the Portuguese possessions in India, North Africa. After the middle of the century, England, France, the Spanish Americas and Brazil were the favorite destinations, not necessarily in that order."[26]The New Christians breathed more freely whenPhilip III of Spaincame to the throne. By the law of April 4, 1601, he granted them the privilege of unrestricted sale of their real estate as well as free departure from the country for themselves, their families, and their property. Many, availing themselves of this permission, followed their coreligionists to North Africa and Turkey. After a few years, however, the privilege was revoked, and the Inquisition resumed its activity.
Some migrated to London, whence their families spread to Brazil (whereconversoshad settled at an early date) and other colonies in the Americas. Migrations toConstantinopleandThessaloniki, where Jewish refugees had settled after the expulsion from Spain, as well as toItaly,Serbia,Romania,Bulgaria,Vienna, andTimișoara, continued into the middle of the 18th century.[citation needed]
Late 20th century political and social changes in Spain caused reappraisal of Jewish and Muslim contributions to its culture. There has been much new scholarship on Sephardic Jews, Moors and the consequences of conversion and expulsion. In addition, there have been official governmental efforts to welcome tourists of both ancestries to Spain. Towns and regions have worked to preserve elements of Jewish and Moorish pasts.
In Spanish Civil Code Art. 22.1, the government created concessions to nationals of several countries andSephardi Jewshistorically linked with Spain allowing them to seek citizenship after five years rather than the customary ten required for residence in Spain. Later it was dropped to two years. In November 2012, the residency requirement was eliminated.[28]In October 2006, theParliament of Andalusiaasked the three parliamentary groups that form the majority to support an amendment that would similarly ease the way for nationals ofMoriscodescent to gain Spanish citizenship. The proposal was originally made by IULV-CA, the Andalusian branch of theUnited Left.[29]
In 2004,Shlomo Moshe Amartraveled to Portugal to celebrate the centennial anniversary of theLisbon Synagogue"Shaare Tikvah". During his stay, Shlomo Moshe Amar met descendants of Jewish families persecuted by the Inquisition who still practice Judaism at the house of rabbi Boaz Pash. This was an historical meeting that had not happened between a Chief Rabbi and Portuguese Bnei Anusim in centuries. Rabbi Shlomo Moshe Amar promised to create a committee to evaluate the Halachic situation of the community. The delay of the Chief Rabbi to create the committee and help the descendants ofSephardiJews in Portugal forced the creation of a second Jewish community in Lisbon, Comunidade Judaica Masorti Beit Israel, to ensure the recognition of the Bnei Anusim as Jews.
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Mesirah(ormesira,lit.'to hand over') is the action in which one Jew reports the conduct of another Jew to a non-rabbinic authority in a manner and under the circumstances forbidden byrabbiniclaw.[1]This may not necessarily apply to reporting legitimate crimes to responsible authority, but it does apply to turning over a Jew to an abusive authority, or otherwise to a legitimate one who would punish the criminal in ways seen as excessive by the Jewish community. In any case, "excessive" punishment by non-Jews may be permissible if a precept of theTorahhas been violated.[2]
The term for an individual who commitsmesirahismoser(Hebrew:מוסר) ormossur.[2]A person who repeatedly violates this law by informing on his fellow Jews is considered subject todin moser(lit.'law of the informer'), which is analogous todin rodefin that both prescribe death for the offender,[1]at least in theory.[3]According to some, in some circumstances the offender may be killed without warning.[1]
The source of the ban comes from the Bava Kamma (Hebrew:בבא קמא) section of theBabylonian Talmud.[4][5][6]The law was most likely instigated to ease Jewish life underRomanorPersianrule. This law is discussed in Babylonian Talmud,Maimonides, and inShulchan Aruch.[7]Shulchan Aruch, however, states that Jews should testify against each other in the gentile court in cases where it is obvious that they would be covering up for each other.[8][9]
Maimonides states:
Whoever adjudicates in a non-Jewish court ... is wicked and it is as though he has reviled, blasphemed and rebelled against the law of Moses.[10]
Maimonides further explains: "It is forbidden to hand over a Jew to the heathen, neither his person nor his goods, even if he is wicked and a sinner, even if he causes distress and pain to fellow-Jews. Whoever hands over a Jew to the heathen has no part in the next world. It is permitted to kill amoserwherever he is. It is even permitted to kill him before he has handed over (a fellow Jew)."[11]
According toMichael Broyde, there are many different opinions among 20th-century rabbis as to the extent and circumstancesmesirahis still valid in modern times.[1]Chaim Kanievsky, a leading Israeli rabbi andposekin Haredi society ruled that reporting instances of sexual child abuse to the police is consistent withJewish law.[12][13]Hershel Schachterconcurred, stating that abuse cases should be reported in full to the civil authorities.[14]
According toThe Times of Israeland aChannel 4investigation, the concept ofmesirahwas used by aHaredi Jewishleader to protect community members investigated forchild molestationfrom police investigation.[15][16]
Themesirahdoctrine came under intense public scrutiny in Australia in early 2015 as a result of evidence given to theRoyal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuserelating to an alleged long-running and systematic cover-up of child sexual abuse and the institutional protection of perpetrators at the exclusive Melbourne boys' schoolYeshiva College. On 28 January 2015 Fairfax Media reported secret tape recordings and emails had been disclosed, which revealed that members of Australia's Orthodox Jewish community who assisted police investigations into alleged child sexual abuse were pressured to remain silent on the matter. Criminal barrister Alex Lewenberg was alleged to have been "disappointed", and to have berated a Jew who had been a victim of a Jewish sex offender and whom he subsequently regarded as amossurfor breaking withmesirahtradition.[17]Lewenberg was subsequently found guilty of professional misconduct.[18]
In February 2015 Zephaniah Waks, an adherent of the ultra-Orthodox HasidicChabadsect in Melbourne, Australia, testified in front of the Royal Commission. He stated that following his discovery that one of his sons had been sexually abused by David Kramer, a teacher at their school, Yeshiva College, he confronted the school's principal, Abraham Glick and demanded that Kramer be sacked. Waks told of his shock when he learned a few days later that Kramer was still working at the school. He again confronted Glick, who then claimed that Kramer had admitted his guilt "because he wanted to be caught", but that the school could not dismiss him because, as Glick claimed, Kramer was at risk of self-harm. Waks also told the Commission that despite his anger, he felt constrained from going to the authorities:
I thought this was absolutely outrageous, however if I reported this to the police I would be in breach of the Jewish principle ofmesirah.
He added that the concept ofmesirahprevented Chabad members from going to secular authorities:
At the very least, the breach ofmesirahalmost certainly always leads to shunning and intimidation within the Jewish community and would almost certainly damage marriage prospects of your children.[19]
Giving evidence to the Commission on the day before his father,Menachem (Manny) Waks, one of three children from the Waks family who were sexually abused by staff at Yeshiva College, testified that after breakingmesirahby going public about his abuse, he and his family had been ostracised by rabbinical leaders, shunned by his community and subjected to a sustained campaign of abuse, intimidation and threats, which eventually forced Waks to leave Australia with his wife and children. He also testified about how members of the Chabad community had pressured him to abandon his advocacy:
I was in fact contacted by several considered community members, and they said to me that the anti-Semites are having a field day with my testimony and my publicity around this issue, and that if I cared about the community, I'd cease doing that straight away.
Counsel Assisting the commission then asked Waks how he felt having been accused of being an informer:
I am appalled by it obviously, because the concept of 'Mesirah' really, you can become a death target. Taken at its literal meaning, you become potentially a target who is legitimate to be murdered, because you've gone and cooperated with the authorities. Now, I've never felt threatened for my life, but it does highlight the severity in which this concept is held.[20]
In December 2017, the Commission's final report included a recommendation to Jewish institutions:
All Jewish institutions in Australia should ensure that their complaint handling policies explicitly state that the halachic concepts ofmesirah,moserandlashon harado not apply to the communication and reporting of allegations of child sexual abuse to police and other civil authorities.[21]
Rabbinic courts in Israelhave issued writs calling forsocial exclusionof Jews bringing legal issues[which?]to Israel's civil courts.[22]
Mesirahhas been cited as one of the main reasons for the gross underreporting ofsexual abuse cases in Brooklyn's Haredi community.[23][24]It has been used to dissuade Jewish auditors from reporting other Jews to theInternal Revenue Servicefor tax fraud.[11][dead link]
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Afallacyis the use ofinvalidor otherwise faulty reasoning in the construction of an argument. All forms of human communication can contain fallacies.
Because of their variety, fallacies are challenging to classify. They can be classified by their structure (formal fallacies) or content (informal fallacies). Informal fallacies, the larger group, may then be subdivided into categories such as improper presumption, faulty generalization, error in assigning causation, and relevance, among others.
The use of fallacies is common when the speaker's goal of achieving common agreement is more important to them than utilizing sound reasoning. When fallacies are used, the premise should be recognized as not well-grounded, the conclusion as unproven (but not necessarily false), and the argument as unsound.[1]
A formal fallacy is an error in theargument's form.[2]All formal fallacies are types ofnon sequitur.
A propositional fallacy is an error that concerns compound propositions. For a compound proposition to be true, the truth values of its constituent parts must satisfy the relevant logical connectives that occur in it (most commonly: [and], [or], [not], [only if], [if and only if]). The following fallacies involve relations whose truth values are not guaranteed and therefore not guaranteed to yield true conclusions.Types ofpropositionalfallacies:
A quantification fallacy is an error in logic where the quantifiers of the premises are in contradiction to the quantifier of the conclusion.Types ofquantificationfallacies:
Syllogistic fallacies– logical fallacies that occur insyllogisms.
Informal fallacies – arguments that are logically unsound for lack of well-grounded premises.[14]
Faulty generalization– reaching a conclusion from weak premises.
Questionable causeis a general type of error with many variants. Its primary basis is the confusion of association with causation, either by inappropriately deducing (or rejecting) causation or a broader failure to properly investigate the cause of an observed effect.
A red herring fallacy, one of the main subtypes of fallacies of relevance, is an error in logic where a proposition is, or is intended to be, misleading in order to make irrelevant or false inferences. This includes any logical inference based on fake arguments, intended to replace the lack of real arguments or to replace implicitly the subject of the discussion.[70][71]
Red herring– introducing a second argument in response to the first argument that is irrelevant and draws attention away from the original topic (e.g.: saying "If you want to complain about the dishes I leave in the sink, what about the dirty clothes you leave in the bathroom?").[72]Injury trial, it is known as aChewbacca defense. In political strategy, it is called adead cat strategy.See alsoirrelevant conclusion.
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So help me Godis a phrase often used to give anoath, sometimes optionally as part of anoath of office. It is used in some jurisdictions as an oath for performing a public duty, such as an appearance in court. The phrase implies greater care than usual in the truthfulness of one's testimony or in the performance of one's duty.
Notably, the wordhelpinso help me Godis in thesubjunctive mood.
InAustralia, theOath of Allegianceis available in two forms, one of which contains the phrase "So help me God!"[1]
InCanada, the Oath of Office, Oath of Allegiance, and Oath of Members of the Privy Council may be sworn, and end in "So help me God." They may also be solemnly affirmed, and in such case the phrase is omitted.[2]
TheConstitution of Fiji, Chapter 17requires this phrase for theoath of allegiance, and before service to the republic from the President's office or Vice-President's office, a ministerial position, or a judicial position.
InNew ZealandtheOath of Allegianceis available in English or Māori in two forms, one an oath containing the phrase 'so help me God' and the other anaffirmationwhich does not. ThePolice Act 1958and theOaths Modernisation Billstill includes the phrase.[3][4]
TheOath of Allegianceset out in thePromissory Oaths Act 1868ends with this phrase, and is required to be taken by various office-holders.[5]
The phrase "So help me God" is prescribed in oaths as early as theJudiciary Act of 1789, for U.S. officers other than the President. The act makes the semantic distinction between anaffirmationand anoath.[6]The oath, religious in essence, includes the phrase "so help me God" and "[I] swear". The affirmation uses "[I] affirm". Both serve the same purpose and are described as one (i.e. "... solemnly swear, or affirm, that ...")[7]
In theUnited States, theNo Religious Test Clausestates that "no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States." Still, there are federal oaths which do include the phrase "So help me God", such as forjusticesandjudgesin28 U.S.C.§ 453.[8]
There is no law that requires Presidents to add the words "So help me God" at the end of the oath (or to use a Bible). Some historians maintain thatGeorge Washingtonhimself added the phrase to the end of his first oath, setting a precedent for future presidents and continuing what was already established practice in his day[9]and that all Presidents since have used this phrase, according to Marvin Pinkert, executive director of theNational Archives Experience.[10]Many other historians reject this story given that "it was not until 65 years after the event that the story that Washington added this phrase first appeared in a published volume" and other witnesses, who were present for the event, did not cite him as having added the phrase.[11]These historians further note that "we have no convincing contemporary evidence that any president said "so help me God" until September 1881, when Chester A. Arthur took the oath after the death of James Garfield."[12]It is demonstrable, however, that those historians are in error regarding their claim that there is no "contemporary evidence" of a president saying "so help me God" until 1881. Richard Gardiner's research published in theWhite House History Quarterly, November 2024, offers contemporary evidence for presidents who used the phrase going back to William Henry Harrison in 1841, and Andrew Jackson.[13]
TheUnited States Oath of Citizenship(officially referred to as the "Oath of Allegiance", 8 C.F.R. Part 337 (2008)), taken by all immigrants who wish to becomeUnited States citizens, includes the phrase "so help me God"; however8 CFR337.1provides that the phrase is optional.
TheEnlistment oathand officer'sOath of Officeboth contain this phrase. A change in October 2013 to Air Force Instruction 36-2606[14]made it mandatory to include the phrase during Air Force enlistments/reenlistments. This change has made the instruction "consistent with the language mandated in 10 USC 502".[15]The Air Force announced on September 17, 2014, that it revoked this previous policy change, allowing anyone to omit "so help me God" from the oath.[16]
Some of the states have specified that the words "so help me God" were used in oath of office, and also required ofjurors, witnesses in court,notaries public, and state employees. Alabama, Connecticut, Delaware, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, New Mexico, North Carolina, Texas, and Virginia retain the required "so help me God" as part of the oath to public office. Historically, Maryland and South Carolina did include it but both have been successfully challenged in court. Other states, such as New Hampshire, North Dakota and Rhode Island allow exceptions or alternative phrases. In Wisconsin, the specific language of the oath has been repealed.[17]
InCroatia, the text of presidential oath, which is defined by the Presidential Elections Act amendments of 1997 (Article 4), ends with "Tako mi Bog pomogao" (So help me God).[18][19]
In 2009, concerns about the phrase infringing onConstitution of Croatiawere raised.Constitutional Court of Croatiaruled them out in 2017, claiming that it is compatible with constitution and secular state.[20][21][22]The court said the phrase is in neither direct nor indirect relation to any religious beliefs of theelected president. It doesn't represent a theist or religious belief and does not stop the president in any way from expressing any other religious belief. Saying the phrase while taking the presidential oath does not force a certain belief on the President and does not infringe on their religious freedoms.[22]
In the inauguration ofDutch monarchs, the phrase "zo waarlijk helpe mij God Almachtig" ("So help me God Almighty") is used at the conclusion of the monarch's oath.[23]
In theOath of Officeof thePresident of the Philippines, the phrase "So help me God" (Filipino:Kasihan nawâ akó ng Diyos) is mandatory in oaths.[24]An affirmation, however, has exactly the same legal effect as an oath.
In medieval France, tradition held that when the Duke of Brittany or other royalty entered the city ofRennes, they would proclaimEt qu'ainsi Dieu me soit en aide("And so help me God").[25]
The phraseSo wahr mir Gott helfe(literally "as true as God may help me") is an optional part in oaths of office prescribed for civil servants, soldiers, judges as well as members and high representatives of the federal and state governments such as theFederal President,Federal Chancellorand theMinister Presidents. Parties and witnesses in criminal and civil proceedings may also be placed under oath with this phrase. In such proceedings, the judge first speaks the wordsYou swear [by God Almighty and All-Knowing] that to the best of your knowledge you have spoken the pure truth and not concealed anything.The witness or party then must answerI swear it [, so help me God]. The words between brackets are added or omitted according to the preference of the person placed under oath.[26]If the person concerned raises a conscientious objection against any kind of oath, the judge may speak the wordsAware of your responsibility in court, you affirm that to the best of your knowledge you have spoken the pure truth and not concealed anythingto which the person needs to replyYes.[27]Both forms of the oath and the affirmation carry the same penalty, if the person is found to have lied. Contrary to the oath without a religious phrase, this kind of affirmation is not necessarily available outside court proceedings (e.g. for an oath of office).
The traditional oath of witnesses in Austrian courts ends with the phraseso wahr mir Gott helfe. There are, however, exemptions for witnesses of different religious denominations as well as those unaffiliated with any religion. The oath is rarely practised in civil trials and was completely abolished for criminal procedures in 2008. The phraseso wahr mir Gott helfeis also an (optional) part in the oath of surveyors who testify as expert witnesses as well as court-certified interpreters. Unlike in Germany, the phraseso wahr mir Gott helfeis not part of the oath of office of theFederal President, members of the federal government or state governors, who may or may not add a religious affirmation after the form of oath prescribed by the constitution.
ThePolishphrase is "Tak mi dopomóż Bóg" or "Tak mi, Boże, dopomóż." It has been used in most version of thePolish Army oaths, however other denominations use different phrases. President, prime minister, deputy prime ministers, ministers and members of both houses of parliament can add this phrase at the end of the oath of their office.[28]
InRomania, the oath translation is "Așa să-mi ajute Dumnezeu!", which is used in various ceremonies such as the ministers' oath in front of the president of the republic or the magistrates' oath.
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InIslam,taqiyya(Arabic:تقیة,romanized:taqiyyah,lit.'prudence')[1][2]is the practice of dissimulation and secrecy of religious belief and practice, primarily inShia Islam.[1][3][4][5][6]
Generally,taqiyyais regarded as the act of maintaining secrecy or mystifying one's beliefs when one's life or property is threatened.[7][8]The practice of concealing one's beliefs has existed since the early days of Islam; early Muslims did so to avoid persecution or violence by non-Muslim governments or individuals.[9][10]
The use oftaqiyyahas varied in recent history, especially betweenSunni Muslimsand Shia Muslims. Sunni Muslims gained political supremacy over time and therefore only occasionally found the need to practicetaqiyya. On the other hand, Shia Muslims, as well asSufi Muslimsdevelopedtaqiyyaas a method of self-preservation and protection in hostile environments.[11]
A related term iskitmān(lit.'action of covering'or'dissimulation'), which has a more specific meaning of dissimulation by silence or omission.[12][13]This practice is emphasized inShi'ismwhereby adherents are permitted to conceal their beliefs when under threat ofpersecutionor compulsion.[3][14]
Taqiyyawas initially practiced under duress by some ofMuhammad's companions.[15]Later, it became important for Sufis, but even more so for Shias, who often experienced persecution as a religious minority.[14][16]In Shia theology,taqiyyais permissible in situations where life or property are at risk and whereby no danger to religion would occur.[14]Taqiyyahas also been politically legitimised inTwelver Shi'ism, to maintain unity among Muslims and fraternity among Shia clerics.[17][18]
The termtaqiyyais derived from the Arabictriliteral rootwāw-qāf-yādenoting "caution, fear",[1]"prudence, guarding against (a danger)",[19]"carefulness, wariness".[20]In the sense of "prudence, fear" it can be used synonymously with the termstuqa(n),tuqāt,taqwá, andittiqāʾ, which are derived from the same root.[12]These terms also have other meanings. For example, the term taqwá generally means "piety" (lit.'fear of God') in an Islamic context.[21]
A related term iskitmān(Arabic:كتمان), the "action of covering, dissimulation".[12]While the terms taqiyya and kitmān may be used synonymously, kitmān refers specifically to the concealment of one's convictions by silence or omission.[13]Kitman derives from Arabickatama"to conceal, to hide".[22]Ibadisused kitmān to conceal their Muslim beliefs in the face of persecution by their enemies.[23]
The technical meaning of the termtaqiyyais thought[by whom?]to be derived from theQuranicreference to religious dissimulation inSura 3:28:
Believers should not take disbelievers as guardians instead of the believers—and whoever does so will have nothing to hope for from Allah—unless it is a precaution against their tyranny. And Allah warns you about Himself. And to Allah is the final return. (illā antattaqūminhumtuqāt).
The two wordstattaqū("you fear") andtuqāt"in fear" are derived from the same root astaqiyya, and the use oftaqiyyaabout the general principle described in this passage is first recorded in a Qur'anic gloss byMuhammad al-Bukhariin the 9th century.[citation needed]
Regarding 3:28,ibn Kathirwrites, "meaning, except those believers who in some areas or times fear for their safety from the disbelievers. In this case, such believers are allowed to show friendship to the disbelievers outwardly, but never inwardly." He quotes theCompanion of the ProphetAbu al-Darda, who said "we smile in the face of some people although our hearts curse them," andHasan ibn Ali, who said, "the tuqyah is acceptable till theDay of Resurrection."[24]
A similar instance of the Qur'an permitting dissimulation under compulsion is found inSurah An-Nahl16:106[25]Sunni and Shia commentators alike observe that verse 16:106 refers to the case of'Ammar b. Yasir, who was forced to renounce his beliefs under physical duress and torture.[13]
The basic principle of taqiyya is agreed upon by scholars, though they tend to restrict it to dealing with non-Muslims and when under compulsion (ikrāh), while Shia jurists also allow it in interactions with Muslims and in all necessary matters (ḍarūriyāt).[26]In Sunni jurisprudence protecting one's belief during extreme or exigent circumstances is calledidtirar(إضطرار), which translates to "being forced" or "being coerced", and this word is not specific to concealing the faith; for example, under the jurisprudence ofidtirarone is allowed to consumeprohibited food(e.g. pork) to avoid starving to death.[27]Additionally, denying one's faith under duress is "only at most permitted and not under all circumstances obligatory".[28]
Al-Tabaricomments on sura XVI, verse 106 (Tafsir, Bulak 1323, xxiv, 122): "If any one is compelled and professes unbelief with his tongue, while his heart contradicts him, in order to escape his enemies, no blame falls on him, because God takes his servants as their hearts believe." This verse was recorded afterAmmar Yasirwas forced by the idolaters ofMeccato recant his faith and denounce theIslamic prophetMuhammad. Al-Tabari explains that concealing one's faith is only justified if the person is in mortal danger, and even thenmartyrdomis considered a noble alternative. If threatened, it would be preferable for a Muslim to migrate to a more peaceful place where a person may practice their faith openly, "since God's earth is wide."[28]InHadith, in the Sunni commentary ofSahih al-Bukhari, known as theFath al-Bari, it is stated that:[29]
أجمعوا على أن من أكره على الكفر واختار القتل أنه أعظم أجرا عند الله ممن اختار الرخصة ، وأما غير الكفر فإن أكره على أكل الخنزير وشرب الخمر مثلا فالفعل أولى
Which translates to:
There is a consensus that whomsoever is forced into apostasy and chooses death has a greater reward than a person who takes the license [to deny one's faith under duress], but if a person is being forced to eat pork or drink wine, then they should do that [instead of choosing death].
Al-Ghazaliwrote in hisThe Revival of the Religious Sciences:
Safeguarding of a Muslim's life is a mandatory obligation that should be observed; and that lying is permissible when the shedding of a Muslim's blood is at stake.
Ibn Sa'd, in his bookal-Tabaqat al-Kubra, narrates on the authority ofIbn Sirin:
The Prophet (S) saw 'Ammar Ibn Yasir (ra) crying, so he (S) wiped off his (ra) tears, and said: "The nonbelievers arrested you and immersed you in water until you said such and such (i.e., bad-mouthing the Prophet (S) and praising the pagan gods to escape persecution); if they come back, then say it again."
Jalal al-Dinal-Suyuti, in his bookal-Ashbah Wa al-Naza'ir, affirms that:
It is acceptable (for a Muslim) to eat the meat of a dead animal at a time of great hunger (starvation to the extent that the stomach is devoid of all food); and to loosen a bite of food (for fear of choking to death) by alcohol; and to utter words of unbelief; and if one is living in an environment where evil and corruption are the pervasive norm, and permissible things (Halal) are the exception and a rarity, then one can use whatever is available to fulfill his needs.
Jalal al-Dinal-Suyuti, in his bookal-Durr al-Manthoor Fi al-Tafsir al- Ma'athoor,[30]narrates that:
Abd Ibn Hameed, on the authority of al-Hassan, said: "al-Taqiyya is permissible until the Day of Judgment."
The practice of taqiyya is not limited to any one sect within Islam. It is observed and referenced in Sunni texts of law, hadith collections, and Quranic exegesis. Although historically more extensively practiced and referenced by Shii Muslims, taqiyya is doctrinally available to Sunni Muslims as well. This challenges the negative notion that taqiyya is exclusively associated with one community or confined to a specific group.[31]
In Sunni Islamic law, as in Islamic law in general, the concept of intention (niyya) holds great importance. Merely performing an act without the right intention is considered insufficient. Afatwaissued by Ibn Abi Juma highlights the significance of one's inner state and intention in determining their identity as a Muslim. According to this fatwa, iftaqiyyais practiced with the right intention, it is not considered sinful but rather a pious act. The fatwa emphasizes that God values the intention of believers over their outward actions, and taqiyya can be seen as a form of outward expression aligned with the correct intention.[31]
WhenMamunbecamecaliph(813 AD), he tried to impose his religious views on the status of the Qur'an over all his subjects, in an ordeal called themihna, or "inquisition". His views were disputed, and many of those who refused to follow his views were imprisoned, tortured, or threatened with the sword.[32]Some Sunni scholars chose to affirm Mamun's view thatthe Qur'an was created, in spite of their beliefs,[13]though a notable exception to this was scholar and theologianAhmad ibn Hanbal, who chose to endure torture instead.[33]
Following the end of theReconquistaof theIberian Peninsulain 1492, Muslims were persecuted by theCatholic Monarchsandforced to convert to Christianityor face expulsion. The principle of taqiyya became very important for Muslims during theInquisitionin 16th-century Spain, as it allowed them to convert to Christianity while remainingcrypto-Muslims, practicing Islam in secret. In 1504,Ubayd Allah al-Wahrani, aMalikimuftiinOran,issued a fatwāallowing Muslims to make extensive use of concealment to maintain their faith.[5][34][35]This is seen as an exceptional case, since Islamic law prohibits conversion except in cases of mortal danger, and even then requires recantation as quickly as possible,[36]and al-Wahrani's reasoning diverged from that of the majority of earlier MalikiFaqīhssuch asAl-Wansharisi.[35]
Minority Shi'a communities, since the earliest days of Islam, were often forced to practice pious circumspection (taqiyya) as an instinctive method of self-preservation and protection, an obligatory practice in the lands which became known as the realm of pious circumspection (dār al-taqiyya). Therefore, the recurring theme is that during times of danger feigning disbelief is allowed.[37]
Two primary aspects of circumspection became central for the Shi'a: not disclosing their association with theImamswhen this could put them in danger and protecting theesoteric teachings of the Imamsfrom those who are unprepared to receive them. While in most instances, minority Shi'a communities employedtaqiyyausing the façade ofSunnismin Sunni-dominated societies, the principle also allows for circumspection as other faiths. For instance, GuptiIsmaili Shi'acommunities in theIndian subcontinentcircumspect asHindusto avoid caste persecution. In many cases, the practice oftaqiyyabecame deeply ingrained into practitioners' psyche. If a believer wished, he/she could adopt this practice at moments of danger, or as a lifelong process.[38]
Kohlberg has coined the expression "prudentialtaqiyya" to describe caution due to fear of external enemies. It can be further categorized into two distinct forms: concealment and dissimulation.
For instance, historical accounts narrate how some Imams concealed their identities as a protective measure. In one story, the Imam Jafar al-Sadiq commended the behavior of a follower who chose to avoid direct interaction with the Imam, even though he recognized him on the street, rather than exposing him, and even cursed those who would call him by his name.[37]
Kohlberg identifies the second type of prudentialtaqiyyaas dissimulation, characterized by using deceptive words or actions intended to mislead opponents. It is typically employed by individuals possessing secret information. It is not solely confined to Imami Shi'ism but has been observed among various Muslim individuals or groups with minority views. During times of danger, the recurring theme is thattaqiyyapermits individuals to utter words of disbelief as a means of self-preservation. Prudentialtaqiyyais considered essential for safeguarding the faith and may be lifted when the political climate no longer poses a threat. Therefore, one way to discern the motivation behind a specific type oftaqiyyais to determine whether it ceases once the danger has subsided.[37]
Kohlberg coined the expression "non-prudentialtaqiyya" for when there is a need to conceal secret doctrines from the uninitiated. Non-prudentialtaqiyyais employed by believers when they possess secret knowledge and are obligated to conceal it from those who have not attained the same level of initiation. This hidden knowledge encompasses diverse aspects, including profound insights into specific Quranic verses, interpretations of the Imam's teachings, and specific religious obligations. The obligation to conceal arises when individuals acquire such exclusive knowledge emphasizing the importance of preserving its secrecy within the initiated community.[37]
If coupled with mental reservation, religious dissimulation is considered lawful in Twelver Shi'ism whenever life or property is at serious risk.[39][40]In Twelver theology,taqiyyaalso refers to hiding or safeguarding the esoteric teachings of Shia imams,[41][42][43]a practice intended to "protect the truth from those not worthy of it."[44]This esoteric knowledge (of God), taught by imams to their (true) followers, is said to distinguish them from other Muslims.[45]
Historically, the Twelver doctrine oftaqiyyawas developed byMuhammad al-Baqir(d.c.732), the fifth of thetwelve imams,[46][47][48]and later by his successor,Ja'far al-Sadiq(d.765).[49]At the time, this doctrine was likely intended for the survival of Shia imams and their followers, for they were being brutally molested and persecuted.[50][51][52]Indeed,taqiyyais particularly relevant to Twelver Shias, for until about the sixteenth century they lived mostly as a minority among an often-hostile Sunni majority.[53][39]Traditions attributed to Shia imams thus encourage their followers to hide their faith for their safety, some even characterizingtaqiyyaas a pillar of faith.[50][54][55]Theological and legal statements of Shia imams were also influenced bytaqiyya.[56][41][57]For instance, al-Baqir is not known to have publicly reviled the first two caliphs, namely, Abu Bakr and Umar,[58][59]most likely because the imam exercisedtaqiyya.[60]Indeed, al-Baqir's conviction that the Islamic prophet had explicitly designated Ali ibn Abi Talib as his successor implies that Abu Bakr and Umar were usurpers.[60]More generally, whenever contradictory statements are attributed to Shia imams, those that are aligned with Sunni positions are discarded, for Shia scholars argue that such statements must have been uttered undertaqiyya.[57]
States
People
Centers
Other
For theIsmailisin the aftermath of theMongolonslaught of theAlamut statein 1256 CE, the need to practice taqiyya became necessary, not only for the protection of the community itself, which was now stateless, but also for safeguarding the line of theNizariIsmaili Imamateduring this period of unrest.[61]Accordingly, the ShiaImamJa'far al-Sadiqstated "Taqiyya is my religion and the religion of my ancestors",[62]a tradition recorded in various sources includingKitāb al-Maḥāsinof Aḥmad b. Muhammad al-Barqī and theDa'ā'im al-Islāmofal-Qāḍī al-Nu'mān.[63]
Such periods in which the Imams are concealed are known assatr, however the term may also refer to times when the Imams were not physically hidden from view but rather when the community was required to practice precautionary dissimulation. Duringsatrthe Imam could only be accessed by his community and in extremely dangerous circumstances, would be accessible only to the highest-ranking members of the Ismaili hierarchy (ḥudūd), whose function it was to transmit the teachings of the Imam to the community. Shi'a Imam Ja'far al-Sadiq is reputed to have said, "Our teaching is the truth, the truth of the truth; it is the exoteric and the esoteric, and the esoteric of the esoteric; it is the secret and the secret of a secret, a protected secret, hidden by a secret."[38]The Fatimid Imam-Caliphal-Hakimexpresses the sentiment oftaqiyyawhen he confides to his followers that "if any religion is stronger than you, follow it, but keep me in your hearts."[38]
According to Shia scholar Muhammad Husain Javari Sabinal, Shiism would not have spread at all if not for taqiyya, referring to instances where Shia have been ruthlessly persecuted by the Sunni political elite during theUmayyadandAbbasidempires.[64]Indeed, for the Ismailis, the persistence and prosperity of the community today owes largely to the careful safeguarding of the beliefs and teachings of the Imams during theIlkhanate, theSafawiddynasty, and other periods of persecution.[citation needed]The 16th century Ismaili author Khwāja Muḥammad Riḍā b. Sulṭān Ḥusayn, also known as Khayrkhvah-i Harati, referring to theAnjudanperiod, writes about the end of an era oftaqiyya. He explains that thus far "a veil was drawn over the visage of truth," but now the Imam "allowed the veil to be lifted". Since the Imam had allowed written correspondence with his followers, he had effectively ended the era oftaqiyya.[65]
The Gupti community viewed the Aga Khan III as their spiritual leader and Imam, but concealed these beliefs to protect themselves. However, the Guptis used a unique form of taqiyya, they did not appear as Sunni, Sufi, or Ithna ashari, which were the more common identities to take on. Rather they identified as Hindus, and this became a significant aspect of who they were. The Guptis view theirtaqiyyaas a fulfillment and culmination of their outwardly professed faith, rather than contrary to it. The name 'Gupta' in Sanskrit, means secret or hidden, which perfectly embodies the concealment of their faith and true identity.[38]
Alawitebeliefs have never been confirmed by their modern religious authorities.[66]Alawites tend to conceal their beliefs (taqiyya) due to historical persecution.[67]Some tenets of the faith are secret, known only to a select few;[68][69]therefore, they have been described as amysticalsect.[70]Alawites celebrateIslamic festivalsbut consider the most important one to beEid al-Ghadir.
Because of theDruze's Ismaili Shia origin, they have also been associated with taqiyya. When the Druze were a minority being persecuted they took the appearance of another religion externally, usually the ruling religion in the area, and for the most part adhered to Muslim customs by this practice.[71]
In the early 21st century, taqiyya has become the subject of debate. According to S. Jonathon O'Donnell, some theories posit "the idea that Muslims have a religious duty to deceive non-Muslims if it furthers the cause" of Islam. He argues the "claim rests on a misreading of the concept oftaqiyya, by which believers may conceal their faith if under threat of violence. This misreading is widely deployed in Islamophobic writings."[72]The term has been used by writers andcounter-jihadistssuch asPatrick Sookhdeo, who posit that Muslims use the doctrine as a key strategy in theIslamizationof Western countries by hiding their true violent intents.[73][74]
In 2008Raymond Ibrahimpublished inJane's Islamic Affairs Analystan article titled "Islam's doctrines of deception".[75]Ibrahim presented his own translation[76]of part of LebaneseDruzescholarSami Makarem's monographAl Taqiyya Fi Al Islam("Dissimulation in Islam"). Ibrahim quoted:
Taqiyya is of fundamental importance in Islam. Practically every Islamic sect agrees to it and practices it ... We can go so far as to say that the practice of taqiyya is mainstream in Islam, and that those few sects not practicing it diverge from the mainstream ... Taqiyya is very prevalent in Islamic politics, especially in the modern era.[75][76][77]
Michael Ryan,[78]also inJane's, characterized Ibrahim's article as "well-researched, factual in places but ... ultimately misleading".[79][77]Ibrahim responded in 2009 with "Taqiyya Revisited: A Response to the Critics", on his blog and on theMiddle East Forumwebsite.[78][80]Ibrahim was again criticised for his view on Taqiyya in 2019, by Islamic scholarUsama Hasanin theJewish Chronicle.[81]Ibrahim also responded to Hasan in aFrontPage Magazinearticle titled "Taqiyya Sunset: Exposing the Darkness Shrouding Islamic Deceit."
Stefan Wimmer argues that taqiyya is not a tool to deceive non-Muslims and spread Islam, but instead a defensive mechanism to save one's life when it is in great danger (giving the example of theReconquista).[82]Similar views are shown by Jakob Skovgaard-Petersen from theUniversity of Copenhagen.[83]
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You can't have your cake and eat it (too)is a popular English idiomaticproverbor figure of speech.[1]The proverb literally means "you cannot simultaneously retain possession of a cake and eat it, too". Once the cake is eaten, it is gone. It can be used to say that one cannot have two incompatible things, or that one should not try to have more than is reasonable. The proverb's meaning is similar to the phrases "you can't have it both ways" and "you can't have the best of both worlds."
For those unfamiliar with it, the proverb may sound confusing due to the ambiguity of the word 'have', which can mean 'keep' or 'to have in one's possession', but which can also be used as a synonym for 'eat' (e.g. 'to have breakfast'). Some find the common form of the proverb to be incorrect or illogical and instead prefer: "You can'teatyour cake and[then still]haveit (too)". Indeed, this used to be the most common form of the expression until the 1930s–1940s, when it was overtaken by the have-eat variant.[2]Another, less common, version uses 'keep' instead of 'have'.[3]
Choosing between having and eating a cake illustrates the concept oftrade-offsoropportunity cost.[4][5][6]
An early recording of the phrase is in a letter on 14 March 1538 fromThomas, Duke of Norfolk, toThomas Cromwell, as "a man can not have his cake and eat his cake".[7]The phrase occurs with the clauses reversed inJohn Heywood'sA dialogue Conteinyng the Nomber in Effect of All the Prouerbes in the Englishe Tonguefrom 1546, as "wolde you bothe eate your cake, and have your cake?".[8][9]InJohn Davies'sScourge of Follyof 1611, the same order is used, as "A man cannot eat his cake and haue it stil."[10]
InJonathan Swift's 1738farcePolite Conversation, the character Lady Answerall says "she cannot eat her cake and have her cake".[11]In a posthumous adaptation ofPolite Conversation, calledTittle Tattle; or, Taste A-la-Mode, released in 1749, the order was reversed: "And she cannot have her Cake and eat her Cake".[12][13][14]A modern-sounding variant from 1812, "We cannot have our cake and eat it too", can be found in R. C. Knopf'sDocument Transcriptions of theWar of 1812(1959).[15]
According toGoogle Ngram Viewer, a search engine that charts the frequencies of phrases in archived historical (written) documents over time, the eat-have order used to be the most common variant, before being surpassed by the have-eat version in the 1930s and 40s.[2]A reflection of this can be found inAyn Rand’s 1957 novelAtlas Shrugged. Several pages intoJohn Galt’s famous monologue, he employs the proverb as an analogy in simple terms: “You cannot have your cake and eat it, too”.
In 1996, the eat-have variant played a role in the apprehension ofTed Kaczynski, also known as the Unabomber. Inhis manifesto, which the terrorist sent to newspapers in the wake of his bombings, Kaczynski advocated the undoing of the industrial revolution, writing: "As for the negative consequences of eliminating industrial society — well, you can’t eat your cake and have it too."James R. Fitzgerald, an FBIforensic linguist, noted the then-uncommon variant of the proverb and later discovered that Kaczynski had also used it in a letter to his mother. This, among other clues, led to his identification and arrest.[16][17][18]
Anarcho-capitalisteconomistHans-Hermann Hoppein his 2001 book,Democracy: The God That Failed,mentions the famous proverb, and then, for further clarification and simplicity states, "You cannot have your cake and eat it too for instance, or what you consume now cannot be consumed again in the future."[19]
In her 2002 book,classicistKatharina Volk ofColumbia Universityused the phrase to describe the development of poetic imagery in didacticLatin poetry, naming the principle behind the imagery's adoption and application the "have-one's-cake-and-eat-it-too principle".[20]
The expression “cakeism” and the associated noun and adjective “cakeist” have come into general use in British English, especially in political journalism, and have been accepted into English dictionaries.[21][22]
The expressions, which reverse the traditional proverb, refer to a wish to enjoy two desirable but incompatible alternatives, especially regarding the UK’s approach toBrexitnegotiations and subsequent deliberations. It developed after comments made by the then UKforeign secretaryBoris Johnsonin 2016, that "I've never been an Outer".[23]"My policy on cake is pro having it and pro eating it."[24]Subsequently, asprime minister, he described the UK's post-Brexit trade deal as a "cakeist treaty".[25]The neologisms have since become objects of derision and have led to sarcastic re-reversals.[26][27]
"Cakeism" has also been used to describe inconsistent positions held by theScottish National Party, for example, arguing for a low-tax, high-public spending economy in anindependent Scotland, or seeking to retain relationships with the UK that would be incompatible with its aspiration forEuropean Unionmembership.[28][29]
The proverb, while commonly used, is at times questioned by people who feel the expression to be illogical or incorrect. As comedianBilly Connollyonce put it: "What good is [having] a cake if you can't eat it?"[30]According to Paul Brians, Professor of English atWashington State University, the idiom confuses many people because the verbto have, can refer to possessing, but also to eating, e.g. "Let's have breakfast" or "I'm having a sandwich". Brians also argues that "You can't eat your cake and have it too" is a more logical variant than "You can't have your cake and eat it too", because the verb-order of "eat-have" makes more sense: once you've eaten your cake, you don't have it anymore.[31]
Ben Zimmer, writing for theLanguage Logof theUniversity of Pennsylvania, states that the interpretation of the two variants relies on the assumption of either sequentiality or simultaneity. If one believes the phrase to imply sequentiality, then the "eat-have" variant could be seen as a more logical form: you cannot eat your cake andthen(still) have it, but you actually can have your cake andtheneat it. Thus, "can't eat and (then) have" would be a correct statement, "can't have and (then) eat" would be an incorrect statement. However, if one believes the "and" conjoining the verbs to imply simultaneity of action rather than sequentiality of action, then both versions are usable as an idiom, because "cake-eating and cake-having are mutually exclusive activities, regardless of the syntactic ordering", Zimmer writes.[18]
In response, Richard Mason disagreed with Zimmer's assertion on the mutually exclusiveness of the two actions: "simultaneous cake-having and cake-eating are NOT mutually exclusive. On the contrary, generally I cannot eat something at any time when I do not have it. But I eat things when I have them all the time. Only when the object is entirely consumed do I no longer have it (and at that time the eating is also terminated)." Therefore, Mason considers the "have-eat" variant to be "logically indefensible".[32]Zimmer reacted to Mason by stating: "the 'having' part of the idiom seems to me to imply possession over a long period of time, rather than the transient cake-having that occurs during cake-eating". He concludes that it is ultimately not relevant to ponder over the logicality of crystallized, commonly used phrases. "Few people protest the expressionhead over heelsto mean 'topsy-turvy,' despite the fact that its "literal" reading describes a normal, non-topsy-turvy bodily alignment".[18]
Stan Carey, writing for theMacmillan DictionaryBlog, likens the "have-eat" vs. "eat-have" question with the discussion over "I could care less" and "I couldn't care less", two phrases that are used to refer to the same thing yet are construed differently, the former sounding illogical because saying "I could care less" would mean that you actually do care to some degree. Carey writes that even though the "eat-have" form of the cake-proverb might make more sense, "idioms do not hinge on logic, and expecting them to make literal sense is futile. But it can be hard to ward off the instinctive wish that language align better with common sense." Carey jokingly states that the cake-idiom actually does have its cake and eats it.[33]
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The wordsPopery(adjectivePopish) andPapism(adjectivePapist, also used to refer to an individual) are mainly historical pejorative words in theEnglish languageforRoman Catholicism, once frequently used byProtestantsandEastern Orthodox Christiansto label their Roman Catholic opponents, who differed from them in accepting theauthority of the Popeover theChristian Church.[1]The words were popularised during theEnglish Reformation(1532–1559), when theChurch of Englandbroke away from theRoman Catholic Churchand divisions emerged between those who rejected papal authority and those who continued to follow Rome. The words are recognised as pejorative;[2][3][4][5]they have been in widespread use in Protestant writings until the mid-nineteenth century, including use in some laws that remain in force in theUnited Kingdom.[6]
PoperyandPapismare sometimes used in modern writing asdog whistlesforanti-Catholicismor they are used as pejorative ways of distinguishing Roman Catholicism from other forms of Christianity that refer to themselves asCatholic, such asEastern Orthodoxy, Lutherans ofEvangelical Catholicchurchmanship or Anglicans ofAnglo-Catholicchurchmanship. Papist was used in the latter way in 2008 by theAristotelian University of Thessalonikiat a conference opposingecumenism, and the word sees some wider use in theEastern Orthodox Church.[7][1]
According to theOxford English Dictionary, the wordPapistwas first used in 1528.[9]
The word was in common use by Protestant writers until the mid-nineteenth century, as shown by its frequent appearance inThomas Macaulay'sHistory of England from the Accession of James IIand in other works of that period, including those with no sectarian bias.
The word is found in certain surviving statutes of theUnited Kingdom, for example in the EnglishBill of Rightsof 1689 and the ScottishClaim of Rightof 1689. Catholics have been excluded from the British throne for centuries. In 1701, Parliament passed theAct of Settlement, which requires that only a Protestant monarch could rule over England and Ireland.[10]Under theAct of Settlementof 1701, no one who professes "the popish religion" may succeed to the throne of theKingdom of Englandand the Act continues to apply to the United Kingdom and all of theCommonwealth Realms;[6]until theSuccession to the Crown Act 2013amended it with effect from 2015, the Act of Settlement also banned from the throne anyone who married "a papist". Fears thatRoman Catholicsecular leaders would beanti-Protestantand would be unduly influenced from Rome arose after all allegiance to the Pope was banned in England in the reigns ofHenry VIIIandElizabeth I.Jonathan Swift(1667–1745), the author ofGulliver's Travels, employed the term in his satirical essayA Modest Proposal, in which he proposed selling Irish babies to be eaten by wealthy English landlords.Daniel Defoewrote in the popularRobinson Crusoe(1719), near the end of the novel: "[...] I began to regret having professed myself a Papist, and thought it might not be the best religion to die with."
Similar terms, such as the traditionalpoperyand the more recentpapalism, are sometimes used,[11][12][13]as in thePopery Act 1698and the IrishPopery Act. TheSeventh-day AdventistprophetessEllen G. Whiteused the termspapistandpoperythroughout her bookThe Great Controversy, a volume harshly criticized for its anti-Catholic tone.
During theAmerican presidential election of 1928, theDemocraticnomineeAl Smithwas labeled apapistby his political opponents. He was the first Roman Catholic ever to gain the presidential nomination of a major party, and this led to fears that, if he were elected, the United States government would follow the dictates of the Vatican.[14]As of 2022[update],John F. KennedyandJoe Bidenare the only Roman Catholics to have been elected President of the United States.
The term is still sometimes used today,[15][16]although much less often than in earlier centuries.
In early use the term appeared in the compound form "Crypto-Papist", referring to members of Reformed, Protestant, or nonconformist churches who at heart were allegedly Roman Catholics.[17][18]Alexis Khomiakhov, a Russianlay theologianof the nineteenth century, claimed that "All Protestants are Crypto-Papists".[19]
Although the term has been used as a means of attacking Protestants withhigh churchsympathies, such asWilliam LaudandJohn Spottiswoode, at other times there have been individuals who have secretly converted to Catholicism, for example,James II of England,Bartholomew RemovandYelizaveta Fyodorovich. Some people may later on openly convert, such asGeorge Calvert, 1st Baron Baltimore, or secretly convert with reservations, such asJohn III of Sweden.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crypto-Papism
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Attorney–client privilegeorlawyer–client privilegeis thecommon lawdoctrine oflegal professional privilegein the United States. Attorney–client privilege is "[a] client's right to refuse to disclose and to prevent any other person from disclosing confidential communications between theclientand the attorney."[1]
The attorney–client privilege is one of the oldest privileges for confidential communications.[2]The United States Supreme Court has stated that by assuringconfidentiality, the privilege encourages clients to make "full and frank" disclosures to their attorneys, who are then better able to provide candid advice and effective representation.[3]
The origins of attorney–client privilege trace back tomedieval England, where the king presided over trials and relied on attorneys to present cases. Because attorneys were considered officers of the court, they were expected to fully disclose all relevant information. However, as legal representation evolved, courts recognized that forcing attorneys to reveal client confidences underminedjustice. This led to a principle that even the king could not compel an attorney to discloseprivileged communications.[4]
One of the earliest recorded cases affirming this privilege isBerd v. Lovelace(1577), where an English court ruled that legal counsel could not be forced to testify about client communications.[5]By the 18th century, the principle had solidified inEnglish common law, emphasizing that the privilege belonged to the client, not the attorney. This doctrine carried over to the American legal system, where it became a foundational rule of professional ethics. TheU.S. Supreme Courthas repeatedly affirmed its importance, notably inUpjohn Co. v. United States, 449 U.S. 383 (1981), which broadened the privilege to cover corporate legal communications.[6]
With respect to experts that are hired by the attorneys, the attorney-client privilege is referred to as aKovel standardbased on the case[7]of United States v. Kovel, 296 F.2d 918 (2d Cir. 1961) or broadly aKovel Agreement.[8][9]Experts hired by attorneys to assist in representation of a client may vary by profession. Such experts can be such asCPAs,Actuaries,medical doctors, orengineers. These experts may be disclosed or undisclosed to the Court. In the United States disclosedExpert witnessesmay not be covered under the Kovel Standard, depending on the Court and the nature of their work, and their involvement in thelegal adviceprocess.
Although there are minor variations, the elements necessary to establish the attorney–client privilege generally are:
There are a number of exceptions to the privilege in most jurisdictions, chief among them:
A corollary to the attorney–client privilege is thejoint defense privilege, which is also called thecommon interest rule.[11]The common interest rule "serves to protect the confidentiality of communications passing from one party to another party where a joint defense or strategy has been decided upon and undertaken by the parties and their respective counsel."[11]
An attorney speaking publicly in regard to a client's personal business and private affairs can be reprimanded by the bar or disbarred, regardless of the fact that he or she may be no longer representing the client. Discussing a client's or past client's criminal history, or otherwise, is viewed as a breach of confidentiality.[12]
The attorney–client privilege is separate from and should not be confused with thework-product doctrine.
When an attorney is not acting primarily as an attorney but, for instance, as a business advisor, member of the Board of Directors, or in another non-legal role, then the privilege generally does not apply.[13]
The privilege protects the confidential communication, and not the underlying information. For instance, if a client has previously disclosed confidential information to a third party who is not an attorney, and then gives the same information to an attorney, the attorney–client privilege will still protect the communication to the attorney, but will not protect the communication with the third party.
The privilege may be waived if the confidential communications are disclosed to third parties.
Other limits to the privilege may apply depending on the situation being adjudicated.
The crime–fraud exception can render the privilege moot when communications between an attorney and client are themselves used to further a crime,tort, or fraud. InClark v. United States, theU.S. Supreme Courtstated that "A client who consults an attorney for advice that will serve him in the commission of a fraud will have no help from the law. He must let the truth be told."[14]The crime–fraud exception alsodoesrequire that the crime or fraud discussed between client and attorney be carried out to be triggered.[15]U.S. courts have not yet conclusively ruled how little knowledge an attorney can have of the underlying crime or fraud before the privilege detaches and the attorney's communications or requisite testimony become admissible.[16]
Lawyers may disclose confidential information relating to the retainer where they are reasonably seeking to collect payment for services rendered. This is justified on policy grounds. If lawyers were unable to disclose such information, many would undertake legal work only where payment is made in advance. This would arguably adversely affect the public's access to justice.
Lawyers may also breach the duty where they are defending themselves against disciplinary or legal proceedings. A client who initiates proceedings against a lawyer effectively waives rights to confidentiality. This is justified on grounds of procedural fairness—a lawyer unable to reveal information relating to the retainer would be unable to defend themselves against such action.
Another case is for theprobateof alast will and testament. Previously confidential communications between the lawyer andtestatormay be disclosed in order to prove that a will represented the intent of the now deceaseddecedent. In many instances, the will,codicil, or other parts of theestate planrequire explanation or interpretation through other proof (extrinsic evidence), such as the attorney's file notes or correspondence from the client.
In certain cases, the client may desire or consent to revelation of personal or family secrets only after his or her death; for example, the will may leave alegacyto aparamouror anatural child.
Courts have occasionally revoked the privilege after the death of the client if it is deemed that doing so serves the client's intent, such as in the case of resolving testamentary disputes among heirs.
In the United States, communications between accountants and their clients are usually not privileged. A person who is worried about accusations of questionable accounting, such astax evasion, may decide to work only with an attorney or only with an accountant who is also an attorney; some or all of the resulting communications may be privileged provided that all the requirements for the attorney–client privilege are met. The mere fact that the practitioner is an attorney will not create a valid attorney–client privilege with respect to a communication. For example, if the practitioner provides business or accounting advice rather than legal advice attorney–client privilege might not be established.
Under federal tax law in the United States, for communications on or after July 22, 1998, there is a limited federally authorizedaccountant–client privilegethat may apply to certain communications with non-attorneys.[17]
If a case arises in the federal court system, the federal court will apply Rule 501 of theFederal Rules of Evidenceto determine whether to apply the privilege law of the relevant state or federal common law. If the case is brought to the federal court underdiversity jurisdiction, the law of the relevant state will be used to apply the privilege. If the case involves afederal question, the federal court will apply the federal common law of attorney–client privilege; however, Rule 501 grants flexibility to the federal courts, allowing them to construe the privilege "in light of experience and reason".[18]
FRE 502(b) provides that inadvertent disclosures during a federal proceeding or to a federal office or agency do not act as a waiver of the privilege if the holder of the privilege "took reasonable steps to prevent disclosure" in the first place and "promptly took reasonable steps to rectify the error."[19]Parties cannot merely state that they took "reasonable steps to prevent disclosure," instead they must give the court a detailed account of the procedures they took.[20]Further, merely sending a letter demanding the return of privileged documents after discovering their inadvertent disclosure may not satisfy the requisite prompt response required.[20]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attorney%E2%80%93client_privilege
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Due diligenceis the investigation or exercise of care that a reasonable business or person is normally expected to take before entering into an agreement orcontractwith another party or an act with a certainstandard of care.
Due diligence can be alegal obligation, but the term more commonly applies to voluntary investigations. It may also offer adefenceagainst legal action. A common example of due diligence is the process through which a potential acquirer evaluates a target company or its assets in advance of amerger or acquisition.[1]The theory behind due diligence holds that performing this type of investigation contributes significantly to informed decision making by enhancing the amount and quality of information available to decision makers and by ensuring that this information is systematically used to deliberate on the decision at hand and all its costs, benefits, and risks.[2]
The term "due diligence" can be read as "required carefulness" or "reasonable care" in general usage, and has been used in the literal sense of "requisite effort" since at least the mid-fifteenth century.[3]It became a specializedlegal termand later a common business term due to the United States'Securities Act of 1933, where the process is called "reasonable investigation". Under Section 11b3, a person could avoid liability for an untrue statement of a material fact if they had, "after reasonable investigation, reasonable ground to believe and did believe, at the time", the truth of the statement.[4]The defense at Section 11, referred to later in legal usage as the "due diligence" defense, could be used bybroker-dealerswhen accused of inadequate disclosure to investors of material information with respect to the purchase ofsecurities. In legal and business use, the term was soon used for the process itself instead of how it was to be performed, so that the original expressions such as "exercise due diligence in investigating" and "investigation carried out with due diligence" were soon shortened to "due diligence investigation" and finally "due diligence".
As long as broker-dealers exercised "due diligence" (required carefulness) in their investigation into the company whoseequitythey were selling, and as long as they disclosed to the investor what they found, they would not be found liable for non-disclosure of information that was not discovered in the process of that investigation.
The broker-dealer community quickly institutionalized,[when?]as a standard practice, the conducting of due diligence investigations of any stock offerings in which they involved themselves. Originally the term was limited to public offerings of equity investments, but over time it has become associated with investigations of privatemergers and acquisitions(M&A) as well.
Due diligence takes different forms depending on its purpose:
A due diligence process can be divided into nine distinct areas:[5]
It is essential that the concepts of valuations (shareholder value analysis) be considered in a due diligence process. This is in order to reduce the number of failed mergers and acquisitions.[5]
In this regard, two new audit areas have been incorporated into the Due Diligence framework:[5]
The relevant areas of concern may include the financial, legal, labor, tax, IT, environment and market/commercial situation of the company. Other areas include intellectual property, real and personal property, insurance and liability coverage, debt instrument review, employee benefits (including theAffordable Care Act) and labor matters, immigration, and international transactions.[9][10][11]Areas of focus in due diligence continue to develop withcybersecurityemerging as an area of concern for business acquirers.[12]Risk is a key factor in determining 'duty of care'.[13]Regulations require 'reasonable security' in cybersecurity programs, and litigators examine whether 'due care' was practiced. Due diligence findings impact a number of aspects of the transaction including the purchase price, therepresentations and warrantiesnegotiated in the transaction agreement, and theindemnificationprovided by the sellers.
Due Diligence has emerged as a separate profession for accounting and auditing experts and is typically referred to as Transaction Services.[further explanation needed]
With the number and size of penalties increasing, the United States'Foreign Corrupt Practices Act(FCPA) has caused many U.S. institutions to look into how they evaluate all of their relationships overseas. The lack of a due diligence of a company's agents, vendors, and suppliers, as well as merger and acquisition partners in foreign countries could lead to doing business with an organization linked to aforeign officialor state owned enterprises and their executives. This link could be perceived as leading to the bribing of the foreign officials and as a result lead to noncompliance with the FCPA. Due diligence in regard to FCPA compliance is required in two aspects:
In the M&A context, buyers can use the due diligence phase to integrate a target into their internal FCPA controls, focusing initial efforts on necessary revisions to the target's business activities with a high-risk of corruption.[15]
While financial institutions are among the most aggressive in defining FCPA best practices, manufacturing, retailing and energy industries are highly active in managing FCPA compliance programs.
In the United Kingdom, theBribery Act 2010requires companies using an "adequate procedures" defence to a charge of bribery to have undertaken due diligence on their business partners. Due diligence is described as "knowing exactly who you are dealing with". Official guidance suggests that "ask[ing] a few questions and do[ing] a few checks" can help to protect an organisation from taking on untrustworthy partners.[16]
Passed on May 25, 2011, theOECDmember countries agreed to revise their guidelines promoting tougher standards of corporate behavior, including human rights. As part of this new definition, they utilized a new aspect of due diligence that requires a corporation to investigate third party partners for potential abuse of human rights.
TheOECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises(a government-backed international agreement that provides guidance on responsible business conduct) state that multinational enterprises will "Seek ways to prevent or mitigate adverse human rights impacts that are directly linked to their business operations, products or services by a business relationship, even if they do not contribute to those impacts".[17]
The term 'due diligence' was originally put forward in this context by UN Special Representative for Human Rights and BusinessJohn Ruggie, who used it as an umbrella to cover the steps and processes by which a company understands, monitors and mitigates its human rights impacts.Human Rights Impact Assessmentis a component of this.
The UN formalized guidelines for Human Rights Due Diligence on June 16, 2011, with the endorsement of Ruggie's Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights.[18]
Due diligence in civil procedure is the idea that reasonable investigation is necessary before certain kinds ofreliefare requested. For example, duly diligent efforts to locate and/or serve a party with civil process is frequently a requirement for a party seeking to use means other thanpersonal serviceto obtain jurisdiction over a party. Similarly, in areas of the law such asbankruptcy, an attorney representing someone filing a bankruptcy petition must engage in due diligence to determine that the representations made in the bankruptcy petition are factually accurate. Due diligence is also generally prerequisite to a request for relief in states where civil litigants are permitted to conduct pre-litigation discovery of facts necessary to determine whether or not a party has a factual basis for a cause of action.
In civil actions seeking a foreclosure or seizure of property, a party requesting this relief is frequently required to engage in due diligence to determine who may claim an interest in the property by reviewing public records concerning the property and sometimes by a physical inspection of the property that would reveal a possible interest in the property of a tenant or other person.
Due diligence is also a concept found in the civil litigation concept of astatute of limitations. Frequently, a statute of limitations begins to run against a plaintiff when that plaintiff knew or should have known had that plaintiff investigated the matter with due diligence that the plaintiff had a claim against a defendant. In this context, the term "due diligence" determines the scope of a party'sconstructive knowledge, upon receiving notice of facts sufficient to constitute "inquiry notice" that alerts a would-be plaintiff that further investigation might reveal a cause of action.
Incriminal law, due diligence is the only available defense to a crime that is one ofstrict liability(i.e., a crime that only requires anactus reusand nomens rea). Once a criminal offence is proven, the defendant must prove on balance that they did everything possible to prevent the act from happening. It is not enough that they met the normalstandard of carein their industry – they must show that they took every reasonable precaution.
The term "due diligence" is also used in criminal law to describe the scope of the duty of a prosecutor to make efforts to turn over potentiallyexculpatory evidenceto (accused) criminal defendants.[citation needed]
In criminal law, "due diligence" also identifies the standard a prosecuting entity must satisfy in pursuing an action against a defendant, especially with regard to the provision of the Federal and State Constitutional and statutory right to a speedy trial or to have a warrant or detainer served in an action. In cases where a defendant is in any type of custodial situation where their freedom is constrained, it is solely the prosecuting entity's duty to ensure the provision of such rights and present the citizen before the court with jurisdiction. This also applies where the respective judicial system and/or prosecuting entity has current address or contact information on the named party and said party has made no attempt to evade notice of the prosecution of the action.[19]
In the United Kingdom, "proper use of a due diligence system" may be used as a defence against a charge of breach of regulations: for example, under the Timber and Timber Products (Placing on the Market) Regulations 2013[20]and the Environmental Protection (Microbeads) (England) Regulations 2017,[21]businesses may be able to defend a charge of non-compliance with regulations if they can show that they have undertaken supplier due diligence to a necessary standard. References to "due diligence" and the maintenance of a "due diligence system" in the regulation concerning timber are drawn from theEuropean Union's Regulation 995/2010, which covers the legal obligations of "operators who place timber and timber products on the market".[20]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Due_diligence
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Agag order(also known as agagging orderorsuppression order) is an order, typically a legal order by acourtor government, restricting information or comment from being made public or passed on to any unauthorized third party. The phrase may sometimes be used of a private order by an employer or other institution.
Uses of gag orders include keepingtrade secretsof a company, protecting the integrity of ongoing police or military operations, and protecting the privacy of victims or minors. Conversely, as their downside, they may be abused as a useful tool for those of financial means to intimidate witnesses and prevent release of information, using the legal system rather than other methods of intimidation.Strategic lawsuit against public participation(SLAPP) orders may potentially be abused in this way.[1][2]
Gag orders are sometimes used in an attempt to assure a fair trial by preventing prejudicial pre-trial publicity, although their use for this purpose is controversial since they are a potentially unconstitutionalprior restraintthat can lead to the press's using less reliable sources such as off-the-record statements and second- or third-hand accounts.[3]
In a similar manner, a "gag law" may limitfreedom of the press, by institutingcensorshipor restrictingaccess to information.[4]
In the summer of 2014,WikiLeaksrevealed the existence of an Australia-wide gagging order, issued 19 June by theSupreme Court of Victoria, to block reporting of bribery allegations involving several international political leaders in the region.[5]
In December 2018, International news sources have reported thatCardinal George Pell's conviction on child-molestation charges is subject to a gag order issued byVictoria, Australiacourt JudgePeter Kidd, suppressing coverage of the conviction by Australian media companies.[6][7][8][9]In early February 2019, Victoria's DPP,Kerri JuddQC, wrote to around 50 Australian news publishers, editors, broadcasters, reporters and subeditors, accusing them of breaking the gag order. Kidd told a closed court that some of the breaches were serious and editors faced jail.[10]
In 2019, theBrazilian Ministry of Environmentimposed a gag order on environmental enforcement agencyIbama, ordering it not to respond to press inquiries and to instead redirect them to the ministry's communications office. Ibama's head of communications was forced to resign after weeks of defying the ministry's directive to reroute press queries.[11]
After the2008 Mumbai attacksin which live streaming of the event was broadcast, theIndian governmentproposed a draft law that would gag media outlets broadcasting live pictures during a terrorist event or war, to ensure the safety of any hostages and to protect security operations from hindrance. This has been opposed byIndian mediawho argue that they have adopted 'self-regulation' during such events and refrain from doing so anyway. It is uncertain if the draft law will be passed.[12]
In late 2009, Israel issued a gag order against the Israeli media reporting on facts surrounding theAnat Kamm–Uri Blau affair. The gag order was ultimately subject to widespread criticism and publicity as the details of the case were reported overseas. The scandal centered around leaked documents from theIsraeli Defense Forcewhich suggested the military had engaged inextrajudicial killings.[13]
A gag order concerning the Prisoner X affair prevented Israeli coverage of the topic for more than two years. After numerous foreign media outlets revealed the prisoner's identity and other key facts in February 2013, a court partially lifted the gag order, allowing Israeli media to quote foreign press reports but offer no original reporting.[14]
On 13 November 2013 a gag order concerning a famous Israeli singer suspected of sex with girls below the age of consent was issued. While the traditional media did not advertise the name of the singer, social media platforms users like Facebook published the singer name and incriminating photos. On 20 NovemberEyal Golanreleased a press statement announcing he was the suspected singer.[15]
In 2014, a blanket gag order regarding thedetainment of Avera Mengitsuwas put into place. It lasted 10 months, until July 9, 2015. Discussions took place in social media forums and some reports were published on foreign websites.[16]Some clues about the affair were leaked to different Arabic media outlets, from which the story made its way to international media and was published toTikun Olamby blogger Richard Silverstein.[17]The gag order was lifted following a request fromHaaretz.[16]TheAssociated Pressspeculated that a statement made byKhaled Mashalthe previous day, in which he spoke of an Israeli request through a European intermediary for the release of "two soldiers and two bodies", may have "forced Israel's hand".[18]
In August 2017, Israeli court issued a month-old gag order on a state witness deal regarding the ongoing criminal investigations of the Prime Minister,Benjamin Netanyahu.
There was speculation that a gag order may be imposed by theMCAon their press statements before they are released to the public to "ensure maximum effectiveness". Such releases would have to be approved by the president.[19]These claims in the media were later denied.[20]
In October 2021, the top attorney for Myanmar's deposed leaderAung San Suu Kyiclaimed that Burmese authorities had issued him a gag order barring him from discussing Aung San Suu Kyi's court proceedings in public because they believed such communications could spark unrest.[21]
In New Zealand,name suppressionis the commonly used term for a court order preventing the publication of a name or details of a criminal case.[22]The rules for name suppression are laid out in theCriminal Procedure Act 2011.[23]Name suppression can be granted automatically for several reasons, including to protect the identities of victims of sex crimes or to protect the identity of children under the age of 17. Name suppression can also be granted at the discretion of the court. Defendants frequently receive name suppression in New Zealand.[24]Often this is due to the court determining that media coverage could cause undue hardship to a defendant, or could prejudice the defendant's right to a fair trial.[25]Name suppression orders can be (and frequently are) opposed, often by media outlets. Victims of crime can waive their automatic name suppression rights, in order to lift name suppression on the defendant, though this is uncommon.[26]
Breaching a name suppression order brings a penalty of up to 6 months in prison for individuals, or fines of up toNZ$100,000 for organisations.[25]
Some high-profile cases have seen breaches of name suppression orders in New Zealand. In 2010, right-wing blogger and vocal critic of name suppression rulesCameron Slaterwas convicted of breaching name suppression orders and fined NZ$8,000.[27]Later, Slater himself benefited from name suppression when charged with attempting to hack a competing political website.[28]
The defendant in themurder of Grace Millanewas granted name suppression during trial, but media outlets covering the case in the United Kingdom published his name, as they were not subject to New Zealand law. This resulted in his name being commonly available online in New Zealand, including being emailed to Google News subscribers within New Zealand.[29]Auckland businessmanLeo Molloywas convicted of breaching name suppression in the case when he posted the defendant's name on a web forum. He was fined NZ$15,000 and sentenced to 350 hours of community service.[30]
In August 2023Te Pāti Māorico-leaderRawiri Waititimade a direct reference to a suppressed case in parliament.[31][32]Despite details of the case being suppressed from publication by the courts, Waititi's speech was protected byparliamentary privilege. He was later suspended from parliament for breaching standing orders.[33]
Name suppression laws in New Zealand have been controversial since they were first introduced in the early 20th century,[24]and specific suppression orders are also sometimes highly controversial.[34]Critics point to the legislation being used to protect the identities of well-known figures when they are accused of crime,[35][36]and that suppressing details from publication conflicts with the principle ofopen justice.[24]The internet has introduced new challenges with the enforcement of name suppression orders.[36]TheNew Zealand Bar Associationhas defended name suppression laws as an important tool for balancing the principles of open justice against fair trial rights.[37]
In July 2021, theNational Broadcasting Commissionissued a gag order barring all journalists and broadcast stations in the country from reporting details of terrorists, kidnappers, and victims.[38]After unsuccessfully calling for the gag order's withdrawal, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) and the Centre for Journalism Innovation and Development (PTCIJ) filed a lawsuit against PresidentMuhammadu Buhariand Minister of Information and CultureLai Mohammed, with National Broadcasting Commission also named as a defendant. The plaintiffs asked the court to “declare illegal the gag order" and to compel the defendants to withdraw the directive, arguing that it was "inconsistent and incompatible with sections 22 and 39 of theNigerian Constitution, Article 9 of theAfrican Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rightsand Article 19 of theInternational Covenant on Civil and Political Rights".[39]
A gag order, or anonymity order, is sometimes issued by courts in the United Kingdom to protect privacy, prevent harm to suspects, prisoners,[40]witnesses, victims, or to protect national security.[41]In theAllan Chappelowmurder case, the trial was held mostlyin cameraand media were prevented from speculating on the case. The order was imposed after a "compelling case" made by prosecutors, despite overwhelming media opposition brought by a legal challenge to the ruling.[42][43][44]This criminal case has been thought to be the first in which a gagging order was imposed.[45]
In 2011, gagging orders that applied to themselves, or "super-injunctions" as they were called, were being referred to almost daily in the United Kingdom after a number of high-profile public figures, including celebrities and politicians,censoredthe British media from revealing information about their personal lives, such as affairs[46]and dealings with prostitutes.
Gag orders protecting the privacy of convicted child murderers such asMary Bell,Jon VenablesandDavid McGreavy, in order to protect them from revenge attacks, have also been controversial because of public concerns about the inability to avoid such persons and protect victims' families and other children from being harmed by them.[40][47]
In The Netherlands, ethologist Gerrit van Putten was given two separate gag orders by the Minister of Agriculture to protectintensivefarming. The first gag order was issued after Van Putten had published a report on tail biting inpigsin 1972, and had advocated that the pig's tail is a thermometer of animal welfare, which was discarded when the "temperature" became too high, i.e. the tails were docked rather than that housing conditions were improved. The second gag order was issued in 1989 by Minister Braks, who did not want to hear about the adverse effects of confined housing of pigs.[48][49][50]
In 2015, a Dutch court issued a gag order on writer Edwin Giltay, banning his non-fiction thrillerThe Cover-up Generaland prohibiting him to promote it. The suppression order denied Edwin Giltay to disclose the contents of the book, which
delineates an espionage scandal withinDutch military intelligencethat he
witnessed first-hand, about obscuring evidence ofwar crimes in
Srebrenica.[51][52][53]In 2016, the Court of Appeal in The Hague revoked the gag order and the book ban.[54]
Anational security letter(18 U.S.C.§ 2709), an administrative subpoena used by theFBI, has an attached gag order which restricts the recipient from ever saying anything about being served with one.[55]The government has issued hundreds of thousands of such NSLs accompanied with gag orders. The gag orders have been upheld in court.[56]
Suspicious activity reports(31 U.S.C.§ 5318(g)(2); the Housing and Community Development Act of 1992 / Annunzio-Wylie Anti-Money Laundering Act,Pub. L.102–550, § 1517(b), 106Stat.4060) require that "If a financial institution or any director, officer, employee, or agent of any financial institution [...] reports a suspicious transaction to a government agency—neither the financial institution, director, officer, employee, or agent of such institution (whether or not any such person is still employed by the institution) [...] may notify any person involved in the transaction that the transaction has been reported; and no current or former officer or employee of or contractor for the Federal Government or of or for any State, local, tribal, or territorial government within the United States, who has any knowledge that such report was made may disclose to any person involved in the transaction that the transaction has been reported".[non-primary source needed]
18 U.S.C.§ 2705(b)(theElectronic Communications Privacy Actof 1986 /Stored Communications Act) also provides for gag orders which direct the recipient of a18 U.S.C.§ 2703(d)order to refrain from disclosing the existence of the order or the investigation.[57][non-primary source needed]
18 U.S.C.§ 3123(d)(2)(the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986) also provides for gag orders which direct the recipient of apen registerortrap and trace deviceorder not to disclose the existence of the pen/trap or the investigation.[58]
In the United States, a court can order parties to a case not to comment on it but has no authority to stop unrelated reporters from reporting on a case. Thus, information concerning a case is often leaked to the media, and the media often chooses to publicly report this leaked information after receiving it. Most statutes which restrict what may be reported have generally been foundunconstitutionaland void. However, the gag provisions of theWIPO Copyright and Performances and Phonograms Treaties Implementation Acthave been upheld.
The trials ofGuantanamo Baysuspects have also been subjected to a gag order, which has hindered public scrutiny.[59]Likewise, as part of a plea bargain,John Walker Lindhconsented to a gag order to not talk to the press or others. Also, Judge Howard Shore from San Diego put a gag order on activist Jeff Olson.[60]
Gag orders can be part of a settlement agreement between two parties. In the state of Pennsylvania in 2011, a lifetime gag order on the discussion offrackingwas agreed to by a family as part oftheir agreementwith the oil and gas drilling companyRange Resources. An attorney for Range Resources claimed in court that the gag order covered not only the adults in the family, but also the children, then aged seven and ten years old, and that the company intended to enforce it.[61][nb 1]
Some U.S. states, the first of which wasFlorida, have enacted so-called "physician gag laws" limiting doctors' ability to ask about a patient's gun ownership.[4]
In 2017, California enacted the California Electronic Communications Privacy Act, adjustingCalifornia Penal Code1546, including Section 1546.2 (b) (1), a provision which allows that in certain cases, a court can issue "an order delaying notification and prohibiting any party providing information from notifying any other party" that an electronicsearch warranthas been requested by a government entity.[63]
On 21 May 1948, a bill was introduced before thePuerto Rican Senatewhich would restrain the rights of theindependenceandNationalistmovements on thearchipelago, which was a colony of the United States at the time. The Senate, controlled by thePartido Popular Democrático(PPD), approved the bill that day.[64]This bill, which resembled the anti-communistSmith Actpassed in the United States in 1940, became known as theLey de la Mordaza(Gag Law, technically "Law 53 of 1948") when the U.S.-appointed governor of Puerto Rico,Jesús T. Piñero, signed it into law on 10 June 1948.[65]
Under this new law it became a crime to print, publish, sell, or exhibit any material intended to paralyze or destroy the insular government; or to organize any society, group or assembly of people with a similar destructive intent. It made it illegal to sing a patriotic song, and reinforced the 1898 law that had made it illegal to display theFlag of Puerto Rico, with anyone found guilty of disobeying the law in any way being subject to a sentence of up to ten years imprisonment, a fine of up to US$10,000 (equivalent to $131,000 in 2024), or both. According toLeopoldo Figueroa, the lone non-PPD member of thePuerto Rico House of Representatives, Law 53 was repressive and was in violation of the First Amendment of theUS Constitutionwhich guaranteesFreedom of Speech. He pointed out that the law as such was a violation of the civil rights of the people of Puerto Rico.[66]
TheInter-American Commission on Human Rightsand theInter-American Press Association(IAPA), as well as theVenezuelan opposition, have considered theLaw on Social Responsibility on Radio and Televisionas a gag law that violates freedom of the press and the exercise of journalism in Venezuela.[67][68]
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Incontractlaw, anon-compete clause(oftenNCC),restrictive covenant, orcovenant not to compete(CNC), is a clause under which one party (usually an employee) agrees not to enter into or start a similar profession or trade in competition against another party (usually the employer). In thelabor market, these agreements prevent workers from freely moving across employers, and weaken the bargaining leverage of workers.[1]
Non-compete agreements are rooted in the medieval system ofapprenticeshipwhereby an older master craftsman took on a younger apprentice, trained the apprentice, and in some cases entered into an agreement whereby the apprentice could not compete with the master after the apprenticeship.[2]Modern uses of non-compete agreements are generally premised on preventing high-skilled workers from transferringtrade secretsor a customer list from one firm to a competing firm, thus giving the competing firm a competitive advantage.[1][2]However, many non-compete clauses apply to low-wage workers or individuals who do not possess transferable trade secrets.[2]
The extent to which non-compete clauses are legally allowed and enforced varies under different jurisdictions. Some localities and states ban non-compete clauses or highly restrict their applicability. In jurisdictions where non-compete agreements are legal, courts tend to evaluate whether a non-compete agreement covers a worker's move to a relevant industry and reasonable geographic area, as well as whether the former is still bound by the agreement over a reasonable time period. An employer bringing a lawsuit may also be asked to identify a protectable business interest that was harmed by the employee's move to a different firm.[2]
Research shows that non-compete agreements make labor markets less competitive, reduce wages and reduce labor mobility.[3][1]While non-compete agreements may incentivize company investment into their workers and research, they may also reduce innovation and productivity by employees who may be forced to leave a sector when they leave a firm.[4][5]The labor movementtends to advocate for restrictions on non-compete agreements while support for non-compete agreements is common among some employers and business associations.
As far back asDyer's Casein 1414, Englishcommon lawchose not to enforce non-compete agreements because of their nature asrestraints on trade.[6]That ban remained unchanged until 1621, when a restriction that was limited to a specific geographic location was found to be an enforceable exception to the previously absolute rule. Almost a hundred years later, the exception became the rule with the 1711 watershed case ofMitchel v Reynolds[7]whichestablished the modern frameworkfor the analysis of the enforceability of non-compete agreements.[8]
Traditionally, non-competes were used to prevent high-skilled workers from transferringtrade secretsor a customer list from one firm to a competing firm.[1][2]However, such clauses can frequently be found in the contracts of low-wage workers and other workers who are unlikely to be in a position to share trade secrets.[2]
When courts consider the enforceability of non-compete agreements, they usually ask the employer to identify a protectable business interest that was harmed by the employee's move to a different firm. Courts consider whether the non-compete covers a relevant industry (does the worker do work for a firm in the same industry?), reasonable geographic area, and reasonable time period.[2]
University of Chicago Law School Professor Eric A. Posner has argued that since non-competes have an adverse impact on competition, they should be covered under a strong anti-trust regime, and the "law should treat noncompetes as presumptively illegal, allowing employers to rebut the presumption if they can prove that the noncompetes they use will benefit rather than harm their workers."[2]
In April, 2024, theFederal Trade Commission(FTC) banned all non compete agreements in the United States.[9]Within a few days, business groups including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce sued to block the new rule.[10]
Studies show that non-compete agreements make labor markets less competitive, reduce wages and reduce labor mobility.[3][1]Existing evidence suggests that the wage suppressing effects of non-competes are disproportionately concentrated on lower-income workers.[1]Non-compete agreements can incentivize firms to increase investment into worker training and research, as those workers are less likely to leave the firm.[1]Non-competes may reduce overall hiring costs and employee turnover for companies, which may result in savings that could in theory be passed on to customers in the form of lower prices and to investors as higher returns.[2]
Non-competes are more common for technical, high-wage workers and more likely to be enforced for those workers. However, even when non-compete agreements are unlikely to be enforced (such as for individual low-wage workers or in states that do not enforce these agreements), the agreements may still have an intimidating impact on those workers.[3][11]
A 2021 study of theU.S. health caresector from 1996–2007 found that noncompete agreements in this sector led to higher prices for physicians, smaller medical practices and greater medical firmconcentration.[12]
A 2021 study found that noncompete agreements for low-wage workers have been shown to lower wages; a study determined that the 2008 Oregon ban on noncompete agreements for workers paid by the hour "increased hourly wages by 2%–3% on average."[13]The study also showed that the Oregon ban on noncompete agreements for low-wage workers "improved averageoccupational statusin Oregon,raised job-to-job mobility, and increased the proportion of salaried workers without affecting hours worked."[13]
Studies have found that non-compete agreements can prompt technical workers to involuntarily leave their technical field to avoid a potential lawsuit from their former employer.[4][5]For this reason, non-compete agreements have been linked to less innovation and lower productivity as inventors switch fields in order to avoid violating non-competes.[5]
InBelgium, CNCs are restricted to new employments within Belgium and for no more than one year. The employer must pay financial compensation for the duration of the CNC, amounting at least half of the gross salary for the corresponding period.[14]
Canadiancourts will enforce non-competition andnon-solicitation agreements; however, the agreement must be limited in time frame, business scope, and geographic scope to what is reasonably required to protect the company's proprietary rights, such as confidential marketing information or client relations[15]and the scope of the agreement must be unambiguously defined. The 2009Supreme Court of CanadacaseShafron v. KRG Insurance Brokers (Western) Inc. 2009 SCC 6held a non-compete agreement to be invalid due to the term "Metropolitan City of Vancouver" not being legally defined.[16]
In 2021, employees in Ontario may no longer enter into non-compete agreements. There are exceptions for when a business is sold, and for chief officers (such asCEOs,CFOs, etc.).[17]
InFrance, CNCs must be limited in time to a maximum of two years and to a region where the employee's new work can reasonably be seen as competitive. The region can be a city or the whole country, depending on the circumstances. The employer must pay financial compensation, typically 30 percent of the previous salary.[18]A CNC may not unreasonably limit the possibilities of the employee to find new employment.
InGermany, CNCs are allowed for a term up to two years. The employer must provide financial compensation for the duration of the CNC amounting to at least half the gross salary.[19]Unreasonable clauses – for example, excluding similar jobs throughout the whole of Germany – can be invalidated.
Section 27 of theIndian Contract Acthas a general bar on any agreement that puts a restriction on trade.[20]The Supreme Court of India has clarified that some non-compete clauses—specifically, those backed by a clear objective that is considered to be in advantage of trade and commerce—are not barred by Section 27 of the Contract Act, and therefore valid in India.[21]
Non-compete agreements are prevalent in Italy.[22]InItaly, CNCs are regulated by articles 2125, 2596, and 1751 bis of the civil code.
In theNetherlands, non-compete clauses (non-concurrentiebedingorconcurrentiebeding) are allowed regarding issues such as moving to a new employer and approaching customers of the old company. Unreasonable clauses can be invalidated in court.[23]
According to Section 27 of the Contract Act, 1872, any agreement that restrains a person from exercising a lawful profession, trade or business is void.[24]However, courts of Pakistan have made decisions in the past in favour of such restrictive clauses given that the restrictions are "reasonable".[25]The definition of "reasonable" depends on the time-period, geographical location and the designation of employee. In the case ofExide Pakistan Limited vs. Abdul Wadood, 2008 CLD 1258 (Karachi), the High Court of Sindh stated that reasonableness of the clause will vary from case to case and depends mainly on duration and extent of geographical territory[26]
InPortugal, CNCs are regulated by article 136 of the labor code and restricted to two years extendible to three years in cases of access to particularly sensitive information. The employer must pay financial compensation for the duration of the CNC, but the law does not specify anything regarding the amount of the compensation.[27]
InRomania, CNCs are regulated by articles 21–24 of the labor code and restricted to two years. The employer must pay financial compensation for the duration of the CNC, amounting to at least 50 percent of the last 6 months salary.
InSpain, CNCs are regulated by article 21 of the labor law. CNCs are allowed up to two years for technical professions and six months for other professions, given that adequate compensation is given.
In theUnited Kingdom, CNCs are often calledrestraint of tradeor restrictive covenant clauses, and may be used only if the employer can prove a legitimate business interest to protect in entering the clause into the contract. Mere competition will not amount to a legitimate business interest.[28]The UK's regulator, theCompetition and Markets Authority, advises that non-compete clauses are a form of employer collusion and are a form of a business cartel.[29]
Restrictions are normally limited in duration, geographical area (an "area covenant"),[30]and content.[31]
In theCrown dependencies, many financial and other institutions require employees to sign 10-year or longer CNCs which could be seen to apply even if they leave the country or enter an unrelated field of work.[citation needed]
In May 2023, the UK Government announced plans to limit non-compete clauses to a maximum of three months.[32]
The majority of American states recognize and enforce various forms of non-compete agreements. A few states, such as California,North Dakota, andOklahoma, totally ban noncompete agreements for employees, or prohibit all noncompete agreements except in limited circumstances.[33]
Data from 2018 indicates that non-compete clauses cover 18 percent of Americanlabor force participants.[34]A 2023 petition to the FTC to ban non-compete agreements estimated that about 30 million workers (about 20% of all U.S. workers) were subject to a noncompete clause.[35]While higher-wage workers are comparatively more likely to be covered by non-compete clauses, non-competes covered 14 percent of workers without college degrees in 2018.[36]By some estimates, nearly half of all technical workers are covered by non-compete agreements.[4]
In March 2019, Democratic officials, labor unions, and workers' advocacy groups urged the U.S. FTC to ban non-compete clauses. A petition to the FTC, seeking a ban on noncompete clauses, was submitted by theAFL-CIO,SEIU, andPublic Citizen.[35]In July 2021, President Joe Biden signedExecutive Order 14036, directing the FTC (whose chair,Lina Khan, he had recently appointed), as well as other federal agencies, to "curtail the unfair use of non-compete clauses and other clauses or agreements that may unfairly limit worker mobility". On January 5, 2023, the FTC proposed a rule banning non-compete agreements.[37]
TheU.S. Chamber of Commercehas lobbied against bans on non-compete agreements; in 2023, it threatened to sue the FTC if it bans non-compete agreements.[38]The Chamber argued that "noncompete agreements are an important tool in fostering innovation and preserving competition".[38]
On April 23, 2024, theFederal Trade Commission(FTC) issued a ban on nearly all non-compete agreements.[39][40]The rule was published on theFederal Registeron May 7 and was to go into effect on September 4, 2024.[41]
The FTC found as shown the use of non-compete clauses by employers has negatively affected competition in labor markets, resulting in reduced wages for workers across the labor force—including workers not bound by non-compete clauses[42]and that by suppressing labor mobility, non-compete clauses have negatively affected competition in product and service markets in several ways.[43]The commission noted that the existing legal frameworks governing non-compete clauses—formed decades ago, without the benefit of this evidence—allow serious anticompetitive harm to labor, product, and service markets to go unchecked.[43]The Commission noted "that instead of using noncompetes to lock in workers, employers that wish to retain employees can compete on the merits for the worker's labor services by improving wages and working conditions."[44]In 2024, approximately one in five American workers, or about 30 million people, are subject to noncompetes.[44]
On August 20, 2024, JudgeAda Brownof theDistrict Court for the Northern District of Texasissued an injunction blocking the rule, ruling that the FTC "lacks statutory authority to promulgate the Non-Compete Rule, and that the Rule is arbitrary and capricious."[45][46]
While CNCs are one of the most common types of restrictive covenants, there are many others. Each serves a specific purpose and provides specific rights and remedies. The most common types of restrictive covenants are as follows:
The enforceability of these agreements depends on the law of the particular state. As a general rule, however, with the exception of invention assignment agreements, they are subject to the same analysis as other CNCs.[47]
No-poaching agreementsbetween employers are typically considered illegalanti-competitivecollusion. (See for exampleHigh-Tech Employee Antitrust Litigationconcerning Silicon Valley employers in the 2000s.)
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Aseverance packageis pay and benefits that employees may be entitled to receive when theyleave employmentat a company unwilfully. In addition to their remaining regular pay, it may include some of the following:
Packages are most typically offered for employees who arelaid offorretire. Severance pay was instituted to help protect the newly unemployed. Sometimes, they may be offered for those who either resign, regardless of the circumstances, or arefired. Policies for severance packages are often found in a company'semployee handbook. Severance contracts often stipulate that employees will not sue the employer forwrongful dismissalor attempt to collect onunemployment benefits, and that if they do so, they must return the severance money.
In the United States, there is no requirement in theFair Labor Standards Act(FLSA) for severance pay. Instead it is a matter of agreement between employers and employees.
Severance agreements, among other things, could prevent an employee from working for a competitor and waive any right to pursue a legal claim against the former employer. Also, an employee may be giving up the right to seekunemployment compensation. An employment attorney may be contacted to assist in the evaluation and review of a severance agreement. The payments in some cases will continue only until the former employee has found another job.
Severance agreements cannot contain clauses that prevent employees from speaking to an attorney to get advice about whether they should accept the offer, or speak to an attorney after they sign. The offer also cannot require that the employee commit a crime, such as failing to appear subject to court subpoena for proceedings related to the company.[2]
It can, however, prevent the filing of a lawsuit against the company for wrongful termination, discrimination, sexual harassment, etc.
Severance packages are often negotiable, and employees can hire a lawyer to review the package (typically for a fee), and potentially negotiate. However, employees are never entitled to any severance package upon termination or lay-offs.[3]
Severance packages vary by country depending ongovernment regulation. For instance, under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), employees over the age of forty (40) are entitled to 21 days to review and sign their severance offer.[4]If an employer requires an employee over 40 to review and sign a severance offer in less than the compliant 21 days, they must allow employees more time to review.[5]
In February 2010, a ruling in the Western District of Michigan held that severance pay is not subject to FICA taxes, but it was overturned by the Supreme Court in March 2014.[6]
Employers are required to pay severance pay after an employee working inPuerto Ricois terminated.[7][8]Employees are not permitted to waive this payment.[9]Severance pay is not required if the employee was terminated with "just cause".[8]
Just cause is satisfied in any of the following situations: the employee had a pattern of improper ordisorderly conduct; the employee worked inefficiently, belatedly, negligently, poorly; the employee repeatedly violated the employer's reasonable and written rules; the employer had a full, temporary, or partial closing of operations; the employer had technological or reorganization changes, changes in the nature of the product made, and changes in services rendered; or the employer reduced the number of employees because of an actual or expected decrease in production,sales, orprofits.[10]
An employee with less than five years of employment with the employer must receive a severance payment equal to two months ofsalary, plus an additional one week of salary for each year ofemployment. An employee with more than five years but less than fifteen years of employment must receive a severance payment equal to three months of salary, plus an additional two weeks of salary for each year of employment. An employee with more than fifteen years of service must receive a severance payment equal to six months of salary, plus an additional three weeks of salary for each year of employment.[11]
The amount of severance pay an employee is owed when dismissed without misconduct varies between common law (judge-made law) and employment law.
In Ontario, the amount of severance pay under the employment law is given in Ontario by Employment Standards Act (ESA),[12]which is also explained in 'Your Guide to the Employment Standards Act's Severance Pay Section'.[13]The amount of severance pay under the employment law in Ontario may be calculated using the tool from Ontario Government.[14]It is stated in ESA's Guide Wrongful dismissal section: "The rules under the ESA about termination and severance of employment are minimum requirements. Some employees may have rights under the common law that are greater than the rights to notice of termination (or termination pay) and severance pay under the ESA. An employee may want to sue their former employer in court forwrongful dismissal".[15]
Common law provides above-minimal entitlements, using a well-recognized set of factors from Bardal v Globe and Mail Ltd. (the "Bardal Factors").[16][17]Bardal Factors include:
There is a severance pay calculator based on common law "Bardal Factors" that predicts the amount of severance pay owed as determined by the court.[18]The goal is to provide enough notice or pay in lieu for the employee to find comparable employment. Unlike statutory minimum notice, the courts will award much more than 8 weeks if warranted by the circumstances, with over 24 months' worth of pay in damages possible.
Other factors considered may include:
The biggest factor in determining severance is re-employability. If someone is in a field or market where they will have great difficulty finding work, the court will provide more severance. The reason being that the primary purpose of severance is to provide the wrongfully dismissed employee the opportunity to secure other employment within the period provided.[19][20](See also Canada section inwrongful dismissalfor related litigation cases in Canada.)
In Canadian common law, there is a basic distinction as to dismissals. There are two basic types of dismissals, or terminations: dismissal with cause (just cause)[21]and termination without cause. An example of cause would be an employee's behavior which constitutes a fundamental breach of the terms of the employment contract. Where cause exists, the employer can dismiss the employee without providing any notice. If no cause exists yet the employer dismisses without providing lawful notice, then the dismissal is awrongful dismissal.
There is a time limit of two years from the date of termination for suing the employer in Ontario. This litigation followscivil procedure in Ontario. Before starting a court case,[22]there are other options,[23]such as, negotiation,mediation, and arbitration.
Typically in a civil lawsuit, in 2019, it can cost $1,500–$5,000 to initiate an action and have a lawyer deliver a Statement of Claim. Responding to the opposing side's documents and conducting examinations for discovery will likely involve another $3,500–$5,000. The preparation and presentation of your case at trial is likely to add another $5,000—$15,000 to your legal costs.[24]These legal expenses are income tax deductible.[25]
There are free Legal information and referral services offered on a confidential basis funded from government (The Access to Justice Fund[26]) for all areas of law in major cities, such as, Ottawa Legal Information Centre.[27]
In the United Kingdom Labour Law provides forRedundancy Pay.[28]The maximum amount of statutory redundancy pay is £17,130.[29]
In Italy, severance pay (TFR) is provided in all cases of termination of the employment relationship, for whatever reason: individual and collective dismissal, resignation, etc. The law recognizes subordinate workers the right to receive severance pay, pursuant to article 2120 of the civil code.[30]
Dutch law provides that a "transition allowance" (transitievergoeding) is due to the employee within one month of the end of employment if the employment was terminated by the employer and not the employee, including if the employer chose to not renew a temporary work contract, save if the termination was due to a grave fault by the employee or if the employee reached the retirement age.[31]The amount of compensation is normally equal to one third of one month's taxable compensation per year of employment, which includes a prorated amount equal to all the bonuses paid out in the preceding three years. This sum cannot exceed the greater of €94000 or one year's gross salary. This payment is subject to normal income taxes.
Severance pay in Luxembourg upon termination of a work contract becomes due after five years' service with a single employer, provided the employee is not entitled to an old-age pension and the termination is due to redundancy, unfair dismissal, or covered in a collective labor agreement.[32]The statutory amount of pay depends on years of service and the notice provided of the pending termination, but all severance pay is generally exempt from income tax.
The severance payment in Mainland China shall be based on the number of years the employee has worked for the employer at the rate of one month salary for each full year worked. Any period of no less than six months but less than one year shall be counted as one year. The severance payment payable to an employee for any period of less than six months shall be one half of his/her monthly salary.[33]
If the monthly salary of an employee is higher than 3 times local average monthly salary where the employer is located, the rate for the severance payment to be paid shall be 3 times local average monthly salary and shall be for no more than 12 years.
Where any employee obtains lump-sum compensation income (including economic compensation, living allowances and other subsidies granted by an employer) from the employer's termination of labor relationship with him/her, the part of the income which is no more than three times the average wage amount of employees in the local area in the previous year shall be exempt from individual income tax.
The fraction of the compensation that exceeds 3 times the local annual average salary shall be taxed as individual income tax as follows:
For those employees receiving a lump sum compensation, the lump sum can be considered as receiving monthly salaries in one time, and shall be allocated to a certain period in average amount. This average amount will be calculated dividing the lump sum by the service years with the current employer, and will be taxed as monthly salaries. For the number of service years with the current employer, the actual number of years should be considered. If the number of years is more than 12, only 12 will be considered.[citation needed]
In Hong Kong, an employee employed under a continuous contract for not less than 24 months is eligible for severance payment if:
In Poland severance is regulated in the Act on Collective Redundancies[35]and may be due to the employee if:
Severance amounts to:
Maximum severance is limited with a 15 x statutory minimum salary.[36]
Comprehensive Employment and Training Act
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Thedoctor–patient relationshipis a central part ofhealth careand the practice ofmedicine. A doctor–patient relationship is formed when a doctor attends to a patient's medical needs and is usually through consent.[1]This relationship is built on trust, respect, communication, and a common understanding of both the doctor and patients' sides. The trust aspect of this relationship goes is mutual: the doctor trusts the patient to reveal any information that may be relevant to the case, and in turn, the patient trusts the doctor to respect their privacy and not disclose this information to outside parties.
A ceremonial dynamic of the doctor–patient relationship is that the doctor is encouraged by theHippocratic Oathto follow certain ethical guidelines.[2][3]Additionally, the healthiness of a doctor–patient relationship is essential to keep the quality of the patient's healthcare high as well as to ensure that the doctor is functioning at their optimum. In more recent times, healthcare has become more patient-centered and this has brought a new dynamic to this ancient relationship.[citation needed]
A patient must have confidence in the competence of their physician and must feel that they can confide in them. For most physicians, the establishment of goodrapportwith a patient is important. Some medical specialties, such aspsychiatryandfamily medicine, emphasize the physician–patient relationship more than others, such aspathologyorradiology, which have very little contact with patients.
The quality of the patient–physician relationship is important to both parties. The doctor and patient's values and perspectives about disease, life, and time available play a role in building up this relationship. A strong relationship between the doctor and patient may lead to frequent, freely-offered quality information about the patient's disease and as a result, better healthcare for the patient and their family. Enhancing both the accuracy of the diagnosis and the patient's knowledge about the disease contributes to a good relationship between the doctor and the patient.[4]In a poor doctor–patient relationship, the physician's ability to make a full assessment may be compromised and the patient may be more likely to distrust thediagnosisand proposed treatment. The downstream effects of this mistrust may include decreased patientadherenceto the physician'smedical advice, which could result in poorer health outcomes for the patient. In these circumstances, and also in cases where there is genuine divergence of medical opinions, asecond opinionfrom another physician may be sought, or the patient may choose to go to another physician that they trust more. Additionally, the benefits of anyplacebo effectare also based upon the patient's subjective assessment (conscious or unconscious) of the physician's credibility and skills.[5]
MichaelandEnid Balinttogether pioneered the study of the physician patient relationship in the UK. Michael Balint's "The Doctor, His Patient and the Illness" (1957) outlined several case histories in detail and became a seminal text.[6]Their work is continued by theBalint Society, The International Balint Federation[7]and other national Balint societies in other countries. It is one of the most influential works on the topic of doctor–patient relationships. In addition, a Canadian physician known asSir William Oslerwas known as one of the "Big Four" professors at the time that the Johns Hopkins Hospital was first founded.[8]At the Johns Hopkins Hospital, Osler had invented the world's firstmedical residencysystem.[9]In terms ofefficacy(i.e. the outcome of treatment), the doctor–patient relationship seems to have a "small, but statistically significant impact on healthcare outcomes".[10]However, due to a relatively small sample size and a minimally effective test, researchers concluded additional research on this topic is necessary.[10]Recognizing that patients receive the best care when they work in partnership with doctors, the UKGeneral Medical Councilissued guidance for both of doctors named "Ethical guidance for doctors",[11]as well as for patients "What to expect from your doctor" in April 2013.[12]
The default medical practice for showing respect to patients and their families is for the doctor to be truthful in informing the patient of their health and to be direct in asking for the patient's consent before giving treatment. Historically in many cultures there has been a shift frompaternalism, the view that the "doctor always knows best", to the idea that patients must have a choice in the provision of their care and be given the right to provideinformed consentto medical procedures.[13]There can be issues with how to handle informed consent in a doctor–patient relationship;[14]for instance, with patients who do not want to know the truth about their condition. Furthermore, there are ethical concerns regarding the use ofplacebo. Does giving a sugar pill lead to an undermining of trust between doctor and patient? Is deceiving a patient for his or her own good compatible with a respectful and consent-based doctor–patient relationship?[15]These types of questions come up frequently in the healthcare system and the answers to all of these questions are usually far from clear but should be informed bymedical ethics.
Shared decision-making involves both the doctor and patient being involved in decisions about treatment. There are varied perspective on what shared decision making involves, but the most commonly used definition involves the sharing of information by both parties, both parties taking steps to build consensus, and reaching an agreement about treatment.[16]: 4
The doctor does not recommend what the patient should do, rather the patient's autonomy is respected and they choose what medical treatment they want to have done. An alternative practice, for the doctor to make a person's health decisions without considering that person's treatment goals or having that person's input into the decision-making process, is considered grossly unethical and against the idea of personal autonomy and freedom.
The spectrum of a physician's inclusion of a patient into treatment decisions is well represented inUlrich Beck'sWorld at Risk. At one end of this spectrum is Beck's Negotiated Approach torisk communication, in which the communicator maintains an open dialogue with the patient and settles on a compromise on which both patient and physician agree. A majority of physicians employ a variation of this communication model to some degree, as it is only with this technique that a doctor can maintain the open cooperation of his or her patient. At the opposite end of this spectrum is the Technocratic Approach to risk communication, in which the physician exerts authoritarian control over the patient's treatment and pushes the patient to accept the treatment plan with which they are presented in a paternalistic manner. This communication model places the physician in a position of omniscience and omnipotence over the patient and leaves little room for patient contribution to a treatment plan.[17]
Physician communication style is crucial to the quality and strength of the doctor–patient relationship. Patient-centered communication, which involves asking open-ended questions, having a warm disposition, encouragingemotional expression, and demonstrating interest in the patient's life, has been shown to positively affect the doctor–patient relationship. Additionally, this type of communication has been shown to decrease other negative attitudes or assumptions the patient might have about doctors or healthcare as a whole, and has even been shown to improve treatment compliance.[18]Another form of communication beneficial to the patient-provider relationship isself-disclosureby the physician in particular. Historically, medical teaching institutions have discouraged physicians from disclosing personal or emotional information to patients, as neutrality and professionalism were prioritized. However, self-disclosure by physicians has been shown to increase rapport, the patient's trust, their intention to disclose information, and the patient's desire to continue with the physician. These effects were shown to be associated withempathy, which is another important dimension which is often under-emphasized in physician training.[19]A physician's response to emotional expression by their patient can also determine the quality of the relationship, and influence how comfortable patients are in discussing sensitive issues, feelings, or information that may be critical for their diagnosis or care. More passive, neutral response styles which allow for patients to elaborate on their feelings have been shown to be more beneficial for patients, and make them feel more comfortable. Physician avoidance or dismissal of a patient's emotional expression may discourage the patient from opening up, and may be harmful to their relationship with their provider.[20][21]
Historically, in the paternalistic model, a physician tended to be viewed as dominant or superior to the patient due to the inherent power dynamic of physician's control over the patient's health, treatment course, and access to knowledge about their condition. In this model, physicians tended to convey only the information necessary to convince the patient of their proposed treatment course. The physician–patient relationship is also complicated by the patient'ssuffering(patientderives from the Latinpatior, "suffer") and limited ability to relieve it without the physician's intervention, potentially resulting in a state of desperation and dependency on the physician. A physician should be aware of these disparities in order to establish a comfortable, trust-based environment and optimize communication with the patient. Additionally, it may be beneficial for the doctor–patient relationship to create a practice ofshared carewith increased emphasis onpatient empowermentin taking a greater degree of responsibility for their care.[22][23]
Patients who seek a doctor's help typically do not know or understand the medical science behind their condition, which is why they go to a doctor in the first place. A patient with no medical or scientific background may not be able to understand what is going on with their body without their doctor explaining it to them. As a result, this can be a frightening and frustrating experience, filled with a sense of powerlessness and uncertainty for the patient,[22][23]though in rare conditions, this pattern tends not to be followed, and due to lack of expertise patients are forced to learn about their conditions.[24]: 155
An in-depth discussion of diagnosis, lab results, and treatment options and outcomes inlayman's termsthat the patient can understand can be reassuring and give the patient a sense of agency over their condition. Concurrently, this type of strong communication between a doctor and their patient can strengthen the physician–patient relationship as well as promote better treatment adherence and health outcomes.[22][23]
Under certain conditions healthcare workers are able to treat patientsinvoluntarily,imprison them, orinvoluntarily administer drugsto alter the patients' ability to think. They may also engage in forms of"informal coercion"where information or access to social services can be used to control a patient.
Lying in the doctor–patient relationship is common.[25]: 164Doctors provide minimal information to patients after medical errors. Doctors may lie to patients to displace culpability for poor outcomes and say they avoid giving patients information because it may confuse patients, cause pain, or undermine hope. They may lie to avoid uncomfortable conversation about disability or death, or to encourage patients to accept a particular treatment option.[25]: 165The experience of being lied to may undermine an individual's trust in others or themselves and reduce faith in one's church, community or society and result in avoidant behaviour to avoid being wounded. Patients may seek financial and legal retribution.[25]: 166
Patients may lie to doctors for financial reasons such as to receivedisability payments, for access to medication, or to avoid incarceration. Patients may lie out of embarrassment or shame.[25]: 165Palmeira and Sterne suggest that healthcare workers acknowledging the motivations of patients to lie to appear in a positive light to reduce deception by patients.[25]: 167
Palmeira and Sterne offer different psychological framings and motivations for lying. From the perspective ofattachment theory, lying may be used to avoid revealing information about an individual, to avoid intimacy and therefore the risk of rejection or shame, or to exaggerate to obtain protection or care. They also discuss the idea of protecting or maintaining anego ideal.[25]: 165Generally, Palmeira and Sterne suggestion discussions about the amount of information and detail parties wish to discuss, viewing obtaining truth as an ongoing process to increase truthfulness in doctor–patient interactions. Palmeira and Sterne suggest that physicians acknowledge their lack of knowledge, and discuss the amount of detail they wish to discuss to avoid deception.[25]: 167
Physicians have a tendency of overestimating their communication skills,[26]as well as the amount of information they provide their patients.[27]Extensive research conducted on 700 orthopedic surgeons and 807 patients, for instance, found that 75% of the surgeons perceived they satisfactorily communicated with their patients, whereas only 21% of the patients were actually satisfied with their communication.[28]Physicians also show a high likelihood of underestimating their patients' information needs and desires, especially for patients who were not college educated or from economically disadvantaged backgrounds.[29][30]There is pervasive evidence that patients' personal attributes such as age, sex, and socioeconomic status may influence how informative physicians are with their patients.[29][30]Patients who are better educated and from upper or upper middle-class positions generally receive higher quality and quantity of information from physicians than do those toward the other end of the social spectrum, although both sides have an equal desire for information.[30]
Race, ethnicity and language has consistently proven to have a significant impact on how physicians perceive and interact with patients.[31]According to a study of 618 medical encounters between mainly Caucasian physicians and Caucasian and African American patients, physicians perceived African Americans to be less intelligent and educated, less likely to be interested in an active lifestyle, and more likely to have substance abuse problems than Caucasians.[32]A study of patients of color showed that having a white physician led to increased experience ofmicroaggressions.[33]Studies in Los Angeles emergency departments have found that Hispanic males and African Americans were less than half as likely to receive pain medication than Caucasians, despite physicians' estimates that patients were experiencing an equivalent level of pain.[31]Another study showed that ethnic-minority groups of varying races reported lower-quality healthcare experiences than non-Hispanic Whites, specifically in treatment decision involvement and information received regarding medications.[34]Other studies show that physicians exhibited substantially less rapport building and empathetic behavior with both Black and Hispanic patients than Caucasians, despite the absence of language barriers.[31][18][21]
Mistrustof physicians or the healthcare system in general falls under the umbrella of medical mistrust. Medical mistrust negatively impacts the doctor–patient relationship, as a patient who has little faith in their physician is less likey to listen to their advice, follow their treatment plans, and feel comfortable disclosing information about themselves. Some forms of communication by the physician, such asself-disclosureand patient-centered communication, have been shown to decrease medical mistrust in patients.[35][36]
Medical mistrust has been shown to be greater forminority grouppatients, and is associated with decreased compliance, which can contribute to poorer health outcomes. Research ofbreast cancerpatients showed that African American women who received concerning mammogram results were less likely to discuss this with their doctor if they had greater medical mistrust.[37]Another study showed that women with higher physician mistrust waited longer to report symptoms to a doctor and receive a diagnosis ofovarian cancer.[38]Two studies showed that African American patients had more medical mistrust than white patients, and were less likely to undergo a recommended surgery as a result.[35][36]
A dilemma may arise in situations where determining the most efficient treatment, or encountering avoidance of treatment, creates a disagreement between the physician and the patient, for any number of reasons. In such cases, the physician needs strategies for presenting unfavorable treatment options or unwelcome information in a way that minimizes strain on the doctor–patient relationship while benefiting the patient's overall physical health and best interests. When the patient either can not or will not do what the physician knows is the correct course of treatment, the patient becomes non-adherent.Adherence management coachingbecomes necessary to provide positive reinforcement of unpleasant options.
For example, according to a Scottish study,[39]patients want to be addressed by their first name more often than is currently the case. In this study, most of the patients either liked (223) or did not mind (175) being called by their first names. Only 77 individuals disliked being called by their first name, most of whom were aged over 65.[39]On the other hand, most patients do not want to call the doctor by his or her first name.[39]
Some familiarity with the doctor generally makes it easier for patients to talk about intimate issues such as sexual subjects, but for some patients, a very high degree of familiarity may make the patient reluctant to reveal such intimate issues.[40]
Transitionsof patients between health care practitioners may decrease the quality of care in the time it takes to reestablish proper doctor–patient relationships. Generally, the doctor–patient relationship is facilitated bycontinuity of carein regard to attending personnel. Special strategies ofintegrated caremay be required where multiple health care providers are involved, includinghorizontal integration(linking similar levels of care, e.g. multiprofessional teams) andvertical integration(linking different levels of care, e.g. primary, secondary and tertiary care).[41]
Researchers have studied the doctor–patient relationship using the theory ofconversation analysis.[42]One of the key concepts in conversation analysis isturn-taking. The process ofturn-takingbetween health care professionals and the patients has a profound impact on the relationship between them. In most scenarios, a doctor will walk into the room in which the patient is being held and will ask a variety of questions involving the patient's history, examination, anddiagnosis.[43]These are often the foundation of the relationship between the doctor and the patient as this interaction tends to be the first they have together. This can go a long way into impacting the future of the relationship throughout the patient's care. Allspeech actsbetween individuals seek to accomplish the same goal, sharing and exchanging information and meeting each participants conversational goals.[43]
Research carried out in medical scenarios analyzed 188 situations in which an interruption occurred between a physician and a patient. Of these 188 analyzed situations, research found that the doctor is much more likely (67% of the time, 126 occasions) as compared to the patient (33% of the time, 62 occasions).[43]This shows that physicians are practicing a form of conversational dominance in which they see themselves as far superior to the patient in terms of importance and knowledge and therefore dominate all aspects of the conversation. A question that comes to mind considering this is if interruptions hinder or improve the condition of the patient. Constant interruptions from the patient whilst the doctor is discussing treatment options and diagnoses can be detrimental or lead to less effective efforts in patient treatment. This is extremely important to take note of as it is something that can be addressed in quite a simple manner. This research conducted on doctor–patient interruptions also indicates that males are much more likely to interject out of turn in a conversation than women.[43]Men's social predisposition to interject becomes problematic when it negatively impacts a woman physician's messages to her patients who are men: she may not be able to finish her statements and the patient will not benefit from what she was about to say, and the physician herself may fall prey to the socially conventional man's interjection by letting it cut short her professional commentary. Conversely, men physicians need to encourage women patients to articulate their reactions and questions, since women interrupt in conversations statistically less often than men do.[43]
A hurdle can arise from how the thinking process goes: a patient typically relates their story in chronological order, where symptoms, test results, consulting opinions, diagnoses and treatment are intertwined. A provider tends to design their approach in a step-by-step analytical manner, extracting as much details out of symptomatology, then past medical and social history then tests then coming to a suggested diagnosis and management plan. Addressing this upfront and at the onset of the visit and carving enough time for both can help avoid unnecessary interruptions on either part, improve provider-patient relation and constructively facilitate care.
An example of where other people present in a doctor–patient encounter may influence their communication is one or more parents present at aminor's visit to a doctor. These may provide psychological support for the patient, but in some cases it may compromise thedoctor–patient confidentialityand inhibit the patient from disclosing uncomfortable or intimate subjects.
When visiting a health provider about sexual issues, having both partners of a couple present is often necessary, and is typically a good thing, but may also prevent the disclosure of certain subjects, and, according to one report, increases the stress level.[40]
Having family around when dealing with difficult medical circumstances or treatments can also lead to complications. Family members, in addition to the patient needing treatment may disagree on the treatment needing to be done. This can lead to tension and discomfort for the patient and the doctor, putting further strain on the relationship.
With the extensive use of technology in healthcare, a new dynamic has risen in this relationship. Telehealth is the use of telecommunications and/or electronic information to support a patient.[44]This applies to clinical care, health-related education, and health administration.[45]An important fact about telehealth is that it increases the quality of the doctor–patient relationship by making health resources more easily available, affordable, and more convenient for both parties. Challenges with using telehealth are that it is harder to get reimbursements, to acquire cross-state licensure, to have common standards, maintain privacy, and have proper guiding principles.[44]The types of care that can be provided via telehealth include general health care (wellness visits), prescriptions for medicine, dermatology, eye exams, nutrition counseling, and mental health counseling. Just like with an in-person visit, it is important to prepare for a telehealth consultation beforehand and have good communication with the healthcare provider.[46]
An interesting outcome of telehealth is that doctors have started to play a different role in the relationship. With patients having more access to information, medical knowledge, and their health data; doctors play the role of a translator between technical data and the patients. This has caused a shift in the way that the doctors see themselves concerning the doctor–patient relationship. Doctors who are engaged in telehealth see themselves as a guide to the patient and undertake the role of a guardian and information manager in the description, collection, and sharing of their patient's data. This is the new dynamic that has risen in this ancient relationship and one which will continue to evolve.[47]
Dr. Rita Charon launched the narrative medicine movement in 2001 with an article in theJournal of the American Medical Association. In the article she claimed that better understanding the patient's narrative could lead to better medical care.[48]
Researchers and Ph.D.s in aBMC Medical Educationjournal conducted a recent study that resulted in five key conclusions about the needs of patients from their health care providers. First, patients want their providers to provide reassurance. Second, patients feel anxious asking their providers questions; they want their providers to tell them it is okay to ask questions. Third, patients want to see their lab results and for the doctor to explain what they mean. Fourth, patients simply do not want to feel judged by their providers. And fifth, patients want to be participants in medical decision-making; they want providers to ask them what they want.[49]
An example of how body language affects patient perception of care is that the time spent with the patient in theemergency departmentis perceived as longer if the doctor sits down during the encounter.[50]
Rude behaviour by patients can have a negative effect on medical outcomes. A study showed that staff who received or witnessed rude behaviour by patients relatives had reduced ability to effectively carry out some of their simpler and more procedural tasks. This is important because if the medical staff are not performing sufficiently in what should be simple tasks, their ability to work effectively incritical conditionswill also be impaired. This is consistent with research showing that rudeness by medical staff to one another decreases effectiveness.[51][52]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor%E2%80%93patient_relationship
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Medical privacy, orhealth privacy, is the practice of maintaining thesecurity and confidentialityofpatientrecords. It involves both the conversational discretion ofhealth care providersand the security ofmedical records. The terms can also refer to the physicalprivacyof patients from other patients and providers while in amedical facility, and tomodesty in medical settings. Modern concerns include the degree of disclosure toinsurance companies, employers, and other third parties. The advent ofelectronic medical records(EMR) and patient care management systems (PCMS) have raised new concerns about privacy, balanced with efforts to reduce duplication of services andmedical errors.[1][2]
Most developed countries including Australia,[3]Canada, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States, New Zealand, and the Netherlands have enacted laws protecting people's medical health privacy. However, many of these health-securing privacy laws have proven less effective in practice than in theory.[4]In 1996, the United States passed theHealth Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)which aimed to increase privacy precautions within medical institutions.[5]
The history of medical privacy traces back to the Hippocratic Oath, which mandates the secrecy of information obtained while helping a patient.
Before the technological boom, medical institutions relied on the paper medium to file individual medical data. Nowadays, more and more information is stored withinelectronic databases. Research indicates that storing information on paper is safer because it is more difficult to physically steal, whereas digital records are vulnerable to hacker access.
In the early 1990s, to address healthcare privacy issues, researchers explored using credit cards and smart cards to enable secure access to medical information, aiming to mitigate fears of data theft. The "smart" card allowed the storage and processing of information to be stored in a singular microchip, yet people were fearful of having so much information stored in a single spot that could easily be accessed.[6]This "smart" card included an individual'ssocial security numberas an important piece of identification that can lead toidentity theftif databases are breached.[6]Additionally, there was the fear that people would target these medical cards because they have information that can be of value to many different third parties, including employers, pharmaceutical companies, drug marketers, and insurance reviewers.[6]
In response to the lack of medical privacy, there was a movement to create better medical privacy protection, but nothing has been officially passed. TheMedical Information Bureauwas thus created to prevent insurance fraud, yet it has since become a significant source of medical information for over 750 life insurance companies; thus, it is very dangerous as it is a target of privacy breaches.[6]Although the electronic filing system of medical information has increased efficiency and administration costs have been reduced, there are negative aspects to consider. The electronic filing system allows for individual information to be more susceptible to outsiders; even though their information is stored on a singular card. Therefore, the medical card serves as a false sense of security as it does not protect their information completely.
With the technological boom, there has been an expansion of the record filing system and many hospitals have therefore adopted new PCMS.[1]PCMS store large amounts of medical records, and hold the personal data of many individuals. These have become critical to the efficiency of storing medical information because of the high volumes of paperwork, the ability to quickly share information between medical institutions, and the increased mandatory reporting to the government.[1]PCMS have ultimately increased the productivity of data record utilization and have created a large dependence on technology within the medical field.
It has also led to social and ethical issues because basichuman rightsare considered to be violated by the PCMS, since hospitals and health information services are now more likely toshare informationwith third-party companies.[1]Thus, there needs to be a reformation to specify which hospital personnel have the access to medical records. This has led to the discussion of privacy rights and created safeguards that will help data keepers understand situations where it is ethical to share an individual's medical information, provide ways for individuals to gain access to their own records, and determine who has ownership of those records.[1]Additionally, it is used to ensure that a person's identity is kept confidential for research or statistical purposes and to understand the process to make individuals aware that their health information is being used.[1]Thus, a balance between privacy and confidentiality must be kept in order to limit the amount of information disclosed and protect patients' rights by safeguarding sensitive information from third parties.
Electronic medical recordsare a more efficient way of storing medical information, yet there are many negative aspects of this type of filing system as well. Hospitals are willing to adopt this type of filing system only if they are able to ensure that the private information of their patients is sufficiently protected.[2]
Researchers have found that U.S. state legislation and regulation of medical privacy laws reduce the number of hospitals that adopt EMR by more than 24%.[2]This is due to decreasing positive network externalities that are created by additional state protections.[2]With increases in restrictions against the diffusion of medical information, hospitals have neglected to adopt the new EMRs because privacy laws restrict health information exchanges. With decreasing numbers of medical institutions adopting the EMR filing system, the U.S. government's plan of a national health network has not been fully recognized.[2]The national network will ultimately cost US$156 billion in investments, yet in order for this to happen, the U.S. government needs to place a higher emphasis on protecting individual privacy.[2]Many politicians and business leaders find that EMRs allow for more efficiency in both time and money, yet they neglect to address the decreasing privacy protections, demonstrating the significant trade-off between EMRs and individual privacy.[2]
The three goals ofinformation security, including electronic information security, areconfidentiality,integrity, andavailability. Organizations are attempting to meet these goals, referred to as theC.I.A. Triad, which is the "practice of defending information from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, disruption, modification, inspection, recording or destruction."[7]
In a 2004 editorial in theWashington Post, U.S. SenatorsBill FristandHillary Clintonsupported this observation, stating "[patients] need...information, including access to their own health records... At the same time, we must ensure the privacy of the systems, or they will undermine the trust they are designed to create". A 2005 report by theCalifornia Health Care Foundationfound that "67 percent of national respondents felt 'somewhat' or 'very concerned' about the privacy of their personal medical records".
The importance of privacy in electronic health records became prominent with the passage of theAmerican Recovery and Reinvestment Act(ARRA) in 2009. One of the provisions (known as theHealth Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health[HITECH] Act) of the ARRA mandated incentives to clinicians for the implementation of electronic health records by 2015.Privacy advocates in the United States have raised concerns about unauthorized access to personal data as more medical practices switch from paper to electronic medical records.[citation needed]TheOffice of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology(ONC) explained that some of the safety measures that EHR systems can utilize are passwords and pin numbers that control access to such systems, encryption of information, and an audit trail to keep track of the changes made to records.[citation needed]
Providing patient access to EHRs is strictly mandated by HIPAA's Privacy Rule. One study found that each year there are an estimated 25 million compelled authorizations for the release of personal health records.[citation needed]. Researchers, however, have found new security threats open up as a result. Some of these security and privacy threats include hackers,viruses,worms, and the unintended consequences of the speed at which patients are expected to have their records disclosed while frequently containing sensitive terms that carry the risk of accidental disclosure.[8]
These privacy threats are made more prominent by the emergence of "cloud computing", which is the use of shared computer processing power.[9]Health care organizations are increasingly using cloud computing as a way to handle large amounts of data. This type ofdata storage, however, is susceptible tonatural disasters,cybercrimeandtechnological terrorism, and hardware failure. Health information breaches accounted for the 39 percent of all breaches in 2015. IT Security costs and implementations are needed to protect health institutions against security and data breaches.[10]
Although privacy issues with thehealth screeningis a great concern among individuals and organizations, there has been little focus on the amount of work being done within the law to maintain the privacy expectation that people desire.[11]Many of these issues lie within the abstractness of the term "privacy" as there are many different interpretations of the term, especially in the context of the law.[11]Prior to 1994, there had been no cases regarding screening practices and the implications towards an individual's medical privacy, unless it was regarding HIV and drug testing.[11]WithinGlover v Eastern Nebraska Community Office of Retardation, an employee sued her employer against violating her4th amendmentrights because of unnecessaryHIV testing.[11]The court ruled in favor of the employer and argued that it was unreasonable search to have it tested. However, this was only one of the few precedents that people have to use. With more precedents, the relationships between employees and employers will be better defined. Yet with more requirements, testing among patients will lead to additional standards for meeting health care standards.[11]Screeninghas become a large indicator for diagnostic tools, yet there are concerns with the information that can be gained and subsequently shared with other people other than the patient and healthcare provider
One of the main dangers to an individual's privacy are private corporations because of theprofitsthey can receive from selling seemingly private information.[12]Privacy merchants are made up of two groups - one that tries to collect people's personal information while the other focuses on using client's information to market company products.[12]Subsequently, privacy merchants purchase information from other companies, such ashealth insurancecompanies, if there is not sufficient information from their own research.[12]Privacy merchants target health insurance companies because, nowadays, they collect huge amounts of personal information and keep them in large databases. They often require patients to provide more information that is needed for purposes other than that of doctors and other medical workers.[12]
Additionally, people's information can be linked to other information outside of the medical field. For example, many employers use insurance information and medical records as an indicator of work ability and ethic.[12]The selling of privacy information can also lead employers to make much money; however, this happens to many people without their consent or knowledge.
Within the United States, in order to define clearprivacy lawsregarding medical privacy, Title 17 thoroughly explains the ownership of one's data and adjusted the law so that people have more control over their own property.[13]The Privacy Act of 1974 offers more restrictions regarding what corporations can access outside of an individual's consent.[13]
States have created additional supplements to medical privacy laws. With HIPAA, many individuals were pleased to see the federal government take action in protecting the medical information of individuals. Yet when people looked into it, there was proof that the government was still protecting the rights of corporations.[13]Many rules were seen as more of suggestions and the punishment for compromising the privacy of its patients were minimal.[13]Even if release of medical information requires consent, blank authorizations can be allowed and will not ask for individuals for additional consent later on.[13]
Although there is a large group of people who oppose the selling of individual's medical information, there are groups such as the Health Benefits Coalition, theHealthcare Leadership Council, and theHealth Insurance Association of Americathat are against the new reforms for data protection as it can ruin their work and profits.[12]Previous controversies, such as Google's "Project Nightingale" in 2019 have demonstrated potential holes in regulations of patient data and medical information. Project Nightingale, a joint effort between Google and the healthcare network Ascension, saw to the selling of millions of patients' identifiable medical information without their consent. Though Google claimed that their process was legal in obtaining the information, there was concern between researchers on this claim.[14]
With the lack of help from the Department of Health and Human Services there is a conflict of interest that has been made clear. Some wish to place individual betterment as more important, while others focus more on external benefits from outside sources. The issues that occur when there are problems between the two groups are also not adequately solved which leads to controversial laws and effects.[15]Individual interests take precedence over the benefits of society as a whole and are often viewed as selfish and for the gain of capital value. If the government does not make any more future changes to the current legislation, countless organizations and people will have access to individual medical information.[15]
In 1999, theGramm-Leach-BilleyAct (GLBA) addressed the insurance privacy debate regarding medical privacy.[16]Yet, there were many issues with the implementation. One issue was that there were inconsistent regulation requirements within the different states due to preexisting laws.[16]Secondly, it was difficult to combine the pre-existing laws with the new framework.[16]And thirdly, in order for the federal government to implement these new rules, they needed state legislature to pass it.[16]
GLBA aimed to regulate financial institutions so that corporations could not affect people's insurance. Because of the difficulty of the implementation of the GLBA, state legislatures are able to interpret the laws themselves and create initiatives to protect the medical privacy.[16]When states are creating their own independent legislature, they create standards that understand the impact of the legislation.[16]If they stray from the standard laws, they must be valid and fair. The new legislation must protect the rights of businesses and allow them to continue to function despite federally regulated competition. Patients gain benefits from these new services and standards through the flow of information that is considerate with medical privacy expectations.[16]
These regulations should focus more on the consumer versus the benefits and political exploitation. Many times, regulations are for the personal gain of the corporation, therefore, state legislatures be wary of this and try to prevent it to the best of their abilities.[16]Medical privacy is not a new issue within theinsurance industry, yet the problems regarding exploitation continue to reoccur; there is more focus on taking advantage of the business environment for personal gain.[16]
In 2001, President George W. Bush passed additional regulations toHIPAAin order to better protect the privacy of individual medical information.[17]These new regulations were supposed to safeguard health information privacy by creating extensive solutions for the privacy of patients. The new regulation goals included being notified once an individual's information is inspected, amend any medical records, and request communication opportunities to discuss information disclosure.[17]
However, there are exceptions to when the disclosure of PHI can be inspected. This includes specific conditions among law enforcement, judicial and administrative proceedings, parents, significant others, public health, health research, andcommercial marketing.[17]These aspects of lack of privacy have caused an alarming number of gaps within privacy measures.
Ultimately, there is still an issue on how to ensure privacy securities; in response, the government has created new regulations that makes trade offs between an individual's privacy and public benefit. These new regulations, however, still cover individually identifiable health information - any data that contains information unique to an individual.[17]However, non-identifiable data is not covered as the government claims it will cause minimal damage to a person's privacy. It also covers all health care organizations and covers businesses as well.
Additionally, under new HIPAA additions, the state legislation is more protective than national laws because it created more obligations for organizations to follow. Ultimately, the new rules called for expansive requirements that created better safety measures for individuals.[17]Yet, there are still ways that businesses and healthcare organizations can be exempt from disclosure rules for all individuals. Thus, the HHS needs to find more ways to balance personal and public trade offs within medical laws. This creates a need for extra government intervention to enforce legislation and new standards to decrease the number of threats against an individual's privacy of health data.[opinion]
TheCOVID-19 pandemicled to a global effort to use technologies, like contact tracing, to reduce the spread of the disease.Contact tracinginvolves notifying people that they have been in contact with an individual who has tested positive for the virus. This led to the general public being concerned about the privacy risks of this technology. In response, in April 2020 Apple and Google created a contact tracing API.[18]
Patients want to be able to share medical information with their physicians, yet they worry about potential privacy breaches that can occur when they release financial and confidential medical information.[19]In order to ensure better protection, the government has created frameworks for keeping information confidential - this includes being transparent about procedures, disclosure and protection of information, and monitoring of these new rules to ensure that people's information.[19]
Recently physicians and patients have started to use email as an additional communication tool for treatment and medical interactions. This way of communication is not "new", but its effects on doctor patient relationships has created new questions regarding legal, moral, and financial problems.[20]
TheAmerican Medical Informatics Associationhas characterized medical emails as way to communicate "medical advice, treatment, and information exchanged professionally"; yet, the "spontaneity, permanence, and information power characterizing" role is significant because of its unknown affects.[20]However, the use of emails allows for increased access, immediate aid, and increased interactions between patients and doctors.[20]There are many benefits and negative aspects of using emails; doctors feel a new sense of negative responsibility to respond to emails outside of the office, but also find benefits with facilitating rapid responses to patient's questions.[20]
Additionally, the use of email between physicians and their patients will continue to grow because of the increasing use of the Internet. With the Internet, patients are able to ask for medical advice and treatment, yet issues regarding confidentiality and legal issues come up.[20]Ultimately, emails between a physician and patient are supposed to be used as a supplement for face to face interactions, not for casual messages. If used properly, physicians could use emails as a way to supplement interactions and provide more medical aid to those who need it immediately.[20]
Although many people believe that the technological changes are the reason for fear of sharing medical privacy, there is a theory that states that institutional ideals between doctors and their patients have created the fear of sharing medical privacy information.[21]Although levels of confidentiality are changing, individuals often feel the need to share more information with their doctors in order to get diagnosed correctly.[21]Because of this, people are concerned with how much information their physicians have. This information could be transferred to other third-party companies. However, there is a call for smaller emphasis on sharing and confidentiality in order to rid patients from their fears of information breaching.[21]There is a common belief that the confidentiality of one's information also only protects the doctors and not the patients, therefore there is a negative stigma towards revealing too much information.[21]Thus it causes patients to not share vital information relevant to their illnesses.
On July 1, 2012, theAustralian Governmentlaunched thePersonally Controlled Electronic Health Record(PCEHR) (eHealth) system.[22]The full implementation incorporates an electronic summary prepared by nominated healthcare providers along with consumer-provided notes. Further, the summary includes information on the individual's allergies, adverse reactions, medications, immunizations, diagnoses, and treatments. The consumer notes operate as a personal medical diary that only the individual can view and edit.[23]Theopt-insystem gives people the option to choose whether to register for the eHealth record or not.[24]
As of January 2016, the Commonwealth Department of Health changed the name PCEHR to My Health Record.[25]
The Personally Controlled Electronic Health Records Act 2012[26]andPrivacy Act 1988governs how eHealth record information is managed and protected.[27]The PCEHR System Operator abides by the Information Privacy Principles[28]in the Privacy Act 1988 (Commonwealth) as well as any applicable State or Territory privacy laws.[29]A Privacy Statement[30]sets out the application of the collection of personal information by the System Operator. The statement includes an explanation of the types of personal information collected, what the information is used for, and how the information is stored. The statement covers measures in place to protect personal information from misuse, loss, unauthorized access, modification, and disclosure.[31]
Security measures include audit trails so that patients can see who has accessed their medical records along with the time the records were accessed. Other measures include the use of encryption as well as secure logins and passwords. Patient records are identified using an Individual Health Identifier (IHI),[32]assigned byMedicare, the IHI service provider.[31][33]
A 2012 nationwide survey in Australia assessed privacy concerns on patients' health care decisions, which could impact patient care. Results listed that 49.1% of Australian patients stated they have withheld or would withhold information from their health care provider based on privacy concerns.[34]
One concern is that personal control of the eHealth record via consent does not guarantee the protection of privacy. It is argued that a narrow definition, 'permission' or 'agreement', does not provide protection for privacy and is not well represented in Australian legislation. The PCEHR allows clinicians to assume consent by consumer participation in the system; however, the needs of the consumer may not be met. Critics argue that the broader definition of 'informed consent' is required, as it encompasses the provision of relevant information by the healthcare practitioner, and understanding of that information by the patient.[35]
Data from the PCEHR is to be predominantly used in patient healthcare, but other uses are possible, for policy, research, audit and public health purposes. The concern is that in the case of research, what is allowed goes beyond existing privacy legislation.[35]
The involvement of pharmaceutical companies is viewed as potentially problematic. If they are perceived by the public to be more concerned with profit than public health, public acceptance of their use of PCEHRs could be challenged. Also perceived as problematic, is the potential for parties other than health care practitioners, such as insurance companies, employers, police or the government, to use information in a way which could result in discrimination or disadvantage.[35]
Information 'leakage' is seen as having the potential to discourage both patient and clinician from participating in the system. Critics argue the PCEHR initiative can only work, if a safe, effective continuum of care within a trusting patient/clinician relationship is established. If patients lose trust in the confidentiality of their eHealth information, they may withhold sensitive information from their health care providers. Clinicians may be reluctant to participate in a system where they are uncertain about the completeness of the information.[36]
Security experts have questioned the registration process, where those registering only have to provide aMedicarecard number, and names and birth dates of family members to verify their identity. Concerns have also been raised by some stakeholders, about the inherent complexities of the limited access features. They warn that access to PCEHR record content, may involve transfer of information to a local system, where PCEHR access controls would no longer apply.[33]
The privacy of patient information is protected at both thefederal levelandprovincial levelinCanada. Thehealth information legislationestablished the rules that must be followed for the collection, use, disclosure and protection of health information by healthcare workers known as "custodians". These custodians have been defined to include almost all healthcare professionals (including all physicians, nurses, chiropractors, operators of ambulances and operators of nursing homes). In addition to the regulatory bodies of specific healthcare workers, the provincial privacy commissions are central to the protection of patient information.
The privacy of patient information is guaranteed by articles 78 and 100 of legal code 5510.
On the other hand, theSocial Security Institution(SGK), which regulates and administers state-sponsored social security / insurance benefits, sells patient information after allegedly anonymizing the data, confirmed on October 25, 2014.[37]
TheNational Health Serviceis increasingly usingelectronic health records, but until recently, the records held by individual NHS organisations, such as General Practitioners,NHS Trusts, dentists and pharmacies, were not linked. Each organization was responsible for the protection of patient data it collected. Thecare. dataprogramme, which proposed to extract anonymised data from GP surgeries into a central database, aroused considerable opposition.
In 2003, the NHS made moves to create a centralized electronic registry of medical records. The system is protected by the UK's Government Gateway, which was built byMicrosoft. This program is known as the Electronic Records Development and the Implementation Programme (ERDIP). The NHSNational Program for ITwas criticized for its lack of security and lack of patient privacy. It was one of the projects that caused theInformation Commissionerto warn[38]about the danger of the country "sleepwalking" into asurveillance society. Pressure groups[according to whom?]opposed toID cardsalso campaigned against the centralized registry.
Newspapers feature stories about lost computers and memory sticks but a more common and longstanding problem is about staff accessing records that they have no right to see. It has always been possible for staff to look at paper records, and in most cases, there is no track of record. Therefore, electronic records make it possible to keep track of who has accessed which records.NHS Waleshas created the National Intelligent Integrated Audit System which provides "a range of automatically generated reports, designed to meet the needs of our local health boards and trusts, instantly identifying any potential issues when access has not been legitimate". Maxwell Stanley Consulting[39]will use a system called Patient Data Protect (powered by VigilancePro) which can spot patterns – such as whether someone is accessing data about their relatives or colleagues.[40]
Since 1974, numerous federal laws have been passed in the United States to specify the privacy rights and protections of patients, physicians, and other covered entities to medical data. Many states have passed its own laws to try and better protect the medical privacy of their citizens.
An important national law regarding medical privacy is theHealth Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996(HIPAA), yet there are many controversies regarding the protection rights of the law.
The most comprehensive law passed is the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), which was later revised after the Final Omnibus Rule in 2013. HIPAA provides a federal minimum standard for medical privacy, sets standards for uses and disclosures ofprotected health information (PHI), and provides civil and criminal penalties for violations.
Prior to HIPAA, only certain groups of people were protected under medical laws such as individuals with HIV or those who received Medicare aid.[41]HIPAA provides protection of health information and supplements additional state and federal laws; yet it should be understood that the law's goal is to balance public health benefits, safety, and research while protecting the medical information of individuals. Yet many times, privacy is compromised for the benefits of the research and public health.
According to HIPAA, the covered entities that must follow the law's set mandates are health plans, health care clearinghouses, and health care providers that electronically transmit PHI. Business associates of these covered entities are also subject to HIPAA's rules and regulations.
In 2008,Congresspassed theGenetic Information Nondiscrimination Act of 2008 (GINA), which aimed to prohibitgenetic discriminationfor individuals seeking health insurance and employment. The law also included a provision which mandated that genetic information held by employers be maintained in a separate file and prohibited disclosure of genetic information except in limited circumstances.
In 2013, after GINA was passed, the HIPAA Omnibus Rule amended HIPAA regulations to include genetic information in the definition of Protected Health Information (PHI). This rule also expanded HIPAA by broadening the definition of business associates to include any entity that sends or accesses PHI such ashealth ITvendors.
The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) is critiqued for not providing strong medical privacy protections as it only provides regulations that disclose certain information.[42]
The government authorizes the access of an individual's health information for "treatment, payment, and health care options without patient consent".[42]Additionally, HIPAA rules are very broad and do not protect an individual from unknown privacy threats. Additionally, a patient would not be able to identify the reason for breach due to inconsistent requirements.[42]Because of limited confidentiality, HIPAA facilitates the sharing of medical information as there is little limitation from different organizations.[42]Information can easily be exchanged between medical institutions and other non-medical institutions because of the little regulation of HIPAA - some effects include job loss due tocredit scoresharing or loss of insurance.[42]
Additionally, doctors are not required to keep patients information confidential because in many cases patient consent is now optional. Patients are often unaware of the lack of privacy they have as medical processes and forms do not explicitly state the extent of how protected they are.[42]Physicians believe that overall, HIPAA will cause unethical and non-professional mandates that can affect a person's privacy and therefore, they in response have to provide warnings about their privacy concerns.[42]Because physicians are not able to ensure a person's privacy, there is a higher chance that patients will be less likely to get treatment and share what their medical concerns are.[42]Individuals have asked for better consent requirements by asking if physicians can warn them prior to the sharing of any personal information.[43]Patients want to be able to share medical information with their physicians, yet they worry about potential breaches that can release financial information and other confidential information and with that fear, they are wary of who may have access.[43]
In order to ensure better protection, the government has created frameworks for keeping information confidential - some of which include being transparent about procedures, disclosure and protection of information, and monitoring of these new rules to ensure that people's information is not affected by breaches.[43]Although there are many frameworks to ensure the protection of basic medical data, many organizations do not have these provisions in check. HIPAA gives a false hope to patients and physicians as they are unable to protect their own information. Patients have little rights regarding their medical privacy rights and physicians cannot guarantee those.[44]
HIPAA does not protect the information of individuals as the government is able to publish certain information when they find it necessary. The government is exempted from privacy rules regarding national security. HIPAA additionally allows the authorization of protected health information (PHI) in order to aid in threats to public health and safety as long as it follows the good faith requirement - the idea that disclosing of information is necessary to the benefit of the public.[45]The Model State Emergency Powers Act (MSEHPA) gives the government the power to "suspend regulations, seize property, quarantine individuals and enforce vaccinations" and requires that healthcare providers give information regarding potential health emergencies".[45]
In regards toHurricane Katrina, many people in Louisiana relied on Medicaid and their PHI was subsequently affected. People's medical privacy rights were soon waived in order for patient's to get the treatment they needed. Yet, many patients were unaware that their rights had been waived.[45]In order to prevent the sharing of personal information in future natural disasters, a website was created in order to protect people's medical data.[45]Ultimately, Katrina showed that the government was unprepared to face a national health scare.
Many patients mistakenly believe that HIPAA protects all health information. HIPAA does not usually cover fitness trackers, social media sites and other health data created by the patient. Health information can be disclosed by patients in emails, blogs, chat groups, or social media sites including those dedicated to specific illnesses, "liking" web pages about diseases, completing online health and symptom checkers, and donating to health causes. In addition, credit card payments for physician visit co-pays, purchase ofover the counter(OTC) medications, home testing products, tobacco products, and visits to alternative practitioners are also not covered by HIPAA.
A 2015 study reported over 165,000 health apps available to consumers. Disease treatment and management account for nearly a quarter of consumer apps. Two-thirds of the apps target fitness and wellness, and ten percent of these apps cancollect datafrom a device or sensor. Since theFood and Drug Administration(FDA) only regulates medical devices and most of these applications are not medical devices, they do not require FDA approval. The data from most apps are outside HIPAA regulations because they do not share data with healthcare providers. "Patients may mistakenly assume that mobile apps are under the scope of HIPAA since the same data, such as heart rate, may be collected by an application that is accessible to their physician and covered by HIPAA, or on a mobile app that is not accessible to the physician and not covered by HIPAA.
In 2000, there was a new surge to add new regulations to HIPAA. It included the following goals: to protect individual medical information by providing secure access and control of their own information, improving healthcare quality by creating a more trust between consumers and their healthcare providers and third party organizations, and improve the efficiency of the medical system through new rules and regulations put forth by the local governments, individuals, and organizations.[46]
The implementation of these new goals was complicated by the change in administrations (Clinton to Bush), so it was difficult for the changes to be successfully implemented.[46]HIPAA, in theory, should apply to all insurance companies, services, and organizations, yet there are exceptions to who actually qualifies under these categories.
Yet, within each category, there are specific restrictions that are different in every category. There are no universal laws that can be easily applied that are easy for organizations can follow. Thus, many states have neglected to implement these new policies. Additionally, there are new patient rights that call for better protection and disclosure of health information. However, like the new rules regarding insurance companies, the enforcement of the legislation is limited and not effective as they are too broad and complex.[46]Therefore, it is difficult for many organizations to ensure the privacy of these people. Enforcing these new requirements also causes companies to spend many resources that they are not willing to use and enforce, which ultimately leads to further problems regarding the invasion of an individual's medical privacy.[46]
The Oregon Genetic Privacy Act (GPA) states that "an individual's genetic information is the property of the individual".[47]The idea of an individual's DNA being compared to property occurred when research caused an individual's privacy to be threatened. Many individuals believed that their genetic information was "more sensitive, personal, and potentially damaging than other types of medical information."[47]Thus, people started calling for more protections. People started to question how their DNA would be able to stay anonymous within research studies and argued that the identity of an individual could be exposed if the research was later shared. As a result, there was a call for individuals to treat their DNA as property and protect it through property rights. Therefore, individuals can control the disclosure of their information without extra questioning and research.[47]Many people believed that comparing one's DNA to property was inappropriate, yet individuals argued that property and privacy are interconnected because they both want to protect the right to control one's body.[47]
Many research and pharmaceutical companies showed opposition because they were worried about conflicts that might arise regarding privacy issues within their work. Individuals, on the other hand, continued to support the act because they wanted protection over their own DNA.[47]As a result, lawmakers created a compromise that included a property clause, that would give individuals protection rights, but also included provisions that would allow research to be done without much consent, limiting the benefits of the provisions.[47]Afterwards, a committee was created to study the effects of the act and how it affected the way it was analyzed and stored.[47]They found that the act benefited many individuals who did not want their privacy being shared with others and therefore the law was officially implemented in 2001.[47]
In order to solve HIPAA issues within Connecticut, state legislatures tried to create better provisions to protect the people living within the state.[41]One of the issues that Connecticut tried to solve were issues with consent. Within the consent clause, health plans and health care clearinghouses do not need to receive consent from individuals because of a general provider consent form with gives healthcare providers permission to disclose all medical information.[41]The patient thus does not get notification when their information is being shared afterwards.[41]
Connecticut, like many other states, tried to protect individual's information from disclosure of information through additional clauses that would protect them from businesses initiatives.[41]In order to do so, Connecticut legislature passed the Connecticut Insurance Information and Privacy Protect Act, which provides additional protections of individual medical information. If third parties neglect to follow this law, they will be fined, may face jail time, and may have their licenses suspended.[41]Yet, even in these additional provisions, there were many holes within this legislation that allowed for businesses agreements to be denied and subsequently, information was compromised. Connecticut is still working to shift its divergent purposes to creating more stringent requirements that create better protections through clear provisions of certain policies.[48]
InCalifornia, the Confidentiality of Medical Information Act (CMIA), provides more stringent protections than the federal statutes.[49]HIPAA expressly provides that more stringent state laws like CMIA, will override HIPAA's requirements and penalties. More specifically, CMIA prohibits providers, contractors and health care service plans from disclosing PHI without prior authorization.
These medical privacy laws also set a higher standard for health IT vendors or vendors of an individual'spersonal health record (PHR)by applying such statutes to vendors, even if they are not business associates of a covered entity. CMIA also outlines penalties for violating the law. These penalties range from liability to the patient (compensatory damages, punitive damages, attorneys' fees, costs of litigation) to civil and even criminal liability.[50]
Likewise, California's Insurance Information and Privacy Protection Act[51](IIPPA) protects against unauthorized disclosure of PHI by prohibiting unapproved information sharing for information collected from insurance applications and claims resolution.
InNew Zealand, theHealth Information Privacy Code (1994)sets specific rules for agencies in the health sector to better ensure the protection of individual privacy. The code addresses the health information collected, used, held and disclosed by health agencies. For the health sector, the code takes the place of the information privacy principles.
The introduction of a nationwide system for the exchange of medical information and access to electronic patient records led to much discussion in theNetherlands.[52]
In the course of having or being part of a medical practice, doctors may obtain information that they wish to share with the medical or research community. If this information is shared or published, the privacy of the patients must be respected. Likewise, participants inmedical researchthat are outside the realm of direct patient care have a right to privacy as well.
While medical privacy remains an important right, it is also crucial to balance privacy with innovation. By limiting patient data in response to privacy violations, it potentially hinders data-driven innovation in medicine. In addition, keeping data secret for a competitive advantage also poses multiple concerns, potentially slowing advances in medical testing (e.g.Myriad Genetics).[53]
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Theclergy–penitent privilege,clergy privilege,confessional privilege,priest–penitent privilege,pastor–penitent privilege,clergyman–communicant privilege, orecclesiastical privilege, is a rule of evidence that forbids judicial inquiry into certain communications (spoken or otherwise) between clergy and members of their congregation.[1]This rule recognises certain communication asprivilegedand not subject to otherwise obligatory disclosure, similar toattorney–client privilegebetweenlawyersand clients. In many jurisdictions certain communications between a member of theclergyof some or all religious faiths (e.g., a minister, priest, rabbi, imam) and a person consulting them in confidence are privileged in law. In particular, Catholics, Lutherans and Anglicans, among adherents of other Christian denominations,confess their sinsto priests, who areunconditionally forbiddenbyChurch canon lawfrom making any disclosure,[2][1]a position supported by the law of many countries, although in conflict with civil (secular) law in some jurisdictions. It is a distinct concept from that ofconfidentiality(seenon-disclosure agreement).
The protection of the clergy–penitent privilege relationships rests on one of the more basic privileges as strong or stronger than the similar clauses to confidentiality between lawyer and client.[3]
In Australia, most states now implement various versions of the Commonwealth Uniform Evidence Law 1995,[4]which provides for clergy privilege. States which have not implemented a version of the Uniform Evidence Act are covered by common law derived from the English common law. Since there is very little case law regarding priest-penitent privilege, it is not absolutely clear if such privilege applies: the standard understanding is that there is no such privilege, but there is some disagreement.[5][6]
Several states have modified the effect of the statutory Evidence Law to restrict clergy privilege when applied to child abuse cases.
In the state ofQueensland, a law was passed on August 9, 2020, that forces members of the clergy to report known or suspected cases of abuse to the police, meaning they are no longer allowed to use the sanctity of the confessional as a defence or excuse in child sex abuse matters.[7]
TwoCanadianprovincesrecognize the privilege in the communications between individuals and their religious leaders in their statutes (Newfoundland and Labradorunder its Evidence Act[8]andQuebecunder itsCharter of Human Rights and Freedoms).[9]Otherwise, religious communication is covered bycommon law.
Canadian law descends from Britishcommon law, and as such the status of priest–penitent privilege is not well defined in national jurisprudence.R. v. Gruenke[10]from 1991 is the leadingSupreme Court of Canadacase regarding this privilege. Religious communications are not presumptively (prima facie) privileged.
The court establishes that a test, proposed byJohn Henry Wigmore, might be employed to determine whether a specific communication is privileged or not. The "Wigmore Criteria" are seen as a general framework, not a "carved in stone" approach. The "Wigmore Criteria" are generally used to determine if privilege covers communications that do not fall under the classic privileged communications such assolicitor–client privilegeorspousal privilege.[11]
To determine whether a communication is privileged, the "Wigmore Criteria" state that:
The "Wigmore Criteria" are informed by theCanadian Charter of Rights and Freedomsguarantee of freedom of religion (protected under s.2(a)) and the interpretive s.27 ("This Charter shall be interpreted in a manner consistent with the preservation and enhancement of the multicultural heritage of Canadians").[12]
As a result of s.27, the termreligious communicationsis used in place of the more common termpriest–penitent. Similarly, analysis should begin from a non-denominational approach.
Religious freedom strengthens the argument in favour of recognition of the privilege for religious communications. However, religious communications are only privileged in particular cases when the Wigmore criteria are satisfied. While a formal confession process is not necessary, it can help in determining whether there is an expectation of privacy when evaluating the communication using the "Wigmore Criteria."
InR. v. Gruenke, it was found that the communications were not privileged because there was no expectation of privilege between Ms. Gruenke and her pastor and her religious counsellor.
In October 1999, it was reported that the Canadian government had opposed a plan to recognize the value of priest–penitient privilege within the bounds ofinternational law.[13]
The status of priest–penitent privilege in English law has not been absolutely determined.
In October 2021, a report which investigatedsexual abuse of childrenby Catholic clergy and lay persons employed by the church, recommended to require priests to notify the police about child abuse cases that are mentioned in confession. BishopEric de Moulins-Beaufortrejected the recommendation. Interior ministerDarmanintold him in a meeting that priests are obliged to report cases of sexual violence against children, even when heard in the confessional, to the police.[14][15]The spokesperson for the French bishops' conference later said that they are not required to do that.[16]
Accused clerics not infrequently see confession as an opportunity to reveal their own abuse crimes. The protected sphere of the confessional box was even used by accused clerics to prepare or conceal offences in some cases. The Sacrament of Confession is therefore particularly significant in this context. The responsibility of the confessor for the adequate clarification, processing and prevention of individual sexual abuse offences needs to be emphasised from a scientific point of view.
In Germany, under section 383(1) No 4 Code of Civil Procedure, clerics may refuse to testify, with a view to what was entrusted to them in the exercise of their pastoral care and guidance. The same applies to document production under section 142(2) Code of Civil Procedure. One must bear in mind that, from the outset, only specific documents whose existence is known of by the petitioner can be asked for, section 142(1) Code of Civil Procedure.
TheMHG study[de]found that the priest-penitent privilege in Germany had been used to cover up sexual abuse.[17][18]
The privilege was recognised under thecommon lawof theRepublic of Irelandas the privilege of the priest in the case ofCook v. Carroll[1945] IR 515.,[19]reversing an earlier judgment from 1802.[20]In 2011, in the wake ofseveral sex abuse scandals, theFine Gael–Labour governmentannounced plans to criminalise failure to report an allegation ofchild abuse, even if made during confession.[21]Seán Brady, the Catholicprimate of all Ireland, condemned this as compromising the seal of the confessional.[21]
Article 178 of the Polish Code ofCriminal Procedureexplicitly forbids calling a clergyman as a witness in order to disclose information he obtained during a confession.[22]Article 261 of the Polish Code ofCivil Procedureallows clergymen to abstain from testifying if this would reveal information he obtained during a confession.[23]
Article 182 of Criminal Procedure[24]states that a witness who is or was clergyman, lawyer, physician, psycologist or other similar roles cannot be compelled into testifying against their clients (not limited to defendants) regarding secrets learned during their service unless with explicit permission from said person.
According to formerChief Justice of the United StatesWarren Burger, "The clergy privilege is rooted in the imperative need for confidence and trust. The[...] privilege recognizes the human need to disclose to a spiritual counselor, in total and absolute confidence, what are believed to be flawed acts or thoughts and to receive consolations and guidance in return."[25]
Roman Catholic priests have a duty undercanon lawto hold in confidence any information obtained during confession.[26]Other religious groups often have similar requirements. A pastor of any denomination who discloses confessional information might be at risk in a civil lawsuit for an invasion of privacy or defamation.[27]However, many jurisdictions have recognized the need for exceptions in extreme cases, such as child abuse, child neglect, sexual abuse, "notorious crimes"/murder,[28]as the needs of modern civil society to protect victims prevail over the 'laws' of a particular religion, which irrespective of the First Amendment's free exercise clause, does not override modern legal jurisprudence.
TheFirst Amendmentis largely cited as thejurisprudentialbasis. The earliest and most influential case acknowledging the priest–penitent privilege wasPeople v. Phillips(1813), where the Court of General Sessions of the City ofNew Yorkrefused to compel a priest to testify. The Court opined:
It is essential to the free exercise of a religion, that its ordinances should be administered—that its ceremonies as well as its essentials should be protected. Secrecy is of the essence of penance. The sinner will not confess, nor will the priest receive his confession, if the veil of secrecy is removed: To decide that the minister shall promulgate what he receives in confession, is to declare that there shall be no penance...
A few years afterPhillipswas decided,People v. Smithdistinguished the case on the grounds that the defendant had approached the minister as a "friend or adviser," not in his capacity as a professional or spiritual advisor. As with most privileges, a debate still exists about the circumstances under which the priest–penitent privilege applies. The capacity in which the clergyman is acting at the time of the communication is relevant in many jurisdictions.
In U.S. practice, the confidentiality privilege has been extended to non-Catholic clergy and non-sacramental counseling, with explicit clergy exemptions put into most state law over the past several decades. In most states, information gained within a confession or private conversation is considered privileged and may be exempted frommandatory reporting requirements.[29]: 2
Proposed, but rejected, Rule 506 (Communications to Clergy) of theFederal Rules of Evidenceprovides:
(a) Definitions. As used in this rule:
(1) A "clergyman" is a minister, priest, rabbi, or other similar functionary of a religious organization, or an individual reasonably believed so to be by the person consulting him.
(2) A communication is "confidential" if made privately and not intended for further disclosure except to other persons present in furtherance of the purpose of the communication.
(b) General rule of privilege. A person has a privilege to refuse to disclose and to prevent another from disclosing a confidential communication made by the person to a clergyman in his professional character as a spiritual adviser.
(c) Who may claim the privilege. The privilege may be claimed by the person, by his guardian or conservator, or by his personal representative if he is deceased. The clergyman may claim the privilege on behalf of the person. His authority so to do is presumed in the absence of evidence to the contrary.
According to New York state law, confessions and confidences made to a clergyman or other minister are privileged and cannot be used as evidence. This privilege is not limited to communications with a particular kind of priest or congregant, and it is not confined to statements made "under the cloak of confession". What matters is that the conversations were of a spiritual nature, and were confidential enough to indicate that the penitent intended that they be kept secret and that the penitent did not waive the privilege subsequently.[30]
New York law (NY CPLR 4505) provides that unless the person confessing or confiding waives the privilege, a clergyman, or other ministers of any religion or duly accredited Christian Science practitioner, shall not be allowed to disclose a confession or confidence made to him in his professional character as a spiritual advisor.[30]
A 1999 Oregon bill gives clergy members the same type of immunity long granted to spouses, whose conversations are privileged.[31]
Oregon Statute ORS 40.260 (Clergy–Penitent Privilege) states confidential communication made privately and not intended for further disclosure may not be examined unless consent to the disclosure of the confidential communication is given by the person who made the communication.[32]Oregon's reporting law 419B.010(1), explicitly exempts pastors from any duty to report such privileged communications.[33]
In California, absent waivers, Cal. Evid. Code § 912, both clergy and penitent – whether or not parties to the action – have the privilege to refuse to disclose a "penitential" communication. Cal. Evid. Code §§ 1033–34.[34]
In 25 states, the clergyman–communicant statutory privilege does not clearly indicate who holds the privilege. In 17 states, the penitent's right to hold the privilege is clearly stated. In only 6 states, both a penitent and a member of the clergy are expressly allowed by the statute to hold the privilege.
In Florida, pastors have an absolute right to keep counseling details confidential.[35]
The Official Code of Georgia Annotated states: "Every communication made by any person professing religious faith, seeking spiritual comfort, or seeking counseling to any Protestant minister of the Gospel, any priest of the Roman Catholic faith, any priest of the Greek Orthodox Catholic faith, any Jewish rabbi, or any Christian or Jewish minister or similar functionary, by whatever name called, shall be deemed privileged. No such minister, priest, rabbi, or similar functionary shall disclose any communications made to him or her by any such person professing religious faith, seeking spiritual guidance, or seeking counseling, nor shall such minister, priest, rabbi, or similar functionary be competent or compellable to testify with reference to any such communication in any court" (O.C.G.A 24-5-502).
Louisiana's Supreme Court ruled in 2014 that a priest may be compelled to testify about what he was told in the confessional regarding a particular sexual abuse case, leaving the priest at risk ofexcommunicationif he even confirms that a confession took place, or jail for contempt of court should he refuse to testify.[2]However, the Court later ruled that a priest has no duty to report confidential information heard during a sacramental confession.[36]
McNicol[37]gives three arguments in favour of the privilege:
Jeremy Bentham, writing in the early years of the 19th century, devoted a whole chapter to serious, considered argument thatRoman Catholicconfession should be exempted from disclosure in judicial proceedings, even inProtestantcountries, entitled:Exclusion of the Evidence of a Catholic Priest, respecting the confessions entrusted to him, proper.[38][39]
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Asubpoena duces tecum(pronounced in English/səˈpiːnəˌdjuːsiːzˈtiːkəm/sə-PEE-nəDEW-seezTEE-kəm), orsubpoena for production of evidence, is acourt summonsordering the recipient to appear before the court and produce documents or other tangibleevidencefor use at ahearingortrial. In some jurisdictions, it can also be issued by legislative bodies such as county boards of supervisors.
The summons is known by various names in different jurisdictions. The termsubpoena duces tecumis used in theUnited States, and some othercommon lawjurisdictions such asSouth AfricaandCanada. The summons is called a "subpoena for production of evidence" in some U.S. states that have sought to reduce the use of non-English words and phrases in court terminology.
Thesubpoena duces tecumis similar to thesubpoena ad testificandum, which is a writ summoning a witness to testify orally. However, unlike the latter summons, thesubpoena duces tecuminstructs the witness to bring in hand books, papers, or evidence for the court. In most jurisdictions, a subpoena usually has to beservedpersonally.
The phrasesub poena duces tecumis aLatinexpression meaning literally "under [threat of] penalty [or punishment], you will bring [it] with you." The wordsubmeans "under" andpoena"penalty";duces"you will lead, guide, pull, bring"; andtecum"with you".
In the United States, a notice to aparty(to theaction) deponent (a person called to testify in adeposition) may be accompanied by a request for production of documents and other tangible things during the taking of a deposition. The notice to produce (literally: "bring these documents with you to the deposition") is served prior to the deposition. This follows theFederal Rules of Civil Procedure.[1]The method of using asubpoena duces tecumis generally valid only to compel awitnessto produce documents and other things at the time of the deposition.
If a deponent is a non-party to the action (not involved directly in the litigation, but wanted for testimony), production of documents can be compelled only through a propersubpoena duces tecum.[2]
Federal cases and some states follow Rule 27(a)(3) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure concerning the production of documents inpretrial discovery, including those pertaining to depositions. These can include thesubpoena duces tecumto produce documents, or in some cases to undergo aphysicalormental examination. In theNinth Circuit, interpreting Rule 27 literally, it has been held that a party can simply produce the documents only, and in certain cases, avoid an oral deposition when presented with asubpoena duces tecum.[3]
In the 1957 caseJencks v. United StatestheUnited States Supreme Courtruled that a defendant must have access togovernment witnesseswho will testify against him in a criminal trial, and must also have access to any documents pertaining to that testimony.[4]This includes papers, documents, written statements, and the like. This led to passage of theJencks Act, 18 USC, Part II, Chapter 223, § 3500, which allows forsubpoena duces tecumof relevant government documents, but only after a government agent or employee has testified at trial. There can be no pre-trial discovery. The subpoena is allowed by the trial judge. The government has the right to deny access to the documents. This may be due to the sensitive nature of the documents, or because they are classified.
If a remedy is granted, there is amistrialand dismissal of criminal charges.[5][6]An accused criminal has no right to subpoena thework productof the prosecution in a criminal case.[7]
The subpoena power of anystate courtin the United States generally ends at that state’s border.[8][9]Consequently, lacking any powers outside the state's border, state prosecutors and defense attorneys in a state criminal case cannot use the same procedures that they would use to obtain a subpoena for an out-of-state witness that they would for an in-state witness.[10]
A domestic corporation may be considered to be a "person" within the meaning of theFourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. It is not necessary to treat a corporation as a person in all circumstances. United Statescase lawis confusing concerning this matter when dealing with foreign corporations, and their operation within the United States.[citation needed]Especially troubling have been rulings concerning theFourth Amendment of the United States ConstitutionandFifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. A foreign agent may not claimFifth Amendmentprovisions againstself-incrimination. Nor can records be withheld fromsubpoena duces tecumon the grounds that production of such documents would incriminate officers or other members of the foreign corporation. However, there is case authority in which foreign corporations have been protected from illegalsearches and seizures, including documents and books.[11]The matter of a foreign corporation operating as a "person" within the United States being afforded protection under the Fourteenth Amendment is discussed.[12][13][14]
In the United States, acontinuance(a rescheduling of acourt hearingto a later date) of a civil action may be granted due to the absence of documents or papers. The party failing to produce the documents requested by asubpoena duces tecummust show good reason why there was a failure to do so. Acceptable explanations have included loss or destruction of papers, or an agreement to use copies. The party seeking the continuance must show that the absence of the documents is not because of the negligence of their own, or of theattorney of record.[15]
Similarly, a continuance may be granted in a criminal case if there is good reason documents pertinent to the case could not be produced at the time of trial. For example, a continuance should be granted for failure to produce a transcript of testimony given at a previous trial. In general, it isreversible errorto proceed with a criminal trial in the absence of a previous trial transcript, when such contains pertinent information that should have been considered in the new trial. In these cases, a continuance is the usual remedy.[16]
A witness who has refused to obey a lawful order to produce books, documents and papers may be incarcerated forcontempt of court. A writ ofhabeas corpuswill not apply unless it can be shown the witness could not have legally had possession of such documents. In such a situation the writ ofhabeas corpuswill properly apply, and is the remedy for such improper action.[17][18]
Atcommon law, and under various statutes pertaining to a given jurisdiction, a right to action for damages, or for a statutory penalty orforfeiture, exists against a witness who, without sufficient excuse, fails or refuses to give oral testimony or to produce documents or other specified items in obedience to the command of a properly issued and served subpoena.[19]
There are certain conditions precedent, or defenses, to a recovery of damages for a person's failure to testify, or to provide documents pertinent to a hearing or trial. There must be a breach of testimonial duty, after having been properly served with a legitimately executed subpoena. There must be a demonstration of actual damages incurred from the absence of testimony. Most courts have rejected the arguments for seeking damages in this kind of case. Giving false testimony in a judicial proceeding even though the allegation is made that the person giving the testimony knew it to be false does not give rise, either at common law or by statute, to a civil action for damages resulting from such testimony. The situation is probably different if intentionally false documents are submitted under asubpoena duces tecum.[20][21]
A writ ofmandamus(Latin for "we command") is appropriate to compel surrender of documents in the possession of attorneys or other persons that have been illegally obtained under the abuse of awrit of attachment.[22]Mandamus canvacatean order to produce books and papers.[23]
In an 1893 case, theUnited States AttorneyforAlabamarefused to vacate his office, refusing to surrender books, papers, and other materials to the newly appointed US Attorney. Thefederal courtin Alabama issued a writ directing the previous attorney to relinquish the documents. He, in turn, sought relief from the Supreme Court, which denied his application, saying it would not interfere with the properly conducted internal matters of a court. In the caseIn re: Parsons, the US Supreme Court wrote:
"If the orders be regarded merely as directions in the administration of judicial affairs in respect of the immediate possession of property or custody of prisoners, we cannot be properly called to, by reason of anything appearing on these records, in the exercise of appellate jurisdiction in this manner, to direct them to be set aside. And if the proceedings should be treated as involving a final determination as on issues joined to the right to such possession and custody, there was no complaint of want of notice or of hearing, and the summary made adopted did not in itself affect the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court upon the ground that it had exceeded its powers."[24]
Mandamus is the remedy where a lower court has clearly failed to issue compulsion to produce documents, or to allow the petitioner access to such documents as may be in the possession of the court or the parties to the action. Mandamus can be used to compel a court to enforce an order to answerinterrogatories(questions submitted by the court or one of the parties to be answered under oath and pain ofperjury).[25][26][27]
Mandamus is the proper remedy to compel thequashingof asubpoena duces tecumfor the production before agrand juryof documents protected byattorney–client privilege.[28][29]Presumably, this would apply to attorney work product, although there is no case law on the matter.[30]
The right of the public to access judicial records is fundamental to a democratic state and is analogous to the United States' First Amendment right of freedom of speech and of the press and the Sixth Amendment right to public trials.[31][32][33]While the right to access trial records is not absolute, it is framed in presumption of public access to the proceedings and records.[34][35][36][37][38]United States Code 11, Section 107 (a), of the federal bankruptcy law, is a codification of the common-law general right to inspect judicial records and documents. However, the right is not absolute and may be denied when the entity seeking to view the records has an improper purpose. The general intent of the statute is to favor public access to court documents.[39]
Attorney–client privilegeis generally recognized by the courts. Communications between lawyer and client are generally immune from subpoena. In other words, a lawyer cannot be compelled to testify in a trial unless the lawyer becomes, or appears to become, a party to the litigation. A similar situation exists with "work product", meaning written documents or computer records generated in preparation for a trial or hearing. This includes information such as potential questions that may be asked of witnesses, lists of possible witnesses, memoranda, notes, trial strategies, written briefs, or documents that may, or may not end up being used in the course of litigation. Usually, none of this can be the subject of asubpoena duces tecum. If a communication between lawyer and client is made in the presence of a third party, the privilege is not recognized to exist.[40][41][42][43][44][45]
Thefederal courtswill apply the common law rule of attorney–client privilege unless there is an interveningstate lawapplying to the central issues of the matter. In those cases, the federal court uses the effective state law.[46][47]
Physician–patient privilegeis usually statutorily defined, and can vary from state to state. The usual rule is that medical records are immune from subpoena if the plaintiff has not alleged physical or mental injuries or damages. Once the plaintiff alleges physical or mental injuries proximately flowing from a potentially tortious act by the defendant, or in some other disability hearing, medical records can be subject tosubpoena duces tecum. While witnesses may try to resistlegal discoveryby asking the judge to protect them from questioning orinspection of documents, the policy of the courts is in favor of full disclosure. It is the intent of the rules of procedure that pre-trial discovery take place without any intervention of a judge. So-called "fishing expeditions" (massive and aimless calls for all documents related to the litigation) are permissible under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26 (b) (1). This rule is repeated in many states' rules of procedure: "Parties may obtain discovery regarding any matter, not privileged, which is relevant ... if the information sought appears reasonably calculated to lead to the discovery of admissible evidence." The looseness of the definition of relevant evidence is generally construed to mean "liberal" production. The physician who is the party to an action does not own the records of patients he has treated. They are not privileged if the patient has waived confidentiality. Physicians must produce medical records undersubpoena duces tecum.[48]
Peer review records and other hospital documents of quality control committee meetings are generally not subject tosubpoena duces tecum, since these have statutory immunity. The theory is that the frankness of peer review would be chilled if these records could be routinely compelled.[49][50]
Several United StatesFederal Circuit Courtshave recognized a limitedreporter's privilege.
In some states (such as California), rape crisis counselors and domestic violence advocates hold a statutory privilege analogous to therapist–client privilege. (See, for example, 1035 Cal. Evidence Code for rape crisis advocates,[51]and 1037.6 Cal. Evidence Code for domestic violence advocates).[52]
Statutes governing the disclosure of information contained in welfare records exist in many jurisdictions. The rationale for the existence of these regulations is to encourage full and frank disclosure by the welfare recipient of his situation and the protection of the recipient from the embarrassment likely to result from the disclosure of information contained in such records.[53]In some states, records can be disclosed at the discretion of the state director of welfare. In general, welfare records are not public records, and should not be considered to be such. Disclosure of information is usually limited to purposes directly connected with the administration of welfare benefits. The investigation of costs of welfare programs have been held to be sufficiently related to the matters in question to justify disclosure. Statutes designed to limit welfare record availability are generally held by the courts to be not immune from the power ofsubpoena duces tecum.
Certain state laws limit the availability of information that can be obtained from the subpoena of such documents. These are always subject to a court challenge, on a case-by-case basis. Welfare recipients are generally allowed access to their files, bysubpoena duces tecum. Death of a welfare recipient is considered in some states to be sufficient reason to remove the reason for confidentiality. Some states have passed so-called "Right to Know" statutes, which would make welfare recipients and the information available to the public. These, along with common law, and state and federal constitutions guaranteeing freedom of the press do not give newspapers (or other news media) the right to access the names of persons on welfare, or the amounts they receive.[54]
An entity (person or a corporation) may be compelled to produce documentary evidence in accordance with the subpoena powers ofFederal Rule of Civil Procedure45 as applied by Bankruptcy Rule 9016. TheUnited States Bankruptcy Courthas powers to compel production of documents from a non-debtor corporation or person concerning transactions involving the debtor corporation or person. Production of documents can be challenged as being burdensome. Assets diverted to outside corporations or bank accounts/stock portfolios and such other assets as land holdings lie within the power to compel production undersubpoena duces tecum. Federal law recognizes no accountant-client privilege. Asubpoena duce tecumserved pursuant to Bankruptcy Rule 2004 is not a violation of accountant-client privilege. 11United States Codesection 107 (a) provides that papers filed in cases under theBankruptcy Codeand dockets of the Bankruptcy Courts are public records and are to be open to examination at reasonable times without charge.[55]
Whenever theFederal Trade Commission(FTC) has reason to believe that any person has violated 15 USC section 13, 14, 18 or 19, it must issue and serve on that person and on theAttorney General of the United States, a complaint stating its charges in that regard. The notice shall also give a date for a hearing in the matter. Delivery of thesubpoena duces tecumfor production of documents may be done in person, or by certified letter. Receipt of the letter is considered proof of service.[56]
Power to issue subpoenas is extended toRobinson–Patman Actcases of price-fixing andClayton Actcases of unlawful acquisition.[57]
A Federal District Court lacks jurisdiction to enjoin theFederal Trade Commissionfrom proceeding in an investigation. It cannot stay (stop) asubpoena duces tecumto produce documents in the investigative stage. An injunction by a federal court does not have the power to restrain the FTC from enforcing an order requiring corporations to furnish reports and documents un 15 USC § 49. The only relief available to stop a demand for documents is to seek anaction of compliance in mandamusby the Attorney General of the United States, or under 15 USC § 50 to enforce fines and forfeitures.[58]
If the FTC institutes an adjudicative proceeding (a hearing), the person who originated the matter by complaining to the FTC is not a party to the action and does not have any control over it. The FTC may allow the complaining person to participate in the proceeding by virtue of 15 USC, section 45. This allows participation for good cause, either by counsel (lawyer) or in person. You cannot intervene in an FTC hearing, except by demonstrating that substantial issues of law or fact would not be properly raised and argued—and that these issues are important and immediate enough to warrant additional expenditure of FTC resources. This involvement can be enhanced bysubpoena duces tecum.
Pre-hearing conferences are the norm. These are useful in:
In general, pre-hearing conferences are not public.[59]The FTC is not restricted by a rigid rule of evidence.[60]
Discovery can be authorized for the production of documents for both pre-trial and post-trial actions. Most states either follow, or have modeled their procedures after, theFederal Rules of Civil ProcedureRule 69(a).
Judgment creditors (those who have received a favorable court ruling for monetary damages) are permitted to ask questions about a debtor's residence; recent employment history; business relationships, including partners, co-shareholders, co-officers, co-directors; the contents of a will; transfers of property; and the identity of persons who either owed a debt to the judgment debtor, or received things of value from the debtor. Information in bank accounts can also be the subject of asubpoena duces tecum.[61]
In federal court proceedings concerning judgment debtors, the inquiry is usually limited to the discovery of assets. In international cases, being tried inUnited States Federal Courts, the application of theHague Service Conventionis utilized where appropriate.[62]
Disabled persons under the age of 65 years can be eligible for disability benefits underSocial SecurityTitles II and XVI.[63]
The seminal case in Social Security law isRichardson v. Perales, a Supreme Court decision from 1971. The court directed that medical reports put forth by a treating physician in Social Security hearings should be accepted as evidence, despite thehearsaynature of the medical records. These should be accepted, even ifcross-examinationis not available. The claimant has the right to subpoena the treating physician. In cases of conflicting medical evidence, it is not unconstitutional for the hearing officer to obtain independent medical advice to help resolve the physical questions involved. Under theAdministrative Procedure Act, hearsay in the form of medical records are admissible up to the point of relevancy.[64]
Several federal agencies have adoptedJencks Actrules. Although the Jencks Act applies only to government agents or employees who testify in criminal cases, making these witnesses and relevant documents available for cross-examination after testimony, it has been applied in administrative law cases in the interests of justice and fair play.[65]The party of record must make an official request to the hearing officer to have Jencks rules followed.[66]Some agency rules such asNational Labor Relations Boardautomatically followJencks Actrequirements.[67]
In a case of alleged negligence by a physician, written summaries of the case by physicians provided to the insurance carrier or other parties can be the subject of asubpoena duces tecum, if, in the opinion of the court, they are relevant to theplaintiff's case. Claims that these statements are "work product" will generally fail.[68]
Medical records form the core of any medical malpractice case.[69]Actions for malpractice are controlled by the general rules of evidence in civil procedure.[70]A malpractice action necessarily involves the question of requisite care and skill applied in a medical case. With the exception ofres ipsa loquiturcases, medical opinion about the care is essential. This involves the necessity to obtain asubpoena duces tecumfor medical records.[71][72][73]
Admission of "learned treatises" (published books and medical articles) at trial varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Some require that the expert admit it is an authoritative reference.[74][75]Others will allow admission of learned treatises by judicial notice.[76][77]
Intortactions for recovery of damages, it is necessary for the introduction of medical records to establish a basis for the claimed loss. An injured plaintiff is entitled to recover the expenses necessary to cure or treat injuries.[78][79][80][81][82][83][84]Courts frequently call upon expert testimony to interpret and advise, after examining medical records concerning the nature of injuries, future medical, disability and other issues before the court.[85][86][87][88]
Medical records introduced as evidence are crucial in determining both causation and impairment in worker's compensation cases. In cases where the evidence is contested, medical evidence in the form of records, opinions, affidavits and testimony concerning both fact and opinion is necessary. When oral testimony is taken from physicians, the usual standard is to state an opinion "within a reasonable degree of medical certainty".[89][90]Worker's compensation laws are dictated by state statute orFederal Employers Liability Act.[91]In many states, the employer has the right to demand an independent examination and can also direct treatment be carried out by certain physicians.[92]
In the landmark 1976 California case ofLanderos v. Flood,[93]the California Supreme Court remanded a case to the trial court for action in tort against a treating physician for failure to report suspected child abuse.[94][95]The theory at trial was that the plaintiff, a child of about 12 months of age, had been returned to a home where further physical abuse occurred, causing more damages. This was because the physician had failed to report the abuse in violation of California law.[94]After this case, all states instituted mandatory reporting by physicians and other medical personnel of any suspected child abuse or neglect cases. In general, reporting in good faith shields the physician or health care worker from tort liability. Reporting to police or social services necessitates obtaining medical records bysubpoena duces tecum. This case, and legislation that followed it were in response to several articles that appeared in the medical literature that definedbattered child syndromeandchild abuse syndrome.[96]
The 1962Social SecurityAmendments[97]require each state to make child welfare services available throughout the state to all children and provide coordination between child welfare services (Title IV-B) and social services provided under theAid to Families with Dependent ChildrenAct (ADC, later known as AFDC; now called Title XX) Determinations in these cases frequently require production of medical records.
In 1972, Congressional hearings began on child abuse and neglect. In response, Congress passed theChild Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act,[98]which defined abuse as "physical or mental injury, negligent treatment, or maltreatment of a child under the age of 18 by a person who is responsible for the child's welfare under circumstances which would indicate that the child's health or welfare is harmed or threatened thereby". The legislation created theNational Center on Child Abuse and Neglectas an information clearinghouse.
TheChild Abuse Prevention and Treatment Actof 1974 (42 U.S.C.§ 5101–42 U.S.C.§ 5106) defined "child abuse and neglect" as "physical or mental injury, sexual abuse, negligent treatment, or maltreatment of a child under the age of eighteen by a person responsible for the child's welfare under circumstances which indicate that the child's health or welfare is harmed or threatened thereby."[99]
TheChild Abuse Prevention and Treatment Actof 1988[100]when enacted, expanded the definition of abuse. Sexual crimes were specifically identified inSex Crimes Against Children Actof 1995[101]These laws have made child abuse a federal crime, and routinely mandate production of medical records.[95][99][102][103][104][105][106][107]
Physician-patient privilege is defined and limited by statute. Many jurisdictions have mandatory reporting laws requiring treating physicians or other medical personnel to report any suspicious injury to police or other appropriate authorities. These requirements may be imposed by statute, ordinance or regulation. Some of these may be limited to wounds typically inflicted by gun or knife. There may be similar reporting requirements in cases of domestic violence. These statutes have been generally upheld to constitutional challenges. Reporting of such cases usually voids any challenge tosubpoena duces tecumof the medical records by police or state authorities.[108]
The issue of removal of a doctor from a hospital staff, or revoking or limiting a license to practice medicine usually involve various state and federal immunities. TheHealthcare Quality Improvement Act(HCQIA) of 1986 granted doctors sitting on peer review committees immunity fromsubpoena duces tecum, or liability for the revocation of hospital privileges of other doctors. The matters of peer review cannot, in the normal course of events, be the subject of asubpoena duces tecum. This has led to claims that powerful doctors can abuse the process to punish other doctors for reasons unrelated to medical issues (termed "sham peer review").
The American Medical Association conducted a probe of the sham peer review issue and found that no pervasive problem exists. Allegations of sham peer review are easy to make (for example, by doctors whose medical mistakes have made them targets of peer review), but actual infractions are rare.[109]Opponents of peer review counter that the sparcity of successful challenges is indicative of how widespread the problem is and how difficult these actions are to win.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subpoena_duces_tecum
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Asubpoena ad testificandumis acourt summonsto appear and give oral testimony for use at a hearing or trial. The use of awritfor purposes of compelling testimony originated in theecclesiastical courtsof Church during theHigh Middle Ages, especially in England. The use of the subpoena writ was gradually adopted over time by civil and criminal courts in England and the European continent.
The subpoena developed as a creative writ, the "writ subpoena", from theCourt of Chancery. Writs of many kinds formed the essential parts of litigation. The primary function of a writ in the 13th and 14th centuries was to convey the king's commands to his officers and servants. It was irrelevant what the nature of those commands might be. TheRegister of Writsshows a large variety of writs to be administrative in nature, as opposed to judicial. These former writs acquired the nameprerogative writsin the 17th and 18th centuries. Prerogative writs that have survived into modern law are thewrit of mandamusandwrit of certiorari. The medievalwrit of prohibitionplayed an important part in the conflict between the church and state in England. The writ was also used in the courts of admiralty and local courts. It has survived in relative obscurity in United States law. The writ subpoena began to be attached to a wide variety of writs in the 14th century. These were an invention of theCourt of Equity, which were a part ofChancery. Thus, "subpoena" was a product of theecclesiastical courtsin England. The commonest writ from this era was thePraecipe quod reddat("You are commanded to return [some misappropriated good or land]"). To these were often added the phrasesub poena("under penalty").
The development of the writ subpoena is closely associated with the invention ofdue process, which slowly replacedtrial by ordeal. The institution of thejury trialnecessitated the hearing of evidence. This, in turn led to the need for a reliable method of compelling witnesses to appear and give testimony. The writ subpoena became the standard method of compelling witnesses. Following theFourth Lateran Councilheld in 1215 (overseen byPope Innocent IIIwho was at the zenith of Papal power), and based on a Latin interpretation of natural moral law, all forms oftrial by ordealortrial by battlewere outlawed in Church courts. Of greater significance to English law was the fact that the clergy were banned from blessing trial by ordeal in the civil and common law courts. This had the effect of bringing the practice of trial by ordeal to an abrupt halt in England. Trial by battle, which later evolved into a method of settling scores by dueling, was less affected. These had never had, nor did they require, the blessing of the Church. They were never a part of Latin or Roman law, but had been prevalent in the underlying Celtic and Saxon cultures. Trial by ordeal had always been viewed with skepticism and condescension by Latin lawyers and intelligentsia. Trial by battle, for the sake of honor had a long and proud tradition in Rome, and remained prominent in Roman lands. It had been banned by the Church courts on the Continent. Those who wanted to duel simply ignored the ban.
Following the Fourth Lateran Council, the civil and common law courts quickly moved to ban trial by ordeal and trial by combat. Implementation proved to be more difficult. What would take their place? The novel choice was trial by jury. In many places, this change was seen as radical and was met with great doubts about its effectiveness. There was a reluctance to accept juries on a large scale by many of the English courts, and the public at large. People were used to a system where decisions were made by the outcome of a duel or an ordeal. The jury system had made a sporadic appearance in England from time to time, including, but not limited toDanelawand theSaxons. Even so, juries had never been predominant. A jury remained a local and obscure phenomenon. It was generally believed that God's will was revealed in the outcome of the battle or ordeal. The fact that the judge would view the result of the ordeal and declare "God's decision" had little bearing on the validity of the procedure. The jury was something else. It did not represent God and its twelve or more members were likely to fail to deliver God's solution.
Cases which had no resolution, just as today, could easily be mocked by the public if the decision by the jury was inconclusive, or not in agreement with all the facts, or with emotions of the populace. Trial by ordeal or battle avoided these problems. The result in difficult cases was almost always clear cut. Judges were spared tough decisions.
1215 was also the year of theMagna Carta. Among other things, it limited theCourts of Eyre. These were circuit riding courts of the King which were roundly feared and hated. They had a reputation for being imperious and angry. There was thought to be little mercy in the Courts of Eyre.Magna Cartalimited the Courts of Eyre to visiting the same location once every seven years.[1][2][3][4][5][6]
The question inevitably arises: Did the writ subpoena develop in the Court of Eyre, or in the Court of Chancery? There were writs of a somewhat similar nature to be found in both courts. Bills (writs of complaints) were the method by which a litigant could make his story known in the courts of 13th and 14th century England. Because novel fact patterns frequently emerged, there was a tendency to become creative in the writing of bills of complaint and writs. Against this novelty, was a strong reaction, wanting to keep the number of writs to a minimum. An example is seen from the time ofEdward II of England: in 1310–1311 John Soke, a litigant appearing in person before the Common Bench, exclaimed in great frustration, "For God's sake, can I have a writ to attaint this fraud?" Judge Stanton replied, "Make your bill and you shall have what the court can allow."[7]This illustrates the great flexibility of the writing of writs to conform to the changing fact situations as they varied from case to case. At that time, a plaintiff who sued by bill was not liable to fail for defects in the form of a bill, provided the bill told an intelligible and consistent story.
As a matter of procedure, the judge would question the plaintiff in order to bring out the cause of the complaint. Once this was accomplished, the subsequent proceeding under the bill would be carried out as if there was a legitimate writ. By the 15th century, the bill would typically pray that a subpoena should be issued to secure the appearance and examination of the defendant. At the bottom of the bill were the names of the pledges to prosecute. These were similar to the bills issued by the Court of Eyre. Those subpoenas issued inChanceryat the time ofHenry VI of Englandwere required to have a pledge attached. Statute at that time prohibited the issue of a writ of subpoena until the plaintiff had found sureties to satisfy the defendant's damages if he did not prevail in his case. When the defendant appeared, both the plaintiff and his witnesses, and the defendant and any witnesses which he might produce, were examined by the Chancellor. Production of documents could be demanded viasubpoena duces tecum. It has been suggested that the writ subpoena was very similar to the bill of Eyre. However, in the opinions of Professor Adams,Sir Frederick Pollock, 3rd Baronetand Professor Powicke, it is erroneous to conclude that the writ subpoena came from the Bill of Eyre. It came from Chancery.
The source of the word writ, or writ subpoena has been ambiguous. TheStatute of Westminster II(1285) under the sectionin consimili casu(in similar case), attempted to limit the number of writs that could be issued.[8][9][10][11]
After the quick abolition of trial by ordeal, the novel approach was to call a jury to consider the case. Some situations were not difficult. As an example, from 1221 there is the case of Thomas de la Hethe. He had been presented by the grand jury with an indictment accusing him of being an associate of a notorious felon named Howe Golightly. Thomas refused to put himself on the country (accept a jury trial). Notwithstanding this refusal, the court declined to permit him any sort of trial by ordeal, but realizing the gravity of the situation they empanelled an impressive jury of twenty-four knights. These found Thomas guilty, and therefore he was hanged. At this time, even a villain who refused jury trial might have a panel of twenty-four knights.[1]
Such a large and distinguished trial by jury consisting of twenty-four knights shows the court's apprehension at depriving a man of his right to a trial by ordeal. Another example comes from the same year, 1221. An indictment indicated that the carcass of a stolen cow was discovered in William's shed. William did not express a claim to any particular sort of trial. He did state that the cow had been placed there by his lord, so that the latter could get his land as anescheatforfelony. The serjeant who arrested William stated that the lord's wife had arranged for his arrest. In such a case, the court simply asked the indictors for more information. They related the whole story; William was acquitted by the court and the lord was committed to gaol.[1]
In this case, the court quickly detected the plot and merely needed confirmation.[1]But what of cases where the facts were not clear, or the decision was difficult? It was these that provided the gravest difficulties with jury trials following the abolition of trial by ordeal. Upon the calling of a general Court of Eyre, it was easy to assemble a thousand or more jurors, who could be questioned, and pronounce a prisoner guilty or not. If the proceedings were instigated upon the delivery and indictment from a gaol, before a non-professional judge, most prisoners were coerced to put themselves upon the mercy of a jury trial, and forgo their ancient right to trial by ordeal. If they refused a jury trial, there was no option but to keep them in prison until they changed their mind.
Under these circumstances, the jury became a new form of ordeal. The judges, in difficult cases ceased to be inquisitors, and simply came to accept the verdict of the jury. The accused was pronounced either "guilty" or "not guilty". This result soon came to be accepted with as little doubt, as much as the result of the hot iron or cold water was accepted a generation earlier. At first, there was no compulsion to deem the actions of a jury with any more rationality than that of the ordeal. The ordeal had shown God's judgment in the matter. The verdict of the jury, while not necessarily congruent with God's will, nonetheless, was inscrutable. Over the course of a generation or so after 1215, the jury system began to be rationalized and regarded as a judicial body.
Bracton(circa 1250) seemed to be fairly complacent with the jury as an institution. Other contemporaneous writers were markedly dissatisfied with the jury.The Mirror of Justices[12]contains a violent attack on the jury system from 1290. In those parts of France where the jury system took root at the same time, there were tremendous protests against it, as being oppressive.[13]
From the time ofEdward I of Englandonward, the function of the jury was slowly being judicially defined. Questions of law were being separated from questions of fact. Arguments centered around questions like: Is a jury conclusion of 11 to 1 enough to convict for a crime?
In 1468,Sir John Fortescuegives a picture of jury trials which is congruent with the modern form. The jury had come to be regarded as twelve men who could be of open mind. Witnesses were examined under oath. Parties or their counsel were presenting facts and evidence to the jury. A century later,Sir Thomas Smithgives a vivid account of the jury trial with examination, cross-examination, all in front of the judge and jury.[13]
Shortly after the institution of the jury system, with its attendant seeking of evidence, based on testimony given by witnesses, the problem ofmaintenancedeveloped. Maintenance was the practice of witnesses coming forward to provide testimony at trial, without being asked to do so. These were frequently well-meaning friends or family members who wanted to participate or help sway the verdict of the trial.The Statute of Westminster I(1275) had fifty-one chapters. One of these dealt with the issue of maintenance.[14]
There are numerous references indicating that there had developed a class of professional testifiers, quite apart from lawyers and advocates, who could be purchased to testify in jury trials. There was an effort to end this practice by providing punishment to whole categories of professional testifiers, such asserjeant-pleaders.[15][16][17]
Sir John Fortescuewas of the opinion that anyone who came forward to volunteer to give testimony in a case should be tried for maintenance, since he should have waited to be issued a writ of subpoena.[18]
Sir Thomas Smithcommented that the jury system in the time of Elizabeth could not exist without the ability to compel testimony using the writ subpoena.[18][19]At this time, maintenance was viewed as the primary evil of the legal system. Political songs of the day evoked the problem: "At Westminster halle (Legis sunt valde scientes); Nevertheless for hem alle (Ibi vincuntur jura potentes...); His owne cause many a man (Nunc judicial et moderatur); Law helpeth noght than (Ergo lex evacuatur)."[20]
The strictness with which the courts interpreted the laws against maintenance was an expression of the censure of the common law. But the censure, overall, proved to be ineffectual. By the Fifteenth Century, the law had become corrupted, and was only another weapon, along with physical violence, for the unscrupulous to achieve their ends. In 1450, Cade proclaimed: "The law serveth of nowght ellys in thes days, but for to do wrong, for nothying is sped almost but false maters by colour of the law for mede, drede and favor."[21]Perjury was not a crime in those days. Maintenance, along withchamperty, appearing armed before a justice of the law, giving ofliveries, forgery of deeds, and other corrupting influences were banned underEdward III of England.
An example of the corruption is seen in the 1445 case of Janycoght de Gales who had been committed to prison until he paid the sum of 388 pounds which was owed to Robert Shirbourne, a draper of London. Janycoght procured a testifier in maintenance, George Grenelawe who accused him of larceny. The idea was that Janycoght would be convicted of larceny, sentenced to Fleet prison, then released because of obligations owed to him by the keepers of that prison. In this manner, he would escape the debt of Shirbourne. It was discovered that Grenelaw had fabricated the complaint.[22]
The abuses were rampant. Increasing strictness against corruption of all kinds at jury trials made many reluctant to testify. The writ subpoena became a necessary answer to this problem.
Court of Equitygrew out of theCourt of Chancery, which were controlled by the Church. There was a concern in these institutions that law be congruent with natural moral law. The great concern was equitable justice or "equity". This was not always seen in the common law courts, which were more pragmatic, and were concerned mainly with land law and inheritance.
Until theLate Middle Agesit was not apparent to contemporaries that there would be, or could be, two different and competing legal systems in England, one of them common law and the other equity. They were, however, aware of the conflicting courts. There was a conflict of jurisdiction. There were numerous complaints that various authorities had exceeded their power. Equity grew in its desire to deal with thede factofailings of the common law courts, and did not concern itself with doctrinal differences. Often, a suitor who was dissatisfied with the result in a common law court would refile the case in Equity or Chancery. These latter courts saw their role as being "equalizers": socially, legally, economically. In this position, and encouraged byRoman lawtraditions, they were always creative in producing new writs which could not be found in the common law courts. It was in this spirit that Justice Berrewyk in 1302, ordered an infant to be brought before the court with a writ subpoena: "under pain of (forfeit) of 100pounds". But there is evidence that "threat of penalty" had been attached to writs used by the government to induce behavior as early as 1232. By 1350, thewrit certis de causis(the "writ for certain causes"), began having the clause subpoena routinely attached. The writquibusdam certis de causisis at least as old at 1346, and had subpoena attached. The great objection which common lawyers made to writs in this form was their failure to mention the cause of the summons. It became the custom in the common law courts that the person would not be compelled to appear without having notice of the reasons for appearing. Early subpoenas carried no notice of the reason for the summons. Objections in Parliament became loud and frequent. On the one hand, Chancery believed that a wrongdoer might engage in maintenance to prepare the verdict before appearing in court. On the other side, common law courts found it difficult to amend the presented writ, and many cases were lost for want of the correct writ at the beginning of the case.[23]
The rolls of the medieval English parliaments contain numerous petitions and acts directed against the Council and Chancery. The spirit of theMagna Carta, as well as some specific language within it, was the promise that justice in England to all citizens and their property would be in the common law courts, and nowhere else. In 1331, these proclamations were again re-enacted. In 1351, they were again recited. The King had to promise that the Council would not proceed without indictment of common law process on an original writ. It was ignored. In 1363, the command to Chancery was repeated by legislature. There was a proclamation that there be no original writs. These pronouncements were ineffective and ignored. More legislation followed in 1389 and 1394. In 1415, the writ subpoena was denounced by name, as a subtlety invented byJohn Waltham. Another legislative act in 1421 called the subpoena not in accordance with due process. By this time, the Council and Chancery were firmly established. Further legislation only encouraged these institutions.[24]
Nowadays, a witness summons can be issued and served upon a person where it is necessary to secure their presence to testify in a court case. In England and Wales, witness summons are covered by Part 34 of the Civil Procedure Rules.[25]
In order for the power of the court to compel the appearance and testimony of a witness inUnited States Federal Courts, or in various state courts, the person who is sought must be served with a subpoena.[26]
The obligation of the individual to attend the court as a witness is enforced by a process of the court, particular process being the subpoena ad testificandum, commonly called the subpoena in the United States. This writ, or form, commands the witness, under penalty, to appear at a trial to give testimony. Thus, the subpoena is the mechanism for compelling the attendance of a witness.[27][28][29]
The court did not err in refusing to order production of a defense alibi witness, where the defense contended that the witness was under subpoena but no evidence was introduced to show that the witness was under subpoena,andno evidence was introduced to show the witness was ever served with a subpoena to testify.[30]
Various states have a statutory provision to define the execution and regulation of subpoenas. Louisiana is typical. There the court made this statement: "A statute provides that the court shall issue subpoenas for the compulsory attendance of witnesses at hearings or trials when requested to do so by the state or the defendant."[31]
One accused of a crime has a constitutional right to have compulsory process to procure the attendance of witnesses in his favor.[32]
The subpoena is a process in the name of the court or a judge, carrying with it a command dignified by the sanction of the law.[33]
A subpoena has been called a mandate lawfully issued under the seal of the court by a clerk thereof.[34]
In general, the norm is to have the clerk of the court issue the subpoena for an upcoming trial in that same court.[35]
Under theUniform Rules of Criminal Procedure, a clerk or, someone acting in the part of the clerk of the court, under a magistrate shall issue a subpoena to a party requesting it, who shall fill in the blanks before it is served.[36]
In the United States, the form of a subpoena may be prescribed by statute of the state, or by the rule of the local court.[37]
A subpoena requires the person therein named to appear and attend before a court or magistrate at the time and place, to testify as a witness.[37]
Under theUniform Rules of Criminal Procedure, the subpoena must state the name of the court and the title, if any, of the proceeding. It must command each person to whom it is directed to attend and give testimony. The time and place must be specified.[36]
The rules governing civil and criminal procedure in federal court provide for the subpoena of witnesses, and specify the form and requisites thereof.[38][39]
In theAmericansystem there is a fundamental right to be heard in due process of law. This is defined in theFourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. A necessary requisite of due process of law is the opportunity to be heard, in a manner which is meaningful, in front of a forum which has an open mind, and is willing to listen to evidence. Adequate notice and an opportunity to confront adverse witnesses must be afforded.
As a general rule, independent of statutory considerations, the writ ofhabeas corpusad testificandumunderAmericanlaw may be resorted to for the purpose of removing a person confined in a jail or prison to enable him to testify as a witness. The issuance of such a writ lies within the sound discretion of the court, or the judicial officer having the power to compel the attendance of witnesses. Relevance and materiality are of consideration in such matters. The constitutional right of an accused to compulsory process for obtaining witnesses does not necessarily extend to compelling the attendance of person in prison. This right is not violated by a statute which makes the right to the production of a witness confined in prison upon the discretion of the court.[40]
The Uniform Rendition of Prisoners as Witnesses in Criminal Proceedings Actprovides by way of reciprocity between state for the summoning of a prisoner in one state to appear and testify as a witness in another. This is accomplished by way of a court order which specifies terms and conditions, and a determination and certification that the witness is material to a pending criminal proceeding. The Uniform Act defines a "witness" as a person who is confined in a penal institution in any state and whose testimony is desired in another state in any criminal proceeding or other investigation by agrand juryor in any criminal action before a court of law.
The subpoena power of anystate courtin the United States generally ends at that state’s border.[41][42]Consequently, lacking any powers outside the state's border, state prosecutors and defense attorneys in a state criminal case cannot use the same procedures that they would use to obtain a subpoena for an out-of-state witness that they would for an in-state witness.[43]
A number of states have adopted theUniform Act to Secure the Attendance of Witnesses from Without a State in Criminal Proceedingsto enable courts, through voluntary co-operation, to secure the attendance of witnesses from other states. The co-operative states must have adopted the same legislation in order to enter into reciprocal agreements for the attendance of witnesses. The law also applies to grand jury investigations.[44]
The issuance of process, including a summons, is regulated by local statutory provisions and rules of the court. These should be consulted. The usual procedure calls for the issuance of a summons by the clerk of the court upon filing a complaint or petition. TheFederal Rules of Civil Procedureprovides that upon filing of a complaint the clerk of the court must forthwith issue a summons and deliver the summons to the plaintiff or the plaintiff's attorney who is responsible for the prompt service of the summons and a copy of the complaint. (FRCP 4) The Federal Rule is not concerned with the amenability of the suit, the proper venue of the case, or the court's jurisdiction. The rule provides the means of invoking thein personamjurisdiction of the court in civil actions and will control if other relevant statutes or rules make no special provisions for service of process in other relevant statutes and rules. The nature of Rule 4 is procedural rather than substantive in nature.[45]
In general, service of a process upon a non-resident will be set aside where the criminal proceedings are instituted against him in bad faith, or as a ruse or pretext for getting him into the jurisdiction in order to serve him with civil process.[46][47]
As a general rule, a witness who is in attendance at a trial in a state other than that of hisresidenceis immune or privileged from the service ofcivil process(delivery of a subpoena in a civil case, but not acriminal case) while in such a state. Usually, immunity is granted to a witness who voluntarily appears to testify for the benefit of another, but it has also been held that the grant of immunity is not affected by the fact that the witness appearance was pursuant to a court order. The immunity is not affected by the witness' domination of a corporate defendant already in action, or the witness' potential liability as a co-defendant. A witness who appears in court as part of his official duties is immune from service of civil process, and it is irrelevant that his appearance was not under subpoena.[48][49]
Contrary to the general rule, there has been opinion thatnon-residentwitnesses are not exempt from civil process. Many courts encourage witnesses to come forward voluntarily and give testimony.[50][51]
Immunity is based on the theory that the court must be unimpeded in its goals, and fear of service could lead to witnesses not appearing, for fear of being served in another pending civil case.[52]
There are two general rules followed:
Various "long-arm statutes" have changed the landscape of civil service across state lines. For instance, immunity from civil service to non-resident witnesses no longer applies in California afterSilverman v. Superior Court203 Cal. App. 3d 145 (Cal. Ct. App. 1988).
Following the United States Supreme Court ruling inMorgan v. United States, federal administrative law was ripe for significant reform. Administrative law had grown significantly during theFranklin Delano Rooseveltadministration and the implementation of the numerous agencies promulgated under theNew Deal. The decision in Morgan precipitated change in the federal system which had been deemed inadequate for the previous thirty five years. In 1941 the United States Attorney General's Committee presented its final report on federal administrative procedure. The report resulted in the FederalAdministrative Procedure Actof 1946 (APA). A parallel report entitled theBenjamin Reportwas issued concerning administrative adjudication in the state of New York in 1942. The Federal Administrative Procedure Act of 1946 required hearings to have the qualities defined in §§ 553 and 554:
For hearings involved in the taking of evidence, there shall preside:
Subject to published rules of the agency and within its power, employees presiding at hearings may -
From the Federal Administrative Procedure Act, 5 U.S.C. § 555 (b): "A person compelled to appear in person before an agency or representative thereof is entitled to be accompanied, represented, and advised by counsel or, if permitted by the agency, by other qualified representative. A party is entitled to appear in person or by, or with counsel in an agency hearing."
InMadera v. Board of Education, 1967, the United States Supreme Court ruled that administrative hearings which complied with the requirements of due process must allow counsel. InPowell v. Alabama, 1938, the Supreme Court ruled that in criminal proceedings, the accused must be provided counsel at public expense, if the defendant cannot afford one. It is not required that representation in administrative hearings be paid for by public funds. Some hearings require that counsel cannot participate, as in arguing the case, but may only advise the client.
When the APA applies, the agency due process hearing must be presided over by the agency head (or one or more of the commissioners or board members, if it is a multiheaded agency) or an administrative law judge. The APA states that is provision requiring hearings by agency heads of administrative law judges, "does not supersede the conduct of specified classes or proceedings... by or before boards or other employees specially provided for by or designed under statute." The most prominent use of this clause is theImmigration and Naturalization Service.
In general, one called to be a witness by subpoena issued under APA guidelines is entitled to have representation by an attorney. This is not uniform, however. The Supreme Court has held that there is no constitutional right to counsel in noncriminal investigatory proceedings.[57]Even the blanket right to counsel given by APA may not apply to all agencies. TheInternal Revenue Serviceand theSecurities and Exchange Commissionhave sought to restrict the right of person called as witnesses in investigatory proceedings to engage lawyers who appear as counsel for someone else in the hearing. The courts have been ambivalent in their reaction to such attempts to restrict the choice of counsel. One case holds that person required to testify in a tax investigation are not entitled to counsel connected with or retained by the taxpayer whose liability is under investigation.[58]
In the case ofGoldberg v. Kelly,397 U.S. 254(1970) decided March 23, 1970, the Supreme Court considered the issue of New York City residents receiving financial aid underAid to Families with Dependent Childrenor the New York State general Home Relief Program who had brought suit challenging the adequacy of procedures for notice and hearing in connection with the termination of such aid. The three judges in the U.S. District Court for Southern New York entered judgment in favor of the plaintiffs. The defendant appealed. The United States Supreme Court ruled that procedural due process requires that a predeterminationevidentiary hearingbe held when public assistance payments were to be discontinued. The procedures followed by New York were constitutionally inadequate in that they failed to permit recipients to appear personally with or without counsel before the official who finally decided the continued eligibility and failing to permit recipient to present evidence to that official orally or to confront or cross-examine adverse witnesses. Welfare benefits are a matter of statutory entitlement for persons qualified to receive them and their termination involves state action that adjudicates important rights, andprocedural due processto termination of welfare benefits.
American Jurisprudence
American Law Reports
Case Law Citation
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subpoena_ad_testificandum
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Data protection (privacy) laws in Russiaare a rapidly developing branch inRussian legislationthat have mostly been enacted in the 2005 and 2006.[1]The Russian Federal Law on Personal Data (No. 152-FZ), implemented on July 27, 2006, constitutes the backbone of Russianprivacy lawsand requires data operators to take "all the necessary organizational and technical measures required for protectingpersonal dataagainst unlawful or accidental access".[2]Amendment was signed on December 20, 2020 and came into effect on March 1, 2021. The amendment requires "personal data made publicly available" needs to receive consent from the data subject.[3]Russia'sFederal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Mediais the government agency tasked with overseeing compliance.[4]
Consentof the individual is required for processing of his personal data. This rule doesn't apply where such processing is necessary for performance of the contract, to which an individual is a party.
One shall bear in mind that a personal data subject is entitled at any time to revoke his previously granted consent, which obliges the operator to stop processing of such personal data and destroy it within three business days (unless other period of time was agreed on by the operator and an individual) after the date of such revocation, and notify the personal data subject of the fact that his personal data has been destroyed.
More specifically, processing of personal data for the purpose of direct marketing may be performed subject to prior consent of personal data subjects. Lack of such consent is presumed unless the operator proves the contrary. Processing of personal data for the purposes indicated above must be immediately ceased at the demand of personal data subject.
At the time of obtaining of personal data the operator is obliged, subject to request of an individual, to communicate to the latter information relating to the operator and the process of prospective processing.
If personal data is obtained not directly from a personal data subject, the operator prior to processing such information must provide the individual with the following information:
Generally, it is prohibited to process in any way sensitive personal data of the individual, save for the cases where express written consent, containing all conditions provided for by the law, has been obtained from the individual prior to processing.
Generally, to transfer personal data outside the Russian Federation, the operator will have to make sure, prior to such transfer, that the rights of personal data subjects will enjoy adequate and sufficient protection in the country of destination.
Until 1 September 2015 the position of Federal Service on Telecommunications the governmental body responsible for personal data protection was that adequate and sufficient protection exists only in those foreign states which signed and ratifiedConvention for the Protection of Individuals with regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data. Nevertheless, there are three major exceptions which permit transfer of personal data to the countries where lower or no standard of personal data protection applies, namely:
On 1 September 2015 a new "Article 18 (5)" came into effect more strictly limiting the export of data.[7]
The Russian legislation imposes strict limitations on using of the electronic means of communication for direct marketing. Namely, express consent should be obtained from the individual before marketing communications are sent to him by email or SMS. Lack of such prior consent is presumed unless the sender proves the contrary. The law provides for immediate cessation of sending marketing communications at the individual’s short notice. It should be also noted that in Russia it is expressly prohibited to send emails or SMS messages using autodial.
To send marketing communications by post, operator must obtain specific permission from the Federal Service on Telecommunications. Unfortunately the procedure of obtaining of such permission hasn’t been established yet.
Where personal data is processed it should be adequate, relevant and not excessive in relation to the purpose or purposes for which they are processed.
Personal data being processed shall enjoy confidential regime. It implies employment by the operator of sufficient technical and organisational means designed to prevent unauthorised access of any third parties to processed personal information. Procedures (including issuance of internal regulations or decrees) must be in place to regulate the process of access to such confidential information.
Personal data should be accurate and kept up to date where necessary. The operator is obliged to ensure accessibility of personal information for examination by personal data subjects at their request. In case such subjects find that this information is outdated or inadequate, the operator will be obliged to stop processing of such information until the required modifications are introduced.
Personal data should not be kept for longer than is necessary for the purposes for which they are processed, which requires its destruction after such purposes have been fulfilled or in case their fulfillment is not required any more.
Personal data must be processed in accordance with the rights of personal data subjects under applicable data protection legislation. An operator will be in breach of this principle if, amongst other things, he:
Procedures must be in place to ensure that computer systems are configured appropriately to allow accurate recording of the giving of consents in all relevant cases, described herein. Procedures must also be in place to ensure that any notices or requests are responded to and dealt with promptly.
Appropriate technical and organization measures must be taken against unauthorized or unlawful processing of personal data and against accidental loss or destruction of, or damage to, personal data. Operators should consider appropriate measures to ensure data integrity (for electronic processing), including the installation of virus protection software and firewalls, adopting encryption for data transfers, using privacy enhancing technologies and making regular backups that are securely stored. For manual processing, consideration should be given to appropriate security measures, such as storage of paper records in lockable, fire-proof cabinets.
The relevant provisions require effective protection of personal data. Mandatory regulations on protection of such data are currently being developed byFederal Security Service(hereinafter, the “FSS”) to be issued within two months. For the moment, according to information received from FSS specialist during telephone consultation, FSS has a preliminary draft of the said regulations which may be modified as the final version of said regulations is to be issued within two months. The draft in its current version provides for protection of all personal data being transferred outside Russia in form ofencryption. It is worth mentioning, that for the time being, it is practically possible to use only Russian encryption software and equipment for that purpose.
The legislation gives certain rights to personal data subjects in respect of personal data held about them. These include:
The legislation describes certain personal data categories:[8]
Operators to whom Russian legislation applies are required to send notification to the territorial body of Russian Federal Service on Supervision over Mass Communications, Telecommunications and Preservation of the Cultural Heritage (hereinafter, the “Federal Service on Telecommunications”) for eachregionof Russia where he possesses personal information processing facilities. For Moscow it will be Moscow Department of the above mentioned federal service. Such notification is necessary for inclusion of the operator into specific Register and shall be made by the operators who have been processing personal information prior to enactment of the Federal law “On Personal Data” dated 27.07.2006 and continue to process it after its enactment prior to January 1, 2008. Those operators who haven’t been engaged in processing of personal information using their own or third party’s equipment located in Russia prior to enactment of the said law must send the notification before they actually start processing personal data. It is important that the said notification contain information provided for by the applicable legislation.
Scopeof application of Russian Data Protection legislation: Russian laws apply when the operator uses his own or third-party data processing equipment located in Russia. As well as in cases where the data has been already transferred outside Russia, but there has been a violation of personal data subject’s rights prior to or during such transfer. If the data is transferred outside Russia duly, it will be subsequently regulated by the laws of country of destination and implications of Russian law will not apply thereto.
In most cases, the Federal Service on Telecommunications only has jurisdiction in relation to data held or processed in Russia. Nevertheless, the legal implications of the Russian legislation on data protection will apply in respect of the data already transferred outside Russia in case the rights of individuals, whose personal data has been collected and processed using equipment located in Russia, have been violated prior to or during such transfer (e.g., an operator transferred personal data to a country where personal data don’t enjoy adequate protection without prior written consent of a data subject). In that case the Federal Service on Telecommunications may file lawsuits against operators to protect the rights of the personal data subjects and impose respective fines for violation of the data protection legislation.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Data_protection_(privacy)_laws_in_Russia
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TheElectronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986(ECPA) was enacted by theUnited States Congressto extend restrictions on governmentwire tapsof telephone calls to include transmissions of electronic data by computer (18 U.S.C.§ 2510et seq.), added new provisions prohibiting access to stored electronic communications, i.e., theStored Communications Act(SCA,18 U.S.C.§ 2701et seq.), and added so-calledpen trapprovisions that permit the tracing of telephone communications (18 U.S.C.§ 3121et seq.).
ECPA was an amendment to Title III of theOmnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968(theWiretap Statute), which was primarily designed to prevent unauthorized government access to private electronic communications. The ECPA has been amended by theCommunications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act(CALEA) of 1994, theUSA PATRIOT Act(2001), the USA PATRIOT reauthorization acts (2006), and theFISA Amendments Act(2008).[1]
"Electronic communications" means any transfer of signs, signals, writing, images, sounds,data, or intelligence of any nature transmitted in whole or in part by a wire,radio,electromagnetic, photoelectronic or photooptic system that affects interstate orforeign commerce, but excludes the following:[2]
Title I of the ECPAprotects wire, oral, and electronic communicationswhile in transit. It sets down requirements for search warrants that are more stringent than in other settings.[3]Title II of the ECPA, theStored Communications Act(SCA), protects communications held in electronic storage, most notably messages stored on computers. Its protections are weaker than those of Title I, however, and do not impose heightened standards for warrants. Title III prohibits the use ofpen registerand/or trap and trace devices to record dialing, routing, addressing, and signaling information used in the process of transmitting wire or electronic communications without a court order.
The law was first brought to attention after theCaptain Midnight broadcast signal intrusion, where electrical engineer John R. MacDougall hacked into theHBOsignal on April 27, 1986.
As a consequence, this act was passed. This act also made satellite hijacking a felony.[4]
The ECPA extended government restrictions onwire tapsfrom telephone calls to include transmissions of electronic data by computer (18 U.S.C.§ 2510et seq.), added new provisions prohibiting access to stored electronic communications, i.e., theStored Communications Act(18 U.S.C.§ 2701et seq.), and added so-called pen/trap provisions that permit the tracing of telephone communications (18 U.S.C.§ 3121et seq.).
18 U.S.C.§ 3123(d)(2)provides for gag orders which direct the recipient of apen registerortrap and trace deviceorder not to disclose the existence of the pen/trap or the investigation.[5]
The ECPA extendedprivacy protectionsprovided by theOmnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968(of employers monitoring of employees phone calls) to include also electronic and cell phone communications.[6][7]See alsoEmployee monitoringandWorkplace privacy.
Several court cases have raised the question of whethere-mailmessages are protected under the stricter provisions of Title I while they were in transient storage en route to their final destination. InUnited States v. Councilman, aU.S. district courtand a three-judge appeals panel ruled they were not, but in 2005, the fullUnited States Court of Appeals for the First Circuitreversed this opinion.Privacyadvocates were relieved; they had argued inamicus curiaebriefs that if the ECPA did not protect e-mail in temporary storage, its added protections were meaningless as virtually all electronic mail is stored temporarily in transit at least once and that Congress would have known this in 1986 when the law was passed. (see, e.g., RFC 822). The case was eventually dismissed on grounds unrelated to ECPA issues.[citation needed]
The seizure of a computer, used to operate an electronicbulletin board system, and containing private electronic mail which had been sent to (stored on) the bulletin board, but not read (retrieved) by the intended recipients, does not constitute an unlawful intercept under the Federal Wiretap Act, 18 U.S.C. s 2510, et seq., as amended by Title I of ECPA.[8]Governments can actually track cell phones in real time without a search warrant under ECPA by analyzing information as to antennae being contacted by cell phones, as long as the cell phone is used in public where visual surveillance is available.[9]
InRobbins v. Lower Merion School District(2010), also known as "WebcamGate", the plaintiffs charged that two suburbanPhiladelphiahigh schools violated ECPA by remotely activating the webcams embedded in school-issued laptops and monitoring the students at home. The schools admitted to secretly snapping over 66,000 webshots andscreenshots, including webcam shots of students in their bedrooms.[10][11]
ECPA has been criticized for failing to protect all communications and consumer records, mainly because the law is so outdated and out of touch with how people currently share, store, and use information.
Under ECPA, it is relatively easy for a government agency to demand service providers hand over personal consumer data stored on the service provider's servers.[12]Email that is stored on a third party's server for more than 180 days is considered by the law to be abandoned. All that is required to obtain the content of the emails by a law enforcement agency is a written statement certifying that the information is relevant to an investigation, withoutjudicial review.[13]When the law was initially passed, emails were stored on a third party's server for only a short period of time, just long enough to facilitate transfer of email to the consumer's email client, which was generally located on their personal or work computer. Now, with online email services prevalent such asGmailandHotmail, users are more likely to store emails online indefinitely, rather than to only keep them for less than 180 days.[14]If the same emails were stored on the user's personal computer, it would require the police to obtain a warrant first for seizure of their contents, regardless of their age. When they are stored on an internet server however, no warrant is needed, starting 180 days after receipt of the message, under the law. In 2013, members of the U.S. Congress proposed to reform this procedure.[15]
ECPA also increased the list of crimes that can justify the use of surveillance, as well as the number of judicial members who can authorize such surveillance. Data can be obtained on traffic and calling patterns of an individual or a group without a warrant, allowing an agency to gain valuable intelligence and possibly invade privacy without any scrutiny, because the actual content of the communication is left untouched. While workplace communications are, in theory, protected, all that is needed to gain access to communiqué is for an employer to simply give notice or a supervisor to report that the employee's actions are not in the company's interest. This means that, with minimal assumptions, an employer can monitor communications within the company. The ongoing debate is, where to limit the government's power to see into civilian lives, while balancing the need to curb national threats.[citation needed][16]
In 2011,The New York Timespublished "1986 Privacy Law Is Outrun by the Web", highlighting that:[17]
...the Justice Department argued in court that cellphone users had given up theexpectation of privacyabout their location by voluntarily giving that information to carriers. In April, it argued in a federal court inColoradothat it ought to have access to some e-mails without a search warrant. And federal law enforcement officials, citing technology advances, plan to ask for new regulations that would smooth their ability to perform legal wiretaps of various Internet communications.
The analysis went on to discuss howGoogle,Facebook,Verizon,Twitterand other companies are in the middle between users and governments.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Communications_Privacy_Act
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Information privacy, data privacyordata protection lawsprovide a legal framework on how to obtain, use and store data of natural persons. The various laws around the world describe the rights of natural persons to control who is using their data. This includes usually the right to get details on which data is stored, for what purpose and to request the deletion in case the purpose is not given anymore.
Over 80 countries and independent territories, including nearly every country inEuropeand many inLatin Americaand theCaribbean,Asia, andAfrica, have now adopted comprehensive data protection laws.[1]TheEuropean Unionhas theGeneral Data Protection Regulation (GDPR),[2]in force since May 25, 2018. The United States is notable for not having adopted a comprehensive informationprivacylaw, but rather having adopted limited sectoral laws in some areas like theCalifornia Consumer Privacy Act(CCPA).[3]
The German state of Hessia enacted the world'sfirstdata privacy law on September 30, 1970.[4]In Germany the terminformational self-determinationwas first used in the context of a German constitutional ruling relating topersonal informationcollected during the 1983census.
India passed itsDigital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023in August 2023.
China passed itsPersonal Information Protection Law(PIPL) in mid-2021, and was effective from November 1, 2021. It focuses heavily onconsent,rights of the individual, and transparency of data processing. PIPL has been compared to the EU GDPR as it has similar scope and many similar provisions.[5]
In thePhilippines, The Data Privacy Act of 2012 mandated the creation of theNational Privacy Commissionthat would monitor and maintain policies that involve information privacy and personal data protection in the country. Modeled after theEU Data Protection Directiveand theAsia-Pacific Economic Cooperation(APEC) Privacy Framework, the independent body would ensure compliance of the country with international standards set for data protection.[6]The law requires government and private organizations composed of at least 250 employees or those which have access to the personal and identifiable information of at least 1000 people to appoint a Data Protection Officer that would assist in regulating the management of personal information in such entities.[7]
In summary, the law identifies important points regarding the handling of personal information as follows:
In early 2022, Sri Lanka became the first country in South Asia to enact comprehensive data privacy legislation. The Personal Data Protection Act No. 9 of 2022, effective since March 19, 2022, applies to processing within Sri Lanka and extends extraterritorially to controllers or processors offering goods and services to individuals in Sri Lanka and/or monitoring their behavior in the country.[8]
The right to data privacy is relatively heavily regulated and actively enforced in Europe. Article 8 of theEuropean Convention on Human Rights(ECHR) provides a right to respect for one's"private and family life, his home and his correspondence", subject to certain restrictions. TheEuropean Court of Human Rightshas given this article a very broad interpretation in itsjurisprudence. According to the Court's case law the collection of information by officials of the state about an individual without their consent always falls within the scope of Article 8. Thus, gathering information for the officialcensus, recordingfingerprintsandphotographsin a police register, collectingmedical dataor details of personal expenditures, and implementing a system of personal identification has been judged to raise data privacy issues. What also falls under "privacy-sensitive data" under the GDPR is such information asracial or ethnic origin, political opinions,religiousorphilosophicalbeliefs and information regarding a person's sex life orsexual orientation.[9]
Any state interference with a person's privacy is only acceptable for the Court if three conditions are fulfilled:
The government is not the only entity which may pose a threat to data privacy. Other citizens, and private companies most importantly, may also engage in threatening activities, especially since the automated processing of data became widespread. TheConvention for the Protection of Individuals with regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Datawas concluded within theCouncil of Europein 1981. This convention obliges the signatories to enact legislation concerning the automatic processing of personal data, which many duly did.
As all the member states of theEuropean Unionare also signatories of theEuropean Convention on Human Rightsand theConvention for the Protection of Individuals with regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data, theEuropean Commissionwas concerned that diverging data protection legislation would emerge and impede the free flow of data within the EU zone. Therefore, the European Commission decided to propose harmonizing data protection law within the EU. The resultingData Protection Directivewas adopted by theEuropean Parliamentand ministers from national governments in 1995 and had to be transposed into national law by the end of 1998.
The directive contains a number of key principles with which member states must comply. Anyone processing personal data must comply with the eight enforceable principles of good practice.[10]They state that the data must be:
Personal data covers both facts and opinions about the individual.[10]It also includes information regarding the intentions of the data controller towards the individual, although in some limited circumstances exemptions will apply. With processing, the definition is far wider than before. For example, it incorporates the concepts of "obtaining", "holding" and "disclosing".[11]
All EU member states adopted legislation pursuant this directive or adapted their existing laws. Each country also has its own supervisory authority to monitor the level of protection.[12]
Because of this, in theory the transfer of personal information from the EU to the US is prohibited when equivalent privacy protection is not in place in the US. American companies that would work with EU data must comply with theSafe HarbourArchived2010-06-09 at theWayback Machineframework. The core principles of data protected are limited collection, consent of the subject, accuracy, integrity, security, subject right of review and deletion. As a result, customers of international organizations such as Amazon and eBay in the EU have the ability to review and delete information, while Americans do not. In the United States the equivalent guiding philosophy is theCode of Fair Information Practice(FIP).
The difference in language here is important: in the United States the debate is about privacy where in the European Community the debate is on data protection. Moving the debate from privacy to data protection is seen by some philosophers as a mechanism for moving forward in the practical realm while not requiring agreement on fundamental questions about the nature of privacy.
Franceadapted its existing law, "no. 78-17 of 6 January 1978 concerning information technology, files and civil liberties".[13]
InGermany, both the federal government and the states enacted legislation.[14]
WhileSwitzerlandis not a member of theEuropean Union(EU) or of theEuropean Economic Area(EEA), it has partially implemented the EUDirective on the protection of personal datain 2006 by acceding to theSTE 108agreement of theCouncil of Europeand a corresponding amendment of the federal Data Protection Act. However, Swiss law imposes less restrictions upon data processing than the Directive in several respects.[15]
In Switzerland, the right to privacy is guaranteed in article 13 of theSwiss Federal Constitution. The Swiss Federal Data Protection Act (DPA)[16]and the Swiss Federal Data Protection Ordinance (DPO) entered into force on July 1, 1993. The latest amendments of the DPA and the DPO entered into force on January 1, 2008.
The DPA applies to the processing of personal data by private persons and federal government agencies. Unlike the data protection legislation of many other countries, the DPA protects both personal data pertaining to natural persons and legal entities.[17]
The Swiss FederalData Protectionand Information Commissioner in particular supervises compliance of the federal government agencies with the DPA, provides advice to private persons on data protection, conducts investigations and makes recommendations concerning data protection practices.
Some data files must be registered with the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner before they are created. In the case of a transfer ofpersonal dataoutside ofSwitzerland, special requirements need to be met and, depending on the circumstances, the Swiss Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner must be informed before the transfer is made.[17]
Most Swiss cantons have enacted their own data protection laws regulating the processing of personal data by cantonal and municipal bodies.
In theUnited KingdomtheData Protection Act 1998(c 29) (Information Commissioner) implemented the EUDirective on the protection of personal data.[18]It replaced theData Protection Act 1984(c 35). The 2016General Data Protection Regulationsupersedes previous Protection Acts. TheData Protection Act 2018(c 12) updates data protection laws in the UK. It is a national law which complements the European Union'sGeneral Data Protection Regulation(GDPR).
InCanada, thePersonal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act(PIPEDA) went into effect on 1 January 2001, applicable to private bodies which are federally regulated. All other organizations were included on 1 January 2004.[19][20]The PIPEDA brought Canada into compliance withEU data protection law,[21]although civil society, regulators, and academics have claimed that it does not address modern challenges of privacy law as well as the GDPR does, calling for reform.[22]
The PIPEDA specifies the rules to govern collection, use, or disclosure of the personal information in the course of recognizing the right of privacy of individuals with respect to their personal information. It also specifies the rules for the organizations to collect, use, and disclose personal information.
The PIPEDA applies to:
The PIPEDA doesnotapply to:
As specified in the PIPEDA:
"Personal Information" means information about an identifiable individual, but does not include the name, title, or business address or telephone number of an employee of an organization.
"Organization" means an association, a partnership, a person and a trade union.
"Federal work, undertaking or business" means any work, undertaking or business that is within the legislative authority of Parliament, including:
The PIPEDA gives individuals the right to:
The PIPEDA requires organizations to:
Data privacy is not highly legislated or regulated in theU.S.[23]In the United States, access to private data contained in, for example, third-party credit reports may be sought when seeking employment or medical care, or making automobile, housing, or other purchases on credit terms. Although partial regulations exist, there is no all-encompassing law regulating the acquisition, storage, or use of personal data in the U.S. In general terms, in the U.S., whoever can be troubled to key in the data, is deemed to own the right to store and use it, even if the data was collected without permission, except to any extent regulated by laws and rules such as the federal Communications Act's provisions, and implementing rules from the Federal Communications Commission, regulating use ofcustomer proprietary network information(CPNI). For instance, theHealth Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996(HIPAA), theChildren's Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998(COPPA), and theFair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act of 2003(FACTA), are all examples of U.S. federal laws with provisions which tend to promote information flow efficiencies.
The Supreme Court interpreted the Constitution to grant a right of privacy to individuals inGriswold v. Connecticut.[24]Very few states, however, recognize an individual's right to privacy, a notable exception beingCalifornia. An inalienable right to privacy is enshrined in theCalifornia Constitution's article 1, section 1, and the California legislature has enacted several pieces of legislation aimed at protecting this right. The CaliforniaOnline Privacy Protection Act(OPPA) of 2003 requires operators of commercial web sites or online services that collect personal information on California residents through a web site to conspicuously post aprivacy policyon the site and to comply with its policy.
An early attempt to create rules around the use of information in the U.S. was thefair information practiceguidelines developed by theDepartment for Health, Education and Welfare (HEW)(later renamed Department of Health & Human Services (HHS)), by a Special Advisory Committee on Automated Personal Data Systems, under the chairmanship of computer pioneer and privacy pioneerWillis H. Ware. The report submitted by the Chair to the HHS Secretary titled "Records, Computers and Rights of Citizens (07/01/1973)",[25][26]proposes universal principles for the privacy and protection of consumer and citizen data:
Thesafe harbor arrangementwas developed by theUnited States Department of Commercein order to provide a means for U.S. companies to demonstrate compliance with European Commission directives and thus to simplify relations between them and European businesses.[27]
TheHealth Insurance Portability and Accountability Act(HIPAA) was enacted by theU.S. Congressin 1996. HIPAA is also known as the Kennedy-Kassebaum Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA-Public Law 104-191), effective August 21, 1996. The basic idea of HIPAA is that an individual who is a subject of individually identifiable health information should have:
One difficulty with HIPAA is that there must be a mechanism to authenticate the patient who demands access to his/her data. As a result, medical facilities have begun to ask for Social Security Numbers from patients, thus arguably decreasing privacy by simplifying the act of correlating health records with other records.[28]The issue of consent is problematic under HIPAA, because the medical providers simply make care contingent upon agreeing to the privacy standards in practice.
TheFair Credit Reporting Actapplies the principles of the Code of Fair Information Practice to credit reporting agencies. The FCRA allows individuals to opt out of unwanted credit offers:
Because of theFair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act, each person can obtain afree annual credit report.[29]
The Fair Credit Reporting Act has been effective in preventing the proliferation of specious so-called private credit guides. Before 1970,[when?][30]private credit guides offered detailed, if unreliable, information on easily identifiable individuals.[31][32]Before the Fair Credit Reporting Act, salacious unsubstantiated material could be included – and in fact, gossip was widely included in credit reports.[33]EPIC has aFCRA page. The Consumer Data Industry Association, which represents the consumer reporting industry, also has awebsite with FCRA information.
The Fair Credit Reporting Act provides consumers the ability to view, correct, contest, and limit the uses of credit reports. The FCRA also protects the credit agency from the charge of negligent release in the case of misrepresentation by the requester. Credit agencies must ask the requester the purpose of a requested information release, but need to make no effort to verify the truth of the requester's assertions. In fact, the courts have ruled that, "The Act clearly does not provide a remedy for an illicit or abusive use of information about consumers" (Henry v Forbes, 1976). It is widely believed that in order to avoid the FCRA, ChoicePoint was created by Equifax at which time the parent company copied all its records to its newly created subsidiary. ChoicePoint is not a credit reporting agency, and thus FCRA does not apply.[34]
TheFair Debt Collection Practices Actsimilarly limits dissemination of information about a consumer's financial transactions. It prevents creditors or their agents from disclosing the fact that an individual is in debt to a third party, although it allows creditors and their agents to attempt to obtain information about a debtor's location. It limits the actions of those seeking payment of a debt. For example, debt collection agencies are prohibited from harassment or contacting individuals at work. TheBankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Actof 2005 (which actually gutted consumer protections, for example in case of bankruptcy resulting from medical cost) limited some of these controls on debtors.
TheElectronic Communications Privacy Act(ECPA) establishes criminal sanctions for interception of electronic communication. However, the legislation has been criticized for lack of impact due to loopholes.[35]
The following summarized some of the laws, regulations and directives related to the protection of information systems:
Several US federal agencies have privacy statutes that cover their collection and use of private information. These include the Census Bureau, the Internal Revenue Service, and the National Center for Education Statistics (under the Education Sciences Reform Act). In addition, theCIPSEAstatute protects confidentiality of data collected by federal statistical agencies.
Lawmakers in several states have proposed legislation to change the way online businesses handle user information. Among those generating significant attention are severalDo Not Track legislationand theRight to Know Act(California Bill AB 1291). The California Right to Know Act, if passed, would require every business which keeps user information to provide its user a copy of stored information when requested.[36]The bill faced heavy oppositions from trade groups representing companies such as Google, Microsoft, and Facebook, and failed to pass.[37]
Arkansas has a biometric data privacy law.[38]
On June 28, 2018 California legislature passed AB 375, theCalifornia Consumer Privacy Actof 2018, effective January 1, 2020.[39]In November 2020,Proposition 24, also known as theCalifornia Privacy Rights Act, amended and expanded the CCPA.[40]The law specifically protects employee data.[41]
On June 6, 2023, Florida enactedFlorida Senate Bill 262, effective July 1, 2024. It gives consumers the right to confirm whether businesses with over $1 billion in gross annual revenue who derive more than half of their revenue from online ads collected data about them and control over the data, including correction and deletion. The law also prohibits government agencies from asking asocial mediacompanies to censor content or remove users from its platform.[42]
On October 3, 2008, Illinois enacted theBiometric Information Privacy Act. The law was the first in the nation to regulate biometric data.[43]The law requires private businesses to obtain consent to collect or disclose thebiometric identifiersof consumers. The law also requires the data be securely stored and destroyed in a timely manner.[44]The law specifically protects employee data.[41]
In 2021, New York enacted a commercial biometric data privacy law that requires businesses to conspicuously notify consumers of data collection. The law bars employers from collecting biometric data from employees.[38]
In 2009, Texas enacted a consumer law requiring consent for biometric data for commercial use to be leased, sold, or disclosed. The law also requires the data be destroyed within one year of collection.[43][38]
In 2017, Washington enacted a specific consumer biometric data privacy law covering commercial use.[43][38]
On April 27, 2023, Washington enacted theMy Health, My Data Act, effective March 31, 2024.[45]The law was the first in the nation to regulate consumer health data not protected by HIPAA.[46]The law requires companies to obtain prior authorization to obtain, share, or sell health data, including data that can be used to infer or linked to health status, such as purchasing medications or digestion tracking. The law guarantees the right to withdraw consent and request deletion. The law also prohibitsgeo-fencesaround healthcare facilities.[46][47]
Brazil'sGeneral Personal Data Protection Law(LGPD) became law on September 18, 2020. The law's primary aim is to unify 40 different Brazilian laws that regulate the processing ofpersonal data. The bill has 65 articles and has many similarities to the GDPR.[48]
Unlike the U.S. approach toprivacy protection, which relies on industry-specific legislation, regulation and self-regulation, the European Union relies on the comprehensive privacy legislation. TheEuropean Directive on Data Protectionthat went into effect in October 1998, includes, for example, the requirement to create government data protection agencies, registration of databases with those agencies, and in some instances prior approval before personal data processing may begin. In order to bridge these different privacy approaches and provide a streamlined means for U.S. organizations to comply with the Directive, the U.S. Department of Commerce in consultation with the European Commission developed a "safe harbor" framework. In order for the framework to be enforced, companies must publicly publish a privacy policy.[49]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_privacy_law
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Personality rights, sometimes referred to as theright of publicity, are rights for an individual to control the commercial use of their identity, such as name, image, likeness, or other unequivocal identifiers. They are generally considered asproperty rights, rather thanpersonal rights, and so the validity of personality rights of publicity may survive the death of the individual to varying degrees, depending on the jurisdiction.
Personality rights are generally considered to consist of two types of rights: the right of publicity,[1]or the right to keep one's image and likeness from being commercially exploited without permission or contractual compensation, which is similar (but not identical) to the use of atrademark; and theright to privacy, or the right to be left alone and not have one's personality represented publicly without permission. Incommon lawjurisdictions,publicity rightsfall into the realm of thetortofpassing off.
A commonly cited justification for this doctrine, from a policy standpoint, is the notion ofnatural rightsand the idea that every individual should have a right to control how their right of publicity is commercialized by a third party, if at all. Often, but not always, the motivation to engage in such commercialization is to help propel sales or visibility for a product or service, which usually amounts to some form ofcommercial speech[2](which in turn receives thelowest level of judicial scrutiny).
In contrast withcommon lawjurisdictions, mostcivil lawjurisdictions have specific civil code provisions that protect an individual's image, personal data and other generally private information. Exceptions have been carved out of these general, broad privacy rights when dealing with news and public figures. Thus, while it may violate an ordinary citizen's privacy to speak about their medical records, one is generally allowed to report on more intimate details in the lives of celebrities and politicians.
Unlike most common law jurisdictions the personality rights in civil law are generally inheritable, thus one can make a claim against someone who invades the privacy of a deceased relative if the memory of their character is besmirched by such publication.
Personality rights have developed out ofcommon lawconcepts ofproperty,trespassand intentionaltort. Thus personality rights are, generally speaking, judge-made law, though there arejurisdictionswhere some aspects of personality rights are statutory. In some jurisdictions, publicity rights and privacy rights are not clearly distinguished, and the term publicity right is generally used. In a publicity rights case the issue to decide is whether a significant section of the public would be misled into believing (incorrectly) that a commercial arrangement had been concluded between aplaintiffand adefendantunder which the plaintiff agreed to the advertising involving the image or reputation of a famous person. The actionable misrepresentation requires a suggestion that the plaintiff has endorsed or licensed the defendant's products, or somehow can exercise control over those products. This is done by way of thetortofpassing off.
The meaning of the law is best illustrated by principal cases on the subject.
In Australia, false association or endorsement is actionable via the law ofpassing off, not a separate law of "right of personality". TheHendersoncase[3]was a decision of the Supreme Court of New South Wales (both the first instance and appellate jurisdiction). The plaintiffs wereballroom dancersand they sued the defendant in passing off alleging it wrongfully published their photograph on the cover of a gramophone record entitledStrictly for Dancing: Vol. 1. An injunction was granted on the ground that the use suggested the plaintiffs recommended or approved of the defendant's goods, or had some connection with the goods.
However, in the 1988 case ofHoney v Australian Airlines,[4]Gary Honey, a well known Australian athlete, failed in his claim for damages afterAustralian Airlinesused a photograph of him on a poster without his permission. The judge held, in essence, that the poster depicted excellence in general rather than a particular person.
The provinces ofBritish Columbia,Manitoba,Newfoundland and Labrador, andSaskatchewanhave enacted privacy legislation dealing with personality rights, which have the following traits:[5]
Canadian common law recognizes a limited right to personality. It was first acknowledged in the 1971 Ontario decision ofKrouse v. Chrysler Canada Ltd., where the Court held that where a person has marketable value in their likeness and it has been used in a manner that suggests an endorsement of a product then there is grounds for an action in appropriation of personality. This right was later expanded upon inAthans v. Canadian Adventure Camps(1977) where the Court held that the personality right included both image and name.
InGould Estate v. Stoddart Publishing Co. Ltd.(1998), the Ontario Court of Appeal concluded that simply writingaboutsomebody, even for the purpose of generating a profit, does not constitute appropriation of personality.
The general tort of appropriation of personality is still in development, but it is currently[when?]being argued that it will be recognized in all common law provinces,[6]with certain characteristics:[7]
In 1994, the newCivil Code of Quebecintroduced new provisions that enshrine the right to privacy as an attribute of personality:[8]
3.Every person is the holder of personality rights, such as the right to life, the right to the inviolability and integrity of his person, and the right to the respect of his name, reputation and privacy. These rights are inalienable.
...
36.The following acts, in particular, may be considered as invasions of the privacy of a person:
InAubry v Éditions Vice-Versa Inc, theSupreme Court of Canadaalso affirmed that under Quebec'sCharter of Human Rights and Freedomsprivacy provisions, a photographer can take photographs in public places but may not publish the picture unless permission has been obtained from the subject, except where the subject appears in an incidental manner, or whose professional success depends on public opinion.[9]The relevant provisions of theCharterare:
4.Every person has a right to the safeguard of his dignity, honour and reputation.5.Every person has a right to respect for his private life.
Therefore, the following general characteristics may be drawn:[10]
InCyprus, people depicted in photographs can oppose their use in advertisements and their publication in magazines, even if it was taken in a public place.[11]
InDenmark, theDanish Penal Codechapters 26 and 27, provides certain personality rights. The governmental Danish Data Protection Agency, has made a declaration regarding publication on the Internet of pictures taken of persons in a public area:[12]
A portrait photograph is defined as a photograph, with the purpose of depicting one or more specific person(s). The personality rights however may be contracted for persons who are generally accepted as public persons.
InFrance, personality rights are protected under article 9 of the French civil code. While publicly known facts and images of public figures are not generally protected, use of someone's image or personal history has been held actionable under French law. The most famous case in recent history is perhaps the publication of the book onFrançois MitterrandcalledLe Grand Secret[13]in which Mitterrand's doctor published a book that not only revealed private facts about Mitterrand's life, but also revealed medical confidences protected bydoctor–patient privilege.
InGermany, personality rights are protected under theGerman civil code, where the concept of an "absolute person of contemporary history" allows the depiction of individuals who are part of history but still gives them some protection of their rights of privacy outside the public sphere. A succinct statement of the German law can be found in the following judicial statement from theMarlene Dietrichcase: the general right of personality has been recognised in the case law of the GermanFederal Court of Justicesince 1954 as a basic right constitutionally guaranteed by Articles 1 and 2 of theBasic Lawand at the same time as an "other right" protected in civil law under § 823 (1) of theBGB(established case law since BGHZ 13, 334, 338 - readers' letters). It guarantees as against all the world the protection of human dignity and the right to free development of the personality. Special forms of manifestation of the general right of personality are the right to one's own picture (§§ 22 ff. of theKUG[de]) and the right to one's name (§ 12 of the BGB). They guarantee protection of the personality for the sphere regulated by them.[14]
In addition to the general personality rights, there are special rules that forbid taking intimate pictures without consent (§ 184kStGB), and that forbid taking pictures which violate the "most personal sphere" of those pictured (§ 201 StGB - in particular, photos of private situations such as inside the bedroom, and photos of helpless persons, such as accident victims). In contrast to the general rules about the right to one's image, these rules also apply to just taking images, not only to publishing them.
The relevant Greek laws include 57 AK and 2472/1997. As regarding photography:
The relevant Guernsey law was enacted on 3 December 2012 under the name ofImage Rights Bailiwick of Guernsey Ordinance 2012and allows for the registration of a personality right, together with images associated with that personality. Images are widely defined and can be any number of personal attributes, such as likeness, mannerisms, gestures, voice, nickname etc.
Personalities able to register fall into 5 categories, namely sole, joint, group, legal and fictional character. In addition, humans can be registered up to 100 years after the date of death, making the law very favourable for estate managers and trustees.
InHong Kong, as in most other common law jurisdictions, there is no separate "personality right", and false association or endorsement is actionable under the law of passing off. The main case on this point relates toCantopopsinger/actorAndy LauandHang Seng Bankover the allegedly unauthorized use of Lau's image oncredit cards,[17]which has led to the observation that only limited personality rights exist in this jurisdiction.[18]
There are few studies on the right to fame in Iranian law. However, through general principles, an attempt has been made to support celebrities.[19]
In a 1994 case involving the estate ofBob Marley, theSupreme Court of Jamaicaacknowledged a property right of personality which survived his death.[20]
In October 2007,J-popduoPink LadysuedKobunshafor¥3.7 million after the publisher's magazineJosei Jishinused photos of the duo on an article on dieting through dancing without their permission. The case was rejected by theTokyo District Court. In February 2012, the Supreme Court rejected the duo's appeal based on the right of publicity.[21][22]
InPortugal, personality rights are protected under the "tutela geral da personalidade" on article 70 of the Portuguese Civil Code and, also, in article 17 of the Constitution of the Portuguese Republic.
Some personality rights, like the right to image or honor are specifically typified in the civil code in the articles following the "tutela geral".
Specifically regarding image rights, article 79 of the Portuguese Civil Code states that an image of a person cannot be published or exposed without her consent, even after the person's death (in which case the consent is to be obtained from existing family or heirs). However, consent is not needed for public personalities when in their public roles, for use in scientific, didactic or cultural purposes, or when the image is produced in a public setting. However, if the image harms the honor, reputation or decorum of the person it cannot be reproduced or exposed without consent.
In thePeople's Republic of China, rights of personality are established by statute. According to article 100 and 101 of theGeneral Principle of Civil Lawof the People's Republic of China, the right of name and the right of image are protected. It is prohibited to use another's image for commercial use without that person's consent. In the new Tort Liabilities Law which came into effect on Jan 1, 2021, the right of privacy is mentioned for the first time in the legislation.[23]
InSouth Africa, personality rights are protected under theSouth African law of delictand theBill of Rights, which also provides forfreedom of expressionandfreedom of association.[24]After much uncertainty concerning the recognition of image rights inSouth Africa, theSupreme Court of Appealprovided clarity in the landmark case ofGrütter v Lombard.[25][26][27]In South Africa, a person's right to identity is violated if the attributes of that person is used without permission in a way which cannot be reconciled with the true image of that person.[28]Apart from the unauthorized use of a person's image, this kind of infringement also entails some kind of misrepresentation concerning the individual, such as that the individual approves or endorses a particular product or service or that an attorney is a partner in a firm, while this is not the case. Secondly, the right to identity is violated if the attributes of a person is used without authorization by another person for commercial gain.[29][30]Apart from the unauthorized use of the individual's image, such use also primarily entails a commercial motive which is exclusively aimed at promoting a service or product or to solicit clients or customers. The mere fact that the user may benefit or profit from any product or service in respect of which the individual's attributes have incidentally been used, is not in itself sufficient. This violation of the right to identity therefore also entails unauthorized use of the individual's attributes with a commercial purpose, whether it is done by means of advertisement or the manufacture and distribution of merchandise covered with the attributes of the individual. Personality rights are not absolute and it goes without saying that the use of a person's attributes must be unlawful before a plaintiff will succeed with any claim. With the use of a person's image, the personality rights, privacy,human dignityandfreedom of associationof the individual must often be weighed against the user's right tofreedom of expression. The use of a person's image can be justified on the grounds of consent, truth and public interest, fair comment and jest.[31]
In South Korea, as defined in theCivil Code, section 751:
A person who has injured the person, liberty or fame of another or has inflicted any mental anguish to another person shall be liable to make compensation for damages arising therefrom.[32]
While the concept of personality rights is recognized, it is not yet widely known. The Korean terminology ("인격표지영리권", literally translated to "personality sign commercial rights") is still much less frequently used compared to the transcription of the English term "publicity rights".
Nor any independent law on personality rights exist in South Korea (as of October 2023). However, in 2022, a related provision was enacted under the existing Unfair Competition Prevention Act.[33][34]This revision is considered to have provided a foundation for an independent Act in near future. Much change is expected as it has been reported that around 80% of Korean entertainment agencies voiced difficulties in publicity right violations of their talents.[35]
On December 26, 2022, the Ministry of Justice announced plans to stipulate personality rights in Civil Code in the near future. The most notable difference between the new law and the Publicity Rights provision under the Unfair Competition Prevention Act would be the expansion of scope; the new law will go beyond 'celebrities' and will recognize everyone's right to their name, portrait, voice, etc.[36][37]
Personality rights are said to exist to some extent by both influence of constitution and tort liability,[38][39]but cases filed to enforce such rights against shopping malls have been unsuccessful.[40][41]
South Korea's portrait rights are too widely recognized compared to other countries. Because of this, it is common for South Korean media reports to blur people's faces in press photos, even though there is no problem of defamation. In contrast, most countries regard blur as a distortion of the truth. It is common that the public's faces photographed only in the South Korean media are blurred even when there in no possibility of defamation. Criticism has been raised against this.[42]
According to the agency (Spanish) Data Protection for the collection and dissemination on Internet of images of a person without their consent may be a serious breach of the Data Protection Act which would be punishable by a minimum fine of 60,000 euros. According toEl MundoData Protection Agency decided to investigate ex officio by the mere distribution of the image of a person on the Internet without their consent.[43]
In the United States, the right of publicity is based onstate-level law, as opposed to federal, and recognition of the right can vary from state to state.[44]The rationale underlying the right of publicity in theUnited Statesis rooted in both privacy and economic exploitation.[45]The rights are based in tort law, and parallel Prosser's "Four Torts" which might be summarized as: 1) Intrusion upon physical solitude; 2) public disclosure of private facts; 3) depiction in a false light; and 4) appropriation of name and likeness. If looking at it through the prism of Prosser's four torts, violation of a right of publicity most closely aligns with appropriation. The right of publicity often is manifest in advertising or merchandise. In states without a specific right of publicity statute, the right of publicity is usually recognized via common law. The right of publicity has evolved rapidly, with a history of reported cases in the United States and worldwide.[46]
The right of publicity is defined as the right of all individuals to control commercial use of their names, images, likenesses, or other identifying aspects of identity. In certain contexts, the right of publicity is limited (under U.S. law) by theFirst Amendment. The right of publicity can be referred to aspublicity rightsor evenpersonality rights. The term "right of publicity" was coined by JudgeJerome Frankin 1953.[47]
The extent of recognition of this right in the U.S. is largely driven bystatuteorcase law. Because the right of publicity is primarily governed by state (as opposed to federal) law, the degree of recognition of the right of publicity can vary from one state to the next. The right of publicity is not simply an analog to trademark law, though it could be noted that the right of publicity has some commonality with the protection of trademarks as long as one understands that the right of publicity is a distinct legal doctrine, with its own policies, objectives and standards, including notable differences from trademark law.[48]For example, falsity or likelihood of confusion generally do not have to be established to present a colorable right of publicity claim.
At a national level, theU.S. Supreme Courtheld in the 1977 caseZacchini v. Scripps-Howard Broadcasting Co.that theFirst Amendmentdid notimmunizeatelevision stationfrom liability for broadcastingHugo Zacchini'shuman cannonballact without his consent. This was the first, and so far the only, U.S. Supreme Court ruling on rights of publicity and it served to confirm the overall validity of the doctrine and the interests it protects.
Indianahas one of the stronger right of publicity statutes in the U.S., providing recognition of the right for 100 years after death, and protecting not only the usual "name, image and likeness", but alsosignature,photograph,gestures, distinctive appearances, and mannerisms. Notably, Oklahoma also provides 100 years of protection after death, and Tennessee's statute provides rights that do not ever expire if use is continuous. There are other notable characteristics of the Indiana law,[example needed]though most of the major movement in right of publicity emanates fromNew YorkandCalifornia, with a significant body of case law which suggest potentially contradictory positions with respect to recognition of the right of publicity under certain circumstances.
Some states recognize the right through statute and some others through common law. California has both statutory and common-law strains of authority protecting slightly different forms of the right. The right of publicity shares characteristics of a property right and as such is transferable to the person's heirs after their death. TheCelebrities Rights Actwas passed inCaliforniain 1985 and it extended the personality rights for a celebrity to 70 years after their death. Previously, the 1979Lugosi v. Universal Picturesdecision by theCalifornia Supreme Courtheld thatBela Lugosi's personality rights could not pass to his heirs.[49][50]
California Civil Code Section 3344(a) states:
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personality_rights
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ThePrivacy Act of 1974(Pub. L.93–579, 88Stat.1896, enactedDecember 31, 1974,5 U.S.C.§ 552a), aUnited States federal law, establishes a Code of Fair Information Practice that governs the collection, maintenance, use, and dissemination ofpersonally identifiable informationabout individuals that is maintained in systems of records by federal agencies.[1]At its creation, it was meant to be an "American Bill of Rights on data."[2]
A system of records is a group of records under the control of an agency from which information is retrieved by the name of the individual or by some identifier assigned to the individual. The Privacy Act requires that agencies give the public notice of their systems of records by publication in theFederal Register. The Privacy Act prohibits the disclosure of information from a system of records absent of the written consent of the subject individual, unless the disclosure is pursuant to one of twelve statutory exceptions. The Act also provides individuals with a means by which to seek access to and amendment of their records and sets forth various agency record-keeping requirements. Additionally, with people granted the right to review what was documented with their name, they are also able to find out if the "records have been disclosed" and are also given the right to make corrections.[1]
An idea enshrining aright to privacybecame relevant when theSocial Security numberbecame a de facto identifier for people across the federal government, and computers installed across federal agencies in the late 1950s. In the early 1960s, there was widespread interest in a "federal data center," with Congress commissioning various reports looking into the idea.[2]
However, withMcCarthyism, the 1965–1966 Congressional wiretapping hearings, and cultural milestones likeGeorge Orwell's bookNineteen Eighty-Four, the public became concerned about the idea of the government knowing everything about an individual.
The idea of a "federal data bank" was debated in a series of Congressional hearings starting in 1966, one of them featuring authorVance Packard. He testified, "Big Brother, if he ever comes to the United States, may turn out to be...a relentless bureaucrat obsessed with efficiency."[2]
By 1971, the Congressional hearings on privacy solidified a policy demand for an "American Bill of Rights on data," namely with a 1973 report calledRecords, Computers, and Rights of Citizens.[2]
Passing a bill about the right to privacy became a priority in the light ofWatergateandCOINTELPRO, two scandals in which people and political parties considered "subversive" were subject to investigation and illegal surveillance by the government.[3]PresidentNixonpublicly supported the personal right to privacy in 1974, in an attempt to win back public trust in the government after Watergate.[4]
SenatorSam Ervinwas the bill's principal sponsor, especially as the House and Senate versions were combined. The law went into effect on September 27, 1975.[3]
Although the Privacy Act was groundbreaking when it was passed, in subsequent years it has been criticized as lacking an enforcement mechanism. The United States the only nation in theOrganisation for Economic Co-operation and Developmentwithout a data protection agency to enforce privacy laws.[5]
The Privacy Act states in part:
There are specific exceptions to the Act that allow the use of personal records. Examples of these exceptions are:[7]
The Privacy Act mandates that eachUnited States Governmentagency have in place an administrative and physical security system to prevent the unauthorized release of personal records.
To protect the privacy and liberty rights of individuals, federal agencies must state "the authority (whether granted by statute, or by Executive order of the President) which authorizes the solicitation of the information and whether disclosure of such information is mandatory or voluntary" when requesting information. (5 U.S.C.§ 552e) This notice is common on almost all federal government forms which seek to gather information from individuals, many of which seek personal and confidential details.[8]
Subsection "U" requires that each agency have a Data Integrity Board. Each agency's Data Integrity Board is supposed to make an annual report to OMB, available to the public, that includes all complaints that the Act was violated, such as use of records for unauthorized reasons or the holding of First Amendment Records and report on —..."(v) any violations of matching agreements that have been alleged or identified and any corrective action taken". Former Attorney General Dick Thornburg appointed a Data Integrity Board but since then, the USDOJ has not published any Privacy Act reports.[9]
The Computer Matching and Privacy Protection Act of 1988, P.L.
100–503, amended the Privacy Act of 1974 by adding certain protections for the subjects of Privacy Act records whose records are used in automated matching programs. These protections have been mandated to ensure:
The ComputerMatching Actis codified as part of the Privacy Act.[11]
The Privacy Act also states:
The Privacy Act does apply to the records of every "individual," defined as "a citizen of the United States or an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence"[12]but the Privacy Act only applies to records held by an "agency".[13]Therefore, the records held by courts, executive components, or non-agency government entities are not subject to the provisions in the Privacy Act and there is no right to these records.[14]
On January 25, 2017,President Trumpsigned an executive order that eliminates Privacy Act protections for foreigners. Section 14 of Trump's "Enhancing Public Safety" executive order directs federal agencies to "ensure that their privacy policies exclude persons who are not United States citizens or lawful permanent residents from the protections of the Privacy Act regarding personally identifiable information" to the extent consistent with applicable law.[15]
Broad exemptions of the Act include "routine [agency] use" of data, which can be claimed under a general "compatible" purpose. However, this can result in "mission creep" of a agency's database extending beyond its original stated goals.[16]
The Act also forbade agencies from collecting information about people's First Amendment activities.[17]
Following the controversialPassenger Name Record(PNR) agreement signed with theEuropean Union(EU) in 2007, theBush administrationprovided an exemption for theDepartment of Homeland Securityand theArrival and Departure Information System(ADIS) from the U.S. Privacy Act.[18]ADIS is intended to authorize people to travel only after PNR and API (Advance Passenger Information) data has been checked and cleared through a US agency watchlist.[18]TheAutomated Targeting Systemis also to be exempted.[18]The Privacy Act does not protect non-US persons without lawful permanent residency in the US, which is problematic for the exchange ofPassenger Name Recordinformation between the US and theEuropean Union.
The passing of the Privacy Act was a rushed bipartisan effort, with compromises made when combining the House and Senate versions of the bill.[4][19][17]
Weaknesses in the Privacy Act included general exceptions for "routine use," intelligence and law enforcement agencies, as well as lacking an enforcement mechanism and violations having to be "intentional and willful."[2][19][20]Even as early as 1976, law reviews acknowledged that there were many limitations on the Privacy Act, namely because it was "practically unenforceable."[19]The 1977 report from the Privacy Protection Study Commission (created by the Act) also concluded that the Act did not result in intended benefits, because definitions and disclosure of data use were unclear, and the public was not aware of the Act's provisions.[16]
The Act only covers record systems that "retrieve" information by name or individual identifier, which is easily circumvented. A database could contain identifying information (such as name or SSN) without being indexed by them, and therefore would be exempted from the Privacy Act.[16]
In addition, the Act was undercut in federal courts usingtort lawtheory. Federal courts established that there had to be "actual damages" for claims to be levied against the Act, not just "reputation loss" or "emotional distress."[2](Refer toDoe v. ChaoandFederal Aviation Administration v. Cooper.)
Under Trump's second administration, the Privacy Act has been cited in up to fourteen lawsuits pertaining toDOGEaccess to data that could contain sensitive personal data.[21][22]Congressional leaderGerry Connollystated "I am concerned that DOGE is moving personal information across agencies without the notification required under the Privacy Act or related laws, such that the American people are wholly unaware their data is being manipulated in this way."[22]
Due to the recent lawsuits, Congressional leaderLori Trahanannounced an effort to modernize and update the Act to address growing concerns about government surveillance, unvetted access, and misuse.[21]
This article uses material from the public domain source:
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ThePrivacy Act 1988is anAustralian lawdealing withprivacy.
Section 14 of the Act stipulates a number ofprivacyrights known as the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs). These principles apply to Australian Government andAustralian Capital Territoryagencies or private sector organizations contracted to these governments, organizations and small businesses who provide a health service, as well as to private organizations with an annual turnover exceeding AUD$3M (with some specific exceptions).[1]The principles govern when and howpersonal informationcan be collected by these entities. Information can only be collected if it is relevant to the agencies' functions. Upon this collection, that law mandates that Australians have the right to know why information about them is being acquired and who will see the information. Those in charge of storing the information have obligations to ensure such information is neither lost nor exploited. An Australian will also have the right to access the information unless this is specifically prohibited by law.[1]
The Privacy Act was amended in 2000 to cover the private sector. Schedule 3 of the Privacy Act sets out a significantly different set of privacy principles, the National Privacy Principles (NPPs). These apply to private sector organizations (including not for profit organizations) with a turnover exceeding three million dollars, other than health service providers or traders inpersonal information. These principles extend to the transfer of personal information out of Australia.[2]
The Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) replaced the National Privacy Principles and Information Privacy Principles on 12 March 2014 via the Privacy Amendment (Enhancing Privacy Protection) Act 2012, which amended the Privacy Act 1988.[3]The Act was further amended in 2017 and December 2022, significantly enhancing the protection of privacy in Australia. These amendments included increased maximum penalties for data breaches and enhanced enforcement powers for the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC).
The Privacy Act Review commenced in 2020 following recommendations by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission in its 2019 Digital Platforms Inquiry – Final Report.[4]On 28 September 2023, the Australian Government released its response to the Privacy Act Review Report, committing to further modernizing privacy regulations.
Privacy principles that are the same as the NPPs are also included in the legislation applying to the public sectors of some Australian States and Territories, namely theInformation Privacy Act 2000(Victoria),Information Act 2002(Northern Territory),Personal Information Protection Act 2004(Tasmania), and theHealth Records and Information Privacy Act 2002(New South Wales).
Australia's privacy principles, the APPs, depend upon the meaning of "personal information" (as defined in Privacy Act 1988 s6). This term has not yet been interpreted in a restrictive way as has been "personal data" in the UKDurantcase.[5]
The Privacy Act creates anOffice of the Privacy Commissionerand a Privacy Commissioner[3]in Australia. The OAIC is responsible for investigating breaches of the Australian Privacy Principles (APPs) and credit reporting provisions. The OAIC’s powers include accepting enforceable undertakings, seeking civil penalties in the case of serious or repeated breaches of privacy, and conducting assessments of privacy performance for both Australian Government agencies and businesses. Section 36 of the Act states that Australians may appeal to this Commissioner if they feel their privacy rights have been compromised, unless the privacy was violated by an organization that has its own dispute resolution mechanisms under an approved Privacy Code. The Commissioner, who may decide to investigate complaints and, in some cases must investigate, can under section 44 obtain relevant evidence from other people. There is no appeal to a Court or Tribunal against decisions of the Commissioner except in limited circumstances. Section 45 of the Privacy Act allows the Commissioner to interview the people themselves, and the people might have to swear anoathto tell the truth. Anyone who fails to answer the Commissioner may be subject to a fine of up to $2,000 and/or year-longimprisonment(under section 65). Under section 64 of the Privacy Act, the Commissioner is also given immunity against any lawsuits that he or she might be subjected to for the carrying out of their duties.
If the Commissioner will not hear a complaint, an Australian may receive legal assistance under section 63. If a complaint is taken to theFederal Court of Australia, in certain circumstances others may receive legal assistance.
TheAustralian Law Reform Commissioncompleted an inquiry into the state of Australia's privacy laws in 2008. The Report entitledFor Your Information: Australian Privacy Law and Practice[6][7]recommended significant changes be made to the Privacy Act, as well as the introduction of a statutory cause of action for breach of privacy.[8]The Australian Government committed in October 2009 to implementing a large number of the recommendations that the Australian Law Reform Commission had made in its report.[9]
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Regulation of algorithms, oralgorithmic regulation, is the creation of laws, rules and public sector policies for promotion andregulationofalgorithms, particularly inartificial intelligenceandmachine learning.[1][2][3]For the subset of AI algorithms, the termregulation of artificial intelligenceis used. The regulatory and policy landscape for artificial intelligence (AI) is an emerging issue in jurisdictions globally, including in the European Union.[4]Regulation of AI is considered necessary to both encourage AI and manage associated risks, but challenging.[5]Another emerging topic is theregulation ofblockchainalgorithms (Use of the smart contracts must be regulated) and is mentioned along with regulation of AI algorithms.[6]Many countries have enactedregulations of high frequency trades, which is shifting due to technological progress into the realm of AI algorithms.[citation needed]
The motivation for regulation of algorithms is the apprehension oflosing control over the algorithms, whose impact on human life increases. Multiple countries have already introduced regulations in case of automatedcredit scorecalculation—right to explanationis mandatory for those algorithms.[7][8]For example, The IEEE has begun developing a new standard to explicitly address ethical issues and the values of potential future users.[9]Bias, transparency, and ethics concerns have emerged with respect to the use of algorithms in diverse domains ranging from criminal justice[10]to healthcare[11]—many fear that artificial intelligence could replicate existing social inequalities along race, class, gender, and sexuality lines.
In 2016,Joy BuolamwinifoundedAlgorithmic Justice Leagueafter a personal experience with biased facial detection software in order to raise awareness of the social implications of artificial intelligence through art and research.[12]
In 2017Elon Muskadvocated regulation of algorithms in the context of theexistential risk from artificial general intelligence.[13][14][15]According toNPR, theTeslaCEO was "clearly not thrilled" to be advocating for government scrutiny that could impact his own industry, but believed the risks of going completely without oversight are too high: "Normally the way regulations are set up is when a bunch of bad things happen, there's a public outcry, and after many years a regulatory agency is set up to regulate that industry. It takes forever. That, in the past, has been bad but not something which represented a fundamental risk to the existence of civilisation."[13]
In response, some politicians expressed skepticism about the wisdom of regulating a technology that is still in development.[14]Responding both to Musk and to February 2017 proposals by European Union lawmakers to regulate AI and robotics, Intel CEOBrian Krzanichhas argued that artificial intelligence is in its infancy and that it is too early to regulate the technology.[15]Instead of trying to regulate the technology itself, some scholars suggest to rather develop common norms including requirements for the testing and transparency of algorithms, possibly in combination with some form of warranty.[16]One suggestion has been for the development of a global governance board to regulate AI development.[17]In 2020, the European Union published its draft strategy paper for promoting and regulating AI.[18]
Algorithmic tacit collusionis a legally dubious antitrust practise committed by means of algorithms, which the courts are not able to prosecute.[19]This danger concerns scientists and regulators in EU, US and beyond.[19]European CommissionerMargrethe Vestagermentioned an early example of algorithmic tacit collusion in her speech on "Algorithms and Collusion" on March 16, 2017, described as follows:[20]
"A few years ago, two companies were selling a textbook called The Making of a Fly. One of those sellers used an algorithm which essentially matched its rival’s price. That rival had an algorithm which always set a price 27% higher than the first. The result was that prices kept spiralling upwards, until finally someone noticed what was going on, and adjusted the price manually. By that time, the book was selling – or rather, not selling – for 23 million dollars a copy."
In 2018, the Netherlands employed an algorithmic system SyRI (Systeem Risico Indicatie) to detect citizens perceived being high risk for committingwelfare fraud, which quietly flagged thousands of people to investigators.[21]This caused a public protest. The district court of Hague shut down SyRI referencingArticle 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights(ECHR).[22]
In 2020, algorithms assigning exam grades to students in the UK sparked open protest under the banner "Fuck the algorithm."[23]This protest was successful and the grades were taken back.[24]
AI law and regulations can be divided into three main topics, namely governance of autonomous intelligence systems, responsibility and accountability for the systems, and privacy and safety issues.[5]The development of public sector strategies for management and regulation of AI has been increasingly deemed necessary at the local, national,[25]and international levels[18]and in fields from public service management[26]to law enforcement,[18]the financial sector,[25]robotics,[27]the military,[28]and international law.[29][30]There are many concerns that there is not enough visibility and monitoring of AI in these sectors.[31]In the United States financial sector, for example, there have been calls for theConsumer Financial Protection Bureauto more closely examine source code and algorithms when conducting audits of financial institutions' non-public data.[32]
In the United States, on January 7, 2019, following an Executive Order on 'Maintaining American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence', the White House'sOffice of Science and Technology Policyreleased a draftGuidance for Regulation of Artificial Intelligence Applications, which includes ten principles for United States agencies when deciding whether and how to regulate AI.[33][34]In response, theNational Institute of Standards and Technologyhas released a position paper,[35]theNational Security Commission on Artificial Intelligencehas published an interim report,[36]and theDefense Innovation Boardhas issued recommendations on the ethical use of AI.[37]
In April 2016, for the first time in more than two decades, the European Parliament adopted a set of comprehensive regulations for the collection, storage, and use of personal information, theGeneral Data Protection Regulation(GDPR)1 (European Union, Parliament and Council 2016).[6] The GDPR's policy on the right of citizens to receive an explanation for algorithmic decisions highlights the pressing importance of human interpretability in algorithm design.[38]
In 2016, China published a position paper questioning the adequacy of existing international law to address the eventuality offully autonomous weapons, becoming the first permanent member of the U.N.Security Councilto broach the issue,[29]and leading toproposals for global regulation.[39]In the United States, steering on regulating security-related AI is provided by theNational Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence.[40]
In 2017, the U.K. Vehicle Technology and Aviation Bill imposes liability on the owner of an uninsured automated vehicle when driving itself and makes provisions for cases where the owner has made “unauthorized alterations” to the vehicle or failed to update its software. Further ethical issues arise when, e.g., aself-driving carswerves to avoid a pedestrian and causes a fatal accident.[41]
In 2021, theEuropean Commissionproposed theArtificial Intelligence Act.[42]
There is a concept of algorithm certification emerging as a method of regulating algorithms. Algorithm certification involves auditing whether the algorithm used during the life cycle 1) conforms to the protocoled requirements (e.g., for correctness, completeness, consistency, and accuracy); 2) satisfies the standards, practices, and conventions; and 3) solves the right problem (e.g., correctly model physical laws), and satisfies the intended use and user needs in the operational environment.[9]
Blockchainsystems provide transparent and fixed records of transactions and hereby contradict the goal of the EuropeanGDPR, which is to give individuals full control of their private data.[43][44]
By implementing theDecree on Development of Digital Economy,Belarushas become the first-ever country to legalizesmart contracts. Belarusian lawyer Denis Aleinikov is considered to be the author of a smart contract legal concept introduced by the decree.[45][46][47]There are strong arguments that the existing US state laws are already a sound basis for the smart contracts' enforceability —Arizona,Nevada,OhioandTennesseehave amended their laws specifically to allow for the enforceability of blockchain-based contracts nevertheless.[48]
There have been proposals to regulate robots and autonomous algorithms. These include:
In 1942, authorIsaac Asimovaddressed regulation of algorithms by introducing the fictionalThree Laws of Robotics:
The main alternative to regulation is a ban, and the banning of algorithms is presently highly unlikely. However, inFrank Herbert'sDuneuniverse,thinking machinesis a collective term forartificial intelligence, which were completely destroyed and banned after a revolt known as theButlerian Jihad:[50]
JIHAD, BUTLERIAN: (see also Great Revolt) — the crusade against computers, thinking machines, and conscious robots begun in 201 B.G. and concluded in 108 B.G. Its chief commandment remains in theO.C. Bibleas "Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a human mind."[51]
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Theright to be forgotten(RTBF[1]) is the right to haveprivate informationabout a person be removed from Internet searches and other directories in some circumstances. The issue has arisen from desires of individuals to "determine the development of their life in an autonomous way, without being perpetually or periodicallystigmatizedas a consequence of a specific action performed in the past".[2]: 231The right entitles a person to have data about them deleted so that it can no longer be discovered by third parties, particularly throughsearch engines.[3]: 121
Those who favor a right to be forgotten cite its necessity due to issues such asrevenge pornsites and references to past petty crimes appearing in search engine listings for a person's name. The main concern is for the potentially undue influence that such results may exert upon a person's online reputation indefinitely if not removed.[4]
Those who oppose the right worry about its effect on the right tofreedom of expressionand whether creating a right to be forgotten would result in a decreased quality of theInternet,censorship, and therewriting of history.[5]
The right to be forgotten is distinct from theright to privacy. The right to privacy constitutes information that is not known publicly, whereas the right to be forgotten involves revoking public access to information that was known publicly at a certain time.[3]: 122[6]
Argentina has had lawsuits by celebrities againstGoogleandYahoo!in which the plaintiffs demand the removal of certain search results, and require removal of links to photographs.[7]One case, brought by artistVirginia da Cunha, involved photographs which had originally been taken with her permission and uploaded with her permission, however she alleged that the search results improperly associated her photographs with pornography.[8]De Cunha's case achieved initial success resulting in Argentina search engines not showing images of the particular celebrity, however, this decision is on appeal.[9]
Virginia Simari, the judge in favor of De Cunha, stated that people have the right to control their image and avert others from "capturing, reproducing, broadcasting, or publishing one's image without permission".[10]In addition, Simari used a treatise written by Julio César Rivera, a Buenos Aires lawyer, author, and law professor "the right to control one's personal data includes the right to prevent others from using one's image."[10]Since the 1990s, Argentina has also been a part of the habeas data movement in which they "adopted a constitutional provision that is part freedom-of-government-information law and part data privacy law."[10]Their version is known asAmparo. Article 43[10]explains it:
"Any person shall file this action to obtain information on the data about himself and their purpose, registered in public records or databases, or in private ones intended to supply information; and in case of false data or discrimination, this action may be filed to request the suppression, rectification, confidentiality or updating of said data."[10]
Argentina's efforts to protect their people's right to be forgotten has been called "the most complete"[by whom?]because individuals are able to correct, delete, or update information about themselves: overall, their information is bound to remain confidential.
In 2016, a Chinese court in Beijing rejected an argument for the right to be forgotten when a judge ruled in favor ofBaiduin a lawsuit over removing search results.[11]: 140It was the first of such cases to be heard in Chinese court.[12]In the suit, Ren Jiayu sued Chinese search engine Baidu over search results that negatively associated him with a previous employer, Wuxi Taoshi Biotechnology.[11]: 140Ren argued that by posting the search results, Baidu had infringed upon his right of name and right of reputation, both protected under Chinese law.[12]Because of these protections, Ren believed he had a right to be forgotten by removing these search results.[12]The court ruled against Ren, claiming his name is a collection of common characters and as a result the search results were derived from relevant words.[12]The court described search results as neutral findings based on an algorithm and stated that retaining such information was necessary for the public.[11]: 140
As the call for personal information protection has grown louder, China has taken active measures to strengthen data protection. In 2018, China released the national standard "Information Security Technology—Personal Information Security Specification," which was the first systematic regulation for personal information protection.[13]In 2020, the updated national standards replaced the version that came into effect in 2018.[14]
Subsequently, in 2021, China introduced the formal legal framework, the "Personal Information Protection Law of the People's Republic of China" (PIPL).[15][16]The enactment of this law filled a legal gap and made detailed provisions regarding the collection, storage, use, transfer, and deletion of personal information. The law explicitly outlines that individuals have a range of fundamental rights over their data, including the right to know, the right to decide, the right to access and copy, the right to rectify or supplement, and the "right to be forgotten."[16]
For businesses, it is essential to follow the principles of legality, fairness, and necessity when collecting and using personal data, ensuring transparency and data security. Moreover, the PIPL strengthens the regulation of cross-border data flows, requiring risk assessments in specific cases and mandating additional protective measures for users.[17]
Europe's data protection laws do not implement a "right to be forgotten", but a more limited "right to [data] erasure". Variations on the concept a right to be forgotten have existed in Europe for many years, including:
Opinions on the right to be forgotten differ greatly between the United States and EU countries. In the United States, accessibility, the right of free speech according to theFirst Amendment, and the "right to know" are typically favored over removing or increasing difficulty to access truthfully published information regarding individuals and corporations. Although the term "right to be forgotten" is a relatively new idea, theEuropean Court of Justicelegally solidified that the "right to be forgotten" is a human right when they ruled against Google in theCostejacase on May 13, 2014.[20]
This raises questions about the limitations of application in ajurisdictioninclude the inability to require removal of information possessed by companies outside the jurisdiction. There is no global framework to allow individuals control over their online image. However, ProfessorViktor Mayer-Schönbergerhas argued that Google cannot escape compliance with the law of France implementing the decision of the European Court of Justice in 2014, pointing out that the U.S. and other nations have long maintained that their local laws have "extra-territorial effects".[21]
In 1995, theEuropean Unionadopted theEuropean Data Protection Directive(Directive 95/46/EC) to regulate the processing of personal data.[22]This is now considered a component ofhuman rights law.[23]The new EuropeanGeneral Data Protection Regulationprovides protection and exemption for companies listed as "media" companies, like newspapers and other journalistic work. However, Google purposely opted out of being classified as a "media" company, therefore the company is not protected. Judges in the European Union ruled that because the international corporation, Google, is a collector and processor of data it should be classified as a "data controller" under the meaning of the EU data protection directive. These "data controllers" are required under EU law to remove data that is "inadequate, irrelevant, or no longer relevant", making this directive of global importance.[18]
In Article 12 of the Directive 95/46/EC the EU gave a legal basis to Internet protection for individuals.[2]: 233In 2012 theEuropean Commissiondisclosed a draft European Data Protection Regulation to supersede the directive, which included specific protection in the right to be forgotten in Article 17.[24]Aright to be forgottenwas replaced by a more limitedright of erasurein Article 17 of the version of the GDPR that was adopted by the European Parliament in March 2014 and which became EU law in April 2016.
To exercise the right to be forgotten and request removal from a search engine, one must complete a form through the search engine's website.Google's removal request process requires the applicant to identify their country of residence, personal information, a list of theURLsto be removed along with a short description, and - in some cases - attachment of legal identification.[25]The applicant receives an email from Google confirming the request but the request must be assessed before it is approved for removal. If the request is approved, searches using the individual's name will no longer result in the content appearing in search results. The content remains online and is not erased.[26]After a request is filled, their removals team reviews the request, weighing "the individual's right to privacy against the public's right to know", deciding if the website is "inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant, or excessive in relation to the purposes for which they were processed".[27]Google has formed an Advisory Council of various professors, lawyers, and government officials from around Europe to provide guidelines for these decisions.[28]However, the review process is still a mystery to the general public. Guidelines set by EU regulators were not released until November 2014, but Google began to take action on this much sooner than that, which (according to one author) allowed them "to shape interpretation to [their] own ends".[28]In May 2015, eighty academics called for more transparency from Google in an open letter.[29]
The form asks people to select one of the 28 countries that make up the European Union, as well as Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland.[30]"The form allows an individual or someone representing an individual to put in a request" for the removal of any URLs believed to be a violation of the individual's privacy.[31]Regardless of who is submitting the form, some form of photo identification of the person the form is being submitted for must be present. This is meant to serve as proof that the person for whom the request was made for does in fact approve.
If Google refuses a request to delink material, Europeans can appeal to their local data protection agency.[32]As of May 2015, the British Data Protection Agency had treated 184 such complaints, and overturned Google's decision in about a quarter of those.[33]If Google fails to comply with a Data Protection Agency decision, it can face legal action.[34]
In July 2014, in the early stages of Google's effort to comply with the court ruling, legal experts questioned whether Google's widely publicized delistings of a number of news articles violated the UK and EUData Protection Directive, since in implementing the Directive, Google is required to weigh the damage to the person making the request against any public interest in the information being available.[35]Google indeed acknowledged that some of its search result removals, affecting articles that were of public interest, were incorrect, and reinstated the links a week later.[4][36]Commentators like Charles Arthur, technology editor ofThe Guardian, andAndrew OrlowskiofThe Registernoted that Google is not required to comply with removal requests at all, as it can refer requests to the information commissioner in the relevant country for a decision weighing the respective merits of public interest and individual rights.[4][35][37]
Google notifies websites that have URLs delinked, and various news organizations, such as BBC, have published lists of delinked articles. Complainants have been named in news commentary regarding those delinkings. In August 2015 the British Data Protection Agency issued an enforcement action requiring Google to delink some of these more recent articles from searches for a complainant's name, after Google refused to do so.[38]Google complied with the request.[39]Some academics have criticized news organizations and Google for their behavior.[40][41]
In July 2015, Google accidentally revealed data on delinkings that "shows 95% of Google privacy requests are from citizens out to protect personal and private information – not criminals, politicians and public figures."[42]
This data leak caused serious social consequences for Google as the public expressed their outrage and fear over the information that was recently made public. Though only 5% of requests were made by criminals, politicians, and public figures, the content removed was what sparked the most fear.[43]In particular, one request for data removal was from a British doctor requesting to have 50 links removed on past botched medical procedures. Google agreed to remove three search results containing his personal information.[43]The public voiced their outrage stating that removing such information can be used for manipulation and could result in innocent people making uninformed decisions. Google responded to the public outrage by saying that when removing content they consider both the right of the individual and public interest.[43]
The European Union has been advocating for the delinkings requested by EU citizens to be implemented by Google not just in European versions of Google (as in google.co.uk, google.fr, etc.), but on google.com and other international subdomains. Regulators want delinkings to be implemented so that the law cannot be circumvented in any way. Google has refused the French Data Protection Agency's demand to apply the right internationally.[44]Due in part to their refusal to comply with the recommendation of the privacy regulating board Google has become the subject of a four-year-long antitrust investigation by the European Commission.[45]In September 2015, the French Data Protection Agency dismissed Google's appeal.[46]
The French Data Protection Agency appealed to the EU courts to seek action on Google for failing to delink in its global servers. In September 2019 the Court of Justice for the EU issued its decision, finding that Google is not required to delink on sites external to the EU, concluding that "Currently, there is no obligation under EU law, for a search engine operator who grants a request for de-referencing made by a data subject ... to carry out such a de-referencing on all the versions of its search engine."[47][48]
As of September 2015, the most delinked site iswww.facebook.com. Three of Google's own sites,groups.google.com,plus.google.comandwww.youtube.comare among the ten most delinked sites.[39]In addition to Google, Yahoo and Bing have also made forms available for making delinking requests.
In September 2019, the European Court of Justice ruled that the Right to be Forgotten did not apply outside of its member states.[49]The ruling meant that Google did not have to delete the names of individuals from all of its international versions.
In December 2022, the judges in Luxembourg further extended the Right to be Forgotten in the caseC-460/20 TU, RE vs Google LLC. The case relates to two managers of a group of investment companies, who argued that three unflattering news articles should be ‘de-referenced’ from the search engine results of Google, when searching for their names. They claimed that the information presented in the articles was wrong factually, which raised the question whether search engine operators need to check the accuracy of the information. Additionally, the applicants required that photographs showing them on preview images — or thumbnails — when carrying out a search, ought to be removed. In this judgment the European Court of Justice largely agreed with the request of the applicants. Search engine operators such as Google are required to de-reference the respective information, if a person who seeks de-referencing submits 'relevant and sufficient' evidence capable of substantiating his or her request, and thereby manifests the inaccuracy of the information found (para. 72). For thumbnails an independent assessment must be performed, but essentially the same thinking applies.[50]
Europe's jurisdiction of data also extends beyond its borders into countries that does not have "adequate" protections. For instance, Europe's transfer of data to vulnerable countries are limited, resulting in companies likeGoogleandAmazonto establish European data centers to quarantine data from Europe.[51]
In May 2014, theEuropean Court of Justiceruled againstGoogleinCosteja, a case brought by a Spanish man, Mario Costeja González, who requested the removal of a link to a digitized 1998 article inLa Vanguardianewspaper about an auction for his foreclosed home, for a debt that he had subsequently paid.[52]He initially attempted to have the article removed by complaining to theSpanish Agency of data protection, which rejected the claim on the grounds that it was lawful and accurate, but accepted a complaint against Google and asked Google to remove the results.[53]Google sued in theSpanishAudiencia Nacional(National High Court) which referred a series of questions to the European Court of Justice.[54]The court ruled inCostejathat search engines are responsible for the content they point to and thus, Google was required to comply with EU data privacy laws.[55][56][57]On its first day of compliance only (May 30, 2014), Google received 12,000 requests to have personal details removed from its search engine.[58]
On October 27, 2009, lawyers forWolfgang Werléwho—together with Manfred Lauber—was convicted of murderingWalter Sedlmayrsent theWikimedia Foundationacease and desistletter requesting that Werlé's name be removed from the English language Wikipedia articleWalter Sedlmayr, citing a 1973Federal Constitutional Courtdecision that allows the suppression of a criminal's name in news accounts once he is released from custody.[59][60][61]Previously, Alexander H. Stopp, attorney for Werlé and Lauber, had won a default judgment in German court, on behalf of Lauber, against the Wikimedia Foundation.[59]According to theElectronic Frontier Foundation, Werlé's lawyers also challenged an Internet service provider in Austria which published the names of the convicted killers.[62]
Wikimedia is based in the United States, where the First Amendment protectsfreedom of speechandfreedom of the press. In Germany, the law seeks to protect the name and likenesses of private persons from unwanted publicity.[63]On January 18, 2008, a court inHamburgsupported the personality rights of Werlé, which by German law includes removing his name from archive coverage of the case.[64]
On November 12, 2009,The New York Timesreported that Wolfgang Werlé had a case pending against theWikimedia Foundationin a German court. The editors of the German-language Wikipediaarticle about Sedlmayrremoved the names of the murderers,[59]which have since then been restored to the article.The Guardianobserved that the lawsuit has resulted in theStreisand effect, an upsurge in publicity for the case resulting from the legal action.[65]
On December 15, 2009, the GermanFederal Court of Justice(Bundesgerichtshof) inKarlsruheruled that German websites do not have to check their archives in order to provide permanent protection of personality rights for convicted criminals. The case occurred after the names of the brothers were found on the website ofDeutschlandradio, in an archive article dating from July 2000.[66]The presiding judge Gregor Galke stated "This is not a blank check", and stated that the right to rehabilitation of offenders had been taken into consideration.[67][68]
On November 28, 2019, the German constitutional court in Karlsruhe ruled that German murderer Paul Termann has the right to be forgotten.[69]
The 2012 draft European Data Protection Regulation Article 17 detailed the "right to be forgotten and to erasure".[70]By Article 17 individuals to whom the data appertains are granted the right to "obtain from the controller the erasure of personal data relating to them and the abstention from further dissemination of such data, especially in relation to personal data which are made available by the data subject while he or she was a child or where the data is no longer necessary for the purpose it was collected for, the subject withdraws consent, the storage period has expired, the data subject objects to the processing of personal data or the processing of data does not comply with other regulation".[70]
The EU defines "data controllers" as "people or bodies that collect and manage personal data".[71]The EU General Data Protection Regulation requires data controllers who have been informed that an individual has requested the deletion of any links to or copies of information must "take all reasonable steps, including technical measures, in relation to data for the publication of which the controller is responsible, to inform third parties which are processing such data, that a data subject requests them to erase any links to, or copy or replication of that personal data. Where the controller has authorized a third party publication of personal data, the controller shall be considered responsible for that publication".[70]In the situation that a data controller does not take all reasonable steps then they will be fined heavily.[72]
The European Parliament was once "expected to adopt the proposals in first reading in the April 2013 Plenary session".[73]The right to be forgotten was replaced by a more limited right to erasure in the version of the GDPR adopted by the European Parliament in March 2014.[74][75]Article 17 provides that the data subject has the right to request erasure of personal data related to him on any one of a number of grounds including non-compliance with article 6.1 (lawfulness) that includes a case (f) where the legitimate interests of the controller is overridden by the interests or fundamental rights and freedoms of the data subject which require protection of personal data (see alsoCosteja).[76][77]
The European Union is an influential group of states, and this tendency towards the right to be forgotten in the EU is an indicator of its recognition globally as a right. To support this, in 2012 the Obama Administration released a "Privacy Bill of Rights" to protect consumers online, and while this has not quite the strength of the EU law, it is a step towards recognition of the right to be forgotten.[78]
In June 2014,Privacy CommissionerAllan Chiang Yam-wang (蔣任宏) expressed his support for introducing the right to be forgotten to Hong Kong.[79][80]Opposition expressed their worry that the right would inhibitfreedom of information, and introducingerase from history.[81]Charles Mok, Hong KongLegislative Councillorfrom I.T. occupation, oppose to introduce the right to be forgotten, citing the difficulty of enforcing and abuses of practising the right. He described the abuses as "right to be deleteion"[82][83]In July 2015, Stephen Wong Kai-yi (黃繼兒) replaced Chiang's position and promised not to introduce the right to be forgotten.[84]
In April 2016, theDelhi High Courtbegan to examine the issue after a Delhi banker requested to have his personal details removed from search results after a marital dispute.[85]In this case, due to the dispute being settled, the banker's request is valid.[85]The High Court has asked for a reply from Google and other search engine companies by September 19, upon which the court will continue to investigate the issue.[86]
In January 2017, theKarnataka High Courtupheld the right to be forgotten, in a case involving a woman who originally went to court in order to get a marriage certificate annulled, claiming to have never been married to the man on the certificate.[87]After the two parties came to an agreement, the woman's father wanted her name to be removed from search engines regarding criminal cases in the high court.[87]The Karnataka High Court approved the father's request, stating that she had a right to be forgotten. According to the court, its ruling would align with western countries' decisions, which typically approve of the right to be forgotten when dealing with cases "involving women in general and highly sensitive cases involving rape or affecting the modesty and reputation of the person concerned."[87]The woman in this specific case was worried that the search results would affect her standing with her husband, as well as her reputation in society.[87]
As of February 2017, the Delhi High Court is hearing a case involving a man requesting to have information regarding his mother and wife to be removed from a search engine.[88]The man believes that having his name linked to the search is hindering his employment options.[88]The Delhi High Court is still working on the case, along with the issue of whether or not a right to be forgotten should be a legal standard in India.[88]Currently, there is no legal standard for the right to be forgotten, but if implemented, this would mean that citizens no longer need to file a case in order to request for information from search engines to be removed.[88]This case could have significant impacts on the right to be forgotten and search engines in India.
In May 2016,South Korea's Communications Commission(KCC) announced citizens will be able to request search engines and website administrators to restrict their own postings from being accessible publicly.[89]The KCC released "Guidelines on the Right to Request Access Restrictions on Personal Internet Postings",[90]which took effect in June 2016 and do not apply to third party contents.[89]To the extent that the right to be forgotten concerns a data subject's right to limit the searchability of third party postings about him/her, the Guideline does not constitute a right to be forgotten.[91]Also, as to the right to withdraw one's own posting, critics have noted that people have been able to delete their own postings before the Guideline as long as they have retained their login credentials, and that people who have misplaced their login credentials were permitted to retrieve or receive new ones.[92]The only services significantly affected by the Guideline are Wiki-type services where people's contributions make logical sense only in response to or in conjunction with one another's contributions and therefore the postings are made permanent part of the mass-created content, but KCC made sure that the Guideline applies to these services only when the posting identifies the authors.[93]
The guidelines created by the KCC include that data subjects can remove content that includes the URL links, and any evidence consisting of personal information. The commission included different amendments to the guideline. This includes describing the Guidelines as a "minimum" and "preliminary"[94]precaution regarding privacy rights in vague areas of existing laws. The guideline encompasses foreign Internet companies that provide translation services for South Korean consumers. In order to have a person's information "forgotten" he or she has to go through a three step process:[95]the issue posted with the URL, proof of ownership of the post, grounds for the request. There are restrictions on each step. When posting the URL, the web operator has the right to preserve the posting issue. The second being that if the post is relevant to public interest, web operators will process this request on the terms of relevance.
The right to be forgotten was added in the constitution of theCanton of Genevain the new article 21A[96]right todigital integrityvoted on June 18, 2023.
Consideration of the right to be forgotten occurred in US case law, specifically inMelvin v. Reid, and inSidis v. FR Publishing Corp.[97]
InMelvin v. Reid(1931), an ex-prostitute was charged with murder and then acquitted; she subsequently tried to assume a quiet and anonymous place in society. However, the 1925 movieThe Red Kimonorevealed her history, and she successfully sued the producer.[98][99]The court reasoned that "any person living a life of rectitude has that right to happiness which includes a freedom from unnecessary attacks on his character, social standing or reputation."[100]
InSidis v. FR Publishing Corp.(1940), the plaintiff,William James Sidis, was a formerchild prodigywho wished to spend his adult life quietly, without recognition; however, this was disrupted by an article inThe New Yorker.[101]The court held here that there were limits to the right to control one's life and facts about oneself, and held that there is social value in published facts, and that a person cannot ignore their celebrity status merely because they want to.[101]
There is opposition to further recognition of the right to be forgotten in the United States as commentators argue[who?]that it will contravene the right tofreedom of speechand freedom of expression, or will constitutecensorship, thus potentially breaching peoples' constitutionally protected right to freedom of expression in theUnited States Constitution.[102]These criticisms are consistent with the proposal that the only information that can be removed by user's request is content that they themselves uploaded.[clarification needed][102][103]
In a June 2014 opinion piece inForbes, columnist Joseph Steinberg noted that "many privacy protections that Americans believe that they enjoy – even some guaranteed by law – have, in fact, been eroded or even obliterated by technological advances". Steinberg, in explaining the need for legislation guaranteeing the "right to be forgotten", noted that existing laws require adverse information be removed from credit reports after a period of time, and that allowing the sealing or expunging of criminals records are effectively undermined by the ability of prospective lenders or employers to find forever the removed information in a matter of seconds by doing a web search.[104]
On March 11, 2015,Intelligence Squared US, an organization that stagesOxford-Style debates, held an event concerning the question, "Should the U.S. adopt the 'Right to be Forgotten' online?" The side against the motion won with a 56% majority of the voting audience.[105]
While opinions among experts are divided in the U.S., one survey indicated that 9 in 10 Americans want some form of the right to be forgotten.[106]The consumer rights organizationConsumer Watchdoghas filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission for Americans to obtain the right as well.[107]
In March 2017,New Yorkstate senatorTony Avellaand assemblymanDavid Weprinintroduced a bill proposing that individuals be allowed to require search engines and online speakers to remove information that is "inaccurate", "irrelevant", "inadequate", or "excessive", that is "no longer material to current public debate or discourse" and is causing demonstrable harm to the subject.[108]
In June 2018,Californiaenacted theCalifornia Consumer Privacy Act, providing consumers with the right to delete their personal information from covered businesses.[109]In October 2023, the state enacted theCalifornia Delete Act, requiring theCalifornia Privacy Protection Agencyto establish aone-stop shopdeletion mechanism for consumers to directdata brokersto delete their personal information.[110]
In January 2021, theBoston Globeannounced a program to allow subjects of relatively inconsequential stories to have the stories contextualized, removed from Google searches or anonymized.[111]In January 2025, it was reported thatThe Oregonian,The Plain Dealer,Bangor Daily News,The Atlanta Journal-ConstitutionandNJ.comoffered similar services.[112]
The regulatory differences in the protection of personal data between countries has real impact on international relations. The right to be forgotten, specifically, is a matter of EU-US relations when applied to cross-border data flow, as it raises questions about territorial sovereignty. The structure of theWestphalian international systemassumes that the reach of a country's jurisdiction is limited to its geographic territory.[113]However, online interactions are independent of geographic location and present across multiple locations, rendering the traditional concept of territorial sovereignty moot.[113]Therefore, the EU and the United States are forced to confront their regulatory differences and negotiate on a set of regulations that apply to all foreign companies processing and handling data of European citizens and residents.[113]
The regulatory differences on the right to be forgotten along with numerous other data protection rights have affected discussions and negotiations on trans-Atlantic data privacy regulations. A case in point is the EU and the United States' endeavors to develop theInternational Safe Harbor Privacy Principlesagreement, a data transfer pact that enables the transfer of data between the EU and US companies in a manner consistent with the EU's data protection schemes.[114]Article 25 of the Data Protection Directive articulates that cross-border transfer of data can take place only if the "third country in question ensures an adequate level of protection," meaning that the country meets the EU's minimum standards of data protection.[114]The standards include, among many provisions, a component that protects the right to "opt out" of further processing or transmission of personal data, with the assumption that data may not be further processed in ways inconsistent with the intent for which they were collected.[114]
Given the inconsistencies between the EU and the United States on numerousdigital privacyregulations, including the right to be forgotten, Article 25 poses a threat to trans-Atlantic data flows. Therefore, the EU and the United States began negotiations to mediate the differences through the Safe Harbor agreement, which as a result of debate and discussion between the two parties, requires companies to provide individuals with the choice or opportunity to "opt out", and provides other protections.[114]
As a result of the mass surveillance performed by the US government on European citizens' data, the Safe Harbor agreement has been invalidated by theEuropean Union Court of Justicein itsSchremscase. The Safe Harbor agreement has now been replaced by thePrivacy Shield principles.
Businesses that manage their clients' online reputations have responded to the European Court ruling by exercising the right to be forgotten as a means to remove unfavorable information.[115]One technique used by reputation consulting companies is to submit multiple requests for each link, written with different angles in an attempt to get links removed. Google, for example, does not limit the number of requests that can be submitted on the removal of a given link.[116]
Major criticisms stem from the idea that the right to be forgotten would restrict the right to freedom of speech.[117][118][119]Many nations, and the United States in particular (with theFirst Amendment to the United States Constitution), have very strong domesticfreedom of speechlaws, which would be challenging to reconcile with the right to be forgotten.[120]Some academics see that only a limited form of the right to be forgotten would be reconcilable with US constitutional law; the right of an individual to delete data that they have personally submitted.[102][103][121]In this limited form of the right individuals could not have material removed that has been uploaded by others, as demanding the removal of information could constitutecensorshipand a reduction in the freedom of expression in many countries.[122]Sandra Coliver of theOpen Society Justice Initiativeargues that not all rights must be compatible and this conflict between the two rights is not detrimental to the survival of either.[123]
The draft General Data Protection Regulation was written broadly and this has caused concern.[124]It has attracted criticism that its enactment would require data controlling companies to go to great lengths to identify third parties with the information and remove it.[125][126]The proposed regulation has also caused criticism due to the fact that this could produce a censoring effect in that companies, such as Facebook or Google, will wish to not be fined due to the act, and will therefore be likely to delete wholesale information rather than facing the fine, which could produce a "serious chilling effect".[125]In addition to this, there are concerns about the requirement to take down information that others have posted about an individual; the definition of personal data in Article 4(2) includes "any information relating to" the individual.[127]This, critics have claimed, would require companies to take down any information relating to an individual, regardless of its source, which would amount to censorship, and result in the big data companies eradicating much data to comply with this.[128]Such removal can impact the accuracy and ability of businesses and individuals to performbusiness intelligence, particularlydue diligenceto comply with anti bribery, anticorruption, andknow your customerlaws.[129]The right to be forgotten was invoked to remove from Google searches 120 reports about company directors published byDato Capital, a Spanish company which compiles such reports about private company directors, consisting entirely of information they are required by law to disclose;[129][130]Fortunemagazine examined the 64 reports relating to UK directorships, finding that in 27 (42%) the director was the only person named, in the remaining only the director and co-directors were named, and 23 (36%) involve directorships started since 2012.[130]
Other criticism revolves around the principle ofaccountability.[131]
There were concerns that the proposed General Data Protection Regulation would result in Google and other Internet search engines not producing neutral search results, but rather producing biased and patchy results, and compromising theintegrityof Internet-based information.[125]To balance this criticism, the proposed General Data Protection Regulation included an exception "for the processing of personal data carried out solely for journalistic purposes or the purpose of artistic or literary expression in order to reconcile the right to the protection of personal data with the rules governing freedom of expression."[70]Article 80 upheld freedom of speech, and while not lessening obligations on data providers and social media sites, nevertheless due to the wide meaning of "journalistic purposes" allows more autonomy and reduces the amount of information that is necessary to be removed.[2]: 9When Google agreed to implement the ruling, European Commission Vice-PresidentViviane Redingsaid, "The Court also made clear that journalistic work must not be touched; it is to be protected."[132]However, Google was criticized for taking down (by the Costeja precedent) a BBC News weblog post aboutStan O'Nealby economics editorRobert Peston(eventually, Peston reported that his weblog post has remained findable in Google after all).[133][134]Despite these criticisms and Google's action, the company's CEO,Larry Pageworries that the ruling will be "used by other governments that aren't as forward and progressive as Europe to do bad things", though has since distanced himself from that statement.[135]For example, pianistDejan Laziccited the "Right To Be Forgotten" in trying to remove a negative review about his performance fromThe Washington Post. He claimed that the critique was "defamatory, mean-spirited, opinionated, offensive and simply irrelevant for the arts".[136][137]and the St. Lawrence parish of the Roman Catholic church in Kutno, Poland asked Google to removethe Polish Wikipedia page about it,[138](in Polish)without any allegations mentioned therein as of that date.
Index on Censorshipclaimed that theCostejaruling "allows individuals to complain to search engines about information they do not like with no legal oversight. This is akin to marching into a library and forcing it to pulp books. Although the ruling is intended for private individuals it opens the door to anyone who wants to whitewash their personal history… The Court's decision is a retrograde move that misunderstands the role and responsibility of search engines and the wider Internet. It should send chills down the spine of everyone in the European Union who believes in the crucial importance of free expression and freedom of information."[139]
In 2014, theGerry Hutchpage on theEnglish Wikipediawas among the first Wikipedia pages to be removed by severalsearch engines' query results in the European Union.[140][141]The Daily Telegraphsaid, on 6 August 2014, that Wikipedia co-founderJimmy Wales"described the EU's Right to be Forgotten as deeply immoral, as the organisation that operates the online encyclopedia warned the ruling will result in an Internet riddled withmemory holes".[142]Other commentators have disagreed with Wales, pointing to problems such as Google including links torevenge pornsites in its search results,[4][143]and have accused Google of orchestrating a publicity campaign to escape the burdensome obligation to comply with the law.[35][37]Julia Powles, a law and technology researcher at theUniversity of Cambridge, made a rebuttal to Wales' and theWikimedia Foundationconcerns in an editorial published byGuardian, opining that "There is a public sphere of memory and truth, and there is a private one...Without the freedom to be private, we have precious little freedom at all."[144]
In response to the criticism, the EU has released a factsheet to address what it considers myths about the right to be forgotten.[145]In addition to this, for further clarification of the law, the factsheet provides information about the important court case C-131/12 and frequently asked questions regarding Google, the purpose of the law, and how it works.[146]
Other criticisms involving the right to be forgotten concerns the policies for data removal regarding minors. The U.S. has laws that protect the privacy of minors. The California Minor Eraser Law is a law that allows California residents younger than the age of 18 to request to have information removed that they posted on an online server. The law "applies to websites, social media sites, mobile apps and other online services"[147]and follows "Europe's recognition of the 'right to be forgotten'".[147]This law became effective on January 1, 2015 and remains in existence. Online "service"[148]operators that have services "directed toward minors"[148]must update their privacy policies to include the option to remove data if requested by a minor that is posted on a service.
In the UK, the2017Conservativemanifesto[149]included a pledge to allow social media platform users to remove outdated information that was posted when they were younger than the age of 18. "A Tory victory on the 8th of June will lead to those youthful indiscretions on Facebook and Twitter being open to erasure. But there are also plans to fine social media firms for not moving at the speed of political opportunism over extreme content."[149]The United Kingdom has not yet fully adopted the ruling of theEuropean Court of Justiceregarding the right to be forgotten and argued to keep it from becoming EU law.[citation needed]However, in the upcoming elections in the UK laws could be passed to allow minors to remove embarrassing posts or photos on social media that could come back to affect job applications or public image in later life.
Theresa May, then Prime Minister of the UK, has advocated to extend privacy rights for minors in allowing them to have a right to delete information. The intentions for this extension of privacy are based on the fact that social media sites store years of data that affect minors lives' much later after the information is posted.[150]May gave her stance on privacy when she said, "'The Internet has brought a wealth of opportunity but also significant new risks which have evolved faster than society's response to them'".[150]TheConservative Party, which was headed by May from 2016 to 2019, has pushed for policies that aggressively remove illegal material from the Internet and fine firms that do not take action in removing said material.[150]
In 2015,Commission nationale de l'informatique et des libertés(CNIL) asked Google to remove data from all versions available in any part of the world. Google and other entities argued that European data regulators should not be allowed to decide what Internet users around the world find when they use a search engine.[151]
Security researchers from CISPA,Saarland University[152]and theUniversity of Auckland[153]are working to develop software[154]to support the automation of the right to be forgotten in a scalable, provable and privacy-preserving manner. The team's software, Oblivion, would automate the process of verifying someone's personal information can be found in a Google search result, to help Google staff manage the high volume of take-down requests.[155]
Researchers have noted that the current capabilities of this technology have some limitations. The software can only determine whether a piece of information is available, not whether it should be removed.[155]
Data deletion protocols concerning the death of a user is another consideration.[156]
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Admissible evidence, in acourtoflaw, is anytestimonial,documentary, or tangibleevidencethat may be introduced to afactfinder—usually ajudgeorjury—to establish or to bolster a point put forth by a party to the proceeding. For evidence to be admissible, it must berelevantand "not excluded by the rules of evidence",[1]which generally means that it must not be unfairlyprejudicial, and it must have some indicia of reliability. The general rule in evidence is that all relevant evidence is admissible and all irrelevant evidence is inadmissible, though some countries (such as theUnited Statesand, to an extent,Australia) proscribe theprosecutionfrom exploiting evidenceobtained in violationofconstitutional law, thereby rendering relevant evidence inadmissible. Thisrule of evidenceis called theexclusionary rule. In the United States, this was effectuated federally in 1914 under theSupreme CourtcaseWeeks v. United Statesand incorporated against the states in 1961 in the caseMapp v. Ohio. Both of these cases involved law enforcement conductingwarrantless searchesof the petitioners' homes, with incriminating evidence being described inside them.Consciousness of guiltis admissible evidence.
For evidence to be admissible, it must tend to prove or disprove some fact at issue in the proceeding.[2]However, if the utility of this evidence is outweighed by its tendency to cause the fact finder to disapprove of the party it is introduced against for some unrelated reason, it is not admissible. Furthermore, certain public-policy considerations bar the admission of otherwise relevant evidence.
For evidence to be admissible enough to be admitted, the party proffering the evidence must be able to show that the source of the evidence makes it so. If evidence is in the form ofwitnesstestimony, the party that introduces the evidence mustlay the groundworkfor the witness's credibility and knowledge.Hearsayis generally barred for its lack of reliability. If the evidence is documentary, the party proffering the evidence must be able to show that it is authentic, and must be able to demonstrate thechain of custodyfrom the original author to the present holder. The trial judge performs a "gatekeeping" role in excluding unreliable testimony. The United States Supreme Court first addressed the reliability requirement for experts in the landmark caseDaubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc..[3]The Court laid out four non-exclusive factors that trial courts may consider when evaluating scientific expert reliability: (1) whetherscientific evidencehas been tested and the methodology with which it has been tested; (2) whether the evidence has been subjected to peer review or publication; (3) whether a potential rate of error is known; and (4) whether the evidence is generally accepted in the scientific community.[3]Kumho Tire Co., Ltd. v. Carmichaellater extended theDaubertanalysis to include all expert testimony.[4]It bears an effect on the verdict of the court.
In some non-democratic legal systems, the courts effectively function as organs of those in power,[opinion]and the rules of evidence are designed to favor their interests.[citation needed]
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Deliberative process privilegeis thecommon-lawprinciple that the internal processes of the executive branch of a government are immune from normal disclosure or discovery in civil litigations,Freedom of Information Actrequests, etc.
The theory behind the protection is that by guaranteeing confidentiality, the government will receive better or more candid advice, recommendations and opinions, resulting in better decisions for society as a whole. The deliberative process privilege is often in dynamic tension with the principle of maximal transparency in government.
In the context of the U.S. presidential offices and their work products, this principle is often referred to asexecutive privilege, or as a type of executive privilege that is distinct from "presidential communications privilege".
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Aprivilege logis a document that describes documents or other items withheld from production in acivil lawsuitunder a claim that the documents are "privileged" from disclosure due to theattorney–client privilege,work product doctrine, joint defense doctrine, or some other privilege. Rule 26(b)(5)(A) of theFederal Rules of Civil Procedurerequires that a party who withholds information on grounds of privilege must (i) expressly make the claim; and (ii) describe the nature of the documents, communications, or tangible things not produced or disclosed—and do so in a manner that, without revealing information itself privileged or protected, will enable other parties to assess the claim. A party withholding privileged documents from discovery complies with Rule 26(b)(5)(A) by producing a log containing the following information for each withheld document: the date, type of document, author(s), recipient(s), general subject-matter of the document, and the privilege being claimed (e.g., attorney-client). A production log or similar document may explain where documents on the privilege log were found, identify lawyers on the log, or provide other information.
Whenever a claim of privilege is made, the person making the claim has the burden of showing that the privilege applies. Therefore, it is generally the withholding party's burden to provide sufficient information on its privilege log to allow the opposing party to assess the claim of privilege, inquire further, or seekin camerareview of the withheld documents or otherCourtinvolvement, if necessary.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privilege_log
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The titlesenior administration officialis a term used by theAmericanpress to indicate the identity of a source whileretaining his or her anonymity. As the title is subjective, the reporter writing the article is allowed to decide if a source should be called one.[1][2]Most reporters require the source to have "commissioned status". These include any Assistant to the President, Deputy Assistant to the President, and Special Assistant to the President (all of these people are members of theExecutive Office of the President). However, senior administration officials almost always have the rank of Assistant. Other people that can be classified using this title include theVice Presidentand Cabinet secretaries (occasionally deputies and undersecretaries as well). Sometimes officials request that they be identified using other titles to prevent anybody from determining their true identity.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senior_administration_official
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Shield laws in the United Statesare designed to protectreporters' privilegeor to prevent prosecution when states’ laws differ, especially on the issue ofabortion.[1]Reporters’ privilege involves the right of media to refuse to testify as to the information and/or sources of information obtained during the news gathering and dissemination process. Currently, theUnited States federal governmenthas not enacted any national reporters' privilege shield laws, but most of the 50 states do have shield laws or other protections for reporters.
A shield law is a law that gives reporters protection against being forced to disclose confidential information or sources in state court. There is no federal shield law and state shield laws vary in scope. In general, however, a shield law aims to provide the protection of: "a reporter cannot be forced to reveal his or her source" Thus, a shield law provides a privilege to a reporter pursuant to which the reporter cannot be forced[2]by a subpoena or other court order to testify about information contained in a news story and/or the source of that information. Several shield laws additionally provide protection for the reporter even if the source or information is revealed during the dissemination of the news story, that is whether or not the source or information is confidential. Depending on the jurisdiction, the privilege may be total or qualified, and it may also apply to other persons involved in the news-gathering and dissemination process as well, such as an editor or a publisher. However, shield laws do not ensure absolute protection.[2]
The issue of whether or not journalists can besubpoenaedand forced to reveal confidential information arose in 1972 with theUnited States Supreme CourtcaseBranzburg v. Hayes. Paul Branzburg was a reporter forThe Courier-JournalinLouisville, Kentuckyand wrote an article about the drughashish. In creating the article, he came in contact with two local citizens who had created and used the drug. Because their activity was illegal, Branzburg promised the two individuals that he would not reveal their identities. After the article was published, Branzburg was subpoenaed by a local grand jury and ordered to reveal the identity of his sources. Branzburg refused and cited the provisions forfreedom of the pressfrom theFirst Amendment to the United States Constitutionin his defense.
The Supreme Court decided in a five to four decision that the press did not have a Constitutional right of protection from revealing confidential information in court. The court acknowledged, however, that the government must "convincingly show a substantial relation between the information sought and a subject of overriding and compelling state interest."[3]While this ruling did not set a precedent for journalistic rights in court, it did define a more stringent set of requirements for when a journalist could be subpoenaed in court.
This ruling was limited in nature, did not set a clear federal precedent regarding journalistic privileges from revealing confidential information, and thus has been interpreted and cited differently by courts over the years.https://globalfreedomofexpression.columbia.edu/cases/branzburg-v-hayes/
States differ on their approach to protecting reporter's privilege. As of 2018[update], 49 states and theDistrict of Columbiaoffer some form of protections[5]Forty states (plus D.C.) have passed shield laws.[6]These laws vary from state to state. Some protections apply to civil but not to criminal proceedings. Other laws protect journalists from revealing confidential sources, but not other information. Many states have also established court precedents which provide protection to journalists, usually based on constitutional arguments. Only Wyoming lacks both legislation and judicial precedent to protect reporter's privilege.[6]
Proponents of shield laws argue that they ensure that news gatherers may do their jobs to their fullest ability and that they help avoid a dichotomy between state laws and journalistic ethics, but the differences between states' laws has raised questions regarding which laws apply where in regard to national reporting. Proponents argue that a federal shield law should exist to eliminate contradictions between state laws.
Opponents argue that shield laws afford extra privileges to journalists and that no citizen should be able to ignore a court ordered subpoena. Opponents also cite problems with defining who is considered a journalist or news gatherer and who is not, and note that if journalists get special protection from the government, then they are getting special journalistic benefits from the government instead of acting in complete independence. Some opponents also argue that journalists are often forced to testify by federal courts only in cases where a federal shield law likely would not protect them anyway. Finally, the federal government may not have constitutional right to enforce a shield law on state courts.
Many journalists, however, are subpoenaed to testify in criminal and civil cases for coverage of a variety of matters that do not involve questions of national security.[8]In recent years, there have been bills for federal shield laws in the United States Congress; however, none of these bills have passed the Senate. A primary objection to recent efforts to pass a federal shield law has been concern about leaks of classified information, particularly given the modern potential of such leaks to be published globally on the Internet by non-traditional recipients, such as WikiLeaks, who might claim to be "journalists" under an unqualified shield law.[9]
Sometimes, the press is not even immune from its sources, such as when the source wishes to remain anonymous and the journalist wishes to disclose it. Such was the case inCohen v. Cowles Media Co.(1991).[10]The Supreme Court upheld that a source may have a right to confidentiality if an agreement was made with the reporter. Unfortunately, the bigger issue of source disclosure gets even more confusing, since theCohenandBranzburgdecisions could allow for the possibility of a journalist being subpoenaed by a court to disclose the name of a source, and being sued by a source under promissory estoppel laws for that disclosure. The current laws of the land, and the gray areas of forecasting potential consequences of publishing a story with confidential sources places the press in a very precarious situation. The current shield laws in some states give the press somewhat of an upper hand. However, since federal law does not recognize reportorial privilege in most cases, it is understandable how the press might feel muzzled.
The shield law privilege may also be waived by a reporter, as theNew Jersey Supreme Courtrecently found in the case ofIn re Michael G. Venezia.[11]In that case, a New Jersey newspaper published an article containing defamatory statements about the plaintiff. The article attributed the statements to a source who was identified by name in the article; the source later denied making the defamatory statements. The plaintiff filed a defamation lawsuit against the newspaper, the reporter and the alleged source of the defamatory statements. When the plaintiff sought to question the newspaper reporter about the article, the reporter and his newspaper refused, claiming protection under New Jersey's shield law.[12]It was discovered, however, that the reporter had already given a statement under oath concerning the article—and, most important, the alleged source of the statement and exactly what that source said—to a local county prosecutor's office. The reporter also talked about his source and what the source said with a local municipal attorney. TheVeneziacourt unanimously held that, while New Jersey has arguably the most protective shield law in the United States, a reporter waives the privilege when he talks about his sources and information outside of the newsgathering process, as did the reporter inVenezia.TheVeneziacourt stated: "The privilege holder is not permitted to step from behind the shield as he pleases, sallying forth one moment to make a disclosure to one person and then to seek the shield's protection from having to repeat the same disclosure to another person. A reporter cannot play peek-a-boo with the privilege." Thus, theVeneziacourt ordered that the reporter must submit to the plaintiff's deposition request.Veneziais highly significant because it marks the first time that a reporter has ever been found to have waived the privilege under New Jersey's current shield law, and because it explores the issue of what is or is not a "newsgathering activity," and, thus, what activ ities are subject to protection under the law.https://law.justia.com/cases/new-jersey/supreme-court/2007/a-63-05-doc.html#:~:text=As%20clearly%20established%20in%20our%20case%20law%2C,an%20article%20evaluating%20the%20performance%20of%20various
Currently, courts are struggling to define the standards for when shield laws should apply to non-traditional media outlets, particularly in the context of blogs and Internet publishing. InObsidian Finance Group, LLC v. Cox, theUnited States District Court for the District of Oregonfound that to qualify as a reporter, a standard of professionalism must be met, including but not limited to being associated with a traditional news print or television media outlet or obtaining a journalism degree. A subsequent opinion in the same case clarified that these were examples and not requirements; bloggers could qualify, and the denial of media status in the Cox case appears to have been largely motivated by the defendant reportedly offering to remove accusations for a substantial fee. Conversely, inThe Mortgage Specialists, Inc. v. Implode-Explode Heavy Industries, Inc.theNew Hampshire Supreme Courtadopted a much broader definition of media that applies to blogs and website curators, reiterating that "freedom of the press is a fundamental personal right which is not confined to newspapers and periodicals."[13]
In July 2013 theWhite Housewas pushing for a federal media shield law named theFree Flow of Information Act[14]authored by U.S. SenatorsCharles SchumerandLindsey Graham. Under the bill, the scope of protection for reporters would vary according to whether it was a civil case, an ordinary criminal case or a national security case. The greatest protection would be given to civil cases, in which litigants seeking to force reporters to testify or trying to obtain their calling information would be required to show why their need for the information outweighed the public's interest in unfettered news gathering. Ordinary criminal cases would work in a similar fashion, except the burden would be on the reporter seeking to quash the subpoena to show by a "clear and convincing" standard that the public interest in the free flow of information should prevail over the needs of law enforcement. Cases involving the disclosure of classified information would be more heavily tilted toward the government. Judges could not quash a subpoena through a balancing test if prosecutors presented facts showing that the information sought might help prevent a terrorist attack or other acts likely to harm national security. The legislation would create a presumption that when the government is seeking calling records from a telephone carrier, the news organization would be notified ahead of time, allowing it to fight the subpoena in court. But the bill would also allow the government to seek a 45- to 90-day delay in notification if a court determines that such notice would threaten the integrity of the investigation.[15]The legislation would also include an exception where journalists could be subpoenaed if it means national security is at risk.[citation needed]
TheProtect Reporters from Exploitative State Spying Act (PRESS Act, S.2074)is abipartisanfederal shield law designed to protect journalist-source confidentiality, with common-sense[neutralityisdisputed]exceptions for cases involving terrorism, serious emergencies, or journalists suspected of crimes. In January 2024, theU.S. House of Representativespassed the legislation unanimously. The bill broadly defines "covered journalist" to include anyone engaged in gathering, preparing, reporting, or publishing news or information of public interest, ensuring protection for both professional and unconventional journalists, as well as emerging outlets that may struggle against subpoenas.[16]As of October 2024, it was awaiting consideration by theSenate Judiciary Committee, where it has bipartisan support, including three Republican sponsors. The bill has faced opposition from a small group of conservative senators, notablyTom Cotton(R-AR), who argue it could undermine law enforcement and national security.[17]
In recent years, a larger effort by journalists to press for federal shield laws formed following thePlame affair, in which reporters who released the name ofValerie Plamewere asked who their sources were. One of the reporters,Judith MillerofThe New York Times, was jailed for 85 days in 2005 for refusing to disclose her source in the government probe.
There is also a question about whether or not journalists should be exempt from national security laws.[18]
In 2023 a paper was published in theColumbia Law Reviewabout ways in which shield laws could protect medical practitioners providingabortionwho treated patients in US states that prohibited abortion.[19]Following publication of the paper, several states passed shield laws for medical practitioners. As of July 2023[update]fifteen states had such shield laws, and five had telemedicine provisions, specifically protecting a provider who prescribed and mailed abortion pills to a patient in a state where abortion was banned.[20]From 18 June 2023Aid Accessmailed medication to patients throughout the US with providers licensed in the five states with telemedicine provisions, with no need to ship from other countries as had been necessary before. It was expected that legal battles would follow as the shield laws were tested in court. Patients themselves were not protected by the shield laws, and remained subject to prosecution for self-managing abortions.[20]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shield_laws_in_the_United_States
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Banking secrecy,[1][2]alternatively known asfinancial privacy,banking discretion, orbank safety,[3][4]is aconditional agreementbetween a bank and its clients that all foregoing activities remain secure,confidential, and private.[5]Most often associated withbanking in Switzerland, banking secrecy is prevalent inLuxembourg,Monaco,Hong Kong,Singapore,Ireland, andLebanon, among otheroff-shore banking institutions.
Otherwise known asbank–client confidentialityorbanker–client privilege,[6][7]the practice was started byItalian merchantsduring the 1600s nearNorthern Italy(a region that would become theItalian-speaking regionof Switzerland).[8]Geneva bankers established secrecysocially and through civil law in theFrench-speaking regionduring the 1700s.Swissbanking secrecy was first codified with theBanking Act of 1934, thus making it a crime to disclose client information to third parties without a client's consent. The law, coupled with a stable Swiss currency and international neutrality, prompted large capital flight to private Swiss accounts. During the 1940s,numbered bank accountswere introduced creating an enduring principle of bank secrecy that continues to be considered one of the main aspects ofprivate bankingglobally. Advances infinancial cryptography(viapublic-key cryptography) could make it possible to use anonymous electronic money and anonymous digital bearer certificates for financial privacy and anonymous Internet banking, given enabling institutions and secure computer systems.[9]
While some banking institutions voluntarily impose banking secrecy institutionally, others operate in regions where the practice is legally mandated and protected (e.g.off-shore financial centers). Almost all banking secrecy standards prohibit the disclosure of client information to third parties without consent or an acceptedcriminal complaint. Additional privacy is provided to select clients vianumbered bank accountsor underground bank vaults.
Recent research has indicated that the use of offshore financial centers has been of concern because criminals get involved with them. It is argued that these financial centers enable the actions of criminals. However, there have been attempts by global institutions to regulate money laundering and illegal activities.[10]
Numbered bank accounts, used by Swiss banks and other offshore banks located in tax havens, have been accused by the international community of being a major instrument of the underground economy, facilitating tax evasion and money laundering.[11]AfterAl Capone's 1931 condemnation for tax evasion, according to journalistLucy Komisar:
mobsterMeyer Lanskytook money fromNew Orleansslot machines and shifted it to accounts overseas. The Swiss secrecy law two years later assured him ofG-man-proof-banking.[11]Later, he bought a Swiss bank and for years deposited his Havana casino take in Miami accounts, then wired the funds to Switzerland via a network of shell andholdingcompanies and offshore accounts.[11]
Economist andNobel PrizelaureateJoseph Stiglitz, told Komisar:
You ask why, if there's an important role for a regulated banking system, do you allow a non-regulated banking system to continue? It's in the interest of some of the moneyed interests to allow this to occur. It's not an accident; it could have been shut down at any time. If you said the US, the UK, the majorG7banks will not deal with offshore bank centers that don't comply with G7 banks regulations, these banks could not exist. They only exist because they engage in transactions with standard banks.[11]
Further research inpoliticsis needed to gain a better understanding of banking secrecy.[12]For instance, the role of economic interests, competition between financial centers, and the influence of political power on international organizations like theOECDare great places to start.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banking_secrecy
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Black projectis an informal term used to describe a highlyclassified, top-secret military or defense project that is not publicly acknowledged bygovernment, military personnel, or contractors.
In the United States, the formal term for a black project is anunacknowledgedspecial access program(SAP). Black projects receive their funding from theblack budget.
The US depends on private defense contractors to develop and build military equipment. The two most notable examples areLockheed MartinandNorthrop Grumman. The R&D department of Lockheed Martin is commonly referred to asSkunk Works; it is responsible for a number of aircraft designs, highly classified R&D programs, and exotic aircraft platforms.
Two well known sites for testing of black projects arethe Nevada Test siteandArea 51.
Below are examples of previously unacknowledged black projects categorized per country.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_project
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Aclandestine cell systemis a method for organizing a group of people, such asresistancefighters,spies,mercenaries,organized crimemembers, orterrorists, to make it harder forpolice,militaryor other hostile groups to catch them. In a cell structure, each cell consists of a relatively small number of people, who know little to no information concerning organization assets (such as member identities) beyond their cell. This limits the harm that can be done to the organization as a whole by any individual cell memberdefecting, being amole, beingsurveilled, or giving up information after being apprehended and interrogated.
The structure of a clandestine cell system can range from a stricthierarchyto an extremely distributed organization, depending on the group'sideology, its operational area, thecommunications technologiesavailable, and the nature of the mission.Criminal organizations,undercover operations, and unconventional warfare units led byspecial forcesmay also use this sort of organizational structure.
Covertandclandestineoperations are not the same when it comes totradecraft. The modernNATOdefinition of a covert operation says the identity of the sponsor is concealed, but in a clandestine operation the operation itself is concealed from the participants. Put differently, clandestine means "hidden", and covert means "deniable"—that is to say that the sponsor of a covert action is sufficiently removed from it that the sponsor can claim ignorance in the event the plot is discovered.
Asleeper cellrefers to a cell, or isolated grouping ofsleeper agents, that lies dormant until it receives orders or decides to act.
In World War II,Operation Jedburghteams were formed to lead unconventional warfare against German units by acts of sabotage and leading local resistance forces. They also acted as a liaison between Allied command and the resistance units. They were composed of two officers – one American or British, and the other a native to the area they would operate, preferably from the area into which they landed – and a third member who was a radio operator. They operated in France and the Netherlands and similar teams operated in South East Asia.
On the night of the 5/6 June 1944, the firstOperation Jedburghteams parachuted into occupied France[1][2]
Especially through the French member, they would contact trusted individuals in the area of operation, and ask them to recruit a team of trusted subordinates (a subcell). If the mission was sabotage, reconnaissance, or espionage, there was no need to meet in large units. If the team was to carry out direct action (often an unwise mission unless an appreciable number of the locals had military experience) it would be necessary to assemble into larger units for combat. Even then, the hideouts of the leadership were known only to subcell leaders. The legitimacy of the Jedburgh team came from its known affiliation with Allied powers, andit was a structure more appropriate for unconventional warfare than for truly clandestine operations[clarify].
Also known as theViet Cong, this organization grew from earlier anticolonial groups fighting the French and from anti-Japanese guerrillas during World War II.[3]
The modernProvisional Irish Republican Army(PIRA) has a history going back to Irish revolutionary forces in the early 20th century. Its doctrine and organization have changed over time, as political, technological, and cultural situations have changed in Ireland.[4]
Officially, the PIRA was hierarchical, but as British security forces became more effective it changed to a semiautonomous model for its operational and for certain of its support cells (such as transportation, intelligence, cover, and security).[5]Its leadership saw itself as guiding and as building consensus. The lowest-level cells, typically of 2–5 people, tended to be built from people with existing personal relationships. British counterinsurgents could understand the command structure, but not the workings of the operational cells.
TheIRA[clarify]had an extensive network of inactive or sleeper cells, so it could summon newad hocorganizations for any specific operation.
The NLF (Viet Cong) and PIRA, as well as other movements, have chosen to become parallel. In the case of the NLF, except for some individuals with sanctuary in North Vietnam, people in the political organization could not be overt during theVietnam War. After the war ended, surviving NLF officials held high office.
In the case of the PIRA, its political wing,Sinn Féin, became increasingly overt, and then a full participant in politics.HamasandHezbollahalso have variants of overt political/social service and covert military wings.
The overt political/social–covert military split postponed the inflexibility of a completely secret organization and shortage of PMC/black-ops resources as well as redundancy.[clarify]Once an active insurgency began, the secrecycould limit[clarify]freedom of action, distort information about goals and ideals, and restrict communication within the insurgency.[6]In such a split organization, public issues can be addressed overtly while military actions are kept covert and intelligence functions stay clandestine.
Many cell systems receive support from outside the cell. This can include leaders, trainers, and supplies (such as the Jedburgh assistance to the French Resistance), or a safe haven for overt activities (such as the NLF spokesmen who could operate in Hanoi).
External support need not be overt. Certain Shi'a groups in Iraq, for example, receive assistance fromIran,[citation needed]but this is not a public position of the government of Iran, and may even be limited to factions of that government. Early U.S. support to the Afghan Northern Alliance against the Taliban used clandestine operators from theCIAandUnited States Army Special Forces. As the latter conflict escalated, U.S. participation became overt.
Note that bothunconventional warfare(guerrilla operations) andforeign internal defense(counterinsurgency) may be covert and use cellular organization.
In a covert counterinsurgency mission, only selected host nation leaders are aware of the foreign support organization. UnderOperation White Star, for example, U.S. personnel gave covert counterinsurgency assistance to the Royal Lao Army starting in 1959, this became overt in 1961, and finally ceased operations in 1962.
Different kinds of insurgency differ in where they place clandestine or covert cells. Also, when certain types of insurgency grow in power, they deemphasize the cell system. They may still use cells for leadership security, but if overt violence by organized units becomes significant, cells become less important. In Mao's three-stage doctrine,[7]cells are still useful in Phase II to give cover to part-time guerillas, but as the insurgency creates full-time military units in Phase III, the main units become the focus, not the cells.
Different varieties of insurgency place their cells differently with respect to the existing government. The U.S. Army Field Manual FM3-07 distinguishes between varieties of insurgencies.[8]Drawing on this work, Nyberg (aUnited States Marine Corpsofficer) describes four types of cell system[9](there is also a new type associated with transnational terrorist insurgencies):
The examples here will useCIA cryptonymsas a naming convention used to identify members of the cell system. Cryptonyms begin with a two-letter country or subject name (e.g., AL), followed by more letters so as to form an arbitrary word, such as "BERRY", "BEN", and "BEATLE" in the example below.
Station BERRY operates, on behalf of country B, in target country BE. The station has three case officers and several support officers. Case officer BETTY supervises the local agents BEN and BEATLE. Case officer BESSIE supervises BENSON and BEAGLE.
Some recruits, due to the sensitivity of their position or their personalities not being appropriate for cell leadership, might not enter cells but be run as singletons, perhaps by other than the recruiting case officer. In this example, asset BARD isa different sort of highly sensitive[clarify]singleton, who is a joint asset of the country B, and the country identified by prefix AR. ARNOLD is a case officer from the country AR embassy, who knows only the case officer BERTRAM and the security officer BEST. ARNOLD does not know the station chief of BERRY or any of its other personnel. Other than BELL and BEST, the Station personnel only know BERTRAM as someone authorized to be in the Station, and who is known for his piano playing at embassy parties. He iscovered[clarify]as Cultural Attache, in a country that has very few pianos. Only the personnel involved with BARD know that ARNOLD is other than anotherfriendly[clarify]diplomat.
In contrast, BESSIE and BETTY know one another, and procedures exist for their taking over each other's assets in the event one of the two is disabled.
Some recruits, however, would be qualified to recruit their own subcell, as BEATLE has done. BETTY knows the identity of BEATLE-1 and BEATLE-2, since he or she had them checked by headquarters counterintelligence before they were recruited.
The diagram in this section shows that two teams, ALAN and ALICE, have successfully entered an area of operation, the country coded AL, but are only aware of a pool of potential recruits, and have not yet actually recruited anyone. They communicate with one another only through headquarters, so compromise of one team will not affect the other.
Assume that in team ALAN, ALASTAIR is one of the officers with local contacts, and might recruit two cell leaders: ALPINE and ALTITUDE. The other local officer in the team, ALBERT, recruits ALLOVER. When ALPINE recruited two subcell members, they would be referred to as ALPINE-1 and ALPINE-2.
ALPINE and ALTITUDE only know how to reach ALASTAIR, but they are aware of at least some of other team members' identities should ALASTAIR be unavailable, and they would accept a message from ALBERT. Most often, the identity (and location) of the radio operator may not be shared. ALPINE and ALTITUDE, however, do not know one another. They do not know any of the members of team ALICE.
Thelegitimacy[clarify]of the subcell structure came from the recruitment process, originally by the case officer and then by the cell leaders. The cell leader might propose subcell member names to the case officer, so the case officer could have headquarters run a background check on the potential recruit before bringing them into the subcell. In principle, however, the subcell members would know ALPINE, and sometimes the other members of the ALPINE cell if they needed to work together; if ALPINE-1 and ALPINE-2 had independent assignments, they might not know each other. ALPINE-1 and ALPINE-2 certainly would not know ALASTAIR or anyone in the ALTITUDE or ALLOVER cells.
As the networks grow, a subcell leader might create her or his own cell, so ALPINE-2 might become the leader of the ALIMONY cell.
Modern communications theory has introduced methods to increasefault tolerancein cell organizations. Game theory and graph theory have been applied to the study of optimal covert network design.[12]
In the past, if cell members only knew the cell leader, and the leader was neutralized, the cell was cut off from the rest of the organization. But if a traditional cell had independent communications with the foreign support organization, headquarters might be able to arrange its reconnection. Another method is to have impersonal communications as "side links" between cells, such as a pair ofdead drops, one for Team ALAN to leave "lost contact" messages to be retrieved by Team ALICE, and another dead drop for Team ALICE to leave messages for Team ALAN.
These links, to be used only onlosing contact[clarify], do not guarantee a contact. When a team finds a message in its emergency drop, it might do no more than send an alert message to headquarters. Headquarters might determine, throughSIGINTor other sources, that the enemy had captured the leadership and the entire team, and order the other team not to attempt contact. If headquarters can have reasonable confidence that there is a communications failure or partial compromise, it might send a new contact to the survivors.
Whenthe cut-off team[clarify]has electronic communications, such as the Internet, it has a much better chance of eluding surveillance and getting emergency instructions than by using a dead drop that can be under physical surveillance.[citation needed]
If theal-Qaeda Training Manual[13]is authentic, it demonstrates that Eastern cell structures may differ from the Western mode. Al-Qaeda's minimal core leadership group can be viewed as a ring or chain network, with each leader/node heading their own particular hierarchy.
Such networks function by having their sub-networks provide information and other forms of support (the 'many-to-one' model), while the core group supplies 'truth' and decisions/directions (the 'one-to-many' model). Trust and personal relationships are an essential part of the Al-Qaeda network (a limiting factor[clarify], even while it provides enhanced security). Cell members are trained as 'replaceable' units and 'vetting' of members occurs during the training period under the observation of the core group.[14]
Cells of this structure arebuilt outwards, from[clarify]an internal leadership core. Superficially, this might be likened to a Western cell structure that emanates from a headquarters, but the Western centrality is bureaucratic, while structures in other non-Western cultures build on close personal relationships, often built over years, perhaps involving family or other in-group linkages. Such in-groups are thus extremely hard to infiltrate. Still, it may be possible for an in-group to be compromised throughCOMINTor, in rare cases, by compromising a member.
The core group is a ring, superimposed on aninner hub-and-spoke structure of ideological authority[clarify]. Each member of the core forms another hub and spoke system, the spokes leading toinfrastructure cellsunder the supervision of the core group member, and possibly to operational groups that the headquarters supports. In an organization like this, there is a point at which the operational cell becomes autonomous of the core.Members surviving the operation may rejoin at various points.[clarify]
Osama bin Laden, in this model, had the responsibility of commanding the organization and being the spokesman on propaganda messages distributed by the propaganda cell. The other members of the core each command one or more infrastructure cells.
Whilethe tight coupling[clarify]enhances security, it can limit flexibility and the ability to scale the organization. The in-group values that tie the cell together initially, shared cultural and ideological values, are not sufficient to create additional loyalty to a bureaucratic process.
"Members of the core group are under what could be termed 'positive control'—long relationships and similar mindsets make 'control' not so much of an issue, but there are distinct roles, and position (structural, financial, spiritual) determines authority, thus making the core group a hierarchy topologically."[14]
In the illustration of the core shown here, each member knows how to reach two other members, and also knows the member(s) he or she considers her or his ideological superior. Solid lines show basic communication, dotted red arrows showthe first level of ideological respect[clarify], and dotted blue arrows show a second level of ideological respect.
If Osama, the most respected, died, the core would reconstitute itself. While different members each have an individual ideological guide, and these are not the same for all members, the core would reconstitute itself with (in our example) Richard as most respected.
Assume there are no losses, and Osama can be reached directly only by members of the core group. Members of outer cells and support systems might know him only as "the Commander", or, as in the actual case of al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden's face is recognizable worldwide, but only a few people knew where he was or even how to contact him.
Any clandestine or covert service, especially a non-national one, needs a variety of technical and administrative functions, such as:[14]
A national intelligence service[15]has a support organization to deal with services like finance, logistics, facilities (e.g.,safehouses), information technology, communications, training, weapons and explosives, medical services, etc. Transportation alone is a huge function, including the need to buy tickets without drawing suspicion, and, where appropriate, using private vehicles. Finance includes the need to transfer money without coming to the attention of financial security organizations.
Some of these functions, such as finance, are far harder to operate in remote areas (like theFATAofPakistan) than in cities with large numbers of official and unofficial financial institutions and the communications to support them. If the financial office is distant from the remote headquarters, there is a need forcouriers, who must be trusted to some extent, but who may not know the contents of their messages or the actual identity of the sender and/or receiver. The couriers, depending on the balance among type and size of message, security, and technology available, may memorize messages, carry audio or video recordings, or hand-carry computer media.
These cells are socially embedded (less so than the core group, however), structurally embedded, functionally embedded (they are specialized into a domain), and knowledge base-specific (there does not seem to be a great deal of cross-training or lateral mobility in the organization). Such cells are probably subjected to a mixture of both positive and negative control ('do this, do these sorts of things, don't do that').[14]
The leader of a military cell is responsible for training its members, and, when an operation is scheduled, selecting the operational commander, giving her or him the basic objective and arranging whatever support is needed, and then releasing her or him from tight control to execute themeeting[clarify]. Military leaders might have direct, possibly one-way, communications with their cells, or they might have to give Kim the messages to be transmitted, by means that Anton and Hassan have no need to know.
Note that Anton does not have a direct connection to Kim. Under normal circumstances, he sacrifices efficiency for security, by passing communications requests through Hassan.[clarify]The security structure also means that Hassan does not know the members of Anton's cells, and Kim may know only ways to communicate with them but not their identity.
Kim operates two systems of cells, one for secure communications and one for propaganda. To send out a propaganda message, Osama must pass it to Kim. If Kim were compromised, the core group might have significant problems with any sort of outside communications.
Terrorist networks do notmatch cleanly[clarify]to other cell systems that regularly report to a headquarters. The apparent al-Qaeda methodology, of letting operational cells decide on their final dates and means of attack, exhibitsan operational pattern, but not a periodicity[clarify]that could easily be used for anindications checklistappropriate for a warning center. Such lists depend on seeing alocal[clarify]pattern to give a specific warning.[16]
Note that Hassan has two subordinates that have not yet established operational cells. These subordinates can be consideredsleepers, but not necessarily with a sleeper cell.
For each mission, one or more operational cellsare created[clarify]. If al-Qaeda uses its typicalmodus operandiof multiple concurrent attacks, there may be an operational cell for each target location. Some operations may need support cells in the operational area. For example, it may be more secure to have a local cell build bombs, which will be delivered by cells coming from outside the area.
Operational cells are not created, but instead 'seeded' utilizing individuals spotted or that request assistance (both groups are 'vetted' by being trained under the observation of the core group, which dramatically restricts the opportunity for passing off walk-ins under false flag). Categorization of operational cells appears to be by capabilities, region, and then task/operation. Operational cells are composed of members whose worldview has been firmly tested—necessary to front-load, because such cells are dispersed back to their own local control (or negative control—proscribed behavior—with positive control only coming in the form of contact for synchronization or support).[14]
U.S. special operations forces sometimes wait for presidential authorization to make an attack, or even to move to staging areas. A country would have to face the consequences of an inappropriate attack, so it may tend to be overcautious, whereas a terror network might merely shrug at the world being upset. Assuming that the al-Qaeda operational technique is not to usepositive control[clarify], their operations may be morerandom, but[clarify]also more unpredictable for counterterror forces. If their cells need constant control, there are communications links that might be detected by SIGINT, and if their command can be disrupted, the field units could not function. Since there is fairly little downside for terrorists to attack out of synchronization with other activities, the lack of positive control becomes a strength of their approach to cell organization.
Operational cells need to have continuous internal communication; there is a commander, who may be in touch with infrastructure cells or, less likely from a security standpoint, with the core group.
Al-Qaeda's approach differs from that of earlier terrorist organizations:
In the above graphic, note the indirect support network controlled by Richard's subcell.
"While Al-Qaeda has elements of the organization designed to support the structure, but such elements are insufficient in meeting the needs of such an organization, and for security reasons there would be redundant and secondary-/tertiary-networks that are unaware of their connection to Al-Qaeda. These networks, primarily related to fundraising and financial activities, as well as technology providers, are in a 'use' relationship with Al-Qaeda—managed through cut-outs or individuals that do not inform them of the nature of activities, and that may have a cover pretext sufficient to deflect questions or inquiry."[14]
In 2002,U.S. News & World Reportsaid that American intelligence was beginning to acquire intelligence on al-Qaeda indicating that "[o]nce thought nearly impossible to penetrate, al-Qaeda is proving no tougher a target than theKGBor the Mafia—closed societies that took the U.S. government years to get inside. 'We're getting names, the different camps they trained at, the hierarchy, the infighting,' says an intelligence official. 'It's very promising.'"[17]The report also said that the collected data has allowed the recruiting of informants.
Writing in the U.S. Army journalMilitary Review, David W. Pendall suggested that a "catch-and-release program for suspected operatives might create reluctance or distrust in such suspects and prevent them from further acts or, perhaps more important, create distrust in the cell leaders of these individuals in the future." The author noted the press release describingRamzi bin al-Shibh's cooperation with the United States is "sure to prevent reentry into a terrorist cell as a trusted member and most likely limits the further trust and assignments of close cell associates still at large. The captor would determine when to name names and when to remain silent."[18]Indeed, once intelligence learns the name and characteristics of an at-large adversary, as well as some sensitive information that would plausibly be known to him, a news release could be issued to talk about his cooperation. Such a method could not be used too often, but, used carefully, could disturb the critical trust networks. The greatest uncertainty might be associated with throwing doubt onto a key member of an operational cell that has gone autonomous.[citation needed]
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Concealment devicesordiversion safesare used to hide things for the purpose ofsecrecyorsecurity. They are made from an ordinary household object such as a book, a soda can, a candle, a can, or something as small as a coin. The idea is that such an inconspicuous object would not be expected to contain anything of worth.[1]
Examples inespionageincludedead dropspikes for transferring items to other people, and hollowed-out coins or hollowed out teeth for concealing something - such as microfilm or asuicidepill. Examples insmugglingincludesuitcaseswithfalse bottomsfor hidingcontraband.
DuringWorld War IIMI9was responsible for creating many concealment devices for "escape aids" to assistprisoners of warto escape.
Starting in theFirst World Warand still continuing today, military personnel useammunitioncasings to hide small amounts of critical information[citation needed]e.g. encryption/recognition codes or navigational grid references etc. The hiding place is very easy to prepare: the bullet is removed from thecartridgeand the propellant powder poured away. A small piece of paper with writing on it can be stored inside. Given that ammunition can be found everywhere in a combat zone, it is very easy to hide or discard such items because they blend in easily. Similarly, if a soldier is captured, the enemy expects that soldiers will have ammunition in their pockets, so little attention is paid, beyond confiscating and discarding it.
Booksare possibly the most common concealment devices in usage. They are easily made and can contain quite large objects. They are also very difficult for outsiders to spot but easy to recognize for those that are looking for a specific book on a shelf.
A new type, the hollow candle looks like a large scentedcandlebut is mostly hollow. The bottom comes off and rolled papers or small objects can be placed and hidden inside. Some of the most clever of these contraptions looked like large, ordinary black candles with a felt base concealing the opening. To open them, two metal needles are poked through the felt at certain points and an electric current passed through, causing them to open.[citation needed]
"Trap"is a colloquial term for a secret compartment in an automobile. It can be intended to hide legal items, such as handguns or valuables, from thieves. But it can also be used to hidecontraband, such as illegal drugs, from searches by authorities.[2]
Until the 1980s, drugs trafficked in cars in the U.S. tended to be hidden in obvious places such as wheel wells or spare tires.[citation needed]In the early 1980s, the first magnetically or hydraulically actuated secret compartments, dubbed "urban traps" by theDrug Enforcement Administration, started to appear – often in door panels, dashboards, seats and roofs. By the early 1990s, however, police had learned to detect such traps by looking for suspicious buttons and switches. More recent traps have no visible controls, are electronically controlled and may require complicated procedures for access. For example, one trap found in the airbag compartment of a U.S. car in 2012 would only open if a driver was in the seat, all doors were closed (to prevent the trap from opening during a roadside police search), the defroster was turned on and a magnetic card was swiped over a sensor hidden in an air-conditioning vent.[2]
The legality of traps is dependent on the jurisdiction in which they are used.[3]In 2012, Alfred Anaya, famous among rich clients in California for his skill in installing sophisticated traps, was sentenced to more than 24 years in prison under U.S. federal law as a co-conspirator in a drug-trafficking operation. The conviction relied on testimony that Anaya had seen one of his clients stash some $800,000 in cash in a trap. The prosecution successfully argued that Anaya must have deduced from this that the trap was to be used for drug trafficking.[2]
Also a new form of concealment device, mock cans of various household chemicals or food and drinks can be purchased. A wide variety of commonly used personal care, household products and food containers with removable tops and bottoms are available. Valuables can be discreetly stored inside these lookalike containers and kept in their seemingly rightful places. Each of these diversion safes are indistinguishable from the genuine product, and can thus avoid detection, and they may even be weighted to feel full.[4]
A hollow container, fashioned to look like anEisenhower dollar, is still used today to hide and send messages or film without being detected. Because it resembles ordinary pocket change, it is virtually undetectable as a concealment device. If a hollow coin is suspected, it sometimes can be easily confirmed by weighing against a normal coin on a simple balance. However, more sophisticated hollow coins have had their weight adjusted to match an unaltered coin by including a ring of a dense metal such as lead inside the coin. Typically coins that have no gold or silver content are used so as to further avoid suspicion.
Such hollow coins were created from two ordinary coins, bymillingout one face and the interior of both coins (to create a cavity), and the edges of one (so it could slide into the other). The half coin with intact edges would also have a pin-prick size hole drilled through its face, so the device could be opened by inserting a pin. A scratch may be added to help line up the faces while closing it—although it is very difficult to detect a slight misalignment by casual inspection. A device of this nature was famously discovered by a paper boy in the "Hollow Nickel Case".U-2pilotFrancis Gary Powerswas issued with a hollow silver dollar containing a tiny,saxitoxin-impregnated needle,[5]to be used tocommit suicidein case of capture by enemy forces.
A device whereby a safe-looking safe is left open but has ahidden compartment(e.g., in the door) where small valuable articles can be hidden. As an alternative variant, a safe may be "stocked" with some lesser valuables, with the expectation that it will be burgled, but that the real safe or hiding place for the important valuables will be missed.
A fake electrical outlet, which can be pulled out from the wall and which contains a hidden compartment for storage.
Concealment furniture is furniture that has been specially designed to hide guns and other weapons.[6]The furniture can be made of different materials, but the most popular ones are wood, plastic, and metal. The first concealment furniture was invented in 1939 byJohn BrowningJr., who was a well-known gun designer.[7]He invented a gun cabinet that could be used as a desk or armoire. It was made with an upper section that could be easily removed to access the hidden compartment for guns and ammunition.
Some concealment furniture pieces are designed for handguns, while others hold shotguns and rifles as well.
Thin objects such as papers/money can be concealed in or behind theframeof apainting.
Computer equipment andconsumer electronicscan easily be used for concealing goods and information. Usually the only tool required is a screwdriver, the device can be opened up, have the majority of the electronic and mechanical components removed and replaced with the goods to be concealed. Some of the more common devices used for this purpose are video players such as VHS, CD, DVD and Blu-ray players, computer accessories such as DVD-ROM drives and hard disk drives, battery packs or even a laptop computer itself. More often than not, the majority of the components will be removed to allow more space to conceal an item, but that will render the device inoperable and may arouse suspicion, and it may be of more benefit to preserve the operation of the device at the sacrifice of space. Additionally, the electronic device itself may be subject to theft, thereby defeating the purpose of such a concealment device. In other cases, items may be stored in parts of the machine without having to render it unusable - free space in the form of caddies that would normally be occupied by secondary and tertiary hard drives or disk drives can be large enough to store small items such as money and other valuables.
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Aconspiracy theoryis an explanation for an event or situation that asserts the existence of aconspiracy(generally by powerful sinister groups, often political in motivation),[3][4][5]when other explanations are more probable.[3][6][7]The term generally has a negativeconnotation, implying that the appeal of a conspiracy theory is based in prejudice, emotional conviction, or insufficient evidence.[8]A conspiracy theory is distinct from a conspiracy; it refers to a hypothesized conspiracy with specific characteristics, including but not limited to opposition to the mainstream consensus among those who are qualified to evaluate its accuracy, such asscientistsorhistorians.[9][10][11]
Conspiracy theories tend to be internally consistent and correlate with each other;[12]they are generally designed to resistfalsificationeither by evidence against them or a lack of evidence for them.[13]They are reinforced bycircular reasoning: both evidence against the conspiracyandabsence of evidence for it are misinterpreted as evidence of its truth.[8][14]Stephan Lewandowskyobserves "This interpretation relies on the notion that, the stronger the evidence against a conspiracy, the more the conspirators must want people to believe their version of events."[15]As a consequence, the conspiracy becomes a matter of faith rather than something that can be proven or disproven.[1][16]Studies have linked belief in conspiracy theories to distrust of authority and politicalcynicism.[17][18][19]Some researchers suggest thatconspiracist ideation—belief in conspiracy theories—may be psychologically harmful or pathological.[20][21]Such belief is correlated withpsychological projection,paranoia, andMachiavellianism.[22][23]
Psychologists usually attribute belief in conspiracy theories to a number of psychopathological conditions such asparanoia,schizotypy,narcissism, andinsecure attachment,[9]or to a form ofcognitive biascalled "illusory pattern perception".[24][25]It has also been linked with the so-calledDark triadpersonality types, whose common feature is lack ofempathy.[26]However, a 2020 review article found that mostcognitive scientistsview conspiracy theorizing as typically nonpathological, given that unfounded belief in conspiracy is common across both historical and contemporary cultures, and may arise from innate human tendencies towards gossip, group cohesion, and religion.[9]One historical review of conspiracy theories concluded that "Evidence suggests that the aversive feelings that people experience when in crisis—fear, uncertainty, and the feeling of being out of control—stimulate a motivation to make sense of the situation, increasing the likelihood of perceiving conspiracies in social situations."[27]
Historically, conspiracy theories have been closely linked toprejudice,propaganda,witch hunts,wars, andgenocides.[12][28][29][30][31]They are often strongly believed by the perpetrators ofterrorist attacks, and were used as justification byTimothy McVeighandAnders Breivik, as well as by governments such asNazi Germany, theSoviet Union,[28]andTurkey.[32]AIDS denialismby the government ofSouth Africa, motivated by conspiracy theories, caused an estimated 330,000 deaths from AIDS.[33][34][35]QAnonanddenialismabout the2020 United States presidential electionresults led to theJanuary 6 United States Capitol attack,[36][37][38]and belief inconspiracy theories about genetically modified foodsled the government ofZambiato reject food aid during afamine,[29]at a time when three million people in the country were suffering fromhunger.[39]Conspiracy theories are a significant obstacle to improvements inpublic health,[29][40]encouraging opposition to such public health measures asvaccinationandwater fluoridation. They have been linked to outbreaks ofvaccine-preventable diseases.[29][33][40][41]Other effects of conspiracy theories include reduced trust inscientific evidence,[12][29][42]radicalization and ideological reinforcement ofextremistgroups,[28][43]and negative consequences for theeconomy.[28]
Conspiracy theories once limited to fringe audiences have become commonplace inmass media, theInternet, andsocial media,[9][12]emerging as acultural phenomenonof the late 20th and early 21st centuries.[44][45][46][47]They are widespread around the world and are often commonly believed, some even held by the majority of the population.[48][49][50]Interventions to reduce the occurrence of conspiracy beliefs include maintaining anopen society, encouraging people to useanalytical thinking, and reducing feelings of uncertainty, anxiety, or powerlessness.[42][48][49][51]
TheOxford English Dictionarydefinesconspiracy theoryas "the theory that an event or phenomenon occurs as a result of a conspiracy between interested parties;spec.a belief that some covert but influential agency (typically political in motivation and oppressive in intent) is responsible for an unexplained event". It cites a 1909 article inThe American Historical Reviewas the earliest usage example,[52][53]although it also appeared in print for several decades before.[54]
The earliest known usage was by the American authorCharles Astor Bristed, in a letter to the editor published inThe New York Timeson 11 January 1863.[55]He used it to refer to claims that British aristocrats were intentionallyweakening the United States during the American Civil Warin order to advance their financial interests.
England has had quite enough to do in Europe and Asia, without going out of her way to meddle with America. It was a physical and moral impossibility that she could be carrying on a gigantic conspiracy against us. But our masses, having only a rough general knowledge of foreign affairs, and not unnaturally somewhat exaggerating the space which we occupy in the world's eye, do not appreciate the complications which rendered such a conspiracy impossible. They only look at the sudden right-about-face movement of the English Press and public, which is most readily accounted for on the conspiracy theory.[55]
The term is also used as a way to discreditdissentinganalyses.[56]Robert Blaskiewicz comments that examples of the term were used as early as the nineteenth century and states that its usage has always been derogatory.[57]According to a study by Andrew McKenzie-McHarg, in contrast, in the nineteenth century the termconspiracy theorysimply "suggests a plausible postulate of a conspiracy" and "did not, at this stage, carry any connotations, either negative or positive", though sometimes a postulate so-labeled was criticized.[58]The author and activistGeorge Monbiotargued that the terms "conspiracy theory" and "conspiracy theorist" are misleading, as conspiracies truly exist andtheoriesare "rational explanations subject to disproof". Instead, he proposed the terms "conspiracy fiction" and "conspiracy fantasist".[59]
The term "conspiracy theory" is itself the subject of a conspiracy theory, which posits that the term was popularized by theCIAin order to discredit conspiratorial believers, particularly critics of theWarren Commission, by making them a target of ridicule.[60]In his 2013 bookConspiracy Theory in America, the political scientist Lance deHaven-Smith wrote that the term entered everyday language in the United States after 1964, the year in which the Warren Commission published its findings on theassassination of John F. Kennedy, withThe New York Timesrunning five stories that year using the term.[61]
Whether the CIA was responsible for popularising the term "conspiracy theory" was analyzed by Michael Butter, a Professor of American Literary and Cultural History at theUniversity of Tübingen. Butter wrote in 2020 that the CIA documentConcerning Criticism of the Warren Report, which proponents of the theory use as evidence of CIA motive and intention, does not contain the phrase "conspiracy theory" in the singular, and only uses the term "conspiracy theories" once, in the sentence: "Conspiracy theories have frequently thrown suspicion on our organisation [sic], for example, by falsely alleging thatLee Harvey Oswaldworked for us."[62]
A conspiracy theory is not simply aconspiracy, which refers to any covert plan involving two or more people.[10]In contrast, the term "conspiracy theory" refers tohypothesizedconspiracies that have specific characteristics. For example, conspiracist beliefs invariably oppose the mainstream consensus among those people who are qualified to evaluate their accuracy, such asscientistsorhistorians.[11]Conspiracy theorists see themselves as having privileged access to socially persecuted knowledge or a stigmatized mode of thought that separates them from the masses who believe the official account.[10]Michael Barkundescribes a conspiracy theory as a "template imposed upon the world to give the appearance of order to events".[10]
Real conspiracies, even very simple ones, are difficult to conceal and routinely experience unexpected problems.[63]In contrast, conspiracy theories suggest that conspiracies are unrealistically successful and that groups of conspirators, such asbureaucracies, can act with near-perfect competence and secrecy. The causes of events or situations are simplified to exclude complex or interacting factors, as well as the role of chance and unintended consequences. Nearly all observations are explained as having been deliberately planned by the alleged conspirators.[63]
In conspiracy theories, the conspirators are usually claimed to be acting with extreme malice.[63]As described by Robert Brotherton:
The malevolent intent assumed by most conspiracy theories goes far beyond everyday plots borne out of self-interest, corruption, cruelty, and criminality. The postulated conspirators are not merely people with selfish agendas or differing values. Rather, conspiracy theories postulate a black-and-white world in which good is struggling against evil. The general public is cast as the victim of organised persecution, and the motives of the alleged conspirators often verge on pure maniacal evil. At the very least, the conspirators are said to have an almost inhuman disregard for the basic liberty and well-being of the general population. More grandiose conspiracy theories portray the conspirators as being Evil Incarnate: of having caused all the ills from which we suffer, committing abominable acts of unthinkable cruelty on a routine basis, and striving ultimately to subvert or destroy everything we hold dear.[63]
A conspiracy theory may take any matter as its subject, but certain subjects attract greater interest than others. Favored subjects include famous deaths and assassinations, morally dubious government activities, suppressed technologies, and "false flag" terrorism. Among the longest-standing and most widely recognized conspiracy theories are notions concerning theassassination of John F. Kennedy, the1969 Apollo Moon landings, and the9/11 terrorist attacks, as well as numerous theories pertaining to alleged plots for world domination by various groups, both real and imaginary.[64]
Conspiracy beliefs are widespread around the world.[48]In rural Africa, common targets of conspiracy theorizing include societal elites, enemy tribes, and the Western world, with conspirators often alleged to enact their plans via sorcery or witchcraft; one common belief identifies modern technology as itself being a form of sorcery, created with the goal of harming or controlling the people.[48]In China, one widely published conspiracy theory claims that a number of events including therise of Hitler, the1997 Asian financial crisis, andclimate changewere planned by theRothschild family, which may have led to effects on discussions aboutChina's currency policy.[49][65]
Conspiracy theories once limited to fringe audiences have become commonplace inmass media, contributing to conspiracism emerging as acultural phenomenonin the United States of the late 20th and early 21st centuries.[44][45][46][47]The general predisposition to believe conspiracy theories cuts across partisan and ideological lines. Conspiratorial thinking is correlated with antigovernmental orientations and a low sense of political efficacy, with conspiracy believers perceiving a governmental threat to individual rights and displaying a deep skepticism that who one votes for really matters.[66]
Conspiracy theories are often commonly believed, some even being held by the majority of the population.[48][49][50]A broad cross-section of Americans today gives credence to at least some conspiracy theories.[67]For instance, a study conducted in 2016 found that 10% of Americans think thechemtrail conspiracy theoryis "completely true" and 20–30% think it is "somewhat true".[68]This puts "the equivalent of 120 million Americans in the 'chemtrails are real' camp".[68]Belief in conspiracy theories has therefore become a topic of interest for sociologists, psychologists and experts infolklore.
Conspiracy theories are widely present on theWebin the form ofblogsandYouTubevideos, as well as onsocial media. Whether the Web has increased the prevalence of conspiracy theories or not is an open research question.[69]The presence and representation of conspiracy theories insearch engineresults has been monitored and studied, showing significant variation across different topics, and a general absence of reputable, high-quality links in the results.[70]
One conspiracy theory that propagated through former US President Barack Obama's time in office[71]claimed that he wasborn in Kenya, instead of Hawaii where he was actually born.[72]Former governor of Arkansas and political opponent of ObamaMike Huckabeemade headlines in 2011[73]when he, among other members ofRepublicanleadership, continued to question Obama's citizenship status.
A conspiracy theory can be local or international, focused on single events or covering multiple incidents and entire countries, regions and periods of history.[10]According toRussell MuirheadandNancy Rosenblum, historically, traditional conspiracism has entailed a "theory", but over time, "conspiracy" and "theory" have become decoupled, as modern conspiracism is often without any kind of theory behind it.[75][76]
Jesse Walker(2013) has identified five kinds of conspiracy theories:[77]
Michael Barkunhas identified three classifications of conspiracy theory:[78]
Murray Rothbardargues in favor of a model that contrasts "deep" conspiracy theories to "shallow" ones. According to Rothbard, a "shallow" theorist observes an event and asksCui bono?("Who benefits?"), jumping to the conclusion that a posited beneficiary is responsible for covertly influencing events. On the other hand, the "deep" conspiracy theorist begins with a hunch and then seeks out evidence. Rothbard describes this latter activity as a matter of confirming with certain facts one's initial paranoia.[79]
Belief in conspiracy theories is generally based not on evidence but on the faith of the believer.[80]Noam Chomskycontrasts conspiracy theory toinstitutional analysis, which focuses mainly on the public, long-term behavior of publicly known institutions, as recorded in, for example, scholarly documents ormainstream mediareports.[81]Conspiracy theory conversely posits the existence of secretive coalitions of individuals and speculates on their alleged activities.[82][83]Belief in conspiracy theories is associated with biases in reasoning, such as theconjunction fallacy.[84]
Clare Birchall atKing's College Londondescribes conspiracy theory as a "form of popular knowledge or interpretation".[a]The use of the word 'knowledge' here suggests ways in which conspiracy theory may be considered in relation to legitimate modes of knowing.[b]The relationship between legitimate and illegitimate knowledge, Birchall claims, is closer than common dismissals of conspiracy theory contend.[86]
Theories involving multiple conspirators that are proven to be correct, such as theWatergate scandal, are usually referred to asinvestigative journalismorhistorical analysisrather than conspiracy theory.[87]Bjerg (2016) writes: "the way we normally use
the term conspiracy theory excludes instances where the theory has been
generally accepted as true. The Watergate scandal serves as the standard
reference."[88]By contrast, the term "Watergate conspiracy theory" is used to refer to a variety of hypotheses in which those convicted in the conspiracy were in fact the victims of a deeper conspiracy.[89]There are also attempts to analyze the theory of conspiracy theories (conspiracy theory theory) to ensure that the term "conspiracy theory" is used to refer to narratives that have been debunked by experts, rather than as a generalized dismissal.[90]
Conspiracy theory rhetoric exploits several importantcognitive biases, includingproportionality bias,attribution bias, andconfirmation bias.[33]Their arguments often take the form of asking reasonable questions, but without providing an answer based on strong evidence.[91]Conspiracy theories are most successful when proponents can gather followers from the general public, such as in politics, religion and journalism. These proponents may not necessarily believe the conspiracy theory; instead, they may just use it in an attempt to gain public approval. Conspiratorial claims can act as a successful rhetorical strategy to convince a portion of the public viaappeal to emotion.[29]
Conspiracy theories typically justify themselves by focusing on gaps or ambiguities in knowledge, and then arguing that the true explanation for thismust be a conspiracy.[63]In contrast, any evidence that directly supports their claims is generally of low quality. For example, conspiracy theories are often dependent oneyewitness testimony, despite its unreliability, while disregarding objective analyses of the evidence.[63]
Conspiracy theories are not able to befalsifiedand are reinforced byfallacious arguments. In particular, the logical fallacycircular reasoningis used by conspiracy theorists: both evidence against the conspiracy and an absence of evidence for it are re-interpreted as evidence of its truth,[8][14]whereby the conspiracy becomes a matter of faith rather than something that can be proved or disproved.[1][16]The epistemic strategy of conspiracy theories has been called "cascade logic": each time new evidence becomes available, a conspiracy theory is able to dismiss it by claiming that even more people must be part of the cover-up.[29][63]Any information that contradicts the conspiracy theory is suggested to be disinformation by the alleged conspiracy.[42]Similarly, the continued lack of evidence directly supporting conspiracist claims is portrayed as confirming the existence of a conspiracy of silence; the fact that other people have not found or exposed any conspiracy is taken as evidence that those people are part of the plot, rather than considering that it may be because no conspiracy exists.[33][63]This strategy lets conspiracy theories insulate themselves from neutral analyses of the evidence, and makes them resistant to questioning or correction, which is called "epistemic self-insulation".[33][63]
Conspiracy theorists often take advantage offalse balancein the media. They may claim to be presenting a legitimate alternative viewpoint that deserves equal time to argue its case; for example, this strategy has been used by theTeach the Controversycampaign to promoteintelligent design, which often claims that there is a conspiracy of scientists suppressing their views. If they successfully find a platform to present their views in a debate format, they focus on using rhetoricalad hominemsand attacking perceived flaws in the mainstream account, while avoiding any discussion of the shortcomings in their own position.[29]
The typical approach of conspiracy theories is to challenge any action or statement from authorities, using even the most tenuous justifications. Responses are then assessed using a double standard, where failing to provide an immediate response to the satisfaction of the conspiracy theorist will be claimed to prove a conspiracy. Any minor errors in the response are heavily emphasized, while deficiencies in the arguments of other proponents are generally excused.[29]
In science, conspiracists may suggest that ascientific theorycan be disproven by a single perceived deficiency, even though such events are extremely rare. In addition, both disregarding the claims and attempting to address them will be interpreted as proof of a conspiracy.[29]Other conspiracist arguments may not be scientific; for example, in response to theIPCC Second Assessment Reportin 1996, much of the opposition centered on promoting a procedural objection to the report's creation. Specifically, it was claimed that part of the procedure reflected a conspiracy to silence dissenters, which served as motivation for opponents of the report and successfully redirected a significant amount of the public discussion away from the science.[29]
Historically, conspiracy theories have been closely linked toprejudice,witch hunts,wars, andgenocides.[28][29]They are often strongly believed by the perpetrators ofterroristattacks, and were used as justification byTimothy McVeigh,Anders BreivikandBrenton Tarrant, as well as by governments such asNazi Germanyand theSoviet Union.[28]AIDS denialismby the government ofSouth Africa, motivated by conspiracy theories, caused an estimated 330,000 deaths from AIDS,[33][34][35]while belief inconspiracy theories about genetically modified foodsled the government ofZambiato reject food aid during afamine,[29]at a time when 3 million people in the country were suffering fromhunger.[39]
Conspiracy theories are a significant obstacle to improvements inpublic health.[29][40]People who believe in health-related conspiracy theories are less likely to followmedical advice, and more likely to usealternative medicineinstead.[28]Conspiratorialanti-vaccinationbeliefs, such asconspiracy theories about pharmaceutical companies, can result in reduced vaccination rates and have been linked to outbreaks ofvaccine-preventable diseases.[33][29][41][40]Health-related conspiracy theories often inspire resistance towater fluoridation, and contributed to the impact of theLancet MMR autism fraud.[29][40]
Conspiracy theories are a fundamental component of a wide range of radicalized and extremist groups, where they may play an important role in reinforcing the ideology and psychology of their members as well as further radicalizing their beliefs.[28][43]These conspiracy theories often share common themes, even among groups that would otherwise be fundamentally opposed, such as theantisemiticconspiracy theories found among political extremists on both thefar rightandfar left.[28]More generally, belief in conspiracy theories is associated with holding extreme and uncompromising viewpoints, and may help people in maintaining those viewpoints.[42]While conspiracy theories are not always present in extremist groups, and do not always lead to violence when they are, they can make the group more extreme, provide an enemy to direct hatred towards, and isolate members from the rest of society. Conspiracy theories are most likely to inspire violence when they call for urgent action, appeal to prejudices, or demonize and scapegoat enemies.[43]
Conspiracy theorizing in the workplace can also have economic consequences. For example, it leads to lower job satisfaction and lower commitment, resulting in workers being more likely to leave their jobs.[28]Comparisons have also been made with the effects of workplace rumors, which share some characteristics with conspiracy theories and result in both decreased productivity and increased stress. Subsequent effects on managers include reduced profits, reduced trust from employees, and damage to the company's image.[28][93]
Conspiracy theories can divert attention from important social, political, and scientific issues.[94][95]In addition, they have been used to discredit scientific evidence to the general public or in a legal context. Conspiratorial strategies also share characteristics with those used by lawyers who are attempting to discredit expert testimony, such as claiming that the experts have ulterior motives in testifying, or attempting to find someone who will provide statements to imply that expert opinion is more divided than it actually is.[29]
It is possible that conspiracy theories may also produce some compensatory benefits to society in certain situations. For example, they may help people identify governmental deceptions, particularly in repressive societies, and encouragegovernment transparency.[49][94]However, real conspiracies are normally revealed by people working within the system, such aswhistleblowersandjournalists, and most of the effort spent by conspiracy theorists is inherently misdirected.[43]The most dangerous conspiracy theories are likely to be those that incite violence, scapegoat disadvantaged groups, or spreadmisinformationabout important societal issues.[96]
Strategies to address conspiracy theories have been divided into two categories based on whether the target audience is the conspiracy theorists or the general public.[51][49]These strategies have been described as reducingeither the supply or the demandfor conspiracy theories.[49]Both approaches can be used at the same time, although there may be issues of limited resources, or if arguments are used which may appeal to one audience at the expense of the other.[49]
Brief scientific literacy interventions, particularly those focusing on critical thinking skills, can effectively undermine conspiracy beliefs and related behaviors. Research led by Penn State scholars, published in theJournal of Consumer Research, found that enhancing scientific knowledge and reasoning through short interventions, such as videos explaining concepts like correlation and causation, reduces the endorsement of conspiracy theories. These interventions were most effective against conspiracy theories based on faulty reasoning and were successful even among groups prone to conspiracy beliefs. The studies, involving over 2,700 participants, highlight the importance of educational interventions in mitigating conspiracy beliefs, especially when timed to influence critical decision-making.[97][98]
People who feelempoweredare more resistant to conspiracy theories. Methods to promote empowerment include encouraging people to useanalytical thinking,primingpeople to think of situations where they are in control, and ensuring that decisions by society and government are seen to follow procedural fairness (the use of fair decision-making procedures).[51]
Methods of refutation which have shown effectiveness in various circumstances include: providing facts that demonstrate the conspiracy theory is false, attempting to discredit the source, explaining how the logic is invalid or misleading, and providing links to fact-checking websites.[51]It can also be effective to use these strategies in advance, informing people that they could encounter misleading information in the future, and why the information should be rejected (also called inoculation or prebunking).[51][99][100]While it has been suggested that discussing conspiracy theories can raise their profile and make them seem more legitimate to the public, the discussion can put people on guard instead as long as it is sufficiently persuasive.[9]
Other approaches to reduce the appeal of conspiracy theories in general among the public may be based in the emotional and social nature of conspiratorial beliefs. For example, interventions that promoteanalytical thinkingin the general public are likely to be effective. Another approach is to intervene in ways that decreasenegative emotions, and specifically to improve feelings of personal hope and empowerment.[48]
It is much more difficult to convince people who already believe in conspiracy theories.[49][51]Conspiracist belief systems are not based on external evidence, but instead usecircular logicwhere every belief is supported by other conspiracist beliefs.[51]In addition, conspiracy theories have a "self-sealing" nature, in which the types of arguments used to support them make them resistant to questioning from others.[49]
Characteristics of successful strategies for reaching conspiracy theorists have been divided into several broad categories: 1) Arguments can be presented by "trusted messengers", such as people who were formerly members of an extremist group. 2) Since conspiracy theorists think of themselves as people who value critical thinking, this can be affirmed and then redirected to encourage being more critical when analyzing the conspiracy theory. 3) Approaches demonstrate empathy, and are based on building understanding together, which is supported by modeling open-mindedness in order to encourage the conspiracy theorists to do likewise. 4) The conspiracy theories are not attacked with ridicule or aggressive deconstruction, and interactions are not treated like an argument to be won; this approach can work with the general public, but among conspiracy theorists it may simply be rejected.[51]
Interventions that reduce feelings of uncertainty, anxiety, or powerlessness result in a reduction in conspiracy beliefs.[42]Other possible strategies to mitigate the effect of conspiracy theories include education, media literacy, and increasing governmental openness and transparency.[99]Due to the relationship between conspiracy theories and political extremism, the academic literature onderadicalizationis also important.[51]
One approach describes conspiracy theories as resulting from a "crippled epistemology", in which a person encounters or accepts very few relevant sources of information.[49][101]A conspiracy theory is more likely to appear justified to people with a limited "informational environment" who only encounter misleading information. These people may be "epistemologicallyisolated" inself-enclosed networks. From the perspective of people within these networks, disconnected from the information available to the rest of society, believing in conspiracy theories may appear to be justified.[49][101]In these cases, the solution would be to break the group's informational isolation.[49]
Public exposure to conspiracy theories can be reduced by interventions that reduce their ability to spread, such as by encouraging people to reflect before sharing a news story.[51]Researchers Carlos Diaz Ruiz and Tomas Nilsson have proposed technical and rhetorical interventions to counter the spread of conspiracy theories on social media.[102]
The primary defense against conspiracy theories is to maintain anopen society, in which many sources of reliable information are available, and government sources are known to be credible rather than propaganda. Additionally, independent nongovernmental organizations are able to correct misinformation without requiring people to trust the government.[49]The absence ofcivil rightsandcivil libertiesreduces the number of information sources available to the population, which may lead people to support conspiracy theories.[49]Since the credibility of conspiracy theories can be increased if governments act dishonestly or otherwise engage in objectionable actions, avoiding such actions is also a relevant strategy.[99]
Joseph Pierre has said that mistrust in authoritative institutions is the core component underlying many conspiracy theories and that this mistrust creates an epistemic vacuum and makes individuals searching for answers vulnerable to misinformation. Therefore, one possible solution is offering consumers a seat at the table to mend their mistrust in institutions.[103]Regarding the challenges of this approach, Pierre has said, "The challenge with acknowledging areas of uncertainty within a public sphere is that doing so can be weaponized to reinforce a post-truth view of the world in which everything is debatable, and any counter-position is just as valid. Although I like to think of myself as a middle of the road kind of individual, it is important to keep in mind that the truth does not always lie in the middle of a debate, whether we are talking about climate change, vaccines, or antipsychotic medications."[104]
Researchers have recommended that public policies should take into account the possibility of conspiracy theories relating to any policy or policy area, and prepare to combat them in advance.[99][9]Conspiracy theories have suddenly arisen in the context of policy issues as disparate as land-use laws and bicycle-sharing programs.[99]In the case of public communications by government officials, factors that improve the effectiveness of communication include using clear and simple messages, and using messengers which are trusted by the target population. Government information about conspiracy theories is more likely to be believed if the messenger is perceived as being part of someone'sin-group. Official representatives may be more effective if they share characteristics with the target groups, such as ethnicity.[99]
In addition, when the government communicates with citizens to combat conspiracy theories, online methods are more efficient compared to other methods such as print publications. This also promotes transparency, can improve a message's perceived trustworthiness, and is more effective at reaching underrepresented demographics. However, as of 2019[update], many governmental websites do not take full advantage of the available information-sharing opportunities. Similarly, social media accounts need to be used effectively in order to achieve meaningful communication with the public, such as by responding to requests that citizens send to those accounts. Other steps include adapting messages to the communication styles used on the social media platform in question, and promoting a culture of openness. Since mixed messaging can support conspiracy theories, it is also important to avoid conflicting accounts, such as by ensuring the accuracy of messages on the social media accounts of individual members of the organization.[99]
Successful methods for dispelling conspiracy theories have been studied in the context ofpublic healthcampaigns. A key characteristic of communication strategies to address medical conspiracy theories is the use of techniques that rely less on emotional appeals. It is more effective to use methods that encourage people to process information rationally. The use of visual aids is also an essential part of these strategies. Since conspiracy theories are based on intuitive thinking, and visual information processing relies on intuition, visual aids are able to compete directly for the public's attention.[9]
In public health campaigns, information retention by the public is highest for loss-framed messages that include more extreme outcomes. However, excessively appealing to catastrophic scenarios (e.g. low vaccination rates causing an epidemic) may provoke anxiety, which is associated with conspiracism and could increase belief in conspiracy theories instead.Scare tacticshave sometimes had mixed results, but are generally considered ineffective. An example of this is the use of images that showcase disturbing health outcomes, such as the impact of smoking on dental health. One possible explanation is that information processed via the fear response is typically not evaluated rationally, which may prevent the message from being linked to the desired behaviors.[9]
A particularly important technique is the use offocus groupsto understand exactly what people believe, and the reasons they give for those beliefs. This allows messaging to focus on the specific concerns that people identify, and on topics that are easily misinterpreted by the public, since these are factors which conspiracy theories can take advantage of. In addition, discussions with focus groups and observations of the group dynamics can indicate which anti-conspiracist ideas are most likely to spread.[9]
Interventions that address medical conspiracy theories by reducing powerlessness include emphasizing the principle ofinformed consent, giving patients all the relevant information without imposing decisions on them, to ensure that they have a sense of control. Improving access to healthcare also reduces medical conspiracism. However, doing so by political efforts can also fuel additional conspiracy theories, which occurred with theAffordable Care Act(Obamacare) in the United States. Another successful strategy is to require people to watch a short video when they fulfil requirements such as registration for school or a drivers' license, which has been demonstrated to improve vaccination rates and signups for organ donation.[9]
Another approach is based on viewing conspiracy theories as narratives which express personal and cultural values, making them less susceptible to straightforward factual corrections, and more effectively addressed by counter-narratives.[100][105]Counter-narratives can be more engaging and memorable than simple corrections, and can be adapted to the specific values held by individuals and cultures. These narratives may depict personal experiences, or alternatively they can be cultural narratives. In the context of vaccination, examples of cultural narratives include stories about scientific breakthroughs, about the world before vaccinations, or about heroic and altruistic researchers. The themes to be addressed would be those that could be exploited by conspiracy theories to increasevaccine hesitancy, such as perceptions of vaccine risk, lack of patient empowerment, and lack of trust in medical authorities.[100]
It has been suggested that directly counteringmisinformationcan be counterproductive. For example, since conspiracy theories can reinterpret disconfirming information as part of their narrative, refuting a claim can result in accidentally reinforcing it,[63][106]which is referred to as a "backfire effect".[107]In addition, publishing criticism of conspiracy theories can result in legitimizing them.[94]In this context, possible interventions include carefully selecting which conspiracy theories to refute, requesting additional analyses from independent observers, and introducing cognitive diversity into conspiratorial communities by undermining their poor epistemology.[94]Any legitimization effect might also be reduced by responding to more conspiracy theories rather than fewer.[49]
There are psychological mechanisms by which backfire effects could potentially occur, but the evidence on this topic is mixed, and backfire effects are very rare in practice.[100][107][108]A 2020 review of the scientific literature on backfire effects found that there have been widespreadfailures to replicatetheir existence, even under conditions that would be theoretically favorable to observing them.[107]Due to the lack ofreproducibility, as of 2020[update]most researchers believe that backfire effects are either unlikely to occur on the broader population level, or they only occur in very specific circumstances, or they do not exist.[107]Brendan Nyhan, one of the researchers who initially proposed the occurrence of backfire effects, wrote in 2021 that the persistence of misinformation is most likely due to other factors.[108]
In general, people do reject conspiracy theories when they learn about their contradictions and lack of evidence.[9]For most people, corrections and fact-checking are very unlikely to have a negative impact, and there is no specific group of people in which backfire effects have been consistently observed.[107]Presenting people with factual corrections, or highlighting the logical contradictions in conspiracy theories, has been demonstrated to have a positive effect in many circumstances.[48][106]For example, this has been studied in the case of informing believers in9/11 conspiracy theoriesabout statements by actual experts and witnesses.[48]One possibility is that criticism is most likely to backfire if it challenges someone's worldview or identity. This suggests that an effective approach may be to provide criticism while avoiding such challenges.[106]
The widespread belief in conspiracy theories has become a topic of interest for sociologists, psychologists, and experts in folklore since at least the 1960s, whena number of conspiracy theoriesarose regardingthe assassinationof U.S. PresidentJohn F. Kennedy.SociologistTürkay Salim Nefes underlines the political nature of conspiracy theories. He suggests that one of the most important characteristics of these accounts is their attempt to unveil the "real but hidden" power relations in social groups.[109][110]The term "conspiracism" was popularized by academic Frank P. Mintz in the 1980s. According to Mintz, conspiracism denotes "belief in the primacy of conspiracies in the unfolding of history":[111]: 4
Conspiracism serves the needs of diverse political and social groups in America and elsewhere. It identifies elites, blames them for economic and social catastrophes, and assumes that things will be better once popular action can remove them from positions of power. As such, conspiracy theories do not typify a particular epoch or ideology.[111]: 199
Research suggests, on a psychological level,conspiracist ideation—belief in conspiracy theories—can be harmful or pathological,[20][21]and is highly correlated withpsychological projection, as well as withparanoia, which is predicted by the degree of a person'sMachiavellianism.[112]The propensity to believe in conspiracy theories is strongly associated with the mental health disorder ofschizotypy.[113][114][115][116][117]Conspiracy theories once limited to fringe audiences have become commonplace inmass media, emerging as acultural phenomenonof the late 20th and early 21st centuries.[44][45][46][47]Exposure to conspiracy theories in news media and popular entertainment increases receptiveness to conspiratorial ideas, and has also increased the social acceptability of fringe beliefs.[28][118]
Conspiracy theories often use complicated and detailed arguments, including ones that appear analytical or scientific. However, belief in conspiracy theories is primarily driven by emotion.[48]One of the most widely confirmed facts about conspiracy theories is that belief in a single conspiracy theory is often associated with belief in other conspiracy theories.[33][119]This even applies when the conspiracy theories directly contradict each other—e.g., believing thatOsama bin Ladenwas already dead before his compound in Pakistan was attacked makes the same person more likely to believe that he is still alive. One conclusion from this finding is that the content of a conspiracist belief is less important than the idea of a coverup by the authorities.[33][95][120]Analytical thinkingaids in reducing belief in conspiracy theories, in part because it emphasizes rational and critical cognition.[42]
Some psychological scientists assert that explanations related to conspiracy theories can be, and often are, "internally consistent" with strong beliefs previously held prior to the event that sparked the belief in a conspiracy.[42]People who believe in conspiracy theories tend to believe in other unsubstantiated claims, includingpseudoscienceandparanormalphenomena.[121]
Psychological motives for believing in conspiracy theories can be categorized as epistemic, existential, or social. These motives are particularly acute in vulnerable and disadvantaged populations. However, it does not appear that the beliefs help to address these motives; in fact, they may be self-defeating, acting to make the situation worse instead.[42][106]For example, while conspiratorial beliefs can result from a perceived sense ofpowerlessness, exposure to conspiracy theories immediately suppresses personal feelings of autonomy and control. Furthermore, they also make people less likely to take actions that could improve their circumstances.[42][106]
This is additionally supported by the fact that conspiracy theories have a number of disadvantageous attributes.[42]For example, they promote a hostile and distrustful view of other people and groups allegedly acting based on antisocial and cynical motivations. This is expected to lead to increasedsocial alienationandanomieand reducedsocial capital. Similarly, they depict the public as ignorant and powerless against the alleged conspirators, with important aspects of society determined by malevolent forces, a viewpoint that is likely to be disempowering.[42]
Each person may endorse conspiracy theories for one of many different reasons.[122]The most consistently demonstrated characteristics of people who find conspiracy theories appealing are a feeling ofalienation, unhappiness or dissatisfaction with their situation, an unconventional worldview, and a sense ofdisempowerment.[122]While various aspects of personality affect susceptibility to conspiracy theories, none of theBig Five personality traitsare associated with conspiracy beliefs.[122]
The political scientistMichael Barkun, discussing the usage of "conspiracy theory" in contemporary American culture, holds that this term is used for a belief that explains an event as the result of a secret plot by exceptionally powerful and cunning conspirators to achieve a malevolent end.[123][124]According to Barkun, the appeal of conspiracism is threefold:
This third point is supported by the research of Roland Imhoff, professor ofsocial psychologyat theJohannes Gutenberg University Mainz. His research suggests that the smaller the minority believing in a specific theory, the more attractive it is to conspiracy theorists.[125]Humanistic psychologistsargue that even if a posited cabal behind an alleged conspiracy is almost always perceived as hostile, there often remains an element of reassurance for theorists. This is because it is a consolation to imagine that humans create difficulties in human affairs and remain within human control. If a cabal can be implicated, there may be a hope of breaking its power or of joining it. Belief in the power of a cabal is an implicit assertion of human dignity—an unconscious affirmation that man is responsible for his own destiny.[126]
People formulate conspiracy theories to explain, for example, power relations in social groups and the perceived existence of evil forces.[c][124][109][110]Proposed psychological origins of conspiracy theorising include projection; the personal need to explain "a significant event [with] a significant cause;" and the product of various kinds and stages of thought disorder, such as paranoid disposition, ranging in severity to diagnosable mental illnesses. Some people prefer socio-political explanations over the insecurity of encounteringrandom, unpredictable, or otherwise inexplicable events.[127][128][129][130][131][132]According to Berlet and Lyons, "Conspiracism is a particular narrative form of scapegoating that frames demonized enemies as part of a vast insidious plot against the common good, while it valorizes the scapegoater as a hero for sounding the alarm".[133]
Some psychologists believe that a search for meaning is common in conspiracism. Once cognized,confirmation biasand avoidance ofcognitive dissonancemay reinforce the belief. When a conspiracy theory has become embedded within a social group,communal reinforcementmay also play a part.[134]
Inquiry into possible motives behind the accepting of irrational conspiracy theories has linked[135]these beliefs to distress resulting from an event that occurred, such as theevents of 9/11.Additional research suggests that "delusional ideation" is the trait most likely to indicate a stronger belief in conspiracy theories.[136]Research also shows an increased attachment to these irrational beliefs leads to a decreased desire for civic engagement.[84]Belief in conspiracy theories is correlated with low intelligence, lower analytical thinking,anxiety disorders,paranoia, andauthoritarianbeliefs.[137][138][139]
ProfessorQuassim Cassamargues that conspiracy theorists hold their beliefs due to flaws in their thinking and, more precisely, their intellectual character. He cites philosopherLinda Trinkaus Zagzebskiand her bookVirtues of the Mindin outlining intellectual virtues (such as humility, caution, and carefulness) and intellectual vices (such as gullibility, carelessness, and closed-mindedness). Whereas intellectual virtues help reach sound examination, intellectual vices "impede effective and responsible inquiry", meaning that those prone to believing in conspiracy theories possess certain vices while lacking necessary virtues.[140]
Some researchers have suggested that conspiracy theories could be partially caused by the human brain's mechanisms for detecting dangerous coalitions. Such a mechanism could have been helpful in the small-scale environment humanity evolved in but is mismatched in a modern, complex society and thus "misfire", perceiving conspiracies where none exist.[141]
Some historians have argued thatpsychological projectionis prevalent amongst conspiracy theorists. According to the argument, this projection is manifested in the form of attributing undesirable characteristics of the self to the conspirators. Historian Richard Hofstadter stated that:
This enemy seems on many counts a projection of the self; both the ideal and the unacceptable aspects of the self are attributed to him. A fundamental paradox of the paranoid style is the imitation of the enemy. The enemy, for example, may be the cosmopolitan intellectual, but the paranoid will outdo him in the apparatus of scholarship, even of pedantry. ... The Ku Klux Klan imitated Catholicism to the point of donning priestly vestments, developing an elaborate ritual and an equally elaborate hierarchy. TheJohn Birch Societyemulates Communist cells and quasi-secret operation through "front" groups, and preaches a ruthless prosecution of the ideological war along lines very similar to those it finds in the Communist enemy. Spokesmen of the various fundamentalist anti-Communist "crusades" openly express their admiration for the dedication, discipline, and strategic ingenuity the Communist cause calls forth.[130]
Hofstadter also noted that "sexual freedom" is a vice frequently attributed to the conspiracist's target group, noting that "very often the fantasies of true believers reveal strong sadomasochistic outlets, vividly expressed, for example, in the delight of anti-Masons with the cruelty of Masonic punishments".[130]
Marcel Danesisuggests that people who believe conspiracy theories have difficulty rethinking situations. Exposure to those theories has caused neural pathways to be more rigid and less subject to change. Initial susceptibility to believing these theories' lies, dehumanizing language, and metaphors leads to the acceptance of larger and more extensive theories because the hardened neural pathways are already present. Repetition of the "facts" of conspiracy theories and their connected lies simply reinforces the rigidity of those pathways. Thus, conspiracy theories and dehumanizing lies are not mere hyperbole; they can actually change the way people think:
Unfortunately, research into this brain wiring also shows that once people begin to believe lies, they are unlikely to change their minds even when confronted with evidence that contradicts their beliefs. It is a form of brainwashing. Once the brain has carved out a well-worn path of believing deceit, it is even harder to step out of that path – which is how fanatics are born. Instead, these people will seek out information that confirms their beliefs, avoid anything that is in conflict with them, or even turn the contrasting information on its head, so as to make it fit their beliefs.
People with strong convictions will have a hard time changing their minds, given how embedded a lie becomes in the mind. In fact, there are scientists and scholars still studying the best tools and tricks to combat lies with some combination of brain training and linguistic awareness.[142]
In addition to psychological factors such as conspiracist ideation, sociological factors also help account for who believes in which conspiracy theories. Such theories tend to get more traction among election losers in society, for example, and the emphasis on conspiracy theories by elites and leaders tends to increase belief among followers with higher levels of conspiracy thinking.[143]Christopher Hitchensdescribed conspiracy theories as the "exhaust fumes of democracy":[131]the unavoidable result of a large amount of information circulating among a large number of people.
Conspiracy theories may be emotionally satisfying, as they assign blame to a group to which the theorist does not belong and, thus, absolve the theorist of moral or political responsibility in society.[144]Likewise,Roger Cohenwriting forThe New York Timeshas said that, "captive minds; ... resort to conspiracy theory because it is the ultimate refuge of the powerless. If you cannot change your own life, it must be that some greater force controls the world."[132]
Sociological historian Holger Herwig found in studying German explanations for the origins ofWorld War I, "Those events that are most important are hardest to understand because they attract the greatest attention from myth makers and charlatans."[145]Justin FoxofTimemagazine argues that Wall Street traders are among the most conspiracy-minded group of people, and ascribes this to the reality of some financial market conspiracies, and to the ability of conspiracy theories to provide necessary orientation in the market's day-to-day movements.[127]
Bruno Latournotes that the language and intellectual tactics ofcritical theoryhave been appropriated by those he describes as conspiracy theorists, includingclimate-change denialistsand the9/11 Truth movement: "Maybe I am taking conspiracy theories too seriously, but I am worried to detect, in those mad mixtures of knee-jerk disbelief, punctilious demands for proofs, and free use of powerful explanation from the social neverland, many of the weapons of social critique."[146]
Michael Kelly, aWashington Postjournalist and critic ofanti-warmovements on both the left and right, coined the term "fusion paranoia" to refer to a political convergence of left-wing and right-wing activists around anti-war issues andcivil liberties, which he said were motivated by a shared belief in conspiracism or sharedanti-governmentviews.[147]
Barkun has adopted this term to refer to how the synthesis of paranoid conspiracy theories, which were once limited to American fringe audiences, has given them mass appeal and enabled them to become commonplace inmass media,[148]thereby inaugurating an unrivaled period of people actively preparing forapocalypticormillenarianscenarios in the United States of the late 20th and early 21st centuries.[149]Barkun notes the occurrence of lone-wolf conflicts with law enforcement acting as a proxy for threatening the established political powers.[150]
As evidence that undermines an alleged conspiracy grows, the number of alleged conspirators also grows in the minds of conspiracy theorists. This is because of an assumption that the alleged conspirators often have competing interests. For example, if Republican PresidentGeorge W. Bushis allegedly responsible for the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and the Democratic party did not pursue exposing this alleged plot, that must mean that both the Democratic and Republican parties are conspirators in the alleged plot. It also assumes that the alleged conspirators are so competent that they can fool the entire world, but so incompetent that even the unskilled conspiracy theorists can find mistakes they make that prove the fraud. At some point, the number of alleged conspirators, combined with the contradictions within the alleged conspirators' interests and competence, becomes so great that maintaining the theory becomes an obvious exercise in absurdity.[151]
The physicistDavid Robert Grimesestimated the time it would take for a conspiracy to be exposed based on the number of people involved.[152][153]His calculations used data from thePRISM surveillance program, theTuskegee syphilis experiment, and theFBI forensic scandal. Grimes estimated that:
Grimes's study did not consider exposure by sources outside of the alleged conspiracy. It only considered exposure from within the alleged conspiracy through whistleblowers or through incompetence.[154]Subsequent comments on thePubPeerwebsite[155]point out that these calculations must exclude successful conspiracies since, by definition, we don't know about them, and are wrong by an order of magnitude aboutBletchley Park, which remained a secret far longer than Grimes' calculations predicted.
The term "truth seeker" is adopted by some conspiracy theorists when describing themselves on social media.[156]Conspiracy theorists are often referred to derogatorily as "cookers" in Australia.[157]The term "cooker" is also loosely associated with thefar right.[158][159]
The philosopherKarl Popperdescribed the central problem of conspiracy theories as a form offundamental attribution error, where every event is generally perceived as being intentional and planned, greatly underestimating the effects of randomness and unintended consequences.[95]In his bookThe Open Society and Its Enemies, he used the term "the conspiracy theory of society" to denote the idea that social phenomena such as "war, unemployment, poverty, shortages ... [are] the result of direct design by some powerful individuals and groups".[161]Popper argued thattotalitarianismwas founded on conspiracy theories which drew on imaginary plots which were driven by paranoid scenarios predicated ontribalism,chauvinism, orracism. He also noted that conspirators very rarely achieved their goal.[162]
Historically, real conspiracies have usually had little effect on history and have hadunforeseen consequencesfor the conspirators, in contrast to conspiracy theories, which often posit grand, sinister organizations or world-changing events, the evidence for which has been erased or obscured.[163][164]As described byBruce Cumings, history is instead "moved by the broad forces and large structures of human collectivities".[163]
Conspiracy theories are a prevalent feature ofArabculture and politics.[165]Variants include conspiracies involving colonialism,Zionism, superpowers, oil, and thewar on terrorism, which is often referred to in Arab media as a "war against Islam".[165]For example,The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, an infamoushoaxdocument purporting to be a Jewish plan for world domination, is commonly read and promoted in the Muslim world.[166][167][168]Roger Cohenhas suggested that the popularity of conspiracy theories in the Arab world is "the ultimate refuge of the powerless".[132]Al-Mumin Said has noted the danger of such theories, for they "keep us not only from the truth but also from confronting our faults and problems".[169]Osama bin LadenandAyman al-Zawahiriused conspiracy theories about the United States to gain support foral-Qaedain the Arab world, and as rhetoric to distinguish themselves from similar groups, although they may not have believed the conspiratorial claims themselves.[170]
Conspiracy theories are a prevalent feature of culture and politics inTurkey. Conspiracism is an important phenomenon in understanding Turkish politics.[171]This is explained by a desire to "make up for our lostOttomangrandeur",[171]the humiliation of perceiving Turkey as part of "the malfunctioning half" of the world,[172]and a "low level of media literacy among the Turkish population."[173]
There are a wide variety of conspiracy theories including theJudeo-Masonic conspiracy theory,[174][175]theinternational Jewish conspiracy theory, and thewar against Islam conspiracy theory. For example,Islamists, dissatisfied with themodernistandsecularistreforms that took place throughout the history of the Ottoman Empire and the Turkish Republic, have put forward many conspiracy theories to defame theTreaty of Lausanne, an important peace treaty for the country, and the republic's founderKemal Atatürk.[176][177]Another example is theSèvres syndrome, a reference to theTreaty of Sèvresof 1920, a popular belief in Turkey that dangerous internal and external enemies, especiallythe West, are "conspiring to weaken and carve up the Turkish Republic".[178]
The historianRichard Hofstadteraddressed the role ofparanoiaand conspiracism throughoutU.S. historyin his 1964 essay "The Paranoid Style in American Politics".Bernard Bailyn's classicThe Ideological Origins of the American Revolution(1967) notes that a similar phenomenon could be found in North America during the time preceding theAmerican Revolution. Conspiracism labels people's attitudes and the type of conspiracy theories that are more global and historical in proportion.[179]
Harry G. West and others have noted that while conspiracy theorists may often be dismissed as a fringe minority, certain evidence suggests that a wide range of the U.S. believes in conspiracy theories. West also compares those theories tohypernationalismandreligious fundamentalism.[180][181]Theologian Robert Jewett and philosopherJohn Shelton Lawrenceattribute the enduring popularity of conspiracy theories in the U.S. to theCold War,McCarthyism, andcounterculturerejection of authority. They state that among both the left-wing and right-wing, there remains a willingness to use real events, such as Soviet plots, inconsistencies in theWarren Report, and the9/11attacks, to support the existence of unverified and ongoing large-scale conspiracies.[182]
In his studies of "American political demonology", historianMichael Paul Rogintoo analyzed this paranoid style of politics that has occurred throughout American history. Conspiracy theories frequently identify an imaginary subversive group that is supposedly attacking the nation and requires the government and allied forces to engage in harsh extra-legal repression of those threatening subversives. Rogin cites examples from the Red Scares of 1919 to McCarthy's anti-communist campaign in the 1950s and, more recently, fears of immigrant hordes invading the US. Unlike Hofstadter, Rogin saw these "countersubversive" fears as frequently coming from those in power and dominant groups instead of from the dispossessed. Unlike Robert Jewett, Rogin blamed not the counterculture but America's dominant culture of liberal individualism and the fears it stimulated to explain the periodic eruption of irrational conspiracy theories.[183]TheWatergate scandalhas also been used to bestow legitimacy to other conspiracy theories, withRichard Nixonhimself commenting that it served as a "Rorschach ink blot" which invited others to fill in the underlying pattern.[87]
Historian Kathryn S. Olmsted cites three reasons why Americans are prone to believing in government conspiracy theories:
Alex Jonesreferenced numerous conspiracy theories for convincing his supporters to endorseRon PauloverMitt Romneyin the2012 Republican Party presidential primariesandDonald TrumpoverHillary Clintonin the2016 United States presidential election.[185][186]Into the 2020s, theQAnon conspiracy theoryalleges that Trump is fighting against adeep-statecabalof child sex-abusing and Satan-worshippingDemocrats.[36][37][187][188][189][190]
Informational notes
Citations
California drought manipulation
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspiracy_theory
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Acovert operationorundercover operationis a military or police operation involving acovert agentor troops acting under an assumedcoverto conceal the identity of the party responsible.[1]
Under US law, theCentral Intelligence Agency(CIA) must lead covert operations unless the president finds that another agency should do so and informs Congress.[2]The CIA's authority to conduct covert action comes from theNational Security Act of 1947.[3]PresidentRonald ReaganissuedExecutive Order 12333titledUnited States Intelligence Activitiesin 1984. This order defined covert action as "special activities", both political and military, that the US Government could legally deny. The CIA was also designated as the sole authority under the 1991Intelligence Authorization Actand inTitle 50 of the United States CodeSection 413(e).[3][4]The CIA must have a "Presidential Finding" issued by the President in order to conduct these activities under theHughes-Ryan amendmentto the 1991 Intelligence Authorization Act.[2]These findings are then monitored by the oversight committees in both the US Senate and House of Representatives.[5]As a result of this framework, the CIA "receives more oversight from the Congress than any other agency in the federal government", according to one author.[6]TheSpecial Activities Division(SAD) is a division of the CIA'sDirectorate of Operations, responsible for Covert Action and "Special Activities". These special activities include covert political influence and paramilitary operations.
According to a 2018 study by University of Chicago political scientist Austin Carson, covert operations may have the beneficial effect of preventing escalation of disputes into full-blown wars.[7]He argues that keeping military operations secret can limit escalation dynamics, as well as insulate leaders from domestic pressures while simultaneously allowing them communicating their interest to the adversary in keeping a war contained.[7]He finds that covert operations are frequently detected by other major powers.[7]
A 2024 study found that state denials of covert actions, even when the covert actions were obvious, could have a de-escalatory effect (compared to making the covert action public).[8]
To go "undercover" (that is, to go on anundercover operation) is to avoid detection by the object of one's observation, and especially todisguiseone's own identity (or use anassumed identity) for the purposes of gaining the trust of an individual or organization in order to learn or confirm confidential information, or to gain the trust of targeted individuals to gather information orevidence. Undercover operations are traditionally employed bylaw enforcement agenciesandprivate investigators; those in such roles are commonly referred to as undercover agents.
A black operation or "black ops" is a covert orclandestine operationby agovernment agency, amilitary unitor aparamilitary organizationin which the operation itself is at least partially hidden from the organization or government's own scrutiny.[9]For example, in the United States, some activities by military and intelligence agencies are funded by a classified "black budget", of which the details, and sometimes even the total, are hidden from the public and from most congressional oversight.[10][11]
A single such activity may be called ablack bag operation;[9]that term is primarily used for surreptitious entries into structures to obtain information forhuman intelligenceoperations.[12]Such operations have been carried out by theFBI,[13]CIA,[14]NSA,KGB,Stasi,Mossad,MI6,MI5,ASIS,COMANF,DGSE,AISE,CNI,MSS,VAJA,R&AW,UDU,SVR,FSB,GRU,ISI,BND,BINand the intelligence services of other states.[12]
Law enforcement has carried out undercover work in a variety of ways throughout the course of history, butEugène François Vidocq(1775–1857) developed the first organized (though informal) undercover program in France in the early 19th century, from the lateFirst Empirethrough most of theBourbon Restorationperiod of 1814 to 1830. At the end of 1811 Vidocq set up an informal plainclothes unit, theBrigadede laSûreté("Security Brigade"), which was later converted to a security police unit under thePrefecture of Police. The Sûreté initially had eight, then twelve, and, in 1823, twenty employees. One year later, it expanded again, to 28 secret agents. In addition, there were eight people who worked secretly for the Sûreté, but instead of a salary, they received licences for gambling halls. A major portion of Vidocq's subordinates comprised ex-criminals like himself.[15]
Vidocq personally trained his agents, for example, in selecting the correct disguise based on the kind of job. He himself went out hunting for criminals too. His memoirs are full of stories about how he outsmarted crooks by pretending to be a beggar or an oldcuckold. At one point, he even simulated his own death.[16]
In England, the first modernpoliceforce was established in 1829 by SirRobert Peelas theMetropolitan Policeof London. From the start, the force occasionally employed plainclothes undercover detectives, but there was much public anxiety that its powers were being used for the purpose of political repression. In part due to these concerns, the 1845 officialPolice Ordersrequired all undercover operations to be specifically authorized by thesuperintendent. It was only in 1869 that Police commissionerEdmund Hendersonestablished a formal plainclothes detective division.[17]
The firstSpecial Branchof police was theSpecial Irish Branch, formed as a section of theCriminal Investigation Departmentof theMPSin London in 1883, initially to combat the bombing campaign that theIrish Republican Brotherhoodhad begun a few years earlier. This pioneering branch became the first to receive training incounter-terrorismtechniques.
Its name was changed toSpecial Branchas it had its remit gradually expanded to incorporate a general role in counter terrorism, combating foreign subversion and infiltratingorganized crime.Law enforcement agencieselsewhere established similar Branches.[18]
In the United States, a similar route was taken when theNew York City Police Departmentunderpolice commissionerWilliam McAdooestablished the Italian Squad in 1906 to combat rampant crime and intimidation in the poor Italian neighborhoods.[19][self-published source]Various federal agencies began their own undercover programs shortly afterwards –Charles Joseph Bonapartefounded the Bureau of Investigation, the forerunner of theFederal Bureau of Investigation, in 1908.[20][21]
Secret policeforces in the Eastern Bloc also used undercover operatives.[22]
Undercover agents may engage in criminal activities as part of their investigation. Joh defined the termauthorized criminalityto describe this phenomenon, which she restricts primarily to undercover law enforcement officers, excludingconfidential informants.[23]These criminal activities are primarily used to "provide opportunities for the suspect to engage in the target crime" and to maintain or bolster their cover identity. However, these crimes must be necessary to advance the investigation otherwise they may be prosecutable like any other crime.[24]The FBI requires that such activities must be sanctioned and necessary for the investigation; they also stipulate that agents may not instigate criminal activity (to avoid entrapment) or participate in violence except for self-defense or the defense of others.[25]Most other legislation surrounding authorized criminality is not uniform and is a patchwork of federal and state laws.[26]
There are two principal problems that can affect agents working in undercover roles. The first is the maintenance of identity and the second is the reintegration back into normal duty.
Living a double life in a new environment presents many problems. Undercover work is one of the most stressful jobs a special agent can undertake.[27]The largest cause of stress identified is the separation of an agent from friends, family and his normal environment. This simple isolation can lead to depression and anxiety. There is no data on the divorce rates of agents, but strain on relationships does occur. This can be a result of a need for secrecy and an inability to share work problems, and the unpredictable work schedule, personality and lifestyle changes and the length of separation can all result in problems for relationships.[28]
Stresscan also result from an apparent lack of direction of the investigation or not knowing when it will end. The amount of elaborate planning, risk, and expenditure can pressure an agent to succeed, which can cause considerable stress.[29]The stress that an undercover agent faces is considerably different from his counterparts on regular duties, whose main source of stress is the administration and the bureaucracy.[30]As the undercover agents are removed from the bureaucracy, it may result in another problem. The lack of the usual controls of a uniform, badge, constant supervision, a fixed place of work, or (often) a set assignment could, combined with their continual contact with theorganized crime, increase the likelihood for corruption.[29]
This stress may be instrumental in the development of drug or alcohol abuse in some agents. They are more prone to the development of anaddictionas they suffer greater stress than other police, they are isolated, and drugs are often very accessible.[29]Police, in general, have very high alcoholism rates compared to most occupational groups, and stress is cited as a likely factor.[29]The environment that agents work in often involves a very liberal exposure to the consumption of alcohol,[31]which in conjunction with the stress and isolation could result in alcoholism.
There can be some guilt associated with going undercover due to betraying those who have come to trust the officer. This can cause anxiety or even, in very rare cases, sympathy with those being targeted. This is especially true with the infiltration of political groups, as often the agent will share similar characteristics with those they are infiltrating like class, age, ethnicity or religion. This could even result in the conversion of some agents.[28]
The lifestyle led by undercover agents is very different compared to other areas in law enforcement, and it can be quite difficult to reintegrate back into normal duties. Agents work their own hours, they are removed from direct supervisory monitoring, and they can ignore the dress and etiquette rules.[32]So resettling back into the normal police role requires the shedding of old habits, language and dress. After working such free lifestyles, agents may have discipline problems or exhibit neurotic responses. They may feel uncomfortable, and take a cynical, suspicious or even paranoid world view and feel continually on guard.[29]Other risks include capture, death andtorture.
Undercover agents should not be confused withlaw enforcement officerswho wearplainclothes—that is, to wearcivilian clothing, instead of wearing auniform, to avoid detection or identification as a law enforcement officer. However, plainclothes police officers typically carry normal police equipment and normal identification. Police detectives are assigned to wear plainclothes by not wearing the uniform typically worn by their peers. Police officers in plainclothes must identify themselves when using their police powers; however, they are not always required to identify themselves on demand and may lie about their status as a police officer in some situations (seesting operation).
Sometimes, police might drive an unmarked vehicle or a vehicle which looks like a taxi.[33]
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Acover-upis an attempt, whether successful or not, toconcealevidence of wrongdoing, error, incompetence, or otherembarrassinginformation. Research has distinguished personal cover-ups (covering up one's own misdeeds) from relational cover-ups (covering up someone else's misdeeds).[1]
The expression is usually applied to people in positions ofauthoritywhoabuse powerto avoid or silencecriticismor to deflectguiltof wrongdoing. Perpetrators of a cover-up (initiators or their allies) may be responsible for a misdeed, abreach of trust or duty, or a crime.
While the terms are often used loosely,cover-upinvolves withholding incriminatory evidence, whilewhitewashinvolves releasing misleadinglyexculpatory evidence, and aframeupinvolves falsely blaming an innocent person.Misprisionis the failure ofmandated reportersto disclose crimes they are aware of (e.g., a military officer failing to proactively report evidence oftreason, or a hospital failing to reportchild abuse).
A cover-up involving multiple parties is a type ofconspiracy.
Snowjobis an American andCanadian[2]colloquialism for deception or a cover-up; for example,Helen Gahagan Douglasdescribed theNixon Administrationas "the greatest snow job in history".[3]
When ascandalbreaks, the discovery of an attempt to cover up the truth is often regarded as even more reprehensible than the original deeds.[citation needed]
Initially, a cover-up may require a lot of effort, but it will be carried out by those closely involved with the misdeed.[citation needed]Once some hint of the hidden matter starts to become known, the cover-up gradually draws all the top leadership, at least, of an organization into complicity in covering up a misdeed or even crime that may have originally been committed by a few of its members acting independently.[citation needed]This may be regarded as tacit approval of that behaviour.[citation needed]
It is likely that some cover-ups are successful, although by definition this cannot be confirmed. Many[citation needed]fail, however, as more and more people are drawn in and the possibility of exposure makes potential accomplices fearful of supporting the cover-up and as loose ends that may never normally have been noticed start to stand out. As it spreads, the cover-up itself creates yet more suspicious circumstances.
The original misdeed being covered may be relatively minor, such as the "third-rate burglary" which started theWatergate scandal, but the cover-up adds so many additional crimes (obstruction of justice,perjury, payoffs andbribes, in some cases suspicious suicides or outrightmurder) that the cover-up becomes much more serious than the original crime.[citation needed]This gave rise to the phrase, "it's not the crime, it's the cover-up".[5]
Cover-ups do not necessarily require the active manipulation of facts or circumstances. Arguably the most common form of cover-up is one of non-action. It is the conscious failure to release incriminating information by a third party. This passive cover-up may be justified by the motive of not wanting to embarrass the culprit or expose them to criminal prosecution, or even the belief that the cover-up is justified by protecting the greater community from scandal. Yet, because of the passive cover-up, the misdeed often goes undiscovered and results in harm to others ensuing from its failure to be discovered.[citation needed]
Real cover-ups are common enough, but any event that is not completely clear is likely to give rise to a thicket ofconspiracy theoriesalleging covering up of sometimes the weirdest and most unlikely conspiracies.
The following list is considered to be a typology[6]since those who engage in cover-ups tend to use many of the same methods of hiding the truth and defending themselves. This list was compiled from famous cover-ups such as theWatergate Scandal, theIran-Contra Affair,My Lai massacre, thePentagon Papers, the cover-up of corruption in New York City under Boss Tweed (William M. TweedandTammany Hall) in the late 19th century,[7]and the tobacco industry cover-up of the health hazards of smoking.[8]The methods in actual cover-ups tend to follow the general order of the list below.
Depending on the nature of cover-up activities, they may constitute a crime in certain jurisdictions.
Perjury(actively telling lies to the court, as opposed to refusing to answer questions) is considered a crime in virtually all legal systems. Likewise,obstruction of justice, that is, any activity that aims to cover-up another crime, is itself a crime in many legal systems.
The United States has the crime ofmaking false statementsto a federal agent in the context of any matter within the federal jurisdiction, which includes "knowingly and willfully" making a statement that "covers up by any trick, scheme, or device a material fact".[11]
Conspiracy theoriesgenerally include an allegation of a cover-up of the facts of some prominent event. Examples include:
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Deceptionis the act of convincing of one or many recipients of untrue information. The person creating the deception knows it to be false while the receiver of the information does not.[1]It is often done for personal gain or advantage.[2][3]
Deceit and dishonestycan also form grounds for civil litigation intort, orcontract law(where it is known asmisrepresentationorfraudulent misrepresentationif deliberate), or give rise to criminal prosecution forfraud.[4]
TheInterpersonal Deception Theoryexplores the interrelation between communicative context and sender and receiver cognitions and behaviors in deceptive exchanges.
Some forms of deception include:
Buller and Burgoon (1996) have proposed three taxonomies to distinguish motivations for deception based on their Interpersonal Deception Theory:
In the biological world, mimicry involves deception by similarity to another organism, or to a natural object. Animals for example may deceive predators or prey byvisual,auditoryor other means.[8]
Thecamouflageof a physical object often works by breaking up the visual boundary of that object. This usually involves colouring the camouflaged object with the same colours as the background against which the object will be hidden.[9]
Military camouflageas a form of visual deception is a part of many campaigns.
Disguises are used to create the impression of a false appearance.[10]A seventeenth-century story collection, Zhang Yingyu'sThe Book of Swindles(ca. 1617), offers multiple examples of the bait-and-switch and fraud techniques involving the stimulation of greed in Ming-dynasty China.[11]
Deception has also been observed and studied inromanticrelationships.[6][12]
There are three primary motivations for deception in relationships.
Deception impacts the perception of a relationship in a variety of ways, for both the deceiver and the deceived. The deceiver typically perceives less understanding and intimacy from the relationship, in that they see their partner as less empathetic and more distant.[17]The act of deception can also result in feelings of distress for the deceiver, which become worse the longer the deceiver has known the deceived, as well as in longer-term relationships. Once discovered, deception creates feelings of detachment and uneasiness surrounding the relationship for both partners; this can eventually lead to both partners becoming more removed from the relationship or deterioration of the relationship.[12]In general, discovery of deception can result in a decrease in relationship satisfaction and commitment level, however, in instances where a person is successfully deceived, relationship satisfaction can actually be positively impacted for the person deceived, since lies are typically used to make the other partner feel more positive about the relationship.
In general, deception tends to occur less often in relationships with higher satisfaction and commitment levels and in relationships where partners have known each other longer, such as long-term relationships and marriage.[12]In comparison, deception is more likely to occur in casual relationships and in dating where commitment level and length of acquaintanceship is often much lower.[17][18]
Unique to exclusive romantic relationships is the use of deception in the form of infidelity. When it comes to the occurrence of infidelity, there are many individual difference factors that can impact this behavior. Infidelity is impacted byattachment style, relationship satisfaction,executive function,sociosexual orientation, personality traits, andgender. Attachment style impacts the probability of infidelity and research indicates that people with an insecureattachment style(anxious or avoidant) are more likely to cheat compared to individuals with a secure attachment style,[19]especially for avoidant men and anxious women.[20]Insecure attachment styles are characterized by a lack of comfort within a romantic relationship resulting in a desire to be overly independent (avoidant attachment style) or a desire to be overly dependent on their partner in an unhealthy way (anxious attachment style). Those with an insecure attachment style are characterized by not believing that their romantic partner can/will support and comfort them in an effective way, either stemming from a negative belief regarding themselves (anxious attachment style) or a negative belief regarding romantic others (avoidant attachment style). Women are more likely to commit infidelity when they are emotionally unsatisfied with their relationship whereas men are more likely to commit infidelity if they are sexually unsatisfied with their current relationship.[21]Women are more likely to commit emotional infidelity than men while men are more likely to commit sexual infidelity than women; however, these are not mutually exclusive categories as both men and women can and do engage in emotional or sexual infidelity.[21]
Executive control is a part ofexecutive functionsthat allows for individuals to monitor and control their behavior through thinking about and managing their actions. The level of executive control that an individual possesses is impacted by development and experience and can be improved through training and practice.[22][23]Those individuals that show a higher level of executive control can more easily influence/control their thoughts and behaviors in relation to potential threats to an ongoing relationship which can result in paying less attention to threats to the current relationship (other potential romantic mates).[24]Sociosexual orientationis concerned with how freely individuals partake in casual sex outside of a committed relationship and their beliefs regarding how necessary it is to be in love in order to engage in sex with someone.[25]Individuals with a less restrictivesociosexual orientation(more likely to partake in casual sex) are more likely to engage in infidelity.[21][25]Individuals that have personality traits including (high) neuroticism, (low) agreeableness, and (low) conscientiousness are more likely to commit infidelity.[21]Men are generally speculated to cheat more than women, but it is unclear if this is a result of socialization processes where it is more acceptable for men to cheat compared to women or due to an actual increase in this behavior for men.[26]Research conducted by Conley and colleagues (2011) suggests that the reasoning behind these gender differences stems from the negative stigma associated with women who engage in casual sex and inferences about the sexual capability of the potential sexual partner. In their study, men and women were equally likely to accept a sexual proposal from an individual who was speculated to have a high level of sexual prowess. Additionally, women were just as likely as men to accept a casual sexual proposal when they did not anticipate being subjected to the negative stigma of sexually permissible women as slutty.[26]
Research on the use of deception in online dating has shown that people are generally truthful about themselves with the exception of physical attributes to appear more attractive.[27][28][29]According to the Scientific American, "nine out of ten online daters will fib about their height, weight, or age" such that men were more likely to lie about height while women were more likely to lie about weight.[30]In a study conducted by Toma and Hancock, "less attractive people were found to be more likely to have chosen a profile picture in which they were significantly more attractive than they were in everyday life".[31]Both genders used this strategy in online dating profiles, but women more so than men.[31]Additionally, less attractive people were more likely to have "lied about objective measures of physical attractiveness such as height and weight".[31]In general, men are more likely to lie on dating profiles the one exception being that women are more likely to lie about weight.[27]
People who negotiate feel more tempted to use deceit. In negotiation, it includes both parties to trust and respect one another. In negotiations, one party is unaware of what is going on in the other side of the thing that needs to be negotiated. Deception in negotiation comes in many forms, and each has its reaction (Gaspar et al.,2019).[32]
Journalistic deception ranges from passive activities (i.e.blending intoa civil rights march) to active deception (i.e. falsely identifying oneself over the telephone, getting hired as a worker at a mental hospital).[33]Paul Braun says that the journalist does not stand apart from the rest of the populace in the use of deception.[33]
For legal purposes,deceitis atortthat occurs when a person makes a factual misrepresentation, knowing that it is false (or having no belief in its truth and being reckless as to whether it is true) and intending it to be relied on by the recipient, and the recipient acts to his or her detriment in reliance on it. Deceit may also be grounds for legal action incontract law(known asmisrepresentation, or if deliberate,fraudulent misrepresentation), or a criminal prosecution, on the basis offraud.
Military deception(MILDEC) is an attempt by a military unit to gain an advantage duringwarfareby misleading adversary decision makers into taking action or inaction that creates favorable conditions for the deceiving force. This is usually achieved by creating or amplifying an artificialfog of warvia psychological operations,information warfare, visual deception, or other methods. As a form ofdisinformation, it overlaps withpsychological warfare. Military deception is also closely connected tooperations security(OPSEC) in that OPSEC attempts to conceal from the adversary critical information about an organization's capabilities, activities, limitations, and intentions, or provide a plausible alternate explanation for the details the adversary can observe, while deception reveals false information in an effort to mislead the adversary.
Deception in warfare dates back to early history.The Art of War, an ancient Chinese military treatise, emphasizes the importance of deception as a way for outnumbered forces to defeat larger adversaries. Examples of deception in warfare can be found in ancientEgypt,Greece, andRome, theMedieval Age, theRenaissance, and theEuropean Colonial Era. Deception was employed duringWorld War Iand came into even greater prominence duringWorld War II. In modern times, the militaries of several nations have evolved deception tactics, techniques and procedures into fully fledged doctrine. (Full article...)
Deception is a common topic in religious discussions. Some sources focus on how religious texts deal with deception. But, other sources focus on the deceptions created by the religions themselves. For example, Ryan McKnight is the founder of an organization called FaithLeaks. He stated that the organizations "goal is to reduce the amount of deception and untruths and unethical behaviors that exist in some facets of religion".[34]
In general, Islam never allows deception and lie. ProphetMuhammadsaid, "He who deceives is not of me (is not my follower)".[35]However, there are some exceptions, especially in case of war or peace making or in case of safeguarding one's faith.[36]For an example,Taqiyais an Islamic juridical term for the cases in which a Muslim is allowed to lie under the circumstance when need to deny their faith due to force or when faced with persecution.[37]The concept mainly followed by Shi'ite sect, but it varies "significantly among Islamic sects, scholars, countries, and political regimes", and has been evoked bycritics of Islamto portray the faith allowing dishonesty.[38]
Though commonly used and allowed by the ethical guidelines of the American Psychological Association, there has been debate about whether or not the use of deception should be permitted in psychological researchexperiments. Those against deception object to the ethical and methodological issues involved in its use. Dresser (1981) notes that, ethically, researchers are only to use subjects in an experiment after the subject has given informed consent. However, because of its very nature, a researcher conducting a deception experiment cannot reveal its true purpose to the subject, thereby making any consent given by a subject misinformed.[39]Baumrind(1964), criticizing the use of deception in theMilgram (1963) obedience experiment, argues that deception experiments inappropriately take advantage of the implicit trust and obedience given by the subject when the subject volunteers to participate.[40]
From a practical perspective, there are also methodological objections to deception. Ortmann and Hertwig (1998) note that "deception can strongly affect the reputation of individual labs and the profession, thus contaminating the participant pool". If the subjects in the experiment are suspicious of the researcher, they are unlikely to behave as they normally would, and the researcher's control of the experiment is then compromised.[41]Those who do not object to the use of deception note that there is always a constant struggle in balancing "the need for conducting research that may solve social problems and the necessity for preserving the dignity and rights of the research participant".[42]They also note that, in some cases, using deception is the only way to obtain certain kinds of information, and that prohibiting all deception in research would "have the egregious consequence of preventing researchers from carrying out a wide range of important studies".[43]
Some findings suggest that deception is not harmful to subjects. Christensen's (1988) review of the literature found "that research participants do not perceive that they are harmed and do not seem to mind being misled". Furthermore, those participating in experiments involving deception "reported having enjoyed the experience more and perceived more educational benefit" than those who participated in non-deceptive experiments.[44]Lastly, it has also been suggested that an unpleasant treatment used in a deception study or the unpleasant implications of the outcome of a deception study may be the underlying reason that a study using deception is perceived as unethical in nature, rather than the actual deception itself.[45][46]
Some methodologies in social research, especially inpsychology, involve deception. The researchers purposely mislead or misinform the participants about the true nature of the experiment. In an experiment conducted byStanley Milgramin 1963 the researchers told participants that they would be participating in a scientific study of memory and learning. In reality the study looked at the participants' willingness to obey commands, even when that involved inflicting pain upon another person. After the study, the subjects were informed of the true nature of the study, and steps were taken in order to ensure that the subjects left in a state of well-being.[47]
Through the internet, individuals can portray themselves however they please because of the lack of face-to face communication.[7]Digital deception is widely used within different forms of technology to misrepresent someone or something.[18]Through digital deception, people are easily capable of deceiving others whether it be for their own benefit or to ensure their safety. One form of digital deception is catfishing. By creating a false identity catfishers deceive those online to build relationships, friendships, or connections without revealing who they truly are as a person. They do so by creating an entirely new account that has made up information allowing them to portray themselves as a different person. Most lies and misinformation are spread commonly through emails andinstant messagingsince these messages are erased faster.[19]Without face to face communication, it could be easier to deceive others, making it difficult to detect the truth from a lie. These unreliable cues allow digital deception to easily influence and mislead others.[20]
Double bluffing is a deceptive scenario, in which the deceiver tells truth to a person about some subject, but makes the person think that the deceiver is lying.[48][49][50][51]In poker, the term double bluff refers to a situation in which the deceiving player is trying to bluff with bad cards, then gets re-raised by the opponent, and then re-raises again in the hopes that the enemy player folds.[52]This strategy works best on opponents who easily fold under pressure.[53]
Deception detection is extremely difficult unless it is a blatant or obvious lie or contradicts something the other knows to be true. While it is difficult to deceive a person over a long period of time, deception often occurs in day-to-day conversations between relational partners.[6]Detecting deception is difficult because there are no known completely reliable indicators of deception and because people often reply on atruth-defaultstate. Deception, however, places a significant cognitive load on the deceiver. He or she must recall previous statements so that his or her story remains consistent and believable. As a result, deceivers often leak important information both verbally andnonverbally.
Deception and its detection is a complex, fluid, and cognitive process that is based on the context of the message exchange. Theinterpersonal deception theoryposits that interpersonal deception is a dynamic, iterative process of mutual influence between a sender, whomanipulatesinformation to depart from the truth, and a receiver, who attempts to establish the validity of the message.[54]A deceiver's actions are interrelated to the message receiver's actions. It is during this exchange that the deceiver will reveal verbal and nonverbal information about deceit.[55]Some research has found that there are some cues that may be correlated with deceptive communication, but scholars frequently disagree about the effectiveness of many of these cues to serve as reliable indicators.[56]A cross cultural study conducted to analyze human behavior and deception concluded detecting deception often has to do with the judgements of a person and how they interpretnon-verbal cues.One's personality can influence these judgements also as some people are more confident in deceiving compared to others.[57]Noted deception scholar Aldert Vrij even states that there is no nonverbal behavior that is uniquely associated with deception.[58]As previously stated, a specific behavioral indicator of deception does not exist. There are, however, some nonverbal behaviors that have been found to be correlated with deception. Vrij found that examining a "cluster" of these cues was a significantly more reliable indicator of deception than examining a single cue.[58]
Many people believe that they are good at deception, though this confidence is often misplaced.[59]Deception detection can decrease with increased empathy.[60]Emotionrecognition training does not affect the ability to detect deception.[60]
Mark Frankproposes that deception is detected at the cognitive level.[61]Lying requires deliberate conscious behavior, so listening to speech and watching body language are important factors in detecting lies. If a response to a question has a lot disturbances, less talking time, repeated words, and poor logical structure, then the person may be lying. Vocal cues such as frequency height and variation may also provide meaningful clues to deceit.[62]
Fear specifically causes heightened arousal in liars, which manifests in more frequent blinking, pupil dilation, speech disturbances, and a higher pitched voice. The liars that experience guilt have been shown to make attempts at putting distance between themselves and the deceptive communication, producing "nonimmediacy cues". These can be verbal or physical, including speaking in more indirect ways and showing an inability to maintain eye contact with their conversation partners.[63]Another cue for detecting deceptive speech is the tone of the speech itself. Streeter, Krauss, Geller, Olson, and Apple (1977) have assessed that fear and anger, two emotions widely associated with deception, cause greater arousal than grief or indifference, and note that the amount of stress one feels is directly related to the frequency of the voice.[64]
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"Don't ask, don't tell" (DADT) was the official United States policy onmilitary service of homosexual people. Instituted during theClinton administration, the policy was issued underDepartment of DefenseDirective 1304.26 on December 21, 1993, and was in effect from February 28, 1994, until September 20, 2011.[1]The policy prohibited military personnel from discriminating against or harassingclosetedhomosexual or bisexual service members or applicants, while barringopenly gay, lesbian, or bisexual persons from military service. This relaxation of legal restrictions on service by gays and lesbians in the armed forces was mandated byPublic Law103–160 (Title 10 of the United States Code§654), which was signed November 30, 1993.[2]The policy prohibited people who "demonstrate a propensity or intent to engage in homosexual acts" from serving in thearmed forces of the United States, because their presence "would create an unacceptable risk to the high standards of morale, good order and discipline, and unit cohesion that are the essence of military capability".[3]
The act prohibited any non-heterosexual person from disclosing their sexual orientation or from speaking about any same-sex relationships, including marriages or other familial attributes, while serving in theUnited States armed forces. The act specified that service members who disclose that they are homosexual or engage in homosexual conduct should be separated (discharged) except when a service member's conduct was "for the purpose of avoiding or terminating military service" or when it "would not be in the best interest of the armed forces".[4]Since DADT ended in 2011, persons who are openly homosexual and bisexual have been able to serve.[5]
The "don't ask" section of the DADT policy specified that superiors should not initiate an investigation of a service member's orientation without witnessing disallowed behaviors. However, evidence of homosexual behavior deemed credible could be used to initiate an investigation. Unauthorized investigations and harassment of suspected servicemen and women led to an expansion of the policy to "don't ask, don't tell, don't pursue, don't harass".[6]
Beginning in the early 2000s, several legal challenges to DADT were filed, andlegislation to repeal DADTwas enacted in December 2010, specifying that the policy would remain in place until the President, theSecretary of Defense, and theChairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staffcertified that repeal would not harm military readiness, followed by a 60-day waiting period.[7]A July 6, 2011, ruling from a federal appeals court barred further enforcement of the U.S. military's ban on openly gay service members.[8]PresidentBarack Obama, Secretary of DefenseLeon Panetta, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff AdmiralMike Mullensent that certification to Congress on July 22, 2011, which set the end of DADT to September 20, 2011.[9]
Even with DADT repealed, the legal definition of marriage as being one man and one woman under theDefense of Marriage Act(DOMA) meant that, although same-sex partners could get married, their marriage was not recognized by the federal government. This barred partners from access to the same benefits afforded to heterosexual couples such as base access, health care, andUnited States military pay, including family separation allowance andBasic Allowance for Housingwith dependents.[10]The Department of Defense attempted to allow some of the benefits that were not restricted by DOMA,[11]but the Supreme Court decision inUnited States v. Windsor(2013) made these efforts unnecessary.[12]
Engaging inhomosexual activityhad been grounds for discharge from the American military since theRevolutionary War. Policies based on sexual orientation appeared as the United States prepared to enterWorld War II. When the military added psychiatric screening to its induction process, it included homosexuality as a disqualifying trait, then seen as a form ofpsychopathology. When the army issued revised mobilization regulations in 1942, it distinguished "homosexual" recruits from "normal" recruits for the first time.[13]Before the buildup to the war, gay service members were court-martialed, imprisoned, and dishonorably discharged; but in wartime, commanding officers found it difficult to convene court-martial boards of commissioned officers and the administrativeblue dischargebecame the military's standard method for handling gay and lesbian personnel. In 1944, a new policy directive decreed that homosexuals were to be committed to military hospitals, examined by psychiatrists, and discharged under Regulation 615–360,section 8.[14]
In 1947, blue discharges were discontinued and two new classifications were created: "general" and "undesirable". Under such a system, a serviceman or woman found to be gay but who had not committed any sexual acts while in service would tend to receive an undesirable discharge. Those found guilty of engaging in sexual conduct were usually dishonorably discharged.[15]A 1957 U.S. Navy study known as theCrittenden Reportdismissed the charge that homosexuals constitute a security risk, but nonetheless did not advocate for an end to anti-gay discrimination in the navy on the basis that "The service should not move ahead of civilian society nor attempt to set substantially different standards in attitude or action with respect to homosexual offenders." It remained secret until 1976.[16]Fannie Mae Clackumwas the first service member to successfully appeal such a discharge, winning eight years of back pay from theUS Court of Claimsin 1960.[17]
From the 1950s through theVietnam War, some notable gay service members avoided discharges despite pre-screening efforts, and when personnel shortages occurred, homosexuals were allowed to serve.[18]
Thegay and lesbian rights movementin the 1970s and 1980s raised the issue by publicizing several noteworthy dismissals of gay service members. Air Force TSgtLeonard Matlovich, the first service member to purposely out himself to challenge the ban, appeared on the cover ofTimein 1975.[19]In 1982 the Department of Defense issued a policy stating that, "Homosexuality is incompatible with military service." It cited the military's need "to maintain discipline, good order, and morale" and "to prevent breaches of security".[20]In 1988, in response to a campaign against lesbians at the Marines'Parris Island Depot, activists launched the Gay and Lesbian Military Freedom Project (MFP) to advocate for an end to the exclusion of gays and lesbians from the armed forces.[21]In 1989, reports commissioned by the Personnel Security Research and Education Center (PERSEREC), an arm of the Pentagon, were discovered in the process ofJoseph Steffan's lawsuit fighting his forced resignation from the U.S. Naval Academy. One report said that "having a same-gender or an opposite-gender orientation is unrelated tojob performancein the same way as is being left- or right-handed."[22]Other lawsuits fighting discharges highlighted the service record of service members likeTracy ThorneandMargarethe (Grethe) Cammermeyer. The MFP began lobbying Congress in 1990, and in 1991 SenatorBrock Adams(D-Washington) and Rep.Barbara Boxerintroduced the Military Freedom Act, legislation to end the ban completely. Adams and Rep.Pat Schroeder(D-Colorado) re-introduced it the next year.[23]In July 1991, Secretary of DefenseDick Cheney, in the context of the outing of his press aidePete Williams, dismissed the idea that gays posed a security risk as "a bit of an old chestnut" in testimony before the House Budget Committee.[24]In response to his comment, several major newspapers endorsed ending the ban, includingUSA Today, theLos Angeles Times, and theDetroit Free Press.[25]In June 1992, the General Accounting Office released a report that members of Congress had requested two years earlier estimating the costs associated with the ban on gays and lesbians in the military at $27 million annually.[26]
During the1992 U.S. presidential electioncampaign, the civil rights of gays and lesbians, particularly their open service in the military, attracted some press attention,[27]and all candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination supported ending the ban on military service by gays and lesbians,[28]but the Republicans did not make a political issue of that position.[29]In an August cover letter to all his senior officers, GeneralCarl Mundy Jr., Commandant of the Marine Corps, praised a position paper authored by a Marine Corps chaplain that said that "In the unique, intensely close environment of the military, homosexual conduct can threaten the lives, including the physical (e.g.AIDS) and psychological well-being of others". Mundy called it "extremely insightful" and said it offered "a sound basis for discussion of the issue".[30]The murder of gay U.S. Navy petty officerAllen R. Schindler Jr.on October 27, 1992 brought calls from advocates for allowing open service by gays and lesbians in the US military, and requested prompt action from the incoming Clinton administration.[31]
The policy was introduced as a compromise measure in 1993 by President Bill Clinton who campaigned in 1992 on the promise to allow all citizens to serve in the military regardless of sexual orientation.[32]CommanderCraig Quigley, a Navy spokesman, expressed the opposition of many in the military at the time when he said, "Homosexuals are notoriously promiscuous" and that in shared shower situations, heterosexuals would have an "uncomfortable feeling of someone watching".[33]
During the 1993 policy debate, the National Defense Research Institute prepared a study for the Office of the Secretary of Defense published asSexual Orientation and U.S. Military Personnel Policy: Options and Assessment. It concluded that "circumstances could exist under which the ban on homosexuals could be lifted with little or no adverse consequences for recruitment and retention" if the policy were implemented with care, principally because many factors contribute to individual enlistment and re-enlistment decisions.[34]On May 5, 1993,Gregory M. Herek, associate research psychologist at theUniversity of California at Davisand an authority on public attitudes toward lesbians andgay men, testified before theHouse Armed Services Committeeon behalf of several professional associations. He stated, "The research data show that there is nothing about lesbians and gay men that makes them inherently unfit for military service, and there is nothing about heterosexuals that makes them inherently unable to work and live with gay people in close quarters." Herek added, "The assumption that heterosexuals cannot overcome their prejudices toward gay people is a mistaken one."[35]
In Congress,DemocraticSenatorSam NunnofGeorgiaand Chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee led the contingent that favored maintaining the absolute ban on gays. Reformers were led by Democratic CongressmanBarney FrankofMassachusetts, who favored modification (but ultimately voted for the defense authorization bill with the gay ban language), and1964Republicanpresidential nomineeBarry Goldwater, a former Senator and a retired Major General,[36]who argued on behalf of allowing service by open gays and lesbians but was not allowed to appear before the Committee by Nunn. In a June 1993Washington Postopinion piece, Goldwater wrote: "You don't have to be straight to shoot straight".[37]The White House was also reportedly upset when LGBT activistDavid Mixneropenly described Nunn as an "old-fashioned bigot" for opposing Clinton's plan to lift the ban on gays in the military.[38]
Congress rushed to enact the existing gay ban policy into federal law, outflanking Clinton's planned repeal effort. Clinton called for legislation to overturn the ban, but encountered intense opposition from theJoint Chiefs of Staff, members of Congress, and portions of the public. DADT emerged as a compromise policy.[39]Congress included text in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1994 (passed in 1993) requiring the military to abide by regulations essentially identical to the 1982 absolute ban policy.[40]The Clinton administration on December 21, 1993,[41]issued Defense Directive 1304.26, which directed that military applicants were not to be asked about their sexual orientation.[40]This policy is now known as "Don't Ask, Don't Tell". The phrase was coined byCharles Moskos, a military sociologist.
In accordance with the December 21, 1993, Department of Defense Directive 1332.14,[42]it was legal policy (10 U.S.C. § 654)[43]that homosexuality was incompatible with military service and that persons who engaged in homosexual acts or stated that they are homosexual or bisexual were to be discharged.[32][40]TheUniform Code of Military Justice, passed by Congress in 1950 and signed by PresidentHarry S Truman, established the policies and procedures for discharging service members.[44]
The full name of the policy at the time was "Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Don't Pursue". The "Don't Ask" provision mandated that military or appointed officials not ask about or require members to reveal their sexual orientation. The "Don't Tell" stated that a member may be discharged for claiming to be a homosexual or bisexual or making a statement indicating a tendency towards or intent to engage in homosexual activities. The "Don't Pursue" established what was minimally required for an investigation to be initiated. A "Don't Harass" provision was added to the policy later. It ensured that the military would not allow harassment or violence against service members for any reason.[39]
TheServicemembers Legal Defense Networkwas founded in 1993 to advocate an end to discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in the U.S. Armed Forces.[45]
DADT was upheld by five federal Courts of Appeal.[46]TheSupreme Court, inRumsfeld v. Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights, Inc.(2006), unanimously held that the federal government could constitutionally withhold funding from universities, no matter what their nondiscrimination policies might be, for refusing to give military recruiters access to school resources. An association of law schools had argued that allowing military recruiting at their institutions compromised their ability to exercise their free speech rights in opposition to discrimination based on sexual orientation as represented by DADT.[47]
In January 1998, Senior Chief Petty Officer Timothy R. McVeigh[a]won a preliminary injunction from a U.S. district court that prevented his discharge from the U.S. Navy for "homosexual conduct" after 17 years of service. His lawsuit did not challenge the DADT policy but asked the court to hold the military accountable for adhering to the policy's particulars. The Navy had investigated McVeigh's sexual orientation based on hisAOLemail account name and user profile. District JudgeStanley Sporkinruled inMcVeigh v. Cohenthat the Navy had violated its own DADT guidelines: "Suggestions of sexual orientation in a private, anonymous email account did not give the Navy a sufficient reason to investigate to determine whether to commence discharge proceedings."[48]He called the Navy's investigation "a search and destroy mission" against McVeigh. The case also attracted attention because a navy paralegal had misrepresented himself when querying AOL for information about McVeigh's account.Frank Richlinked the two issues: "McVeigh is as clear-cut a victim of a witch hunt as could be imagined, and that witch hunt could expand exponentially if the military wants to add on-line fishing to its invasion of service members' privacy."[49]AOL apologized to McVeigh and paid him damages. McVeigh reached a settlement with the Navy that paid his legal expenses and allowed him to retire with full benefits in July.The New York Timescalled Sporkin's ruling "a victory for gay rights, with implications for the millions of people who use computer on-line services".[50]
In April 2006, Margaret Witt, a major in theUnited States Air Forcewho was being investigated for homosexuality, filed suit in theUnited States District Court for the Western District of Washingtonseekingdeclaratoryandinjunctive reliefon the grounds that DADT violates substantivedue process, the Equal Protection Clause, and procedural due process. In July 2007 theSecretary of the Air Forceordered her honorable discharge. Dismissed by the district court, the case was heard on appeal, and the Ninth Circuit issued its ruling on May 21, 2008. Its decision inWitt v. Department of the Air Forcereinstated Witt's substantive-due-process and procedural-due-process claims and affirmed the dismissal of her Equal Protection claim. The Ninth Circuit, analyzing the Supreme Court decision inLawrence v. Texas(2003), determined that DADT had to be subjected to heightened scrutiny, meaning that there must be an "important" governmental interest at issue, that DADT must "significantly" further the governmental interest, and that there can be no less intrusive way for the government to advance that interest.
TheObama administrationdeclined to appeal, allowing a May 3, 2009, deadline to pass, leavingWittas binding on the entire Ninth Circuit, and returning the case to the District Court.[51]On September 24, 2010, District JudgeRonald B. Leightonruled that Witt's constitutional rights had been violated by her discharge and that she must be reinstated to the Air Force.[52]
The government filed an appeal with the Ninth Circuit on November 23, but did not attempt to have the trial court's ruling stayed pending the outcome.[53]In a settlement announced on May 10, 2011, the Air Force agreed to drop its appeal and remove Witt's discharge from her military record. She will retire with full benefits.[54]
In 2010, a lawsuit filed in 2004 by theLog Cabin Republicans(LCR), the nation's largest Republican gay organization, went to trial.[55]Challenging the constitutionality of DADT, the plaintiffs stated that the policy violates the rights of gay military members to free speech, due process and open association. The government argued that DADT was necessary to advance a legitimate governmental interest.[56]Plaintiffs introduced statements by PresidentBarack Obama, from prepared remarks, that DADT "doesn't contribute to our national security", "weakens our national security", and that reversal is "essential for our national security". According to plaintiffs, these statements alone satisfied their burden of proof on the due process claims.[57]
On September 9, 2010, JudgeVirginia A. Phillipsruled inLog Cabin Republicans v. United States of Americathat the ban on service by openly gay service members was an unconstitutional violation of theFirstandFifth Amendments.[58][59]On October 12, 2010, she granted an immediate worldwide injunction prohibiting the Department of Defense from enforcing the "Don't Ask Don't Tell" policy and ordered the military to suspend and discontinue any investigation or discharge, separation, or other proceedings based on it.[60][61]The Department of Justice appealed her decision and requested a stay of her injunction,[62]which Phillips denied but which the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals granted on October 20[63][64]and stayed pending appeal on November 1.[65]The U.S. Supreme Court refused to overrule the stay.[66]District Court neither anticipated questions of constitutional law nor formulated a rule broader than is required by the facts. The constitutional issues regarding DADT are well-defined, and the District Court focused specifically on the relevant inquiry of whether the statute impermissibly infringed upon substantive due process rights with regard to a protected area of individual liberty. Engaging in a careful and detailed review of the facts presented to it at trial, the District Court concluded that the Government put forward no persuasive evidence to demonstrate that the statute is a valid exercise of congressional authority to legislate in the realm of protected liberty interests. See Log Cabin, 716 F. Supp. 2d at 923. Hypothetical questions were neither presented nor answered in reaching this decision. On October 19, 2010, military recruiters were told they could accept openly gay applicants.[67]On October 20, 2010, Lt.Dan Choi, an openly gay man honorably discharged under DADT, re-enlisted in the U.S. Army.[68]
Following the passage of theDon't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010, the Justice Department asked the Ninth Circuit to suspend LCR's suit in light of the legislative repeal. LCR opposed the request, noting that gay personnel were still subject to discharge. On January 28, 2011, the Court denied the Justice Department's request.[69]The Obama administration responded by requesting that the policy be allowed to stay in place while they completed the process of assuring that its end would not impact combat readiness. On March 28, the LCR filed a brief asking that the court deny the administration's request.[70]
In 2011, while waiting for certification, several service members were discharged under DADT at their own insistence,[71]until July 6 when a three-judge panel of theNinth Circuit Court of Appealsre-instated Judge Phillips' injunction barring further enforcement of the U.S. military's ban on openly gay service members.[72]On July 11, the appeals court asked the DOJ to inform the court if it intended to proceed with its appeal.[73]On July 14, the Justice Department filed a motion "to avoid short-circuiting the repeal process established by Congress during the final stages of the implementation of the repeal".[74]and warning of "significant immediate harms on the government". On July 15, the Ninth Circuit restored most of the DADT policy,[74]but continued to prohibit the government from discharging or investigating openly gay personnel. Following the implementation of DADT's repeal, a panel of three judges of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appealsvacatedthe Phillips ruling.[75]
Following the July 1999 murder of Army Pfc.Barry Winchell, apparently motivated by anti-gay bias, President Clinton issued an executive order modifying theUniform Code of Military Justiceto permit evidence of a hate crime to be admitted during the sentencing phase of a trial.[76][77]In December, Secretary of DefenseWilliam Cohenordered a review of DADT to determine if the policy's anti-gay harassment component was being observed.[78]When that review found anti-gay sentiments were widely expressed and tolerated in the military, the DOD adopted a new anti-harassment policy in July 2000, though its effectiveness was disputed.[76]On December 7, 1999,Hillary Clintontold an audience of gay supporters that "Gays and lesbians already serve with distinction in our nation's armed forces and should not face discrimination. Fitness to serve should be based on an individual's conduct, not their sexual orientation."[79]Later that month, retired GeneralCarl E. Mundy Jr.defended the implementation of DADT against what he called the "politicization" of the issue by both Clintons. He cited discharge statistics for the Marines for the past five years that showed 75% were based on "voluntary admission of homosexuality" and 49% occurred during the first six months of service, when new recruits were most likely to reevaluate their decision to enlist. He also argued against any change in the policy, writing inThe New York Times: "Conduct that is widely rejected by a majority of Americans can undermine the trust that is essential to creating and maintaining the sense of unity that is critical to the success of a military organization operating under the very different and difficult demands of combat."[80]The conviction of Winchell's murderer, according toThe New York Times, "galvanized opposition" to DADT, an issue that had "largely vanished from public debate". Opponents of the policy focused on punishing harassment in the military rather than the policy itself, which SenatorChuck Hageldefended on December 25: "The U.S. armed forces aren't some social experiment."[81]
The principal candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2000,Al GoreandBill Bradley, both endorsed military service by open gays and lesbians, provoking opposition from high-ranking retired military officers, notably the recently retired commandant of the Marine Corps, GeneralCharles C. Krulak. He and others objected to Gore's statement that he would use support for ending DADT as a "litmus test" when considering candidates for theJoint Chiefs of Staff.[82]The 2000Democratic Partyplatform was silent on the issue,[83]while theRepublican Partyplatform that year said: "We affirm that homosexuality is incompatible with military service."[84]Following the election ofGeorge W. Bushin 2000, observers expected him to avoid any changes to DADT, since his nominee for Secretary of State Colin Powell had participated in its creation.[85]
In February 2004, members of the British Armed Forces, Lt Rolf Kurth and Lt Cdr Craig Jones, along with Aaron Belkin, Director of the Center for the Study of Sexual Minorities in the Military met with members of Congress and spoke at the National Defense University. They spoke about their experience of the current situation in the UK. The UK lifted the ban on gay members serving in their forces in 2000.[86][87]
In July 2004, theAmerican Psychological Associationissued a statement that DADT "discriminates on the basis of sexual orientation" and that "Empirical evidence fails to show that sexual orientation is germane to any aspect of military effectiveness including unit cohesion, morale, recruitment and retention." It said that the U.S. military's track record overcoming past racial and gender discrimination demonstrated its ability to integrate groups previously excluded.[88]TheRepublican Party platform that yearreiterated its support for the policy—"We affirm traditional military culture, and we affirm that homosexuality is incompatible with military service."[89]—while theDemocratic Partymaintained its silence.[90]
In February 2005, theGovernment Accountability Officereleased estimates of the cost of DADT. It reported at least $95.4 million in recruiting costs and at least $95.1 million for training replacements for the 9,488 troops discharged from 1994 through 2003, while noting that the true figures might be higher.[91]In September, as part of its campaign to demonstrate that the military allowed open homosexuals to serve when its workforce requirements were greatest, theCenter for the Study of Sexual Minorities in the Military(now the Palm Center) reported that army regulations allowed the active-duty deployment of Army Reservists and National Guard troops who claim to be or who are accused of being gay. A U.S. Army Forces Command spokesperson said the regulation was intended to prevent Reservists and National Guard members from pretending to be gay to escape combat.[92][93]Advocates of ending DADT repeatedly publicized discharges of highly trained gay and lesbian personnel,[94]especially those in positions with critical shortages, including fifty-nine Arabic speakers and ninePersianspeakers.[95][96]Elaine Donnelly, president of theCenter for Military Readiness, later argued that the military's failure to ask about sexual orientation at recruitment was the cause of the discharges: [Y]ou could reduce this number to zero or near zero if the Department of Defense dropped Don't Ask, Don't Tell. ... We should not be training people who are not eligible to be in the Armed Forces."[97]
In February 2006, aUniversity of CaliforniaBlue Ribbon Commissionthat includedLawrence Korb, a former assistant defense secretary during theReaganadministration,William Perry, Secretary of Defense in theClintonadministration, and professors from theUnited States Military Academyreleased their assessment of the GAO's analysis of the cost of DADT released a year earlier. The commission report stated that the GAO did not take into account the value the military lost from the departures. They said that that total cost was closer to $363 million, including $14.3 million for "separation travel" following a service member's discharge, $17.8 million for training officers, $252.4 million for training enlistees, and $79.3 million in recruiting costs.[91]
In 2006,Soulforce, a national LGBT rights organization, organized itsRight to Serve Campaign, in which gay men and lesbians in several cities attempted to enlist in the Armed Forces or National Guard.[98]Donnelly of the Center for Military Readiness stated in September: "I think the people involved here do not have the best interests of the military at heart. They never have. They are promoting an agenda to normalize homosexuality in America using the military as a battering ram to promote that broader agenda." She said that "pro-homosexual activists ... are creating media events all over the country and even internationally."[99]
In 2006, a speaking tour of gay former service members, organized by SLDN, Log Cabin Republicans, and Meehan, visited 18 colleges and universities. Patrick Guerriero, executive director of Log Cabin, thought the repeal movement was gaining "new traction" but "Ultimately", said, "we think it's going to take a Republican with strong military credentials to make a shift in the policy." Elaine Donnelly called such efforts "a big P.R. campaign" and said that "The law is there to protect good order and discipline in the military, and it's not going to change."[100]
In December 2006,Zogby Internationalreleased the results of a poll of military personnel conducted in October 2006 that found that 26% favored allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly in the military, 37% were opposed, while 37% expressed no preference or were unsure. Of respondents who had experience with gay people in their unit, 6% said their presence had a positive impact on their personal morale, 66% said no impact, and 28% said negative impact. Regarding overall unit morale, 3% said positive impact, 64% no impact, and 27% negative impact.[101]
RetiredChairman of the Joint Chiefs of StaffGeneralJohn Shalikashvili[102]and former Senator andSecretary of DefenseWilliam Cohen[103]opposed the policy in January 2007: "I now believe that if gay men and lesbians served openly in the United States military, they would not undermine the efficacy of the armed forces" Shalikashvili wrote. "Our military has been stretched thin by our deployments in the Middle East, and we must welcome the service of any American who is willing and able to do the job."[104]Shalikashvili cited the recent "Zogby poll of more than 500 service members returning from Afghanistan and Iraq, three-quarters of whom said they were comfortable interacting with gay people.[105]The debate took a different turn in March when GeneralPeter Pace, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the editorial board of theChicago Tribunehe supported DADT because "homosexual acts between two individuals are immoral and ... we should not condone immoral acts."[106]His remarks became, according to theTribune, "a huge news story on radio, television and the Internet during the day and showed how sensitive the Pentagon's policy has become."[107]Senator John Warner, who backed DADT, said "I respectfully, but strongly, disagree with the chairman's view that homosexuality is immoral", and Pace expressed regret for expressing his personal views and said that DADT "does not make a judgment about the morality of individual acts."[108]Massachusetts GovernorMitt Romney, then in the early stages of his campaign for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, defended DADT:[109]
When I first heard [the phrase], I thought it sounded silly and I just dismissed it and said, well, that can't possibly work. Well, I sure was wrong. It has worked. It's been in place now for over a decade. The military says it's working and they don't want to change it ... and they're the people closest to the front. We're in the middle of a conflict right now. I would not change it.
That summer, after U.S. SenatorLarry Craigwas arrested for lewd conduct in a men's restroom, conservative commentatorMichael Medvedargued that any liberalization of DADT would "compromise restroom integrity and security". He wrote: "The national shudder of discomfort and queasiness associated with any introduction of homosexual eroticism into public men's rooms should make us more determined than ever to resist the injection of those lurid attitudes into the even more explosive situation of the U.S. military."[110]
In November 2007, 28 retired generals and admirals urged Congress to repeal the policy, citing evidence that 65,000 gay men and women were serving in the armed forces and that there were over a million gay veterans.[104][111]On November 17, 2008, 104 retired generals and admirals signed a similar statement.[111]In December, SLDN arranged for60 Minutesto interviewDarren Manzella, an Army medic who served in Iraq after coming out to his unit.[112]
In 2008, former U.S. SenatorSam Nunn, who previously stalled efforts to lift the ban on gays serving in military when he was Chairman of the Senate Armed Forces Committee, hinted a shift from his previous political views by endorsing a newPentagonstudy to examine the issue of homosexuals serving openly in the military, stating "I think [when] 15 years go by on any personnel policy, it's appropriate to take another look at it—see how it's working, ask the hard questions, hear from the military. Start with a Pentagon study."[113]
On May 4, 2008, while Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff AdmiralMike Mullenaddressed the graduating cadets atWest Point, a cadet asked what would happen if the next administration were supportive of legislation allowing gays to serve openly. Mullen responded, "Congress, and not the military, is responsible for DADT." Previously, during his Senate confirmation hearing in 2007, Mullen told lawmakers, "I really think it is for the American people to come forward, really through this body, to both debate that policy and make changes, if that's appropriate." He went on to say, "I'd love to have Congress make its own decisions" with respect to considering repeal.[114]
In May 2009, when a committee of military law experts at thePalm Center, an anti-DADT research institute, concluded that the President could issue an Executive Order to suspend homosexual conduct discharges,[115]Obama rejected that option and said he wanted Congress to change the law.[116]
On July 5, 2009,Colin Powelltold CNN that the policy was "correct for the time" but that "sixteen years have now gone by, and I think a lot has changed with respect to attitudes within our country, and therefore I think this is a policy and a law that should be reviewed." Interviewed for the same broadcast, Mullen said the policy would continue to be implemented until the law was repealed, and that his advice was to "move in a measured way. ... At a time when we're fighting two conflicts there is a great deal of pressure on our forces and their families."[117]In September,Joint Force Quarterlypublished an article by an Air Force colonel[118]that disputed the argument that unit cohesion is compromised by the presence of openly gay personnel.[119]
In October 2009, the Commission on Military Justice, known as theCox Commission, repeated its 2001 recommendation that Article 125 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which bans sodomy, be repealed, noting that "most acts of consensual sodomy committed by consenting military personnel are not prosecuted, creating a perception that prosecution of this sexual behavior is arbitrary."[120]
In January 2010, the White House and congressional officials started work on repealing the ban by inserting language into the 2011 defense authorization bill.[121]During Obama'sState of the Union Addresson January 27, 2010, he said that he would work with Congress and the military to enact a repeal of the gay ban law and for the first time set a timetable for repeal.[122]
At a February 2, 2010, congressional hearing, SenatorJohn McCainread from a letter signed by "over one thousand former general and flag officers". It said: "We firmly believe that this law, which Congress passed to protect good order, discipline and morale in the unique environment of the armed forces, deserves continued support."[123]The signature campaign had been organized byElaine Donnellyof theCenter for Military Readiness, a longtime supporter of a traditional all-male and all-heterosexual military.[124]Servicemembers United, a veterans group opposed to DADT, issued a report critical of the letter's legitimacy. They said that among those signing the letter were officers who had no knowledge of their inclusion or who had refused to be included, and even one instance of a general's widow who signed her husband's name to the letter though he had died before the survey was published. The average age of the officers whose names were listed as signing the letter was 74, the oldest was 98, and Servicemembers United noted that "only a small fraction of these officers have even served in the military during the 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' period, much less in the 21st century military."[125]
TheCenter for American Progressissued a report in March 2010 that said a smooth implementation of an end to DADT required eight specified changes to the military's internal regulations.[126]On March 25, 2010, Defense Secretary Gates announced new rules mandating that onlyflag officerscould initiate discharge proceedings and imposing more stringent rules of evidence on discharge proceedings.[127]
The underlying justifications for DADT had been subjected to increasing suspicion and outright rejection by the early 21st century. Mounting evidence obtained from the integration efforts of foreign militaries, surveys of U.S. military personnel, and studies conducted by the DoD gave credence to the view that the presence of open homosexuals within the military would not be detrimental at all to the armed forces. A DoD study conducted at the behest of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates in 2010 supports this most.
The DoD working group conducting the study considered the impact that lifting the ban would have on unit cohesion and effectiveness, good order and discipline, and military morale. The study included a survey that revealed significant differences between respondents who believed they had served with homosexual troops and those who did not believe they had. In analyzing such data, the DoD working group concluded that it was actually generalized perceptions of homosexual troops that led to the perceived unrest that would occur without DADT. Ultimately, the study deemed the overall risk to military effectiveness of lifting the ban to be low. Citing the ability of the armed forces to adjust to the previous integration of African-Americans and women, the DoD study asserted that the United States military could adjust as had it before in history without an impending serious effect.[128]
In March 2005, Rep.Martin T. Meehanintroduced theMilitary Readiness Enhancement Actin the House. It aimed "to amend title 10, United States Code, to enhance the readiness of the Armed Forces by replacing the current policy concerning homosexuality in the Armed Forces, referred to as 'Don't ask, don't tell,' with a policy of nondiscrimination on the basis of sexual orientation".[129]As of 2006, it had 105 Democrats and 4 Republicans as co-sponsors.[100]He introduced the bill again in 2007 and 2009.
During the2008 U.S. presidential electioncampaign, Senator Barack Obama advocated a full repeal of the laws barring gays and lesbians from serving in the military.[130]Nineteen days after his election, Obama's advisers announced that plans to repeal the policy might be delayed until 2010, because Obama "first wants to confer with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and his new political appointees at the Pentagon to reach a consensus, and then present legislation to Congress".[131]As president he advocated a policy change to allow gay personnel to serve openly in the armed forces, stating that the U.S. government has spent millions of dollars replacing troops expelled from the military, including language experts fluent inArabic, because of DADT.[132]On the eve of theNational Equality Marchin Washington, D.C., October 10, 2009, Obama stated in a speech before theHuman Rights Campaignthat he would end the ban, but he offered no timetable.[133][134]Obama said in his 2010 State of the Union Address: "This year, I will work with Congress and our military to finally repeal the law that denies gay Americans the right to serve the country they love because of who they are."[135]This statement was quickly followed up by Defense SecretaryRobert Gatesand Joint Chiefs chairmanMichael Mullenvoicing their support for a repeal of DADT.[136]
Democrats in both houses of Congress first attempted to end DADT by amending the Defense Authorization Act. On May 27, 2010, on a 234–194 vote,[137]the U.S. House of Representatives approved theMurphyamendment[138]to theNational Defense Authorization Actfor Fiscal Year 2011. It provided for repeal of the DADT policy and created a process for lifting the policy, including aU.S. Department of Defensestudy and certification by key officials that the change in policy would not harm military readiness followed by a waiting period of 60 days.[139][140]The amended defense bill passed the House on May 28, 2010.[141]On September 21, 2010,John McCainled a successfulfilibusteragainst on the Defense Authorization Act, in which 56 Senators voted toend debate, four short of the 60 votes required.[142]Some advocates for repeal, including the Palm Center, OutServe, and Knights Out, opposed any attempt to block the passage of NDAA if it failed to include DADT repeal language. The Human Rights Campaign, the Center for American Progress, Servicemembers United and SLDN refused to concede that possibility.[143]
TheAmerican Civil Liberties Union(ACLU) filed a lawsuit,Collins v. United States, against the Department of Defense in November 2010 seeking full compensation for those discharged under the policy.[144]
On November 30, 2010, theJoint Chiefs of Staffreleased the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Comprehensive Review Working Group (CRWG) report authored byJeh C. Johnson,General Counsel of the Department of Defense, and Army GeneralCarter F. Ham.[145][146]It outlined a path to the implementation of repeal of DADT.[147]The report indicated that there was a low risk of service disruptions due to repealing the ban, provided time was provided for proper implementation and training.[145][148]It included the results of a survey of 115,000 active-duty and reserve service members. Across all service branches, 30 percent thought that integrating gays into the military would have negative consequences. In the Marine Corps and combat specialties, the percentage with that negative assessment ranged from 40 to 60 percent. The CRWG also said that 69 percent of all those surveyed believed they had already worked with a gay or lesbian and of those, 92 percent reported that the impact of that person's presence was positive or neutral.[147][148]The same day, in response to the CRWG, 30 professors and scholars, most from military institutions, issued a joint statement saying that the CRWG "echoes more than 20 studies, including studies by military researchers, all of which reach the same conclusion: allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly will not harm the military ... We hope that our collective statement underscores that the debate about the evidence is now officially over".[149]TheFamily Research Council's president,Tony Perkins, interpreted the CRWG data differently, writing that it "reveals that 40 percent of Marines and 25 percent of the Army could leave".[150]
Gates encouraged Congress to act quickly to repeal the law so that the military could carefully adjust rather than face a court decision requiring it to lift the policy immediately.[148]The United States Senate held two days of hearings on December 2 and 3, 2010, to consider the CRWG report. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Joint Chiefs chairman Michael Mullen urged immediate repeal.[151]The heads of the Marine Corps, Army, and Navy all advised against immediate repeal and expressed varied views on its eventual repeal.[152]Oliver North, writing inNational Reviewthe next week, said that Gates' testimony showed "a deeply misguided commitment to political correctness". He interpreted the CRWG's data as indicating a high risk that large numbers of resignations would follow the repeal of DADT. Service members, especially combat troops, he wrote, "deserve better than to be treated like lab rats in Mr. Obama's radical social experiment".[153]
On December 9, 2010, another filibuster prevented debate on the Defense Authorization Act.[154]In response to that vote, SenatorsJoe LiebermanandSusan Collinsintroduced a bill that included the policy-related portions of the Defense Authorization Act that they considered more likely to pass as a stand-alone bill.[155]It passed the House on a vote of 250 to 175 on December 15, 2010.[156]On December 18, 2010, the Senate voted to end debate on its version of the bill by a cloture vote of 63–33.[157]The final Senate vote was held later that same day, with the measure passing by a vote of 65–31.[158]
U.S. Secretary of DefenseRobert Gatesreleased a statement following the vote indicating that the planning for implementation of a policy repeal would begin right away and would continue until Gates certified that conditions were met for orderly repeal of the policy.[159]President Obama signed the repeal into law on December 22, 2010.[7]
The repeal act established a process for ending the DADT policy. The President, the Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff were required to certify in writing that they had reviewed the Pentagon's report on the effects of DADT repeal, that the appropriate regulations had been reviewed and drafted, and that implementation of repeal regulations "is consistent with the standards of military readiness, military effectiveness, unit cohesion, and recruiting and retention of the Armed Forces". Once certification was given, DADT would be lifted after a 60-day waiting period.[160]
RepresentativeDuncan D. Hunterannounced plans in January 2011 to introduce a bill designed to delay the end of DADT. His proposed legislation required all of the chiefs of the armed services to submit the certification at the time required only of the President, Defense Secretary and Joint Chiefs chairman.[161]In April, Perkins of the Family Research Council argued that the Pentagon was misrepresenting its own survey data and that hearings by the House Armed Services Committee, now under Republican control, could persuade Obama to withhold certification.[162]Congressional efforts to prevent the change in policy from going into effect continued into May and June 2011.[163]
On January 29, 2011, Pentagon officials stated that the training process to prepare troops for the end of DADT would begin in February and would proceed quickly, though they suggested that it might not be completed in 2011.[164]On the same day, the DOD announced it would not offer any additional compensation to service members who had been discharged under DADT, who received half of the separation pay other honorably discharged service members received.[165]
In May 2011, the U.S. Army reprimanded three colonels for performing a skit in March 2011 at a function atYongsan Garrison, South Korea, that mocked the repeal.[166]
In May 2011, revelations that an April Navy memo relating to its DADT training guidelines contemplated allowing same-sex weddings in base chapels and allowingchaplainsto officiate if they so chose resulted in a letter of protest from 63 Republican congressman, citing theDefense of Marriage Act(DOMA) as controlling the use of federal property.[167]Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council said the guidelines "make it even more uncomfortable for men and women of faith to perform their duties".[168]A Pentagon spokesperson replied that DOMA "does not limit the type of religious ceremonies a chaplain may perform in a chapel on a military installation", and a Navy spokesperson said that "A chaplain can conduct a same-sex ceremony if it is in the tenets of his faith".[169]A few days later the Navy rescinded its earlier instructions "pending additional legal and policy review and interdepartmental coordination".[170]
While waiting for certification, several service members were discharged at their own insistence[71]until a July 6 ruling from a federal appeals court barred further enforcement of the U.S. military's ban on openly gay service members,[8]which the military promptly did.[171]
Anticipating the lifting of DADT, some active duty service members wearing civilian clothes marched inSan Diego's gay pride paradeon July 16. The DOD noted that participation "does not constitute a declaration of sexual orientation".[172]
President Obama, Secretary of DefenseLeon Panetta, and AdmiralMike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, sent the certification required by the Repeal Act to Congress on July 22, 2011, setting the end of DADT for September 20, 2011.[173]A Pentagon spokesman said that service members discharged under DADT would be able to re-apply to rejoin the military then.[174]
At the end of August 2011, the DOD approved the distribution of the magazine produced byOutServe, an organization of gay and lesbian service members, at Army and Air Force base exchanges beginning with the September 20 issue, coinciding with the end of DADT.[175]
On September 20, Air Force officials announced that 22 Air Force Instructions were "updated as a result of the repeal of DADT".[176]On September 30, 2011, the Department of Defense modified regulations to reflect the repeal by deleting "homosexual conduct" as a ground for administrative separation.[177][178]
On the eve of repeal, US Air Force 1st Lt.Josh Seefried, one of the founders ofOutServe, an organization of LGBT troops, revealed his identity after two years of hiding behind a pseudonym.[179]Senior AirmanRandy Phillips, after conducting a social media campaign seeking encouragement coming out and already out to his military co-workers, came out to his father on the evening of September 19. His video of their conversation made him, in one journalist's estimation, "the poster boy for the DADT repeal".[180]The moment the repeal took effect at midnight on September 19, US Navy Lt.Gary C. Rossmarried his same-sex partner of eleven and a half years, Dan Swezy, making them the first same-sex military couple to legally marry in the United States.[181]Retired Rear Adm.Alan M. Steinmanbecame the highest-ranking person to come out immediately following the end of DADT.[182]HBO produced aWorld of Wonderdocumentary,The Strange History of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, and premiered it on September 20.Varietycalled it "an unapologetic piece of liberal advocacy" and "a testament to what formidable opponents ignorance and prejudice can be".[183]Discharge proceedings on the grounds of homosexuality, some begun years earlier, came to an end.[184]
In the weeks that followed, a series of firsts attracted press attention to the impact of the repeal. The Marine Corps were the first branch of the armed services to recruit from the LGBTQ community.[185]Reservist Jeremy Johnson became the first person discharged under DADT to re-enlist.[186]Jase Danielsbecame the first to return to active duty, re-joining the Navy as a third class petty officer.[187]On December 2, Air Force intelligence officer Ginger Wallace became the first open LGBT service member to have a same-sex partner participate in the "pinning-on" ceremony that marked her promotion to colonel.[188]On December 23, after 80 days at sea, US Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Marissa Gaeta won the right to the traditional "first kiss" upon returning to port and shared it with her same-sex partner.[189]On January 20, 2012, U.S. service members deployed toBagram, Afghanistan, produced a video in support of theIt Gets Better Project, which aims to support LGBT at-risk youth.[190]Widespread news coverage continued even months after the repeal date, when a photograph of Marine Sgt. Brandon Morgan kissing his partner at a February 22, 2012, homecoming celebration onMarine Corps Base Hawaiiwentviral.[191]When asked for a comment, a spokesperson for the Marine Corps said: "It's your typical homecoming photo."[192]
On September 30, 2011, Under Secretary of DefenseClifford Stanleyannounced the DOD's policy that military chaplains are allowed to perform same-sex marriages "on or off a military installation" where local law permits them. His memo noted that "a chaplain is not required to participate in or officiate a private ceremony if doing so would be in variance with the tenets of his or her religion" and "a military chaplain's participation in a private ceremony does not constitute an endorsement of the ceremony by DoD".[193]Some religious groups announced that their chaplains would not participate in such weddings, including an organization of evangelical Protestants, the Chaplain Alliance for Religious Liberty[194]and Roman Catholics led by ArchbishopTimothy Broglioof theArchdiocese for the Military Services, USA.[195]
In late October 2011, speaking at theAir Force Academy, Colonel Gary Packard, leader of the team that drafted the DOD's repeal implementation plan, said: "The best quote I've heard so far is, 'Well, some people's Facebook status changed, but that was about it.'"[196]In late November, discussing the repeal of DADT and its implementation, Marine GeneralJames F. Amossaid "I'm very pleased with how it has gone" and called it a "non-event". He said his earlier public opposition was appropriate based on ongoing combat operations and the negative assessment of the policy given by 56% of combat troops under his command in the Department of Defense's November 2010 survey. A Defense Department spokesperson said implementation of repeal occurred without incident and added: "We attribute this success to our comprehensive pre-repeal training program, combined with the continued close monitoring and enforcement of standards by our military leaders at all levels."[197]
In December 2011, Congress considered two DADT-related amendments in the course of work on theNational Defense Authorization Act for 2012. The Senate approved 97–3, an amendment removing the prohibition on sodomy found inArticle 125of theUniform Code of Military Justiceas recommended by the Comprehensive Review Working Group (CRWG) a year earlier.[198][199]The House approved an amendment banning same-sex marriages from being performed at military bases or by military employees, including chaplains and other employees of the military when "acting in an official capacity". Neither amendment appeared in the final legislation.[198]
In July 2012, the Department of Defense granted permission for military personnel to wear their uniforms while participating in the San Diego Pride Parade. This was the first time that U.S. military personnel were permitted to wear their service uniforms in such a parade.[200]
Marking the first anniversary of the passage of the Repeal Act, television news networks reported no incidents in the three months since DADT ended. One aired video of a social gathering for gay service members at a base in Afghanistan.[201]Another reported on the experience of lesbian and gay troops, including some rejection after coming out to colleagues.[202]
The Palm Center, athink tankthat studies issues of sexuality and the military, released a study in September 2012 that found no negative consequences, nor any effect on military effectiveness from DADT repeal. This study began six months following repeal and concluded at the one year mark. The study included surveys of 553 generals and admirals who had opposed repeal, experts who supported DADT, and more than 60 heterosexual, gay, lesbian and bisexual active duty service personnel.[203][204]
On January 7, 2013, the ACLU reached a settlement with the federal government inCollins v. United States. It provided for the payment of full separation pay to service members discharged under DADT since November 10, 2004, who had previously been granted only half that.[205]
Several candidates for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination called for the restoration of DADT, includingMichele Bachmann,[206]Rick Perry,[207]andRick Santorum.[208]Newt Gingrichcalled for an extensive review of DADT's repeal.[209]
Ron Paul, having voted for the Repeal Act, maintained his support for allowing military service by open homosexuals.[210]Herman Caincalled the issue "a distraction" and opposed reinstating DADT.[211]Mitt Romneysaid that the winding down of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan obviated his opposition to the repeal and said he was not proposing any change to policy.[212]
On September 22, 2011, the audience at a Republican candidates' debate booed a U.S. soldier posted in Iraq who asked a question via video about the repeal of DADT, and none of the candidates acknowledged or responded to the crowd's behavior.[213]Two days later, Obama commented on the incident while addressing a dinner of theHuman Rights Campaign: "You want to be commander in chief? You can start by standing up for the men and women who wear the uniform of the United States, even when it's not politically convenient".[214]
In June 2012, Rep.Howard McKeon, Republican chair of the House Armed Services Committee, said he considered the repeal of DADT a settled issue, and that if Romney became president he would not advocate its reinstatement, though others in his party might.[215]
In September 2021, on the 10th anniversary of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell repeal, PresidentJoe Bidenannounced that the Veterans Administration would start providing benefits for service members who received other-than-honorable discharges (before DADT was enacted and while it was in effect) because of their sexual orientation.[216]
In 2024, more than 800 veterans who had been previously dishonorably discharged under DADT had their cases reviewed and discharge papers automatically updated to honorable discharge status. With this review, nearly all of the 13,500 people who were dishonorably discharged under DADT now have an honorable discharge and as a result, can access benefits for veterans.[217]
In 1993,Timereported that 44% of those polled supported openly gay service members,[218]and in 1994, a CNN poll indicated 53% of Americans believed gays and lesbians should be permitted to serve openly.[219]
According to a December 2010Washington Post–ABC Newspoll, 77% of Americans said gays and lesbians who publicly disclose their sexual orientation should be able to serve in the military. That number showed little change from polls over the previous two years, but represented the highest level of support in a Post-ABC poll. The support also cut across partisan and ideological lines, with majorities of Democrats (86%), Republicans (74%), independents (74%), liberals (92%), conservatives (67%), white evangelical Protestants (70%) and non-religious (84%) in favor of homosexuals serving openly.[220]
A November 2010 survey by thePew Research Centerfound that 58% of the U.S. public favored allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly in the military, while less than half as many (27%) were opposed.[221]According to a November 2010CNN/Opinion Research Corporationpoll, 72% of adult Americans favored permitting people who are openly gay or lesbian to serve in the military, while 23% opposed it.[222]"The main difference between the CNN poll and the Pew poll is in the number of respondents who told pollsters that they didn't have an opinion on this topic – 16 percent in the Pew poll compared to only five percent in the CNN survey", said CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "The two polls report virtually the same number who say they oppose gays serving openly in the military, which suggests that there are some people who favor that change in policy but for some reason were reluctant to admit that to the Pew interviewers. That happens occasionally on topics where moral issues and equal-treatment issues intersect."[223]
A February 2010Quinnipiac University Polling Institutenational poll showed 57% of American voters favored gays serving openly, compared to 36% opposed, while 66% said not allowing openly gay personnel to serve is discrimination, compared to 31% who did not see it as discrimination.[224]ACBS News/New York Timesnational poll done at the same time showed 58% of Americans favored gays serving openly, compared to 28% opposed.[225]
Chaplain groups and religious organizations took various positions on DADT. Some felt that the policy needed to be withdrawn to make the military more inclusive. TheSouthern Baptist Conventionbattled the repeal of DADT, warning that their endorsements for chaplains might be withdrawn if the repeal took place.[226][227]They took the position that allowing gay men and women to serve in the military without restriction would have a negative impact on the ability of chaplains who think homosexuality is a sin to speak freely regarding their religious beliefs. TheRoman Catholic Churchcalled for the retention of the policy, but had no plans to withdraw its priests from serving as military chaplains.[228]Sixty-five retired chaplains signed a letter opposing repeal, stating that repeal would make it impossible for chaplains whose faith teaches that same-sex behavior is immoral to minister to military service members.[229]Other religious organizations and agencies called the repeal of the policy a "non-event" or "non-issue" for chaplains, saying that chaplains have always supported military service personnel, whether or not they agree with all their actions or beliefs.[230][231][232]
After the policy was introduced in 1993, the military discharged over 13,000 troops from the military under DADT.[111][233][234]The number of discharges per fiscal year under DADT dropped sharply after theSeptember 11 attacksand remained comparatively low through to the repeal. Discharges exceeded 600 every year until 2009.
In November 2019, bothRhode IslandandNew York Statesigned into law and implemented restoring military benefits to gay and lesbian military veterans. It is estimated that approximately 100,000 individuals were discharged between the beginning ofWorld War IIand the repeal of the Don't Ask Don't Tell policy in September 2011.[240]
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Freedom of information lawsallow access by the general public to data held by national governments and, where applicable, by state and local governments. The emergence offreedom of informationlegislation was a response to increasing dissatisfaction with the secrecy surrounding government policy development and decision making.[1]In recent yearsAccess to Information Acthas also been used. They establish a "right-to-know" legal process by which requests may be made for government-held information, to be received freely or at minimal cost, barring standard exceptions. Also variously referred to asopen records, orsunshine laws(in theUnited States), governments are typically bound by a duty to publish and promote openness. In many countries there are constitutional guarantees for the right of access to information, but these are usually unused if specific support legislation does not exist. Additionally, the United NationsSustainable Development Goal 16has a target to ensure public access to information and the protection of fundamental freedoms as a means to ensure accountable, inclusive and just institutions.[2]
Over 100 countries around the world have implemented some form offreedom of informationlegislation.[3][4][5]Sweden'sFreedom of the Press Actof 1766 is the oldest in the world.[6][7]
Most freedom of information laws exclude the private sector from their jurisdiction thus information held by the private sector cannot be accessed as a legal right. This limitation has serious implications because the private sector performs many functions which were previously the domain of the public sector. As a result, information that was previously public is now within the private sector, and the private contractors cannot be forced to disclose information.[8]
Other countries are working towards introducing such laws, and many regions of countries with national legislation have local laws. For example, all U.S. states have laws governing access to public documents belonging to the state and local taxing entities. Additionally, the U.S. Freedom of Information Act governs record management of documents in the possession of the federal government.
A related concept isopen meetingslegislation, which allows access to government meetings, not just to the records of them. In many countries,privacyordata protectionlaws may be part of the freedom of information legislation; the concepts are often closely tied together in political discourse.
A basic principle behind most freedom of information legislation is that theburden of prooffalls on the bodyaskedfor information, not the personaskingfor it. The person making the request does not usually have to give an explanation for their actions, but if the information is not disclosed a valid reason has to be given.
In 2015 TheUNESCOGeneral Conference voted to designate 28 Sep as “International Day for the Universal Access to Information” or, as it is more commonly known,Access to Information Day. The date had previously been celebrated as “Right to Know Day” since 2002. The UNESCO resolution recommends approval by theUN General Assembly.[9]
InAlbania, the constitution of 1998 guarantees the right of access to information; the legislation for supporting this is Law no. 119/2014 "On the right to information" (Ligji nr. 119/2014 "Për të drejtën e informimit"). The law regulates the right of access to information being produced or held by public sector. The rules contained in this law are designated to ensure the public access to information, in the framework of assuming the rights and freedoms of the individual in practice, as well as establishing views on the state and society situation. This law aims also at encouraging integrity, transparency and accountability of the public sector bodies. Every person shall, where deemed that the rights provided for in this law have been violated, be entitled to file a complaint administratively to the Information and Data Protection Commissioner's Office.[10]
InArgentina, the Access to public information Act (Ley 27.275) was adopted in 2016.
The Law on Freedom of Information[11]was unanimously approved by the Parliament on 23 September 2003 and went into force in November 2003.
InAustralia, theFreedom of Information Act 1982was passed at the federal level in 1982, applying to all "ministers, departments and public authorities" of the Commonwealth. The act was amended in 2010 under the Rudd Government, establishing the government office of the information commissioner, to further promote freedom of information.
There is similar legislation in all states and territories:[12]
"Austria’s government has frequently been criticized for inadequate transparency. Official secrecy remains enshrined in the constitution, and Austria’s overall legal framework on access to information is weak" writes theNGOFreedom Housein its 2022 and 2023 reports.[21][22]Reporters without Borders (RSF): "In Austria,press freedomhas been undermined by various political pressures or restrictions on access to information."[23]
In the context of a newly proposed public access law that has yet to be passed byparliament,Transparency Internationalwrites: "More than 110 countries have already created freedom of information – Nonsense that this should not be possible in Austria."[24]
InAzerbaijan, a Law on Access to Information was approved in 2005. It has gone into effect. Previously in 1998 there was accepted Law on Freedom on Information, but the Law of 2005 provided more detailed and secured regulation for access to official information.
On 21 October 2008, theCaretaker Government of Bangladeshissued in the Bangladesh Gazette the Right to Information Ordinance (No. 50 of 2008), based loosely on the IndianRight to Information Act, 2005.[25]The Ordinance was passed by the current government of Bangladesh in the first session of this parliament on 29 March 2009. TheA2iprogramme is a part of theVision 2021, apolitical manifestoof theBangladesh Awami Leagueparty before winning theNational Elections of 2008.
Article 32 of the Constitution was amended in 1993 to include a right of access to documents held by the government.
InBelize, theFreedom of Information Actwas passed in 1998 was amended in 2000 and is currently in force, though a governmental commission noted that "not much use has been made of the Act".[26]
The National Assembly of Bhutan passed an RTI Bill in February 2014. Its purpose is to curb corruption by providing the public with the right to access information.
Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) was the first country in the Balkan region to adopt a Freedom of Information Act.Freedom of Access to Information Actor FOIA – was adopted by the Parliament Assembly of Bosnia and Herzegovina on 17 November 2000. Both federal entities – the Republika Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina – passed freedom of information laws in 2001, theFreedom of Access to Information Act for the Republika SrpskaandFreedom of Access to Information Act for the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovinarespectively.
The FOIA Act changed on the BiH state level two times. The first alteration was passed in 2006, enabling stronger legal protection within the framework of administrative law of BiH. The second alteration was passed in December 2009, which enforced legal penalties for prescribed violations.
InBrazil, the Article 5, XXXIII, of the Constitution sets that "everyone shall have the right to receive information of his own interest or of public interest from public entities, which shall be given within the time prescribed by law". Also, article 22 of the Federal law nº 8.159/1991 grants the right to "full access to public documents".
A statute passed in 2011 and that will enter into force in 2012 (Federal Law 12.527/2011, promulgated on 28 November 2011) regulates the manner and the timetable for the information to be given by the State.
InBulgaria, theAccess to Public Information Act(APIA) was passed in 2000, following a 1996 recommendation from the Constitutional Court to implement such a law. The act defined public information as any information related to the social life in the Republic of Bulgaria. It allows citizens of Bulgaria access to public information created by state bodies and provides principles under which the information may be accessed, as well as when access can be denied.[27]
The Access to Public Information Act was amended in 2005, 2007, 2008, 2011, 2015, and 2018. Several amendments, particularly those made in 2007 and 2018, faced backlash from government organizations, media, journalists, and information advocates.
The 2007 amendments to the act were criticized for limiting access by extending reply times from 14 to 20 business days, removing the obligation for public authorities to provide partial access and allowing fees to be charged for information requests. Despite widespread criticism, all of the 2007 amendments were passed.[28]
In 2008, the authorities obligated to provide information were expanded, and the obligation for proactive publishing of information online was introduced. Additional focus was placed on access to information related to trade secrets.[29]
2015 brought extensive changes to the APIA with a focus on the digital aspects of information access, such as the publication of information online and the acceptance of e-requests. Amendments included: allowing citizens to submit e-requests for information with no need for electronic signatures, clarifying the definition of a “public law organization” expanding the organizations that comply with the APIA, requiring public sector bodies to publish their material in machine readable formats with all appropriate metadata, the calculation of fees and information reuse, and expanding categories of information required to be proactively made available online.[30]The amendments also discuss third party consent and dissent, allowing public agencies to provide partial access to information to a requestor if a third party does not respond within 14 days.[30]
In 2018, amendments were introduced to Article 40 of the APIA which states that request or denial of access to information may be appealed in front of the Administrative or Supreme Court .[27]The amendment to Article 40 in 2018 made information requests unable to be subjected to a cassation appeal.[31]
InCanada, theAccess to Information Actallows citizens to demand records from federal bodies. The act came into force in 1983, under thePierre Trudeaugovernment, permitting Canadians to retrieve information from government files, establishing what information could be accessed, mandating timelines for response.[32]This is enforced by theInformation Commissioner of Canada.
There is also a complementaryPrivacy Actthat was introduced in 1983. The purpose of thePrivacy Actis to extend the present laws of Canada that protect theprivacyof individuals with respect to personal information about themselves held by a federal government institution and that provide individuals with a right of access to that information. It is aCrown copyright. Complaints for possible violations of the Act may be reported to thePrivacy Commissioner of Canada.
Canadian access to information laws distinguish between access to records generally and access to records that containpersonal informationabout the person making the request. Subject to exceptions, individuals have a right of access to records that contain their own personal information under thePrivacy Actbut the general public does not have a right of access to records that contain personal information about others under theAccess to Information Act.
Each province and territory in Canada has its own access to information legislation. In all cases, this is also the provincial public sector privacy legislation. For example:
From 1989 to 2008, requests made to the federal government were catalogued in theCoordination of Access to Information Requests System.
A 393-page report released in September 2008, sponsored by several Canadian newspaper groups, compares Canada's Access to Information Act to the FOI laws of the provinces and of 68 other nations.[33]
In 2009,The Walrus (magazine)published a detailed history of FOI in Canada.[34]
The Freedom of Information Law in theCayman Islandswas passed in 2007 and was brought into force in January 2009. The act applies to public authorities and grants citizens the right to access information created by those public authorities.[35]The act was last revised in January 2021 and includes six sections: preliminary, right of access, repealed, internal review, information managers, miscellaneous.[36]
In the Cayman Islands, all information requests are processed by information managers working in public authorities. A pdf of all public authorities, Information Managers, and contact information as of 2025 is available on the Cayman Island Government website.
Part 1, Preliminary, contains the citation for the Act and definitions of chief officer, consent, information manager, personal information, and public access. Part 2, Right of Access, covers general information such as applications by third parties, provisions to access, reasonable search, receipt and acknowledgment of requests, access to record during working hours, personal information, and third party rights and fees. Part 3, Repealed, contains three acts that have since been repealed and removed from the act. Part 4, Internal Review, states that an internal review can be conducted by a person of higher or equal rank to whoever made an initial decision about an information request. Part 5, Information Managers, outlines the role of information managers, their part in internal reviews, and what information they need to register and monitor information requests. Finally, Part 6, Miscellaneous, discusses what to do if a minor places an information request. It states that a child does not need parental consent to place a request but that the information manager may decide to withhold access depending on the content of the request.[36]
InChile, article 8 of theConstitutionprovides for the freedom of information. A law titled Law on Access to Public Information (Ley de Acceso a la Información Pública) took effect on 20 April 2009.[37]
In April 2007, theState Council of the People's Republic of Chinapromulgated the "Regulations of the People's Republic of China on Open Government Information" (中华人民共和国政府信息公开条例), which came into effect on 1 May 2008.[38]
TheColombianconstitution grants the right of access to public information throughLaw 57 of 1985which thereby mandates the publishing of acts and official documents. This is implemented and applies to documents that belong to official facilities (offices or the like). Additionally, there is the anticorruptionstatement ofLaw 190 of 1955also known asanti corruption actwhich in its 51st article mandates public offices to list in visible area all the contracts and purchases made by month. The latter taking place slowly. A more modern law, the "Ley de transparencia y del derecho de acceso a la información pública nacional" it's at its final stages.[39]
Article 23 of theconstitutionstates that "Every person has the right to present petitions to the authorities for the general or private interest and to secure their prompt resolution. The legislative body may regulate the presentation of petitions to private organisations in order to guarantee fundamental rights."[40]
This article justifies the existence of a jurisdictional mechanism known a petition action. This action is regulated by the law 1755 of 2015 and is considered by the Colombian Judicial Doctrine as a fundamental human right. According to the law all petitions should be fully addressed in 15 business days. If not addressed the official in charge of resolving the petition may be charged with misconduct.[41]
Access to official information is governed by theOfficial Information Act 2008. The law is based heavily on theNew Zealand legislation.
InCroatia, theZakon o pravu na pristup informacijama(Act on the Right of Access to Information) first introduced in 2003 extends to all public authorities.[42]
The right of access to information in Cyprus is guaranteed in constitutional provisions on freedom of expression. The No. 184(I)/2017 law on access to information in the southern part of the Republic of Cyprus of the country has been published on 22 December 2017. A law that falls below Council of Europe standards in the Northern occupied part of Cyprus.[43]The right to access to public information is provided in different ways in the two parts of the island, in which Cyprus is de facto divided.
As to 2011, research by the Open Cyprus Project showed that there was a level of 75% of administrative silence island-wide, in response to information requests.[44]Over half of the respondents to this survey stated that, in practice, access to key documents is not possible.[44]
Since late 2013, a draft law on the Right to Access Public Information was being discussed in the Parliament of the Republic of Cyprus.
On 22 December 2017 the law has finally been approved (Law number 184(I)/2017 Law on the Right of Access to Information of the Public Sector).
In theCzech Republic, theZákon č. 106/1999 Sb., o svobodném přístupu k informacím(Act No. 106/1999 Coll. on Free Access to Information) covers the "state agencies, territorial self-administration authorities and public institutions managing public funds" as well as anybody authorized by the law to reach legal decisions relating to the public sector, to the extent of such authorisation.[45]
Access to Public Administration Files Act of 1985 is aDanishact passed by theFolketingconcerning public access to governmental records. The Act came into force in 1987 and repealed the Public Records Act of 1970.[46]New version of the Act came into force on 1 January 2014.[47]Denmark is considered to be a historic pioneer in the field of FOI along with Sweden, Finland and Norway.[48]There is no constitutional basis in theConstitution of Denmarkfor the right of the public to information.[49]Denmark scores 64 points in Global Right to Information Rating.[50]
According to the Act of 1985, Section 4 Part 1 states that “any person may ask to see documents received or issued by an administrative authority.”[51]Information concerning administrative matters of the public administration; electricity and heating utilities as well as private bodies receiving public funding or performing public function can be acquired. Yet, the information concerning activities of judicial branch and legislators is not accessible.[52][53]
Reasons do not have to be given while making a request; however, the authorities can ask for additional information regarding document.[53]The requests are supposed to be handled as soon as possible; if within period of 10 days response to an application was not provided, the authority has to inform on reasons for the delay as well as expected date for a decision.[54]More detailed procedures are not laid down in the Act.[53]
Access to information is limited by “the obligation to maintain secrecy.”[55]: Ch.4, S.14Considerations of State security, defense, foreign policy, external economic interests as well as public financial interests can limit the granting of access to the information.[55]: Ch.3, S.13Registers and records processed electronically are excluded from the administrative documents that can be given access to.[55]: Ch.2, S.5.2Section 10 outlines other areas excluded from access, such as records of meetings of theCouncil of State, minutes, as well as documents prepared for such meetings; correspondence between ministries concerning legislation and material used for scientific research or public statistics.[55]: Ch.3, S.10
Decision to grant or not to grant access can be appealed.[56][55]: Ch.4, S.15.2Decisions can also be appealed externally to Folketingets Ombudsman.[56][57]Ombudsman can also deliver opinions and review decisions; however, these are not binding even though generally followed.[57]Ombudsman receives 200–300 complaints annually; approximately 15 percent of complaints are ruled in favor of appellants.[57]
The exemption regarding EU documents was taken out of the Act in 1991.[58]Amendments were also made in 2000; they concerned data on the employees of the Government.[58]In January 2014 new Public Records Act was enforced.[59]The new act was highly debated since it was considered to limit transparency in the Government and legislative proceedings; Denmark received one point less in the category of Political Environment when compared with the Freedom of the Press report of 2015.[60]The new legislation caused demonstrations and protests.[60]It can be regarded as a response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.[60]After the Public Records Act of 2013 came into effect, public access to information regarding theIntelligence Servicesinstead of falling under the Public Records Act is now managed by the Act on the Security and Intelligence Service as well as the Act on the Defense Intelligence Service.[60]In addition, the access to legislative process was further restricted. According to the new Act documents in the drafting stage are not to be accessed as well as “other corresponding political activities,” so restriction is not concerning only Bills.[60]In the future, it will not be possible to find the calendars of ministers being published.[60]Nevertheless, the Act was created while keeping in mind the strengthening the project of the Open Government; the list of institutions covered by the Act was extended as well as list of public-private institutions and companies.[60]
Hipólito Mejía approvedLey No.200-04 – Ley General de Libre Acceso a la Información Pública[61](Law number 200-04 – Law on Access to Information) on 28 July 2004, which allows public access to information from the government and private organisations that receive public money to conduct state business. Rough drafts and projects that are not part of an administrative procedure are not included.
InEcuador, theTransparency and Access to Information Lawof 2004 declares that the right of access to information is guaranteed by the state.
InEl Salvador, theLaw on Access to Public Informationwas given assent by The Legislative Assembly of El Salvador on 3 March 2011.[62]The act ensures the right to access information is guaranteed by the state and that all organizations and institutions receiving funding from the government are required to set up a website listing "bylaws, regulations, plans, directories, staff salaries, services provided, collective bargain contracts, budgets, auditing results, contracts, acquisitions, credits and loans, among other reports"[63]
InEstonia, thePublic Information Act[64]of 2000 seeks to "ensure that the public and every person has the opportunity to access information intended for public use, based on the principles of a democratic and social rule of law and an open society, and to create opportunities for the public to monitor the performance of public duties". It extends to all "holders of information", covering all state and local government bodies,legal persons in public lawandlegal personsin private law if they are performing public duties (providing health, education etc.).
In matters concerning the local, national and transboundary environment, theAarhus conventiongrants the public rights regarding access to information, public participation and access to justice in governmentaldecision-makingprocesses. It focuses on interactions between the public and public authorities.
The recognition of the right to access to public information underArticle 10(including "freedom (..) to receive (..) information") of theEuropean Convention on Human Rightswas one of subjects inGuerra v. Italycase before the European Court of Human Rights in 1998. The majority considered Article 10 was not applicable to the complaint. However, the court found that in the specific case, which included living near a high-risk factory, not providing information was in violation ofArticle 8(respect to private and family life). Besides, two judges expressed a dissent on applicability of Article 10, and further six judges reserved a possibility, that in other circumstances, right to access to information could be protected by Article 10.[65]
TheParliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europehas considered in 1996, that "public access to clear and full information on this subject [Chernobyl disaster]—and many others for that matter—must be viewed as a basic human right".[66]In 2009, CoE Convention on Access to Official Documents was opened for signature.[67]
Article 42CFRandArticle 15TFEUgive ″[a]ny citizen of the Union, and any natural or legal person residing or having its registered office in a Member State, [...] a right of access to documents of the institutions, bodies, offices and agencies of the Union, whatever their medium." It follows from Article 15 TFEU that this right is "subject to the principles and the conditions to be defined" in legislation.
Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 of the European Parliament and the Council of 30 May 2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents[68]further defines this right of access to documents of the three institutions; for most other EU bodies and agencies, there is a provision in the legal act establishing them which makes Regulation No 1049/2001 applicable to them as well.[69]In some other cases, specific rules apply (e.g. to theEESC,[70]theCoR,[71]theCourt of Justice,[72]theCourt of Auditors[73]and theECB).[74]"Document" is defined broadly and it is assumed that all documents, even if classified, may be subject to right of access unless it falls under one of the exceptions. If access is refused, the applicant is allowed a confirmatory request. A complaint against a refusal can be made with the European Ombudsman and/or an appeal can be brought before the EuropeanGeneral Court.
In addition,Directive 2003/98/EC of the European Parliament and the Council of 17 November 2003 on the re-use of public sector information[75]sets out the rules and practices for accessing public sector information resources for further exploitation. This directive has been reviewed in 2013 byDirective 2013/37/EU of the European Parliament and the Council of 26 June 2013 amending Directive 2003/98/EC on the re-use of public sector information[76]
Since 2008, theEuropean Commissionoperates the Register of Interest representatives, a voluntary register of lobbyists at the European union.[77]
Directive 2003/4/ECof the European Parliament and Council provides for citizens of each country to have freedom of access to information on the environment, in line with the requirements of theAarhus Convention. Governments are required to transcribe the directive into national legislation (for example, in the United Kingdom, theEnvironmental Information Regulations 2004).
Directive 95/46/EC, theData Protection directive, provides a variety of rights in relation to personal data, including a right of access. This has been transcribed into national legislation through, for example, theData Protection Act 1998(United Kingdom) and the Data Protection 2003 (Ireland).
InFinland, theLaki yleisten asiakirjain julkisuudesta 9.2.1951/83(Act on the Openness of Public Documentsof 1951) established the openness of all records and documents in the possession of officials of the state, municipalities, and registered religious communities. Exceptions to the basic principle could only be made by law, or by an executive order for specific enumerated reasons such as national security. The openness of unsigned draft documents was not mandated, but up to the consideration of the public official. This weakness of the law was removed when the law was revised in the 1990s. The revised law, theLaki viranomaisten toiminnan julkisuudesta 21.5.1999/621(Act on the Openness of Government Activitiesof 1999), called in short "Publicity Act" (Finnish:Julkisuuslaki) also extended the principle of openness to corporations that perform legally mandated public duties, such as pension funds and public utilities, and to computer documents.[78]
The Publicity Act establishes a process by which any person may access any record in possession of an authority. The person may ask the authority for the document in person or in writing. When making the request, the requester needs to specify the document so that it can be identified. However, the authority is liable to assist the person with its document registers and indices in this task. After receiving the request, the authority has two weeks to give the document. If the decision is negative, and document is withheld, the requester may appeal to the administrative court. The document may be given orally, for reading and copying in the authority's premises or as an electronic or paper copy, as requested by the person. However, the copying may be declined if it would be unfeasible because of the large number of documents or otherwise technically difficult. There are also a number of limitations on the release of electronic documents designed for the protection of the individual privacy.[79]: §§13, 14, 15
The reasons for withholding a document are listed in the article 24 of the Act. They may be grouped to three categories: automatic non-openness, conditional non openness or conditional openness. The documents where automatic non-openness is prescribed remain withheld in all cases. In the case of conditional non-openness, the reasonability of the non-openness is reviewed case-by-case by the authority and, if appeals are made, by the court. In the third category, openness is a rule, and the reason for non-openness needs to be established by the authority.[79]: §24
The absolute reasons for non-openness are (subpoint of Article 24 in captions)[79]: §24
Conditional non-openness is mandated for the following categories of documents, unless it is "obviously clear" that the protected interest is not endangered[79]: §24.1
Conditional openness is prescribed for the following categories of information:[79]: §24.1
Non-open information remains non-open for 25 years after it was created or obtained by an authority. Documents that are non-open to protect the privacy of an individual remain non-open for 50 years after the protected individual has died.[79]: §31.2, 31, 5
If information is still, after 25 years, valid and describes a security measure of a building, facility, system or method or it is still part of a plan used for national defence or civil defence, it remains non-open as long as the information is pertinent for the purpose. The same indefinite non-openness applies to all documents under international security obligations, if the release might still affect Finnish foreign relations negatively. The non-openness of other documents may be prolonged up to 55 years by theCouncil of State, if necessary to safeguard a protected interest.[79]: §31.3–4
InFrance, the accountability of public servants is a constitutional right, according to theDeclaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen.
The implementing legislation is theLoi n°78–753 du 17 juillet 1978 portant diverses mesures d'amélioration des relations entre l'administration et le public et diverses dispositions d'ordre administratif, social et fiscal(Act No. 78-753 of 17 July 1978).On various measures for improved relations between the Civil Service and the public and on various arrangements of administrative, social and fiscal nature). It sets as a general rule that citizens can request a copy of any administrative document (in paper, digitised or other form), and establishes the Commission d’Accès aux Documents Administratifs, an independent administrative authority, to oversee the process, although no administration is required to accept those request.[80]
InGeorgia, the General Administrative Code contains aLaw on Freedom of Information.
InGermany, the federal government passed a freedom of information law on 5 September 2005; it was last updated on 7 August 2013.[81]The law grants each person an unconditional right to access official federal information. No legal, commercial, or any other kind of justification is necessary.
Thirteen of the sixteenBundesländer—Baden-Württemberg,Berlin,Brandenburg,Bremen,Hamburg,Hesse,Mecklenburg-Vorpommern,Nordrhein-Westfalen,Rheinland-Pfalz,Saarland,Sachsen-Anhalt,Schleswig-HolsteinandThüringen—have approved individual "Informationsfreiheitsgesetze" (Freedom of Information laws).
InGreece, the 1975 Greek Constitution guaranteed the right of access to administrative documents and the right of citizens to obtain information. However it was not until 1986 that the first law was passed to provide for access to information.[82]
Article 16 (Right to Access Administrative Documents—Δικαίωμα γνώσης διοικητικών εγγράφων) of Law 1599/1986 (State-citizenry Relationship—Σχέσεις Κράτους-πολίτη) introduced the right of all citizens to read most administrative documents. This right is now codified as article 5 (Access to documents—Πρόσβαση σε έγγραφα) of the Administrative Procedural Code (Κώδικας Διοικητικής Διαδικασίας), Law 2690/1999. Under this article, citizens have a right to know the content of administrative documents. Administrative documents are defined as those produced by public sector entities, such as reports, studies, minutes, statistical data, circulars, instructions, responses, consultatory responses, and decisions. In addition, citizens with a legitimate interest may also accessprivatedocuments stored by public services.[83]The right cannot be exercised if the document concerns the private or family lives of others, or if the document's confidentiality is safeguarded by specific legal provisions. Furthermore, the public body can refuse access if the document refers to discussions in the Cabinet, or if accessing the document can seriously hamper criminal or administrative violation investigations carried out by judicial, police, or military authorities.[84]
Citizens may study the documents at the place where they are archived, or they may obtain a copy at their own cost. Access to one's own medical data is provided with the help of a doctor. Access to documents should take into account whether they be covered by copyright, patent, or trade secret regulations.
In addition, Law 3448/2006, on the reuse of public sector information, harmonizes the national laws with the requirements on theEuropean Union Directive 2003/98/EC.[85]
Guyana has a freedom of information act, which came into force in 2013, but it has relatively weak provisions. A commission tasked with ensuring asset declarations by government officials has begun functioning since 2018.Guyana also entered into the EITI, which guarantees the transparency of the proceeds of oil reserves of countries.[86]
InHong Kongthere are no laws specifically enacted to guarantee the freedom of information.
Since March 1995, theGovernment of Hong Konghas promulgated a "Code on Access to Information" to serve a similar purpose. This code, like other internal regulations of the Government, was not legislated by theLegislative Counciland has a minimal legal status. It requires government agencies listed in its appendix to appoint Access to Information Officers to answer citizens' requests for governmental records. A fee may be charged prior to the release of information. The code does not require the government to archive information.[87]
InHungary, theAct on the Protection of Personal Data and Public Access to Data of Public Interestof 1992 extends a right of access to all data of public interest, defined as any information processed by a body performing a governmental function. Complaints and contested applications may be appealed to the Data Protection Commissioner (until 2011) or to the court.[88]
In 2005 the Parliament adopted theAct on the Freedom of Information by Electronic Means(Act XC of 2005). The Act has three basic parts: 1. electronic disclosure of certain data by public sector bodies, 2. publicity of legislation and 3. openness of Court decisions.
From 2010 on theSecond Orbán Governmenthave changed considerable parts of the legislation, changing the constitution and by releasing a completely rewritten law (Act CXII of 2011on the right to information self-determination and freedom of information). The move discontinued the Data Protection Commissioner office (in January 2012 theEuropean Commissionlaunched infringement proceedings against Hungary for the abolition of the position and for violation of doing it mid-term), and moved data protection into theNational Authority of Data Protection and Freedom of Information(NAIH) government body, run a leader loyal to the government; the results were that controversial data is withheld without merit and needs to be forced out by lengthy and costly court process.
Legally the law withholds openness of public data (Section III and IV) and protection of personal data (section II).
InIcelandthe Information Act (Upplýsingalög) Act no. 50/1996[89]gives access to public information.
TheRight to Information Act(RTI Act) was passed byParliamenton 11 May 2005 and was published in the gazette of India on 15 June 2005. It came into effect on 12 October 2005[90][91]replacing the erstwhile Freedom of information Act, 2002. The Supreme Court of India had, in several Judgments prior to enactment of both Acts, interpreted Indian Constitution to read Right to Information as the Fundamental Right as embodied in Right to Freedom of Speech and Expression and also in Right to Life. RTI Act laid down a procedure to guarantee this right. Under this law all Government Bodies or Government funded agencies have to designate a Public Information Officer (PIO). The PIO's responsibility is to ensure that information requested is disclosed to the petitioner within 30 days or within 48 hours in case of information concerning the life or liberty of a person. The law was inspired by previous legislation from select states (among themTamil Nadu(1997),Goa(1997),Rajasthan(2000),Karnataka(2000),Delhi(2001),Maharashtra(2002) etc.) that allowed the right to information (to different degrees) to citizens about activities of any State Government body.
12.
Question No.115
Starred
28 November 2019
India Justice Report 2019
Legal Aid to Poor
A number of high-profile disclosures revealed corruption in various government schemes such scams inPublic Distribution Systems(ration stores), disaster relief, construction of highways etc. The law itself has been hailed as a landmark in India's drive towards more openness and accountability.
However the RTI has certain weaknesses that hamper implementation. There have been questions on the lack of speedy appeal to non-compliance to requests. The lack of a central PIO makes it difficult to pin-point the correct PIO to approach for requests. There is also a criticism of the manner in which the Information Commissioners are appointed to head the information commission. It is alleged by RTI Activists that bureaucrats working in close proximity with the government are appointed in the RTI Commissions in a non-transparent manner.[92]The PIO, being an officer of the relevant Government institution, may have a vested interest in not disclosing damaging information on activities of his/her Institution, This therefore creates a conflict of interest. In the state of Maharashtra it was estimated that only 30% of the requests are actually realised under the Maharashtra Right to Information act. The law does not allow disclosure of information that affects national security, defence, and other matters that are deemed of national interest.[93][94][95][96][97][98][99][100][101]
The Law on Dissemination of and Free Access to Information was approved by Iranian Parliament in 2008. Its English and Arabic renditions were officially released as part of the government's efforts to promote Freedom of Information (FOI) in October 2018.[102]
In 2023 Iranian government charged Etemad after publishing information on denied news by the government around hijab watch guards law obtained by Foia, the government claimed it was top secret.[103]
InIreland, the Freedom of Information Act 1997 came into effect in April 1998, one year after its enactment.[104]It provided for members of the public to access information specifically about themselves, amend incorrect information, and request an explanation behind administrative decisions concerning themselves, as well as allowing any person to access records generated by a list of specified public bodies. The Act is seen as having led to a sea-change in the relationship between the citizen, journalists,government departmentsandpublic bodies. Disclosure is the default assumption of the Act; bodies can withhold information only by citing exemptions specified in the legislation. Decisions of public bodies in relation to requests for information may be reviewed by theOffice of the Information Commissioner.
The 2014 Act was amended by the Freedom of Information (Amendment) Act 2003.[105]The amendments introduced fees for non-personal requests and restricted the kinds of material which could be accessed.
The Freedom of Information Act 2014 repealed the 1997 and 2003 Acts, removing most of the restrictions introduced in 2003 and widening the range of bodies covered to all public bodies, unless specifically exempt.[106]It also allowed for the government to prescribe (or designate) other bodies receiving significant public funds, so that the FOI legislation would also apply to them.
InIsrael, the Freedom of Information Law, 5758–1998, supported by the Freedom of Information Regulations, 5759–1999, controls freedom of information. It defines the bodies subject to the legislation by a set of listed categories – essentially, most public bodies – and provides for the government to publish a list of all affected bodies. However, this list does not seem to have been made publicly available, if indeed it was ever compiled.[neutralityisdisputed]Many public bodies are not obliged to follow the law, which limits the potential for use by the public.
The Israeli Freedom of Information Law has, in some cases, actually achieved the opposite intended result.[citation needed]some Government agencies now take the position that a citizen may only request information via FOIL—i.e., an official letter designated as such and including the 95shekelfee. Thus an Israeli citizen in many cases cannot simply write a letter asking a question, and can be asked to file a FOIL application with a fee and wait the minimum statutory 30 days for a reply, which the agency can extend to 60 days. In many cases FOIL letters are simply ignored,[citation needed]or some laconic response is sent stating the request is either unclear, unspecific, too vague or some other legalese, anything in order to keep the information away from the public.[citation needed]When the 60 days are up, if the anticipated result usually yield nothing significant,[citation needed]the applicant must petition the District Court to compel disclosure, a procedure that requires attorneys to draft pleadings and a payment of (approximately) $420 court fee. A judgement in such FOIL appeals in Israel can take many months, and again the agency can easily[neutralityisdisputed]avoid disclosure by simply not complying, although risking being charged with contempt of court. While there are some successes in courts compelling Israeli government agencies to disclose information, they are usually in non-controversial areas. The law provides for the expected[neutralityisdisputed]"security" exemption and an applicant applying for such information can expect not to benefit from FOIL (and also have his or her court appeal rejected). Applicants can sometimes be helped byThe Movement for Freedom of Information.[107]
WhileItalydoes not have a freedom of information act, it has several legislations over the past 35 years. Chapter V of Law No. 241 of 7 August 1990, which provides access to administrative documents, was the first Italian law to allow information requests. Chapter V of Law No. 241 of 7 August 1990 provides for access to administrative documents. However, the right to access is limited. The law states that those requesting information must have a legal interest. The 1992 regulations require "a personal concrete interest to safeguard in legally relevant situations."[108]The act was amended in 2005, inserting the principle of transparency into the law and rewrote article 22 of the law to state that access to administrative documents is to promote transparency and participation.[109]
In 2013, Article 5, d.l. 33/2013, aka the transparency decree, was written into law and expanded the limited access granted by Law No. 241 Chapter 5. The article does not replace Law No. 241, Chapter 5. The article defined transparency as, “total accessibility (of data and documents held by public administrations, in order to protect citizens' rights, promote the participation of data subjects in administrative activity and) encourage widespread forms of control over the pursuit of institutional functions and the use of public resources.”[110]In 2016 Legislative Decree No. 97 amended Article 5, d.l. 33/2013.
Under the 2016 legislation, any person has a right to obtain access to documents, information and data that public entities hold.[111]No particular interest is required in this case, but the law states specific limits for this right, mainly to balance it with other public and private rights. In some cases, these limits are absolutes and in other cases they are subject to discretion.[112]The legislation also outlines general civic access and its limitations, as well as how to submit information requests to.[113]
The last update to the Transparency Decree was made in 2022, with Legislative Decree no. 104/2022. The act expands to include information requests between that of employee and employer and was applicable to all employment relationships as of August 1, 2021.[114]It requires specific and complete information related to employment contracts be mandatorily given between employer and employee. It provides protection for employees in their right to request access to information from employers and the employees right to stability of employment, work planning, multiple employments, and mandatory probationary and training periods.[114]
In Jamaica, the relevant legislation is theAccess to Information Act, 2002.[115]
InJapan, the "Law Concerning Access to Information Held by Administrative Organs" (行政機関の保有する情報の公開に関する法律) was promulgated in 1999. The law was enforced in 2001.
Small town governments, rather than the federal government, were the first to take measures to enact freedom of information as the national government was "not...as eager as local governments to deal with freedom of information legislation"[116]
Local efforts in some ways predate national efforts; In many local governments, regulations about information disclosure (情報公開条例) were established starting from the latter half of the 1980s.[117]
The Constitution of Latvia states: "Article 100. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression, which includes the right to freely receive, keep and distribute information and to express his or her views. Censorship is prohibited." The right to access state held information has been repeatedly recognized by the Constitutional Court of Latvia, most notably in its judgment "On Conformity of the Cabinet of Ministers 21 January 1997 Regulations No.46 "On Government Agreements" with the 20 November 1998 "Information Accessibility Law"[118][119]
The Law on Freedom of Information was signed into law by the State President in November 1998 and has been amended a number of times recently. Any person can ask for information in "any technically feasible form" without having to show a reason. The request can be oral or written. Bodies must respond in 15 days.
On 1 September 2012, Legal Notice 156 of 2012 brought the Freedom of Information Act (Chapter 496 of the Laws of Malta) fully into force, allowing the public (resident citizens of Malta, the EU and the EEA) to submit requests for documents/information held by the Government. FOI requests are submitted free of charge but processing of documents by public authorities may require the public to pay fees which never exceed Eur 40. When access to documents is refused, the FOIA in Malta provides for a complaint and appeal mechanism that can be ultimately resolved through the Courts of Appeal.
PresidentEllen Johnson Sirleafsigned the Freedom of Information Act of 2010 into law in October 2010.Liberiabecame only the fourth country inAfrica, and the first inWest Africa, to pass such legislation.[120]The law allows both the media and individual citizens to demand information from any public authority or any private authority that carries out government functions.[121]
Article 16 of the Constitution of North Macedonia guarantees "access to information and the freedom of reception and transmission of information".
The Law on Free Access to Information of Public Character was adopted on 25 January 2006. It is scheduled to go into force in September 2006.The law allows any natural or legal person to obtain information from state and municipal bodies and natural and legal persons who are performing public functions. The requests can be oral, written or electronic. Requests must be responded to in 10 days.
The state ofSelangorpassed the Freedom of Information Enactment (Selangor) 2010 on 1 April 2011, allowing the Malaysian public an access to the state documents including that of local councils, city halls and state government-linked companies.[122]Subsequently, the state ofPenangpassed the Freedom of Information bill on 4 November 2011, allowing the public to access to state documents.[123]Both states are under the ruling of the federal oppositionPakatan Rakyat.
The Maldives passed the Right to Information Act (RTI) on 12 January 2014.[124]
The Constitution was amended in 1977 to include a right of freedom of information. Article 6 says in part, "the right of information shall be guaranteed by the state." The Supreme Court made a number of decisions further enhancing that right.
The Federal Law of Transparency and Access to Public Government Information was unanimously approved by Congress in April 2002 and signed by President Fox in June 2002. It went into effect in June 2003.
Article 34 of the Constitution provides for a right of access to information.
The Law of the Republic of Moldova on Access to Information[125]was approved by Parliament in May 2000 and went into force in August 2000. Under the law, citizens and residents of Moldova can demand information from state institutions, organisations financed by the public budget and individuals and legal entities that provide public services and hold official information.
A freedom of information law was passed in Montenegro late in 2005, after a process of several years.
Nepal Government passed a draft of information act in September 2007 on behalf of freedom. Based on that draft, the government enacted a specific law to regulate right to information on 18 July 2007. However, in February 2009 for the protection, promotion and execution of Right to Information in Nepal National Information Commission formedRight to Information Act, 2007.[126]
Article 110 of the Constitution states: "In the exercise of their duties government bodies shall observe the principle of transparency in accordance with the rules to be prescribed by Act of Parliament."
The Dutch act on public access to government information entered into force in 1980 and is updated several times later. Under the act known as theWet Openbaarheid van Bestuur[nl], orWobfor short, any person can demand information (calledwobbing) related to an administrative matter if it is contained in documents held by public authorities or companies carrying out work for a public authority. The request can either be written or oral. The authority has two (on environmental issues) or four weeks to respond. The act also obliges the government to provide informationunsolicitedas it is in the interest of good and democratic governance.
In New Zealand, the relevant legislation is theOfficial Information Act 1982. This implemented a general policy of openness regarding official documents and replaced the Official Secrets Act.
Former PresidentGoodluck Jonathansigned into law the Freedom of Information (FoI) Bill, awaited for 12 years by media proprietors and practitioners alike, during which the Villa got knocks for filibustering and lawmakers complained of bombardment by campaigners.
The House of Representatives passed the Bill on 24 February 2011, and the Senate dialed up integrity on 16 March as it delivered on promise to pass it.
The harmonized version was passed by both Chambers on 26 May 2011.It was conveyed to Jonathan on 27 May, and he signed it on 28 May 2011, according to a statement Aso Rock issued on Tuesday.[127]
Two states in Nigeria (namely Ekiti and Lagos State) have adopted the Freedom of Information Act at State level but they have extended the response date at State level from 7 days to 14 days. More states are expected to adopt the bill and come up with their own version.
The current freedom of information legislation was enacted 19 May. 2006,[128]and superseded the previous law of 1970[129]by 1 January 2009. Article 100 of the Constitution gives access to public documents.[130]The basic principle of the law is everyone has the right to access to State and municipal documents and to be present at sittings of courts and elected assemblies.
PresidentPervez Musharrafpromulgated the Freedom of Information Ordinance 2002 in October 2002.[131]The law allows any citizen access to public records held by a public body of the federal government including ministries, departments, boards, councils, courts and tribunals. It does not apply to government owned corporations or provincial governments. The bodies must respond within 21 days.
More recently, by virtue of the 18th Amendment of 2010, article 19A has been inserted in theConstitution of Pakistan.[132]It gives the right to access to information the status of a fundamental constitutional right. Article 19A "Right to Information" reads: "Every citizen shall have the right to have access to information in all matters of public importance subject to regulation and reasonable restrictions imposed by law".
The National Constitution ofParaguay[133]enacted in 1992, guarantees the right to be informed and to receive true, responsible, and equitable information (Art. 28). The same article states that public sources of information are free, and that a law will regulate the modalities, time periods, and sanctions "in order to make this right effective". In practice, this last provision delayed the recognition of the right due to the absence of a law making it "effective". Congress, government agencies and Courts were reluctant to enforce the right to access public sources of information until 2013. A Supreme Court judgment (No. 1306 of 15 October 2013),[134]marked the beginning of what has been called a "Transparency Spring".[135]
The ruling from the Supreme Court was made in the context of anAmparofiled by a citizen called Jose Daniel Vargas Tellez, after the San Lorenzo Municipality denied him access to the information about the names, the job descriptions and the wages of all the employees that were working in that public office. The Court of First Instance and the Court of Appeals rejected the Amparo on the grounds that information of that type was considered sensitive by the Data Protection and Privacy Act (Law 1682/02 and 1969/02). The latter rulings were challenged on constitutional grounds and the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Vargas Tellez holding that while this information relating to the identity and wages of public employees and officers constitutes personal propriety data, it is nonetheless registered in a "public source of information", which makes it available to any citizen who requests it. The right to access to this information is recognized under the Constitution and international instruments such as theAmerican Convention on Human Rights(Art. 13); TheInternational Covenant on Civil and Political Rights(Art. 19); and theUnited Nations Convention against Corruption(Art. 13).
Following the Supreme Court's decision, and with the support of the civil society and PresidentHoracio Cartes, the first Transparency law was enacted (Law No. 5189/14) requiring all public offices to disclose information regarding the use of public funds to pay salaries. In addition, The Freedom of Information and Government Transparency Law (Law 5282/2014) was enacted in 2014 and a final regulation of 2015 (Executive Decree 4064/15) set the final step in the road to Transparency. These rules expressly recognize that the right to access public information is a human right, which improves the State, promotes citizen participation and public accountability, and serves as a tool to combat corruption. Currently, all requests to access public information can be done online through a single portal, and government offices are obliged to respond within 15 days.
Paraguay became internationally committed to promote transparency, empower citizens, fight corruption, and harness new technologies to strengthen governance after becoming a member of theOpen Government Partnership. Presently, most government offices have Transparency offices and can provide information to citizens and receive reports of corruption. The main Executive agency in charge of promoting Electronic Government is the SENATICS.
Art 28 of the Constitution also states that any person affected by the diffusion of a false, distorted, or ambiguous information has the right to demand its rectification or its clarification by the same means and under the same conditions in which it was divulged, without prejudice to the other compensatory rights. There is also a specific law that regulatesHabeas Data, and any citizen can request a copy of publicly or privately held information relating to them, and can demand that any inaccurate data found be destroyed.
On 23 July 2016, Philippine presidentRodrigo Dutertesigned theexecutive order on freedom of informationto be implemented effectively in all offices under the executive branch of government.[136]
Section 13(4) of theConstitution of the Pitcairn Islandsprovides that "Freedom of information in Pitcairn shall be provided by Ordinance, which shall reflect thefreedom of information legislation of the United Kingdomadapted to the circumstances of Pitcairn".[137]
TheFreedom of Information Ordinance 2012implements this requirement.[138]
Article 61 of the Constitution provides for the right to information and mandates that Parliament enact a law setting out this right.
The Law on Access to Public Information was approved in September 2001 and went into effect in January 2002. The Act allows anyone to demand access to public information, public data and public assets held by public bodies, private bodies that exercise public tasks, trade unions and political parties. The requests can be oral or written. The bodies must respond within 14 days.
ThePortuguese Constitutionguarantees the right of access to administrative documents in its Article 268, titled "Citizens’ rights and guarantees [before the Administration]". Its paragraphs (1), (2) and (6) read as following:
"1. Citizens have the right to be informed by the Administration, whenever they so request, as to the progress of the procedures and cases in which they are directly interested, together with the right to be made aware of the definitive decisions that are taken in relation to them.
2. Without prejudice to the law governing matters concerning internal and external security, criminal investigation and personal privacy, citizens also have the right of access to administrative files and records.
[...]
6. For the purposes of paragraphs (1) and (2) the law shall lay down a maximum time limit for responses by the Administration."[139]
The rule enshrined in Art. 268, par. (2) of the Constitution is known as the "principle ofopen Administration"[140]and it is regulated by Law no. 26/2016 (Lei n.º 26/2016, de 22 de Agosto[141]) which also enacts into national law theEuropean Directivesno.2003/4/ECand2003/98/EC. Art. 15 of this law requires public entities to respond to each request within 10 days and the law's Chapter 3 created an independent watchdog to keep track of compliance with its rules, the Commission for Access to Administrative Documents (Comissão de Acesso aos Documentos Administrativos).
Since 2001 there is one law on Freedom of Information and one on transparent decision-making processes in public
administration (asunshine law).[142][143]
The law Relating to Access to Information was passed on 8 February 2013. It puts forth the purpose of the law, recognises the right to access to information, the procedures for accessing information, and compliance related issues.available athttp://www.humanrightsinitiative.org/postoftheday/2013/18/Rwanda_ATI_Law_March2013_NewDelhi_SatbirS.pdf
In Serbia, theAccess to Public Information Actgives access to documents of public authorities.
The President of the Republic, Mr. Danny Faure assented to the Access to Information Act in July 2018. The Access to Information Bill 2018 was published in the Official Gazette on 24 March 2017. The Right of Access to Information is guaranteed under Article 28 of the Constitution of the Republic of Seychelles. This Act gives the public with the constitutional right of access to information held by public authorities performing a governmental function. The Act will is administered and applied by an independent Information Commission, the setting of which has been cleared with the enactment of the Law. The commission is appointed by the President in consultation with the Speaker of the National Assembly on the recommendation of the Constitutional Appointments Authority (CAA).The Information Commission strives to promote awareness, educate and popularise the right to access to information and fosters good governance by enhancing transparency, accountability and integrity in the Public Service and Administration.https://www.infocom.sc/
Slovakia passed the Freedom of Information Act in May 2000 (Num. law: 211/2000 Z. z.). Under the law, everybody can demand information from state institutions, organisations, from municipalities, individuals and legal entities financed by the public budget.[144]
Slovenia passed the Access to Public Information Act in March 2003.[145]The Act governs the procedure which ensures everyone free access to public information held by state bodies, local government bodies, public agencies, public funds and other entities of public law, public powers holders and public service contractors.[146]
Section 32 of theConstitution of South Africaguarantees "the right of access to any information held by the state; and any information that is held by another person and that is required for the exercise or protection of any rights." This right is implemented through the Promotion of Access to Information Act, which was enacted on 2 February 2000. The right of access toprivatelyheld information is an interesting feature, as most freedom of information laws only cover governmental bodies.
The Constitutional Court ruled in 1989 that there is a constitutional right to information "as an aspect of the right of freedom of expression and specific implementing legislation to define the contours of the right was not a prerequisite to its enforcement."
The Act on Disclosure of Information by Public Agencies was enacted in 1996 and went into effect in January 1998. It allows citizens to demand information held by public agencies.
Sri Lanka's Right to Information Act No 12 of 2016 was certified on 4 August 2016. After much debate and many amendments to the draft Bill, the final Act comprising 44 Sections was certified in early August 2016. The implementation of the Act is expected to take time due to the necessity of establishing cadre positions in government institutions to provide information to the general public. The Act is considered to hold many strengths and positive features that would effectively authorize citizens to be actively involved in the process of governance. Moreover, Article 14A(1) introduced by virtue of 19th Amendment to the 1978 Constitution of Sri Lanka has paved the way for the recognition of right to information as a fundamental right.
InSweden, theSwedish Freedom of the Press Actgrants public access to official documents and is included in theConstitution of Sweden. Dating back to 1766, it is the first freedom of information legislation in the modern sense. In modern times the right has become known as the Principle of Public Access (Swedish:offentlighetsprincipen).[147]
The Principle of Public Access means that the general public is guaranteed insight into activities pursued by government agencies. All official documents handled by government agencies are public unless they contain information specified as secret under thePublic Access to Information and Secrecy Act. Each request to take part of official documents is handled individually and classifying documents or information as secret is subject to appeal. The constitution also grants the right for government employees to pass on information without risk of criminal charges or repercussions and the right to attend court proceedings and meetings of legislative assemblies like theRiksdag.
There are a number of exemptions to this principle when the information concerns:
Switzerland is a federal state. Access to federal documents is governed by theSwiss Federal Act on the Principle of Freedom of Information in the Administration, and supervised by theFederal Data Protection and Information Commissioner.[149]Access to documents at thecantonal levelis governed by cantonal laws, which are mostly similar to the federal law.
As of 2018, the cantons ofAppenzell Innerrhoden,Glarus,Lucerne,Nidwalden,ObwaldenandThurgaudo not have freedom of information legislation.[150]
The "Freedom of Government Information Law" (政府資訊公開法), enacted by theLegislative Yuanof theROCgovernment in Taiwan, has been in force since 28 December 2005.[151]
Tanzania's Access to Information Act was passed in 2016.
In Thailand, the relevant legislation is theOfficial Information Act of 1997.
InTrinidad and Tobago, the relevant legislation is theFreedom of Information Act, 1999.
Tunisia adopted a freedom of information law after the revolution, in 2016. However the law was criticized for security related exemptions. A 2018 law requiring public officials revealing their assets was a step forward to transparency.[152]
InTurkey, theTurkish Law on the Right to Information(Bilgi Edinme Hakkı Kanunu) was signed on 24 October 2003, and it came into effect 6 months later on 24 April 2004.
InUganda, theAccess to Information Act(ATI) was approved in 2005 but its regulations were not passed until 2011. The laws states that citizen and especially journalists can demand accountability from a government official. The Hub for Investigative Media (HIM) in Uganda offers training programs that teaches East-African journalists in matters of fact-checking and digital security. HIM also has made government officials are of the ATI law and its provision. They have also conducted a nationwide campaign to train journalists on the knowledge and application of the ATI laws as right holders.[153]
The 1996Constitutiondoes not include a specific general right of access to information but contains a general right of freedom of collect and disseminate information and rights of access to personal and environmental information.
The Art. 5 of The Law on Information of 1992 (revised in 2011) provides the term «right for information» which includes the possibility of free collection, usage, distribution, storage and protection of information necessary for the exercise of person's rights, freedoms and legitimate interests.[154]
Law on Access to Public Information was adopted 13 January 2011 and go into force from 9 May 2011. It widens the range of subjects, obliged to provide information, gives legislative definition of public information and makes public information accessible with statutory restrictions.[155][156]
TheFreedom of Information Act 2000(2000 c. 36) is the implementation of freedom of information legislation in theUnited Kingdomon a national level, with the exception of Scottish bodies, which are covered by theFreedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002(2002 asp. 13). Environmental information is covered by further legislationEnvironmental Information Regulations 2004.Tony Blair, the UK Prime Minister who introduced the Freedom of Information Act, later expressed regret over the Act, claiming that the Act impeded the ability of officials to deliberate "with a reasonable level of confidentiality".[157]
In the United States theFreedom of Information Actwas signed into law by PresidentLyndon B. Johnsonon 4 July 1966, and went into effect the following year.Ralph Naderhas been credited with the impetus for creating this act, among others.[158]The Electronic Freedom of Information Act Amendments were signed by PresidentBill Clintonon 2 October 1996.[159]
The Act applies only tofederal agencies. However, all of the states, as well as the District of Columbia and some territories, have enacted similar statutes to require disclosures by agencies of the state and of local governments, though some are significantly broader than others. Some state and local government agencies attempt to get around state open records laws by claiming copyright for their works and then demanding high fees to license the public information.[160]: 441–42Some states expand government transparency throughopen meeting laws, which require government meetings to be announced in advance and held publicly.
The Act was enacted in 2008 under President Vazquez's Administration and is mainly implemented by the Judiciary.
InZimbabwe, theAccess to Information and Privacy Act (AIPPA)was signed by their PresidentRobert Mugabein February 2002.
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Anopen secretis information that was originally intended to be confidential but has at some point been disclosed and is known to many people.[1]Open secrets aresecretsin the sense that they are excluded from formal or official discourse, but they areopenin the sense that they are familiar and referred to in idioms and language games, though these often require explanation for outsiders.[2]
One famous open secret is that ofArea 51, aUnited Statesmilitary basecontaining an aircraft testing facility.[3]The U.S. government did not explicitly affirm the existence of any military facility nearGroom Lake,Lincoln County,Nevada, until 2013, when theCIAreleased documents revealing that the site was established to test spy planes.[4]While the general location of the base is now officially acknowledged, the base does not appear on government maps or in declassified satellite photography.[5]Yet despite this, the base was demonstrably and widely acknowledged to exist for many years before the CIA officially confirmed its existence.[6][7]The immense secrecy has made it the frequent subject ofconspiracy theoriesand a central component toUFOfolklore.[8]
TheNational Security Agencywas formally established byPresident Trumanin a memorandum of 24 October 1952, that revisedNational Security Council Intelligence Directive (NSCID) 9.[9]Since President Truman's memo was aclassifieddocument,[9]the existence of the NSA was not known to the public at that time. Due to its ultra-secrecy, the U.S. intelligence community referred to the NSA as "No Such Agency".[10]
The existence of theBritishSecret Intelligence Service(MI6) was widely known for several decades before the government's official acknowledgement of the organisation in 1994.[11]
Post Office Towerwas completed in 1964 and information about it was designated an official secret, due to its importance to the national communications network. In 1978, the journalistDuncan Campbellwastriedfor collecting information about secret locations, and during the trial the judge ordered that the sites could not be identified by name; the Post Office Tower could only be referred to as "Location 23".[12]It was officially revealed byKate Hoeyunderparliamentary privilegein 1993.[13]
It is often said that the tower did not appear onOrdnance Surveymaps, despite being a 177-metre (581 ft) tall structure in the middle of central London that was open to the public for about 15 years.[14]However, this is incorrect; the 1:25,000 (published 1971) and 1:10,000 (published 1981) Ordnance Survey maps show the tower.[15]It is also shown in theLondon A–Z street atlasfrom 1984.[16]
Israeliswidely acknowledged to possess nuclear weapons.[17]This can be considered an open secret, because the Israeli government has never explicitly stated whether or not it possesses a nuclear stockpile, officially maintaining apolicy of deliberate ambiguity.[18][19][20][21]
Camp Mirageis the codename for a formerCanadian Forcesforward logistics facility located inDubai,United Arab Emirates. The facility was established in late December 2001 and, though not officially acknowledged by the Canadian Forces, was considered an open secret.[22]
Russell Brandis a British actor and comedian, accused multiple times ofsexual assaultandharassment, with events dating back to 1999. These accusations have been discussed many times, however due tolibel law, he couldn't be conclusively named on public broadcast due to a lack of hard evidence. In 2025, he was charged with five counts of varioussex crimesby theMetropolitan Police, and named in acivil law suitinNew York state, and he is now widely associated with these incidents, publicly.
Kayfabe, or the presentation ofprofessional wrestlingas "real" or unscripted, is an open secret, kept displayed as legitimate within the confines of wrestling programs but openly acknowledged as predetermined by wrestlers and promoters in the context of interviews for decades.
In television, the primary real-world identity ofThe Stig, a costumed and masked television test-driver used byBBC TelevisionforTop Gear, was an open secret until the unofficialembargowas broken by a newspaper in 2009.[23]
Charles Seifedescribed it as an open secret thatnuclear fusion technology, although cleaner thannuclear fission, is not "clean energy", and planned fusion reactors would produce morewasteby volume than fission reactors—the idea that it is clean is an oversimplification used to sell the technology.[24]
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Thesociological aspects ofsecrecywere first studied byGeorg Simmelin the early-1900s. Simmel describes secrecy as the ability or habit of keeping secrets. He defines the secret as the ultimate sociological form for the regulation of theflowand distribution of information. Simmel put it best by saying "if human interaction is conditioned by the capacity to speak, it is shaped by the capacity to be silent."[1]It also can control the very essence ofsocial relationsthrough manipulations of the ratio of "knowledge" to "ignorance".
Simmel[2]defines the secret society as an interactional unit characterized in its total by the fact that reciprocal relations among its members are governed by the protective function of secrecy. This central feature is established on a dual contingency:
Georg Simmel came up with some unifying threads that he summed up and called the "Propositions".[2][3]What these propositions function as is that they work together and apply primarily to the genetic and developmental conditions of the secret society. Here are a few of them.
Some scholars working in sociology have attempted to rehabilitate the secret: to question the moral distaste it has accumulated in the current era of transparency in order to think through its more creative, productive or politically resistant possibilities.[4][5]
Secrecy andcensorshipcan involve norms about the control of information. This idea was integrated by saying that Censorship of communication in the modern sense is associated with large, complex urban societies with a degree of centralized control and technical means of effectively reaching a mass audience.[6]It involves a determination of what can, and can not (or in the case of non-governmental efforts should and should not) be expressed in light of given political, religious, cultural, and artistic standards. The appearance of new communications (e.g., the printing press or the Internet) technologies invariably create demands from conflicting groups for greater openness and freedom of communication and demands for greater control. Authorities try (often in vain) to control new techniques of mass communication. Three major means of direct censorship (pre-publication review, licensing and registration, and government monopolization) are preventive in nature. Among democracies there is considerable variation in censorship by content, media of communication, place, time period and across societies. There are degrees of censorship and individual interests are balanced against those of the community, however hard the latter is to define. More common than outright prohibition, is the segmentation of material involving time, place and person restrictions. Direct government means of censorship must be considered separately from the availability of resources to create and distribute information, the activities of private groups and from informal censorship, including exclusion from sources of information and self-censorship. In a democratic society secrecy and openness exist in a continual dynamic tension.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secrecy_(sociology)
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Secret passages, also commonly referred to ashidden passagesorsecret tunnels, are hidden routes used for stealthy travel, escape, or movement of people and goods. They are sometimes inside buildings leading tosecret rooms.
Others allow people to enter or exit buildings without being seen. Hidden passages and secret rooms have been built in castles and houses owned by heads of state, the wealthy, criminals, and abolitionists associated with the AmericanUnderground Railroad. They have helped besieged rulers escape attackers, includingPope Alexander VIin 1494,Pope Clement VIIin 1527 andMarie Antoinettein 1789. Passages and tunnels have been used by criminals, armies (notably theViet Congin theVietnam War) and political organizations to smuggle goods and people or conceal their activities.
Entrances to some secret passages appear as architectural features, such as a fireplaces or built-insliding bookcases. Some entrances are more elaborately concealed and can be opened only by engaging a hidden mechanism or locking device. Others are much simpler; for example, atrapdoorhidden under a rug.
Some buildings have secret areas built into their original plans, such as secret passages inmedieval castles, designed to allow inhabitants to escape from enemy sieges. Other castles' secret passages led to an underground water source, providing water during prolongedsieges.
TraditionalArabichouses sometimes have a "Bab AL-Sirr": a secret door used as an emergency exit built into the walls and hidden with a window sill or a bookcase. The name comes from one of the six gates cut through an ancient wall inAden(in modern-dayYemen), which was opened only in the event of a state security emergency. In modern-daySpain, the Arab fortress ofBenquerenciahas a Bab al-Sirr known as the "Door of Treason."[1]
Other secret passages have sometimes been added after initial building. Secret tunnels have often been created as escape routes from prisons orprisoner-of-war camps, where they are known as escape tunnels. They typically require a hidden opening or door, and may involve other deceptive construction techniques, such as the creation of a false wall. Other tunnels have been made for different reasons, such as those used for smuggling firearms, illegal drugs and other contraband.
There have been many instances throughout history of secret passages and rooms having been used:
Builders of ancientEgyptian pyramidsprotected the burial chambers from tomb robbers.[2]While some passageways and chambers in pyramids were unknown until recently, they are generally thought to have structural functions rather than secretive ones.[3]
Early Christians, who were persecuted by Roman authorities in the 2nd century AD, used hidden rooms to conceal their gatherings for worship.[4]
In 1327,Roger Mortimer, 1st Earl of March, imprisoned KingEdward II of Englandafter the completion of acoup d'état. Edward II died in custody the same year. In 1330, small group of armed supporters of Edward II used a secret passage to attack Mortimer, who was inNottingham Castle, defended by several hundred soldiers. The attackers entered through a long, winding secret passage which led directly into the building in which the queen was lodged. An accomplice inside the castle slid back the bolts to the door, which allowed the attackers to arrest Mortimer.[5]
ThePassettois a passage that links theVatican CitywithCastel Sant'Angelo.Pope Alexander VIcrossed it in 1494, whenCharles VIIIinvaded the city, andPope Clement VIIescaped to safety through it during theSack of Rome, in 1527.
Catholic priests, inBritain, used hidden rooms calledpriest holesto escapeProtestantpersecution, starting from the reign ofQueen Elizabeth I.
In the 1730s and 1740s a secret tunnel betweenThe Olde Belland the nearbyThe Mermaid InninRye, East Sussexwas used by theHawkhurst Gangfor smuggling.[6][7]
In 1789, at the outset of what would become theFrench Revolution, angry demonstrators inParismarched in the streets and stormed theBastille. The revolution spread to smaller towns, where tax offices were attacked, and to the French countryside, where peasants attacked rich nobles living in manor houses and castles. Many French royalty and nobles fled to Austria, Russia or Britain. In October, a mob of 7,000 demonstrators marched to the Royal Palace atVersailles. Although the mob managed to overcome the palace's defences and killMarie Antoinette'sbodyguards, Marie Antoinette escaped from the palace through a secret passageway.
TheMikhailovsky Castleis a castle that was built to protect theRussian Tsar Paul Ifrom assassins. Completed in 1800, the castle's protective features included massive walls and water on all four sides (rivers and canals), withdrawbridgesthat were raised at night and gun emplacements overlooking the drawbridges. TheTsaralso had a secret passageway built into the hallway outside his bedroom to enable him to escape if assailants managed to get past the castle's defences. However, he was never able to use the secret passageway. Forty days after he took up residence in the castle, a group ofco-conspiratorskilled him in his bedroom.
During Japan'sBoshin War(1868–1869), theEmperor's Imperial forces attacked the loyal retainers of theshōgunTokugawa Yoshinobuat Aizu Basin. A band of 15- and 16-year-olds loyal to the Shogun, who called themselves the White Tiger Brigade, escaped from Imperial troops using a secret passageway. When the young warriors emerged from the passageway, they saw a burningsamurairesidence, which they mistook for the castle. Believing that the castle had fallen to the Imperial troops, the young warriors committed mass-suicide byseppuku(disembowelment), rather than face the dishonor of defeat.
William the5th Duke of Portlandcreated a network of tunnels on his estate atWelbeck Abbey, during the 19th century, so that he could enter and leave the property unseen.
The Regal Knickerbocker, inChicago, Illinois, is a grand 350-room hotel built in the 1920s, during theU.S. Prohibition era. When the hotel was remodeled in 1980, workers found a secret door in one of the penthouse ballrooms, which leads to a stairway down to ground level. This may have been used to help people engaging in illegal gambling or drinking to escape in the event of a police raid.
During the U.S. Prohibition era, illegal bars, called "speakeasies", were often concealed behind, above or below seemingly legitimate businesses designed specifically for illicit bootlegging activities. InDecatur, Illinois, the third floor of Bell's Jewelry Store housed a speakeasy, agambling denand abrothel, during the 1920s and 1930s. Customers accessed a stairway from the street and entered a sporting goods shop that acted as a "front". After the customers passed through rows of shelves lined with dusty sporting merchandise, a secret panel in the wall was slid open revealing the entrance to the speakeasy and brothel.
In 1928New York City, Jack Kriendler and Charlie Berns purchased a formerbordelloand converted it into a bar and restaurant called the "21 Club." In 1930, they hired architect Frank Buchanan to design a secret door to hide the liquor supply in the cellar, as the place was converting to a speakeasy. To conceal the hidden door fromfederal prohibition agents, Buchanan designed the door so that it would appear to be solid concrete wall. The door, which weighed two and a half tons, was supported by massive precision hinges and faced with a concrete slab. The secret door could be opened only by inserting an 18" length of wire through one of several cracks in the concrete.
During World War II, BritishRoyal Air Forceofficers held captive inColditz Castlebuilt a false wall in the attic of one of thePOWbuildings, to hide a workshop where they were constructing a glider to help them escape.[8]
Guerrilla warfarefighters have used tunnels and secret passages to attack their enemies without being captured and transport arms and supplies. TheCủ Chi tunnelswere used particularly during theTết Offensivein theVietnam Warbetween 1968 and 1969 by CommunistVietcongguerillas, who made these inhospitable but sturdy tunnels their home, and transported supplies for the Offensive that were assembled through them. The tunnels contained sleeping chambers, kitchens, classrooms, wells, and medical facilities. In order to maintain the flow of oxygen from the surface, the Vietcong would cleverly disguise air vents as seemingly natural objects like termite mounds. However, the tunnels were far from homey; the Vietcong suffered from many of the elements, such as disease and venomous insects and animals. Particularly nerve-wracking to the Vietcong were the massive aerial bombardment fromB-52bombers, which could usually cave in portions of the tunnels depending on their depths. Nonetheless, the tunnels stood up to almost everything the American military threw at them.
North Koreahas often threatened itsSoutherncounterpart. From 1954, North Korea has been boring tunnels to the South. Up until 1990s only four have been found by the South, but civilian tunnel diggers (남굴사) claim that there are other networks of tunnels under the South.[9]There are reports that the North has exported their skill of boring tunnels toHezbollahinLebanonandHamasin theGaza strip.[10]Swedish journalistBertil Lintnerhas provided pictures of North Koreans helping the tunnel boring in Myanmar. He is considered the first journalist to reveal the growing relationship between Myanmar and North Korea on strategic cooperation. He has stated that in the 1970s, Sweden exportedtunnel boring machinesof Atlas Copco Corp. to North Korea.[citation needed]
Four North Korean tunnels have been discovered. The first tunnel (제1땅굴), was found in 1974 in JangnamMyun YeonCheonKun, Kyungki Province; and the second tunnel (제2땅굴) was found in 1975 in KeodongMyun, ChulwonKun, Kangwon Province. The third tunnel (제3땅굴) was found in 1978 in ChangdanMyung, Paju City, Kyungki Province. This one is close to the capital,Seouland extended beyond the DMZ over 400 meters.[11]The fourth tunnel (제4땅굴) was found in 1990, in HaeanMyun, YangkuKun, Kangwon Province.[citation needed]
HamasandIslamic Jihadhave built tunnels across the border between theGaza StripandIsraelin order to enter Israel secretly, carry out attacks and capture hostages, and return unseen to the Gaza strip.[12][13][14]
On 25 January 2006 a 720-metre (2,360 ft)smuggling tunnelthat crossed under the border of theUnited StatesandMexicowas discovered. It was used to transport vast quantities ofcannabisfromTijuanaintoOtay, California, for U.S. consumption. It linked two industrial warehouses and was ventilated and well lit. It, and other tunnels, have also been used forillegal immigration.[1]
Between August 2000 and May 2002 more than 1,000 ancient books went missing from the library of themonastery of Mont Sainte-Odile. Stanislas Gosse stole the books after finding an old map showing a secret entrance into the library. The route was not easy, however, involving climbing up exterior walls, a steep staircase and a secret chamber. A mechanism then opened the back of one of five cupboards. The disappearance of so many books over such a length of time confused the librarian, the monks and the police. Gosse was finally caught after he was observed onclosed-circuit television.[2]
A small number of contractors in the US and UK specialize in the construction of hidden doors and fortified secret rooms for private residences. These rooms, known as "panic rooms" or "safe rooms", are hidden, secure spaces designed to protect inhabitants in the case of a break-in orhome invasion.
The fortified doors and walls protect the occupants so they can summon help using a mobile or land-line phone. Doors and walls can be reinforced withsteel,Kevlar,sound-proofor bullet-resistantfiberglasspanels. The door to the safe room can be concealed by panels that match existing walls or doors in the home.
Secret passages are used as aplot elementor as part of the setting in mythological stories, fiction, and in television programs or films. Secret passages in old buildings, castles,haunted houses, and the lairs of villains or superheroes enable characters to secretly enter or exit the building, access a hidden part of the structure, or enter a supernatural realm. These passageways are often opened by pulling a disguised lever or lock mechanism. In some cases, a certain book on a bookshelf serves as the hidden trigger for the mechanism.
In Greek mythology,Hyrieus, the King ofBoeotia, hiredTrophoniusandAgamedesto build atreasurechamber for him. However, the pair built in a secret entrance and stole his fortune. In the Hindu EpicMahabharata, thePandavasescape an assassination attempt byDuryodhanin theLakshagrahaby escaping through a secret passage they had built earlier.[15]
In the late 1890s, detective novels featuring seemingly "impossible crimes" became popular. Impossible crimes were sometimes carried out using secret passages or doors. Subsequent generations of detective pulp fiction and mystery story authors also used the plot device of secret passages.
However, the use of secret passages in detective fiction and mystery stories has been criticised, on the grounds that it is not "fair" to expect the reader to guess about the existence of these secret passages.Ronald Knox(1888–1957), a British theologian and detective story author, argued that the plot device of a secret passage was overused in detective fiction. Knox'sTen Commandments for Detective Fictionstates that "Not more than one secret room or passage is allowable." Furthermore, Knox urges that secret passages not be used in detective stories unless the story takes place in an old house or castle where a reader might reasonably expect to find a secret door or passageway.
Carolyn Wells' "impossible crime" stories from the first decades of the 20th century, such asFaulkner's Folly(1917) are often set in anupper classcountry house, where a murder takes place. There is aclosed circle of suspects, all linked to the murdered man; however, based on the layout of the house, the murder seems "impossible". In Wells' stories, the solution to the seemingly impossible crime plots tend to depend on the murderers' use of secret passageways, secret panels, and hidden doors.
Passages figure in several books of theFamous Fiveseries written byEnid Blyton.
Many of the supposedly haunted locations the main characters explore in theScooby-Doochildren's cartoon franchise have secret passageways, tunnels, and halls.
Various secret passages have been depicted inBatmanfiction, usually one betweenWayne ManorandThe Batcaveand another for theBatmobileto enter/exit the Batcave.
In theHarry Potterseries byJ.K. Rowling, the ancient castle school ofHogwarts(where much of the action takes place) contains numerous secret and magical passages hidden behind paintings, statuary, and furniture.
Inrole-playing games, secret passages, like traps, can be found in all sorts of buildings, especially indungeonsand castles inhigh fantasyrole-playing games. The mansion in the board gameCluedo(Clue) has two secret passages that players can use to move to an opposite corner of the board.
Video gamesoften feature hidden areas, sometimes as an important part of the game and other times as anEaster egg. Such areas can be a required route in order to continue or may be optional and contain rewards for the player, such as abonus stage, asecret character, extra items or a shortcut to a later part of the game. Some secret entrances are invisible, such as a normal-looking wall that can be walked through, while others give a slight visual clue, such as a cave behind a waterfall.
Parent categories:
Secret rooms and passages:
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Self-concealmentis a psychological construct defined as "a predisposition to activelyconcealfrom others personal information that one perceives asdistressingor negative".[1]Its opposite isself-disclosure.[1][2]
The concealed personal information (thoughts,feelings, actions, or events) is highly intimate, negative invalenceand has three characteristics: it is a subset of private information, can be consciously accessed, and is actively concealed from others. Self-concealment significantly contributes to negativepsychological health.
Secrets and secret keeping have been a longstanding interest of psychologists and psychotherapists.[3]Jourard's[4][5]work on self-disclosure and Pennebaker's research on the health benefits of disclosing traumatic events and secrets set the stage for the conceptualization and measurement of self-concealment.
Jourard's research pointed to the conclusion that stress and illness result not only from low self-disclosure, but more so from the intentional avoidance of being known by another person. In a later line of research,Pennebaker[6][7]and his colleagues examined the confiding-illness relation or the inhibition-disease link and found that not expressing thoughts and feelings about traumatic events is associated with long-term health effects. Pennebaker attributed the unwillingness to disclose distressing personal information to either circumstances or individual differences. The self-concealment construct, and the scale for its measurement, the Self-Concealment Scale, were introduced to permit assessment and conceptualization of individual differences on this personality dimension.
Self-concealment uniquely and significantly contributes to the prediction ofanxiety,depression, and physical symptoms.[1]Subsequent research has examined the effects of self-concealment onsubjective well-beingandcoping, finding that high self-concealment is associated with psychological distress and self-reported physical symptoms,[8]anxiety and depression,[9][10][11]shyness, negativeself-esteem,[12]loneliness,[13]rumination,[14]trait social anxiety,[15]social anxiety,[16]andself-silencing,[17]ambivalence overemotional expressiveness,[18]maladaptivemoodregulation,[19]and acute and chronic pain.[20]
Individuals with increasedinferiorityfeelings have a higher tendency toward self-concealment, which in turn results in an increase in loneliness and a decrease in happiness.[21]
Theoretical models offered to explain the consistent finding of negative health effects for self-concealment include:
Kelly offers a comprehensive review of several explanatory models and the evidence supporting each of them, concluding that a genetic component shared by high self-concealers might make them both more prone to self-conceal and more vulnerable to physical and psychological problems.[27]
Research studies have focused on the relation of self-concealment toattachmentorientations,[28][29][30]help seeking and attitudes toward counseling,[31][32][33]desire for greater (physical) interpersonal distance,[30]stigma,[34][35]distress disclosure,[9]lying behavior and authenticity,[36][37][38]and psychotherapy process.[31][39][40]
Research also focuses on self-concealment in specific populations: LGBT,[16][35][41][42]multicultural,[43][44][45]and adolescents, families, and romantic partners.[36][46][47]
A recent review of 137 studies using the Self-Concealment Scale presented a working model for the antecedents of self-concealment and the mechanisms of action for its health effects. The authors conceptualize self-concealment as a "complex trait-like motivational construct where high levels of SCmotivationenergize a range of goal-directed behaviors (e.g., keeping secrets, behavioral avoidance, lying) and dysfunctional strategies for theregulation of emotions(e.g.,expressive suppression) which serve to conceal negative or distressing personal information."[48]These mechanisms are seen as then affecting health through direct and indirect pathways, and as being "energized by a conflict between urges to conceal, and reveal—a dual-motive conflict which eventually leads to adverse physiological effects and a breakdown of self-regulatory resources".[49]
The 10-item Self-Concealment Scale (SCS)[1]measures the degree to which a person tends to conceal personal information perceived as negative or distressing. The SCS has proven to have excellentpsychometricproperties (internal consistency and test-retest reliability) and unidimensionality.[1][50]Representative items include: "I have an important secret that I haven't shared with anyone", "There are lots of things about me that I keep to myself", "Some of my secrets have really tormented me", "When something bad happens to me, I tend to keep it to myself", and "My secrets are too embarrassing to share with others".
Minority groupsemploy self-concealment to manage perceived stigma.[51]For example,LGBTpeople (lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans) people, who are stigmatized (seecoming out) for the characteristics inherent to theirsexual identitiesorgender identity, employ self-concealment as a result.[52][53]
Self-concealment is observed inAfrican,AsianandLatin Americaninternational college students.[54]ForAfrican Americansin particular their self-concealment correlates with the degree of theirAfrocentriccultural values.[55]ArabandMiddle Easternpeople have been documented employing the followingidentity negotiationstrategies:
Self-concealment strategies can also present in those with sexualparaphilias. Research in the experiences offurries, a stigmatized group, found that they are more likely to self disclose if there is little difference in power between the furry and the individual with whom they are disclosing their identity to.[51]
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"Somebody else's problem"or"someone else's problem"is an issue which is dismissed by a person on the grounds that they consider somebody else to be responsible for it.
A 1976 edition of the journalEkisticsused the phrase in the context of bureaucratic inaction onlow-income housing, describing "the principle ofsomebody else's problem" as something that prevented progress. Where responsibility for a complex problem falls across many different departments of government, even those agencies who wish to tackle the issue are unable to do so.[1]
Referring to a team working on acomputer programmingproject,Alan F. Blackwellwrote in 1997 that: "Many sub-goals can be deferred to the degree that they become what is known amongst professional programmers as an 'S.E.P.' – somebody else's problem."[2]
Douglas Adams' 1982 novelLife, the Universe and Everything(inThe Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxycomedy science fictionseries) introduces the idea of an "SEPfield" as a kind ofcloaking device. The characterFord Prefectsays,
An SEP is something we can't see, or don't see, or our brain doesn't let us see, because we think that it's somebody else's problem. That’s what SEP means. Somebody Else’s Problem. The brain just edits it out, it's like a blind spot.
The narration then explains:
The Somebody Else's Problem field... relies on people's natural predisposition not to see anything they don't want to, weren't expecting, or can't explain. If Effrafax had painted the mountain pink and erected a cheap and simple Somebody Else’s Problem field on it, then people would have walked past the mountain, round it, even over it, and simply never have noticed that the thing was there.
Adams' description of an SEP field is quoted in an article of "psychological invisibility", where it is compared to other fictional effects such as the perception filter inDoctor Who, as well as cognitive biases such asinattentional blindnessandchange blindness.[3]
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Smugglingis the illegal transportation of objects, substances, information or people, such as out of a house or buildings, into aprison, or across an internationalborder, in violation of applicablelawsor other regulations. More broadly, social scientists define smuggling as the purposeful movement across a border in contravention to the relevant legal frameworks.[2]
There are various motivations to smuggle. These include the participation in illegal trade, such as in thedrug trade,illegal weapons trade,prostitution,human trafficking,kidnapping,heists,chop shops,illegal immigrationorillegal emigration,tax evasion,import restrictions,export restrictions, providingcontrabandto prison inmates, or thetheftof the items being smuggled.
Smuggling is a common theme in literature, fromBizet's operaCarmento theJames Bondspy books (and later films)Diamonds Are ForeverandGoldfinger.
The verbsmuggle, fromLow GermansmuggelnorDutchsmokkelen(="to transport (goods) illegally"), apparently afrequentativeformation of a word meaning "to sneak", most likely entered the English language during the 1600s–1700s.[3]
Smuggling has a long and controversial history, probably dating back to the first time at which duties were imposed in any form, or any attempt was made to prohibit a form oftraffic. Smuggling is often associated with efforts by authorities to prevent theimportationof certaincontrabanditems or non-taxed goods; however, there has also been smuggling based on illegally exporting goods. In England smuggling first became a recognised problem in the 13th century, following the creation of a national customs collection system byEdward Iin 1275.[4]Medieval smuggling tended to focus on the export of highly taxed export goods — notably wool and hides.[5]Merchants also, however, sometimes smuggled other goods to circumvent prohibitions or embargoes on particular trades. Grain, for instance, was usually prohibited from export, unless prices were low, because of fears that grain exports would raise the price of food in England and thus cause food shortages and civil unrest. Following the loss ofGasconyto the French in 1453, imports of wine were also sometimes embargoed during wars to try to deprive the French of the revenues that could be earned from their main export.
Most studies of historical smuggling have been based on official sources — such as court records, or the letters of Revenue Officers. A senior academic of the University of Bristol states that they only detail the activities of those dumb enough to get caught.[6]This has led him and others, such as Prof. H. V. Bowen of the University of Swansea to use commercial records to reconstruct smuggling businesses.[7]Jones' study focuses on smuggling in Bristol in the mid-16th century, arguing that the illicit export of goods like grain and leather represented a significant part of the city's business, with many members of the civic elite engaging in it, whether by disguised/hidden transport or mis-description of goods.[8]Grain smuggling by members of the civic elite, often working closely with corrupt customs officers, has also been shown to have been prevalent in East Anglia during the later 16th century.[9]
In England wool was smuggled to the continent in the 17th century, under the pressure of highexcise taxes. In 1724Daniel Defoewrote ofLymington, Hampshire, on the south coast of England
I do not find they have any foreign commerce, except it be what we call smuggling and roguing; which I may say, is the reigning commerce of all this part of the English coast, from the mouth of the Thames to the Land's End in Cornwall.[10]
The high rates of duty levied on tea and also wine and spirits, and other luxury goods coming in from mainlandEuropeat this time made the clandestine import of such goods and the evasion of the duty a highly profitable venture for impoverished fishermen and seafarers. In certain parts of the country such as theRomney Marsh,East Kent,Cornwalland EastCleveland, the smuggling industry was for many communities more economically significant than legal activities such as farming and fishing. The principal reason for the high duty was the need for the government to finance a number of extremely expensivewarswith France and the United States.
Before the era of drug smuggling and human trafficking, smuggling had acquired a kind of nostalgic romanticism, in the vein ofRobert Louis Stevenson'sKidnapped:
Few places on the British coast did not claim to be the haunts of wreckers or mooncussers.[11]The thievery was boasted about and romanticized until it seemed a kind of heroism. It did not have any taint of criminality and the whole of the south coast had pockets vying with one another over whose smugglers were the darkest or most daring.The Smugglers Innwas one of the commonest names for a bar on the coast.[12]
InNorth America, smuggling incolonial timeswas a reaction to the heavy taxes and regulations imposed by mercantilist trade policies. AfterAmerican independencein 1783, smuggling developed at the edges of the United States at places likePassamaquoddy Bay,St. Mary'sinGeorgia,Lake Champlain, andLouisiana. DuringThomas Jefferson'sembargo of 1807-1809, these same places became the primary places where goods were smuggled out of the nation in defiance of the law. Like Britain, a gradual liberalization of trade laws as part of thefree trademovement meant less smuggling. in 1907 PresidentTheodore Roosevelttried to cut down on smuggling by establishing theRoosevelt Reservationalong theUnited States-Mexico Border.[13][14]Smuggling revived in the 1920s duringProhibition, and drug smuggling became a major problem after 1970. In the 1990s, when economic sanctions were imposed onSerbia, a large percent of the population lived off smuggling petrol and consumer goods from neighboring countries. The state unofficially allowed this to continue or otherwise the entire economy would have collapsed.
In modern times, as manyfirst-world countrieshave struggled to contain a rising influx of immigrants, the smuggling of people across national borders has become a lucrative extra-legal activity, as well as the extremely dark side, people-trafficking, especially of women who may be enslaved typically as prostitutes.
Much smuggling occurs when enterprising merchants attempt to supply demand for a good or service that is illegal or heavily taxed. As a result, illegaldrug trafficking, and the smuggling ofweapons(illegal arms trade), as well as the historical staples of smuggling,alcohol(rum-running) andtobacco,[15]are widespread. As the smuggler faces significant risk of civil and criminal penalties if caught with contraband, smugglers are able to impose a significant price premium on smuggled goods. The profits involved in smuggling goods appear to be extensive. Theiron law of prohibitiondictates that greater enforcement results in more potentalcoholand drugs being smuggled.
Profits also derive from avoiding taxes or levies on imported goods. For example, a smuggler might purchase a large quantity ofcigarettesin a place with low taxes and smuggle them into a place with higher taxes, where they can be sold at a far higher margin than would otherwise be possible. It has been reported that smuggling one truckload of cigarettes within theUnited Statescan lead to a profit of US$2 million.[16]
In October 2023, Spanish police arrested 11 individuals involved in smuggling migrants hidden in trucks atAlgecirassea border, connected to a network providing forged documents. In the same month, they dismantled another criminal organization focused on supplying fake documents to migrants in Spain, primarily in the agricultural sector.[17]
With regard topeople smuggling, a distinction can be made between people smuggling as a service to those wanting to illegally migrate and theinvoluntary trafficking of people. An estimated 90% of people who illegally crossed the border betweenMexicoand the United States are believed to have paid a smuggler to lead them across.[18]
People smuggling can be used to rescue a person from oppressive circumstances. For example, when theSouthern United Statesallowedslavery, many slaves moved north via theUnderground Railroad. Similarly, duringthe Holocaust,Jewish peoplewere smuggled out ofGermanyby people such asAlgoth Niska.
Trafficking of human beings — sometimes calledhuman traffickingor, in the case of sexual services, sex trafficking — is not the same as people smuggling. A smuggler will facilitate illegal entry into a country for a fee, and on arrival at their destination, the smuggled person is free; the trafficking victim is coerced in some way. Victims do not agree to be trafficked; they are tricked, lured by false promises, or forced into it. Traffickers use coercive tactics includingdeception,fraud,intimidation,isolation, physical threats and use of force,debt bondageor even force-feeding drugs to control their victims.
While the majority of victims are women,[19]and sometimes children, other victims include men, women and children forced or conned into manual or cheap labor. Due to the illegal nature of trafficking, the exact extent is unknown. A U.S. government report published in 2003 estimates that 800,000-900,000 people worldwide are trafficked across borders each year.[20]This figure does not include those who are trafficked internally.
According to a study by Alternatives to Combat Child Labour Through Education and Sustainable Services in the Middle East and North Africa Region (ACCESS-MENA) 30% of school children living in border villages ofYemenhad been smuggled intoSaudi Arabia. Child trafficking is commonly referenced as "transporting". Smuggled children were in danger of beingsexually abusedor even killed.[21]Povertyis one of the reasons behind child trafficking and some children are smuggled with their parents' consent via a transporter. As many as 50% of those smuggled are children. In the Philippines, between 60,000 and 100,000 children are trafficked to work in the sex industry.[22]
Each year, hundreds of thousands of migrants are moved illegally by highly organized internationalsmuggling and trafficking groups, often in dangerous or inhumane conditions. This phenomenon has been growing in recent years as people oflow income countriesare aspiring to enterdeveloped countriesin search of jobs. Migrant smuggling and human trafficking are two separate offences and differ in a few central respects. While "smuggling" refers to facilitating the illegal entry of a person into a State, "trafficking" includes an element ofexploitation.
The trafficker retains control over the migrant—through force, fraud or coercion—typically in the sex industry, through forced labour or through other practices similar to slavery. Trafficking violates the idea of basichuman rights. The overwhelming majority of those trafficked are women and children. These victims are commodities in a multibillion-dollar global industry.Criminal organizationsare choosing to traffic human beings because, unlike other commodities, people can be used repeatedly and because trafficking requires little in terms of capital investment.
Smuggling is also reaping huge financial dividends to criminal groups who charge migrants massive fees for their services. Intelligence reports have noted that drug-traffickers and other criminal organizations are switching to human cargo to obtain greater profit with less risk.[23]
It is acknowledged that the smuggling of people is a growing global phenomenon.[24]It is atransnational crime. Currently, economic instability appears to be the main reason for illegal migration movement throughout the world. Nevertheless, many of the willing migrants undertake the hazardous travel to their destination country with criminal syndicates specialized in people smuggling. These syndicates arrange everything for the migrants, but at a high price.
Very often the traveling conditions are inhumane: the migrants are overcrowded in trucks or boats and fatal accidents occur frequently. After their arrival in the destination country, their illegal status puts them at the mercy of their smugglers, which often force the migrants to work for years in the illegal labor market to pay off the debts incurred as a result of their transportation.[25]
Wildlife smugglingresults from the demand for exotic species and the lucrative nature of the trade. TheCITES(Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) regulates the movement of endangered wildlife across political borders.[26]
Research on smuggling as economic phenomenon is scant.Jagdish Bhagwatiand Bent Hansen first forwarded a theory of smuggling in which they saw smuggling essentially as an import-substituting economic activity. Their main consideration, however, was the welfare implications of smuggling. Against common belief that theprivate sectoris more efficient than thepublic sector, they showed that smuggling might not enhance social welfare though it may divert resources from governments to the private sector.[27]
In contrast,Faizul Latif Chowdhury, in 1999, suggested a production-substituting model of smuggling in which price disparity due to cost of supply is critically important as an incentive for smuggling.[28]This price disparity is caused by domestic consumption-taxes and import duties. Drawing attention to the case of cigarettes, Chowdhury suggested that, inBangladesh,smuggling of cigarettesreduced the level of domestic production. Domestic production of cigarettes is subject tovalue added tax(VAT) and otherconsumption tax. Reduction of domestic taxes enables the local producer to supply at a lower cost and bring down the price disparity that encourages smuggling.
However, Chowdhury suggested that there is a limit beyond which reducing domestic taxes on production cannot confer a competitive advantage versus smuggled cigarettes. Therefore, government needs to upscale its anti-smuggling drive so that seizures (taking possession of person or property by legal process) can add to the cost of smuggling and thus render smuggling uncompetitive. Notably, Chowdhury modeled the relationship of the smuggler to the local producer as one of antagonisticduopoly.
On the other hand, research by Tat Chee Tsui in 2016 suggests that even if increasing cigarette duty may encourage smuggling, total cigarette-consumption still declines because the price of illicit goods, as substitutes of taxed cigarettes, also increases because of higher tax rate.[29]
One economic view sees smuggling asmonopoly-busting - as a challenge to state-sponsored restrictions or taxes on trade.[30][31]
In smuggling, concealment can involve concealing the smuggled goods on a person's clothing, luggage or inside a body cavity. Some smugglers hide the whole transportation vehicle or ship used to bring the items into an area. Avoiding border checks, such as by small ships, privateairplanes, through overland smuggling routes,smuggling tunnelsand even small submersibles.[32][33]This also applies for illegally passing a border oneself, for illegal immigration or illegal emigration. In many parts of the world, particularly theGulf of Mexico, the smuggling vessel of choice is thego-fast boat.
Submitting toborder checkswith the goods or people hidden in a vehicle or between (other) merchandise, or the goods hidden in luggage, in or under clothes, inside the body (seebody cavity search,balloon swallowerandmule), etc. Many smugglers fly on regularly scheduledairlines. A large number of suspected smugglers are caught each year bycustomsworldwide. Goods and people are also smuggled across seas hidden incontainers, and overland hidden in cars, trucks, and trains. A related topic is illegally passing a border oneself as astowaway. The high level ofdutylevied on alcohol and tobacco in Britain has led to large-scale smuggling fromFranceto the UK through theChannel Tunnel.
The combination of acknowledged corruption at the border and high import tariffs led smugglers in the 1970s and '80s to fly electronic equipment such as stereos and televisions in cargo planes from one country to clandestine landing strips in another, thereby circumventing encounters at the frontier between countries.[34]
For illegally passing a border oneself, another method is with a falsepassport(completely fake, or illegally changed, or the passport of a lookalike).
AtBorder checkpoints, especially for shipping cargo, Border agents must inspect cargo for smuggled and illegal goods. However, because of what is called Gridlock a maximum of 5%inspectionsper cargo holds worldwide.[35]Since it can take a proper and complete inspection four to six hours, major globaltrade routessuch asSingaporeoffer great opportunity for smugglers and traders alike. As the leadingCape TownCustoms Officialargues, if ashipping portstops and inspects every ship it would cause a total shippinggrid lock, which is trade gridlock, which is alsoeconomic gridlock.[36]By under-declaring and misrepresenting, even the most surprising goods is common practice when smuggling. Whatpopular culturedoes not communicate, is thatillegal drugsandarmsare not the bane of customs officers and the ultimate threat to their economy. In reality, the most commonly smuggled items are everyday items one believes to be common and thus causes higher losses intax revenue. An anonymousshipping agentsaid that smuggling becomes second nature to businessmen, taking finishedproductsand misrepresenting them to offer the cheapest possible rate. What the majority of people do not realize, is that themediaand popular culture focus on criminal organizations as primary smugglers, but in reality legitimate businesses are the biggest offenders.[37]By incorporating their label onmerchandiseor products, it leavesbiastowards their goods as the popular media portrays them as reliable. Smuggling, however, is produced through the very culture of theshipping industryand is affected byinstitutionalizedtariffsandtaxesaround the world.[38]
The existence of the Multi-Consignment Contraband (MCC) smuggling method (smuggling two or more different types of contraband such as drugs and illegal immigrants or drugs and guns at the same time) was verified following the completion of a study that found 16 documented cases of smugglers transporting more than one type of contraband in the same shipment.[39]MCC shipments were frequently associated with Phase II and Phase IIIsmuggling organizations.
In addition to human couriers, smugglers have been known to transport illicit goods with the use oftrained animals.[40]One advantage to smugglers using animals is that unlike human couriers, who mightturn state's evidenceif caught, an animal courier, if caught with any contraband on them, would be unable to provide any verbal information to the authorities.
One way that smugglers have used animals to transport contraband at times is through the use ofdogs. Often smugglers have been known to strap drugs onto the backs of canine and then use such dogs aspack animalsto transport the contraband across further distances or across borders.[41]
Another way smugglers have used to transport contraband on multiple occasions iscats. Usually the cats are used to sneak drugs intoprisons, whereprison gangscan then sell the drugs to other inmates.[42]Often a smuggler from the outside will attach small amounts of drugs to a cat and then the cat will either be lured inside the prison by inmates with cat treats or the cat might be trained to enter the prison. In addition to drugs, cats have also been used to smuggle other kinds of contraband into prison such ascellphones, tools, batteries and phone chargers.[43]The reason why cats can make good drug couriers is due to the fact that felines are naturally stealthy animals and because the prison guards are often less likely to suspect that contraband might be on a cat.
Additionally smugglers have also used homingpigeonsto transport contraband by air at times. Carrier pigeons have been used to smuggle drugs into prisons[44]and across borders.[45]Additionally homing pigeons have also been used to transport cellphones and SIM cards into prisons. The reason why pigeons have been useful for smugglers, is that they can fly for long distances and because the birds are usually unlikely to arouse much suspicion from authorities, due to the fact that pigeons are such widespread and commonly witnessed birds, in both rural and urban areas.
Smugglers have also been known to transport contraband with the use oflivestock. One such example is the use ofhorses,donkeys,mulesandponies.[46]The traffickers often strap the illicit goods to the packhorsespack saddle, so that the animal can carry more loads of contraband further and across more rugged terrain then a human courier. In addition to Packhorses, Smugglers have also been known to transport contraband with the use ofhorse-drawn vehicles.[47]Additionally there are also livestock that smugglers have used as living body couriers, in such instances the animals are either made to swallow the drugs or the drugs are surgically implanted inside the animals before they areherdedto another destination, at a later date when the animals areslaughteredfor theirmeat, the drugs are then removed and given to associates. One such example is the use ofcattle.[48]Cattle have been used as 'body couriers' to transport contraband in multiple ways, often by inserting the drugs into the cattle, to be removed at a later time after slaughter. Another animal that traffickers have used as body couriers aregoats, which they remove drugs from after slaughter.[49]Additionally another animal that has been used by smugglers to transport contraband aresheep.[50]Oftentimes, the traffickers either attach the drugs to the sheep's wool or they insert the drugs inside the sheep to be removed at a later date after slaughter. What type of livestock or pack animals do organized criminals use to carry contraband, often depends on availability and region. For example, in parts of South America, traffickers have usedllamasas pack animals to transport drugs across rugged terrain or across borders.[51]In certain parts of Asia,elephantshave been used as pack animals to carry large amounts of drugs across wilderness areas or across borders.[52]In Middle Eastern countries, smugglers have also been known to usecamelsas pack animals to transport drugs across further distances or across borders.[53]
In popular perception smuggling is synonymous with illegal trade. Evensocial scientistshave misconstrued smuggling as illegal trade.[54]While the two have indeed identical objectives, namely the evasion of taxes and the importation of contraband items, their demand and cost functions are altogether different requiring different analytical framework. As a result, illegal trade throughcustoms stationsis differently considered, and smuggling is defined asinternational tradethrough 'unauthorized route'.[55][citation needed]A seaport, airport or land port which has not been authorized by the government for importation and exportation is an 'unauthorized route'. The legal definition of these occurs in theCustoms Actof the country. Notably, some definitions define any 'undeclared' trafficking of currency and precious metal as smuggling. Smuggling is acognizable offensein which both the smuggled goods and the goods are punishable.
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Sub rosa(Neo-Latinfor "under the rose") is aLatinphrase which denotes secrecy or confidentiality. Therosehas an ancient history as a symbol of secrecy.
InHellenisticand laterRoman mythology, roses were associated with secrecy becauseCupidgave a rose toHarpocrates(the Hellenistic god ofsilence) so that he would not reveal the secrets ofVenus.[1]Banquet rooms were decorated with rose carvings, reportedly as a reminder that discussions in the rooms should be kept in confidence.[1]
This was inherited in laterChristian symbolism, where roses were carved onconfessionalsto signify thatthe conversations would remain secret.[1]
The phrase entered theGerman language(unter der Rose) and, later, theEnglish language, both as aLatin loan phrase(at least as early as 1654) and in its English translation.[1]
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Biswamohan Paniis a formerdesign engineeratIntel. In November 2008 he was charged with stealing $1 billion worth oftrade secretsfrom Intel while he worked for its main rival,Advanced Micro Devices(AMD).[1][2]The information he allegedly obtained was believed to be related to Intel's then next-generationItaniummicroprocessor.[1]The incident shed light, according toBusinessWeek, on the vulnerability of Intel, one of the world's biggest and most sophisticated technology companies.[3]On April 6, 2012, Biswamohan Pani pleaded guilty to five counts ofwire fraudbefore U.S. District JudgeF. Dennis Saylor IVfor accessing Intel systems and downloading Intel secret documents between May 8, 2008, and June 10, 2008, valued by Intel between $200 million and $400 million.[4]
On 8 August 2012 he was sentenced to three years in federal prison and given a fine of US$17,500.[5]
This article about a United States engineer, inventor or industrial designer is astub. You can help Wikipedia byexpanding it.
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Adata breach, also known asdata leakage, is "the unauthorized exposure, disclosure, or loss ofpersonal information".[1]
Attackers have a variety of motives, from financial gain topolitical activism,political repression, andespionage. There are several technical root causes of data breaches, including accidental or intentional disclosure of information by insiders, loss or theft ofunencrypteddevices, hacking into a system by exploitingsoftware vulnerabilities, andsocial engineering attackssuch asphishingwhere insiders are tricked into disclosing information. Although prevention efforts by the company holding the data can reduce the risk of data breach, it cannot bring it to zero.
The first reported breach was in 2002 and the number occurring each year has grown since then. A large number of data breaches are never detected. If a breach is made known to the company holding the data, post-breach efforts commonly include containing the breach, investigating its scope and cause, and notifications to people whose records were compromised, as required by law in many jurisdictions. Law enforcement agencies may investigate breaches, although the hackers responsible are rarely caught.
Many criminals sell data obtained in breaches on thedark web. Thus, people whose personal data was compromised are at elevated risk ofidentity theftfor years afterwards and a significant number will become victims of this crime.Data breach notification lawsin many jurisdictions, including allstates of the United StatesandEuropean Union member states, require the notification of people whose data has been breached. Lawsuits against the company that was breached are common, although few victims receive money from them. There is little empirical evidence of economic harm to firms from breaches except the direct cost, although there is some evidence suggesting a temporary, short-term decline instock price.
A data breach is a violation of "organizational, regulatory, legislative or contractual" law or policy[2]that causes "the unauthorized exposure, disclosure, or loss ofpersonal information".[1]Legal and contractual definitions vary.[3][2]Some researchers include other types of information, for exampleintellectual propertyorclassified information.[4]However, companies mostly disclose breaches because it is required by law,[5]and only personal information is covered bydata breach notification laws.[6][7]
The first reported data breach occurred on 5 April 2002[8]when 250,000social security numberscollected by theState of Californiawere stolen from a data center.[9]Before the widespread adoption ofdata breach notification lawsaround 2005, the prevalence of data breaches is difficult to determine. Even afterwards, statistics per year cannot be relied on because data breaches may be reported years after they occurred,[10]or not reported at all.[11]Nevertheless, the statistics show a continued increase in the number and severity of data breaches that continues as of 2022[update].[12]In 2016, researcherSasha Romanoskyestimated that data breaches (excludingphishing) outnumbered other security breaches by a factor of four.[13]
According to a 2020 estimate, 55 percent of data breaches were caused byorganized crime, 10 percent bysystem administrators, 10 percent byend userssuch as customers or employees, and 10 percent by states or state-affiliated actors.[14]Opportunistic criminals may cause data breaches—often usingmalwareorsocial engineering attacks, but they will typically move on if the security is above average. More organized criminals have more resources and are more focused in theirtargeting of particular data.[15]Both of them sell the information they obtain for financial gain.[16]Another source of data breaches arepolitically motivated hackers, for exampleAnonymous, that target particular objectives.[17]State-sponsored hackers target either citizens of their country or foreign entities, for such purposes aspolitical repressionandespionage. Often they use undisclosedzero-day vulnerabilitiesfor which the hackers are paid large sums of money.[18]ThePegasus spyware—ano-click malwaredeveloped by the Israeli companyNSO Groupthat can be installed on most cellphones and spies on the users' activity—has drawn attention both for use against criminals such as drug kingpinEl Chapoas well as political dissidents, facilitating themurder of Jamal Khashoggi.[19]
Despite developers' goal of delivering a product that works entirely as intended, virtually allsoftwareandhardwarecontains bugs.[20]If a bug creates a security risk, it is called avulnerability.[21][22][23]Patchesare often released to fix identified vulnerabilities, but those that remain unknown (zero days) as well as those that have not been patched are still liable for exploitation.[24]Both software written by the target of the breach and third party software used by them are vulnerable to attack.[22]Thesoftware vendor is rarely legally liablefor the cost of breaches, thus creating an incentive to make cheaper but less secure software.[25]
Vulnerabilities vary in their ability to beexploitedby malicious actors. The most valuable allow the attacker toinjectand run their own code (calledmalware), without the user being aware of it.[21]Some malware is downloaded by users via clicking on a malicious link, but it is also possible for maliciousweb applicationsto download malware just from visiting the website (drive-by download).Keyloggers, a type of malware that records a user's keystrokes, are often used in data breaches.[26]The majority of data breaches could have been averted by storing all sensitive information in an encrypted format. That way, physical possession of the storage device or access to encrypted information is useless unless the attacker has theencryption key.[27]Hashingis also a good solution for keepingpasswordssafe frombrute-force attacks, but only if the algorithm is sufficiently secure.[28]
Many data breaches occur on the hardware operated by a partner of the organization targeted—including the2013 Target data breachand2014 JPMorgan Chase data breach.[29]Outsourcingwork to a third party leads to a risk of data breach if that company has lower security standards; in particular, small companies often lack the resources to take as many security precautions.[30][29]As a result, outsourcing agreements often include security guarantees and provisions for what happens in the event of a data breach.[30]
Human causes of breach are often based on trust of another actor that turns out to be malicious.Social engineering attacksrely on tricking an insider into doing something that compromises the system's security, such as revealing a password or clicking a link to download malware.[31]Data breaches may also be deliberately caused by insiders.[32]One type of social engineering,phishing,[31]obtains a user'scredentialsby sending them a malicious message impersonating a legitimate entity, such as a bank, and getting the user to enter their credentials onto a malicious website controlled by the cybercriminal.Two-factor authenticationcan prevent the malicious actor from using the credentials.[33]Training employees to recognize social engineering is another common strategy.[34]
Another source of breaches is accidental disclosure of information, for example publishing information that should be kept private.[35][36]With the increase inremote workandbring your own devicepolicies, large amounts of corporate data is stored on personal devices of employees. Via carelessness or disregard of company security policies, these devices can be lost or stolen.[37]Technical solutions can prevent many causes of human error, such as encrypting all sensitive data, preventing employees from using insecure passwords, installingantivirus softwareto prevent malware, and implementing a robust patching system to ensure that all devices are kept up to date.[38]
Although attention to security can reduce the risk of data breach, it cannot bring it to zero. Security is not the only priority of organizations, and an attempt to achieve perfect security would make the technology unusable.[39]Many companies hire achief information security officer(CISO) to oversee the company's information security strategy.[40]To obtain information about potential threats, security professionals will network with each other and share information with other organizations facing similar threats.[41]Defense measures can include an updated incident response strategy, contracts withdigital forensicsfirms that could investigate a breach,[42]cyber insurance,[43][7]and monitoring thedark webfor stolen credentials of employees.[44]In 2024, the United StatesNational Institute of Standards and Technology(NIST) issued a special publication, "Data Confidentiality: Identifying and Protecting Assets Against Data Breaches".[45]TheNIST Cybersecurity Frameworkalso contains information about data protection.[46]Other organizations have released different standards for data protection.[47]
The architecture of a company's systems plays a key role in deterring attackers. Daswani and Elbayadi recommend having only one means ofauthentication,[48]avoiding redundant systems, and making the most secure setting default.[49]Defense in depthanddistributed privilege(requiring multiple authentications to execute an operation) also can make a system more difficult to hack.[50]Giving employees and software the least amount of access necessary to fulfill their functions (principle of least privilege) limits the likelihood and damage of breaches.[48][51]Several data breaches were enabled by reliance onsecurity by obscurity; the victims had put access credentials in publicly accessible files.[52]Nevertheless, prioritizing ease of use is also important because otherwise users might circumvent the security systems.[53]Rigoroussoftware testing, includingpenetration testing, can reduce software vulnerabilities, and must be performed prior to each release even if the company is using acontinuous integration/continuous deploymentmodel where new versions are constantly being rolled out.[54]
The principle ofleast persistence[55]—avoiding the collection of data that is not necessary and destruction of data that is no longer necessary—can mitigate the harm from breaches.[56][57][58]The challenge is that destroying data can be more complex with modern database systems.[59]
A large number of data breaches are never detected.[60]Of those that are, most breaches are detected by third parties;[61][62]others are detected by employees or automated systems.[63]Responding to breaches is often the responsibility of a dedicatedcomputer security incident response team, often including technical experts,public relations, and legal counsel.[64][65]Many companies do not have sufficient expertise in-house, and subcontract some of these roles;[66]often, these outside resources are provided by the cyber insurance policy.[67]After a data breach becomes known to the company, the next steps typically include confirming it occurred, notifying the response team, and attempting to contain the damage.[68]
To stop exfiltration of data, common strategies include shutting down affected servers, taking them offline,patchingthe vulnerability, andrebuilding.[69]Once the exact way that the data was compromised is identified, there is typically only one or two technical vulnerabilities that need to be addressed in order to contain the breach and prevent it from reoccurring.[70]Apenetration testcan then verify that the fix is working as expected.[71]Ifmalwareis involved, the organization must investigate and close all infiltration and exfiltration vectors, as well as locate and remove all malware from its systems.[72]If data was posted on thedark web, companies may attempt to have it taken down.[73]Containing the breach can compromise investigation, and some tactics (such as shutting down servers) can violate the company's contractual obligations.[74]
Gathering data about the breach can facilitate later litigation or criminal prosecution,[75]but only if the data is gathered according to legal standards and thechain of custodyis maintained.[76]Database forensics can narrow down the records involved, limiting the scope of the incident.[77]Extensive investigation may be undertaken, which can be even more expensive thanlitigation.[62]In the United States, breaches may be investigated by government agencies such as theOffice for Civil Rights, theUnited States Department of Health and Human Services, and theFederal Trade Commission(FTC).[78]Law enforcement agencies may investigate breaches[79]although the hackers responsible are rarely caught.[80]
Notifications are typically sent out as required by law.[81]Many companies offer freecredit monitoringto people affected by a data breach, although only around 5 percent of those eligible take advantage of the service.[82]Issuing new credit cards to consumers, although expensive, is an effective strategy to reduce the risk ofcredit card fraud.[82]Companies try to restore trust in their business operations and take steps to prevent a breach from reoccurring.[83]
After a data breach, criminals make money by selling data, such as usernames, passwords,social mediaorcustomer loyaltyaccount information,debitandcredit cardnumbers,[16]and personal health information (seemedical data breach).[84]Criminals often sell this data on thedark web—parts of the internet where it is difficult to trace users and illicit activity is widespread—using platforms like.onionorI2P.[85]Originating in the 2000s, the dark web, followed by untraceablecryptocurrenciessuch asBitcoinin the 2010s, made it possible for criminals to sell data obtained in breaches with minimal risk of getting caught, facilitating an increase in hacking.[86][87]One popular darknet marketplace,Silk Road, was shut down in 2013 and its operators arrested, but several other marketplaces emerged in its place.[88]Telegramis also a popular forum for illegal sales of data.[89]
This information may be used for a variety of purposes, such asspamming, obtaining products with a victim's loyalty or payment information,identity theft,prescription drug fraud, orinsurance fraud.[90]The threat of data breach or revealing information obtained in a data breach can be used forextortion.[16]
Consumers may suffer various forms of tangible or intangible harm from the theft of their personal data, or not notice any harm.[91]A significant portion of those affected by a data breach become victims ofidentity theft.[82]A person's identifying information often circulates on the dark web for years, causing an increased risk of identity theft regardless of remediation efforts.[80][92]Even if a customer does not end up footing the bill forcredit card fraudor identity theft, they have to spend time resolving the situation.[93][94]Intangible harms includedoxxing(publicly revealing someone's personal information), for example medication usage or personal photos.[95]
There is little empirical evidence of economic harm from breaches except the direct cost, although there is some evidence suggesting a temporary, short-term decline instock price.[96]Other impacts on the company can range from lost business, reduced employee productivity due to systems being offline or personnel redirected to working on the breach,[97]resignation or firing of senior executives,[78]reputational damage,[78][98]and increasing the future cost of auditing or security.[78]Consumer losses from a breach are usually a negativeexternalityfor the business.[99]Some experts have argued that the evidence suggests there is not enough direct costs or reputational damage from data breaches to sufficientlyincentivizetheir prevention.[100][101]
Estimating the cost of data breaches is difficult, both because not all breaches are reported and also because calculating the impact of breaches in financial terms is not straightforward. There are multiple ways of calculating the cost to businesses, especially when it comes to personnel time dedicated to dealing with the breach.[102]Author Kevvie Fowler estimates that more than half the direct cost incurred by companies is in the form of litigation expenses and services provided to affected individuals, with the remaining cost split between notification and detection, including forensics and investigation. He argues that these costs are reduced if the organization has invested in security prior to the breach or has previous experience with breaches. The moredata recordsinvolved, the more expensive a breach typically will be.[103]In 2016, researcherSasha Romanoskyestimated that while the mean breach cost around the targeted firm $5 million, this figure was inflated by a few highly expensive breaches, and the typical data breach was much less costly, around $200,000. Romanosky estimated the total annual cost to corporations in the United States to be around $10 billion.[104]
The law regarding data breaches is often found inlegislation to protect privacymore generally, and is dominated by provisions mandating notification when breaches occur.[105]Laws differ greatly in how breaches are defined,[3]what type of information is protected, the deadline for notification,[6]and who hasstandingto sue if the law is violated.[106]Notification laws increasetransparencyand provide a reputational incentive for companies to reduce breaches.[107]The cost of notifying the breach can be high if many people were affected and is incurred regardless of the company's responsibility, so it can function like astrict liabilityfine.[108]
As of 2024[update],Thomas on Data Breachlisted 62United Nations member statesthat are covered by data breach notification laws. Some other countries require breach notification in more generaldata protection laws.[109]Shortly after the first reported data breach in April 2002, California passeda law requiring notificationwhen an individual's personal information was breached.[9]In the United States, notification laws proliferated after the February 2005ChoicePoint data breach, widely publicized in part because of the large number of people affected (more than 140,000) and also because of outrage that the company initially informed only affected people in California.[110][111]In 2018, theEuropean Union'sGeneral Data Protection Regulation(GDPR) took effect. The GDPR requires notification within 72 hours, with very high fines possible for large companies not in compliance. This regulation also stimulated the tightening of data privacy laws elsewhere.[112][113]As of 2022[update], the onlyUnited States federal lawrequiring notification for data breaches is limited to medical data regulated underHIPAA, but all 50 states (since Alabama passed a law in 2018) have their own general data breach notification laws.[113]
Measures to protect data from a breach are typically absent from the law or vague.[105]Filling this gap is standards required bycyber insurance, which is held by most large companies andfunctions asde factoregulation.[114][115]Of the laws that do exist, there are two main approaches—one that prescribes specific standards to follow, and thereasonablenessapproach.[116]The former is rarely used due to a lack of flexibility and reluctance of legislators to arbitrate technical issues; with the latter approach, the law is vague but specific standards can emerge fromcase law.[117]Companies often prefer the standards approach for providing greaterlegal certainty, but they might check all the boxes without providing a secure product.[118]An additional flaw is that the laws are poorly enforced, with penalties often much less than the cost of a breach, and many companies do not follow them.[119]
Manyclass-action lawsuits,derivative suits, and other litigation have been brought after data breaches.[120]They are oftensettledregardless of the merits of the case due to the high cost of litigation.[121][122]Even if a settlement is paid, few affected consumers receive any money as it usually is only cents to a few dollars per victim.[78][122]Legal scholarsDaniel J. SoloveandWoodrow Hartzogargue that "Litigation has increased the costs of data breaches but has accomplished little else."[123]Plaintiffs often struggle to prove that they suffered harm from a data breach.[123]The contribution of a company's actions to a data breach varies,[119][124]and likewise the liability for the damage resulting for data breaches is a contested matter. It is disputed what standard should be applied, whether it is strict liability,negligence, or something else.[124]
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InCanada,trade secretsare generally considered to include information set out, contained or embodied in, but not limited to, a formula, pattern, plan, compilation, computer program, method, technique, process, product, device or mechanism; it may be information of any sort; an idea of a scientific nature, or of a literary nature, as long as they grant an economical advantage to the business and improve its value.[1]Additionally, there must be some element of secrecy. Matters of public knowledge or of general knowledge in an industry cannot be the subject-matter of a trade secret.[2]
Trade secretsare a type ofintellectual propertythat consists of certaininformation,expertiseorknow-howthat has been developed or acquired by firms. This knowledge frequently gives firms their competitive edge in the market and it has to be kept as a secret.
In Canada any information that a firm or its employees produces or acquires for the purpose of the firm's business can constitute confidential information that courts are willing to protect. All that is required is that the creator of the information “has used his brain and thus produced a result which can be produced by somebody who goes through the same process”.[3]
According toSeager v. Copydex Ltd,[4]courts will even act to protect a comparatively underdeveloped idea from misappropriation. However, information may stop being confidential and confident may be released from its obligations of confidence if the information subject to confidence is later publicly disclosed by the confider or a third party.
With one exception in the field of employer-employee relations, there is no recognized distinction in Canada between the rights and remedies afforded totrade secretsas opposed to mereconfidential information. In the field of employer-employee relationships, the British caseFaccenda Chicken Ltd. v. Fowler, which has been cited with approval by several Canadian courts, has drawn a distinction between the two.[5]
Under theConstitution Act 1867, the exclusive Legislative Authority of theParliament of Canadaextends to most areas of intellectual property such as patents, trademarks and copyrights;[6]whereas the provincial government has exclusive authority to legislate on matters related toproperty and civil rights. The federal Parliament also has exclusive jurisdiction to create offences under its criminal law power.[7]
At one time, the federalTrade-marks Actprohibited anyone from "do[ing] any other act or adopt[ing] any other business practice contrary to honest industrial or commercial usage in Canada,"[8]which was considered to include the taking of trade secrets.[9]However, theSupreme Court of Canadaruled inMacDonald v. Vapor Canada Ltd.that the provisions encroached on the provinces' authority overproperty and civil rightsand could not be upheld under the federaltrade and commercepower.[10]Therefore, the regulation of trade secrets as a civil matter falls under provincial jurisdiction.
TheUniform Trade Secrets Act, adopted by the Uniform Law Conference of Canada in 1989, would provide civil remedies for the breach of trade secrets. That Uniform Act defines "trade secrets" as follows:
1(1) In this Act...
"trade secret" means any information that
(2) For the purposes of the definition trade secret "information" includes information set out, contained or embodied in, but not limited to, a formula, pattern, plan, compilation, computer program, method, technique, process, product, device or mechanism.[11]
To date, the Uniform Act has not been enacted into law by any of the Legislatures,[12]but the definition has been incorporated in the federalSecurity of Information Act.[13]
In all the provinces but Quebec, trade secrets are governed by the common law, ultimately derived from the English common law as interpreted and applied in Canada. The Canadian definition of trade secret is based on Canadian case law and doctrine, and also draws on American and English case law.[14]InLac Minerals Ltd. v. International Corona Resources Ltd., theSupreme Court of Canadaheld that a breach of confidence action issui generisand the courts may rely on all three traditional jurisdictional bases for action (contract, equity and property) to enforce the policy of the law that confidences are to be respected.[15]
In common law, there are essentially five types ofcivil actionthat atrade secretholder can rely on to seek protection of its trade secrets before a court of justice:
TheSupreme Court of Canadastated inCadbury Schweppes Inc. v. FBI Foods Ltd.that all these types of actions coexist in the Canadian judicial system and remain available to the trade secret holder.[17]
In Quebec, trade secrets are governed by provisions under theCivil Code of Quebec. An action for breach oftrade secretsor confidential business information generally arises either from a contractual liability action[18]or, in the absence of a contract, from a civil liability action.[19]
TheCodedeals specifically withtrade secretsin one article that provides for a defense where disclosing the secret is in the public interest,[20]and in one that describes how a loss resulting from disclosure is to be calculated.[21]However, none of its provisions define the concept of trade secret.
TheQuebec Court of Appealhas ruled inContinental Casualty Company v. Combined Insurance Companythat those who owntrade secrets(secrets de commerce) are entitled to seek protection and thatQuebeccourts are competent to grant remedies in the case the plaintiff can evidence its ownership of them.[22]
Two important forms of contract used by employers in Canada to protect theirtrade secretsand confidential information arenon-disclosure agreementsandnon-competition agreements, which are also known asconfidentiality agreementsandrestrictive covenants.[5]
According toFaccenda Chicken Ltd. v. Fowler, ex-employees, post-termination, may use their general skills and knowledge anywhere but they may not use or divulge their former employer's trade secrets. Exceptionally, ex-employers may also be able to enjoin a former employee's use of non-trade secret information where that information has been obtained from records which qualify as trade secrets.[23]
According toInternational Tools Ltd. v. Kollar, in Canada the length of apermanent injunctionto force a defendant to cease using the plaintiff's information should not normally extend beyond the time that the plaintiff's trade secrets remains a secret which is exclusively known to the plaintiff and its confidants.[24]
InCadbury Schweppes Inc. v. FBI Foods Ltd.Justice Binnie concluded that the form of relief for breach of confidence was “dictated by the facts of the case rather than strict jurisdictional or doctrinal considerations”.[25]He also stated that “whether a breach of contract in a particular case has a contractual, tortuous, proprietary or trust flavour goes to the appropriateness of particular equitable remedy but does not limit the court’s jurisdiction to grant it”.[25]
InR. v. Stewart,[26]theSupreme Court of Canadaheld that the taking of confidential information cannot form the basis of a charge of theft[27]under theCriminal Code, but it could in certain circumstances form one forfraud:[28]
Parliament has since amended theSecurity of Information Actto provide that it is an offence to:
for the benefit of a foreign economic entity, and to the detriment of Canada's economic interests, international relations or national defence or national security.[13]
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This is a list of articles that list different types or classifications ofcommunication protocolsused incomputer networks.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_network_protocols
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Web3(also known asWeb 3.0)[1][2][3]is an idea for a new iteration of theWorld Wide Webwhich incorporates concepts such asdecentralization,blockchain technologies, and token-based economics.[4]This is distinct fromTim Berners-Lee's concept of theSemantic Web. Some technologists and journalists have contrasted it withWeb 2.0, in which they sayuser-generated contentis controlled by a small group of companies referred to asBig Tech.[5]The term "web3" was coined in 2014 byEthereumco-founderGavin Wood, and the idea gained interest in 2021 fromcryptocurrencyenthusiasts, large technology companies, andventure capitalfirms.[5][6]The concepts of web3 were first represented in 2013.[7][8]
Critics have expressed concerns over thecentralization of wealthto a small group of investors and individuals,[9]or a loss of privacy due to more expansive data collection.[10]Billionaires likeElon MuskandJack Dorseyhave argued that web3 only serves as abuzzwordor marketing term.[11][12][13]
Web 1.0andWeb 2.0refer to eras in thehistory of the World Wide Webas it evolved through various technologies and formats. Web 1.0 refers roughly to the period from 1991 to 2004, where most sites consisted ofstatic pages, and the vast majority of users were consumers, not producers of content.[14][15]Web 2.0is based around the idea of "the web as platform"[16]and centers on user-created content uploaded toforums,social mediaand networking services,blogs, andwikis, among other services.[17]Web 2.0 is generally considered to have begun around 2004 and continues to the current day.[16][18][5]
Web3 is distinct fromTim Berners-Lee's 1999 concept of aSemantic Web, which was also sometimes referred to as Web 3.0.[19]While the Semantic Web envisioned a web of linked data, web3 in theblockchaincontext refers to a decentralized internet built upon distributed ledger technologies.[20]Some writers referring to the decentralized concept usually known as "web3" have used the term "Web 3.0", leading to some confusion between the two concepts.[21][22]Furthermore, some visions of web3 also incorporate ideas relating to the semantic web.[23][24]
The term "web3" was coined byPolkadotfounder andEthereumco-founderGavin Woodin 2014, referring to a "decentralized online ecosystem based on blockchain."[1]In 2021, the idea of web3 gained popularity.[25]Particular interest spiked toward the end of 2021, largely due to interest fromcryptocurrencyenthusiasts and investments from high-profile technologists and companies.[5][6]Executives from venture capital firmAndreessen Horowitztraveled toWashington, DC, in October 2021 to lobby for the idea as a potential solution to questions about regulation of the web, with which policymakers have been grappling.[26]
Specific visions for web3 differ, and the term has been described by Olga Kharif as "hazy", but they revolve around the idea of decentralization and often incorporate blockchain technologies, such as variouscryptocurrenciesandnon-fungible tokens(NFTs).[5]Kharif has described web3 as an idea that "would build financial assets, in the form of tokens, into the inner workings of almost anything you do online".[27]A policy brief published by theBennett Institute for Public Policyat theUniversity of Cambridgedefined web3 as "the putative next generation of the web's technical, legal, and payments infrastructure—including blockchain,smart contractsand cryptocurrencies."[28]
Some visions are based around the concept ofdecentralized autonomous organizations(DAOs).[29]Decentralized finance(DeFi) is another key concept; in it, users exchange currency without bank or government involvement.[5]Self-sovereign identityallows users to identify themselves without relying on an authentication system such asOAuth, in which a trusted party has to be reached in order to assess identity.[30]
Academic researchers, such as Tomer J. Chaffer and Justin Goldston in 2022, have described web3 as a possible solution to concerns about the over-centralization of the web in a few "Big Tech" companies.[31][5][26]Some have expressed the notion that web3 could improvedata security,scalability, andprivacybeyond what is currently possible withWeb 2.0platforms.[32]Bloombergstates that skeptics say the idea "is a long way from proving its use beyond niche applications, many of them tools aimed at crypto traders".[27]The New York Timesreported that several investors are betting $27billion that web3 "is the future of the internet".[33][34]
Some Web 2.0 companies, includingRedditandDiscord, have explored incorporating web3 technologies into their platforms.[5][35]On November 8, 2021, CEO Jason Citron tweeted a screenshot suggesting Discord might be exploring integrating cryptocurrency wallets into their platform. Two days later, and after heavy user backlash,[35][36]Discord announced they had no plans to integrate such technologies and that it was an internal-only concept that had been developed in a company-widehackathon.[36]
Some legal scholars quoted byThe Conversationhave expressed concerns over the difficulty of regulating a decentralized web, which they reported might make it more difficult to preventcybercrime,online harassment,hate speech, and the dissemination ofchild pornography.[37]But, the news website also states that, "[decentralized web] represents the cyber-libertarian views and hopes of the past that the internet can empower ordinary people by breaking down existing power structures". Some other critics of web3 see the concept as a part of acryptocurrency bubble, or as an extension ofblockchain-based trends that they see as overhyped or harmful, particularlyNFTs.[35]Some critics have raised concerns about theenvironmental impact of cryptocurrenciesand NFTs.[6]Cryptocurrencies vary in efficiency, withproof of stakehaving been designed to be less energy intensive than the more widely usedproof of work, although there is disagreement about how secure and decentralized this is in practice.[38][39][40][41]Others have expressed beliefs that web3 and the associated technologies are apyramid scheme.[6]
Jack Dorsey, co-founder and former CEO ofTwitter, dismissed web3 as a "venture capitalists' plaything".[42]Dorsey opined that web3 will not democratize the internet, but it will shiftpowerfrom players likeFacebookto venture capital funds likeAndreessen Horowitz.[9]
Liam Proven, writing forThe Register, concludes that web3 is "a myth, a fairy story. It's what parents tell their kids about at night if they want them to grow up to become economists".[43]
In 2021,SpaceXandTeslaCEOElon Muskexpressed skepticism about web3 in a tweet, saying that web3 "seems more marketing buzzword than reality right now."[11]
In November 2021, James Grimmelmann ofCornell Universityreferred to web3 asvaporware, calling it "a promised future internet that fixes all the things people don't like about the current internet, even when it's contradictory." Grimmelmann also argued that moving the internet toward a blockchain-focused infrastructure would centralize and cause moredata collectioncompared to the current internet.[10]
Software engineer Stephen Diehl described web3 in a blog post as a "vapid marketing campaign that attempts to reframe the public's negative associations of crypto assets into a false narrative about disruption of legacy tech company hegemony."[44]
Kevin Werbach, author ofThe Blockchain and the New Architecture of Trust,[45]has said that "many so-called 'Web 3.0' solutions are not as decentralized as they seem, while others have yet to show they are scalable, secure and accessible enough for the mass market", adding that this "may change, but it's not a given that all these limitations will be overcome".[46]
In early 2022,Moxie Marlinspike, creator ofSignal, articulated how web3 is not as decentralized as it appears to be, mainly due to consolidation in the cryptocurrency field, including in blockchainapplication programming interfaceswhich are currently mainly controlled by the companiesAlchemyandInfura;cryptocurrency exchangeswhich are mainly dominated byBinance,Coinbase,MetaMask, andOpenSea; and thestablecoinmarket which is currently dominated byTether. Marlinspike also remarked that the new web resembles the old web.[47][48][49]
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TheRSA Secret-Key Challengewas a series ofcryptographiccontests organised byRSA Laboratorieswith the intent of helping to demonstrate the relative security of differentencryption algorithms. The challenge ran from 28 January 1997 until May 2007.[1]
For each contest, RSA had posted on its website a block of ciphertext and the randominitialization vectorused for encryption. To win, a contestant would have had to break the code by finding the original plaintext and thecryptographic keythat will generate the posted ciphertext from the plaintext. The challenge consisted of oneDEScontest and twelve contests based around the block cipherRC5.
Each of the RC5 contests is named after the variant of theRC5cipher used. The nameRC5-w/r/bindicates that the cipher usedw-bit words,rrounds, and a key made up ofbbytes. The contests are often referred to by the names of the corresponding distributed.net projects, for example RC5-32/12/9 is often known as RC5-72 due to the 72-bit key size.
The first contest was DES Challenge III (and was also part of theDES Challenges) and was completed in 22 hours 15 minutes by distributed.net and theEFF'sDeep Crackmachine.
In May 2007 RSA Laboratories announced the termination of the challenge, stating that they would not disclose the solutions to the remaining contents, and nor would they confirm or reward prize money for future solutions.[1]On 8 September 2008distributed.netannounced that they would fund a prize of $4000 for the RC5-32/12/9 contest.[2]
The contests are associated with thedistributed.netgroup, which had actively participated in the challenge by making use ofdistributed computingto perform abrute force attack.
RC5-32/12/7 was completed on 19 October 1997, with distributed.net finding the winning key in 250 days and winning the US$10,000 prize. The recovered plaintext was:The unknown message is: It's time to move to a longer key length.
RC5-32/12/8 also carried a US$10,000 prize and was completed by distributed.net on 14 July 2002. It took the group 1,757 days to locate the key, revealing the plaintext:The unknown message is: Some things are better left unread.
There were eight contests that had not yet been solved, RC5/32/12/9 through RC5/32/12/16, each of which was a US$10,000 prize. Distributed.net is working on RC5-32/12/9 and were at 12.298% as of July 13 2024 (7.559% as of March 22 2021, 6.700% as of 20 June 2020, 5.329% as of 18 September 2018, 4.356% as of 7 January 2017).[3]
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Inmathematics, aGolomb ruleris asetof marks atintegerpositions along a ruler such that no two pairs of marks are the same distance apart. The number of marks on the ruler is itsorder, and the largest distance between two of its marks is itslength. Translation and reflection of a Golomb ruler are considered trivial, so the smallest mark is customarily put at 0 and the next mark at the smaller of its two possible values. Golomb rulers can be viewed as a one-dimensional special case ofCostas arrays.
The Golomb ruler was named forSolomon W. Golomband discovered independently bySidon (1932)[1]andBabcock (1953).Sophie Piccardalso published early research on these sets, in 1939, stating as a theorem the claim that two Golomb rulers with the samedistance setmust becongruent. This turned out to be false for six-point rulers, but true otherwise.[2]
There is no requirement that a Golomb ruler be able to measurealldistances up to its length, but if it does, it is called aperfectGolomb ruler. It has been proved that no perfect Golomb ruler exists for five or more marks.[3]A Golomb ruler isoptimalif no shorter Golomb ruler of the same order exists. Creating Golomb rulers is easy, but proving the optimal Golomb ruler (or rulers) for a specified order is computationally very challenging.
Distributed.nethas completed distributed massivelyparallel searchesfor optimal order-24 through order-28 Golomb rulers, each time confirming the suspected candidate ruler.[4][5][6][7][8]
Currently, thecomplexityof finding optimal Golomb rulers (OGRs) of arbitrary ordern(wherenis given in unary) is unknown.[clarification needed]In the past there was some speculation that it is anNP-hardproblem.[3]Problems related to the construction of Golomb rulers are provably shown to be NP-hard, where it is also noted that no known NP-complete problem has similar flavor to finding Golomb rulers.[9]
A set of integersA={a1,a2,...,am}{\displaystyle A=\{a_{1},a_{2},...,a_{m}\}}wherea1<a2<...<am{\displaystyle a_{1}<a_{2}<...<a_{m}}is a Golomb ruler if and only if
Theorderof such a Golomb ruler ism{\displaystyle m}and itslengthisam−a1{\displaystyle a_{m}-a_{1}}. Thecanonical formhasa1=0{\displaystyle a_{1}=0}and, ifm>2{\displaystyle m>2},a2−a1<am−am−1{\displaystyle a_{2}-a_{1}<a_{m}-a_{m-1}}. Such a form can be achieved through translation and reflection.
Aninjective functionf:{1,2,...,m}→{0,1,...,n}{\displaystyle f:\left\{1,2,...,m\right\}\to \left\{0,1,...,n\right\}}withf(1)=0{\displaystyle f(1)=0}andf(m)=n{\displaystyle f(m)=n}is a Golomb ruler if and only if
Theorderof such a Golomb ruler ism{\displaystyle m}and itslengthisn{\displaystyle n}. The canonical form has
A Golomb ruler of ordermwith lengthnmay beoptimalin either of two respects:[11]: 237
The general termoptimal Golomb ruleris used to refer to the second type of optimality.
Golomb rulers are used withininformation theoryrelated toerror correcting codes.[13]
Golomb rulers are used in the selection of radio frequencies to reduce the effects ofintermodulation interferencewith bothterrestrial[14]andextraterrestrial[15]applications.
Golomb rulers are used in the design of phased arrays of radio antennas. In radio astronomy one-dimensional synthesis arrays can have the antennas in a Golomb ruler configuration in order to obtain minimum redundancy of the Fourier component sampling.[16][17]
Multi-ratiocurrent transformersuse Golomb rulers to place transformer tap points.[citation needed]
A number of construction methods produceasymptotically optimalGolomb rulers.
The following construction, due toPaul ErdősandPál Turán, produces a Golomb ruler for every odd prime p.[12]
The following table contains all known optimal Golomb rulers, excluding those with marks in the reverse order. The first four areperfect.
^ *The optimal ruler would have been known before this date; this date represents that date when it was discovered to be optimal (because all other rulers were proved to not be smaller). For example, the ruler that turned out to be optimal for order 26 was recorded on 10 October 2007, but it was not known to be optimal until all other possibilities were exhausted on 24 February 2009.
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TheDES Challengeswere a series ofbrute force attackcontests created byRSA Securityto highlight the lack of security provided by theData Encryption Standard.
The first challenge began in 1997 and was solved in 96 days by theDESCHALL Project.[1]
DES Challenge II-1was solved bydistributed.netin 39 days in early 1998. The plaintext message being solved for was "The secret message is: Many hands make light work."[2]
DES Challenge II-2was solved in just 56 hours in July 1998, by theElectronic Frontier Foundation(EFF), with their purpose-builtDeep Crackmachine. EFF won $10,000 for their success, although their machine cost $250,000 to build. The contest demonstrated how quickly a rich corporation or government agency, having built a similar machine, could decrypt ciphertext encrypted with DES. The text was revealed to be "The secret message is: It's time for those 128-, 192-, and 256-bit keys."[3]
DES Challenge IIIwas a joint effort between distributed.net and Deep Crack. The key was found in just 22 hours 15 minutes in January 1999, and the plaintext was "See you in Rome (second AES Conference, March 22-23, 1999)".[4]
After the DES had been shown to be breakable,FBIdirector Louis Freeh told Congress, "That is not going to make a difference in a kidnapping case. It is not going to make a difference in a national security case. We don't have the technology or the brute force capability to get to this information."[5]
It was not until special purpose hardware brought the time down below 24 hours that both industry and federal authorities had to admit that the DES was no longer viable. Although theNational Institute of Standards and Technologystarted work on what became theAdvanced Encryption Standardin 1997, they continued to endorse the DES as late as October 1999, with FIPS 46-3. However,Triple DESwas preferred.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DES_Challenges
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Incryptography,key sizeorkey lengthrefers to the number ofbitsin akeyused by acryptographicalgorithm (such as acipher).
Key length defines the upper-bound on an algorithm'ssecurity(i.e. a logarithmic measure of the fastest known attack against an algorithm), because the security of all algorithms can be violated bybrute-force attacks. Ideally, the lower-bound on an algorithm's security is by design equal to the key length (that is, the algorithm's design does not detract from the degree of security inherent in the key length).
Mostsymmetric-key algorithmsare designed to have security equal to their key length. However, after design, a new attack might be discovered. For instance,Triple DESwas designed to have a 168-bit key, but an attack of complexity 2112is now known (i.e. Triple DES now only has 112 bits of security, and of the 168 bits in the key the attack has rendered 56 'ineffective' towards security). Nevertheless, as long as the security (understood as "the amount of effort it would take to gain access") is sufficient for a particular application, then it does not matter if key length and security coincide. This is important forasymmetric-key algorithms, because no such algorithm is known to satisfy this property;elliptic curve cryptographycomes the closest with an effective security of roughly half its key length.
Keysare used to control the operation of a cipher so that only the correct key can convert encrypted text (ciphertext) toplaintext. All commonly-used ciphers are based on publicly knownalgorithmsor areopen sourceand so it is only the difficulty of obtaining the key that determines security of the system, provided that there is no analytic attack (i.e. a "structural weakness" in the algorithms or protocols used), and assuming that the key is not otherwise available (such as via theft, extortion, or compromise of computer systems). The widely accepted notion that the security of the system should depend on the key alone has been explicitly formulated byAuguste Kerckhoffs(in the 1880s) andClaude Shannon(in the 1940s); the statements are known asKerckhoffs' principleand Shannon's Maxim respectively.
A key should, therefore, be large enough that a brute-force attack (possible against any encryption algorithm) is infeasible – i.e. would take too long and/or would take too much memory to execute.Shannon'swork oninformation theoryshowed that to achieve so-called 'perfect secrecy', the key length must be at least as large as the message and only used once (this algorithm is called theone-time pad). In light of this, and the practical difficulty of managing such long keys, modern cryptographic practice has discarded the notion of perfect secrecy as a requirement for encryption, and instead focuses oncomputational security, under which the computational requirements of breaking an encrypted text must be infeasible for an attacker.
Encryption systems are often grouped into families. Common families include symmetric systems (e.g.AES) and asymmetric systems (e.g.RSAandElliptic-curve cryptography[ECC]). They may be grouped according to the centralalgorithmused (e.g.ECCandFeistel ciphers). Because each of these has a different level of cryptographic complexity, it is usual to have different key sizes for the samelevel of security, depending upon the algorithm used. For example, the security available with a 1024-bit key using asymmetricRSAis considered approximately equal in security to an 80-bit key in a symmetric algorithm.[1]
The actual degree of security achieved over time varies, as more computational power and more powerful mathematical analytic methods become available. For this reason, cryptologists tend to look at indicators that an algorithm or key length shows signs of potential vulnerability, to move to longer key sizes or more difficult algorithms. For example, as of May 2007[update], a 1039-bit integer was factored with thespecial number field sieveusing 400 computers over 11 months.[2]The factored number was of a special form; the special number field sieve cannot be used on RSA keys. The computation is roughly equivalent to breaking a 700 bit RSA key. However, this might be an advance warning that 1024 bit RSA keys used in secure online commerce should bedeprecated, since they may become breakable in the foreseeable future. Cryptography professorArjen Lenstraobserved that "Last time, it took nine years for us to generalize from a special to a nonspecial, hard-to-factor number" and when asked whether 1024-bit RSA keys are dead, said: "The answer to that question is an unqualified yes."[3]
The 2015Logjam attackrevealed additional dangers in using Diffie-Hellman key exchange when only one or a few common 1024-bit or smaller prime moduli are in use. This practice, somewhat common at the time, allows large amounts of communications to be compromised at the expense of attacking a small number of primes.[4][5]
Even if a symmetric cipher is currently unbreakable by exploiting structural weaknesses in its algorithm, it may be possible to run through the entirespaceof keys in what is known as a brute-force attack. Because longer symmetric keys require exponentially more work to brute force search, a sufficiently long symmetric key makes this line of attack impractical.
With a key of lengthnbits, there are 2npossible keys. This number grows very rapidly asnincreases. The large number of operations (2128) required to try all possible 128-bit keys is widely consideredout of reachfor conventional digital computing techniques for the foreseeable future.[6]However, aquantum computercapable of runningGrover's algorithmwould be able to search the possible keys more efficiently. If a suitably sized quantum computer would reduce a 128-bit key down to 64-bit security, roughly aDESequivalent. This is one of the reasons whyAESsupports key lengths of 256 bits and longer.[a]
IBM'sLucifer cipherwas selected in 1974 as the base for what would become theData Encryption Standard. Lucifer's key length was reduced from 128 bits to56 bits, which theNSAand NIST argued was sufficient for non-governmental protection at the time. The NSA has major computing resources and a large budget; some cryptographers includingWhitfield DiffieandMartin Hellmancomplained that this made the cipher so weak that NSA computers would be able to break a DES key in a day through brute forceparallel computing. The NSA disputed this, claiming that brute-forcing DES would take them "something like 91 years".[7]
However, by the late 90s, it became clear that DES could be cracked in a few days' time-frame with custom-built hardware such as could be purchased by a large corporation or government.[8][9]The bookCracking DES(O'Reilly and Associates) tells of the successful ability in 1998 to break 56-bit DES by a brute-force attack mounted by a cyber civil rights group with limited resources; seeEFF DES cracker. Even before that demonstration, 56 bits was considered insufficient length forsymmetric algorithmkeys for general use. Because of this, DES was replaced in most security applications byTriple DES, which has 112 bits of security when using 168-bit keys (triple key).[1]
TheAdvanced Encryption Standardpublished in 2001 uses key sizes of 128, 192 or 256 bits. Many observers consider 128 bits sufficient for the foreseeable future for symmetric algorithms ofAES's quality untilquantum computersbecome available.[citation needed]However, as of 2015, the U.S.National Security Agencyhas issued guidance that it plans to switch to quantum computing resistant algorithms and now requires 256-bit AES keys for dataclassified up to Top Secret.[10]
In 2003, the U.S. National Institute for Standards and Technology,NISTproposed phasing out 80-bit keys by 2015. At 2005, 80-bit keys were allowed only until 2010.[11]
Since 2015, NIST guidance says that "the use of keys that provide less than 112 bits ofsecurity strengthfor key agreement is now disallowed." NIST approved symmetric encryption algorithms include three-keyTriple DES, andAES. Approvals for two-key Triple DES andSkipjackwere withdrawn in 2015; theNSA's Skipjack algorithm used in itsFortezzaprogram employs 80-bit keys.[1]
The effectiveness ofpublic key cryptosystemsdepends on the intractability (computational and theoretical) of certain mathematical problems such asinteger factorization. These problems are time-consuming to solve, but usually faster than trying all possible keys by brute force. Thus,asymmetric keysmust be longer for equivalent resistance to attack than symmetric algorithm keys. The most common methods are assumed to be weak against sufficiently powerfulquantum computersin the future.
Since 2015, NIST recommends a minimum of 2048-bit keys forRSA,[12]an update to the widely accepted recommendation of a 1024-bit minimum since at least 2002.[13]
1024-bit RSA keys are equivalent in strength to 80-bit symmetric keys, 2048-bit RSA keys to 112-bit symmetric keys, 3072-bit RSA keys to 128-bit symmetric keys, and 15360-bit RSA keys to 256-bit symmetric keys.[14]In 2003,RSA Securityclaimed that 1024-bit keys were likely to become crackable sometime between 2006 and 2010, while 2048-bit keys are sufficient until 2030.[15]As of 2020[update]the largest RSA key publicly known to be cracked isRSA-250with 829 bits.[16]
The Finite FieldDiffie-Hellmanalgorithm has roughly the same key strength as RSA for the same key sizes. The work factor for breaking Diffie-Hellman is based on thediscrete logarithm problem, which is related to the integer factorization problem on which RSA's strength is based. Thus, a 2048-bit Diffie-Hellman key has about the same strength as a 2048-bit RSA key.
Elliptic-curve cryptography(ECC) is an alternative set of asymmetric algorithms that is equivalently secure with shorter keys, requiring only approximately twice the bits as the equivalent symmetric algorithm. A 256-bitElliptic-curve Diffie–Hellman(ECDH) key has approximately the same safety factor as a 128-bitAESkey.[12]A message encrypted with an elliptic key algorithm using a 109-bit long key was broken in 2004.[17]
TheNSApreviously recommended 256-bit ECC for protecting classified information up to the SECRET level, and 384-bit for TOP SECRET;[10]In 2015 it announced plans to transition to quantum-resistant algorithms by 2024, and until then recommends 384-bit for all classified information.[18]
The two best known quantum computing attacks are based onShor's algorithmandGrover's algorithm. Of the two, Shor's offers the greater risk to current security systems.
Derivatives of Shor's algorithm are widely conjectured to be effective against all mainstream public-key algorithms includingRSA,Diffie-Hellmanandelliptic curve cryptography. According to Professor GillesBrassard, an expert in quantum computing: "The time needed to factor an RSA integer is the same order as the time needed to use that same integer as modulus for a single RSA encryption. In other words, it takes no more time to break RSA on a quantum computer (up to a multiplicative constant) than to use it legitimately on a classical computer." The general consensus is that these public key algorithms are insecure at any key size if sufficiently large quantum computers capable of running Shor's algorithm become available. The implication of this attack is that all data encrypted using current standards based security systems such as the ubiquitousSSLused to protect e-commerce and Internet banking andSSHused to protect access to sensitive computing systems is at risk. Encrypted data protected using public-key algorithms can be archived and may be broken at a later time, commonly known as retroactive/retrospective decryption or "harvest now, decrypt later".
Mainstream symmetric ciphers (such asAESorTwofish) and collision resistant hash functions (such asSHA) are widely conjectured to offer greater security against known quantum computing attacks. They are widely thought most vulnerable toGrover's algorithm. Bennett, Bernstein, Brassard, and Vazirani proved in 1996 that a brute-force key search on a quantum computer cannot be faster than roughly 2n/2invocations of the underlying cryptographic algorithm, compared with roughly 2nin the classical case.[19]Thus in the presence of large quantum computers ann-bit key can provide at leastn/2 bits of security. Quantum brute force is easily defeated by doubling the key length, which has little extra computational cost in ordinary use. This implies that at least a 256-bit symmetric key is required to achieve 128-bit security rating against a quantum computer. As mentioned above, the NSA announced in 2015 that it plans to transition to quantum-resistant algorithms.[10]
In a 2016 Quantum Computing FAQ, the NSA affirmed:
"A sufficiently large quantum computer, if built, would be capable of undermining all widely-deployed public key algorithms used for key establishment and digital signatures. [...] It is generally accepted that quantum computing techniques are much less effective against symmetric algorithms than against current widely used public key algorithms. While public key cryptography requires changes in the fundamental design to protect against a potential future quantum computer, symmetric key algorithms are believed to be secure provided a sufficiently large key size is used. [...] The public-key algorithms (RSA,Diffie-Hellman,[Elliptic-curve Diffie–Hellman] ECDH, and[Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm] ECDSA) are all vulnerable to attack by a sufficiently large quantum computer. [...] While a number of interesting quantum resistant public key algorithms have been proposed external to NSA, nothing has been standardized byNIST, and NSA is not specifying any commercial quantum resistant standards at this time. NSA expects that NIST will play a leading role in the effort to develop a widely accepted, standardized set of quantum resistant algorithms. [...] Given the level of interest in the cryptographic community, we hope that there will be quantum resistant algorithms widely available in the next decade. [...] The AES-256 and SHA-384 algorithms are symmetric, and believed to be safe from attack by a large quantum computer."[20]
In a 2022 press release, the NSA notified:
"A cryptanalytically-relevant quantum computer (CRQC) would have the potential to break public-key systems (sometimes referred to as asymmetric cryptography) that are used today. Given foreign pursuits in quantum computing, now is the time to plan, prepare and budget for a transition to [quantum-resistant] QR algorithms to assure sustained protection of [National Security Systems] NSS and related assets in the event a CRQC becomes an achievable reality."[21]
Since September 2022, the NSA has been transitioning from theCommercial National Security Algorithm Suite(now referred to as CNSA 1.0), originally launched in January 2016, to the Commercial National Security Algorithm Suite 2.0 (CNSA 2.0), both summarized below:[22][b]
CNSA 2.0
CNSA 1.0
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Incryptography, acustom hardware attackuses specifically designedapplication-specific integrated circuits(ASIC) to decipherencrypted messages.
Mounting a cryptographicbrute force attackrequires a large number of similar computations: typically trying onekey, checking if the resulting decryption gives a meaningful answer, and then trying the next key if it does not. Computers can perform these calculations at a rate of millions per second, and thousands of computers can be harnessed together in adistributed computingnetwork. But the number of computations required on averagegrows exponentiallywith the size of the key, and for many problems standard computers are not fast enough. On the other hand, many cryptographic algorithms lend themselves to fast implementation in hardware, i.e. networks oflogic circuits, also known as gates.Integrated circuits(ICs) are constructed of these gates and often can execute cryptographic algorithms hundreds of times faster than a general purpose computer.[1]
Each IC can contain large numbers of gates (hundreds of millions in 2005). Thus, the same decryption circuit, orcell, can be replicated thousands of times on one IC. The communications requirements for these ICs are very simple. Each must be initially loaded with a starting point in the key space and, in some situations, with a comparison test value (seeknown plaintext attack). Output consists of a signal that the IC has found an answer and the successful key.
Since ICs lend themselves to mass production, thousands or even millions of ICs can be applied to a single problem. The ICs themselves can be mounted inprinted circuit boards. A standard board design can be used for different problems since the communication requirements for the chips are the same. Wafer-scale integration is another possibility. The primary limitations on this method are the cost ofchip design,IC fabrication, floor space, electric power and thermal dissipation.[2]
The earliest custom hardware attack may have been theBombeused to recoverEnigma machinekeys inWorld War II. In 1998, a custom hardware attack was mounted against theData Encryption Standardcipher by theElectronic Frontier Foundation. Their "Deep Crack" machine cost U.S. $250,000 to build and decrypted theDES Challenge II-2test message after 56 hours of work. The only other confirmed DES cracker was theCOPACOBANAmachine (Cost-Optimized PArallel COde Breaker) built in 2006. Unlike Deep Crack, COPACOBANA consists of commercially available FPGAs (reconfigurable logic gates). COPACOBANA costs about $10,000[3]to build and will recover aDESkey in under 6.4 days on average. The cost decrease by roughly a factor of 25 over the EFF machine is an impressive example of the continuous improvement ofdigital hardware. Adjusting for inflation over 8 years yields an even higher improvement of about 30x. Since 2007,SciEngines GmbH, a spin-off company of the two project partners of COPACOBANA has enhanced and developed successors of COPACOBANA. In 2008, their COPACOBANA RIVYERA reduced the time to break DES to the current record of less than one day, using 128 Spartan-3 5000's.[4]It is generally believed[citation needed]that large government code breaking organizations, such as the U.S.National Security Agency, make extensive use of custom hardware attacks, but no examples have beendeclassifiedor leaked as of 2005[update].
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Custom_hardware_attack
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Logjamis asecurity vulnerabilityin systems that useDiffie–Hellman key exchangewith the same prime number. It was discovered by a team of computer scientists and publicly reported on May 20, 2015.[1]The discoverers were able to demonstrate their attack on 512-bit (US export-grade) DH systems. They estimated that a state-level attacker could do so for 1024-bit systems, then widely used, thereby allowing decryption of a significant fraction of Internet traffic. They recommended upgrading to at least 2048 bits for shared prime systems.[2][3][4]
Diffie–Hellman key exchange depends for its security on the presumed difficulty of solving thediscrete logarithm problem. The authors took advantage of the fact that thenumber field sievealgorithm, which is generally the most effective method for finding discrete logarithms, consists of four large computational steps, of which the first three depend only on the order of the group G, not on the specific number whose finite log is desired. If the results of the first three steps areprecomputedand saved, they can be used to solve any discrete log problem for that prime group in relatively short time. This vulnerability was known as early as 1992.[5]It turns out that much Internet traffic only uses one of a handful of groups that are of order 1024 bits or less.
One approach enabled by this vulnerability that the authors demonstrated was using aman-in-the-middle network attackerto downgrade aTransport Layer Security(TLS) connection to use 512-bit DHexport-gradecryptography, allowing them to read the exchanged data and inject data into the connection. It affects theHTTPS,SMTPS, andIMAPSprotocols, among others. The authors needed several thousandCPUcores for a week to precompute data for a single 512-bit prime. Once that was done, however, individual logarithms could be solved in about a minute using two 18-coreIntel XeonCPUs.[6]Its CVE ID isCVE-2015-4000.[7]
The authors also estimated the feasibility of the attack against 1024-bit Diffie–Hellman primes. By design, many Diffie–Hellman implementations use the same pre-generatedprimefor their field. This was considered secure, since thediscrete logarithm problemis still considered hard for big enough primes even if the group is known and reused. The researchers calculated the cost of creating logjam precomputation for one 1024-bit prime at hundreds of millions of USD, and noted that this was well within range of the FY2012 $10.5 billionU.S. Consolidated Cryptologic Program(which includesNSA). Because of the reuse of primes, generating precomputation for just one prime would break two-thirds ofVPNsand a quarter of allSSHservers globally. The researchers noted that this attack fits claims in leaked NSA papers that NSA is able to break much current cryptography. They recommend using primes of 2048 bits or more as a defense or switching toelliptic-curve Diffie–Hellman(ECDH).[1]Claims on the practical implications of the attack were however disputed by security researchers Eyal Ronen andAdi Shamirin their paper "Critical Review of Imperfect Forward Secrecy".[8]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logjam_(computer_security)
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Inmathematics, theRSA numbersare a set of largesemiprimes(numbers with exactly twoprime factors) that were part of theRSA Factoring Challenge. The challenge was to find the prime factors of each number. It was created byRSA Laboratoriesin March 1991 to encourage research intocomputational number theoryand the practical difficulty offactoringlargeintegers. The challenge was ended in 2007.[1]
RSA Laboratories(which is aninitialismof the creators of the technique; Rivest, Shamir and Adleman) published a number of semiprimes with 100 to 617decimaldigits. Cash prizes of varying size, up toUS$200,000 (and prizes up to $20,000 awarded), were offered for factorization of some of them. The smallest RSA number was factored in a few days. Most of the numbers have still not been factored and many of them are expected to remain unfactored for many years to come. As of February 2020[update], the smallest 23 of the 54 listed numbers have been factored.
While the RSA challenge officially ended in 2007, people are still attempting to find the factorizations. According to RSA Laboratories, "Now that the industry has a considerably more advanced understanding of the cryptanalytic strength of common symmetric-key and public-key algorithms, these challenges are no longer active."[2]Some of the smaller prizes had been awarded at the time. The remaining prizes were retracted.
The first RSA numbers generated, from RSA-100 to RSA-500, were labeled according to their number of decimal digits. Later, beginning with RSA-576,binarydigits are counted instead. An exception to this is RSA-617, which was created before the change in the numbering scheme. The numbers are listed in increasing order below.
Note: until work on this article is finished, please check both the table and the list, since they include different values and different information.
matrix (67.5 hours on the Cray-C90 at SARA, Amsterdam) and square root (48 hours per dependency on an SGI Challenge processor) run by Peter L. Montgomery and Marije Elkenbracht-Huizing
sieving: 8.9 CPU-years on about 125 SGI and Sun workstations running at 175 MHZ on average, and on about 60 PCs running at 300 MHZ on average; approximately equivalent to 1500 mips years; run by Peter L. Montgomery, Stefania Cavallar,Herman J.J. te Riele, and Walter M. Lioen (36.8%), Paul Leyland (28.8%), Bruce Dodson (26.6%), Paul Zimmermann (5.4%), and Arjen K. Lenstra (2.5%).
matrix: 100 hours on the Cray-C916 at SARA, Amsterdam
square root: four different dependencies were run in parallel on four 250 MHZ SGI Origin 2000 processors at CWI; three of them found the factors of RSA-140 after 14.2, 19.0 and 19.0 CPU-hours
sieving: 35.7 CPU-years in total, on about one hundred and sixty 175-400 MHz SGI and Sun workstations, eight 250 MHz SGI Origin 2000 processors, one hundred and twenty 300-450 MHz Pentium II PCs, and four 500 MHz Digital/Compaq boxes; approximately equivalent to 8000 mips years; run by Alec Muffett (20.1% of relations, 3057 CPU days), Paul Leyland (17.5%, 2092 CPU days), Peter L. Montgomery and Stefania Cavallar (14.6%, 1819 CPU days), Bruce Dodson (13.6%, 2222 CPU days), Francois Morain and Gerard Guillerm (13.0%, 1801 CPU days), Joel Marchand (6.4%, 576 CPU days), Arjen K. Lenstra (5.0%, 737 CPU days), Paul Zimmermann (4.5%, 252 CPU days), Jeff Gilchrist (4.0%, 366 CPU days), Karen Aardal (0.65%, 62 CPU days), and Chris and Craig Putnam (0.56%, 47 CPU days)
matrix: 224 hours on one CPU of the Cray-C916 at SARA, Amsterdam
square root: four 300 MHz R12000 processors of a 24-processor SGI Origin 2000 at CWI; the successful one took 39.4 CPU-hours and the others took 38.3, 41.9, and 61.6 CPU-hours
RSA-100 has 100 decimal digits (330 bits). Its factorization was announced on April 1, 1991, byArjen K. Lenstra.[3][4]Reportedly, the factorization took a few days usingthe multiple-polynomial quadratic sieve algorithmon aMasParparallel computer.[5]
The value and factorization of RSA-100 are as follows:
It takes four hours to repeat this factorization using the program Msieve on a 2200 MHzAthlon 64processor.
The number can be factorized in 72 minutes on overclocked to 3.5 GHz Intel Core2 Quad q9300, using GGNFS and Msieve binaries running by distributed version of the factmsieve Perl script.[6]
RSA-110 has 110 decimal digits (364 bits), and was factored in April 1992 byArjen K. Lenstraand Mark S. Manasse in approximately one month.[4][5]
The number can be factorized in less than four hours on overclocked to 3.5 GHz Intel Core2 Quad q9300, using GGNFS and Msieve binaries running by distributed version of the factmsieve Perl script.[6]
The value and factorization are as follows:
RSA-120 has 120 decimal digits (397 bits), and was factored in June 1993 by Thomas Denny, Bruce Dodson, Arjen K. Lenstra, and Mark S. Manasse.[7]The computation took under three months of actual computer time.
The value and factorization are as follows:
RSA-129, having 129 decimal digits (426 bits), was not part of the 1991 RSA Factoring Challenge, but rather related toMartin Gardner'sMathematical Games columnin the August 1977 issue ofScientific American.[3]
RSA-129 was factored in April 1994 by a team led byDerek Atkins,Michael Graff,Arjen K. LenstraandPaul Leyland, using approximately 1600 computers[8]from around 600 volunteers connected over theInternet.[9]AUS$100 token prize was awarded by RSA Security for the factorization, which was donated to theFree Software Foundation.
The value and factorization are as follows:
The factorization was found using theMultiple Polynomial Quadratic Sievealgorithm.
The factoring challenge included a message encrypted with RSA-129. When decrypted using the factorization the message was revealed to be "The Magic Words are Squeamish Ossifrage".
In 2015, RSA-129 was factored in about one day, with the CADO-NFS open source implementation of number field sieve, using a commercial cloud computing service for about $30.[10]
RSA-130 has 130 decimal digits (430 bits), and was factored on April 10, 1996, by a team led byArjen K. Lenstraand composed ofJim Cowie,Marije Elkenbracht-Huizing,Wojtek Furmanski,Peter L. Montgomery,Damian WeberandJoerg Zayer.[11]
The factorization was found in the third trial.[3]
The value and factorization are as follows:
The factorization was found using theNumber Field Sievealgorithm and thepolynomial
which has a root of 12574411168418005980468 modulo RSA-130.
RSA-140 has 140 decimal digits (463 bits), and was factored on February 2, 1999, by a team led byHerman te Rieleand composed ofStefania Cavallar, Bruce Dodson,Arjen K. Lenstra, Paul Leyland,Walter Lioen, Peter L. Montgomery,Brian MurphyandPaul Zimmermann.[12][13]
The value and factorization are as follows:
The factorization was found using theNumber Field Sievealgorithm and an estimated 2000MIPS-yearsof computing time.
The matrix had 4671181 rows and 4704451 columns and weight 151141999 (32.36 nonzeros per row)[3]
RSA-150 has 150 decimal digits (496 bits), and was withdrawn from the challenge by RSA Security. RSA-150 was eventually factored into two 75-digit primes by Aoki et al. in 2004 using thegeneral number field sieve(GNFS), years after bigger RSA numbers that were still part of the challenge had been solved.
The value and factorization are as follows:
RSA-155 has 155 decimal digits (512 bits), and was factored on August 22, 1999, in a span of six months, by a team led by Herman te Riele and composed of Stefania Cavallar, Bruce Dodson,Arjen K. Lenstra, Walter Lioen, Peter L. Montgomery, Brian Murphy,Karen Aardal,Jeff Gilchrist,Gerard Guillerm, Paul Leyland,Joel Marchand,François Morain,Alec Muffett, Craig Putnam,Chris Putnamand Paul Zimmermann.[14][15]
The value and factorization are as follows:
The factorization was found using thegeneral number field sievealgorithm and an estimated 8000MIPS-yearsof computing time.
The polynomials were 119377138320*x^5 - 80168937284997582*y*x^4 - 66269852234118574445*y^2*x^3 + 11816848430079521880356852*y^3*x^2 + 7459661580071786443919743056*y^4*x - 40679843542362159361913708405064*y^5 and x - 39123079721168000771313449081*y (this pair has a yield of relations approximately 13.5 times that of a random polynomial selection); 124722179 relations were collected in the sieving stage; the matrix had 6699191 rows and 6711336 columns and weight 417132631 (62.27 nonzeros per row).[3]
RSA-160 has 160 decimal digits (530 bits), and was factored on April 1, 2003, by a team from theUniversity of Bonnand theGermanFederal Office for Information Security(BSI). The team containedJ. Franke, F. Bahr,T. Kleinjung, M. Lochter, and M. Böhm.[16][17]
The value and factorization are as follows:
The factorization was found using thegeneral number field sievealgorithm.
RSA-170 has 170 decimal digits (563 bits) and was first factored on December 29, 2009, by D. Bonenberger and M. Krone fromFachhochschule Braunschweig/Wolfenbüttel.[18]An independent factorization was completed by S. A. Danilov and I. A. Popovyan two days later.[19]
The value and factorization are as follows:
The factorization was found using thegeneral number field sievealgorithm.
RSA-576 has 174 decimal digits (576 bits), and was factored on December 3, 2003, by J. Franke and T. Kleinjung from the University of Bonn.[20][21][22]A cash prize of $10,000 was offered by RSA Security for a successful factorization.
The value and factorization are as follows:
The factorization was found using thegeneral number field sievealgorithm.
RSA-180 has 180 decimal digits (596 bits), and was factored on May 8, 2010, by S. A. Danilov and I. A. Popovyan fromMoscow State University, Russia.[23]
The factorization was found using thegeneral number field sievealgorithm implementation running on three Intel Core i7 PCs.
RSA-190 has 190 decimal digits (629 bits), and was factored on November 8, 2010, by I. A. Popovyan from Moscow State University, Russia, and A. Timofeev fromCWI, Netherlands.[24]
RSA-640 has 193 decimal digits (640 bits). A cash prize of US$20,000 was offered by RSA Security for a successful factorization. On November 2, 2005, F. Bahr, M. Boehm, J. Franke and T. Kleinjung of the German Federal Office for Information Security announced that they had factorized the number using GNFS as follows:[25][26][27]
The computation took five months on 80 2.2 GHzAMDOpteronCPUs.
The slightly larger RSA-200 was factored in May 2005 by the same team.
RSA-200 has 200 decimal digits (663 bits), and factors into the two 100-digit primes given below.
On May 9, 2005, F. Bahr, M. Boehm, J. Franke, and T. Kleinjung announced[28][29]that they had factorized the number using GNFS as follows:
The CPU time spent on finding these factors by a collection of parallel computers amounted – very approximately – to the equivalent of 75 years work for a single 2.2GHzOpteron-based computer.[28]Note that while this approximation serves to suggest the scale of the effort, it leaves out many complicating factors; the announcement states it more precisely.
RSA-210 has 210 decimal digits (696 bits) and was factored in September 2013 by Ryan Propper:[30]
RSA-704 has 212 decimal digits (704 bits), and was factored by Shi Bai, Emmanuel Thomé and Paul Zimmermann.[31]The factorization was announced July 2, 2012.[32]A cash prize of US$30,000 was previously offered for a successful factorization.
RSA-220 has 220 decimal digits (729 bits), and was factored by S. Bai, P. Gaudry, A. Kruppa, E. Thomé and P. Zimmermann. The factorization was announced on May 13, 2016.[33]
RSA-230 has 230 decimal digits (762 bits), and was factored by Samuel S. Gross on August 15, 2018.[34]
RSA-232 has 232 decimal digits (768 bits), and was factored on February 17, 2020, by N. L. Zamarashkin, D. A. Zheltkov and S. A. Matveev.[35][36][37]
RSA-768 has 232 decimal digits (768 bits), and was factored on December 12, 2009, over the span of two years, by Thorsten Kleinjung, Kazumaro Aoki, Jens Franke,Arjen K. Lenstra, Emmanuel Thomé, Pierrick Gaudry, Alexander Kruppa,Peter Montgomery, Joppe W. Bos, Dag Arne Osvik, Herman te Riele, Andrey Timofeev, andPaul Zimmermann.[38]
The CPU time spent on finding these factors by a collection of parallel computers amounted approximately to the equivalent of almost 2000 years of computing on a single-core 2.2 GHz AMD Opteron-based computer.[38]
RSA-240 has 240 decimal digits (795 bits), and was factored in November 2019 by Fabrice Boudot, Pierrick Gaudry, Aurore Guillevic, Nadia Heninger, Emmanuel Thomé and Paul Zimmermann.[39]
The CPU time spent on finding these factors amounted to approximately 900 core-years on a 2.1 GHz Intel Xeon Gold 6130 CPU. Compared to the factorization of RSA-768, the authors estimate that better algorithms sped their calculations by a factor of 3–4 and faster computers sped their calculation by a factor of 1.25–1.67.
RSA-250 has 250 decimal digits (829 bits), and was factored in February 2020 by Fabrice Boudot, Pierrick Gaudry, Aurore Guillevic, Nadia Heninger, Emmanuel Thomé, and Paul Zimmermann. The announcement of the factorization occurred on February 28.
The factorisation of RSA-250 utilised approximately 2700 CPU core-years, using a 2.1 GHz Intel Xeon Gold 6130 CPU as a reference. The computation was performed with the Number Field Sieve algorithm, using the open source CADO-NFS software.
The team dedicated the computation toPeter Montgomery, an American mathematician known for his contributions tocomputational number theoryandcryptographywho died on February 18, 2020, and had contributed to factoring RSA-768.[40]
RSA-260 has 260 decimal digits (862 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-270 has 270 decimal digits (895 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-896 has 270 decimal digits (896 bits), and has not been factored so far. A cash prize of $75,000 was previously offered for a successful factorization.
RSA-280 has 280 decimal digits (928 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-290 has 290 decimal digits (962 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-300 has 300 decimal digits (995 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-309 has 309 decimal digits (1,024 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-1024 has 309 decimal digits (1,024 bits), and has not been factored so far. $100,000 was previously offered for factorization.
RSA-310 has 310 decimal digits (1,028 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-320 has 320 decimal digits (1,061 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-330 has 330 decimal digits (1,094 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-340 has 340 decimal digits (1,128 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-350 has 350 decimal digits (1,161 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-360 has 360 decimal digits (1,194 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-370 has 370 decimal digits (1,227 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-380 has 380 decimal digits (1,261 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-390 has 390 decimal digits (1,294 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-400 has 400 decimal digits (1,327 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-410 has 410 decimal digits (1,360 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-420 has 420 decimal digits (1,393 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-430 has 430 decimal digits (1,427 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-440 has 440 decimal digits (1,460 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-450 has 450 decimal digits (1,493 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-460 has 460 decimal digits (1,526 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-1536 has 463 decimal digits (1,536 bits), and has not been factored so far. $150,000 was previously offered for successful factorization.
RSA-470 has 470 decimal digits (1,559 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-480 has 480 decimal digits (1,593 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-490 has 490 decimal digits (1,626 bits), and has not been factored so far.
RSA-500 has 500 decimal digits (1,659 bits) and has not been factored so far.
RSA-617 has 617 decimal digits (2,048 bits) and has not been factored so far.
RSA-2048 has 617 decimal digits (2,048 bits). It is the largest of the RSA numbers and carried the largest cash prize for its factorization, $200,000.
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LCS35is acryptographicchallenge and atime-lock puzzleset byRon Rivestin 1999. The challenge is to calculate the value
w=22t(modn){\displaystyle w=2^{2^{t}}{\pmod {n}}}
wheretis a specific 14-digit (or 47-bit) integer, namely 79685186856218, andnis a specific 616-digit (or 2048-bit) integer that is the product of two large primes (which are not given). The value ofwcan then be used to decrypt the ciphertextz, another 616-digit integer. The plaintext provides the concealed information about the factorisation ofn, allowing the solution to be easily verified.
The idea behind the challenge is that the only known way to find the value ofwwithout knowing the factorisation ofnis bytsuccessive squarings. The value oftwas chosen so that this brute-force calculation would require about 35 years using 1999 chip speeds as a starting point, taking into accountMoore's law. Rivest notes that "just as a failure of Moore's Law could make the puzzle harder than intended, a breakthrough in the art of factoring would make the puzzle easier than intended."
The challenge was set at (and takes its name from) the 35th anniversary celebrations of the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science, now part ofMIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.
The LCS35 challenge was solved on April 15, 2019, twenty years later, by programmer Bernard Fabrot.[1][2]The plaintext begins with "!!!Happy Birthday LCS!!!".[3]
On May 14, 2019, Ronald L. Rivest published a new version of LCS35 (named CSAIL2019) to extend the puzzle out to the year 2034.[4]
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"The Magic Words are Squeamish Ossifrage" was the solution to a challengeciphertextposed by the inventors of theRSAcipherin 1977. The problem appeared inMartin Gardner'sMathematical Games columnin the August 1977 issue ofScientific American.[1]It was solved in 1993–94 by a large, joint computer project co-ordinated byDerek Atkins,Michael Graff,Arjen LenstraandPaul Leyland.[2][3][4][5]More than 600 volunteers contributedCPUtime from about 1,600 machines (two of which werefaxmachines) over six months. The coordination was done via theInternetand was one of the first such projects.
Ossifrage('bone-breaker', from Latin) is an older name for thebearded vulture, a scavenger famous for dropping animal bones and live tortoises on top of rocks to crack them open. The 1993–94 effort began the tradition of using the words "squeamish ossifrage" incryptanalyticchallenges.
The difficulty ofbreaking the RSA cipher—recovering aplaintextmessage given a ciphertext and the public key—is connected to the difficulty offactoringlarge numbers. While it is not known whether the two problems are mathematically equivalent, factoring is currently the only publicly known method of directly breaking RSA. Thedecryptionof the 1977 ciphertext involved the factoring of a 129-digit (426 bit) number,RSA-129, in order to recover the plaintext.
Ron Rivestestimated in 1977 that factoring a 125-digit semiprime would require 40quadrillionyears, using the bestalgorithmknown and the fastest computers of the day.[6]In their original paper they recommended using 200-digit (663 bit) primes to provide a margin of safety against future developments,[7]though it may have only delayed the solution as a 200-digit semiprime was factored in 2005.[8][9]However, efficient factoring algorithms had not been studied much at the time, and a lot of progress was made in the following decades. Atkins et al. used thequadratic sievealgorithm invented byCarl Pomerancein 1981. While the asymptotically fasternumber field sievehad just been invented, it was not clear at the time that it would be better than the quadratic sieve for 129-digit numbers. The memory requirements of the newer algorithm were also a concern.[10]
There was a US$100 prize associated with the challenge, which the winners donated to theFree Software Foundation.
In 2015, the same RSA-129 number was factored in about one day, with the CADO-NFS open source implementation of number field sieve, using a commercial cloud computing service for about $30.[11]
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Integer factorizationis the process of determining whichprime numbersdivide a given positiveinteger. Doing this quickly has applications incryptography. The difficulty depends on both the size and form of the number and itsprime factors; it is currently very difficult to factorize largesemiprimes(and, indeed, most numbers that have no small factors).
The first enormous distributed factorisation wasRSA-129, a 129-digit challenge number described in the Scientific American article of 1977 which first popularised the RSA cryptosystem. It was factorised between September 1993 and April 1994, usingMPQS, with relations contributed by about 600 people through the internet, and the final stages of the calculation performed on aMasParsupercomputer at Bell Labs.
Between January and August 1999,RSA-155, a 155-digit challenge number prepared by the RSA company, was factorised usingGNFSwith relations again contributed by a large group, and the final stages of the calculation performed in just over nine days on theCrayC916supercomputer at the SARA Amsterdam Academic Computer Center.
In January 2002, it was announced the factorisation of a 158-digit cofactor of 2953+ 1, using a couple of months on about 25 PCs at theUniversity of Bonn, with the final stages done using a cluster of six Pentium-III PCs.
In April 2003, the same team factored the 160-digitRSA-160using about a hundred CPUs atBSI, with the final stages of the calculation done using 25 processors of anSGIOriginsupercomputer.
The 576-bit (174-digit)RSA-576was factored by members of theNFSNETcollaboration in December 2003, using resources at BSI and the University of Bonn; soon afterwards it was announced a group factored a 164-digit cofactor of 21826+ 1.
A 176-digit cofactor of 11281+ 1 was factored between February and May 2005 using machines atNTTandRikkyo Universityin Japan.[1]
The 663-bit (200-digit)RSA-200challenge number was factored between December 2003 and May 2005, using a cluster of 80 Opteron processors at BSI in Germany; the announcement was made on 9 May 2005.[2]They later (November 2005) factored the slightly smallerRSA-640challenge number.
On December 12, 2009, a team including researchers from theCWI, theEPFL,INRIAand NTT in addition to the authors of the previous record factoredRSA-768, a 232-digit semiprime.[3]They used the equivalent of almost 2000
years of computing on a single core 2.2 GHzAMDOpteron.
In November 2019, the 795-bit (240-digit)RSA-240was factored.[4][5]
In February 2020, the factorization of the 829-bit (250-digit)RSA-250was completed.[6]
12151− 1, of 542 bits (163 digits), was factored between April and July 1993 by a team atCWIandOregon State University.[7]
2773+ 1, of 774 bits (233 digits), was factored between April and November 2000 by 'The Cabal', with the matrix step done over 250 hours on the Cray also used for RSA-155.[8]
2809− 1, of 809 bits (244 digits), had its factorisation announced at the start of January 2003. Sieving was done at the CWI, at the Scientific Computing Institute and the Pure Mathematics Department at Bonn University, and using private resources. The linear algebra step was done at SARA in Amsterdam.[9]
6353− 1, of 911 bits (275 digits), was factored between September 2005 and January 2006 usingSNFS.[10]
21039− 1, of 1039 bits (313 digits) (though a factor of 23 bits was already known) was factored between September 2006 and May 2007 by a group atNTT,EPFLand theUniversity of Bonn.[11][12]
21061− 1, of 1061 bits (320 digits) was factored between early 2011 and 4 August 2012 by a group at CSU Fullerton, using the nfs@homeBOINCproject for about 300 CPU-years of sieving; the linear algebra was run at the Trestles cluster at SDSC and the Lonestar cluster at TACC and needed additional 35 CPU-years.[13]
All unfactored parts of the numbers 2n− 1 withnbetween 1000 and 1200 were factored by a multiple-number-sieve approach in which much of the sieving step could be done simultaneously for multiple numbers, starting in 2010.[14]To be precise,n= 1081 (326 digits) was completed on 11 March 2013;n= 1111 (335 digits) on 13 June 2013;n= 1129 (340 digits) on 20 September 2013;n= 1153 (348 digits) on 28 October 2013;n=1159 (349 digits) on 9 February 2014;n= 1177 (355 digits) on 29 May 2014,n= 1193 (360 digits) on 22 August 2014, andn= 1199 (361 digits) on 11 December 2014; the first detailed announcement was made in late August 2014. The total effort for the project is of the order of 7500 CPU-years on 2.2 GHz Opterons, with roughly 5700 years spent sieving and 1800 years on linear algebra.
The record of the prime factor other than the ultimate prime factor has 151 decimal digits, it is a prime factor of 7889+1.[15][16][17]
As of the end of 2007, thanks to the constant decline in memory prices, the ready availability of multi-core 64-bit computers, and the availability of the efficient sieving code via ggnfs[18]and of robust open-source software such as msieve[19]for the finishing stages, special-form numbers of up to 750 bits (226 digits) and general-form numbers of up to about 520 bits (157 digits) can be factored in a few months on a few PCs by a single person without any special mathematical experience.[20]These bounds increase to about 950 bits (286 digits)[21]and 600 bits (181 digits)[22]if it were possible to secure the collaboration of a few dozen PCs for sieving; currently the amount of memory and the CPU power of a single machine for the finishing stage are equal barriers to progress.
In 2009, a 512-bit (155-digit) RSA key was factored used to sign theTI-83graphing calculator using software found on the internet; this eventually led to theTexas Instruments signing key controversy.
In September 2013, the 696-bit (210-digit)RSA-210was factored[23]using institutional resources; between March 2013 and October 2014, another 210-digit number (the 117th term in thehome primesequence starting with 49),[24]using $7600 worth of processing time on Amazon EC2 machines[25]for the sieving, and four months on a dual Xeon E5-2687W v1 for the linear algebra.
The largest number reliably factored[clarification needed]byShor's algorithmis 21 which was factored in 2012.[26]15 had previously been factored by several labs.
In April 2012, the factorization of 143 = 13 × 11 by a room-temperature (300 K) NMRadiabatic quantum computerwas reported by a group.[27]In November 2014 it was discovered that the 2012 experiment had in fact also factored much larger numbers without knowing it.[clarification needed][28][29]In April 2016 the 18-bit number 200,099 was factored usingquantum annealingon aD-Wave 2Xquantum processor.[30]Shortly after, 291 311 was factored using NMR at higher than room temperature.[31]In late 2019,Zapata computingclaimed to have factored 1,099,551,473,989,[32]and in 2021 released a paper describing this computation.[33]In 2024, a new approach to embed prime factoring problems into quantum annealers has been proposed, leading to (i) the embedding of 21×12 prime factoring problems into a D-Wave Pegasus architecture; (ii) the factoring of 8,219,999 by using a quantum annealer without exploiting hybrid techniques.[34]
As such, claims of factoring with quantum computers have however been criticized for depending heavily on classical computation to reduce the number of qubits required.[35][36]For example, the factorization of 1,099,551,473,989 relied on classical pre-processing to reduce the problem to a three-qubit quantum circuit.[33]Furthermore, the three numbers factored in this paper (200,099, 291,311, and 1,099,551,473,989) can easily be factored usingFermat's factorization method, requiring only 3, 1, and 1 iterations of the loop respectively.
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TheChaocipher[1]is aciphermethod invented by John Francis Byrne in 1918 and described in his 1953 autobiographicalSilent Years.[2]He believed Chaocipher was simple, yet unbreakable. Byrne stated that the machine he used to encipher his messages could be fitted into acigar box. He offered cash rewards for anyone who could solve it.
Byrne tried unsuccessfully to interest the US Signal Corps and Navy in his system. Although numerous students of classicalcryptanalysisattempted to solve the challenge messages over the years, none succeeded. For 90 years, the Chaocipher algorithm was a closely guarded secret known only to a handful of persons.
In May 2010 Byrne's daughter-in-law,Patricia Byrne, donated all Chaocipher-related papers and artifacts[3]to theNational Cryptologic Museumin Ft. Meade, Maryland, USA. This led to the disclosure of the Chaocipher algorithm.[4]
In Byrne's embodiment of Chaocipher, the system consists of two disks, referred to as the left and right disks, each having 26 equal-sized removable tabs around its periphery. These removable tabs contain the 26 letters of the alphabet (i.e., A through Z) in some prearranged order. On the circumference of each disk are studs that allow the two disks to 'engage' or interlock. When engaged, turning one disk in one direction (e.g., clockwise) will cause the other wheel to turn in the opposite direction (e.g., counterclockwise). The tabs are removable, meaning that a tab can be removed from the periphery, another block of tabs shifted, and the extracted tab inserted into an empty space in the periphery.
At any point in time, the disks can be engaged with each other so that moving one moves the other in the opposite direction. Similarly, engaged disks can be disengaged, at which point a disk can be turned without moving the other disk. Engagement and disengagement could conceivably be performed by placing a lever in one of two positions.
The two disks mentioned above sit on a platform consisting of two spindles.
On the platform around each disk are two marks known as the 'zenith' and the 'nadir'. The zenith can be thought of as 12 o'clock on an analog clock, while the nadir is 6 o'clock.
In its classic form, the Chaocipher system consists of two alphabets, with the right-side alphabet used for locating the plaintext letter, while the other ("left") alphabet is used for reading the corresponding ciphertext letter. The underlying algorithm is related to the concept of dynamic substitution[5]whereby the two alphabets are slightly modified after each input plaintext letter is enciphered. This leads to nonlinear and highly diffused alphabets as encryption progresses.
Deciphering is identical to enciphering, with the ciphertext letter being located in the "left" alphabet while the corresponding plaintext letter is read from the "right" alphabet.
A detailed description of the Chaocipher algorithm is available[4]as well as discussions of the deciphered plaintexts[6]and the solution to Byrne's challenge.[7]
Given left and right disks, enciphering a plaintext character consists of five steps:
These five steps are performed continuously until the plaintext input is exhausted. To illustrate the process we will encipher the first plaintext letter of Byrne's Exhibit 1 using the same alphabets and disk setting he used, as shown in Figure 1.
Suppose we want to encipher the letter "A". Locate 'A' on the periphery of the plaintext (right) disk. You can see the plaintext letter highlighted in Figure 2.
While the disks are engaged, rotate the right disk to bring the plaintext letter 'A' to the zenith (Figure 3). Note how the left (cipher) disk rotates respectively in the opposite direction.
The letter in the zenith position on the cipher (left) disk is our ciphertext letter (i.e., 'C').
At this point we have completed the enciphering of a plaintext letter into ciphertext, i.e. 'A' (pt) was enciphered into 'C' (ct).
See the next section for instructions on performing Chaocipher's unique permuting of the two disks in preparation for enciphering the next plaintext letter.
Now that the plaintext letter and its corresponding ciphertext letter are known, proceed to permute the alphabets on both disks in preparation for enciphering the next plaintext letter.
Permuting the left wheel's alphabet involves the following general steps (Figure 4):
Before performing the permuting step, the left disk should look like the diagram in Figure 4a.
Performing step (1), extract the letter at position zenith-1 (i.e., "P") leaving a momentary 'hole' at that position (Figure 4b).
For step (2) shift all letters in the counter-clockwise sequence beginning with zenith-2 ("E") down to and including the nadir ("O"), moving the sequence ("EDQRSTIXYLMO") as a complete block one position clockwise (Figure 4c).
In the final step (3), insert the extracted letter ("P") back into the alphabet at the nadir position. The left is now permuted and should now look like Figure 4d.
Permuting the right disk is similar to that of the left disk, with small but significant differences. It consists of the following general steps (Figure 5):
Let's perform the above steps on the right disk using our example. The right disk should look like the diagram in Figure 5a. In this configuration the letter at the zenith is 'A'.
In step (1) first disengage the two disks. This allows rotating the right disk (see next step) without moving the left disk. Next, rotate the disk one position counter-clockwise, moving the letter 'Y' to the zenith position (Figure 5b). Lastly, reengage the two disks.
In step (2) extract the letter tab at position zenith+2 ('N') from the disk, temporarily leaving a 'hole' (Figure 5c).
In step (3) slide the eleven letter tabs from zenith+3 until zenith+13 (i.e., 'BQDSEFGHLWI') one position counter-clockwise. This closes up the 'hole' at zenith+2 while opening a new 'hole' at the nadir (Figure 5d).
For the final step (4) insert the previously extracted letter tab ("N") back into the disk at the nadir position. This completes permuting the right disk, which should now look like Figure 5e.
Reengaging the disks prepares the system for enciphering the next plaintext letter (Figure 6).
Deciphering a Chaocipher-encrypted message is identical to the steps used for enciphering. The sole difference is that the decipherer locates the known ciphertext letter in the left (cipher) disk, reading off the plaintext letter from the right (plain) disk. Left/right disk permuting is identical in enciphering and deciphering.
Henry E. Langen,[8]editor of TheAmerican Cryptogram Association's newsletterThe Cryptogrambetween 1952–1956, was quoted as saying "He did explain that the machine is made up somewhat like a typewriter with two revolving disks with the alphabets arranged along the periphery in a complete disorder [...] With only two disks used, I am a bit confused as to how this can result in such utter chaotification of the plaintext message."[9]
Although John F. Byrne presented Chaocipher challenge messages in his autobiographical "Silent Years", he never described how the system worked. Anyone tackling the challenge messages had to do so with no knowledge of the system.
Until 2010 at least three people knew how it worked: Byrne's son John, and two of the editors ofCryptologiato whom John confided the underlying method in 1990 (i.e., Lou Kruh and Cipher Deavours).[10]
In August 2009, Moshe Rubin located Byrne's daughter-in-lawPatricia Byrne (nee Neway)who, in May 2010, donated her father-in-law's Chaocipher artifacts and papers to the National Cryptologic Museum.[11]
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In cryptography, ablock cipher mode of operationis an algorithm that uses ablock cipherto provideinformation securitysuch asconfidentialityorauthenticity.[1]A block cipher by itself is only suitable for the secure cryptographic transformation (encryption or decryption) of one fixed-length group ofbitscalled ablock.[2]A mode of operation describes how to repeatedly apply a cipher's single-block operation to securely transform amounts of data larger than a block.[3][4][5]
Most modes require a unique binary sequence, often called aninitialization vector(IV), for each encryption operation. The IV must be non-repeating, and for some modes must also be random. The initialization vector is used to ensure that distinctciphertextsare produced even when the sameplaintextis encrypted multiple times independently with the samekey.[6]Block ciphers may be capable of operating on more than oneblock size, but during transformation the block size is always fixed. Block cipher modes operate on whole blocks and require that the final data fragment bepaddedto a full block if it is smaller than the current block size.[2]There are, however, modes that do not require padding because they effectively use a block cipher as astream cipher.
Historically, encryption modes have been studied extensively in regard to their error propagation properties under various scenarios of data modification. Later development regardedintegrity protectionas an entirely separate cryptographic goal. Some modern modes of operation combineconfidentialityandauthenticityin an efficient way, and are known asauthenticated encryptionmodes.[7]
The earliest modes of operation, ECB, CBC, OFB, and CFB (see below for all), date back to 1981 and were specified inFIPS 81,DES Modes of Operation. In 2001, the USNational Institute of Standards and Technology(NIST) revised its list of approved modes of operation by includingAESas a block cipher and adding CTR mode inSP800-38A,Recommendation for Block Cipher Modes of Operation. Finally, in January, 2010, NIST addedXTS-AESinSP800-38E,Recommendation for Block Cipher Modes of Operation: The XTS-AES Mode for Confidentiality on Storage Devices. Other confidentiality modes exist which have not been approved by NIST. For example, CTS isciphertext stealingmode and available in many popular cryptographic libraries.
The block cipher modes ECB, CBC, OFB, CFB, CTR, andXTSprovide confidentiality, but they do not protect against accidental modification or malicious tampering. Modification or tampering can be detected with a separatemessage authentication codesuch asCBC-MAC, or adigital signature. The cryptographic community recognized the need for dedicated integrity assurances and NIST responded with HMAC, CMAC, and GMAC.HMACwas approved in 2002 asFIPS 198,The Keyed-Hash Message Authentication Code (HMAC),CMACwas released in 2005 underSP800-38B,Recommendation for Block Cipher Modes of Operation: The CMAC Mode for Authentication, andGMACwas formalized in 2007 underSP800-38D,Recommendation for Block Cipher Modes of Operation: Galois/Counter Mode (GCM) and GMAC.
The cryptographic community observed that compositing (combining) a confidentiality mode with an authenticity mode could be difficult and error prone. They therefore began to supply modes which combined confidentiality and data integrity into a single cryptographic primitive (an encryption algorithm). These combined modes are referred to asauthenticated encryption, AE or "authenc". Examples of AE modes areCCM(SP800-38C),GCM(SP800-38D),CWC,EAX,IAPM, andOCB.
Modes of operation are defined by a number of national and internationally recognized standards bodies. Notable standards organizations includeNIST,ISO(with ISO/IEC 10116[5]), theIEC, theIEEE,ANSI, and theIETF.
An initialization vector (IV) or starting variable (SV)[5]is a block of bits that is used by several modes to randomize the encryption and hence to produce distinct ciphertexts even if the same plaintext is encrypted multiple times, without the need for a slower re-keying process.[citation needed]
An initialization vector has different security requirements than a key, so the IV usually does not need to be secret. For most block cipher modes it is important that an initialization vector is never reused under the same key, i.e. it must be acryptographic nonce. Many block cipher modes have stronger requirements, such as the IV must berandomorpseudorandom. Some block ciphers have particular problems with certain initialization vectors, such as all zero IV generating no encryption (for some keys).
It is recommended to review relevant IV requirements for the particular block cipher mode in relevant specification, for exampleSP800-38A.
For CBC and CFB, reusing an IV leaks some information about the first block of plaintext, and about any common prefix shared by the two messages.
For OFB and CTR, reusing an IV causes key bitstream re-use, which breaks security.[8]This can be seen because both modes effectively create a bitstream that is XORed with the plaintext, and this bitstream is dependent on the key and IV only.
In CBC mode, the IV must be unpredictable (random or pseudorandom) at encryption time; in particular, the (previously) common practice of re-using the last ciphertext block of a message as the IV for the next message is insecure (for example, this method was used by SSL 2.0). If an attacker knows the IV (or the previous block of ciphertext) before the next plaintext is specified, they can check their guess about plaintext of some block that was encrypted with the same key before (this is known as the TLS CBC IV attack).[9]
For some keys, an all-zero initialization vector may generate some block cipher modes (CFB-8, OFB-8) to get the internal state stuck at all-zero. For CFB-8, an all-zero IV and an all-zero plaintext, causes 1/256 of keys to generate no encryption, plaintext is returned as ciphertext.[10]For OFB-8, using all zero initialization vector will generate no encryption for 1/256 of keys.[11]OFB-8 encryption returns the plaintext unencrypted for affected keys.
Some modes (such as AES-SIV and AES-GCM-SIV) are built to be more nonce-misuse resistant, i.e. resilient to scenarios in which the randomness generation is faulty or under the control of the attacker.
Ablock cipherworks on units of a fixedsize(known as ablock size), but messages come in a variety of lengths. So some modes (namelyECBandCBC) require that the final block be padded before encryption. Severalpaddingschemes exist. The simplest is to addnull bytesto theplaintextto bring its length up to a multiple of the block size, but care must be taken that the original length of the plaintext can be recovered; this is trivial, for example, if the plaintext is aCstylestringwhich contains no null bytes except at the end. Slightly more complex is the originalDESmethod, which is to add a single onebit, followed by enough zerobitsto fill out the block; if the message ends on a block boundary, a whole padding block will be added. Most sophisticated are CBC-specific schemes such asciphertext stealingorresidual block termination, which do not cause any extra ciphertext, at the expense of some additional complexity.SchneierandFergusonsuggest two possibilities, both simple: append a byte with value 128 (hex 80), followed by as many zero bytes as needed to fill the last block, or pad the last block withnbytes all with valuen.
CFB, OFB and CTR modes do not require any special measures to handle messages whose lengths are not multiples of the block size, since the modes work byXORingthe plaintext with the output of the block cipher. The last partial block of plaintext is XORed with the first few bytes of the lastkeystreamblock, producing a final ciphertext block that is the same size as the final partial plaintext block. This characteristic of stream ciphers makes them suitable for applications that require the encrypted ciphertext data to be the same size as the original plaintext data, and for applications that transmit data in streaming form where it is inconvenient to add padding bytes.
A number of modes of operation have been designed to combine secrecy and authentication in a single cryptographic primitive. Examples of such modes are ,[12]integrity-aware cipher block chaining (IACBC)[clarification needed], integrity-aware parallelizable mode (IAPM),[13]OCB,EAX,CWC,CCM, andGCM.Authenticated encryptionmodes are classified as single-pass modes or double-pass modes.
In addition, some modes also allow for the authentication of unencrypted associated data, and these are calledAEAD(authenticated encryption with associated data) schemes. For example, EAX mode is a double-pass AEAD scheme while OCB mode is single-pass.
Galois/counter mode (GCM) combines the well-known counter mode of encryption with the new Galois mode of authentication. The key feature is the ease of parallel computation of the Galois field multiplication used for authentication. This feature permits higher throughput than encryption algorithms.
GCM is defined for block ciphers with a block size of 128 bits. Galois message authentication code (GMAC) is an authentication-only variant of the GCM which can form an incremental message authentication code. Both GCM and GMAC can accept initialization vectors of arbitrary length. GCM can take full advantage of parallel processing and implementing GCM can make efficient use of aninstruction pipelineor a hardware pipeline. The CBC mode of operation incurspipeline stallsthat hamper its efficiency and performance.
Like in CTR, blocks are numbered sequentially, and then this block number is combined with an IV and encrypted with a block cipherE, usually AES. The result of this encryption is then XORed with the plaintext to produce the ciphertext. Like all counter modes, this is essentially a stream cipher, and so it is essential that a different IV is used for each stream that is encrypted.
The ciphertext blocks are considered coefficients of apolynomialwhich is then evaluated at a key-dependent pointH, usingfinite field arithmetic. The result is then encrypted, producing anauthentication tagthat can be used to verify the integrity of the data. The encrypted text then contains the IV, ciphertext, and authentication tag.
Counter with cipher block chaining message authentication code(counter with CBC-MAC; CCM) is anauthenticated encryptionalgorithm designed to provide both authentication and confidentiality. CCM mode is only defined for block ciphers with a block length of 128 bits.[14][15]
Synthetic initialization vector (SIV) is a nonce-misuse resistant block cipher mode.
SIV synthesizes an internal IV using the pseudorandom function S2V. S2V is a keyed hash based on CMAC, and the input to the function is:
SIV encrypts the S2V output and the plaintext using AES-CTR, keyed with the encryption key (K2).
SIV can support external nonce-based authenticated encryption, in which case one of the authenticated data fields is utilized for this purpose. RFC5297[16]specifies that for interoperability purposes the last authenticated data field should be used external nonce.
Owing to the use of two keys, the authentication key K1and encryption key K2, naming schemes for SIV AEAD-variants may lead to some confusion; for example AEAD_AES_SIV_CMAC_256 refers to AES-SIV with two AES-128 keys andnotAES-256.
AES-GCM-SIVis a mode of operation for the Advanced Encryption Standard which provides similar performance to Galois/counter mode as well as misuse resistance in the event of the reuse of a cryptographic nonce. The construction is defined in RFC 8452.[17]
AES-GCM-SIV synthesizes the internal IV. It derives a hash of the additional authenticated data and plaintext using the POLYVAL Galois hash function. The hash is then encrypted an AES-key, and used as authentication tag and AES-CTR initialization vector.
AES-GCM-SIVis an improvement over the very similarly named algorithmGCM-SIV, with a few very small changes (e.g. how AES-CTR is initialized), but which yields practical benefits to its security "This addition allows for encrypting up to 250messages with the same key, compared to the significant limitation of only 232messages that were allowed with GCM-SIV."[18]
Many modes of operation have been defined. Some of these are described below. The purpose of cipher modes is to mask patterns which exist in encrypted data, as illustrated in the description of theweakness of ECB.
Different cipher modes mask patterns by cascading outputs from the cipher block or other globally deterministic variables into the subsequent cipher block. The inputs of the listed modes are summarized in the following table:
Note:g(i) is any deterministic function, often theidentity function.
The simplest of the encryption modes is theelectronic codebook(ECB) mode (named after conventional physicalcodebooks[19]). The message is divided into blocks, and each block is encrypted separately. ECB is not recommended for use in cryptographic protocols: the disadvantage of this method is a lack ofdiffusion, wherein it fails to hide data patterns when it encrypts identicalplaintextblocks into identicalciphertextblocks.[20][21][22]
A striking example of the degree to which ECB can leave plaintext data patterns in the ciphertext can be seen when ECB mode is used to encrypt abitmap imagewhich contains large areas of uniform color. While the color of each individualpixelhas supposedly been encrypted, the overall image may still be discerned, as the pattern of identically colored pixels in the original remains visible in the encrypted version.
ECB mode can also make protocols without integrity protection even more susceptible toreplay attacks, since each block gets decrypted in exactly the same way.[citation needed]
Ehrsam, Meyer, Smith and Tuchman invented the cipher block chaining (CBC) mode of operation in 1976. In CBC mode, each block of plaintext is XORed with the previous ciphertext block before being encrypted. This way, each ciphertext block depends on all plaintext blocks processed up to that point. To make each message unique, an initialization vector must be used in the first block.
If the first block has index 1, the mathematical formula for CBC encryption is
while the mathematical formula for CBC decryption is
CBC has been the most commonly used mode of operation. Its main drawbacks are that encryption is sequential (i.e., it cannot be parallelized), and that the message must be padded to a multiple of the cipher block size. One way to handle this last issue is through the method known as ciphertext stealing. Note that a one-bit change in a plaintext or initialization vector (IV) affects all following ciphertext blocks.
Decrypting with the incorrect IV causes the first block of plaintext to be corrupt but subsequent plaintext blocks will be correct. This is because each block is XORed with the ciphertext of the previous block, not the plaintext, so one does not need to decrypt the previous block before using it as the IV for the decryption of the current one. This means that a plaintext block can be recovered from two adjacent blocks of ciphertext. As a consequence, decryptioncanbe parallelized. Note that a one-bit change to the ciphertext causes complete corruption of the corresponding block of plaintext, and inverts the corresponding bit in the following block of plaintext, but the rest of the blocks remain intact. This peculiarity is exploited in different padding oracle attacks, such as POODLE.
Explicit initialization vectorstake advantage of this property by prepending a single random block to the plaintext. Encryption is done as normal, except the IV does not need to be communicated to the decryption routine. Whatever IV decryption uses, only the random block is "corrupted". It can be safely discarded and the rest of the decryption is the original plaintext.
Thepropagating cipher block chaining[23]orplaintext cipher-block chaining[24]mode was designed to cause small changes in the ciphertext to propagate indefinitely when decrypting, as well as when encrypting. In PCBC mode, each block of plaintext is XORed with both the previous plaintext block and the previous ciphertext block before being encrypted. Like with CBC mode, an initialization vector is used in the first block.
Unlike CBC, decrypting PCBC with the incorrect IV (initialization vector) causes all blocks of plaintext to be corrupt.
Encryption and decryption algorithms are as follows:
PCBC is used inKerberos v4andWASTE, most notably, but otherwise is not common.
On a message encrypted in PCBC mode, if two adjacent ciphertext blocks are exchanged, this does not affect the decryption of subsequent blocks.[25]For this reason, PCBC is not used in Kerberos v5.
Thecipher feedback(CFB) mode, in its simplest form uses the entire output of the block cipher. In this variation, it is very similar to CBC, turning a block cipher into a self-synchronizingstream cipher. CFB decryption in this variation is almost identical to CBC encryption performed in reverse:
NIST SP800-38A defines CFB with a bit-width.[26]The CFB mode also requires an integer parameter, denoted s, such that 1 ≤ s ≤ b. In the specification of the CFB mode below, each plaintext segment (Pj) and ciphertext segment (Cj) consists of s bits. The value of s is sometimes incorporated into the name of the mode, e.g., the 1-bit CFB mode, the 8-bit CFB mode, the 64-bit CFB mode, or the 128-bit CFB mode.
These modes will truncate the output of the underlying block cipher.
CFB-1 is considered self synchronizing and resilient to loss of ciphertext; "When the 1-bit CFB mode is used, then the synchronization is automatically restored b+1 positions after the inserted or deleted bit. For other values of s in the CFB mode, and for the other confidentiality modes in this recommendation, the synchronization must be restored externally." (NIST SP800-38A). I.e. 1-bit loss in a 128-bit-wide block cipher like AES will render 129 invalid bits before emitting valid bits.
CFB may also self synchronize in some special cases other than those specified. For example, a one bit change in CFB-128 with an underlying 128 bit block cipher, will re-synchronize after two blocks. (However, CFB-128 etc. will not handle bit loss gracefully; a one-bit loss will cause the decryptor to lose alignment with the encryptor)
Like CBC mode, changes in the plaintext propagate forever in the ciphertext, and encryption cannot be parallelized. Also like CBC, decryption can be parallelized.
CFB, OFB and CTR share two advantages over CBC mode: the block cipher is only ever used in the encrypting direction, and the message does not need to be padded to a multiple of the cipher block size (thoughciphertext stealingcan also be used for CBC mode to make padding unnecessary).
Theoutput feedback(OFB) mode makes a block cipher into a synchronousstream cipher. It generateskeystreamblocks, which are thenXORedwith the plaintext blocks to get the ciphertext. Just as with other stream ciphers, flipping a bit in the ciphertext produces a flipped bit in the plaintext at the same location. This property allows manyerror-correcting codesto function normally even when applied before encryption.
Because of the symmetry of the XOR operation, encryption and decryption are exactly the same:
Each output feedback block cipher operation depends on all previous ones, and so cannot be performed in parallel. However, because the plaintext or ciphertext is only used for the final XOR, the block cipher operations may be performed in advance, allowing the final step to be performed in parallel once the plaintext or ciphertext is available.
It is possible to obtain an OFB mode keystream by using CBC mode with a constant string of zeroes as input. This can be useful, because it allows the usage of fast hardware implementations of CBC mode for OFB mode encryption.
Using OFB mode with a partial block as feedback like CFB mode reduces the average cycle length by a factor of 232or more. A mathematical model proposed by Davies and Parkin and substantiated by experimental results showed that only with full feedback an average cycle length near to the obtainable maximum can be achieved. For this reason, support for truncated feedback was removed from the specification of OFB.[27]
Like OFB, counter mode turns ablock cipherinto astream cipher. It generates the nextkeystreamblock by encrypting successive values of a "counter". The counter can be any function which produces a sequence which is guaranteed not to repeat for a long time, although an actual increment-by-one counter is the simplest and most popular. The usage of a simple deterministic input function used to be controversial; critics argued that "deliberately exposing a cryptosystem to a known systematic input represents an unnecessary risk".[28]However, today CTR mode is widely accepted, and any problems are considered a weakness of the underlying block cipher, which is expected to be secure regardless of systemic bias in its input.[29]Along with CBC, CTR mode is one of two block cipher modes recommended by Niels Ferguson and Bruce Schneier.[30]
CTR mode was introduced byWhitfield DiffieandMartin Hellmanin 1979.[29]
CTR mode has similar characteristics to OFB, but also allows a random-access property during decryption. CTR mode is well suited to operate on a multi-processor machine, where blocks can be encrypted in parallel. Furthermore, it does not suffer from the short-cycle problem that can affect OFB.[31]
If the IV/nonce is random, then they can be combined with the counter using any invertible operation (concatenation, addition, or XOR) to produce the actual unique counter block for encryption. In case of a non-random nonce (such as a packet counter), the nonce and counter should be concatenated (e.g., storing the nonce in the upper 64 bits and the counter in the lower 64 bits of a 128-bit counter block). Simply adding or XORing the nonce and counter into a single value would break the security under achosen-plaintext attackin many cases, since the attacker may be able to manipulate the entire IV–counter pair to cause a collision. Once an attacker controls the IV–counter pair and plaintext, XOR of the ciphertext with the known plaintext would yield a value that, when XORed with the ciphertext of the other block sharing the same IV–counter pair, would decrypt that block.[32]
Note that thenoncein this diagram is equivalent to theinitialization vector(IV) in the other diagrams. However, if the offset/location information is corrupt, it will be impossible to partially recover such data due to the dependence on byte offset.
"Error propagation" properties describe how a decryption behaves during bit errors, i.e. how error in one bit cascades to different decrypted bits.
Bit errors may occur intentionally in attacks or randomly due to transmission errors.
For modernauthenticated encryption(AEAD) or protocols withmessage authentication codeschained in MAC-Then-Encrypt order, any bit error should completely abort decryption and must not generate any specific bit errors to decryptor. I.e. if decryption succeeded, there should not be any bit error. As such error propagation is less important subject in modern cipher modes than in traditional confidentiality-only modes.
(Source: SP800-38A Table D.2: Summary of Effect of Bit Errors on Decryption)
It might be observed, for example, that a one-block error in the transmitted ciphertext would result in a one-block error in the reconstructed plaintext for ECB mode encryption, while in CBC mode such an error would affect two blocks. Some felt that such resilience was desirable in the face of random errors (e.g., line noise), while others argued that error correcting increased the scope for attackers to maliciously tamper with a message.
However, when proper integrity protection is used, such an error will result (with high probability) in the entire message being rejected. If resistance to random error is desirable,error-correcting codesshould be applied to the ciphertext before transmission.
Many more modes of operation for block ciphers have been suggested. Some have been accepted, fully described (even standardized), and are in use. Others have been found insecure, and should never be used. Still others don't categorize as confidentiality, authenticity, or authenticated encryption – for example key feedback mode andDavies–Meyerhashing.
NISTmaintains a list of proposed modes for block ciphers atModes Development.[26][33]
Disk encryption often uses special purpose modes specifically designed for the application. Tweakable narrow-block encryption modes (LRW,XEX, andXTS) and wide-block encryption modes (CMCandEME) are designed to securely encrypt sectors of a disk (seedisk encryption theory).
Many modes use an initialization vector (IV) which, depending on the mode, may have requirements such as being only used once (a nonce) or being unpredictable ahead of its publication, etc. Reusing an IV with the same key in CTR, GCM or OFB mode results in XORing the same keystream with two or more plaintexts, a clear misuse of a stream, with a catastrophic loss of security. Deterministic authenticated encryption modes such as the NISTKey Wrapalgorithm and the SIV (RFC 5297) AEAD mode do not require an IV as an input, and return the same ciphertext and authentication tag every time for a given plaintext and key. Other IV misuse-resistant modes such asAES-GCM-SIVbenefit from an IV input, for example in the maximum amount of data that can be safely encrypted with one key, while not failing catastrophically if the same IV is used multiple times.
Block ciphers can also be used in othercryptographic protocols. They are generally used in modes of operation similar to the block modes described here. As with all protocols, to be cryptographically secure, care must be taken to design these modes of operation correctly.
There are several schemes which use a block cipher to build acryptographic hash function. Seeone-way compression functionfor descriptions of several such methods.
Cryptographically secure pseudorandom number generators(CSPRNGs) can also be built using block ciphers.
Message authentication codes(MACs) are often built from block ciphers.CBC-MAC,OMACandPMACare examples.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cipher_Block_Chaining
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Transport Layer Security(TLS) is acryptographic protocoldesigned to provide communications security over a computer network, such as theInternet. Theprotocolis widely used inapplicationssuch asemail,instant messaging, andvoice over IP, but its use in securingHTTPSremains the most publicly visible.
The TLS protocol aims primarily to provide security, includingprivacy(confidentiality), integrity, and authenticity through the use ofcryptography, such as the use ofcertificates, between two or more communicating computer applications. It runs in thepresentation layerand is itself composed of two layers: the TLS record and the TLShandshake protocols.
The closely relatedDatagram Transport Layer Security(DTLS)is acommunications protocolthat providessecuritytodatagram-based applications. In technical writing, references to "(D)TLS" are often seen when it applies to both versions.[1]
TLS is a proposedInternet Engineering Task Force(IETF) standard, first defined in 1999, and the current version is TLS 1.3, defined in August 2018. TLS builds on the now-deprecatedSSL(Secure Sockets Layer) specifications (1994, 1995, 1996) developed byNetscape Communicationsfor adding theHTTPSprotocol to theirNetscape Navigatorweb browser.
Client-serverapplications use the TLSprotocolto communicate across a network in a way designed to preventeavesdroppingandtampering.
Since applications can communicate either with or without TLS (or SSL), it is necessary for theclientto request that theserverset up a TLS connection.[2]One of the main ways of achieving this is to use a differentport numberfor TLS connections. Port 80 is typically used for unencryptedHTTPtraffic while port 443 is the common port used for encryptedHTTPStraffic. Another mechanism is to make a protocol-specificSTARTTLSrequest to the server to switch the connection to TLS – for example, when using the mail andnewsprotocols.
Once the client and server have agreed to use TLS, they negotiate astatefulconnection by using a handshaking procedure (see§ TLS handshake).[3]The protocols use a handshake with anasymmetric cipherto establish not only cipher settings but also a session-specific shared key with which further communication is encrypted using asymmetric cipher. During this handshake, the client and server agree on various parameters used to establish the connection's security:
This concludes the handshake and begins the secured connection, which is encrypted and decrypted with the session key until the connection closes. If any one of the above steps fails, then the TLS handshake fails and the connection is not created.
TLS and SSL do not fit neatly into any single layer of theOSI modelor theTCP/IP model.[4][5]TLS runs "on top of some reliable transport protocol (e.g., TCP),"[6]: §1which would imply that it is above thetransport layer. It serves encryption to higher layers, which is normally the function of thepresentation layer. However, applications generally use TLS as if it were a transport layer,[4][5]even though applications using TLS must actively control initiating TLS handshakes and handling of exchanged authentication certificates.[6]: §1
When secured by TLS, connections between a client (e.g., a web browser) and a server (e.g., wikipedia.org) will have all of the following properties:[6]: §1
TLS supports many different methods for exchanging keys, encrypting data, and authenticating message integrity. As a result, secure configuration of TLS involves many configurable parameters, and not all choices provide all of the privacy-related properties described in the list above (see the tables below§ Key exchange,§ Cipher security, and§ Data integrity).
Attempts have been made to subvert aspects of the communications security that TLS seeks to provide, and the protocol has been revised several times to address these security threats. Developers of web browsers have repeatedly revised their products to defend against potential security weaknesses after these were discovered (see TLS/SSL support history of web browsers).
Datagram Transport Layer Security, abbreviated DTLS, is a relatedcommunications protocolprovidingsecuritytodatagram-based applications by allowing them to communicate in a way designed[7][8]to preventeavesdropping,tampering, ormessage forgery. The DTLS protocol is based on thestream-oriented Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol and is intended to provide similar security guarantees. However, unlike TLS, it can be used with most datagram oriented protocols includingUser Datagram Protocol(UDP),Datagram Congestion Control Protocol(DCCP),Control And Provisioning of Wireless Access Points(CAPWAP),Stream Control Transmission Protocol(SCTP) encapsulation, andSecure Real-time Transport Protocol(SRTP).
As the DTLS protocol datagram preserves the semantics of the underlying transport, the application does not suffer from the delays associated with stream protocols. However, the application has to deal withpacket reordering, loss of datagram and data larger than the size of a datagramnetwork packet. Because DTLS uses UDP or SCTP rather than TCP, it avoids theTCP meltdown problem,[9][10]when being used to create a VPN tunnel.
The original 2006 release of DTLS version 1.0 was not a standalone document. It was given as a series of deltas to TLS 1.1.[11]Similarly the follow-up 2012 release of DTLS is a delta to TLS 1.2. It was given the version number of DTLS 1.2 to match its TLS version. Lastly, the 2022 DTLS 1.3 is a delta to TLS 1.3. Like the two previous versions, DTLS 1.3 is intended to provide "equivalent security guarantees [to TLS 1.3] with the exception of order protection/non-replayability".[12]
ManyVPN clientsincludingCiscoAnyConnect[13]& InterCloud Fabric,[14]OpenConnect,[15]ZScalertunnel,[16]F5 NetworksEdge VPN Client,[17]and Citrix SystemsNetScaler[18]use DTLS to secure UDP traffic. In addition all modern web browsers support DTLS-SRTP[19]forWebRTC.
In August 1986, the National Security Agency, the National Bureau of Standards, the Defense Communications Agency launched a project, called the Secure Data Network System (SDNS), with the intent of designing the next generation of secure computer communications network and product specifications to be implemented for applications on public and private internets. It was intended to complement the rapidly emerging new OSI internet standards moving forward both in the U.S. government's GOSIP Profiles and in the huge ITU-ISO JTC1 internet effort internationally.[26]
As part of the project, researchers designed a protocol called SP4 (security protocolin layer 4 of the OSI system). This was later renamed the Transport Layer Security Protocol (TLSP) and subsequently published in 1995 as international standard ITU-T X.274|ISO/IEC 10736:1995.[27]Despite the name similarity, this is distinct from today's TLS.
Other efforts towards transport layer security included theSecure Network Programming(SNP)application programming interface(API), which in 1993 explored the approach of having a secure transport layer API closely resemblingBerkeley sockets, to facilitate retrofitting pre-existing network applications with security measures. SNP was published and presented in the 1994USENIXSummer Technical Conference.[28][29]The SNP project was funded by a grant fromNSAto ProfessorSimon LamatUT-Austinin 1991.[30]Secure Network Programmingwon the 2004ACM Software System Award.[31][32]Simon Lam was inducted into theInternet Hall of Famefor "inventing secure sockets and implementing the first secure sockets layer, named SNP, in 1993."[33][34]
Netscape developed the original SSL protocols, andTaher Elgamal, chief scientist atNetscape Communicationsfrom 1995 to 1998, has been described as the "father of SSL".[35][36][37][38]SSL version 1.0 was never publicly released because of serious security flaws in the protocol. Version 2.0, after being released in February 1995 was quickly found to contain a number of security and usability flaws. It used the same cryptographic keys for message authentication and encryption. It had a weak MAC construction that used the MD5 hash function with a secret prefix, making it vulnerable to length extension attacks. It also provided no protection for either the opening handshake or an explicit message close, both of which meantman-in-the-middle attackscould go undetected. Moreover, SSL 2.0 assumed a single service and a fixed domain certificate, conflicting with the widely used feature of virtual hosting in Web servers, so most websites were effectively impaired from using SSL.
These flaws necessitated the complete redesign of the protocol to SSL version 3.0.[39][37]Released in 1996, it was produced byPaul Kocherworking with Netscape engineers Phil Karlton and Alan Freier, with a reference implementation by Christopher Allen and Tim Dierks of Certicom. Newer versions of SSL/TLS are based on SSL 3.0. The 1996 draft of SSL 3.0 was published by IETF as a historical document inRFC6101.
SSL 2.0 was deprecated in 2011 byRFC6176. In 2014, SSL 3.0 was found to be vulnerable to thePOODLEattack that affects allblock ciphersin SSL;RC4, the only non-block cipher supported by SSL 3.0, is also feasibly broken as used in SSL 3.0.[40]SSL 3.0 was deprecated in June 2015 byRFC7568.
TLS 1.0 was first defined inRFC2246in January 1999 as an upgrade of SSL Version 3.0, and written by Christopher Allen and Tim Dierks of Certicom. As stated in the RFC, "the differences between this protocol and SSL 3.0 are not dramatic, but they are significant enough to preclude interoperability between TLS 1.0 and SSL 3.0". Tim Dierks later wrote that these changes, and the renaming from "SSL" to "TLS", were a face-saving gesture to Microsoft, "so it wouldn't look [like] the IETF was just rubberstamping Netscape's protocol".[41]
ThePCI Councilsuggested that organizations migrate from TLS 1.0 to TLS 1.1 or higher before June 30, 2018.[42][43]In October 2018,Apple,Google,Microsoft, andMozillajointly announced they would deprecate TLS 1.0 and 1.1 in March 2020.[20]TLS 1.0 and 1.1 were formally deprecated inRFC8996in March 2021.
TLS 1.1 was defined in RFC 4346 in April 2006.[44]It is an update from TLS version 1.0. Significant differences in this version include:
Support for TLS versions 1.0 and 1.1 was widely deprecated by web sites around 2020,[46]disabling access toFirefoxversions before 24 andChromium-based browsersbefore 29,[47]though third-party fixes can be applied to Netscape Navigator and older versions of Firefox to add TLS 1.2 support.[48]
TLS 1.2 was defined inRFC5246in August 2008.[23]It is based on the earlier TLS 1.1 specification. Major differences include:
All TLS versions were further refined inRFC6176in March 2011, removing their backward compatibility with SSL such that TLS sessions never negotiate the use of Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) version 2.0. As of April 2025 there is no formal date for TLS 1.2 to be deprecated. The specifications for TLS 1.2 became redefined as well by the Standards Track DocumentRFC8446to keep it as secure as possible; it is to be seen as a failover protocol now, meant only to be negotiated with clients which are unable to talk over TLS 1.3 (The original RFC 5246 definition for TLS 1.2 is since then obsolete).
TLS 1.3 was defined in RFC 8446 in August 2018.[6]It is based on the earlier TLS 1.2 specification. Major differences from TLS 1.2 include:[49]
Network Security Services(NSS), the cryptography library developed byMozillaand used by its web browserFirefox, enabled TLS 1.3 by default in February 2017.[51]TLS 1.3 support was subsequently added — but due to compatibility issues for a small number of users, not automatically enabled[52]— toFirefox 52.0, which was released in March 2017. TLS 1.3 was enabled by default in May 2018 with the release ofFirefox 60.0.[53]
Google Chromeset TLS 1.3 as the default version for a short time in 2017. It then removed it as the default, due to incompatible middleboxes such asBlue Coat web proxies.[54]
The intolerance of the new version of TLS wasprotocol ossification; middleboxes had ossified the protocol's version parameter. As a result, version 1.3 mimics thewire imageof version 1.2. This change occurred very late in the design process, only having been discovered during browser deployment.[55]The discovery of this intolerance also led to the prior version negotiation strategy, where the highest matching version was picked, being abandoned due to unworkable levels of ossification.[56]'Greasing' an extension point, where one protocol participant claims support for non-existent extensions to ensure that unrecognised-but-actually-existent extensions are tolerated and so to resist ossification, was originally designed for TLS, but it has since been adopted elsewhere.[56]
During the IETF 100Hackathon, which took place inSingaporein 2017, the TLS Group worked on adaptingopen-source applicationsto use TLS 1.3.[57][58]The TLS group was made up of individuals from Japan, United Kingdom, and Mauritius via the cyberstorm.mu team.[58]This work was continued in the IETF 101 Hackathon inLondon,[59]and the IETF 102 Hackathon in Montreal.[60]
wolfSSLenabled the use of TLS 1.3 as of version 3.11.1, released in May 2017.[61]As the first commercial TLS 1.3 implementation, wolfSSL 3.11.1 supported Draft 18 and now supports Draft 28,[62]the final version, as well as many older versions. A series of blogs were published on the performance difference between TLS 1.2 and 1.3.[63]
InSeptember 2018, the popularOpenSSLproject released version 1.1.1 of its library, in which support for TLS 1.3 was "the headline new feature".[64]
Support for TLS 1.3 was added toSecure Channel(schannel) for theGAreleases ofWindows 11andWindows Server 2022.[65]
TheElectronic Frontier Foundationpraised TLS 1.3 and expressed concern about the variant protocol Enterprise Transport Security (ETS) that intentionally disables important security measures in TLS 1.3.[66]Originally called Enterprise TLS (eTLS), ETS is a published standard known as the 'ETSITS103523-3', "Middlebox Security Protocol, Part3: Enterprise Transport Security". It is intended for use entirely within proprietary networks such as banking systems. ETS does not support forward secrecy so as to allow third-party organizations connected to the proprietary networks to be able to use their private key to monitor network traffic for the detection of malware and to make it easier to conduct audits.[67][68]Despite the claimed benefits, the EFF warned that the loss of forward secrecy could make it easier for data to be exposed along with saying that there are better ways to analyze traffic.[66]
A digital certificate certifies the ownership of a public key by the named subject of the certificate, and indicates certain expected usages of that key. This allows others (relying parties) to rely upon signatures or on assertions made by the private key that corresponds to the certified public key. Keystores and trust stores can be in various formats, such as.pem, .crt,.pfx, and.jks.
TLS typically relies on a set of trusted third-party certificate authorities to establish the authenticity of certificates. Trust is usually anchored in a list of certificates distributed with user agent software,[69]and can be modified by the relying party.
According toNetcraft, who monitors active TLS certificates, the market-leading certificate authority (CA) has beenSymantecsince the beginning of their survey (orVeriSignbefore the authentication services business unit was purchased by Symantec). As of 2015, Symantec accounted for just under a third of all certificates and 44% of the valid certificates used by the 1 million busiest websites, as counted by Netcraft.[70]In 2017, Symantec sold its TLS/SSL business to DigiCert.[71]In an updated report, it was shown thatIdenTrust,DigiCert, andSectigoare the top 3 certificate authorities in terms of market share since May 2019.[72]
As a consequence of choosingX.509certificates, certificate authorities and apublic key infrastructureare necessary to verify the relation between a certificate and its owner, as well as to generate, sign, and administer the validity of certificates. While this can be more convenient than verifying the identities via aweb of trust, the2013 mass surveillance disclosuresmade it more widely known that certificate authorities are a weak point from a security standpoint, allowingman-in-the-middle attacks(MITM) if the certificate authority cooperates (or is compromised).[73][74]
Before a client and server can begin to exchange information protected by TLS, they must securely exchange or agree upon an encryption key and a cipher to use when encrypting data (see§ Cipher). Among the methods used for key exchange/agreement are: public and private keys generated withRSA(denoted TLS_RSA in the TLS handshake protocol),Diffie–Hellman(TLS_DH), ephemeral Diffie–Hellman (TLS_DHE),elliptic-curve Diffie–Hellman(TLS_ECDH), ephemeral elliptic-curve Diffie–Hellman (TLS_ECDHE),anonymous Diffie–Hellman(TLS_DH_anon),[23]pre-shared key(TLS_PSK)[75]andSecure Remote Password(TLS_SRP).[76]
The TLS_DH_anon and TLS_ECDH_anon key agreement methods do not authenticate the server or the user and hence are rarely used because those are vulnerable toman-in-the-middle attacks. Only TLS_DHE and TLS_ECDHE provideforward secrecy.
Public key certificates used during exchange/agreement also vary in the size of the public/private encryption keys used during the exchange and hence the robustness of the security provided. In July 2013,Googleannounced that it would no longer use 1024-bit public keys and would switch instead to 2048-bit keys to increase the security of the TLS encryption it provides to its users because the encryption strength is directly related to thekey size.[77][78]
Notes
Amessage authentication code(MAC) is used for data integrity.HMACis used forCBCmode of block ciphers.Authenticated encryption(AEAD) such asGCMandCCM modeuses AEAD-integrated MAC and does not useHMAC.[6]: §8.4HMAC-basedPRF, orHKDFis used for TLS handshake.
In applications design, TLS is usually implemented on top of Transport Layer protocols, encrypting all of the protocol-related data of protocols such asHTTP,FTP,SMTP,NNTPandXMPP.
Historically, TLS has been used primarily with reliable transport protocols such as theTransmission Control Protocol(TCP). However, it has also been implemented with datagram-oriented transport protocols, such as theUser Datagram Protocol(UDP) and theDatagram Congestion Control Protocol(DCCP), usage of which has been standardized independently using the termDatagram Transport Layer Security(DTLS).
A primary use of TLS is to secureWorld Wide Webtraffic between awebsiteand aweb browserencoded with the HTTP protocol. This use of TLS to secure HTTP traffic constitutes theHTTPSprotocol.[93]
Notes
As of March 2025[update], the latest versions of all major web browsers support TLS 1.2 and 1.3 and have them enabled by default, with the exception ofIE 11. TLS 1.0 and 1.1 are disabled by default on the latest versions of all major browsers.
Mitigations against known attacks are not enough yet:
Most SSL and TLS programming libraries arefree and open-source software.
A paper presented at the 2012ACMconference on computer and communications security[98]showed that many applications used some of these SSL libraries incorrectly, leading to vulnerabilities. According to the authors:
"The root cause of most of these vulnerabilities is the terrible design of the APIs to the underlying SSL libraries. Instead of expressing high-level security properties of network tunnels such as confidentiality and authentication, these APIs expose low-level details of the SSL protocol to application developers. As a consequence, developers often use SSL APIs incorrectly, misinterpreting and misunderstanding their manifold parameters, options, side effects, and return values."
TheSimple Mail Transfer Protocol(SMTP) can also be protected by TLS. These applications usepublic key certificatesto verify the identity of endpoints.
TLS can also be used for tunneling an entire network stack to create aVPN, which is the case withOpenVPNandOpenConnect. Many vendors have by now married TLS's encryption and authentication capabilities with authorization. There has also been substantial development since the late 1990s in creating client technology outside of Web-browsers, in order to enable support for client/server applications. Compared to traditionalIPsecVPN technologies, TLS has some inherent advantages in firewall andNATtraversal that make it easier to administer for large remote-access populations.
TLS is also a standard method for protectingSession Initiation Protocol(SIP) application signaling. TLS can be used for providing authentication and encryption of the SIP signaling associated withVoIPand other SIP-based applications.[99]
Significant attacks against TLS/SSL are listed below.
In February 2015, IETF issued an informational RFC[100]summarizing the various known attacks against TLS/SSL.
A vulnerability of the renegotiation procedure was discovered in August 2009 that can lead to plaintext injection attacks against SSL 3.0 and all current versions of TLS.[101]For example, it allows an attacker who can hijack anhttpsconnection to splice their own requests into the beginning of the conversation the client has with the web server. The attacker cannot actually decrypt the client–server communication, so it is different from a typicalman-in-the-middle attack. A short-term fix is for web servers to stop allowing renegotiation, which typically will not require other changes unlessclient certificateauthentication is used. To fix the vulnerability, a renegotiation indication extension was proposed for TLS. It will require the client and server to include and verify information about previous handshakes in any renegotiation handshakes.[102]This extension has become a proposed standard and has been assigned the numberRFC5746. The RFC has been implemented by several libraries.[103][104][105]
A protocoldowngrade attack(also called a version rollback attack) tricks a web server into negotiating connections with previous versions of TLS (such as SSLv2) that have long since been abandoned as insecure.
Previous modifications to the original protocols, likeFalse Start[106](adopted and enabled by Google Chrome[107]) orSnap Start, reportedly introduced limited TLS protocol downgrade attacks[108]or allowed modifications to the cipher suite list sent by the client to the server. In doing so, an attacker might succeed in influencing the cipher suite selection in an attempt to downgrade the cipher suite negotiated to use either a weaker symmetric encryption algorithm or a weaker key exchange.[109]A paper presented at anACMconference on computer and communications securityin 2012 demonstrated that the False Start extension was at risk: in certain circumstances it could allow an attacker to recover the encryption keys offline and to access the encrypted data.[110]
Encryption downgrade attacks can force servers and clients to negotiate a connection using cryptographically weak keys. In 2014, aman-in-the-middleattack called FREAK was discovered affecting theOpenSSLstack, the defaultAndroidweb browser, and someSafaribrowsers.[111]The attack involved tricking servers into negotiating a TLS connection using cryptographically weak 512 bit encryption keys.
Logjam is asecurity exploitdiscovered in May 2015 that exploits the option of using legacy"export-grade"512-bitDiffie–Hellmangroups dating back to the 1990s.[112]It forces susceptible servers to downgrade to cryptographically weak 512-bit Diffie–Hellman groups. An attacker can then deduce the keys the client and server determine using theDiffie–Hellman key exchange.
TheDROWN attackis an exploit that attacks servers supporting contemporary SSL/TLS protocol suites by exploiting their support for the obsolete, insecure, SSLv2 protocol to leverage an attack on connections using up-to-date protocols that would otherwise be secure.[113][114]DROWN exploits a vulnerability in the protocols used and the configuration of the server, rather than any specific implementation error. Full details of DROWN were announced in March 2016, together with a patch for the exploit. At that time, more than 81,000 of the top 1 million most popular websites were among the TLS protected websites that were vulnerable to the DROWN attack.[114]
On September 23, 2011, researchers Thai Duong and Juliano Rizzo demonstrated a proof of concept calledBEAST(Browser Exploit Against SSL/TLS)[115]using aJava appletto violatesame origin policyconstraints, for a long-knowncipher block chaining(CBC) vulnerability in TLS 1.0:[116][117]an attacker observing 2 consecutive ciphertext blocks C0, C1 can test if the plaintext block P1 is equal to x by choosing the next plaintext blockP2 = x ⊕ C0 ⊕ C1; as per CBC operation,C2 = E(C1 ⊕ P2) = E(C1 ⊕ x ⊕ C0 ⊕ C1) = E(C0 ⊕ x), which will be equal to C1 ifx = P1. Practicalexploitshad not been previously demonstrated for thisvulnerability, which was originally discovered byPhillip Rogaway[118]in 2002. The vulnerability of the attack had been fixed with TLS 1.1 in 2006, but TLS 1.1 had not seen wide adoption prior to this attack demonstration.
RC4as a stream cipher is immune to BEAST attack. Therefore, RC4 was widely used as a way to mitigate BEAST attack on the server side. However, in 2013, researchers found more weaknesses in RC4. Thereafter enabling RC4 on server side was no longer recommended.[119]
Chrome and Firefox themselves are not vulnerable to BEAST attack,[120][121]however, Mozilla updated theirNSSlibraries to mitigate BEAST-likeattacks. NSS is used byMozilla FirefoxandGoogle Chrometo implement SSL. Someweb serversthat have a broken implementation of the SSL specification may stop working as a result.[122]
Microsoftreleased Security Bulletin MS12-006 on January 10, 2012, which fixed the BEAST vulnerability by changing the way that the Windows Secure Channel (Schannel) component transmits encrypted network packets from the server end.[123]Users of Internet Explorer (prior to version 11) that run on older versions of Windows (Windows 7,Windows 8andWindows Server 2008 R2) can restrict use of TLS to 1.1 or higher.
Applefixed BEAST vulnerability by implementing 1/n-1 split and turning it on by default inOS X Mavericks, released on October 22, 2013.[124]
The authors of the BEAST attack are also the creators of the laterCRIMEattack, which can allow an attacker to recover the content of web cookies whendata compressionis used along with TLS.[125][126]When used to recover the content of secretauthentication cookies, it allows an attacker to performsession hijackingon an authenticated web session.
While the CRIME attack was presented as a general attack that could work effectively against a large number of protocols, including but not limited to TLS, and application-layer protocols such asSPDYorHTTP, only exploits against TLS and SPDY were demonstrated and largely mitigated in browsers and servers. The CRIME exploit againstHTTP compressionhas not been mitigated at all, even though the authors of CRIME have warned that this vulnerability might be even more widespread than SPDY and TLS compression combined. In 2013 a new instance of the CRIME attack against HTTP compression, dubbedBREACH, was announced. Based on the CRIME attack a BREACH attack can extract login tokens, email addresses or other sensitive information from TLS encrypted web traffic in as little as 30 seconds (depending on the number of bytes to be extracted), provided the attacker tricks the victim into visiting a malicious web link or is able to inject content into valid pages the user is visiting (ex: a wireless network under the control of the attacker).[127]All versions of TLS and SSL are at risk from BREACH regardless of the encryption algorithm or cipher used.[128]Unlike previous instances of CRIME, which can be successfully defended against by turning off TLS compression or SPDY header compression, BREACH exploits HTTP compression which cannot realistically be turned off, as virtually all web servers rely upon it to improve data transmission speeds for users.[127]This is a known limitation of TLS as it is susceptible tochosen-plaintext attackagainst the application-layer data it was meant to protect.
Earlier TLS versions were vulnerable against thepadding oracle attackdiscovered in 2002. A novel variant, called theLucky Thirteen attack, was published in 2013.
Some experts[90]also recommended avoidingtriple DESCBC. Since the last supported ciphers developed to support any program usingWindows XP's SSL/TLS library like Internet Explorer on Windows XP areRC4and Triple-DES, and since RC4 is now deprecated (see discussion ofRC4 attacks), this makes it difficult to support any version of SSL for any program using this library on XP.
A fix was released as the Encrypt-then-MAC extension to the TLS specification, released asRFC7366.[129]The Lucky Thirteen attack can be mitigated in TLS 1.2 by using only AES_GCM ciphers; AES_CBC remains vulnerable. SSL may safeguard email, VoIP, and other types of communications over insecure networks in addition to its primary use case of secure data transmission between a client and the server.[2]
On October 14, 2014, Google researchers published a vulnerability in the design of SSL 3.0, which makesCBC mode of operationwith SSL 3.0 vulnerable to apadding attack(CVE-2014-3566). They named this attackPOODLE(Padding Oracle On Downgraded Legacy Encryption). On average, attackers only need to make 256 SSL 3.0 requests to reveal one byte of encrypted messages.[96]
Although this vulnerability only exists in SSL 3.0 and most clients and servers support TLS 1.0 and above, all major browsers voluntarily downgrade to SSL 3.0 if the handshakes with newer versions of TLS fail unless they provide the option for a user or administrator to disable SSL 3.0 and the user or administrator does so[citation needed]. Therefore, the man-in-the-middle can first conduct aversion rollback attackand then exploit this vulnerability.[96]
On December 8, 2014, a variant of POODLE was announced that impacts TLS implementations that do not properly enforce padding byte requirements.[130]
Despite the existence of attacks onRC4that broke its security, cipher suites in SSL and TLS that were based on RC4 were still considered secure prior to 2013 based on the way in which they were used in SSL and TLS. In 2011, the RC4 suite was actually recommended as a workaround for theBEASTattack.[131]New forms of attack disclosed in March 2013 conclusively demonstrated the feasibility of breaking RC4 in TLS, suggesting it was not a good workaround for BEAST.[95]An attack scenario was proposed by AlFardan, Bernstein, Paterson, Poettering and Schuldt that used newly discovered statistical biases in the RC4 key table[132]to recover parts of the plaintext with a large number of TLS encryptions.[133][134]An attack on RC4 in TLS and SSL that requires 13 × 220encryptions to break RC4 was unveiled on 8 July 2013 and later described as "feasible" in the accompanying presentation at aUSENIXSecurity Symposium in August 2013.[135][136]In July 2015, subsequent improvements in the attack make it increasingly practical to defeat the security of RC4-encrypted TLS.[137]
As many modern browsers have been designed to defeat BEAST attacks (except Safari for Mac OS X 10.7 or earlier, for iOS 6 or earlier, and for Windows; see§ Web browsers), RC4 is no longer a good choice for TLS 1.0. The CBC ciphers which were affected by the BEAST attack in the past have become a more popular choice for protection.[90]Mozilla and Microsoft recommend disabling RC4 where possible.[138][139]RFC7465prohibits the use of RC4 cipher suites in all versions of TLS.
On September 1, 2015, Microsoft, Google, and Mozilla announced that RC4 cipher suites would be disabled by default in their browsers (Microsoft Edge [Legacy],Internet Explorer 11on Windows 7/8.1/10,Firefox, andChrome) in early 2016.[140][141][142]
A TLS (logout) truncation attack blocks a victim's account logout requests so that the user unknowingly remains logged into a web service. When the request to sign out is sent, the attacker injects an unencryptedTCPFIN message (no more data from sender) to close the connection. The server therefore does not receive the logout request and is unaware of the abnormal termination.[143]
Published in July 2013,[144][145]the attack causes web services such asGmailandHotmailto display a page that informs the user that they have successfully signed-out, while ensuring that the user's browser maintains authorization with the service, allowing an attacker with subsequent access to the browser to access and take over control of the user's logged-in account. The attack does not rely on installing malware on the victim's computer; attackers need only place themselves between the victim and the web server (e.g., by setting up a rogue wireless hotspot).[143]This vulnerability also requires access to the victim's computer.
Another possibility is when using FTP the data connection can have a false FIN in the data stream, and if the protocol rules for exchanging close_notify alerts is not adhered to a file can be truncated.
In February 2013 two researchers from Royal Holloway, University of London discovered a timing attack[146]which allowed them to recover (parts of the) plaintext from a DTLS connection using the OpenSSL or GnuTLS implementation of DTLS whenCipher Block Chainingmode encryption was used.
This attack, discovered in mid-2016, exploits weaknesses in theWeb Proxy Autodiscovery Protocol(WPAD) to expose the URL that a web user is attempting to reach via a TLS-enabled web link.[147]Disclosure of a URL can violate a user's privacy, not only because of the website accessed, but also because URLs are sometimes used to authenticate users. Document sharing services, such as those offered by Google and Dropbox, also work by sending a user a security token that is included in the URL. An attacker who obtains such URLs may be able to gain full access to a victim's account or data.
The exploit works against almost all browsers and operating systems.
The Sweet32 attack breaks all 64-bit block ciphers used in CBC mode as used in TLS by exploiting abirthday attackand either aman-in-the-middle attackor injection of a maliciousJavaScriptinto a web page. The purpose of the man-in-the-middle attack or the JavaScript injection is to allow the attacker to capture enough traffic to mount a birthday attack.[148]
TheHeartbleedbug is a serious vulnerability specific to the implementation of SSL/TLS in the popularOpenSSLcryptographic software library, affecting versions 1.0.1 to 1.0.1f. This weakness, reported in April 2014, allows attackers to stealprivate keysfrom servers that should normally be protected.[149]The Heartbleed bug allows anyone on the Internet to read the memory of the systems protected by the vulnerable versions of the OpenSSL software. This compromises the secret private keys associated with thepublic certificatesused to identify the service providers and to encrypt the traffic, the names and passwords of the users and the actual content. This allows attackers to eavesdrop on communications, steal data directly from the services and users and to impersonate services and users.[150]The vulnerability is caused by abuffer over-readbug in the OpenSSL software, rather than a defect in the SSL or TLS protocol specification.
In September 2014, a variant ofDaniel Bleichenbacher's PKCS#1 v1.5 RSA Signature Forgery vulnerability[151]was announced by Intel Security Advanced Threat Research. This attack, dubbed BERserk, is a result of incomplete ASN.1 length decoding of public key signatures in some SSL implementations, and allows a man-in-the-middle attack by forging a public key signature.[152]
In February 2015, after media reported the hidden pre-installation ofsuperfishadware on some Lenovo notebooks,[153]a researcher found a trusted root certificate on affected Lenovo machines to be insecure, as the keys could easily be accessed using the company name, Komodia, as a passphrase.[154]The Komodia library was designed to intercept client-side TLS/SSL traffic for parental control and surveillance, but it was also used in numerous adware programs, including Superfish, that were often surreptitiously installed unbeknownst to the computer user. In turn, thesepotentially unwanted programsinstalled the corrupt root certificate, allowing attackers to completely control web traffic and confirm false websites as authentic.
In May 2016, it was reported that dozens of Danish HTTPS-protected websites belonging toVisa Inc.were vulnerable to attacks allowing hackers to inject malicious code and forged content into the browsers of visitors.[155]The attacks worked because the TLS implementation used on the affected servers incorrectly reused random numbers (nonces) that are intended to be used only once, ensuring that eachTLS handshakeis unique.[155]
In February 2017, an implementation error caused by a single mistyped character in code used to parse HTML created a buffer overflow error onCloudflareservers. Similar in its effects to the Heartbleed bug discovered in 2014, this overflow error, widely known asCloudbleed, allowed unauthorized third parties to read data in the memory of programs running on the servers—data that should otherwise have been protected by TLS.[156]
As of July 2021[update], the Trustworthy Internet Movement estimated the ratio of websites that are vulnerable to TLS attacks.[94]
Forward secrecy is a property of cryptographic systems which ensures that a session key derived from a set of public and private keys will not be compromised if one of the private keys is compromised in the future.[157]Without forward secrecy, if the server's private key is compromised, not only will all future TLS-encrypted sessions using that server certificate be compromised, but also any past sessions that used it as well (provided that these past sessions were intercepted and stored at the time of transmission).[158]An implementation of TLS can provide forward secrecy by requiring the use of ephemeralDiffie–Hellman key exchangeto establish session keys, and some notable TLS implementations do so exclusively: e.g.,Gmailand other Google HTTPS services that useOpenSSL.[159]However, many clients and servers supporting TLS (including browsers and web servers) are not configured to implement such restrictions.[160][161]In practice, unless a web service uses Diffie–Hellman key exchange to implement forward secrecy, all of the encrypted web traffic to and from that service can be decrypted by a third party if it obtains the server's master (private) key; e.g., by means of a court order.[162]
Even where Diffie–Hellman key exchange is implemented, server-side session management mechanisms can impact forward secrecy. The use ofTLS session tickets(a TLS extension) causes the session to be protected by AES128-CBC-SHA256 regardless of any other negotiated TLS parameters, including forward secrecy ciphersuites, and the long-lived TLS session ticket keys defeat the attempt to implement forward secrecy.[163][164][165]Stanford University research in 2014 also found that of 473,802 TLS servers surveyed, 82.9% of the servers deploying ephemeral Diffie–Hellman (DHE) key exchange to support forward secrecy were using weak Diffie–Hellman parameters. These weak parameter choices could potentially compromise the effectiveness of the forward secrecy that the servers sought to provide.[166]
Since late 2011, Google has provided forward secrecy with TLS by default to users of itsGmailservice, along withGoogle Docsand encrypted search, among other services.[167]Since November 2013,Twitterhas provided forward secrecy with TLS to users of its service.[168]As of August 2019[update], about 80% of TLS-enabled websites are configured to use cipher suites that provide forward secrecy to most web browsers.[94]
TLS interception (orHTTPSinterception if applied particularly to that protocol) is the practice of intercepting an encrypted data stream in order to decrypt it, read and possibly manipulate it, and then re-encrypt it and send the data on its way again. This is done by way of a "transparent proxy": the interception software terminates the incoming TLS connection, inspects the HTTP plaintext, and then creates a new TLS connection to the destination.[169]
TLS/HTTPS interception is used as aninformation securitymeasure by network operators in order to be able to scan for and protect against the intrusion of malicious content into the network, such ascomputer virusesand othermalware.[169]Such content could otherwise not be detected as long as it is protected by encryption, which is increasingly the case as a result of the routine use of HTTPS and other secure protocols.
A significant drawback of TLS/HTTPS interception is that it introduces new security risks of its own. One notable limitation is that it provides a point where network traffic is available unencrypted thus giving attackers an incentive to attack this point in particular in order to gain access to otherwise secure content. The interception also allows the network operator, or persons who gain access to its interception system, to performman-in-the-middle attacksagainst network users. A 2017 study found that "HTTPS interception has become startlingly widespread, and that interception products as a class have a dramatically negative impact on connection security".[169]
The TLS protocol exchangesrecords, which encapsulate the data to be exchanged in a specific format (see below). Each record can be compressed, padded, appended with amessage authentication code(MAC), or encrypted, all depending on the state of the connection. Each record has acontent typefield that designates the type of data encapsulated, a length field and a TLS version field. The data encapsulated may be control or procedural messages of the TLS itself, or simply the application data needed to be transferred by TLS. The specifications (cipher suite, keys etc.) required to exchange application data by TLS, are agreed upon in the "TLS handshake" between the client requesting the data and the server responding to requests. The protocol therefore defines both the structure of payloads transferred in TLS and the procedure to establish and monitor the transfer.
When the connection starts, the record encapsulates a "control" protocol – the handshake messaging protocol (content type22). This protocol is used to exchange all the information required by both sides for the exchange of the actual application data by TLS. It defines the format of messages and the order of their exchange. These may vary according to the demands of the client and server – i.e., there are several possible procedures to set up the connection. This initial exchange results in a successful TLS connection (both parties ready to transfer application data with TLS) or an alert message (as specified below).
A typical connection example follows, illustrating ahandshakewhere the server (but not the client) is authenticated by its certificate:
The followingfullexample shows a client being authenticated (in addition to the server as in the example above; seemutual authentication) via TLS using certificates exchanged between both peers.
Public key operations (e.g., RSA) are relatively expensive in terms of computational power. TLS provides a secure shortcut in the handshake mechanism to avoid these operations: resumed sessions. Resumed sessions are implemented using session IDs or session tickets.
Apart from the performance benefit, resumed sessions can also be used forsingle sign-on, as it guarantees that both the original session and any resumed session originate from the same client. This is of particular importance for theFTP over TLS/SSLprotocol, which would otherwise suffer from a man-in-the-middle attack in which an attacker could intercept the contents of the secondary data connections.[172]
The TLS 1.3 handshake was condensed to only one round trip compared to the two round trips required in previous versions of TLS/SSL.
To start the handshake, the client guesses which key exchange algorithm will be selected by the server and sends aClientHellomessage to the server containing a list of supported ciphers (in order of the client's preference) and public keys for some or all of its key exchange guesses. If the client successfully guesses the key exchange algorithm, 1 round trip is eliminated from the handshake. After receiving theClientHello, the server selects a cipher and sends back aServerHellowith its own public key, followed by serverCertificateandFinishedmessages.[173]
After the client receives the server's finished message, it now is coordinated with the server on which cipher suite to use.[174]
In an ordinaryfullhandshake, the server sends asession idas part of theServerHellomessage. The client associates thissession idwith the server's IP address and TCP port, so that when the client connects again to that server, it can use thesession idto shortcut the handshake. In the server, thesession idmaps to the cryptographic parameters previously negotiated, specifically the "master secret". Both sides must have the same "master secret" or the resumed handshake will fail (this prevents an eavesdropper from using asession id). The random data in theClientHelloandServerHellomessages virtually guarantee that the generated connection keys will be different from in the previous connection. In the RFCs, this type of handshake is called anabbreviatedhandshake. It is also described in the literature as arestarthandshake.
RFC5077extends TLS via use of session tickets, instead of session IDs. It defines a way to resume a TLS session without requiring that session-specific state is stored at the TLS server.
When using session tickets, the TLS server stores its session-specific state in a session ticket and sends the session ticket to the TLS client for storing. The client resumes a TLS session by sending the session ticket to the server, and the server resumes the TLS session according to the session-specific state in the ticket. The session ticket is encrypted and authenticated by the server, and the server verifies its validity before using its contents.
One particular weakness of this method withOpenSSLis that it always limits encryption and authentication security of the transmitted TLS session ticket toAES128-CBC-SHA256, no matter what other TLS parameters were negotiated for the actual TLS session.[164]This means that the state information (the TLS session ticket) is not as well protected as the TLS session itself. Of particular concern is OpenSSL's storage of the keys in an application-wide context (SSL_CTX), i.e. for the life of the application, and not allowing for re-keying of theAES128-CBC-SHA256TLS session tickets without resetting the application-wide OpenSSL context (which is uncommon, error-prone and often requires manual administrative intervention).[165][163]
This is the general format of all TLS records.
Most messages exchanged during the setup of the TLS session are based on this record, unless an error or warning occurs and needs to be signaled by an Alert protocol record (see below), or the encryption mode of the session is modified by another record (see ChangeCipherSpec protocol below).
Note that multiple handshake messages may be combined within one record.
This record should normally not be sent during normal handshaking or application exchanges. However, this message can be sent at any time during the handshake and up to the closure of the session. If this is used to signal a fatal error, the session will be closed immediately after sending this record, so this record is used to give a reason for this closure. If the alert level is flagged as a warning, the remote can decide to close the session if it decides that the session is not reliable enough for its needs (before doing so, the remote may also send its own signal).
From the application protocol point of view, TLS belongs to a lower layer, although the TCP/IP model is too coarse to show it. This means that the TLS handshake is usually (except in theSTARTTLScase) performed before the application protocol can start. In thename-based virtual serverfeature being provided by the application layer, all co-hosted virtual servers share the same certificate because the server has to select and send a certificate immediately after the ClientHello message. This is a big problem in hosting environments because it means either sharing the same certificate among all customers or using a different IP address for each of them.
There are two known workarounds provided byX.509:
To provide the server name,RFC4366Transport Layer Security (TLS) Extensions allow clients to include aServer Name Indicationextension (SNI) in the extended ClientHello message. This extension hints to the server immediately which name the client wishes to connect to, so the server
can select the appropriate certificate to send to the clients.
RFC2817also documents a method to implement name-based virtual hosting by upgrading HTTP to TLS via anHTTP/1.1 Upgrade header. Normally this is to securely implement HTTP over TLS within the main "http"URI scheme(which avoids forking the URI space and reduces the number of used ports), however, few implementations currently support this.[citation needed]
The current approved version of (D)TLS is version 1.3, which is specified in:
The current standards replaces these former versions, which are now considered obsolete:
OtherRFCssubsequently extended (D)TLS.
Extensions to (D)TLS 1.3 include:
Extensions to (D)TLS 1.2 include:
Extensions to (D)TLS 1.1 include:
Extensions to TLS 1.0 include:
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transport_Layer_Security
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Ransomwareis a type ofmalwarethatencryptsthe victim'spersonal datauntil aransomis paid.[1][2][3][4][5]Difficult-to-tracedigital currenciessuch aspaysafecardorBitcoinand othercryptocurrenciesare commonly used for the ransoms, making tracing and prosecuting the perpetrators difficult. Sometimes the original files can be retrieved without paying the ransom due to implementation mistakes, leaked cryptographic keys or a complete lack of encryption in the ransomware.
Ransomware attacks are typically carried out using aTrojandisguised as a legitimate file that the user is tricked into downloading or opening when it arrives as an email attachment. However, one high-profile example, theWannaCry worm, traveled automatically between computers without user interaction.[6]
Starting as early as 1989 with the first documented ransomware known as theAIDS trojan, the use of ransomware scams grew internationally.[7][8][9]There were 181.5 million ransomware attacks worldwide in the first six months of 2018, 229% more than the first six months of 2017.[10]In June 2014,security softwarecompanyMcAfeereleased data showing that it had collected more than double the number of ransomware samples that quarter than it had in the same quarter the previous year.[11]CryptoLockerwas particularly successful, procuring an estimated US$3 million before it was taken down by authorities,[12]and CryptoWall was estimated by the USFederal Bureau of Investigation(FBI) to have accrued over US$18 million by June 2015.[13]In 2020, the USInternet Crime Complaint Center(IC3) received 2,474 complaints identified as ransomware, with adjusted losses of over $29.1 million. The losses could exceed this amount, according to the FBI.[14]Globally, according toStatistica, there were about 623 million ransomware attacks in 2021, and 493 million in 2022.[15]
Ransomware payments were estimated at $1.1bn in 2019,[16]$999m in 2020, a record $1.25bn in 2023, and a sharp drop to $813m in 2024,[17]attributed to non-payment by victims and action by law enforcement.
The concept of file-encrypting ransomware was invented and implemented by Young andYungatColumbia Universityand was presented at the 1996 IEEE Security & Privacy conference. It is calledcryptoviral extortionand it was inspired by the fictional facehugger in the movieAlien.[18]Cryptoviral extortion is the following three-round protocol carried out between the attacker and the victim.[1]
Thesymmetric keyis randomly generated and will not assist other victims. At no point is the attacker's private key exposed to victims and the victim need only send a very small ciphertext (the encrypted symmetric-cipher key) to the attacker.
Ransomware attacks are typically carried out using aTrojan, entering a system through, for example, a malicious attachment, an embedded link in aphishingemail, or a vulnerability in a network service. The program then runs apayload, which locks the system in some fashion, or claims to lock the system but does not (e.g., ascarewareprogram). Payloads may display a fake warning purportedly by an entity such as alaw enforcement agency, falsely claiming that the system has been used for illegal activities, contains content such aspornographyand"pirated" media.[19][20][21]
Some payloads consist simply of an application designed to lock or restrict the system until payment is made, typically by setting theWindows Shellto itself,[22]or even modifying themaster boot recordand/orpartition tableto prevent the operating system from booting until it is repaired.[23]The most sophisticated payloadsencryptfiles, with many usingstrong encryptiontoencryptthe victim's files in such a way that only the malware author has the needed decryption key.[1][24][25]
Payment is virtually always the goal, and the victim iscoercedinto paying for the ransomware to be removed either by supplying a program that can decrypt the files, or by sending an unlock code that undoes the payload's changes. While the attacker may simply take the money without returning the victim's files, it is in the attacker's best interest to perform the decryption as agreed, since victims will stop sending payments if it becomes known that they serve no purpose. A key element in making ransomware work for the attacker is a convenient payment system that is hard to trace. A range of such payment methods have been used, includingwire transfers,premium-rate text messages,[26]pre-paidvoucherservices such aspaysafecard,[7][27][28]and theBitcoincryptocurrency.[29][30][31]
In May 2020, vendor Sophos reported that the global average cost to remediate a ransomware attack (considering downtime, people time, device cost, network cost, lost opportunity and ransom paid) was $761,106. Ninety-five percent of organizations that paid the ransom had their data restored.[32]
The first known malware extortion attack, the"AIDS Trojan"written by Joseph Popp in 1989, had a design failure so severe it was not necessary to pay the extortionist at all. Its payload hid the files on the hard drive and encrypted only theirnames, and displayed a message claiming that the user's license to use a certain piece of software had expired. The user was asked to payUS$189 to "PC Cyborg Corporation" in order to obtain a repair tool even though the decryption key could be extracted from the code of the Trojan. The Trojan was also known as "PC Cyborg". Popp was declaredmentally unfitto stand trial for his actions, but he promised to donate the profits from the malware to fundAIDSresearch.[33]
The idea of abusing anonymous cash systems to safely collect ransom from humankidnappingwas introduced in 1992 by Sebastiaan von Solms andDavid Naccache.[34]This electronic money collection method was also proposed for cryptoviral extortion attacks.[1]In the von Solms-Naccache scenario a newspaper publication was used (since bitcoin ledgers did not exist at the time the paper was written).
The notion of using public key cryptography for data kidnapping attacks was introduced in 1996 by Adam L. Young andMoti Yung. Young and Yung critiqued the failed AIDS Information Trojan that relied onsymmetric cryptographyalone, the fatal flaw being that the decryption key could be extracted from the Trojan, and implemented an experimental proof-of-concept cryptovirus on aMacintosh SE/30that usedRSAand theTiny Encryption Algorithm(TEA) tohybrid encryptthe victim's data. Sincepublic key cryptographyis used, the virus only contains theencryptionkey. The attacker keeps the correspondingprivatedecryption key private. Young and Yung's original experimental cryptovirus had the victim send the asymmetric ciphertext to the attacker who deciphers it and returns the symmetric decryption key it contains to the victim for a fee. Long beforeelectronic moneyexisted Young and Yung proposed that electronic money could be extorted through encryption as well, stating that "the virus writer can effectively hold all of the money ransom until half of it is given to him. Even if the e-money was previously encrypted by the user, it is of no use to the user if it gets encrypted by a cryptovirus".[1]They referred to these attacks as being "cryptoviralextortion", an overt attack that is part of a larger class of attacks in a field calledcryptovirology, which encompasses both overt and covert attacks.[1]The cryptoviral extortion protocol was inspired by the parasitic relationship between H. R. Giger's facehugger and its host in the movieAlien.[1][18]
Examples of extortionate ransomware became prominent in May 2005.[35]By mid-2006, Trojans such asGpcode, TROJ.RANSOM.A,Archiveus, Krotten, Cryzip, and MayArchive began utilizing more sophisticated RSA encryption schemes, with ever-increasing key-sizes. Gpcode.AG, which was detected in June 2006, was encrypted with a 660-bit RSA public key.[36]In June 2008, a variant known as Gpcode.AK was detected. Using a 1024-bit RSA key, it was believed large enough to be computationally infeasible to break without a concerteddistributedeffort.[37][38][39][40]
Encrypting ransomware returned to prominence in late 2013 with the propagation ofCryptoLocker—using theBitcoindigital currencyplatform to collect ransom money. In December 2013,ZDNetestimated based on Bitcoin transaction information that between 15 October and 18 December, the operators of CryptoLocker had procured about US$27 million from infected users.[41]The CryptoLocker technique waswidely copiedin the months following, including CryptoLocker 2.0 (thought not to be related to CryptoLocker), CryptoDefense (which initially contained a major design flaw that stored the private key on the infected system in auser-retrievable location, due to its use of Windows' built-in encryption APIs),[30][42][43][44]and the August 2014 discovery of a Trojan specifically targetingnetwork-attached storagedevices produced bySynology.[45]In January 2015, it was reported that ransomware-styled attacks have occurred against individual websites via hacking, and through ransomware designed to targetLinux-basedweb servers.[46][47][48]
In 2022, Costa Rica received widespreadContiransomware attacks affecting government, healthcare and industry.[49]This led President Rodrigo Chaves to declare a state of emergency and announce that Costa Rica is "at war" with its ransomware hackers.[50]
In some infections, there is a two-stage payload, common in many malware systems. The user is tricked into running a script, which downloads the main virus and executes it. In early versions of the dual-payload system, the script was contained in a Microsoft Office document with an attached VBScript macro, or in a windows scripting facility (WSF) file. As detection systems started blocking these first stage payloads, the Microsoft Malware Protection Center identified a trend away towardLNK fileswith self-contained Microsoft WindowsPowerShellscripts.[51]In 2016, PowerShell was found to be involved in nearly 40% of endpoint security incidents.[52]
Some ransomware strains have usedproxiestied toTorhidden servicesto connect to theircommand and controlservers, increasing the difficulty of tracing the exact location of the criminals.[53][54]Furthermore,dark webvendors have increasingly[when?]started to offer the technologyas a service, wherein ransomware is sold, ready for deployment on victims' machines, on a subscription basis, similarly to Adobe Creative Cloud or Office 365.[54][55][56]
Symantec has classified ransomware to be the most dangerous cyber threat.[57]
In August 2010, Russian authorities arrested nine individuals connected to a ransomware Trojan known as WinLock. Unlike the previous Gpcode Trojan, WinLock did not use encryption. Instead, WinLock trivially restricted access to the system by displaying pornographic images and asked users to send apremium-rate SMS(costing around US$10) to receive a code that could be used to unlock their machines. The scam hit numerous users across Russia and neighbouring countries—reportedly earning the group over US$16 million.[21][58]
In 2011, a ransomware Trojan surfaced that imitated theWindows Product Activationnotice, and informed users that a system's Windows installation had to be re-activated due to "[being a] victim of fraud". An online activation option was offered (like the actual Windows activation process), but was unavailable, requiring the user to call one of sixinternational numbersto input a 6-digit code. While the malware claimed that this call would be free, it was routed through a rogue operator in a country with high international phone rates, who placed the call on hold, causing the user to incur large internationallong-distancecharges.[19]
In 2012, Symantec reported spread out of Eastern Europe of ransomware with a lock screen purporting to be law enforcement demanding payment for illegal activity.[59]
In February 2013, a ransomware Trojan based on the Stamp.EKexploit kitsurfaced; the malware was distributed via sites hosted on the project hosting servicesSourceForgeandGitHubthat claimed to offer "fake nude pics" of celebrities.[60]In July 2013, anOS X-specific ransomware Trojan surfaced, which displays a web page that accuses the user of downloading pornography. Unlike its Windows-based counterparts, it does not block the entire computer, but simplyexploits the behaviour of the web browser itselfto frustrate attempts to close the page through normal means.[61]
In July 2013, a 21-year-old man from Virginia, whose computer coincidentally did contain pornographic photographs of underage girls with whom he had conducted sexualized communications, turned himself in to police after receiving and being deceived byFBI MoneyPak Ransomwareaccusing him of possessing child pornography. An investigation discovered the incriminating files, and the man was charged withchild sexual abuseand possession of child pornography.[62]
The converse of ransomware is acryptovirologyattack invented by Adam L. Young that threatens to publish stolen information from the victim's computer system rather than deny the victim access to it.[63]In a leakware attack, malware exfiltrates sensitive host data either to the attacker or alternatively, to remote instances of the malware, and the attacker threatens to publish the victim's data unless a ransom is paid. The attack was presented atWest Pointin 2003 and was summarized in the bookMalicious Cryptographyas follows, "The attack differs from the extortion attack in the following way. In the extortion attack, the victim is denied access to its own valuable information and has to pay to get it back, where in the attack that is presented here the victim retains access to the information but its disclosure is at the discretion of the computer virus".[64]The attack is rooted in game theory and was originally dubbed "non-zero sum games and survivable malware". The attack can yield monetary gain in cases where the malware acquires access to information that may damage the victim user or organization, e.g., the reputational damage that could result from publishing proof that the attack itself was a success.
Common targets for exfiltration include:
Exfiltration attacks are usually targeted, with a curated victim list, and often preliminary surveillance of the victim's systems to find potential data targets and weaknesses.[65][66]
With the increased popularity of ransomware on PC platforms, ransomware targetingmobile operating systemshas also proliferated. Typically, mobile ransomware payloads are blockers, as there is little incentive to encrypt data since it can be easily restored via online synchronization.[67]Mobile ransomware typically targets theAndroidplatform, as it allows applications to be installed from third-party sources.[67][68]The payload is typically distributed as anAPK fileinstalled by an unsuspecting user; it may attempt to display a blocking message over top of all other applications,[68]while another used a form ofclickjackingto cause the user to give it "device administrator" privileges to achieve deeper access to the system.[69]
Different tactics have been used oniOSdevices, such as exploitingiCloudaccounts and using theFind My iPhonesystem to lock access to the device.[70]OniOS 10.3, Apple patched a bug in the handling of JavaScript pop-up windows inSafarithat had been exploited by ransomware websites.[71]It recently[when?]has been shown that ransomware may also target ARM architectures like those that can be found in various Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices, such as Industrial IoT edge devices.[72]
In August 2019 researchers demonstrated it is possible to infectDSLR cameraswith ransomware.[73]Digital cameras often usePicture Transfer Protocol(PTP - standard protocol used to transfer files.) Researchers found that it was possible to exploit vulnerabilities in the protocol to infect target camera(s) with ransomware (or execute any arbitrary code). This attack was presented at theDefconsecurity conference in Las Vegas as a proof of concept attack (not as actual armed malware).
The first attacks were on random users, typically infected through email attachments sent by small groups of criminals, demanding a few hundred dollars in cryptocurrency to unlock files (typically a private individual's photographs and documents) that the ransomware had encrypted. As ransomware matured as a business, organised gangs entered the field, advertising on thedark Webfor experts, andoutsourcingfunctions. This led to improvement in the quality of ransomware and its success. Rather than random emails, the gangs stole credentials, found vulnerabilities in target networks, and improved the malware to avoid detection by anti-malware scanners. Ransoms demanded escalated into the much larger sums (millions) that an enterprise would pay to recover its data, rather than what an individual would pay for their documents (hundreds).
In 2016, a significant uptick in ransomware attacks on hospitals was noted. According to the 2017 Internet Security Threat Report from Symantec Corp, ransomware affected not only IT systems but also patient care, clinical operations, and billing. Online criminals may be motivated by the money available and sense of urgency within the healthcare system.[74]
Ransomware is growing rapidly across the internet users but also for the IoT environment.[59]The big problem is that millions of dollars are lost by some organizations and industries that have decided to pay, such as the Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center and the MedStar Health.[75]
According to Symantec 2019 ISTR report, for the first time since 2013, in 2018 there was an observed decrease in ransomware activity with a drop of 20 percent. Before 2017, consumers were the preferred victims, but in 2017 this changed dramatically, it moved to the enterprises. In 2018 this path accelerated with 81 percent infections which represented a 12 percent increase.[76]The common distribution method today is based on email campaigns.
In late 2019 ransomware group Maze downloaded companies' sensitive files before locking them, and threatened to leak the data publicly if the ransom was not paid; in at least one case they did this. Many other gangs followed; "leak sites" were created on the dark web where stolen data could be accessed. Later attacks focussed on the threat to leak data, without necessarily locking it—this negated the protection afforded victims by robust backup procedures. As of 2023[update]there is a risk of hostile governments using ransomware to conceal what is actually intelligence gathering.[77]
The first reported death following a ransomware attack was at a German hospital in October 2020.[78]
There was a significant increase in ransomware attacks during the 2020COVID-19 pandemic. Evidence found that the targeted institutions of these attacks included government, finance, and healthcare. Researchers have contended that several different factors can explain the increase in attacks during this time. However, a major factor is thatremote work, which became the norm for many industries in 2020, led to the surge in attacks because of the lack of security in comparison to traditional work environments.[79]
Ransomware attacks are estimated to have led to payments totalling $1.1bn in 2019, $999m in 2020, and a record $1.25bn in 2023. This decreased to $813m in 2024, with a sharp drop in the second half of the year, according to research firmChainalysis, attributed to victims refusing to pay, and action by law enforcement. However, Chainalysis said that the downward trend in payments was fragile, and ransomware attacks remained prolific.[80]A coordinated international operation in February 2024 took down gangLockBit, and gangBlackCat/ALPHVdisappeared.[80]
As of early 2015, the United Kingdom was considering banning schools, the NHS and local councils from making ransomware payments, requiring private companies to report proposed payouts, and requiring mandatory reporting of ransomware attacks.[80]
In 2012, a major ransomware Trojan known as Reveton began to spread. Based on the CitadelTrojan(which, itself, is based on theZeusTrojan), its payload displays a warning purportedly from a law enforcement agency claiming that the computer has been used for illegal activities, such as downloadingunlicensed softwareorchild pornography. Due to this behaviour, it is commonly referred to as the "Police Trojan".[81][82][83]The warning informs the user that to unlock their system, they would have to pay a fine using a voucher from an anonymous prepaid cash service such asUkashorpaysafecard. To increase the illusion that the computer is being tracked by law enforcement, the screen also displays the computer'sIP address, while some versions display footage from a victim'swebcamto give the illusion that the user is being recorded.[7][84]
Reveton initially began spreading in various European countries in early 2012.[7]Variants were localized with templates branded with the logos of different law enforcement organizations based on the user's country; for example, variants used in the United Kingdom contained the branding of organizations such as theMetropolitan Police Serviceand thePolice National E-Crime Unit. Another version contained the logo of theroyalty collection societyPRS for Music, which specifically accused the user of illegally downloading music.[85]In a statement warning the public about the malware, the Metropolitan Police clarified that they would never lock a computer in such a way as part of an investigation.[7][20]
In May 2012,Trend Microthreat researchers discovered templates for variations for theUnited StatesandCanada, suggesting that its authors may have been planning to target users in North America.[86]By August 2012, a new variant of Reveton began to spread in the United States, claiming to require the payment of a$200 fine to the FBI using aMoneyPakcard.[8][9][84]In February 2013, a Russian citizen was arrested inDubaiby Spanish authorities for his connection to a crime ring that had been using Reveton; ten other individuals were arrested onmoney launderingcharges.[87]In August 2014,Avast Softwarereported that it had found new variants of Reveton that also distribute password-stealing malware as part of its payload.[88]
Encrypting ransomware reappeared in September 2013 with a Trojan known asCryptoLocker, which generated a 2048-bit RSA key pair and uploaded in turn to a command-and-control server, and used to encrypt files using awhitelistof specificfile extensions. The malware threatened to delete the private key if a payment ofBitcoinor a pre-paid cash voucher was not made within 3 days of the infection. Due to the extremely large key size it uses, analysts and those affected by the Trojan considered CryptoLocker extremely difficult to repair.[29][89][90][91]Even after the deadline passed, the private key could still be obtained using an online tool, but the price would increase to 10 BTC—which cost approximately US$2300 as of November 2013.[92][93]
CryptoLocker was isolated by the seizure of theGameover ZeuSbotnetas part ofOperation Tovar, as officially announced by theU.S. Department of Justiceon 2 June 2014. The Department of Justice also publicly issued anindictmentagainst the Russian hacker Evgeniy Bogachev for his alleged involvement in the botnet.[94][95]It was estimated that at least US$3 million was extorted with the malware before the shutdown.[12]
In September 2014, a wave of ransomware Trojans surfaced that first targeted users inAustralia, under the namesCryptoWallandCryptoLocker(which is, as with CryptoLocker 2.0, unrelated to the original CryptoLocker). The Trojans spread via fraudulent e-mails claiming to be failed parcel delivery notices fromAustralia Post; to evade detection by automatic e-mail scanners that follow all links on a page to scan for malware, this variant was designed to require users to visit a web page and enter aCAPTCHAcode before the payload is actually downloaded, preventing such automated processes from being able to scan the payload.Symantecdetermined that these new variants, which it identified asCryptoLocker.F, were again, unrelated to the original CryptoLocker due to differences in their operation.[96][97]A notable victim of the Trojans was theAustralian Broadcasting Corporation; live programming on its televisionnews channelABC News 24was disrupted for half an hour and shifted toMelbournestudios due to a CryptoWall infection on computers at itsSydneystudio.[98][99][100]
Another Trojan in this wave,TorrentLocker, initially contained a design flaw comparable to CryptoDefense; it used the samekeystreamfor every infected computer, making the encryption trivial to overcome. However, this flaw was later fixed.[42]By late-November 2014, it was estimated that over 9,000 users had been infected by TorrentLocker in Australia alone, trailing only Turkey with 11,700 infections.[101]
Another major ransomware Trojan targeting Windows, CryptoWall, first appeared in 2014. One strain of CryptoWall was distributed as part of amalvertisingcampaign on theZedoad network in late-September 2014 that targeted several major websites; the ads redirected to rogue websites that used browser pluginexploits[102]to download the payload. ABarracuda Networksresearcher also noted that the payload was signed with adigital signaturein an effort to appear trustworthy to security software.[103]CryptoWall 3.0 used a payload written inJavaScriptas part of an email attachment, which downloads executables disguised asJPGimages. To further evade detection, the malware creates new instances ofexplorer.exeandsvchost.exeto communicate with its servers. When encrypting files, the malware also deletes volume shadow copies and installs spyware that steals passwords andBitcoin wallets.[104]
The FBI reported in June 2015 that nearly 1,000 victims had contacted the bureau'sInternet Crime Complaint Centerto report CryptoWall infections, and estimated losses of at least $18 million.[13]
The most recent[when?]version, CryptoWall 4.0, enhanced its code to avoid antivirus detection, and encrypts not only the data in files but also the file names.[105]
Fusob is a major family of mobile ransomware. Between April 2015 and March 2016, about 56 percent of accounted mobile ransomware was Fusob.[106]
Like most other pieces of ransomware, it employs scare tactics to extort a hefty sum from the user.[107]The appacts as if it were a notice from the authorities, demanding the victim to pay a fine from $100 to $200USDor otherwise face a fictitious criminal charge. Fusob requests iTunes gift cards for payment, unlike most cryptocurrency-centric ransomware.
In order to infect devices, Fusobmasqueradesas a pornographic video player.[108]When it is installed, it first checks the device's system language. If the language is Russian or Eastern-European, Fusob remains dormant. Otherwise, it locks the device and demands ransom. About 40% of victims are in Germany, while the United Kingdom encompasses 14.5% of victims and the US encompasses 11.4%. Fusob and Small (another family of ransomware) represented over 93% of mobile ransomware between 2015 and 2016.
In May 2017, theWannaCry ransomware attackspread through the Internet, using an exploit vector namedEternalBlue, which was allegedly leaked from the U.S.National Security Agency. The ransomware attack, unprecedented in scale,[109]infected more than 230,000 computers in over 150 countries,[110]using 20 different languages to demand money from users usingBitcoincryptocurrency. WannaCry demanded US$300 per computer.[111]The attack affectedTelefónicaand several other large companies in Spain, as well as parts of the BritishNational Health Service(NHS), where at least 16 hospitals had to turn away patients or cancel scheduled operations,[112]FedEx,Deutsche Bahn,Honda,[113]Renault, as well as theRussian Interior Ministryand Russian telecomMegaFon.[114]The attackers gave their victims a 7-day deadline from the day their computers got infected, after which the encrypted files would be deleted.[115]
Petya was first discovered in March 2016; unlike other forms of encrypting ransomware, the malware aimed to infect themaster boot record, installing a payload which encrypts the file tables of theNTFSfile system the next time that the infected system boots, blocking the system from booting into Windows at all until the ransom is paid.Check Pointreported that despite what it believed to be an innovative evolution in ransomware design, it had resulted in relatively-fewer infections than other ransomware active around the same time frame.[116]
On 27 June 2017, a heavily modified version of Petya was used for a global cyberattack primarily targetingUkraine(but affecting many countries[117]). This version had been modified to propagate using the same EternalBlue exploit that was used by WannaCry. Due to another design change, it is also unable to actually unlock a system after the ransom is paid; this led to security analysts speculating that the attack was not meant to generate illicit profit, but to simply cause disruption.[118][119]
On 24 October 2017, some users inRussiaand Ukraine reported a new ransomware attack, named "Bad Rabbit", which follows a similar pattern to WannaCry and Petya by encrypting the user's file tables and then demands a Bitcoin payment to decrypt them.ESETbelieved the ransomware to have been distributed by a bogus update toAdobe Flashsoftware.[120]Among agencies that were affected by the ransomware were:Interfax,Odesa International Airport,Kyiv Metro, and the Ministry of Infrastructure of Ukraine.[121]As it used corporate network structures to spread, the ransomware was also discovered in other countries, including Turkey, Germany, Poland, Japan, South Korea, and the United States.[122]Experts believed the ransomware attack was tied to the Petya attack in Ukraine (especially because Bad Rabbit's code has many overlapping and analogical elements to the code of Petya/NotPetya,[123]appending to CrowdStrike Bad Rabbit and NotPetya's dynamic link library (DLL) share 67 percent of the same code[124]) though the only identity to the culprits are the names of characters from theGame of Thronesseries embedded within the code.[122]
Security experts found that the ransomware did not use the EternalBlue exploit to spread, and a simple method to inoculate an unaffected machine running older Windows versions was found by 24 October 2017.[125][126]Further, the sites that had been used to spread the bogus Flash updating have gone offline or removed the problematic files within a few days of its discovery, effectively killing off the spread of Bad Rabbit.[122]
In 2016, a new strain of ransomware emerged that was targetingJBossservers.[127]This strain, named "SamSam", was found to bypass the process of phishing or illicit downloads in favor of exploiting vulnerabilities on weak servers.[128]The malware uses aRemote Desktop Protocolbrute-force attackto guess weak passwords until one is broken. The virus has been behind attacks on government and healthcare targets, with notable hacks occurring against the town ofFarmington, New Mexico, theColorado Department of Transportation,Davidson County, North Carolina, and most recently,[when?]aransomware attackon the infrastructure ofAtlanta.[128]
Mohammad Mehdi Shah Mansouri (born inQom,Iranin 1991) and Faramarz Shahi Savandi (born inShiraz,Iran, in 1984) are wanted by theFBIfor allegedly launching SamSam ransomware.[129]The two have allegedly made $6 million from extortion and caused over $30 million in damages using the malware.[130]
On May 7, 2021, a cyberattack was executed on the US Colonial Pipeline. TheFederal Bureau of InvestigationidentifiedDarkSideas the perpetrator of theColonial Pipeline ransomware attack, perpetrated bymalicious code, that led to a voluntary shutdown of the main pipeline supplying 45% of fuel to theEast Coast of the United States. The attack was described as the worst cyberattack to date on the U.S.critical infrastructure. DarkSide successfully extorted about 75Bitcoin(almost US$5 million) from Colonial Pipeline. U.S. officials are investigating whether the attack was purely criminal or took place with the involvement of the Russian government or another state sponsor. Following the attack, DarkSide posted a statement claiming that "We are apolitical, we do not participate ingeopolitics...Our goal is to make money and not creating problems for society."
In May 2021, the FBI andCybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency(CISA) issued a joint alert urging the owners and operators of critical infrastructure to take certain steps to reduce their vulnerability to DarkSide ransomware and ransomware in general.
Syskeyis a utility that was included withWindows NT-based operating systems to encrypt theuser account database, optionally with a password. The tool has sometimes been effectively used as ransomware duringtechnical support scams—where a caller with remote access to the computer may use the tool to lock the user out of their computer with a password known only to them.[131]Syskey was removed from later versions ofWindows 10andWindows Serverin 2017, due to being obsolete and "known to be used by hackers as part of ransomware scams".[132][133]
Ransomware-as-a-service (RaaS) became a notable method after the Russia-based[134]or Russian-speaking[135]groupREvilstaged operations against several targets, including the Brazil-basedJBS S.A.in May 2021, and the US-basedKaseya Limitedin July 2021.[136]After a July 9, 2021 phone call between United States presidentJoe Bidenand Russian presidentVladimir Putin, Biden told the press, "I made it very clear to him that the United States expects when a ransomware operation is coming from his soil even though it’s not sponsored by the state, we expect them to act if we give them enough information to act on who that is." Biden later added that the United States would take the group's servers down if Putin did not.[137][138]Four days later, REvil websites and other infrastructure vanished from the internet.[139]
If an attack is suspected or detected in its early stages, it takes some time for encryption to take place; immediate removal of the malware (a relatively simple process) before it has completed would stop further damage to data, without salvaging any already lost.[140][141]
Security experts have suggested precautionary measures for dealing with ransomware. Using software or other security policies to block known payloads from launching will help to prevent infection, but will not protect against all attacks[29][142]As such, having a properbackupsolution is a critical component to defending against ransomware. Note that, because many ransomware attackers will not only encrypt the victim's live machine but it will also attempt to delete any hot backups stored locally or on accessible over the network on aNAS, it is also critical to maintain "offline"backupsof datastored in locations inaccessible from any potentially infected computer, such as external storage drives or devices thatdo not have any access to any network (including the Internet), prevents them from being accessed by the ransomware. Moreover, if using a NAS orCloud storage, then the computer should haveappend-onlypermission to the destination storage, such that it cannot delete or overwrite previous backups. According tocomodo, applying twoAttack SurfaceReduction onOS/Kernelprovides a materially-reduced attack surface which results in a heightened security posture.[143][144][145]
Installing securityupdatesissued by software vendors can mitigate thevulnerabilitiesleveraged by certain strains to propagate.[146][147][148][149][150]Other measures includecyber hygiene− exercising caution when openinge-mail attachmentsand links,network segmentation, and keeping critical computers isolated from networks.[151][152]Furthermore, to mitigate the spread of ransomware measures ofinfection controlcan be applied.[153]Such may include disconnecting infected machines from all networks, educational programs,[154]effective communication channels, malware surveillance[original research?]and ways of collective participation[153]
In August 2021, theCybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA)released a report that provided guidance for how to mitigate ransomware attacks. This was due to a significant jump in recent attacks related to ransomware. These attacks included aggression against a US pipeline company and a software company, which impacted the downstream customers ofMSPs.[155]
Write Once Read Many(WORM) storage, such as many optical disc formats are virtually immune to ransomware since its contents cannot be changed or deleted. However data cannot be deleted in any way making it impractical for many storage due to privacy laws and other content laws, the only way is to copy it to a new WORM disk minus the unwanted files, then destroy the original copy.
A number of file systems keep snapshots of the data they hold, which can be used to recover the contents of files from a time prior to the ransomware attack in the event the ransomware does not disable it.
There are a number of tools intended specifically to decrypt files locked by ransomware, although successful recovery may not be possible.[2][158]If the same encryption key is used for all files, decryption tools use files for which there are both uncorrupted backups and encrypted copies (aknown-plaintext attackin the jargon ofcryptanalysis. But it only works when the cipher the attacker used was weak to begin with, being vulnerable to known-plaintext attack); recovery of the key, if it is possible, may take several days.[159]Free ransomware decryption tools can help decrypt files encrypted by the following forms of ransomware: AES_NI, Alcatraz Locker, Apocalypse, BadBlock, Bart, BTCWare, Crypt888, CryptoMix, CrySiS, EncrypTile, FindZip, Globe,Hidden Tear, Jigsaw, LambdaLocker, Legion, NoobCrypt, Stampado, SZFLocker,TeslaCrypt, XData.[160]Ransomware encryption that has been cracked by security researchers is typically abandoned for criminal purposes; thus in practice most attacks cannot be reverted by breaking encryption.[161]
The No More Ransom Project is an initiative by theNetherlands' police's National High Tech Crime Unit,Europol’sEuropean Cybercrime Centre,Kaspersky LabandMcAfeeto help ransomware victims recover their data without paying a ransom.[162]They offer a free CryptoSheriff tool to analyze encrypted files and search for decryption tools.[163][independent source needed]
In addition, old copies of files may exist on the disk, which has been previously deleted. In some cases, these deleted versions may still be recoverable usingsoftware designed for that purpose.
A 2019ProPublicainvestigation found the cybersecurity firms Proven Data Recovery and Monstercloud, which advertised ransom-free decryption services, would typically simply pay the ransom and charge the victim a higher price.[161]SamSam hackers dealt with Proven Data so frequently that they would recommend the company to victims having technical difficulties making payment.[161]Other companies like Coveware were more transparent in offering the service of paying the hackers and patching insecure systems.[161]Many American victims found the ransom amount was too low to meet theUnited States Department of Justicethreshold for federal involvement, but that local police lacked the technical capabilities to help and were often victims themselves.[161]
A British student, Zain Qaiser, from Barking, London was jailed for more than six years atKingston upon Thames Crown Courtfor his ransomware attacks in 2019.[164]He is said to have been "the most prolific cyber criminal to be sentenced in the UK". He became active at the age of 17. He contacted the Russian controller of one of the most powerful attacks, believed to be the Lurk malware gang, and arranged for a split of his profits. He also contacted online criminals from China and the US to move the money.[164]For about one and a half years, he posed as a legitimate supplier of online promotions of book advertising on some of the world's most visited legal pornography websites. Each of the adverts that were promoted on the websites contained theReveton Ransomwarestrain of the malicious Angler Exploit Kit (AEK)[165]that seized control of the machine. Investigators discovered about £700,000 of earnings, although his network may have earned more than £4m. He may have hidden some money using cryptocurrencies. The ransomware would instruct victims to buyGreenDot MoneyPakvouchers and enter the code in the Reveton panel displayed on the screen. This money entered a MoneyPak account managed by Qaiser, who would then deposit the voucher payments into the debit card account of his American co-conspirator, Raymond Odigie Uadiale. Uadiale was a student atFlorida International Universityduring 2012 and 2013 and later worked for Microsoft. Uadiale would convert the money intoLiberty Reservedigital currency and deposit it into Qaiser's Liberty Reserve account.[166]
A breakthrough, in this case, occurred in May 2013 when authorities from several countries seized the Liberty Reserve servers, obtaining access to all its transactions and account history. Qaiser was running encrypted virtual machines on his Macbook Pro with both Mac and Windows operating systems.[167]He could not be tried earlier because he was sectioned (involuntarily committed) under the UK Mental Health Act of 1983 atGoodmayes Hospitalwhere he was found to be using the hospital Wi-Fi to access his advertising sites. His lawyer claimed that Qaiser had suffered from mental illness.[164]Russian police arrested 50 members of the Lurk malware gang in June 2016.[168]Uadiale, a naturalized US citizen of Nigerian descent, was jailed for 18 months.[169]
The publication of proof-of-concept attack code is common among academic researchers and vulnerability researchers.
It teaches the nature of the threat, conveys the gravity of the issues, and enables countermeasures to be devised and put into place. However, lawmakers with the support of law-enforcement bodies are contemplating making the creation of ransomware illegal. In the state of Maryland, the original draft of HB 340 made it a felony to create ransomware, punishable by up to 10 years in prison.[170]A minor in Japan was arrested for creating and distributing ransomware code.[171]
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Manyundeciphered writing systemsexist today; most date back several thousand years, although some more modern examples do exist. The term "writing systems" is used here loosely to refer to groups of glyphs which appear to have representational symbolic meaning, but which may include "systems" that are largelyartistic in natureand are thus not examples of actualwriting.
The difficulty indecipheringthese systems can arise from a lack of known language descendants or from the languages beingentirely isolated, from insufficient examples of text having been found and even (such as in the case ofVinča) from the question of whether the symbols actually constitute a writing system at all. Some researchers have claimed to be able to decipher certain writing systems, such as those ofEpi-Olmec, Phaistos and Indus texts; but to date, these claims have not been widely accepted within the scientific community, or confirmed by independent researchers, for the writing systems listed here (unless otherwise specified).
Certain forms ofproto-writingremain undeciphered and, because of a lack of evidence and linguistic descendants, it is quite likely that they will never be deciphered.
Other areas
Virtually allMesoamerican Glyphic Scriptsremain undeciphered, with the only exceptions beingLowland Maya HieroglyphsandMixteca-Puebla Hieroglyphs(represented by several regional glyphic traditions used in the whole of Postclassic Mesoamerica outside theMaya Lowlands, the most well known of which are theAztec Scriptand theMixtec Script). All Mesoamerican writing systems are thought by linguist Alfonso Lacadena (Lacadena 2012) to descend from Olmec Glyphs, with it splitting in the Late Formative into three branches: Epi-olmec, Zapotec and Central Mexican (from this branch would eventually emerge the Teotihuacan Glyphic Script).
One very similar concept is that offalse writing systems, which appear to be writing but are not. False writing cannot be deciphered because it has nosemanticmeaning. These particularly includeasemic writingcreated forartistic purposes. One prominent example is theCodex Seraphinianus.
Another similar concept is that of undecipheredcryptograms, orciphermessages. These are not writing systemsper se, but a disguised form of another text. Of course any cryptogram is intended to be undecipherable by anyone except the intended recipient so vast numbers of these exist, but a few examples have become famous and are listed inlist of ciphertexts.
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Intelecommunication, acommercial codeis acodeonce used to save oncablegramcosts.[1]Telegraph(andtelex) charged per word sent, so companies which sent large volumes of telegrams developed codes to save money on tolls. Elaborate commercial codes which encoded complete phrases into single words were developed and published ascodebooksof thousands of phrases and sentences with corresponding codewords. Commercial codes were not generally intended to keep telegrams private, as codes were widely published; they were usually cost-saving measures only.
Many general-purpose codes, such as theAcme Codeand theABC Code, were published and widely used between the 1870s and the 1950s, before the arrival of transatlantic telephone calls and next-day airmail rendered them obsolete.[2]Numerous special-purpose codes were also developed and sold for fields as varied as aviation, car dealerships, insurance, and cinema, containing words and phrases commonly used in those professions.[3]
These codes turned complete phrases into single words (commonly of five letters). These were not always genuine words; for example, codes contained "words" such asBYOXO("Are you trying to weasel out of our deal?"),LIOUY("Why do you not answer my question?"),BMULD("You're a skunk!"), orAYYLU("Not clearly coded, repeat more clearly.").
The first telegraphic codes were developed shortly after the advent of the telegraph, and spread rapidly: the first codebook was in use by 1845.[5]In 1854, one eighth of telegrams transmitted between New York and New Orleans were written in code.[1]Cable tolls were charged by the word, and telegraph companies counted codewords like any other words, so a carefully constructed code could reduce message lengths enormously.
Early codes were typically compilations of phrases and corresponding codewords numbering in the tens of thousands. Codewords were chosen to be pronounceable words to minimize errors by telegraphers, and telegrams composed of non-pronounceable words cost significantly more.[6]Regulations of theInternational Telegraph Unionevolved over time; in 1879, it mandated coded telegrams only contain words from German, English, Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch, Portuguese, or Latin, but commercial codes already frequently used nonsense words. By 1903 regulations were changed to allow any pronounceable word no more than ten letters long.[6]
Another aim of the telegraph codes was to reduce the risk of misunderstanding by avoiding having similar words mean similar things. Codes were usually designed to avoid error by using words which could not be easily confused by telegraph operators. Telegrapher errors could sometimes cause serious monetary damages, which in one instance resulted in theUnited States Supreme CourtcasePrimrose v. Western Union Telephone Company,in which a wool dealer argued that an error by aWestern Uniontelegrapher cost $20,000 due to misread instructions. The Supreme Court subsequently ruled Western Union was liable only for the cost of the message, $1.15.[7]
Examples of commercial codes include theABC Telegraphic Code,Bentley's Second Phrase Code,Lieber's Standard Telegraphic Code(1896),Phillips Code(1879 and later),Slater's Telegraphy Code(1916),Western Union Universal Codebook(1907) andUnicode(1889).
In codes such as theABC Code, code words could contain blanks. For example, in the "Freight and tonnage requirements" section,ANTITACTEmeans "Mozambique, loading at not more than two places, to ____, steamer for about ____ tons general cargo at ____ per ton on the d/w capacity to cargo". The telegrapher would then fill in the three parameters: the destination, the number of tons, and the price per ton.
The regulations of the International Telegraph Convention distinguished between "code telegrams", which it describes as "those composed of words the context of which has no intelligible meaning", and "cipher telegrams", which it describes as "those containing series of groups of figures or letters having a secret meaning or words not to be found in a standard dictionary of the language". Cipher telegrams were subject to higher tolls.
Codes such as theABC Telegraphic Code, therefore, included both numbers and code words so the user could choose between the two.
Example code words:
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Great Western Railway telegraphic codeswere acommercial telegraph codeused to shorten thetelegraphicmessages sent between the stations and offices of the railway.
The codes listed below are taken from the 1939 edition of theTelegraph Message Codebook[1]unless stated otherwise.
TheGreat Western Railway(GWR) pioneered telegraph communication over the 13 miles (21 km) fromPaddingtontoWest Draytonon 9 April 1839 using theCooke and Wheatstone telegraphequipment. Although this early system fell into disuse after a few years, from 1850 a new contract with theElectric Telegraph Companysaw double-needle telegraphs working at most stations on the line; these were replaced by single-needle machines from 1860.[2]Although used primarily as a safety device to regulate the passage of trains, it was also used to pass messages between the staff. In order to do this quickly and accurately, a number of code words were used to replace complicated or regularly used phrases. The codes were changed from time to time to reflect current needs.
By 1922 most railways in the country had agreed on standard code words, although the GWR had an extended list of codes that could only be used within its own network. In 1943 all railways were brought into a single system of codes and the GWR special codes were discontinued.[3]
Note: many of these codes could have an extra letter to identify variations, such as Mink A (a 16 ft (4.9 m) ventilated van), or Mink G (a 21 ft (6.4 m) ordinary van). Most of these codes were painted onto the wagons for easy identification.
Note: many of these codes could have an extra letter to identify variations, such as Scorpion C (a 45 ft (14 m) carriage truck), or Scorpion D (a 21 ft (6.4 m) carriage truck).
The 1939Telegraph Message Codebook contains in excess of 900 code words (around half of which were standard codes also used by other railways) yet very few were the familiar codes seen painted on the side of goods wagons.[1]By using these codes long and complex sentences could be sent using just a few words. Some examples of the codes representing phrases include:
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Malware(aportmanteauofmalicious software)[1]is anysoftwareintentionally designed to cause disruption to acomputer,server,client, orcomputer network, leak private information, gain unauthorized access to information or systems, deprive access to information, or which unknowingly interferes with the user'scomputer securityandprivacy.[1][2][3][4][5]Researchers tend to classify malware into one or more sub-types (i.e.computer viruses,worms,Trojan horses,logic bombs,ransomware,spyware,adware,rogue software,wipersandkeyloggers).[1]
Malware poses serious problems to individuals and businesses on the Internet.[6][7]According toSymantec's 2018 Internet Security Threat Report (ISTR), malware variants number has increased to 669,947,865 in 2017, which is twice as many malware variants as in 2016.[8]Cybercrime, which includes malware attacks as well as other crimes committed by computer, was predicted to cost the world economy US$6 trillion in 2021, and is increasing at a rate of 15% per year.[9]Since 2021, malware has been designed to target computer systems that run critical infrastructure such as theelectricity distribution network.[10]
The defense strategies against malware differ according to the type of malware but most can be thwarted by installingantivirus software,firewalls, applying regularpatches,securing networksfrom intrusion, having regularbackupsandisolating infected systems. Malware can be designed to evade antivirus software detection algorithms.[8]
The notion of a self-reproducing computer program can be traced back to initial theories about the operation of complex automata.[11]John von Neumannshowed that in theory a program could reproduce itself. This constituted a plausibility result incomputability theory.Fred Cohenexperimented with computer viruses and confirmed Neumann's postulate and investigated other properties of malware such as detectability and self-obfuscation using rudimentary encryption. His 1987 doctoral dissertation was on the subject of computer viruses.[12]The combination of cryptographic technology as part of the payload of the virus, exploiting it for attack purposes was initialized and investigated from the mid-1990s, and includes initial ransomware and evasion ideas.[13]
BeforeInternetaccess became widespread, viruses spread on personal computers by infecting executable programs orboot sectorsof floppy disks. By inserting a copy of itself into themachine codeinstructions in these programs orboot sectors, a virus causes itself to be run whenever the program is run or the disk is booted. Early computer viruses were written for theApple IIandMac, but they became more widespread with the dominance of theIBM PCandMS-DOS. The first IBM PC virus in the wild was aboot sectorvirus dubbed(c)Brain, created in 1986 by the Farooq Alvi brothers in Pakistan.[14]Malware distributors would trick the user into booting or running from an infected device or medium. For example, a virus could make an infected computer add autorunnable code to any USB stick plugged into it. Anyone who then attached the stick to another computer set to autorun from USB would in turn become infected, and also pass on the infection in the same way.[15]
Older email software would automatically openHTML emailcontaining potentially maliciousJavaScriptcode. Users may also execute disguised malicious email attachments. The2018 Data Breach Investigations ReportbyVerizon, cited byCSO Online, states that emails are the primary method of malware delivery, accounting for 96% of malware delivery around the world.[16][17]
The first worms,network-borne infectious programs, originated not on personal computers, but on multitaskingUnixsystems. The first well-known worm was theMorris wormof 1988, which infectedSunOSandVAXBSDsystems. Unlike a virus, this worm did not insert itself into other programs. Instead, it exploited security holes (vulnerabilities) in networkserverprograms and started itself running as a separateprocess.[18]This same behavior is used by today's worms as well.[19]
With the rise of theMicrosoft Windowsplatform in the 1990s, and the flexiblemacrosof its applications, it became possible to write infectious code in the macro language ofMicrosoft Wordand similar programs. Thesemacro virusesinfect documents and templates rather than applications (executables), but rely on the fact that macros in a Word document are a form ofexecutablecode.[20]
Many early infectious programs, including theMorris Worm, the first internet worm, were written as experiments or pranks.[21]Today, malware is used by bothblack hat hackersand governments to steal personal, financial, or business information.[22][23]Today, any device that plugs into a USB port – even lights, fans, speakers, toys, or peripherals such as a digital microscope – can be used to spread malware. Devices can be infected during manufacturing or supply if quality control is inadequate.[15]
Since the rise of widespreadbroadbandInternetaccess, malicious software has more frequently been designed for profit. Since 2003, the majority of widespreadvirusesand worms have been designed to take control of users' computers for illicit purposes.[24]Infected "zombie computers" can be used to sendemail spam, to host contraband data such aschild pornography,[25]or to engage indistributed denial-of-serviceattacksas a form ofextortion.[26]Malware is used broadly against government or corporate websites to gather sensitive information,[27]or to disrupt their operation in general. Further, malware can be used against individuals to gain information such as personal identification numbers or details, bank or credit card numbers, and passwords.[28][29]
In addition to criminal money-making, malware can be used for sabotage, often for political motives.Stuxnet, for example, was designed to disrupt very specific industrial equipment. There have been politically motivated attacks which spread over and shut down large computer networks, including massive deletion of files and corruption ofmaster boot records, described as "computer killing." Such attacks were made on Sony Pictures Entertainment (25 November 2014, using malware known asShamoonor W32.Disttrack) and Saudi Aramco (August 2012).[30][31]
Malware can be classified in numerous ways, and certain malicious programs may fall into two or more categories simultaneously.[1]Broadly, software can categorised into three types:[32](i) goodware; (ii) grayware and (iii) malware.
A computer virus is software usually hidden within another seemingly harmless program that can produce copies of itself and insert them into other programs or files, and that usually performs a harmful action (such as destroying data).[33]They have been likened tobiological viruses.[3]An example of this is a portable execution infection, a technique, usually used to spread malware, that inserts extra data orexecutable codeintoPE files.[34]A computer virus is software that embeds itself in some otherexecutablesoftware (including the operating system itself) on the target system without the user's knowledge and consent and when it is run, the virus is spread to other executable files.
Awormis a stand-alone malware software thatactivelytransmits itself over anetworkto infect other computers and can copy itself without infecting files. These definitions lead to the observation that a virus requires the user to run an infected software or operating system for the virus to spread, whereas a worm spreads itself.[35]
Once malicious software is installed on a system, it is essential that it stays concealed, to avoid detection. Software packages known asrootkitsallow this concealment, by modifying the host's operating system so that the malware is hidden from the user. Rootkits can prevent a harmfulprocessfrom being visible in the system's list ofprocesses, or keep its files from being read.[36]
Some types of harmful software contain routines to evade identification and/or removal attempts, not merely to hide themselves. An early example of this behavior is recorded in theJargon Filetale of a pair of programs infesting a XeroxCP-Vtime sharing system:
Each ghost-job would detect the fact that the other had been killed, and would start a new copy of the recently stopped program within a few milliseconds. The only way to kill both ghosts was to kill them simultaneously (very difficult) or to deliberately crash the system.[37]
Abackdooris a broad term for a computer program that allows an attacker persistent unauthorised remote access to a victim's machine often without their knowledge.[38]The attacker typically uses another attack (such as atrojan,wormorvirus) to bypass authentication mechanisms usually over an unsecured network such as the Internet to install the backdoor application. A backdoor can also be a side effect of asoftware bugin legitimate software that is exploited by an attacker to gain access to a victim's computer or network.
The idea has often been suggested that computer manufacturers preinstall backdoors on their systems to provide technical support for customers, but this has never been reliably verified. It was reported in 2014 that US government agencies had been diverting computers purchased by those considered "targets" to secret workshops where software or hardware permitting remote access by the agency was installed, considered to be among the most productive operations to obtain access to networks around the world.[39]Backdoors may be installed by Trojan horses,worms,implants, or other methods.[40][41]
A Trojan horse misrepresents itself to masquerade as a regular, benign program or utility in order to persuade a victim to install it. A Trojan horse usually carries a hidden destructive function that is activated when the application is started. The term is derived from theAncient Greekstory of theTrojan horseused to invade the city ofTroyby stealth.[42][43]
Trojan horses are generally spread by some form ofsocial engineering, for example, where a user is duped into executing an email attachment disguised to be unsuspicious, (e.g., a routine form to be filled in), or bydrive-by download. Although their payload can be anything, many modern forms act as a backdoor, contacting a controller (phoning home) which can then have unauthorized access to the affected computer, potentially installing additional software such as a keylogger to steal confidential information, cryptomining software or adware to generate revenue to the operator of the trojan.[44]While Trojan horses and backdoors are not easily detectable by themselves, computers may appear to run slower, emit more heat or fan noise due to heavy processor or network usage, as may occur when cryptomining software is installed. Cryptominers may limit resource usage and/or only run during idle times in an attempt to evade detection.
Unlike computer viruses and worms, Trojan horses generally do not attempt to inject themselves into other files or otherwise propagate themselves.[45]
In spring 2017, Mac users were hit by the new version of Proton Remote Access Trojan (RAT)[46]trained to extract password data from various sources, such as browser auto-fill data, the Mac-OS keychain, and password vaults.[47]
Droppersare a sub-type of Trojans that solely aim to deliver malware upon the system that they infect with the desire to subvert detection through stealth and a light payload.[48]It is important not to confuse a dropper with a loader or stager. A loader or stager will merely load an extension of the malware (for example a collection of malicious functions through reflective dynamic link library injection) into memory. The purpose is to keep the initial stage light and undetectable. A dropper merely downloads further malware to the system.
Ransomware prevents a user from accessing their files until a ransom is paid. There are two variations of ransomware, being crypto ransomware and locker ransomware.[49]Locker ransomware just locks down a computer system without encrypting its contents, whereas crypto ransomware locks down a system and encrypts its contents. For example, programs such asCryptoLockerencryptfiles securely, and only decrypt them on payment of a substantial sum of money.[50]
Lock-screens, or screen lockers is a type of "cyber police" ransomware that blocks screens on Windows or Android devices with a false accusation in harvesting illegal content, trying to scare the victims into paying up a fee.[51]Jisut and SLocker impact Android devices more than other lock-screens, with Jisut making up nearly 60 percent of all Android ransomware detections.[52]
Encryption-based ransomware, like the name suggests, is a type of ransomware that encrypts all files on an infected machine. These types of malware then display a pop-up informing the user that their files have been encrypted and that they must pay (usually in Bitcoin) to recover them. Some examples of encryption-based ransomware areCryptoLockerandWannaCry.[53]
Some malware is used to generate money byclick fraud, making it appear that the computer user has clicked an advertising link on a site, generating a payment from the advertiser. It was estimated in 2012 that about 60 to 70% of all active malware used some kind of click fraud, and 22% of all ad-clicks were fraudulent.[54]
Grayware is any unwanted application or file that can worsen the performance of computers and may cause security risks but which there is insufficient consensus or data to classify them as malware.[32]Types of grayware typically includespyware,adware,fraudulent dialers, joke programs ("jokeware") andremote access tools.[38]For example, at one point,Sony BMGcompact discssilently installed a rootkiton purchasers' computers with the intention of preventing illicit copying.[55]
Potentially unwanted programs(PUPs) are applications that would be considered unwanted despite often being intentionally downloaded by the user.[56]PUPs include spyware, adware, and fraudulent dialers.
Many security products classify unauthorisedkey generatorsas PUPs, although they frequently carry true malware in addition to their ostensible purpose.[57]In fact, Kammerstetter et al. (2012)[57]estimated that as much as 55% of key generators could contain malware and that about 36% malicious key generators were not detected by antivirus software.
Some types of adware turn off anti-malware and virus protection; technical remedies are available.[58]
Programs designed to monitor users' web browsing, displayunsolicited advertisements, or redirectaffiliate marketingrevenues are calledspyware. Spyware programs do not spread like viruses; instead they are generally installed by exploiting security holes. They can also be hidden and packaged together with unrelated user-installed software.[59]TheSony BMG rootkitwas intended to prevent illicit copying; but also reported on users' listening habits, and unintentionally created extra security vulnerabilities.[55]
Antivirus software typically uses two techniques to detect malware: (i) static analysis and (ii) dynamic/heuristic analysis.[60]Static analysis involves studying the software code of a potentially malicious program and producing a signature of that program. This information is then used to compare scanned files by an antivirus program. Because this approach is not useful for malware that has not yet been studied, antivirus software can use dynamic analysis to monitor how the program runs on a computer and block it if it performs unexpected activity.
The aim of any malware is to conceal itself from detection by users or antivirus software.[1]Detecting potential malware is difficult for two reasons. The first is that it is difficult to determine if software is malicious.[32]The second is that malware uses technical measures to make it more difficult to detect it.[60]An estimated 33% of malware is not detected by antivirus software.[57]
The most commonly employed anti-detection technique involves encrypting the malware payload in order to prevent antivirus software from recognizing the signature.[32]Tools such as crypters come with an encrypted blob of malicious code and a decryption stub. The stub decrypts the blob and loads it into memory. Because antivirus does not typically scan memory and only scans files on the drive, this allows the malware to evade detection. Advanced malware has the ability to transform itself into different variations, making it less likely to be detected due to the differences in its signatures. This is known as polymorphic malware. Other common techniques used to evade detection include, from common to uncommon:[61](1) evasion of analysis and detection byfingerprintingthe environment when executed;[62](2) confusing automated tools' detection methods. This allows malware to avoid detection by technologies such as signature-based antivirus software by changing the server used by the malware;[61](3) timing-based evasion. This is when malware runs at certain times or following certain actions taken by the user, so it executes during certain vulnerable periods, such as during the boot process, while remaining dormant the rest of the time; (4)obfuscatinginternal data so that automated tools do not detect the malware;[63](v) information hiding techniques, namelystegomalware;[64]and (5) fileless malware which runs within memory instead of using files and utilizes existing system tools to carry out malicious acts. The use of existing binaries to carry out malicious activities is a technique known as LotL, or Living off the Land.[65]This reduces the amount of forensic artifacts available to analyze. Recently these types of attacks have become more frequent with a 432% increase in 2017 and makeup 35% of the attacks in 2018. Such attacks are not easy to perform but are becoming more prevalent with the help of exploit-kits.[66][67]
Avulnerabilityis a weakness,flawor software bug in anapplication, a complete computer, anoperating system, or acomputer networkthat is exploited by malware to bypass defences orgain privilegesit requires to run. For example,TestDisk 6.4or earlier contained a vulnerability that allowed attackers to inject code into Windows.[68]Malware can exploit security defects (security bugsorvulnerabilities) in the operating system, applications (such as browsers, e.g. older versions of Microsoft Internet Explorer supported by Windows XP[69]), or in vulnerable versions of browser plugins such asAdobe Flash Player,Adobe Acrobat or Reader, orJava SE.[70][71]For example, a common method is exploitation of abuffer overrunvulnerability, where software designed to store data in a specified region of memory does not prevent more data than the buffer can accommodate from being supplied. Malware may provide data that overflows the buffer, with maliciousexecutablecode or data after the end; when this payload is accessed it does what the attacker, not the legitimate software, determines.
Malware can exploit recently discovered vulnerabilities before developers have had time to release a suitablepatch.[6]Even when new patches addressing the vulnerability have been released, they may not necessarily be installed immediately, allowing malware to take advantage of systems lacking patches. Sometimes even applying patches or installing new versions does not automatically uninstall the old versions.
There are several ways the users can stay informed and protected from security vulnerabilities in software.
Software providers often announce updates that address security issues.[72]Common vulnerabilitiesare assigned unique identifiers (CVE IDs) and listed in public databases like theNational Vulnerability Database.
Tools like Secunia PSI,[73]free for personal use, can scan a computer for outdated software with known vulnerabilities and attempt to update them.Firewallsandintrusion prevention systemscan monitor the network traffic for suspicious activity that might indicate an attack.[74]
Users and programs can be assigned moreprivilegesthan they require, and malware can take advantage of this. For example, of 940 Android apps sampled, one third of them asked for more privileges than they required.[75]Apps targeting theAndroidplatform can be a major source of malware infection but one solution is to use third-party software to detect apps that have been assigned excessive privileges.[76]
Some systems allow all users to make changes to the core components or settings of the system, which is consideredover-privilegedaccess today. This was the standard operating procedure for early microcomputer and home computer systems, where there was no distinction between anadministratororroot, and a regular user of the system. In some systems,non-administratorusers are over-privileged by design, in the sense that they are allowed to modify internal structures of the system. In some environments, users are over-privileged because they have been inappropriately granted administrator or equivalent status.[77]This can be because users tend to demand more privileges than they need, so often end up being assigned unnecessary privileges.[78]
Some systems allow code executed by a user to access all rights of that user, which is known as over-privileged code. This was also standard operating procedure for early microcomputer and home computer systems. Malware, running as over-privileged code, can use this privilege to subvert the system. Almost all currently popular operating systems, and also manyscripting applicationsallow code too many privileges, usually in the sense that when a userexecutescode, the system allows that code all rights of that user.[citation needed]
A credential attack occurs when a user account with administrative privileges is cracked and that account is used to provide malware with appropriate privileges.[79]Typically, the attack succeeds because the weakest form of account security is used, which is typically a short password that can be cracked using adictionaryorbrute forceattack. Usingstrong passwordsand enablingtwo-factor authenticationcan reduce this risk. With the latter enabled, even if an attacker can crack the password, they cannot use the account without also having the token possessed by the legitimate user of that account.
Homogeneity can be a vulnerability. For example, when all computers in anetworkrun the same operating system, upon exploiting one, onewormcan exploit them all:[80]In particular,Microsoft WindowsorMac OS Xhave such a large share of the market that an exploited vulnerability concentrating on either operating system could subvert a large number of systems. It is estimated that approximately 83% of malware infections between January and March 2020 were spread via systems runningWindows 10.[81]This risk is mitigated by segmenting the networks into differentsubnetworksand setting upfirewallsto block traffic between them.[82][83]
Anti-malware (sometimes also calledantivirus) programs block and remove some or all types of malware. For example,Microsoft Security Essentials(for Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7) andWindows Defender(forWindows 8,10and11) provide real-time protection. TheWindows Malicious Software Removal Toolremoves malicious software from the system.[84]Additionally, several capable antivirus software programs are available for free download from the Internet (usually restricted to non-commercial use).[85]Tests found some free programs to be competitive with commercial ones.[85][86][87]
Typically, antivirus software can combat malware in the following ways:
A specific component of anti-malware software, commonly referred to as an on-access or real-time scanner, hooks deep into the operating system's core orkerneland functions in a manner similar to how certain malware itself would attempt to operate, though with the user's informed permission for protecting the system. Any time the operating system accesses a file, the on-access scanner checks if the file is infected or not. Typically, when an infected file is found, execution is stopped and the file isquarantinedto prevent further damage with the intention to prevent irreversible system damage. Most AVs allow users to override this behaviour. This can have a considerable performance impact on the operating system, though the degree of impact is dependent on how many pages it creates invirtual memory.[91]
Sandboxingis asecurity modelthat confines applications within a controlled environment, restricting their operations to authorized "safe" actions and isolating them from other applications on the host. It also limits access to system resources like memory and the file system to maintain isolation.[89]
Browser sandboxing is a security measure that isolates web browser processes and tabs from the operating system to prevent malicious code from exploiting vulnerabilities.
It helps protect against malware,zero-day exploits, and unintentional data leaks by trapping potentially harmful code within the sandbox.
It involves creating separate processes, limiting access to system resources, runningweb contentin isolated processes, monitoring system calls, and memory constraints.Inter-process communication(IPC) is used forsecure communicationbetween processes.
Escaping the sandbox involves targeting vulnerabilities in the sandbox mechanism or the operating system's sandboxing features.[90][92]
While sandboxing is not foolproof, it significantly reduces theattack surfaceof common threats.
Keeping browsers and operating systems updated is crucial to mitigate vulnerabilities.[90][92]
Website vulnerability scans check the website, detect malware, may note outdated software, and may report known security issues, in order to reduce the risk of the site being compromised.
Structuring a network as a set of smaller networks, and limiting the flow of traffic between them to that known to be legitimate, can hinder the ability of infectious malware to replicate itself across the wider network.Software-defined networkingprovides techniques to implement such controls.
As a last resort, computers can be protected from malware, and the risk of infected computers disseminating trusted information can be greatly reduced by imposing an"air gap"(i.e. completely disconnecting them from all other networks) and applying enhanced controls over the entry and exit of software and data from the outside world. However, malware can still cross the air gap in some situations, not least due to the need to introduce software into the air-gapped network and can damage the availability or integrity of assets thereon.Stuxnetis an example of malware that is introduced to the target environment via a USB drive, causing damage to processes supported on the environment without the need to exfiltrate data.
AirHopper,[93]BitWhisper,[94]GSMem[95]and Fansmitter[96]are four techniques introduced by researchers that can leak data from air-gapped computers using electromagnetic, thermal and acoustic emissions.
Utilizing bibliometric analysis, the study of malware research trends from 2005 to 2015, considering criteria such as impact journals, highly cited articles, research areas, number of publications, keyword frequency, institutions, and authors, revealed an annual growth rate of 34.1%.North Americaled in research output, followed byAsiaandEurope.ChinaandIndiawere identified as emerging contributors.[97]
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TheCommunications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act(CALEA), also known as the "Digital Telephony Act," is aUnited Stateswiretappinglaw passed in 1994, during thepresidency of Bill Clinton(Pub. L. No. 103-414, 108 Stat. 4279, codified at 47 USC 1001–1010).
CALEA's purpose is to enhance the ability oflaw enforcement agenciesto conductlawful interceptionof communication by requiring thattelecommunications carriersand manufacturers of telecommunications equipment modify and design their equipment, facilities, and services to ensure that they have built-in capabilities fortargeted surveillance, allowing federal agencies to selectively wiretap any telephone traffic; it has since been extended to cover broadband Internet and VoIP traffic. Some government agencies argue that it coversmass surveillanceof communications rather than just tapping specific lines and that not all CALEA-based access requires a warrant.
Journalists and technologists have characterised the CALEA-mandated infrastructure as governmentbackdoors.[1][2]In 2024, the U.S. government realized that China had been tapping communications in the U.S. using that infrastructure for months, or perhaps longer.[3]
The original reason for adopting CALEA was theFederal Bureau of Investigation's worry that increasing use of digitaltelephone exchangeswitches would make tapping phones at the phone company's central office harder and slower to execute, or in some cases impossible.[4]Since the original requirement to add CALEA-compliant interfaces required phone companies to modify or replace hardware and software in their systems,U.S. Congressincluded funding for a limited time period to cover such network upgrades.[5]CALEA was passed into law on October 25, 1994, and came into force on January 1, 1995.[5]
In the years since CALEA was passed it has been greatly expanded to include allVoIPandbroadband Internettraffic. From 2004 to 2007 there was a 62 percent growth in the number of wiretaps performed under CALEA – and more than 3,000 percent growth in interception of Internet data such as email.[6]
By 2007, the FBI had spent $39 million on itsDigital Collection System Network(DCSNet) system, which collects, stores, indexes, and analyzes communications data.[6]
In its own words, the purpose of CALEA is:
The U.S. Congress passed the CALEA to aid law enforcement in its effort to conduct criminal investigations requiring wiretapping of digital telephone networks. The Act obliges telecommunications companies to make it possible for law enforcement agencies totapany phone conversations carried out over its networks, as well as makingcall detail recordsavailable. The act stipulates that it must not be possible for a person to detect that his or her conversation is being monitored by the respective government agency.
Common carriers, facilities-based broadband Internet access providers, and providers of interconnected Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service – all three types of entities are defined to be “telecommunications carriers” and must meet the requirements of CALEA.
The CALEA Implementation Unit at the FBI has clarified that intercepted information is supposed to be sent to Law Enforcement concurrently with its capture.
On March 10, 2004, theUnited States Department of Justice, FBI andDrug Enforcement Administrationfiled a "Joint Petition for Expedited Rulemaking"[7]in which they requested certain steps to accelerate CALEA compliance, and to extend the provisions of CALEA to include the ability to perform surveillance of all communications that travel over the Internet – such as Internet traffic and VoIP.
As a result, theFederal Communications Commissionadopted its First Report and Order on the matter concluding that CALEA applies to facilities-based broadband Internet access providers and providers of interconnected (with thepublic switched telephone network) Voice-over-Internet-Protocol (VoIP) services.
In May 2006, the FCC adopted a "Second Report and Order", which clarified and affirmed the First Order:
For Voice and Text messaging, CALEA software in the central office enables wiretap. If a call comes in for a number on the target phone a "conference bridge" is created and the second leg is sent to law enforcement at the place of their choosing. By law this must be outside of the phone company. This prevents law enforcement from being inside the phone company and possibly illegally tapping other phones.
Text messages are also sent to law enforcement.
There are two levels of CALEA wiretapping:
USA telecommunications providers must install new hardware or software, as well as modify old equipment, so that it doesn't interfere with the ability of a law enforcement agency (LEA) to perform real-time surveillance of any telephone or Internet traffic. Modern voice switches now have this capability built in, yet Internet equipment almost always requires some kind of intelligentdeep packet inspectionprobe to get the job done. In both cases, the intercept function must single out a subscriber named in a warrant for intercept and then immediately send some (headers-only) or all (full content) of the intercepted data to an LEA. The LEA will then process this data with analysis software that is specialized towards criminal investigations.
All traditional voice switches on the U.S. market today have the CALEA intercept feature built in. The IP-based "soft switches" typically do not contain a built-in CALEA intercept feature; and other IP-transport elements (routers, switches, access multiplexers) almost always delegate the CALEA function to elements dedicated to inspecting and intercepting traffic. In such cases, hardware taps or switch/router mirror-ports are employed to deliver copies of all of a network's data to dedicated IP probes.
Probes can either send directly to the LEA according to the industry standard delivery formats (cf. ATIS T1.IAS, T1.678v2, et al.); or they can deliver to an intermediate element called a mediation device, where the mediation device does the formatting and communication of the data to the LEA. A probe that can send the correctly formatted data to the LEA is called a "self-contained" probe.
In order to be compliant, IP-based service providers (broadband, cable, VoIP) must choose either a self-contained probe, or a "dumb" probe component plus a mediation device, or they must implement the delivery of correctly formatted data for a named subscriber on their own.
TheElectronic Frontier Foundation(EFF) warns that:[8]
JournalistMarc Zwillingerfrom theWall Street Journalexplains his concerns with proposed revisions to the CALEA that would require Internet companies to provide law enforcement with a method of gaining access to communication on their networks.[9]Zwillinger warns this new mandatory access could create a dangerous situation for multinational companies not being able to refuse demands from foreign governments.[9]These governments could “threaten financial sanctions, asset seizures, imprisonment of employees and prohibition against a company's services in their countries."[10]In addition, the creation of this new mechanism could create an easier way for hackers to gain access to the U.S. government's key.[9]Moreover, theU.S. telephone networkand theglobal internetdiffer in that U.S. telephone carriers “weren't responsible for decrypting communications unless the carrier possessed the decryption key. In fact, CALEA's legislative history is full of assurances that the Department of Justice and FBI had no intention to require providers to decrypt communications for which they did not have the key.”[9]Therefore, a revision of the CALEA cannot necessarily secure companies from providing data on their devices during criminal investigations to foreign governments.
Originally CALEA only granted the ability to wiretap digital telephone networks, but in 2004, theUnited States Department of Justice(DOJ),Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives(ATF),Federal Bureau of Investigation(FBI), andDrug Enforcement Administration(DEA) filed a joint petition with theFederal Communications Commission(FCC) to expand their powers to include the ability to monitorVoIPandbroadbandInternet communications – so that they could monitor Web traffic as well as phone calls.[11]
TheElectronic Frontier Foundationhas filed several lawsuits to prevent the FCC from granting these expandeddomestic surveillancecapabilities.[12][13]
The FCC's First Report and Order, issued in September 2005, ruled that providers of broadband Internet access and interconnected VoIP services are regulable as “telecommunications carriers” under CALEA. That order was affirmed and further clarified by the Second Report and Order, dated May 2006. On May 5, 2006, a group of higher education and library organizations led by theAmerican Council on Education(ACE) challenged that ruling, arguing that CALEA did not apply to them. On June 9, 2006, the D.C. Circuit Court summarily denied the petition without addressing the constitutionality.[14]
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Human rightsandencryptionare often viewed as interlinked.Encryptioncan be a technology that helps implement basichumanrights. In thedigital age, thefreedom of speechhas become more controversial; however, from a human rights perspective, there is a growing awareness that encryption is essential for a free, open, and trustworthy Internet.[1]
Human rights aremoralprinciples ornormsfor human behaviour that are regularly protected aslegal rightsin national andinternational law.[2]They are commonly understood as inalienable,[3]fundamental rights "to which a person is inherently entitled simply because they are a human being".[4]Those rights are "inherent in all human beings"[5]regardless of their nationality, location, language, religion, ethnic origin, or any other status.[3]They are applicable everywhere and at every time and areuniversal[2]andegalitarian.[3]
Cryptographyis a long-standing subfield of bothmathematicsandcomputer science. It can generally be defined as "the protection of information and computation using mathematical techniques."[6]Encryptionandcryptographyare closely interlinked, although "cryptography" has a broader meaning. For example, adigital signatureis "cryptography", but not technically "encryption".[7][1]
Underinternational human rights law, freedom of expression is recognized as a human right under Article 19 of theUniversal Declaration of Human Rights(UDHR) and theInternational Covenant on Civil and Political Rights(ICCPR). In Article 19 of the UDHR states that "everyone shall have the right to hold opinions without interference" and "everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice".[8]
Since the 1970s, the availability ofdigital computingand the invention ofpublic-keycryptography have made encryption more widely available. (Previously, encryption techniques were the domain ofnation-stateactors.) Cryptographic techniques are also used to protect theanonymityof communicating actors andprivacymore generally. The availability and use of encryption continue to lead to complex, important, and highly contentious legal policy debates. Some government agencies have made statements or proposals to lessen such usage and deployment due to hurdles it presents for government access. The rise of commercialend-to-end encryptionservices have pushed towards more debates around the use of encryption and the legal status of cryptography in general.[1]
Encryption, as defined above, is a set of cryptographic techniques to protect information. Thenormativevalue of encryption, however, is not fixed but varies with the type and purpose of the cryptographic methods used. Traditionally, encryption (cipher) techniques were used to ensure the confidentiality of communications and prevent access to information and communications by others and intended recipients. Cryptography can also ensure the authenticity of communicating parties and the integrity of communications contents, providing a key ingredient for enabling trust in thedigital environment.[1]
There is a growing awareness within human rights organizations that encryption plays an important role in realizing a free, open, and trustworthy Internet. UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expressionDavid Kayeobserved, during the Human Rights Council in June 2015, that encryption and anonymity deserve a protected status under the rights to privacy and freedom of expression:
"Encryption and anonymity, today's leading vehicles for online security, provide individuals with a means to protect their privacy, empowering them to browse, read, develop and share opinions and information without interference and enabling journalists, civil society organizations, members of ethnic or religious groups, those persecuted because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, activists, scholars, artists and others to exercise the rights to freedom of opinion and expression."[9]
In the context of media and communication, two types of encryption in media and communication can be distinguished:
Among the most widely deployed cryptographic techniques is the securitization ofcommunications channelbetween internet users and specific service providers fromman-in-the-middleattacks, access by unauthorized third parties. Given the breadth of nuances involved, these cryptographic techniques must be run jointly by both the serviceuserand the serviceproviderin order to work properly. They require service providers, including online news publisher(s) orsocial network(s), to actively implement them into service design. Users cannot deploy these techniquesunilaterally; their deployment is contingent on active participation by the service provider.[citation needed]TheTLS protocol, which becomes visible to the normal internet user through theHTTPSheader, is widely used for securing online commerce,e-governmentservices and health applications as well as devices that make up networked infrastructures, e.g., routers, cameras. However, although the standard has been around since 1990, the wider spread and evolution of the technology has been slow. As with other cryptographic methods and protocols, the practical challenges related to proper, secure and (wider) deployment are significant and have to be considered. Many service providers still do not implement TLS or do not implement it well.[citation needed]
In the context ofwirelesscommunications, the use of cryptographic techniques that protect communications from third parties are also important. Different standards have been developed to protect wireless communications:2G,3Gand4Gstandards for communication between mobile phones, base stations and base stations controllers; standards to protect communications between mobile devices and wireless routers ('WLAN'); and standards for local computer networks.[10]One common weakness in these designs is that the transmission points of the wireless communication can access all communications e.g., thetelecommunications provider. This vulnerability is exacerbated when wireless protocols onlyauthenticateuser devices, but not thewireless access point.[1]
Whether the data is stored on a device, or on a local server as in thecloud, there is also a distinction between 'at rest'. Given the vulnerability ofcellphonesto theft for instance, particular attention may be given to limiting service provided access. This does not exclude the situation that the service provider discloses this information to third parties like other commercial entities or governments. The user needs to trust the service provider to act in their interests. The possibility that a service provider is legally compelled to hand over user information or to interfere with particular communications with particular users, remains.[1]
There are services that specificallymarketthemselves with claims not to have access to the content of their users' communication. Service Providers can also take measures that restrict their ability to access information and communication, further increasing the protection of users against access to their information and communications. The integrity of thesePrivacy Enhancing Technologies(PETs), depends on delicate design decisions as well as the willingness of the service provider to be transparent andaccountable.[2]For many of these services, the service provider may offer some additional features (besides the ability to communicate), for example, contact list management—meaning that they can observe who is communicating with whom—but take technical measures so that they cannot read the contents of the messages. This has potentially negative implications for users; for instance, since the service provider has to take action to connect users who want to communicate using the service, it will also have the power to prevent users from communicating in the first place.[1]
Following the discovery ofvulnerabilities, there is a growingawarenessthat there needs to be more investment in theauditingof widely usedcodecoming out of the free and open software community. The pervasiveness ofbusiness modelsthat depend on the collection and processing of user data can be an obstacle for adopting cryptographic mechanisms for protecting information at rest. AsBruce Schneierstated:[11]
"Surveillance is the business model of the Internet. This has evolved into a shockingly extensive, robust, and profitable surveillance architecture. You are being tracked pretty much everywhere you go on the Internet, by many companies anddata brokers: ten different companies on one site, a dozen on another."[11]Cryptographic methods play a key role inonline identity management.[11]
Digital credentialsystems can be used to allow anonymous yet authenticated and accountable transactions between users and service providers and to build privacy preserving identity management systems.[12][1]
The Internet allowsend-usersto develop applications and uses of the network without having to coordinate with the relevantinternet service providers. Many of the available encryption tools are not developed or offered by traditional service providers or organizations but by experts in thefree and open-source software(FOSS) and Internet engineering communities. A major focus of these initiatives is to producePrivacy Enhancing Technologies(PETs) that can be unilaterally or collaboratively deployed by interested users who are ready, willing, and able to look after their own privacy interests when interacting with service providers. These PETs include standalone encryption applications as well asbrowser add-onsthat help maintain the confidentiality of web-based communications or permit anonymous access to online services and search engines. Technologies such askeystroke loggerscan intercept content as it is entered before encryption is applied, thereby falling short of offering protection. Hacking into information systems and devices to access data at or after the moment ofdecryptionmay have the same effect.[1]
Multi-party computation(MPC) techniques are an example of collaborative solutions that allow parties, e.g.,NGOswith sensitive data, to dodata analyticswithout revealing theirdatasetsto each other. All of these designs leverage encryption to provide privacy and security assurances in the absence of a trustworthy centralized authority.[1]
There are many developments in the implementations ofcryptocurrenciesusingblockchainprotocols. These systems can have many benefits and theseprotocolscan also be useful for novel forms of contracts and electronic attestation, useful aids when legal infrastructure are not readily available. As to the protection of privacy related to payments, it is a common misconception that the cryptographic techniques that are used inBitcoinensure anonymous payments. The only protection offered by Bitcoin ispseudonymity.[13]
The availability ofmetadata(thenonpersonally identifiable informationgenerated by a user's communications/behaviors) can pose a particular threat to users. This is information that is not protected by law, & that can be observed by service providers through the provisioning of services; including but not limited to: the time, frequency, duration, involved parties & so on. Metadata can also be used to track people geographically and can interfere with their ability to communicate anonymously.[14]As noted by theBerkman Centerreport, metadata is generally not encrypted in ways that make it inaccessible for governments, and accordingly"provides an enormous amount of surveillance data that was unavailable before [internet communication technologies] became widespread."[15]To minimize exposure of meaningful metadata, encryption tools may need to be used in combination with technologies that provide communication anonymity.[citation needed]
The Onion Router, most commonly known asTor, offers the ability to access websites and online services anonymously. Tor requires a community of volunteers to run intermediary proxies which channel a user's communication with a website so that third parties cannot observe who the user is communicating with. Through the use of encryption, each proxy is only aware of part of the communication path meaning that none of the proxies can by itself infer both the user and the website he/she is visiting. Besides protecting anonymity, Tor is also useful when the user's ISP blocks access to content.[1]This is similar as the protection that can be offered by aVPN(Virtual Private Network). Service providers, such as websites, can block connections that come from the Tor network. Because certain malicious traffic may reach service providers as Tor traffic and because Tor traffic may also interfere with the business models, service providers may have anincentiveto do so. This interference can prevent users from using the most effective means to protect their anonymity online. The Tor browser allows users toobfuscatethe origin andend-pointsof their communications when they communicate on the internet.[1]
Obfuscation, the automated generation of "fake" signals that are indistinguishable from users' actual online activities, providing users with a noisy "cover" under which their real information and communication behaviour remains unobservable. Obfuscation has received more attention as a method to protect users online recently.TrackMeNotis an obfuscation tool for search engine users: the plugin sends fake search queries to thesearch engine, affecting the ability of the search engine provider to build an accurate profile of the user. Although TrackMeNot and other search obfuscation tools have been found to be vulnerable to certain attacks that allow search engines to distinguish between user-generated and computer-generated queries, further advances in obfuscation are likely to play a positive role in protecting users when disclosure of information is inevitable, as in the case of search orlocation-based services.[1]
Recent incidents of terrorism have led to further calls for restrictions on encryption.[16]Even though, in the interest ofpublic safety, there are many proposals to interfere with the free deployment of strong encryption, these proposals do not hold up against close scientificscrutiny. These proposals side-step a more fundamental point, related to what is at stake for users. More advanced security measures seem necessary for governments, considering the existing threat landscape for users of digital communications andcomputing.[16]
While many governments consider that encryption techniques could present a hurdle in the investigation of crime and the protection ofnational security, certain countries, such as Germany or theNetherlandshave taken a strong position against restrictions on encryption on the Internet.[17]In 2016, the Ministers of the Interior of France and Germany jointly stated the need to work on solutions for the challenges law enforcement can face as a result of end-to-end encryption, in particular when offered from a foreign jurisdiction.[18]In a joint statement, the European Agency for Network and Information Security (ENISA) andEuropolhave also taken a stance against the introduction of back-doors in encryption products.[19]In addition, restrictions would have serious detrimental effects oncyber security, trade ande-commerce.[20][1]
Privacy anddata protectionlegislation is closely related to the protection of human rights. There are now more than 100 countries with data protection laws.[21]One of the key principles for the fair and lawful processing of personal information regulated by data protection laws is the principle of security. This principle implies that proper security measures are taken to ensure the protection of personal data against unlawful access by others than intended recipients.[1]TheEuropean Union General Data Protection Regulation, which was adopted in 2016 and will enter in to force in 2018, contains an advanced set of rules with respect to the security of personal data.[1]
Encryption can be asafeguardagainst personaldata breachesfor the UN, as it can facilitate the implementation of privacy and data protection by design.[1]Cryptography has also been an essential ingredient for establishing the conditions for e-Commerce over the Internet. The OECD Principles were adopted to ensure that national cryptography policy would not interfere with trade and to ensure the conditions for international developments in e-Commerce.[1]
The policy debate about encryption has a significant international dimension because of theinternational nature of the communications networksand the Internet as well as trade,globalizationand the national security dimensions. The OECD adopted a policy for the recommendation of concerning guidelines for cryptography on March 27, 1997. There are three components to this policy intervention of the OECD, which is primarily aimed at its Member Countries: a recommendation of the OECD Council, Guidelines for Cryptography Policy (as an Annex to the Recommendation) and a Report on Background and Issues of Cryptography Policy to explain the context for the guidelines and the basic issues involved incryptography lawandpolicy debate. The 5th principle on the protection of privacy and personal data: explicitly discusses the connection to human rights as:"The fundamental rights of individuals to privacy, including secrecy of communications and protection of personal data, should be respected in national cryptography policies and in the implementation and use of cryptographic methods."[1]
TheUnited Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization(UNESCO) identified encryption as a relevant element for policy on privacy and freedom of expression. The Keystones Report (2015) articulates that"to the extent that our data can be considered representative of ourselves, encryption has a role to play in protecting who we are, and in preventing abuse of user content. It also allows for greater protection of privacy and anonymity in transit by ensuring that the contents (and sometimes also the metadata) of communications are only seen by the intended recipient."[22]The report recognizes"the role that anonymity and encryption can play as enablers of privacy protection and freedom of expression" andproposes that UNESCO facilitate dialogue on these issues.[1]
The necessary and proportionate principles developed and adopted bycivil societyactors stipulates the protection of theintegrityofcommunications systemsas one of its 13 principles.[23]The principles themselves do not provide for explicit guidance on specific cryptographic policy issues such as back-doors or restrictions on the deployment of encryption. The guidance that is offered by theOECDprinciples and the recent positions of the UN Rapporteur on Encryption state the importance of encryption for the protection of human rights. While it does not give a definitive answer to the question of whether a mandate for encryption back-doors is to be considered incompatible with international law, it does point in that direction. Generally, the available guidance at the international level clarifies that when limitations are imposed on encryption, relevant human rights guarantees have to be strictly observed.[1]
There has been a broad, active and contentious policy debate on encryption in the US since the 1990s beginning with the "Crypto Wars". This involved the adoption of theCommunications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act(CALEA), containing requirements for telecommunications providers and equipment manufacturers to ensure the possibility of effectivewiretapping.[24]It also involved a debate over existing export controls on strong encryption products (considering their classification as munition) and a criminal investigation into cryptographic email software developer and activistPhil Zimmermann. The case was dropped and the general debate resolved after theliberalizationof export controls on most commercial products with strong encryption features and the transfer of these items from the U.S.A. Munitions List (USML), administered by theDepartment of State, to theCommerce Control List(CCL), administered by theDepartment of Commerce.[25]The USA Department of Commerce maintains some controls over items on the CCL, including registration, technical reviews and reporting obligations, and continues to impose licensing and other requirements for sensitive encryption items and sales of such items to foreign governments.[1]
The debate ignited after theEdward Snowdenrevelations and the well-documented increase in deployed encryption measures by Internet services, device makers and users, as well as a concerted call from the technical community and civil society to increase encryption use and security to addressmass surveillancepractices.[26]The increased adoption of encryption by the industry has been received critically by certain government actors, theFBIin particular.[1]This led to the widely reportedFBI–Apple encryption disputeover the possibility to gain access to information on theiPhonein assistance to law enforcement. In 2016, several bills were introduced in theUS Congressthat would place new limits encryption under USA law. The USA's legal system promotes and requires security measures to be implemented in the relevant contexts, including cryptographic methods of various kinds, to ensure security in commerce and trade. Relevant laws are theFederal Information Security Modernization Act(FISMA) of 2014, theGramm-Leach-Bliley Act, theHealth Insurance Portability and Accountability Act(HIPAA) and also theFederal Trade Commission Act. These acts contain security requirements and thereby indirectly require or stimulate the use of encryption in certain circumstances. Finally, many state breach notification laws treat encrypted data as asafe harborby exempting firms that have encrypted data from notice obligations.[1]
Constitutional considerations andhuman rightsplay a role of significance in the USA debate about the legal treatment of encryption methods. Restrictions on distribution of cryptographic protocols, and the publication of cryptographic methods are considered an interference with theFirst Amendment, the USA constitutional safeguard protecting freedom of expression.[1]The USA has particularly active and strongly developed civil society actors involved in cryptographic policy and practice.
The United States of America is a primary site for cryptology research and engineering, development and implementation of cryptographic service innovations. There is an active community of Non-Governmental Organizations engaged in the national and international debate on encryption policy.[27]The predominant interference's with strong encryption that take place or are being considered take place in the field ofnational security,law enforcementandForeign Affairs. In this area and in answering the contentious question of whether and how lawful access to specific communications could be ensured, the US Government has internationally explained its policy as one aiming to ensure that 'responsibly deployed encryption' helps to"secure many aspects of our daily lives, including our private communications and commerce",but also"to ensure that malicious actors can be held to account without weakening our commitment to strong encryption".[1]
As part of the global debate on encryption in the late 1990s, a debate also took place in Germany about the need and legitimacy of imposing a general ban on the encryption of communications because of the impact on criminal investigations.[28]There were profound doubts concerning the constitutionallegitimacyas well as concerns about negative factual consequences of such a ban.[28]In qualitative terms, a number offundamental rightsare considered to be affected by restrictions on encryption: the secrecy of telecommunications, expressions of the general right of personality and, indirectly, all communicative freedoms that are able to be exercised over the Internet.[29]TheFederal Governmentset key points in 1999 for the German cryptographic policy which should especially provide confidence in the security of encryption instead of restricting it.[1]Besides the statements of the German Minister of the Interior towards possible future restrictions, Germany aligns with the position of the UN Special Rapporteur David Kaye and adopts policies of non-restriction or comprehensive protection and only adopts restrictions on a case-specific basis. In November 2015 governmental representatives as well as representatives of theprivate sectorsigned a "Charter to strengthen the trusted communication ("Charta zur Stärkung der vertrauenswürdigen Kommunikation") together, in which they stated:"We want to be Encryption Site No. 1 in the world".[30]TheGerman Governmenthas also used its foreign policy to promote international privacy standards.[1]In particular, Germany, in a joint effort with Brazil, committed itself in theHuman Rights Councilfor the appointment of an UN Special Rapporteur on Privacy.[25]There are multiple examples of how there have been efforts by the government to implement encryption policy. They range from informal actions to laws and regulations: The IT Security Act in 2015, the 'De-Mail' law. There are also several sector-specific rules for encryption and information security in Germany, like the Telecommunications Act (TKG). TheGerman Constitutional Courthas also provided valuable input for the international legal handling of encryption techniques with the IT basic right, with which, the constitutional court recognizes that parts of one's personality go into IT systems and therefore the applied protection has to travel with it.[1]
There are a number of limitations on the free deployment of encryption by electronic communications services despite the fact thatIndian lawand policy promotes and requires the implementation of strong encryption as a security measure, such as inbanking, e-commerce and by organizations handling sensitive personal information.[1]There is notable legal uncertainty about the precise legal scope of these license requirements and to what extent they could have legal effect on (the use of or deployment of ) services by the end-users of covered services. The encryption debate ignited publicly in India in 2008 after the Government published a draft proposal with a number of envisioned limitations on the use of encryption. The policy, issued under Section 84A of the Indian Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008 was short-lived, but worries remain about the lack of safeguards for privacy and freedom of expression that the draft illustrated.[1]In response to the outcry, the Indian government first exempted"mass use encryption products, which are currently being used in web applications, social media sites, and social media applications such as WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter etc."Soon thereafter, it withdrew the proposed policy, and a new policy has not been made public yet.[1]
Section 84A of the Indian Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008empowersthe government to formulate rules on modes of encryption for the electronic medium. Legal commentators have noted the lack oftransparencyabout what types of encryption use and deployment are permitted and required under Indian law, especially in the field of electronic communications services.[1]Thus, the Central Indian Government has, in theory, a broad exclusive monopoly over electronic communications which includes the privilege to provide telecommunication and Internet services in India.[1]
After the Edward Snowden revelations in 2013, Brazil was at the forefront of a global coalition promoting the right to privacy at the UN and condemning USA mass surveillance. In recent events, Brazil has demonstrated diverse aims when it comes to the use and implementation of encryption. On the one side, the country is a leader in providing a legal framework of rules for the Internet.[1]But it has also taken several measures that may be seen to restrict the dissemination of encryption technology. In 2015, in a process that was open for public comments and discussions, Brazil's legislator drafted a new privacy bill ("proteção de dados pessoais"), which was sent to Brazil's Federal Congress on May 13, 2016 and came into force as Bill 5276 of 2016.[31]It regulates and protectspersonal dataand privacy, including online practices and includes provisions for more secure methods such as encryption on the treatment of personal data. The law also addresses security issues and a duty for companies to report any attacks and security breaches. With theMarco Civil(2014), that introduces principles likeneutrality, theBrazilian Civil Rights Framework for the Internet, Brazil was one of the first countries to ever introduce a law, that aims at combining all Internet rules in one bundle. Brazil has a well-established e-government model: The Brazilian Public Key Infrastructure (Infraestrutura de Chaves Públicas Brasileira –ICP-Brasil[pt]).[32]Since 2010 ICP-Brasil certificates can be partly integrated in Brazilian IDs, which can then be used for several services like tax revenue service, judicial services or bank related services. In practice, the ICP-Brasil digital certificate acts as avirtual identitythat enables secure and unique identification of the author of a message or transaction made in an electronic medium such as the web. Brazilian courts have taken a stance against encryption in private messaging services by repeatedly ordering theblockingof the messaging serviceWhatsApp.[33]Since it switched to a full end-to-end encryption, the service has been periodically blocked as a result of a court order in an attempt to make the company comply with demands for information.[1]
The African (Banjul) Charter on Human and People's Rights, was adopted in the context of theAfrican Unionin 1981.[34]A Protocol to the Charter, establishing theAfrican Court on Human and Peoples' Rightswas adopted in 1998 and came into effect in 2005. In the area ofinformation policy, the African Union has adopted the African Union Convention on Cyber Security and Personal Data Protection.[35]The provisions on personal data protection in this Convention generally follow theEuropean modelfor the protection of data privacy and contains a number of provisions on the security of personal data processing.[1]A civil society initiative has adopted a specific African Declaration on Internet Rights and Freedoms "to help shape approaches to Internet policy-making and governance across the continent".[36]
Different countries in theNorth-Africanregion have not seen a significant rise in legal actions aiming at the suppression of encryption in thetransformations that started in 2011. Although legislation often dates back to before the transformations, the enforcement has become stricter since then. No difference in the position towards cryptography can be seen between the countries that had successful revolutions and went through regime changes and those that didn't.[1]
Tunisiahas several laws that limit online anonymity.[1]Articles 9 and 87 of the 2001 Telecommunication Code ban the use of encryption and provide a sanction of up to five years in prison for the unauthorized sale and use of such techniques.[37]
InAlgeria, users have legally needed authorization for the use of cryptographic technology from the relevant telecommunications authority ARPT (Autorité de Régulation de la Poste et des Télécommunications) since 2012.[38]
InEgypt, Article 64 of the 2003 Telecommunication Regulation Law states that the use of encryption devices is prohibited without the written consent of the NTRA, the military, and national security authorities.[39]
InMorocco, the import and export of cryptographic technology, be it soft- or hardware, requires alicensefrom the government. The relevant law No. 53-05 (Loi n° 53-05 relative à l'échange électronique de données juridiques) went into effect in December 2007.[40]
There are no specific provisions in effect in countries in theEast-Africanregion restricting the use of encryption technology. As in other African countries, the main reason given for State surveillance is the prevention ofterroristicattacks.Kenyawith its proximity toSomalia, has cited this threat for adopting restrictive actions. The country has recently fast-tracked a Computer and Cybercrime Law, to be adopted in the end of 2016.[41]InUgandaa number of laws andICTpolicies have been passed over the past three years, none of them however deal with encryption. In 2016, following the Presidential Elections, the Ugandan government shut down social networks such as Twitter, Facebook and WhatsApp.[42]
West-Africancountries neither limit the import or export of encryption technology, nor its use, most national and foreign companies still rely on the use of VPNs for their communication.Ghanarecently introduced a draft law aiming at intercepting electronic and postal communications of citizens, to aid crime prevention. Section 4(3) of the proposed bill gives the government permission to intercept anyone's communication upon only receiving oral order from a public officer.[43]Recently the Nigerian Communications Commission has drafted a bill regarding Lawful Interception of Communications Regulations.[44]If passed, the bill allows the interception of all communication withoutjudicialoversight or court order and forces mobilephone companiesto store voice anddata communicationfor three years. Furthermore, the draft plans to give the National Security Agency a right to ask for a key to decrypt all encrypted communication.[1]
Users in South Africa are not prohibited from using encryption.[45]The provision of such technology, however, is strictly regulated by the Electronic Communications and Transactions Act, 2002.[46]
Countries in Central Africa, like theDemocratic Republic of Congo, theCentral African Republic,GabonandCameroondo not yet have a well-developedlegal frameworkaddressing Internet policy issues. The Internet remains a relatively unregulated sphere.[1]
While a very broad range of human rights is touched upon bydigital technologies, the human rights to freedom of expression (Art. 19 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights [ICCPR]) and the right to private life (Art. 17 ICCPR) are of particular relevance to the protection of cryptographic methods. Unlike the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) which is international 'soft law', the ICCPR is alegally bindinginternational treaty.[47]
Restrictions on the right to freedom of expression are only permitted under the conditions of Article 19, paragraph 3. Restrictions shall be provided for by law and they shall be necessary (a) for the respect of the rights or reputations of others or (b) for the protection of national security or ofpublic orderor ofpublic healthor morals.[1]A further possibility for restriction is set out in Art. 20 ICCPR,[48]In the context of limitations on cryptography, restrictions will most often be based on Article 19 (3)(b), i.e., risks for national security and public order. This raises the complex issue of the relation, and distinction, between security of the individual, e.g., from interference with personal electronic communications, and national security. The right to privacy[49]protects against 'arbitrary or unlawful interference' with one's privacy, one's family, one's home and one's correspondence. Additionally, Article 17(1) of the ICCPR protects against 'unlawful attacks' against one's honour and reputation.[1]The scope of Article 17 is broad. Privacy can be understood as the right to control information about oneself.[50]The possibility to live one's life as one sees fit, within the boundaries set by the law, effectively depends on the information which others have about us and use to inform their behaviour towards us. That is part of the core justification for protecting privacy as a human right.[1]
In addition to the duty to not infringe these rights, States have a positive obligation to effectively ensure the enjoyment of freedom of expression and privacy of every individual under their jurisdiction.[51]These rights may conflict with other rights and interests, such asdignity, equality or life and security of an individual or legitimate public interests. In these cases, the integrity of each right or value must be maintained to the maximum extent, and any limitations required for balancing have to be in law, necessary and proportionate (especially least restrictive) in view of a legitimate aim (such as the rights of others, public morals and national security).[1]
Encryption supports this mode of communication by allowing people to protect the integrity,availabilityand confidentiality of their communications.[1]The requirement of uninhibited communications is an important precondition for freedom of communication, which is acknowledged by constitutional courts e.g.US Supreme Court[52]and theFederal Constitutional Court of Germany[53]as well as theEuropean Court of Human Rights.[54]More specifically, meaningful communication requires people's ability to freely choose the pieces of information and develop their ideas, the style of language and select the medium of communication according to their personal needs. Uninhibited communication is also apreconditionfor autonomous personal development. Human beings grow their personality by communicating with others.[55]UN's first Special Rapporteur on Privacy, Professor Joe Cannataci, stated that"privacy is not just an enabling right as opposed to being an end in itself, but also an essential right which enables the achievement of an over-arching fundamental right to the free, unhindered development of one's personality".[56]In case such communication is inhibited, the interaction is biased because a statement does not only reflect the speaker's true (innermost) personal views but can be unduly influenced by considerations that should not shape communication in the first place.[1]Therefore, the process of forming one's personality throughsocial interactionis disrupted. In a complex society freedom of speech does not become reality when people have the right to speak. A second level of guarantees need to protect the precondition of making use of the right to express oneself. If there is the risk ofsurveillancethe right to protect one freedom of speech by means of encryption has to be considered as one of those second level rights. Thus, restriction of the availability and effectiveness of encryption as such constitutes an interference with the freedom of expression and the right to privacy as it protects private life and correspondence. Therefore, it has to be assessed in terms oflegality, necessity and purpose.[1]
Freedom of expression and the right to privacy (including the right to private communications) materially protect a certain behaviour or a personal state.[1]It is well established in fundamental rights theory that substantive rights have to be complemented by procedural guaranties to be effective.[57]Those procedural guarantees can be rights such as theright to an effective remedy. However, it is important to acknowledge that those procedural rights must, similar to the substantive rights, be accompanied by specific procedural duties of governments without which the rights would erode. The substantial rights have to be construed in a way that they also contain the duty to make governance systems transparent, at least to the extent that allows citizens to assess who made a decision and what measures have been taken. In this aspect, transparency ensures accountability. It is the precondition to know about the dangers for fundamental rights and make use of the respective freedoms.[1]
The effectuate of human rights protection requires the involvement of service providers. These service providers often act as intermediaries facilitating expression and communication of their users of different kinds.[58]In debates about cryptographic policy, the question of lawful government access – and the conditions under which such access should take place in order to respect human rights – has a vertical and national focus. Complexities ofjurisdictionin lawful government access are significant and present a still unsolved puzzle. In particular, there has been a dramatic shift from traditional lawful government access todigital communicationsthrough the targeting of telecommunications providers with strong local connections, to access through targeting over-the-top services with fewer or loose connections to the jurisdictions in which they offer services to users. In which cases such internationally operating service providers should (be able to) hand over user data and communications to local authorities. The deployment of encryption by service providers is a further complicating factor.[1]
From the perspective of service providers, it seems likely that cryptographic methods will have to be designed to account for only providing user data on the basis of valid legal process in certain situations. In recent years, companies and especially online intermediaries have found themselves increasingly in the focus of the debate on the implementation of human rights.[59]Online intermediaries[55]not only have a role of intermediaries betweenContent Providersand users but also one of "Security Intermediaries" in various aspects. Their practices and defaults with regards to encryption are highly relevant to the user's access to and effective usage of those technologies. Since a great amount of data is traveling through their routers and is stored in their clouds, they offer ideal points of access for the intelligence community andnon-state actors. Thus, they also, perhaps involuntarily, function as an interface between the state and the users in matters of encryption policy. The role has to be reflected in the human rights debate as well, and it calls for a comprehensive integration of security of user information and communication in the emergingInternet governancemodel of today.[1]
UNESCO is working on promoting the use of legal assessments based on human rights in cases of interference with the freedom to use and deploy cryptographic methods.[1]The concept ofInternet Universality, developed by UNESCO, includes an emphasis on openness, accessibility to all, and multi-stakeholder participation. While these minimal requirements and good practices can be based on more abstract legal analysis, these assessments have to be made in specific contexts. Secure authenticated access to publicly available content, for instance, is a safeguard against many forms of public and private censorship and limits the risk of falsification. One of the most prevalent technical standards that enables secure authenticated access isTLS. Closely related to this is the availability of anonymous access to information. TOR is a system that allows for practically anonymous retrieval of information online. Both aspects of access to content directly benefit the freedom of thought and expression. The principle oflegal certaintyis vital to every juridical process that concerns cryptographic methods or practices. The principle is essential to any forms of interception and surveillance because it can prevent unreasonable fears of surveillance, such as when the underlying legal norms are drafted precisely. Legal certainty may avert chilling effects by reducing an inhibiting key factor for the exercise of human rights for UNESCO.[1]Continuous innovation in the field of cryptography and setting and spreading new technical standards is therefore essential. Cryptographic standards can expire quickly ascomputing powerincreases. UNESCO has outlined that education and continuousmodernizationof cryptographic techniques are important.[1]
The impact of human rights can only be assessed by analyzing the possible limitations that states can set for thosefreedoms. UNESCO states that national security can be a legitimate aim for actions that limit freedom of speech and theright to privacy, but it calls for actions that are necessary and proportional.[1]"UNESCO considers an interference with the right to encryption as a guarantee enshrined in the freedom of expression and in privacy as being especially severe if:
This article incorporates text from afree contentwork. Licensed under CC BY SA 3.0 IGO (license statement/permission). Text taken fromHuman rights and encryption, 14–59, Wolfgang Schulz, Joris van Hoboken, UNESCO.en.unesco.org/unesco-series-on-internet-freedom.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_and_encryption
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Historic recurrenceis the repetition of similar events inhistory.[a][b]The concept of historic recurrence has variously been applied to overallhuman history(e.g., to the rises and falls ofempires), to repetitive patterns in the history of a givenpolity, and to any two specific events which bear a striking similarity.[4]
Hypothetically, in the extreme, the concept of historic recurrence assumes the form of theDoctrine of Eternal Recurrence, which has been written about in various forms sinceantiquityand was described in the 19th century byHeinrich Heine[c]andFriedrich Nietzsche.[d]
While it is often remarked that "history repeats itself", in cycles of less thancosmologicalduration this cannot be strictly true.[e]In this interpretation of recurrence, as opposed perhaps to the Nietzschean interpretation, there is nometaphysics. Recurrences take place due to ascertainable circumstances and chains ofcausality.[f]
An example is the ubiquitous phenomenon ofmultiple independent discoveryinscienceandtechnology, described byRobert K. MertonandHarriet Zuckerman. Indeed, recurrences, in the form ofreproduciblefindings obtained throughexperimentorobservation, are essential to thenaturalandsocial sciences; and – in the form of observations rigorously studied via thecomparative methodandcomparative research– are essential to thehumanities.
André Gideoffers a kindred thought: "Everything that needs to be said has already been said. But since no one was listening, everything must be said again."[10]
In his bookThe Idea of Historical Recurrence in Western Thought, G. W. Trompf traces historically recurring patterns of political thought and behavior in the west since antiquity.[4]If history has lessons to impart, they are to be foundpar excellencein such recurring patterns. Historic recurrences of the "striking-similarity" type can sometimes induce a sense of "convergence", "resonance" ordéjà vu.[g]
Ancient western thinkers who thought about recurrence were largely concerned withcosmologicalrather than historic recurrence (see "eternal return", or "eternal recurrence").[11]Western philosophers and historians who have discussed various concepts of historic recurrence include the GreekHellenistichistorianPolybius(c. 200 – c. 118 BCE), the Greek historian andrhetoricianDionysius of Halicarnassus(c. 60 BCE – after 7 BCE),Luke the Evangelist,Niccolò Machiavelli(1469–1527),Giambattista Vico(1668–1744),Correa Moylan Walsh(1862–1936), andArnold J. Toynbee(1889–1975).[4]
An eastern concept that bears a kinship to western concepts of historic recurrence is theChineseconcept of theMandate of Heaven, by which an unjust ruler will lose the support ofHeavenand be overthrown.[12]Confucius(ca. 551 – ca. 479 BCE) urged: "Study the past if you would define the future."[13]
In theIslamic world,Ibn Khaldun(1332–1406) wrote thatasabiyyah(social cohesion or group unity) plays an important role in a kingdom's or dynasty's cycle of rise and fall.[14]
G. W. Trompf describes various historicparadigmsof historic recurrence, including paradigms that view types of large-scale historic phenomena variously as "cyclical"; "fluctuant"; "reciprocal"; "re-enacted"; or "revived".[15]He also notes "[t]he view proceeding from a belief inthe uniformity ofhuman nature[Trompf's emphasis]. It holds that because human nature does not change, the same sort of events can recur at any time."[16]"Other minor cases of recurrence thinking", he writes, "include the isolation of any two specific events which bear a verystriking similarity, and the preoccupation withparallelism, that is, with resemblances, both general and precise, between separate sets of historical phenomena" (emphasis in original).[16]
G. W. Trompf notes that most western concepts of historic recurrence imply that "the past teaches lessons for ... future action"—that "the same ... sorts of events which have happened before ... will recur".[7]One such recurring theme was early offered byPoseidonius(a Greekpolymath, native toApamea, Syria; c. 135–51 BCE), who argued that dissipation of the oldRomanvirtues had followed the removal of theCarthaginianchallenge to Rome's supremacy in theMediterraneanworld.[17]
The theme thatcivilizationsflourish or fail according to their responses to the human andenvironmentalchallenges that they face, would be picked up two thousand years later byArnold J. Toynbee.[18]
Dionysius of Halicarnassus(c. 60 BCE – after 7 BCE), while praising Rome at the expense of her predecessors[h]—Assyria,Media,Persia, andMacedonia—anticipated Rome's eventual decay. He thus impliedthe idea of recurring decay in the history of world empires—an idea that was to be developed by the Greek historianDiodorus Siculus(1st century BCE) and byPompeius Trogus, a 1st-century BCERomanhistorianfrom aCeltictribe inGallia Narbonensis.[20]
By the late 5th century,Zosimus(also called "Zosimus the Historian"; fl. 490s–510s: aByzantinehistorian who lived inConstantinople) could see the writing on the Roman wall, and asserted that empires fell due to internal disunity. He gave examples from the histories ofGreeceand Macedonia. In the case of each empire, growth had resulted from consolidation against an external enemy; Rome herself, in response toHannibal's threat posed atCannae, had risen to great-power status within a mere five decades. With Rome's world dominion, however,aristocracyhad been supplanted by amonarchy, which in turn tended to decay intotyranny; afterAugustus Caesar, good rulers had alternated with tyrannical ones. TheRoman Empire, in its western and eastern sectors, had become a contending ground between contestants for power, while outside powers acquired an advantage. In Rome's decay, Zosimus saw history repeating itself in its general movements.[21]
The ancients developed an enduringmetaphorfor apolity's evolution, drawing ananalogybetween an individual human'slife cycleand developments undergone by abody politic: this metaphor was offered, in varying iterations, byCicero(106–43 BCE),Seneca(c. 1 BCE – 65 CE),Florus(c. 74 CE – c. 130 CE), andAmmianus Marcellinus(between 325 and 330 CE – after 391 CE).[22]Thissocial-organismmetaphor, which has been traced back to the Greek philosopher andpolymathAristotle(384–322 BCE),[23]would recur centuries later in the works of the French philosopher andsociologistAuguste Comte(1798–1857), the English philosopher and polymathHerbert Spencer(1820–1903), and the French sociologistÉmile Durkheim(1858–1917).[23]
Can themental illsof asocial organismbe treated, analogously to those of an individual?Sigmund Freudoffered a tentative view, at the end of his bookCivilization and Its Discontents:
If the development ofcivilizationhas such a far-reaching similarity to the development of the individual ... may [it not be the case] that, under the influence ofculturalurges, some civilizations, or some epochs of civilization — possibly the whole of mankind — have become ‘neurotic’? ... [I]n spite of [the] difficulties, we may expect that one day someone will venture to embark upon a pathology of cultural communities.[24]
Manydepressiveandanxiousstates prevalent in society respond tocognitive behavioral therapy, a form ofpsychotherapythat challengescognitive distortions– maladaptive thoughts, beliefs, and attitudes – and their attendant behaviors in order to improveemotional regulationand assist in the development of salutarycoping skills.[25]Mass mediacan have a cognitive-behavioral effect on the social organism.
Niccolò Machiavelli, analyzing the state ofFlorentineandItalianpolitics between 1434 and 1494, described recurrent oscillations between "order" and "disorder" within states:[26]
when states have arrived at their greatest perfection, they soon begin to decline. In the same manner, having been reduced by disorder and sunk to their utmost state of depression, unable to descend lower, they, of necessity, reascend, and thus from good they gradually decline to evil and from evil mount up to good.[26]
Machiavelli accounts for this oscillation by arguing thatvirtù(valor and political effectiveness) produces peace, peace brings idleness (ozio), idleness disorder, and disorderrovina(ruin). In turn, fromrovinasprings order, from ordervirtù, and from this, glory and good fortune.[26]Machiavelli, as had theancient GreekhistorianThucydides, sawhuman natureas remarkably stable—steady enough for the formulation of rules of political behavior. Machiavelli wrote in hisDiscorsi:
Whoever considers the past and the present will readily observe that all cities and all peoples ... ever have been animated by the same desires and the same passions; so that it is easy, by diligent study of the past, to foresee what is likely to happen in the future in any republic, and to apply those remedies that were used by the ancients, or not finding any that were employed by them, to devise new ones from the similarity of events.[27]
In 1377, theArabscholarIbn Khaldun, in hisMuqaddima(orProlegomena), wrote that whennomadictribes become united byasabiyya—Arabicfor "group feeling", "social solidarity", or "clannism"—their superiorcohesionand military prowess puts urban dwellers at their mercy. Inspired often byreligion, they conquer the towns and create newregimes. But within a few generations, writes Ibn Khaldun, the victorious tribesmen lose theirasabiyyaand become corrupted by luxury, extravagance, and leisure. The ruler, who can no longer rely on fierce warriors for his defense, will have to raise extortionate taxes to pay for other sorts of soldiers, and this in turn may lead to further problems that result in the eventual downfall of his dynasty or state.[28][i]
Joshua S. Goldsteinsuggests that empires, analogously to an individual'smidlife crisis, experience a politicalmidlife crisis: after a period of expansion in which all earlier goals are realized, overconfidence sets in, and governments are then likely to attack or threaten their strongest rival; Goldstein cites four examples: theBritish Empireand theCrimean War; theGerman Empireand theFirst World War; theSoviet Unionand theCuban Missile Crisis; theUnited Statesand theVietnam War.[29]Suggestions that theEuropean Unionis suffering a political midlife crisis have been put forward byGideon Rachman(2010),Roland Benedikter(2014), andNatalie Nougayrède(2017).
David Hackett Fischerhas identified four waves in European history, each of some 150–200 years' duration. Each wave begins with prosperity, leading to inflation, inequality, rebellion and war, and resolving in a long period of equilibrium. For example, 18th-century inflation led to theNapoleonic warsand later theVictorianequilibrium.[30]
Sir Arthur Keith's theory of a species-wideamity-enmity complexsuggests that human conscience evolved as a duality: people are driven to protect members of theirin-group, and to hate and fight enemies who belong to anout-group. Thus an endless, useless cycle ofad hoc"isms" arises.[31]
One of the recurrence patterns identified by G. W. Trompf involves "the isolation of any two specific events which bear a verystriking similarity".[7]
In the 18th century,Samuel Johnsonwrote that that people are "all prompted by the same motives, all deceived by the same fallacies, all animated by hope, obstructed by danger, entangled by desire, and seduced by pleasure".[32]According to Freya Johnston,
"His attacks on [the pursuit of originality in the writing of literature] were born of the conviction that literature ought to deal in universal truths; that human nature was fundamentally the same in every time and every place; and that, accordingly (as he put it in the 'Life ofDryden'), 'whatever can happen to man has happened so often that little remains for fancy or invention.'"[33]
Karl Marx, having in mind the respectivecoups d'étatofNapoleon I(1799) and his nephewNapoleon III(1851), wrote acerbically in 1852: "Hegelremarks somewhere that all facts and personages of great importance inworld historyoccur, as it were, twice. He forgot to add: the first time astragedy, the second time asfarce."[34]
Poland'sAdam Michnikbelieves that history is not just about the past because it is constantly recurring, and not as farce as Marx had it but as itself. Michnik writes: "The world is full ofinquisitorsandheretics, liars and those lied to,terroristsand the terrorized. There is still someone dying atThermopylae, someonedrinking a glass of hemlock, someonecrossing the Rubicon, someone drawing up aproscriptionlist."[35]The Spanish-American philosopherGeorge Santayanaobserved: "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."[36]
Plutarch'sParallel Livestraces the similarities between pairs of a Roman and a Greek historical figure.[37]
In 1079Stanislaus of Szczepanów, Poland's Catholicprimate, was murdered by his former friend, KingBolesław the Bold, and in 1170 England's Catholic primateThomas Becketwas murdered at the behest of his former friend, KingHenry II.
Mongolian EmperorKublai Khan's attempted conquest ofJapan(1274, 1281) was frustrated bytyphoons;[j]and Spanish KingPhilip II's 1588 attempted conquest of England was frustrated by ahurricane.
Hernán Cortes's fateful 1519 entry into Mexico'sAztec Empirewas reputedly facilitated by the natives' identification of him with their godQuetzalcoatl, who had been predicted to return that very year; and English CaptainJames Cook's fateful 1778 entry intoHawaii, during the annualMakahikifestival honoringLono, thefertility and peace god, was reputedly facilitated by the natives' identification of Cook with Lono,[38]who had left Hawaii, promising to return on a floating island, evoked by Cook's ship under full sail.[39]
Poland'sQueen Jadwiga, dying in 1399, bequeathed her personal jewelry for the restoration ofKraków University, which would occur in 1400; andLeland Stanford's widowJane Stanfordattempted, after his 1893 death, to sell her personal jewelry to restoreStanford University's financial viability, ultimately bequeathing the jewelry to fund the purchase of books for Stanford University.[k]
On 27 April 1521, Portuguese explorerFerdinand Magellan, in thePhilippine Islands, foolhardily, with only four dozen men, confronted 1,500 natives who defied his attempt toChristianizethem and was killed.[40]On 14 February 1779, English explorer James Cook, onHawaii Island, foolhardily, with only a few men, confronted the natives after some individuals took one of Cook's small boats, and Cook and four of his men were killed.[41]
In 1812, French EmperorNapoleon– born a Corsican outsider – was unprepared for an extended winter campaign yet invaded theRussian Empire, precipitating the fall of theFrench Empire; and in 1941, GermanFührerAdolf Hitler– born an Austrian outsider – was unprepared for an extended winter campaign yet invaded the Russian Empire's Sovietsuccessor state, which was ruled byJoseph Stalin, born a Georgian outsider, thus precipitating the fall of theThird Reich.[42]
Mahatma Gandhiworked to liberate his compatriots by peaceful means and was shot dead;Martin Luther King Jr.worked to liberate his compatriots by peaceful means and was shot dead.[43]
Countries, when politically stressed, have turned toreligionfor support and consolation. TheIranian revolutionthat overthrew theshah of Iranwas led mainly by the religious leaderRuhollah Khomeini; andPope John Paul IIhas been credited with helping endcommunist rulein his native Poland and the rest of Europe.[44]
Over history, confrontations between peoples – typically, geographical neighbors – help consolidate the peoples intonations, at times into frankempires; until at last, exhausted by conflicts and drained of resources, the once militant polities settle into a relatively peaceful habitus.[45][l]Martin Indykobserves: "Wars often don't end until both sides have exhausted themselves and become convinced that they are better off coexisting with their enemies than pursuing a futile effort to destroy them."[47]
The rise of some great empires has been conditional on thedentitionof aquadrupedanimal.Wendy Donigerexplains:
"Unlike cows,horses, whose teeth are quite dull, pull up grass by the roots rather than biting off the blades, or they nibble it right down to the ground, thus quickly destroying the land, which may require some years to recover.... [H]orses in the wild... range constantly to find new territory... [T]he horse came to symbolizeconquestthrough its own naturalimperialism. Thesteppesbrednomadichorses and nomadichordes.... Men wagedwarto get other people's horses so that they could wage war.Horsepower... remained the basic unit of power for centuries.... But thehorse-breedingpeople of the steppes never succeeded in conquering the part of the world west of theCarpathiansand theAlps, norcivilizations.... wheresea power... was decisive."[48]
Polities ignoredJan Bloch's 1898 warnings of therailroad-mobilized,industrialized, stalemated,attritionaltotal war, World War I, that was on the way and would destroy an appreciable part of mankind;[49]and polities ignoregeologists',oceanographers',atmospheric scientists',biologists', andclimatologists' warnings oftipping points in the climate systemthat are on course to destroy all of mankind.[50][m]Christopher de Bellaiguewrites:
"Like theMayaand theAkkadianswe have learned that a brokenenvironmentaggravatespoliticalandeconomicdysfunction and that the inverse is also true. Like theQingwe rue the deterioration of oursoils. But the lesson is never learned. [...]Denialism[...] is one of the most fundamental of human traits and helps explain our current inability to come up with a response commensurate with the perils we face."[52]
There has been, and is, no paucity ofthreats to humankind's continued existence.
Humans tend to behave in accordance with the principles ofsocial physicsdescribed by the English philosopherThomas Hobbesafter he had met the Italian physicistGalileo Galileiin 1636 in Florence.[53][54]Humans,empirically-minded, tend to doubt what has not been presented by their own senses or by unquestioned authorities, andinertlyto not act unless compelled by circumstances.John Vaillantwrites, in reference to theglobal-warmingcrisis, of "the self-protective tendency to favor the status quo over a potentially disruptive scenario one has not witnessed personally."[55]
Naomi Oreskescautions:
"In 2017 the[Svalbard Seed V]aultsuffered a flood caused, ironically, byclimate change. [p. 68.] [T]he seed vault assumes that we know enough to plan effectively and that people will pay attention to what we know. History shows this is often not the case. [T]he most important thing we can do right now is not to plan to respond to climate disaster after it happens but to do everything in our power to prevent it while we still have that chance. [p. 69.]"[56]
Naomi Oreskes adds that "we do not have enough time fornuclear powerto save us from the climate crisis"[57]and that "nuclear fusionis not the solution to the climate crisis".[58]
Geoff Mann writes:
"[W]e are in desperate need of apoliticsthat looks [the] catastrophicuncertainty[ofglobal warmingandclimate change] square in the face. That would mean taking much bigger and more transformative steps: all but eliminatingfossil fuels... and prioritizingdemocraticinstitutions over markets. The burden of this effort must fall almost entirely on the richest people and richest parts of the world, because it is they who continue to gamble with everyone else's fate."[59]
Jim Holtwrites: "Whether you are searching for a cure for cancer, or pursuing a scholarly or artistic career, or engaged in establishing more just institutions, a threat to the future of humanity is also a threat to the significance of what you do."[60]
While it was clear from the laws ofphysicsthat rising levels of "greenhouse gases" in Earth's atmosphere must eventually cause disastrousclimate warming, with consequently enhanceddroughts,floods,forest fires, andcyclones,[61]people were easily lulled into complacency by themendacitiesoffossil-fuelinterests. Similarly, navies continue buildingaircraft carriers, at enormous expense, despite their clear vulnerability to attack, because their construction creates civilian jobs and because, says Stephen Wrage, political science teacher at theU.S. Naval Academy, "Historically, the top leadership of military organizations has not abandoned obsolete prestige weapons until compelled to do so by a calamity."[62]
People ignore warnings about the dangers ofnuclear power plants,[63]until anticipatednuclear power-plant accidents occur; and people ignore warnings about the dangers ofnuclear weapons,[64][n][66]which in 1945 destroyed two Japanese cities, have on several occasions come close to destroying more of the world's cities, and could still do so in future. The dangers of the fissile-fossil complex (nuclear powergeneration and fossil-fueled power generation) have been denied or minimized by power interests, as the dangers oftobacco smokinghave been denied or minimized by tobacco interests.
Jessica Tuchman Mathews, daughter ofThe Guns of AugustauthorBarbara Tuchman, observes that "powerful reasons to doubt that there could be a limitednuclear war[include] those that emerge from any study ofhistory, a knowledge of how humans act under pressure, or experience of government."[67]Apposite evidence for this is provided inMartin J. Sherwin'sGambling with Armageddon, which makes clear, on the basis of recently declassified documents, that it was a matter of sheer chance that war was averted during the Cuban Missile Crisis: numerous events, had they taken a slightly different course, could each have precipitated nuclear war.[68][o]
Fintan O'Toolediscusses, using historic examples, how external threats to a country – or even mere allegations of such threats – can serve politicians' efforts to suppress internal liberties and dissent:
[I]mperial fantasies create the conditions for animperial presidency... that leverages supposed foreign dangers to justify domestic tyranny. In 1793James Madisonwarned that "war is in fact the true nurse of executive aggrandizement." International adventures, he wrote, inflate the persona of the president [of the United States] and unleash the "strongest passions, and most dangerous weaknesses of the human breast: ambition, avarice, vanity." Five years later Madison wrote toThomas Jefferson, "Perhaps it is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to provisions against danger, real or pretended, from abroad."[70]
Appositely, historianArthur Schlesinger Jr.writes:
"Sometimes, when I am particularly depressed, I ascribe our behavior tostupidity—the stupidity of our leadership, the stupidity of our culture. Thirty years ago we suffered military defeat—fighting an unwinnable war against a country about which we knew nothing and in which we had no vital interests at stake.Vietnamwas bad enough, but to repeat the same experiment thirty years later inIraqis a strong argument for a case of national stupidity."[71]
O'Toolewrites about American war correspondentMartha Gellhorn(1908–1998):
Her dispatches were not first drafts of history; they were letters from eternity. ... To see history – at least the history of war – in terms of people is to see it not as a linear process but as a series of terrible repetitions ... It is her ability to capture ... the terrible futility of this sameness that makes Gellhorn's reportage so genuinely timeless. [W]e are ... drawn... into the undertow of her distraught awareness that this moment, in its essence, has happened before and will happen again.[72]
Casey Cep, describing a dissonance betweenWilliam Faulkner's documented personalracismand Faulkner's depiction of theAmerican Confederacy, writes thatMichael Gorra, inThe Saddest Words: William Faulkner's Civil War(Liveright, 2020),
posits that [the character] Quentin [Compson, who suicides inAbsalom, Absalom!] represents Faulkner's view of tragedy as recurrence. "Again" was the saddest word for the character and the author alike because it "suggests that whatwashas simply gone on happening, a cycle of repetition that replays itself, forever." ... "Whatwasis never over", Gorra writes, pointing out that the racism that ensnared Faulkner in the last century persists in th[e 21st] ... "Again.That's precisely why Faulkner remains so valuable – that very recurrence makes him necessary."[73]
British novelistMartin Amisobserves that recurring patterns of imperial ascendance-and-decline are mirrored in thenovelspublished; according to Amis, novels follow current political trends. In the Victorian era, whenBritainwas theascendant power, British novels were large and tried to express what society as a whole was. British power waned during theSecond World Warand ended after the war. The British novel was then some 225 pages long and centered on narrower subjects such as career setbacks or marriage setbacks: the British novel's "great tradition" increasingly looked depleted. Ascendance, according to Amis, had passed to the United States, and Americans such asSaul Bellow,Norman Mailer,Philip Roth, andJohn Updikebegan writing huge novels.[74]
O'Toolewrites, of the prevailing demise of absolute monarchy, especially in capitalistpolities:
There is a reason Westerncapitalismditchedabsolute monarchy: personal rule is rule by whim, prejudice, grudge, and tantrum. ... [C]apitalism as a system abhorsuncertainty. ... [S]cience, intellectual freedom, international cooperation, and social stability create wealth – and ... giving untrammeled power to anautocratbent on obliterating all of those things is a very efficient way to squander it [i.e., power]."[75]
Novelists and historians have discerned recurrent patterns in the histories of modern politicaltyrants.[76]
Gabriel García Márquez, in his novelThe Autumn of the Patriarch(1975), ... create[d] a composite character: a mythical, unnamedautocratwho has held sway, seemingly forever, over an invented Caribbean country akin to Costaguana in Joseph Conrad'sNostromo. To portray him, García Márquez drew upon a motley cohort of Latin Americancaudillos... as well as Spain's GeneralissimoFrancisco Franco...[77]
Ruth Ben-GhiatinStrongmen: Mussolini to the Present(2020), writesAriel Dorfman, documents the "viral recurrence" around the world, over the past century, of despots andauthoritarians"with comparable strategies of control and mendacity". Ben-Ghiat divides the narrative into three – at times, overlapping – periods:[78]
The era of fascist takeovers runs from 1919 and the ascent ofMussoliniuntilHitler's defeat in 1945, withFrancoas the third member of this atrocious trio ... [In] the next phase, the age of military coups (1950–1990) [t]he main representatives ... arePinochet,Muammar Qaddafi, andMobutu Sese Seko, along with minor figures likeIdi Amin,Saddam Hussein, andMohamed Siad Barre. Finally, starting in 1990 [is] the ... cycle of new authoritarians, who win elections and proceed to degrade thedemocracythat brought them to power. Ben-Ghiat primarily dissectsSilvio Berlusconi,Vladimir Putin, andDonald Trump, withViktor Orbán,Jair Bolsonaro,Rodrigo Duterte,Narendra Modi, andRecep Tayyip Erdoğangiven perfunctory assessments.[79]
Dorfman notes the absence, from Ben-Ghiat's study, of many authoritarian rulers, including communists likeMao,Stalin,Ceaușescu, and the three Kims of North Korea. Nor is there mention of Indonesia'sSuhartoor the Shah of Iran,Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, "though theCIAengineered coups that led to both ... lording it over their lands, and the agency can also be linked to Pinochet's militaryputschin Chile." Dorfman believes thatJuan Domingo Perónwould also have been an instructive example to include in Ruth Ben-Ghiat's study ofStrongmen.[80]
British political commentatorFerdinand Mountbrings attention to the ubiquitous recurrence ofmendacityinpolitics: politicians lie to cover up their mistakes, to gain advantage over their opponents, or to achieve purposes that might be unpalatable or harmful to their public or to a foreign public. Some notable practitioners of political mendacity discussed by Mount includeJulius Caesar,Cesare Borgia,Queen Elizabeth I,Oliver Cromwell,Robert Clive,Napoleon,Winston Churchill,Tony Blair,Boris Johnson, andDonald Trump.[81]
Jonathan Freedlandidentifies another tactic in addition to mendacity –humor– in the armamentarium of 21st-century politicians:
"Perhaps what galled[Rory] Stewartand hisToryallies most, just as it infuriated theirNever Trumpcounterparts in theRepublican Party, was the flight fromtruth. The embodiment of the malaise wasBoris Johnson... [Stewart] might also have mentionedhumor, which was a secret weapon for Johnson just as it remains forTrump. US readers are likely to think of Trump when Stewart reflects that Johnson was dangerous precisely because 'he alone could cloak a darker narrative in clowning.' Both men allowed and, in Trump's case, still allow 'the public to indulge ever more offensive opinions under the excuse that some of it might be ajoke.'... The grief that runs through [Stewart's] book is not for his party only. It is for his country.... Britain's international influence is now at the margins, especially after the country's exit from theEU.... [Stewart] has contempt for themedia's fixation on the trivial and the personal... Stewart discovered that, in contemporarypolitics, the liar who is brazen about hisliesis seen as refreshingly honest, while the honest candidate who errs, but fails to brag about it, is the liar.... The reluctant, introspective, intellectual pol[itician] can flourish for a while; they can even capture the imagination, especially of those voters who pride themselves on not falling for anything so shallow ascharisma. But they rarely win."[82]
The verylanguagesin which humans communicate show some striking similarities. Allison Parshall offers an example:
"Manylanguageshave aninterjectionword for expressing pain. [Katarzyna Pisanskiet al., writing in theJournal of the Acoustical Society of America, have] found that pain interjections tend to contain thevowelsound 'ah' (written as [a] in theInternational Phonetic Alphabet) and letter combinations that incorporate it, such as 'ow' and 'ai.' These patterns may point back to the origins of human language itself." (p. 16.) "Researchers are continually discovering cases ofsymbolism, or soundiconicity, in which a word's intrinsic nature has some connection to its meaning. These cases run counter to decades oflinguistic theory, which had regarded language as fundamentally arbitrary... [Many wordsonomatopoeicallyimitate a sound. Also] there's the'bouba-kiki' effect, whereby people from varying cultures are more likely to associate the nonsense word 'bouba' with a rounded shape and 'kiki' with a spiked one.... [S]omehow we all have afeelingabout this,' says Aleksandra Ćwiek... [She and her colleagues have] show[n] that people associate thetrilled'R' sound with roughness and the 'L' sound with smoothness.Mark Dingemanse... in 2013 found [that] the conversational 'Huh?' and similar words in other languages may be universal." (p. 18.)[83]
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Thehistory of sciencecovers the development ofsciencefromancient timesto thepresent. It encompasses all three majorbranches of science:natural,social, andformal.[1]Protoscience,early sciences, and natural philosophies such asalchemyandastrologythat existed during theBronze Age,Iron Age,classical antiquityand theMiddle Ages, declined during theearly modern periodafter the establishment of formal disciplines ofscience in the Age of Enlightenment.
The earliest roots of scientific thinking and practice can be traced toAncient EgyptandMesopotamiaduring the 3rd and 2nd millennia BCE.[2][3]These civilizations' contributions tomathematics,astronomy, andmedicineinfluenced later Greeknatural philosophyofclassical antiquity, wherein formal attempts were made to provide explanations of events in thephysical worldbased on natural causes.[2][3]After thefall of the Western Roman Empire, knowledge ofGreek conceptions of the worlddeteriorated in Latin-speakingWestern Europeduring the early centuries (400 to 1000 CE) ofthe Middle Ages,[4]but continued to thrive in theGreek-speakingByzantine Empire. Aided by translations of Greek texts, theHellenisticworldview was preserved and absorbed into theArabic-speakingMuslim worldduring theIslamic Golden Age.[5]The recovery and assimilation ofGreek worksandIslamic inquiriesinto Western Europe from the 10th to 13th century revived the learning of natural philosophy in the West.[4][6]Traditions of early science were also developed inancient Indiaand separately inancient China, theChinese modelhaving influencedVietnam,KoreaandJapanbeforeWestern exploration.[7]Among thePre-Columbianpeoples ofMesoamerica, theZapotec civilizationestablished their first known traditions of astronomy and mathematics forproducing calendars, followed by other civilizations such as theMaya.
Natural philosophy was transformed by theScientific Revolutionthat transpired during the 16th and 17th centuries in Europe,[8][9][10]asnew ideas and discoveriesdeparted fromprevious Greek conceptionsand traditions.[11][12][13][14]The New Science that emerged was moremechanisticin its worldview, more integrated with mathematics, and more reliable and open as its knowledge was based on a newly definedscientific method.[12][15][16]More "revolutions" in subsequent centuries soon followed. Thechemical revolutionof the 18th century, for instance, introduced new quantitative methods and measurements forchemistry.[17]In the19th century, new perspectives regarding theconservation of energy,age of Earth, andevolutioncame into focus.[18][19][20][21][22][23]And in the 20th century, new discoveries ingeneticsandphysicslaid the foundations for new sub disciplines such asmolecular biologyandparticle physics.[24][25]Moreover, industrial and military concerns as well as the increasing complexity of new research endeavors ushered in the era of "big science," particularly afterWorld War II.[24][25][26]
The nature of the history of science is a topic of debate (as is, by implication, the definition of science itself). The history of science is often seen as a linear story of progress,[27]but historians have come to see the story as more complex.[28][29][30]Alfred Edward Taylorhas characterised lean periods in the advance of scientific discovery as "periodical bankruptcies of science".[31]
Science is a human activity, and scientific contributions have come from people from a wide range of different backgrounds and cultures. Historians of science increasingly see their field as part of a global history of exchange, conflict and collaboration.[32]
Therelationship between science and religionhas been variously characterized in terms of "conflict", "harmony", "complexity", and "mutual independence", among others. Events in Europe such as theGalileo affairof the early 17th century – associated with the scientific revolution and theAge of Enlightenment– led scholars such asJohn William Draperto postulate (c.1874) aconflict thesis, suggesting that religion and science have been in conflict methodologically, factually and politically throughout history. The "conflict thesis" has since lost favor among the majority of contemporary scientists and historians of science.[33][34][35]However, some contemporary philosophers and scientists, such asRichard Dawkins,[36]still subscribe to this thesis.
Historians have emphasized[37]that trust is necessary for agreement on claims about nature. In this light, the 1660 establishment of theRoyal Societyand its code of experiment – trustworthy because witnessed by its members – has become animportant chapterin thehistoriographyof science.[38]Many people in modern history (typicallywomenand persons of color) were excluded from elite scientific communities andcharacterized by the science establishment as inferior. Historians in the 1980s and 1990s described the structural barriers to participation and began to recover the contributions of overlooked individuals.[39][40]Historians have also investigated the mundane practices of science such as fieldwork and specimen collection,[41]correspondence,[42]drawing,[43]record-keeping,[44]and the use of laboratory and field equipment.[45]
Inprehistorictimes, knowledge and technique were passed from generation to generation in anoral tradition. For instance, the domestication ofmaizefor agriculture has been dated to about 9,000 years ago in southernMexico, before the development ofwriting systems.[46][47][48]Similarly,archaeologicalevidence indicates the development ofastronomicalknowledge in preliterate societies.[49][50]
The oral tradition of preliterate societies had several features, the first of which was its fluidity.[2]New information was constantly absorbed and adjusted to new circumstances or community needs. There were no archives or reports. This fluidity was closely related to the practical need to explain and justify a present state of affairs.[2]Another feature was the tendency to describe the universe as just sky and earth, with a potentialunderworld. They were also prone to identify causes with beginnings, thereby providing a historical origin with an explanation. There was also a reliance on a "medicine man" or "wise woman" for healing, knowledge of divine or demonic causes of diseases, and in more extreme cases, for rituals such asexorcism,divination, songs, andincantations.[2]Finally, there was an inclination to unquestioningly accept explanations that might be deemed implausible in more modern times while at the same time not being aware that such credulous behaviors could have posed problems.[2]
The development of writing enabled humans to store and communicate knowledge across generations with much greater accuracy. Its invention was a prerequisite for the development of philosophy and laterscience in ancient times.[2]Moreover, the extent to which philosophy and science would flourish in ancient times depended on the efficiency of a writing system (e.g., use of alphabets).[2]
The earliest roots of science can be traced to theAncient Near Eastc.3000–1200 BCE– in particular toAncient EgyptandMesopotamia.[2]
Startingc.3000 BCE, the ancient Egyptians developed a numbering system that was decimal in character and had oriented their knowledge of geometry to solving practical problems such as those of surveyors and builders.[2]Their development ofgeometrywas itself a necessary development ofsurveyingto preserve the layout and ownership of farmland, which was flooded annually by theNile. The 3-4-5right triangleand other rules of geometry were used to build rectilinear structures, and the post and lintel architecture of Egypt.
Egypt was also a center ofalchemyresearch for much of theMediterranean. According to themedical papyri(writtenc.2500–1200 BCE), the ancient Egyptians believed that disease was mainly caused by the invasion of bodies by evil forces or spirits.[2]Thus, in addition tomedicine, therapies included prayer,incantation, and ritual.[2]TheEbers Papyrus, writtenc.1600 BCE, contains medical recipes for treating diseases related to the eyes, mouth, skin, internal organs, and extremities, as well as abscesses, wounds, burns, ulcers, swollen glands, tumors, headaches, and bad breath. TheEdwin Smith Papyrus, written at about the same time, contains a surgical manual for treating wounds, fractures, and dislocations. The Egyptians believed that the effectiveness of their medicines depended on the preparation and administration under appropriate rituals.[2]Medical historians believe that ancient Egyptian pharmacology, for example, was largely ineffective.[51]Both the Ebers and Edwin Smith papyri applied the following components to the treatment of disease: examination, diagnosis, treatment, and prognosis,[52]which display strong parallels to the basicempirical methodof science and, according to G. E. R. Lloyd,[53]played a significant role in the development of this methodology.
The ancient Egyptians even developed an official calendar that contained twelve months, thirty days each, and five days at the end of the year.[2]Unlike the Babylonian calendar or the ones used in Greek city-states at the time, the official Egyptian calendar was much simpler as it was fixed and did not takelunarand solar cycles into consideration.[2]
The ancient Mesopotamians had extensive knowledge about thechemical propertiesof clay, sand, metal ore,bitumen, stone, and other natural materials, and applied this knowledge to practical use in manufacturingpottery,faience, glass, soap, metals,lime plaster, and waterproofing.Metallurgyrequired knowledge about the properties of metals. Nonetheless, the Mesopotamians seem to have had little interest in gathering information about the natural world for the mere sake of gathering information and were far more interested in studying the manner in which the gods had ordered theuniverse. Biology of non-human organisms was generally only written about in the context of mainstream academic disciplines.Animal physiologywas studied extensively for the purpose ofdivination; the anatomy of theliver, which was seen as an important organ inharuspicy, was studied in particularly intensive detail.Animal behaviorwas also studied for divinatory purposes. Most information about the training and domestication of animals was probably transmitted orally without being written down, but one text dealing with the training of horses has survived.[54]
The ancientMesopotamianshad no distinction between "rational science" andmagic.[55][56][57]When a person became ill, doctors prescribed magical formulas to be recited as well as medicinal treatments.[55][56][57][54]The earliest medical prescriptions appear inSumerianduring theThird Dynasty of Ur(c.2112 BCE –c.2004 BCE).[58]The most extensiveBabylonianmedical text, however, is theDiagnostic Handbookwritten by theummânū, or chief scholar,Esagil-kin-apliofBorsippa,[59]during the reign of the Babylonian kingAdad-apla-iddina(1069–1046 BCE).[60]InEast Semiticcultures, the main medicinal authority was a kind of exorcist-healer known as anāšipu.[55][56][57]The profession was generally passed down from father to son and was held in extremely high regard.[55]Of less frequent recourse was another kind of healer known as anasu, who corresponds more closely to a modern physician and treated physical symptoms using primarilyfolk remediescomposed of various herbs, animal products, and minerals, as well as potions, enemas, and ointments orpoultices. These physicians, who could be either male or female, also dressed wounds, set limbs, and performed simple surgeries. The ancient Mesopotamians also practicedprophylaxisand took measures to prevent the spread of disease.[54]
InBabylonian astronomy, records of the motions of thestars,planets, and themoonare left on thousands ofclay tabletscreated byscribes. Even today, astronomical periods identified by Mesopotamian proto-scientists are still widely used inWestern calendarssuch as thesolar yearand thelunar month. Using this data, they developed mathematical methods to compute the changing length of daylight in the course of the year, predict the appearances and disappearances of the Moon and planets, and eclipses of the Sun and Moon. Only a few astronomers' names are known, such as that ofKidinnu, aChaldeanastronomer and mathematician. Kiddinu's value for the solar year is in use for today's calendars. Babylonian astronomy was "the first and highly successful attempt at giving a refined mathematical description of astronomical phenomena." According to the historian A. Aaboe, "all subsequent varieties of scientific astronomy, in the Hellenistic world, in India, in Islam, and in the West—if not indeed all subsequent endeavour in the exact sciences—depend upon Babylonian astronomy in decisive and fundamental ways."[61]
To theBabyloniansand otherNear Easterncultures, messages from the gods or omens were concealed in all natural phenomena that could be deciphered and interpreted by those who are adept.[2]Hence, it was believed that the gods could speak through all terrestrial objects (e.g., animal entrails, dreams, malformed births, or even the color of a dog urinating on a person) and celestial phenomena.[2]Moreover, Babylonian astrology was inseparable from Babylonian astronomy.
The MesopotamiancuneiformtabletPlimpton 322, dating to the 18th century BCE, records a number ofPythagorean triplets(3, 4, 5) and (5, 12, 13) ...,[62]hinting that the ancient Mesopotamians might have been aware of thePythagorean theoremover a millennium before Pythagoras.[63][64][65]
Mathematical achievements from Mesopotamia had some influence on the development of mathematics in India, and there were confirmed transmissions of mathematical ideas between India and China, which were bidirectional.[66]Nevertheless, the mathematical and scientific achievements in India and particularly in China occurred largely independently[67]from those of Europe and the confirmed early influences that these two civilizations had on the development of science in Europe in the pre-modern era were indirect, with Mesopotamia and later the Islamic World acting as intermediaries.[66]The arrival of modern science, which grew out of theScientific Revolution, in India and China and the greater Asian region in general can be traced to the scientific activities of Jesuit missionaries who were interested in studying the region'sfloraandfaunaduring the 16th to 17th century.[68]
The earliest traces of mathematical knowledge in the Indian subcontinent appear with theIndus Valley Civilisation(c.3300– c.1300 BCE). The people of this civilization made bricks whose dimensions were in the proportion 4:2:1, which is favorable for the stability of a brick structure.[69]They also tried to standardize measurement of length to a high degree of accuracy. They designed a ruler—theMohenjo-daro ruler—whose length of approximately 1.32 in (34 mm) was divided into ten equal parts. Bricks manufactured in ancient Mohenjo-daro often had dimensions that were integral multiples of this unit of length.[70]
TheBakhshali manuscriptcontains problems involvingarithmetic,algebraandgeometry, includingmensuration. The topics covered include fractions, square roots,arithmeticandgeometric progressions, solutions of simple equations,simultaneous linear equations,quadratic equationsandindeterminate equationsof the second degree.[71]In the 3rd century BCE,Pingalapresents thePingala-sutras, the earliest known treatise onSanskrit prosody.[72]He also presents a numerical system by adding one to the sum ofplace values.[73]Pingala's work also includes material related to theFibonacci numbers, calledmātrāmeru.[74]
Indian astronomer and mathematicianAryabhata(476–550), in hisAryabhatiya(499) introduced thesinefunction intrigonometryand the number 0. In 628,Brahmaguptasuggested thatgravitywas a force of attraction.[75][76]He also lucidly explained the use ofzeroas both a placeholder and adecimal digit, along with theHindu–Arabic numeral systemnow used universally throughout the world.Arabictranslations of the two astronomers' texts were soon available in theIslamic world, introducing what would becomeArabic numeralsto the Islamic world by the 9th century.[77][78]
Narayana Pandita(1340–1400[79]) was an Indianmathematician.Plofkerwrites that his texts were the most significant Sanskrit mathematics treatises after those ofBhaskara II, other than theKerala school.[80]: 52He wrote theGanita Kaumudi(lit. "Moonlight of mathematics") in 1356 about mathematical operations.[81]The work anticipated many developments incombinatorics.
Between the 14th and 16th centuries, theKerala school of astronomy and mathematicsmade significant advances in astronomy and especially mathematics, including fields such as trigonometry and analysis. In particular,Madhava of Sangamagramaled advancement inanalysisby providing the infinite and taylor series expansion of some trigonometric functions and pi approximation.[82]Parameshvara(1380–1460), presents a case of the Mean Value theorem in his commentaries onGovindasvāmiandBhāskara II.[83]TheYuktibhāṣāwas written byJyeshtadevain 1530.[84]
The first textual mention of astronomical concepts comes from theVedas, religious literature of India.[85]According to Sarma (2008): "One finds in theRigvedaintelligent speculations about the genesis of the universe from nonexistence, the configuration of the universe, thespherical self-supporting earth, and the year of 360 days divided into 12 equal parts of 30 days each with a periodical intercalary month.".[85]
The first 12 chapters of theSiddhanta Shiromani, written byBhāskarain the 12th century, cover topics such as: mean longitudes of the planets; true longitudes of the planets; the three problems of diurnal rotation; syzygies; lunar eclipses; solar eclipses; latitudes of the planets; risings and settings; the moon's crescent; conjunctions of the planets with each other; conjunctions of the planets with the fixed stars; and the patas of the sun and moon. The 13 chapters of the second part cover the nature of the sphere, as well as significant astronomical and trigonometric calculations based on it.
In theTantrasangrahatreatise,Nilakantha Somayaji's updated the Aryabhatan model for the interior planets, Mercury, and Venus and the equation that he specified for the center of these planets was more accurate than the ones in European or Islamic astronomy until the time ofJohannes Keplerin the 17th century.[86]Jai Singh IIofJaipurconstructed fiveobservatoriescalledJantar Mantarsin total, inNew Delhi,Jaipur,Ujjain,MathuraandVaranasi; they were completed between 1724 and 1735.[87]
Some of the earliest linguistic activities can be found inIron Age India(1st millennium BCE) with the analysis ofSanskritfor the purpose of the correct recitation and interpretation ofVedictexts. The most notable grammarian of Sanskrit wasPāṇini(c. 520–460 BCE), whose grammar formulates close to 4,000 rules for Sanskrit. Inherent in his analytic approach are the concepts of thephoneme, themorphemeand theroot. TheTolkāppiyamtext, composed in the early centuries of the common era,[88]is a comprehensive text on Tamil grammar, which includes sutras on orthography, phonology, etymology, morphology, semantics, prosody, sentence structure and the significance of context in language.
Findings fromNeolithicgraveyards in what is now Pakistan show evidence of proto-dentistry among an early farming culture.[89]The ancient textSuśrutasamhitāofSuśrutadescribes procedures on various forms of surgery, includingrhinoplasty, the repair of torn ear lobes, perineallithotomy, cataract surgery, and several other excisions and other surgical procedures.[90][91]TheCharaka SamhitaofCharakadescribes ancient theories on human body,etiology,symptomologyandtherapeuticsfor a wide range of diseases.[92]It also includes sections on the importance of diet, hygiene, prevention, medical education, and the teamwork of a physician, nurse and patient necessary for recovery to health.[93][94][95]
An ancient Indian treatise onstatecraft,economicpolicy andmilitary strategyby Kautilya[96]andViṣhṇugupta,[97]who are traditionally identified withChāṇakya(c. 350–283 BCE). In this treatise, the behaviors and relationships of the people, the King, the State, the Government Superintendents, Courtiers, Enemies, Invaders, and Corporations are analyzed and documented.Roger Boeschedescribes theArthaśāstraas "a book of political realism, a book analyzing how the political world does work and not very often stating how it ought to work, a book that frequently discloses to a king what calculating and sometimes brutal measures he must carry out to preserve the state and the common good."[98]
The development of Indian logic dates back to the Chandahsutra of Pingala andanviksikiof Medhatithi Gautama (c. 6th century BCE); theSanskrit grammarrules ofPāṇini(c. 5th century BCE); theVaisheshikaschool's analysis ofatomism(c. 6th century BCE to 2nd century BCE); the analysis ofinferencebyGotama(c. 6th century BCE to 2nd century CE), founder of theNyayaschool ofHindu philosophy; and thetetralemmaofNagarjuna(c. 2nd century CE).
Indianlogic stands as one of the three original traditions oflogic, alongside theGreekand theChinese logic. The Indian tradition continued to develop through early to modern times, in the form of theNavya-Nyāyaschool of logic.
In the 2nd century, theBuddhistphilosopherNagarjunarefined theCatuskotiform of logic. The Catuskoti is also often glossedTetralemma(Greek) which is the name for a largely comparable, but not equatable, 'four corner argument' within the tradition ofClassical logic.
Navya-Nyāya developed a sophisticated language and conceptual scheme that allowed it to raise, analyse, and solve problems in logic and epistemology. It systematised all the Nyāya concepts into four main categories: sense or perception (pratyakşa), inference (anumāna), comparison or similarity (upamāna), and testimony (sound or word; śabda).
From the earliest the Chinese used a positional decimal system on counting boards in order to calculate. To express 10, a single rod is placed in the second box from the right. The spoken language uses a similar system to English: e.g. four thousand two hundred and seven. No symbol was used for zero. By the 1st century BCE, negative numbers and decimal fractions were in use andThe Nine Chapters on the Mathematical Artincluded methods for extracting higher order roots byHorner's methodand solving linear equations and byPythagoras' theorem. Cubic equations were solved in theTang dynastyand solutions of equations of order higher than 3 appeared in print in 1245 CE byCh'in Chiu-shao.Pascal's trianglefor binomial coefficients was described around 1100 byJia Xian.[99]
Although the first attempts at an axiomatization of geometry appear in theMohistcanon in 330 BCE,Liu Huideveloped algebraic methods in geometry in the 3rd century CE and also calculatedpito 5 significant figures. In 480,Zu Chongzhiimproved this by discovering the ratio355113{\displaystyle {\tfrac {355}{113}}}which remained the most accurate value for 1200 years.
Astronomical observations from China constitute the longest continuous sequence from any civilization and include records of sunspots (112 records from 364 BCE), supernovas (1054), lunar and solar eclipses. By the 12th century, they could reasonably accurately make predictions of eclipses, but the knowledge of this was lost during the Ming dynasty, so that the JesuitMatteo Riccigained much favor in 1601 by his predictions.[101][incomplete short citation]By 635 Chinese astronomers had observed that the tails of comets always point away from the sun.
From antiquity, the Chinese used an equatorial system for describing the skies and a star map from 940 was drawn using a cylindrical (Mercator) projection. The use of anarmillary sphereis recorded from the 4th century BCE and a sphere permanently mounted in equatorial axis from 52 BCE. In 125 CEZhang Hengused water power to rotate the sphere in real time. This included rings for the meridian and ecliptic. By 1270 they had incorporated the principles of the Arabtorquetum.
In theSong Empire(960–1279) ofImperial China, Chinesescholar-officialsunearthed, studied, and cataloged ancient artifacts.
To better prepare for calamities, Zhang Heng invented aseismometerin 132 CE which provided instant alert to authorities in the capital Luoyang that an earthquake had occurred in a location indicated by a specificcardinal or ordinal direction.[102][103]Although no tremors could be felt in the capital when Zhang told the court that an earthquake had just occurred in the northwest, a message came soon afterwards that an earthquake had indeed struck 400 to 500 km (250 to 310 mi) northwest of Luoyang (in what is now modernGansu).[104]Zhang called his device the 'instrument for measuring the seasonal winds and the movements of the Earth' (Houfeng didong yi 候风地动仪), so-named because he and others thought that earthquakes were most likely caused by the enormous compression of trapped air.[105]
There are many notable contributors to early Chinese disciplines, inventions, and practices throughout the ages. One of the best examples would be the medieval Song ChineseShen Kuo(1031–1095), apolymathand statesman who was the first to describe themagnetic-needlecompassused fornavigation, discovered the concept oftrue north, improved the design of the astronomicalgnomon,armillary sphere, sight tube, andclepsydra, and described the use ofdrydocksto repair boats. After observing the natural process of the inundation ofsiltand the find ofmarinefossilsin theTaihang Mountains(hundreds of miles from the Pacific Ocean), Shen Kuo devised a theory of land formation, orgeomorphology. He also adopted a theory of gradualclimate changein regions over time, after observingpetrifiedbamboofound underground atYan'an, Shaanxi. If not for Shen Kuo's writing,[106]the architectural works ofYu Haowould be little known, along with the inventor ofmovable typeprinting,Bi Sheng(990–1051). Shen's contemporarySu Song(1020–1101) was also a brilliant polymath, an astronomer who created a celestial atlas of star maps, wrote a treatise related tobotany,zoology,mineralogy, andmetallurgy, and had erected a largeastronomicalclocktowerinKaifengcity in 1088. To operate the crowningarmillary sphere, his clocktower featured anescapementmechanism and the world's oldest known use of an endless power-transmittingchain drive.[107]
TheJesuit China missionsof the 16th and 17th centuries "learned to appreciate the scientific achievements of this ancient culture and made them known in Europe. Through their correspondence European scientists first learned about the Chinese science and culture."[108]Western academic thought on the history of Chinese technology and science was galvanized by the work ofJoseph Needhamand the Needham Research Institute. Among the technological accomplishments of China were, according to the British scholar Needham, thewater-poweredcelestial globe(Zhang Heng),[109]dry docks, slidingcalipers, the double-actionpiston pump,[109]theblast furnace,[110]the multi-tubeseed drill, thewheelbarrow,[110]thesuspension bridge,[110]thewinnowing machine,[109]gunpowder,[110]theraised-relief map, toilet paper,[110]the efficient harness,[109]along with contributions inlogic,astronomy,medicine, and other fields.
However, cultural factors prevented these Chinese achievements from developing into "modern science". According to Needham, it may have been the religious and philosophical framework of Chinese intellectuals which made them unable to accept the ideas of laws of nature:
It was not that there was no order in nature for the Chinese, but rather that it was not an order ordained by a rational personal being, and hence there was no conviction that rational personal beings would be able to spell out in their lesser earthly languages the divine code of laws which he had decreed aforetime. TheTaoists, indeed, would have scorned such an idea as being too naïve for the subtlety and complexity of the universe as they intuited it.[111]
During theMiddle Formative Period(c. 900 BCE – c. 300 BCE) ofPre-ColumbianMesoamerica, theZapotec civilization, heavily influenced by theOlmec civilization, established the first knownfull writing systemof the region (possibly predated bythe OlmecCascajal Block),[112]as well as the first known astronomicalcalendar in Mesoamerica.[113][114]Following a period of initial urban development in thePreclassical period, theClassicMaya civilization(c. 250 CE – c. 900 CE) built on the shared heritage of the Olmecs by developing the most sophisticated systems ofwriting,astronomy,calendrical science, andmathematicsamong Mesoamerican peoples.[113]The Maya developed apositional numeral systemwith abase of 20that included the use ofzerofor constructing their calendars.[115][116]Maya writing, which was developed by 200 BCE, widespread by 100 BCE, and rootedin Olmecand Zapotec scripts, contains easily discernible calendar dates in the form oflogographsrepresenting numbers, coefficients, and calendar periods amounting to 20 days and even 20 years for tracking social, religious, political, and economic events in 360-day years.[117]
The contributions of the Ancient Egyptians and Mesopotamians in the areas of astronomy, mathematics, and medicine had entered and shapedGreeknatural philosophyofclassical antiquity, whereby formal attempts were made to provide explanations of events in thephysical worldbased on natural causes.[2][3]Inquiries were also aimed at such practical goals such as establishing a reliable calendar or determining how to cure a variety of illnesses. The ancient people who were considered the firstscientistsmay have thought of themselves asnatural philosophers, as practitioners of a skilled profession (for example,physicians), or as followers of areligious tradition(for example,temple healers).
The earliestGreek philosophers, known as thepre-Socratics,[118]provided competing answers to the question found in the myths of their neighbors: "How did the orderedcosmosin which we live come to be?"[119]The pre-Socratic philosopherThales(640–546 BCE) ofMiletus,[120]identified by later authors such as Aristotle as the first of theIonian philosophers,[2]postulated non-supernatural explanations for natural phenomena. For example, that land floats on water and that earthquakes are caused by the agitation of the water upon which the land floats, rather than the god Poseidon.[121]Thales' studentPythagorasofSamosfounded thePythagorean school, which investigated mathematics for its own sake, and was the first to postulate that the Earth is spherical in shape.[122]Leucippus(5th century BCE) introducedatomism, the theory that allmatteris made of indivisible, imperishable units calledatoms. This was greatly expanded on by his pupilDemocritusand laterEpicurus.
PlatoandAristotleproduced the first systematic discussions of natural philosophy, which did much to shape later investigations of nature. Their development ofdeductive reasoningwas of particular importance and usefulness to later scientific inquiry. Plato founded thePlatonic Academyin 387 BCE, whose motto was "Let none unversed in geometry enter here," and also turned out many notable philosophers. Plato's student Aristotle introducedempiricismand the notion that universal truths can be arrived at via observation and induction, thereby laying the foundations of the scientific method.[123]Aristotle also producedmany biological writingsthat were empirical in nature, focusing on biological causation and the diversity of life. He made countless observations of nature, especially the habits and attributes of plants and animals onLesbos, classified more than 540 animal species, and dissected at least 50.[124]Aristotle's writings profoundly influenced subsequentIslamicandEuropeanscholarship, though they were eventually superseded in theScientific Revolution.[125][126]
Aristotle also contributed to theories of the elements and the cosmos. He believed that thecelestial bodies(such as the planets and the Sun) had something called anunmoved moverthat put the celestial bodies in motion. Aristotle tried to explain everything through mathematics and physics, but sometimes explained things such as the motion of celestial bodies through a higher power such as God. Aristotle did not have the technological advancements that would have explained the motion of celestial bodies.[127]In addition, Aristotle had many views on the elements. He believed that everything was derived of the elements earth, water, air, fire, and lastly theAether. The Aether was a celestial element, and therefore made up the matter of the celestial bodies.[128]The elements of earth, water, air and fire were derived of a combination of two of the characteristics of hot, wet, cold, and dry, and all had their inevitable place and motion. The motion of these elements begins with earth being the closest to "the Earth," then water, air, fire, and finally Aether. In addition to the makeup of all things, Aristotle came up with theories as to why things did not return to their natural motion. He understood that water sits above earth, air above water, and fire above air in their natural state. He explained that although all elements must return to their natural state, the human body and other living things have a constraint on the elements – thus not allowing the elements making one who they are to return to their natural state.[129]
The important legacy of this period included substantial advances in factual knowledge, especially inanatomy,zoology,botany,mineralogy,geography,mathematicsandastronomy; an awareness of the importance of certain scientific problems, especially those related to the problem of change and its causes; and a recognition of the methodological importance of applying mathematics to natural phenomena and of undertaking empirical research.[130][120]In theHellenistic agescholars frequently employed the principles developed in earlier Greek thought: the application of mathematics and deliberate empirical research, in their scientific investigations.[131]Thus, clear unbroken lines of influence lead from ancientGreekandHellenistic philosophers, to medievalMuslim philosophersandscientists, to the EuropeanRenaissanceandEnlightenment, to the secularsciencesof the modern day.
Neither reason nor inquiry began with the Ancient Greeks, but theSocratic methoddid, along with the idea ofForms, give great advances in geometry,logic, and the natural sciences. According toBenjamin Farrington, former professor ofClassicsatSwansea University:
and again:
The astronomerAristarchus of Samoswas the first known person to propose a heliocentric model of theSolar System, while the geographerEratosthenesaccurately calculated the circumference of the Earth.Hipparchus(c. 190 – c. 120 BCE) produced the first systematicstar catalog. The level of achievement in Hellenistic astronomy andengineeringis impressively shown by theAntikythera mechanism(150–100 BCE), ananalog computerfor calculating the position of planets. Technological artifacts of similar complexity did not reappear until the 14th century, when mechanicalastronomical clocksappeared in Europe.[133]
There was not a defined societal structure for healthcare during the age of Hippocrates.[134]At that time, society was not organized and knowledgeable as people still relied on pure religious reasoning to explain illnesses.[134]Hippocrates introduced the first healthcare system based on science and clinical protocols.[135]Hippocrates' theories about physics and medicine helped pave the way in creating an organized medical structure for society.[135]Inmedicine,Hippocrates(c. 460–370 BCE) and his followers were the first to describe many diseases and medical conditions and developed theHippocratic Oathfor physicians, still relevant and in use today. Hippocrates' ideas are expressed inThe Hippocratic Corpus. The collection notes descriptions of medical philosophies and how disease and lifestyle choices reflect on the physical body.[135]Hippocrates influenced a Westernized, professional relationship among physician and patient.[136]Hippocratesis also known as "the Father of Medicine".[135]Herophilos(335–280 BCE) was the first to base his conclusions on dissection of the human body and to describe thenervous system.Galen(129 – c. 200 CE) performed many audacious operations—including brain and eyesurgeries— that were not tried again for almost two millennia.
InHellenistic Egypt, the mathematicianEuclidlaid down the foundations ofmathematical rigorand introduced the concepts of definition, axiom, theorem and proof still in use today in hisElements, considered the most influential textbook ever written.[138]Archimedes, considered one of the greatest mathematicians of all time,[139]is credited with using themethod of exhaustionto calculate theareaunder the arc of aparabolawith thesummation of an infinite series, and gave a remarkably accurate approximation ofpi.[140]He is also known in physics for laying the foundations ofhydrostatics,statics, and the explanation of the principle of thelever.
Theophrastuswrote some of the earliest descriptions of plants and animals, establishing the firsttaxonomyand looking at minerals in terms of their properties, such ashardness.Pliny the Elderproduced one of the largestencyclopediasof the natural world in 77 CE, and was a successor to Theophrastus. For example, he accurately describes theoctahedralshape of thediamondand noted that diamond dust is used byengraversto cut and polish other gems owing to its great hardness. His recognition of the importance ofcrystalshape is a precursor to moderncrystallography, while notes on other minerals presages mineralogy. He recognizes other minerals have characteristic crystal shapes, but in one example, confuses thecrystal habitwith the work oflapidaries. Pliny was the first to showamberwas a resin from pine trees, because of trapped insects within them.[141][142]
The development of archaeology has its roots in history and with those who were interested in the past, such as kings and queens who wanted to show past glories of their respective nations. The 5th-century-BCEGreek historianHerodotuswas the first scholar to systematically study the past and perhaps the first to examine artifacts.
During the rule of Rome, famous historians such asPolybius,LivyandPlutarchdocumented the rise of theRoman Republic, and the organization and histories of other nations, while statesmen likeJulius Caesar, Cicero, and others provided examples of the politics of the republic and Rome's empire and wars. The study of politics during this age was oriented toward understanding history, understanding methods of governing, and describing the operation of governments.
TheRoman conquest of Greecedid not diminish learning and culture in the Greek provinces.[143]On the contrary, the appreciation of Greek achievements in literature, philosophy, politics, and the arts by Rome'supper classcoincided with the increased prosperity of theRoman Empire. Greek settlements had existed in Italy for centuries and the ability to read and speak Greek was not uncommon in Italian cities such as Rome.[143]Moreover, the settlement of Greek scholars in Rome, whether voluntarily or as slaves, gave Romans access to teachers of Greek literature and philosophy. Conversely, young Roman scholars also studied abroad in Greece and upon their return to Rome, were able to convey Greek achievements to their Latin leadership.[143]And despite the translation of a few Greek texts into Latin, Roman scholars who aspired to the highest level did so using the Greek language. The Romanstatesmanand philosopherCicero(106 – 43 BCE) was a prime example. He had studied under Greek teachers in Rome and then in Athens andRhodes. He mastered considerable portions of Greek philosophy, wrote Latin treatises on several topics, and even wrote Greek commentaries of Plato'sTimaeusas well as a Latin translation of it, which has not survived.[143]
In the beginning, support for scholarship in Greek knowledge was almost entirely funded by the Roman upper class.[143]There were all sorts of arrangements, ranging from a talented scholar being attached to a wealthy household to owning educated Greek-speaking slaves.[143]In exchange, scholars who succeeded at the highest level had an obligation to provide advice or intellectual companionship to their Roman benefactors, or to even take care of their libraries. The less fortunate or accomplished ones would teach their children or perform menial tasks.[143]The level of detail and sophistication of Greek knowledge was adjusted to suit the interests of their Roman patrons. That meant popularizing Greek knowledge by presenting information that were of practical value such as medicine or logic (for courts and politics) but excluding subtle details of Greek metaphysics and epistemology. Beyond the basics, the Romans did not value natural philosophy and considered it an amusement for leisure time.[143]
Commentaries andencyclopediaswere the means by which Greek knowledge was popularized for Roman audiences.[143]The Greek scholarPosidonius(c. 135-c. 51 BCE), a native of Syria, wrote prolifically on history, geography, moral philosophy, and natural philosophy. He greatly influenced Latin writers such asMarcus Terentius Varro(116-27 BCE), who wrote the encyclopediaNine Books of Disciplines, which covered nine arts: grammar, rhetoric, logic, arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, musical theory, medicine, and architecture.[143]TheDisciplinesbecame a model for subsequent Roman encyclopedias and Varro's nine liberal arts were considered suitable education for a Roman gentleman. The first seven of Varro's nine arts would later define theseven liberal artsofmedieval schools.[143]The pinnacle of the popularization movement was the Roman scholarPliny the Elder(23/24–79 CE), a native of northern Italy, who wrote several books on the history of Rome and grammar. His most famous work was his voluminousNatural History.[143]
After the death of the Roman EmperorMarcus Aureliusin 180 CE, the favorable conditions for scholarship and learning in the Roman Empire were upended by political unrest, civil war, urban decay, and looming economic crisis.[143]In around 250 CE,barbariansbegan attacking and invading the Roman frontiers. These combined events led to a general decline in political and economic conditions. The living standards of the Roman upper class was severely impacted, and their loss ofleisurediminished scholarly pursuits.[143]Moreover, during the 3rd and 4th centuries CE, the Roman Empire was administratively divided into two halves:Greek East and Latin West. These administrative divisions weakened the intellectual contact between the two regions.[143]Eventually, both halves went their separate ways, with the Greek East becoming theByzantine Empire.[143]Christianitywas also steadily expanding during this time and soon became a major patron of education in the Latin West. Initially, the Christian church adopted some of the reasoning tools of Greek philosophy in the 2nd and 3rd centuries CE to defend its faith against sophisticated opponents.[143]Nevertheless, Greek philosophy received a mixed reception from leaders and adherents of the Christian faith.[143]Some such asTertullian(c. 155-c. 230 CE) were vehemently opposed to philosophy, denouncing it asheretic. Others such asAugustine of Hippo(354-430 CE) were ambivalent and defended Greek philosophy and science as the best ways to understand the natural world and therefore treated it as ahandmaiden(or servant) of religion.[143]Education in the West began its gradual decline, along with the rest ofWestern Roman Empire, due to invasions by Germanic tribes, civil unrest, and economic collapse. Contact with the classical tradition was lost in specific regions such asRoman Britainand northernGaulbut continued to exist in Rome, northern Italy, southern Gaul, Spain, andNorth Africa.[143]
In the Middle Ages, the classical learning continued in three major linguistic cultures and civilizations: Greek (the Byzantine Empire), Arabic (the Islamic world), and Latin (Western Europe).
Thefall of the Western Roman Empireled to a deterioration of the classical tradition in the western part (orLatin West) of Europe during the 5th century. In contrast, the Byzantine Empire resisted the barbarian attacks and preserved and improved the learning.[144]
While the Byzantine Empire still held learning centers such asConstantinople, Alexandria and Antioch, Western Europe's knowledge was concentrated inmonasteriesuntil the development ofmedieval universitiesin the 12th centuries. The curriculum of monastic schools included the study of the few available ancient texts and of new works on practical subjects like medicine[145]and timekeeping.[146]
In the sixth century in the Byzantine Empire,Isidore of Miletuscompiled Archimedes' mathematical works in theArchimedes Palimpsest, where all Archimedes' mathematical contributions were collected and studied.
John Philoponus, another Byzantine scholar, was the first to question Aristotle's teaching of physics, introducing thetheory of impetus.[147][148]The theory of impetus was an auxiliary or secondary theory of Aristotelian dynamics, put forth initially to explain projectile motion against gravity. It is the intellectual precursor to the concepts of inertia, momentum and acceleration in classical mechanics.[149]The works of John Philoponus inspiredGalileo Galileiten centuries later.[150][151]
During theFall of Constantinoplein 1453, a number of Greek scholars fled to North Italy in which they fueled the era later commonly known as the "Renaissance" as they brought with them a great deal of classical learning including an understanding of botany, medicine, and zoology. Byzantium also gave the West important inputs: John Philoponus' criticism of Aristotelian physics, and the works of Dioscorides.[152]
This was the period (8th–14th century CE) of theIslamic Golden Agewhere commerce thrived, and new ideas and technologies emerged such as the importation ofpapermakingfrom China, which made the copying of manuscripts inexpensive.
The eastward transmission of Greek heritage to Western Asia was a slow and gradual process that spanned over a thousand years, beginning with the Asian conquests ofAlexander the Greatin 335 BCE to thefounding of Islam in the 7th century CE.[5]The birth and expansion of Islam during the 7th century was quickly followed by itsHellenization. Knowledge ofGreek conceptions of the worldwas preserved and absorbed into Islamic theology, law, culture, and commerce, which were aided by the translations of traditional Greek texts and someSyriacintermediary sources intoArabicduring the 8th–9th century.
Madrasaswere centers for many different religious and scientific studies and were the culmination of different institutions such as mosques based around religious studies, housing for out-of-town visitors, and finally educational institutions focused on the natural sciences.[153]Unlike Western universities, students at a madrasa would learn from one specific teacher, who would issue a certificate at the completion of their studies called anIjazah. An Ijazah differs from a western university degree in many ways one being that it is issued by a single person rather than an institution, and another being that it is not an individual degree declaring adequate knowledge over broad subjects, but rather a license to teach and pass on a very specific set of texts.[154]Women were also allowed to attend madrasas, as both students and teachers, something not seen in high western education until the 1800s.[154]Madrasas were more than just academic centers. TheSuleymaniye Mosque, for example, was one of the earliest and most well-known madrasas, which was built bySuleiman the Magnificentin the 16th century.[155]The Suleymaniye Mosque was home to a hospital and medical college, a kitchen, and children's school, as well as serving as a temporary home for travelers.[155]
Higher education at a madrasa (or college) was focused on Islamic law and religious science and students had to engage in self-study for everything else.[5]And despite the occasional theological backlash, many Islamic scholars of science were able to conduct their work in relatively tolerant urban centers (e.g.,BaghdadandCairo) and were protected by powerful patrons.[5]They could also travel freely and exchange ideas as there were no political barriers within the unified Islamic state.[5]Islamic science during this time was primarily focused on the correction, extension, articulation, and application of Greek ideas to new problems.[5]
Most of the achievements by Islamic scholars during this period were in mathematics.[5]Arabic mathematicswas a direct descendant of Greek and Indian mathematics.[5]For instance, what is now known asArabic numeralsoriginally came from India, but Muslim mathematicians made several key refinements to the number system, such as the introduction ofdecimal pointnotation. Mathematicians such asMuhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi(c. 780–850) gave his name to the concept of thealgorithm, while the termalgebrais derived fromal-jabr, the beginning of the title of one of his publications.[156]Islamic trigonometry continued from the works of Ptolemy'sAlmagestand IndianSiddhanta, from which they addedtrigonometric functions, drew up tables, and applied trignometry to spheres and planes. Many of their engineers, instruments makers, and surveyors contributed books in applied mathematics. It was inastronomywhere Islamic mathematicians made their greatest contributions.Al-Battani(c. 858–929) improved the measurements ofHipparchus, preserved in the translation ofPtolemy'sHè Megalè Syntaxis(The great treatise) translated asAlmagest. Al-Battani also improved the precision of the measurement of the precession of the Earth's axis. Corrections were made to Ptolemy'sgeocentric modelby al-Battani,Ibn al-Haytham,[157]Averroesand theMaragha astronomerssuch asNasir al-Din al-Tusi,Mu'ayyad al-Din al-UrdiandIbn al-Shatir.[158][159]
Scholars with geometric skills made significant improvements to the earlier classical texts on light and sight by Euclid, Aristotle, and Ptolemy.[5]The earliest surviving Arabic treatises were written in the 9th century byAbū Ishāq al-Kindī,Qustā ibn Lūqā, and (in fragmentary form) Ahmad ibn Isā. Later in the 11th century,Ibn al-Haytham(known as Alhazen in the West), a mathematician and astronomer, synthesized a new theory of vision based on the works of his predecessors.[5]His new theory included a complete system of geometrical optics, which was set in great detail in hisBook of Optics.[5][160]His book was translated into Latin and was relied upon as a principal source on the science of optics in Europe until the 17th century.[5]
The medical sciences were prominently cultivated in the Islamic world.[5]The works of Greek medical theories, especially those of Galen, were translated into Arabic and there was an outpouring of medical texts by Islamic physicians, which were aimed at organizing, elaborating, and disseminating classical medical knowledge.[5]Medical specialtiesstarted to emerge, such as those involved in the treatment of eye diseases such ascataracts. Ibn Sina (known asAvicennain the West, c. 980–1037) was a prolific Persian medical encyclopedist[161]wrote extensively on medicine,[162][163]with his two most notable works in medicine being theKitāb al-shifāʾ("Book of Healing") andThe Canon of Medicine, both of which were used as standard medicinal texts in both the Muslim world and in Europe well into the 17th century. Amongst his many contributions are the discovery of the contagious nature of infectious diseases,[162]and the introduction of clinical pharmacology.[164]Institutionalization of medicine was another important achievement in the Islamic world. Although hospitals as an institution for the sick emerged in the Byzantium empire, the model of institutionalized medicine for all social classes was extensive in the Islamic empire and was scattered throughout. In addition to treating patients, physicians could teach apprentice physicians, as well write and do research. The discovery of the pulmonary transit of blood in the human body byIbn al-Nafisoccurred in a hospital setting.[5]
Islamic science began its decline in the 12th–13th century, before theRenaissancein Europe, due in part to theChristian reconquest of Spainand theMongol conquestsin the East in the 11th–13th century. The Mongolssacked Baghdad, capital of theAbbasid Caliphate, in 1258, which ended theAbbasid empire.[5][165]Nevertheless, many of the conquerors became patrons of the sciences.Hulagu Khan, for example, who led the siege of Baghdad, became a patron of theMaragheh observatory.[5]Islamic astronomy continued to flourish into the 16th century.[5]
By the eleventh century, most of Europe had become Christian; stronger monarchies emerged; borders were restored; technological developments and agricultural innovations were made, increasing the food supply and population. Classical Greek texts were translated from Arabic and Greek into Latin, stimulating scientific discussion in Western Europe.[166]
Inclassical antiquity, Greek and Roman taboos had meant that dissection was usually banned, but in the Middle Ages medical teachers and students at Bologna began to open human bodies, andMondino de Luzzi(c.1275–1326) produced the first known anatomy textbook based on human dissection.[167][168]
As a result of thePax Mongolica, Europeans, such asMarco Polo, began to venture further and further east. The written accounts of Polo and his fellow travelers inspired other Western European maritime explorers to search for a direct sea route to Asia, ultimately leading to theAge of Discovery.[169]
Technological advances were also made, such as the early flight ofEilmer of Malmesbury(who had studied mathematics in 11th-century England),[170]and the metallurgical achievements of theCistercianblast furnaceatLaskill.[171][172]
An intellectual revitalization of Western Europe started with the birth ofmedieval universitiesin the 12th century. These urban institutions grew from the informal scholarly activities of learnedfriarswho visitedmonasteries, consultedlibraries, and conversed with other fellow scholars.[173]A friar who became well-known would attract a following of disciples, giving rise to a brotherhood of scholars (orcollegiumin Latin). Acollegiummight travel to a town or request a monastery to host them. However, if the number of scholars within acollegiumgrew too large, they would opt to settle in a town instead.[173]As the number ofcollegiawithin a town grew, thecollegiamight request that their king grant them acharterthat would convert them into auniversitas.[173]Many universities were chartered during this period, with the first inBolognain 1088, followed byParisin 1150,Oxfordin 1167, andCambridgein 1231.[173]The granting of a charter meant that the medieval universities were partially sovereign and independent from local authorities.[173]Their independence allowed them to conduct themselves and judge their own members based on their own rules. Furthermore, as initially religious institutions, their faculties and students were protected from capital punishment (e.g.,gallows).[173]Such independence was a matter of custom, which could, in principle, be revoked by their respective rulers if they felt threatened. Discussions of various subjects or claims at these medieval institutions, no matter how controversial, were done in a formalized way so as to declare such discussions as being within the bounds of a university and therefore protected by the privileges of that institution's sovereignty.[173]A claim could be described asex cathedra(literally "from the chair", used within the context of teaching) orex hypothesi(by hypothesis). This meant that the discussions were presented as purely an intellectual exercise that did not require those involved to commit themselves to the truth of a claim or to proselytize. Modern academic concepts and practices such asacademic freedomor freedom of inquiry are remnants of these medieval privileges that were tolerated in the past.[173]
The curriculum of these medieval institutions centered on theseven liberal arts, which were aimed at providing beginning students with the skills for reasoning and scholarly language.[173]Students would begin their studies starting with the first three liberal arts orTrivium(grammar, rhetoric, and logic) followed by the next four liberal arts orQuadrivium(arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music).[173][143]Those who completed these requirements and received theirbaccalaureate(orBachelor of Arts) had the option to join the higher faculty (law, medicine, or theology), which would confer anLLDfor a lawyer, anMDfor a physician, orThDfor a theologian.[173]Students who chose to remain in the lower faculty (arts) could work towards aMagister(orMaster's) degree and would study three philosophies: metaphysics, ethics, and natural philosophy.[173]Latin translationsof Aristotle's works such asDe Anima(On the Soul) and the commentaries on them were required readings. As time passed, the lower faculty was allowed to confer its own doctoral degree called thePhD.[173]Many of the Masters were drawn to encyclopedias and had used them as textbooks. But these scholars yearned for the complete original texts of the Ancient Greek philosophers, mathematicians, and physicians such asAristotle,Euclid, andGalen, which were not available to them at the time. These Ancient Greek texts were to be found in the Byzantine Empire and the Islamic World.[173]
Contact with the Byzantine Empire,[150]and with the Islamic world during theReconquistaand theCrusades, allowed Latin Europe access to scientificGreekandArabictexts, including the works ofAristotle,Ptolemy,Isidore of Miletus,John Philoponus,Jābir ibn Hayyān,al-Khwarizmi,Alhazen,Avicenna, andAverroes. European scholars had access to the translation programs ofRaymond of Toledo, who sponsored the 12th centuryToledo School of Translatorsfrom Arabic to Latin. Later translators likeMichael Scotuswould learn Arabic in order to study these texts directly. The European universities aided materially in thetranslation and propagation of these textsand started a new infrastructure which was needed for scientific communities. In fact, European university put many works about the natural world and the study of nature at the center of its curriculum,[174]with the result that the "medieval university laid far greater emphasis on science than does its modern counterpart and descendent."[175]
At the beginning of the 13th century, there were reasonably accurate Latin translations of the main works of almost all the intellectually crucial ancient authors, allowing a sound transfer of scientific ideas via both the universities and the monasteries. By then, the natural philosophy in these texts began to be extended byscholasticssuch asRobert Grosseteste,Roger Bacon,Albertus MagnusandDuns Scotus. Precursors of the modern scientific method, influenced by earlier contributions of the Islamic world, can be seen already in Grosseteste's emphasis on mathematics as a way to understand nature, and in the empirical approach admired by Bacon, particularly in hisOpus Majus.Pierre Duhem's thesis is thatStephen Tempier– the Bishop of Paris –Condemnation of 1277led to the study of medieval science as a serious discipline, "but no one in the field any longer endorses his view that modern science started in 1277".[176]However, many scholars agree with Duhem's view that the mid-late Middle Ages saw important scientific developments.[177][178][179]
The first half of the 14th century saw much important scientific work, largely within the framework ofscholasticcommentaries on Aristotle's scientific writings.[180]William of Ockhamemphasized the principle ofparsimony: natural philosophers should not postulate unnecessary entities, so that motion is not a distinct thing but is only the moving object[181]and an intermediary "sensible species" is not needed to transmit an image of an object to the eye.[182]Scholars such asJean BuridanandNicole Oresmestarted to reinterpret elements of Aristotle's mechanics. In particular, Buridan developed the theory that impetus was the cause of the motion of projectiles, which was a first step towards the modern concept ofinertia.[183]TheOxford Calculatorsbegan to mathematically analyze thekinematicsof motion, making this analysis without considering the causes of motion.[184]
In 1348, theBlack Deathand other disasters sealed a sudden end to philosophic and scientific development. Yet, the rediscovery of ancient texts was stimulated by theFall of Constantinoplein 1453, when many Byzantine scholars sought refuge in the West. Meanwhile, the introduction of printing was to have great effect on European society. The facilitated dissemination of the printed word democratized learning and allowed ideas such asalgebrato propagate more rapidly. These developments paved the way for theScientific Revolution, where scientific inquiry, halted at the start of the Black Death, resumed.[185][186]
The renewal of learning in Europe began with 12th centuryScholasticism. TheNorthern Renaissanceshowed a decisive shift in focus from Aristotelian natural philosophy to chemistry and the biological sciences (botany, anatomy, and medicine).[187]Thus modern science in Europe was resumed in a period of great upheaval: the ProtestantReformationandCatholicCounter-Reformation; the discovery of the Americas byChristopher Columbus; theFall of Constantinople; but also the re-discovery of Aristotle during the Scholastic period presaged large social and political changes. Thus, a suitable environment was created in which it became possible to question scientific doctrine, in much the same way thatMartin LutherandJohn Calvinquestioned religious doctrine. The works of Ptolemy (astronomy) and Galen (medicine) were found not always to match everyday observations. Work byVesaliuson human cadavers found problems with the Galenic view of anatomy.[188]
The discovery ofCristallocontributed to the advancement of science in the period as well with its appearance out of Venice around 1450. The new glass allowed for better spectacles and eventually to the inventions of thetelescopeandmicroscope.
Theophrastus' work on rocks,Peri lithōn, remained authoritative for millennia: its interpretation of fossils was not overturned until after the Scientific Revolution.
During theItalian Renaissance,Niccolò Machiavelliestablished the emphasis of modern political science on directempiricalobservationof politicalinstitutionsand actors. Later, the expansion of the scientific paradigm during theEnlightenmentfurther pushed the study of politics beyond normative determinations.[189]In particular, the study ofstatistics, to study the subjects of thestate, has been applied topollingandvoting.
In archaeology, the 15th and 16th centuries saw the rise ofantiquariansinRenaissance Europewho were interested in the collection of artifacts.
Theearly modern periodis seen as a flowering of the European Renaissance. There was a willingness to question previously held truths and search for new answers. This resulted in a period of major scientific advancements, now known as theScientific Revolution, which led to the emergence of a New Science that was moremechanisticin its worldview, more integrated with mathematics, and more reliable and open as its knowledge was based on a newly definedscientific method.[12][15][16][190]The Scientific Revolution is a convenient boundary between ancient thought and classical physics, and is traditionally held to have begun in 1543, when the booksDe humani corporis fabrica(On the Workings of the Human Body) byAndreas Vesalius, and alsoDe Revolutionibus, by the astronomerNicolaus Copernicus, were first printed. The period culminated with the publication of thePhilosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematicain 1687 byIsaac Newton, representative of the unprecedented growth ofscientific publicationsthroughout Europe.
Other significant scientific advances were made during this time byGalileo Galilei,Johannes Kepler,Edmond Halley,William Harvey,Pierre Fermat,Robert Hooke,Christiaan Huygens,Tycho Brahe,Marin Mersenne,Gottfried Leibniz,Isaac Newton, andBlaise Pascal.[191]In philosophy, major contributions were made byFrancis Bacon, SirThomas Browne,René Descartes,Baruch Spinoza,Pierre Gassendi,Robert Boyle, andThomas Hobbes.[191]Christiaan Huygensderived the centripetal and centrifugal forces and was the first to transfer mathematical inquiry to describe unobservable physical phenomena.William Gilbertdid some of the earliest experiments with electricity and magnetism, establishing that the Earth itself is magnetic.
Theheliocentricastronomical model of the universe was refined byNicolaus Copernicus. Copernicus proposed the idea that the Earth and all heavenly spheres, containing the planets and other objects in the cosmos, rotated around the Sun.[192]His heliocentric model also proposed that all stars were fixed and did not rotate on an axis, nor in any motion at all.[193]His theory proposed the yearly rotation of the Earth and the other heavenly spheres around the Sun and was able to calculate the distances of planets using deferents and epicycles. Although these calculations were not completely accurate, Copernicus was able to understand the distance order of each heavenly sphere. The Copernican heliocentric system was a revival of the hypotheses ofAristarchus of SamosandSeleucus of Seleucia.[194]Aristarchus of Samos did propose that the Earth rotated around the Sun but did not mention anything about the other heavenly spheres' order, motion, or rotation.[195]Seleucus of Seleucia also proposed the rotation of the Earth around the Sun but did not mention anything about the other heavenly spheres. In addition, Seleucus of Seleucia understood that the Moon rotated around the Earth and could be used to explain the tides of the oceans, thus further proving his understanding of the heliocentric idea.[196]
The Scientific Revolution continued into theAge of Enlightenment, which accelerated the development of modern science.
The heliocentric model revived byNicolaus Copernicuswas followed by the model of planetary motion given byJohannes Keplerin the early 17th century, which proposed that the planets followellipticalorbits, with the Sun at one focus of the ellipse. InAstronomia Nova(A New Astronomy), the first two of thelaws of planetary motionwere shown by the analysis of the orbit of Mars. Kepler introduced the revolutionary concept of planetary orbit. Because of his work astronomical phenomena came to be seen as being governed by physical laws.[200]
A decisive moment came when "chemistry" was distinguished fromalchemybyRobert Boylein his workThe Sceptical Chymist, in 1661; although the alchemical tradition continued for some time after his work. Other important steps included the gravimetric experimental practices of medical chemists likeWilliam Cullen,Joseph Black,Torbern BergmanandPierre Macquerand through the work ofAntoine Lavoisier("father of modern chemistry") onoxygenand the law ofconservation of mass, which refutedphlogiston theory. Modern chemistry emerged from the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries through the material practices and theories promoted by alchemy, medicine, manufacturing and mining.[201][202][203]
In 1687, Isaac Newton published thePrincipia Mathematica, detailing two comprehensive and successful physical theories:Newton's laws of motion, which led to classical mechanics; andNewton's law of universal gravitation, which describes the fundamental force of gravity.
William HarveypublishedDe Motu Cordisin 1628, which revealed his conclusions based on his extensive studies ofvertebratecirculatory systems.[191]He identified the central role of theheart,arteries, andveinsin producing blood movement in a circuit, and failed to find any confirmation ofGalen's pre-existing notions of heating and cooling functions.[204]The history of early modern biology and medicine is often told through the search for the seat of the soul.[205]Galen in his descriptions of his foundational work in medicine presents the distinctions between arteries, veins, and nerves using the vocabulary of the soul.[206]
A critical innovation was the creation of permanent scientific societies and their scholarly journals, which dramatically sped the diffusion of new ideas. Typical was the founding of theRoyal Societyin London in 1660 and its journal in 1665 thePhilosophical Transaction of the Royal Society, the first scientific journal in English.[207]1665 also saw the first journal in French, theJournal dessçavans. Science drawing on the works[208]ofNewton,Descartes,PascalandLeibniz, science was on a path to modernmathematics,physicsandtechnologyby the time of the generation ofBenjamin Franklin(1706–1790),Leonhard Euler(1707–1783),Mikhail Lomonosov(1711–1765) andJean le Rond d'Alembert(1717–1783).Denis Diderot'sEncyclopédie, published between 1751 and 1772 brought this new understanding to a wider audience. The impact of this process was not limited to science and technology, but affectedphilosophy(Immanuel Kant,David Hume),religion(the increasingly significant impact ofscience upon religion), and society and politics in general (Adam Smith,Voltaire).
Geology did not undergo systematic restructuring during theScientific Revolutionbut instead existed as a cloud of isolated, disconnected ideas about rocks, minerals, and landforms long before it became a coherent science.Robert Hookeformulated a theory of earthquakes, andNicholas Stenodeveloped the theory ofsuperpositionand argued thatfossilswere the remains of once-living creatures. Beginning withThomas Burnet'sSacred Theory of the Earthin 1681, natural philosophers began to explore the idea that the Earth had changed over time. Burnet and his contemporaries interpreted Earth's past in terms of events described in the Bible, but their work laid the intellectual foundations for secular interpretations of Earth history.
During the late 18th century, researchers such asHugh Williamson[209]andJohn Walshexperimented on the effects of electricity on the human body. Further studies byLuigi GalvaniandAlessandro Voltaestablished the electrical nature of what Volta calledgalvanism.[210][211]
Modern geology, like modern chemistry, gradually evolved during the 18th and early 19th centuries.Benoît de Mailletand theComte de Buffonsaw the Earth as much older than the 6,000 years envisioned by biblical scholars.Jean-Étienne GuettardandNicolas Desmaresthiked central France and recorded their observations on some of the first geological maps. Aided by chemical experimentation, naturalists such as Scotland'sJohn Walker,[212]Sweden's Torbern Bergman, and Germany'sAbraham Wernercreated comprehensive classification systems for rocks and minerals—a collective achievement that transformed geology into a cutting edge field by the end of the eighteenth century. These early geologists also proposed a generalized interpretations of Earth history that ledJames Hutton,Georges CuvierandAlexandre Brongniart, following in the steps ofSteno, to argue that layers of rock could be dated by the fossils they contained: a principle first applied to the geology of the Paris Basin. The use ofindex fossilsbecame a powerful tool for making geological maps, because it allowed geologists to correlate the rocks in one locality with those of similar age in other, distant localities.
The basis forclassical economicsformsAdam Smith'sAn Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, published in 1776. Smith criticizedmercantilism, advocating a system of free trade withdivision of labour. He postulated an "invisible hand" that regulated economic systems made up of actors guided only by self-interest. The "invisible hand" mentioned in a lost page in the middle of a chapter in the middle of the "Wealth of Nations", 1776, advances as Smith's central message.
Anthropology can best be understood as an outgrowth of the Age of Enlightenment. It was during this period that Europeans attempted systematically to study human behavior. Traditions of jurisprudence, history, philology and sociology developed during this time and informed the development of the social sciences of which anthropology was a part.
The 19th century saw the birth of science as a profession.William Whewellhad coined the termscientistin 1833,[213]which soon replaced the older termnatural philosopher.
In physics, the behavior of electricity and magnetism was studied byGiovanni Aldini,Alessandro Volta,Michael Faraday,Georg Ohm, and others. The experiments, theories and discoveries ofMichael Faraday,Andre-Marie Ampere,James Clerk Maxwell, and their contemporaries led to the unification of the two phenomena into a single theory ofelectromagnetismas described byMaxwell's equations.Thermodynamicsled to an understanding of heat and the notion of energy being defined.
In astronomy, the planet Neptune was discovered. Advances in astronomy and in optical systems in the 19th century resulted in the first observation of anasteroid(1 Ceres) in 1801, and the discovery ofNeptunein 1846.
In mathematics, the notion of complex numbers finally matured and led to a subsequent analytical theory; they also began the use ofhypercomplex numbers.Karl Weierstrassand others carried out thearithmetization of analysisfor functions ofrealandcomplex variables. It also saw rise tonew progress in geometrybeyond those classical theories of Euclid, after a period of nearly two thousand years. The mathematical science of logic likewise had revolutionary breakthroughs after a similarly long period of stagnation. But the most important step in science at this time were the ideas formulated by the creators of electrical science. Their work changed the face of physics and made possible for new technology to come about such as electric power, electrical telegraphy, the telephone, and radio.
In chemistry,Dmitri Mendeleev, following theatomic theoryofJohn Dalton, created the firstperiodic tableofelements. Other highlights include the discoveries unveiling the nature of atomic structure and matter, simultaneously with chemistry – and of new kinds of radiation. The theory that all matter is made of atoms, which are the smallest constituents of matter that cannot be broken down without losing the basic chemical and physical properties of that matter, was provided byJohn Daltonin 1803, although the question took a hundred years to settle as proven. Dalton also formulated the law of mass relationships. In 1869,Dmitri Mendeleevcomposed hisperiodic tableof elements on the basis of Dalton's discoveries. The synthesis ofureabyFriedrich Wöhleropened a new research field,organic chemistry, and by the end of the 19th century, scientists were able to synthesize hundreds of organic compounds. The later part of the 19th century saw the exploitation of the Earth's petrochemicals, after the exhaustion of the oil supply fromwhaling. By the 20th century, systematic production of refined materials provided a ready supply of products which provided not only energy, but also synthetic materials for clothing, medicine, and everyday disposable resources. Application of the techniques of organic chemistry to living organisms resulted inphysiological chemistry, the precursor tobiochemistry.[214]
Over the first half of the 19th century, geologists such asCharles Lyell,Adam Sedgwick, andRoderick Murchisonapplied the new technique to rocks throughout Europe and eastern North America, setting the stage for more detailed, government-funded mapping projects in later decades. Midway through the 19th century, the focus of geology shifted from description and classification to attempts to understandhowthe surface of the Earth had changed. The first comprehensive theories of mountain building were proposed during this period, as were the first modern theories of earthquakes and volcanoes.Louis Agassizand others established the reality of continent-coveringice ages, and "fluvialists" likeAndrew Crombie Ramsayargued that river valleys were formed, over millions of years by the rivers that flow through them. After the discovery ofradioactivity,radiometric datingmethods were developed, starting in the 20th century.Alfred Wegener's theory of "continental drift" was widely dismissed when he proposed it in the 1910s,[215]but new data gathered in the 1950s and 1960s led to the theory ofplate tectonics, which provided a plausible mechanism for it. Plate tectonics also provided a unified explanation for a wide range of seemingly unrelated geological phenomena. Since the 1960s it has served as the unifying principle in geology.[216]
Perhaps the most prominent, controversial, and far-reaching theory in all of science has been the theory ofevolutionbynatural selection, which was independently formulated byCharles DarwinandAlfred Wallace. It was described in detail in Darwin's bookThe Origin of Species, which was published in 1859. In it, Darwin proposed that the features of all living things, including humans, were shaped by natural processes over long periods of time. The theory of evolution in its current form affects almost all areas of biology.[217]Implications of evolution on fields outside of pure science have led to bothopposition and supportfrom different parts of society, and profoundly influenced the popular understanding of "man's place in the universe". Separately,Gregor Mendelformulated the principles of inheritance in 1866, which became the basis of moderngenetics.
Another important landmark in medicine and biology were the successful efforts to prove thegerm theory of disease. Following this,Louis Pasteurmade the firstvaccineagainstrabies, and also made many discoveries in the field of chemistry, including theasymmetry of crystals. In 1847, Hungarian physicianIgnác Fülöp Semmelweisdramatically reduced the occurrence ofpuerperal feverby simply requiring physicians to wash their hands before attending to women in childbirth. This discovery predated thegerm theory of disease. However, Semmelweis' findings were not appreciated by his contemporaries and handwashing came into use only with discoveries by British surgeonJoseph Lister, who in 1865 proved the principles ofantisepsis. Lister's work was based on the important findings by French biologistLouis Pasteur. Pasteur was able to link microorganisms with disease, revolutionizing medicine. He also devised one of the most important methods inpreventive medicine, when in 1880 he produced avaccineagainstrabies. Pasteur invented the process ofpasteurization, to help prevent the spread of disease through milk and other foods.[218]
Karl Marxdeveloped an alternative economic theory, calledMarxian economics. Marxian economics is based on thelabor theory of valueand assumes the value of good to be based on the amount of labor required to produce it. Under this axiom,capitalismwas based on employers not paying the full value of workers labor to create profit. TheAustrian Schoolresponded to Marxian economics by viewingentrepreneurshipas driving force of economic development. This replaced the labor theory of value by a system ofsupply and demand.
Psychology as a scientific enterprise that was independent from philosophy began in 1879 whenWilhelm Wundtfounded the first laboratory dedicated exclusively to psychological research (inLeipzig). Other important early contributors to the field includeHermann Ebbinghaus(a pioneer in memory studies),Ivan Pavlov(who discoveredclassical conditioning),William James, andSigmund Freud. Freud's influence has been enormous, though more as cultural icon than a force in scientific psychology.[citation needed]
Modern sociology emerged in the early 19th century as the academic response to the modernization of the world. Among many early sociologists (e.g.,Émile Durkheim), the aim of sociology was instructuralism, understanding the cohesion of social groups, and developing an "antidote" to social disintegration.Max Weberwas concerned with the modernization of society through the concept ofrationalization, which he believed would trap individuals in an "iron cage" of rational thought. Some sociologists, includingGeorg SimmelandW. E. B. Du Bois, used moremicrosociological, qualitative analyses. This microlevel approach played an important role in American sociology, with the theories ofGeorge Herbert Meadand his studentHerbert Blumerresulting in the creation of thesymbolic interactionismapproach to sociology. In particular, just Auguste Comte, illustrated with his work the transition from a theological to a metaphysical stage and, from this, to a positive stage. Comte took care of the classification of the sciences as well as a transit of humanity towards a situation of progress attributable to a re-examination of nature according to the affirmation of 'sociality' as the basis of the scientifically interpreted society.[219]
TheRomantic Movementof the early 19th century reshaped science by opening up new pursuits unexpected in the classical approaches of the Enlightenment. The decline of Romanticism occurred because a new movement,Positivism, began to take hold of the ideals of the intellectuals after 1840 and lasted until about 1880. At the same time, the romantic reaction to the Enlightenment produced thinkers such asJohann Gottfried Herderand laterWilhelm Diltheywhose work formed the basis for thecultureconcept which is central to the discipline. Traditionally, much of the history of the subject was based oncolonialencounters between Western Europe and the rest of the world, and much of 18th- and 19th-century anthropology is now classed asscientific racism. During the late 19th century, battles over the "study of man" took place between those of an "anthropological" persuasion (relying onanthropometricaltechniques) and those of an "ethnological" persuasion (looking at cultures and traditions), and these distinctions became part of the later divide betweenphysical anthropologyandcultural anthropology, the latter ushered in by the students ofFranz Boas.
Science advanced dramatically during the 20th century. There were new and radical developments in thephysicalandlifesciences, building on the progress from the 19th century.[220]
The beginning of the 20th century brought the start of a revolution in physics. The long-held theories of Newton were shown not to be correct in all circumstances. Beginning in 1900,Max Planck,Albert Einstein,Niels Bohrand others developed quantum theories to explain various anomalous experimental results, by introducing discrete energy levels. Not only didquantum mechanicsshow that the laws of motion did not hold on small scales, but the theory ofgeneral relativity, proposed by Einstein in 1915, showed that the fixed background ofspacetime, on which bothNewtonian mechanicsandspecial relativitydepended, could not exist. In 1925,Werner HeisenbergandErwin Schrödingerformulatedquantum mechanics, which explained the preceding quantum theories. Currently, general relativity and quantum mechanics are inconsistent with each other, and efforts are underway to unify the two.[221]
The observation byEdwin Hubblein 1929 that the speed at which galaxies recede positively correlates with their distance, led to the understanding that the universe is expanding, and the formulation of theBig Bangtheory byGeorges Lemaître.George Gamow,Ralph Alpher, andRobert Hermanhad calculated that there should be evidence for aBig Bangin the background temperature of the universe.[222]In 1964,Arno PenziasandRobert Wilson[223]discovered a 3 Kelvin background hiss in theirBell Labsradiotelescope(theHolmdel Horn Antenna), which was evidence for this hypothesis, and formed the basis for a number of results that helped determine theage of the universe.
In 1938Otto HahnandFritz Strassmanndiscovered nuclear fissionwith radiochemical methods, and in 1939Lise MeitnerandOtto Robert Frischwrote the first theoretical interpretation of the fission process, which was later improved byNiels BohrandJohn A. Wheeler. Further developments took place during World War II, which led to the practical application ofradarand the development and use of theatomic bomb. Around this time,Chien-Shiung Wuwas recruited by theManhattan Projectto help develop a process for separating uranium metal into U-235 and U-238 isotopes byGaseous diffusion.[224]She was an expert experimentalist in beta decay and weak interaction physics.[225][226]Wu designed an experiment (seeWu experiment) that enabled theoretical physicistsTsung-Dao LeeandChen-Ning Yangto disprove the law of parity experimentally, winning them a Nobel Prize in 1957.[225]
Though the process had begun with the invention of thecyclotronbyErnest O. Lawrencein the 1930s, physics in the postwar period entered into a phase of what historians have called "Big Science", requiring massive machines, budgets, and laboratories in order to test their theories and move into new frontiers. The primary patron of physics became state governments, who recognized that the support of "basic" research could often lead to technologies useful to both military and industrial applications.
In the early 20th century, the study of heredity became a major investigation after the rediscovery in 1900 of the laws of inheritance developed byMendel.[227]The 20th century also saw the integration of physics and chemistry, with chemical properties explained as the result of the electronic structure of the atom.Linus Pauling's book onThe Nature of the Chemical Bondused the principles of quantum mechanics to deducebond anglesin ever-more complicated molecules. Pauling's work culminated in the physical modelling ofDNA,the secret of life(in the words ofFrancis Crick, 1953). In the same year, theMiller–Urey experimentdemonstrated in a simulation of primordial processes, that basic constituents of proteins, simpleamino acids, could themselves be built up from simpler molecules, kickstarting decades of research into thechemical origins of life. By 1953,James D. WatsonandFrancis Crickclarified the basic structure of DNA, thegenetic materialfor expressing life in all its forms,[228]building on the work ofMaurice WilkinsandRosalind Franklin, suggested that the structure of DNA was a double helix. In their famous paper "Molecular structure of Nucleic Acids"[228]In the late 20th century, the possibilities ofgenetic engineeringbecame practical for the first time, and a massive international effort began in 1990 to map out an entire humangenome(theHuman Genome Project). The discipline ofecologytypically traces its origin to the synthesis ofDarwinian evolutionandHumboldtianbiogeography, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.[229]Equally important in the rise of ecology, however, weremicrobiologyandsoil science—particularly thecycle of lifeconcept, prominent in the work ofLouis PasteurandFerdinand Cohn.[230]The wordecologywas coined byErnst Haeckel, whose particularly holistic view of nature in general (and Darwin's theory in particular) was important in the spread of ecological thinking.[231]The field ofecosystem ecologyemerged in the Atomic Age with the use of radioisotopes to visualize food webs and by the 1970s ecosystem ecology deeply influenced global environmental management.[232]
In 1925,Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkindetermined that stars were composed mostly of hydrogen and helium.[233]She was dissuaded by astronomerHenry Norris Russellfrom publishing this finding in her PhD thesis because of the widely held belief that stars had the same composition as the Earth.[234]However, four years later, in 1929,Henry Norris Russellcame to the same conclusion through different reasoning and the discovery was eventually accepted.[234]
In 1987, supernovaSN 1987Awas observed by astronomers on Earth both visually, and in a triumph forneutrino astronomy, by the solar neutrino detectors atKamiokande. But the solar neutrino flux wasa fraction of its theoretically expected value. This discrepancy forced a change in some values in thestandard modelforparticle physics.
The understanding of neurons and the nervous system became increasingly precise and molecular during the 20th century. For example, in 1952,Alan Lloyd HodgkinandAndrew Huxleypresented a mathematical model for transmission of electrical signals in neurons of the giant axon of a squid, which they called "action potentials", and how they are initiated and propagated, known as theHodgkin–Huxley model. In 1961–1962, Richard FitzHugh and J. Nagumo simplified Hodgkin–Huxley, in what is called theFitzHugh–Nagumo model. In 1962,Bernard Katzmodeledneurotransmissionacross the space between neurons known assynapses. Beginning in 1966, Eric Kandel and collaborators examined biochemical changes in neurons associated with learning and memory storage inAplysia. In 1981 Catherine Morris and Harold Lecar combined these models in theMorris–Lecar model. Such increasingly quantitative work gave rise to numerousbiological neuron modelsandmodels of neural computation.Neurosciencebegan to be recognized as a distinct academic discipline in its own right.Eric Kandeland collaborators have citedDavid Rioch,Francis O. Schmitt, andStephen Kuffleras having played critical roles in establishing the field.[235]
Geologists' embrace ofplate tectonicsbecame part of a broadening of the field from a study of rocks into a study of the Earth as a planet. Other elements of this transformation include:geophysical studiesof the interior of the Earth, the grouping of geology withmeteorologyandoceanographyas one of the "earth sciences", and comparisons of Earth and the solar system's other rocky planets.
In terms of applications, a massive number of new technologies were developed in the 20th century. Technologies such aselectricity, theincandescent light bulb, theautomobileand thephonograph, first developed at the end of the 19th century, were perfected and universally deployed. The first car was introduced by Karl Benz in 1885.[236]The firstairplaneflight occurred in 1903, and by the end of the centuryairlinersflew thousands of miles in a matter of hours. The development of theradio,televisionandcomputerscaused massive changes in the dissemination of information. Advances in biology also led to large increases in food production, as well as the elimination of diseases such aspoliobyDr. Jonas Salk. Gene mapping and gene sequencing, invented by Drs. Mark Skolnik and Walter Gilbert, respectively, are the two technologies that made theHuman Genome Projectfeasible. Computer science, built upon a foundation oftheoretical linguistics,discrete mathematics, andelectrical engineering, studies the nature and limits of computation. Subfields includecomputability,computational complexity,databasedesign,computer networking, artificial intelligence, and the design ofcomputer hardware. One area in which advances in computing have contributed to more general scientific development is by facilitating large-scalearchiving of scientific data. Contemporary computer science typically distinguishes itself by emphasizing mathematical 'theory' in contrast to the practical emphasis ofsoftware engineering.[237]
Einstein's paper "On the Quantum Theory of Radiation" outlined the principles of the stimulated emission of photons. This led to the invention of theLaser(light amplification by the stimulated emission of radiation) and theoptical amplifierwhich ushered in theInformation Age.[238]It is optical amplification that allowsfiber optic networksto transmit the massive capacity of theInternet.
Based on wireless transmission of electromagnetic radiation and global networks of cellular operation, the mobile phone became a primary means to access the internet.[239]
In political science during the 20th century, the study of ideology, behaviouralism and international relations led to a multitude of 'pol-sci' subdisciplines includingrational choice theory,voting theory,game theory(also used in economics),psephology,political geography/geopolitics,political anthropology/political psychology/political sociology, political economy,policy analysis, public administration, comparative political analysis andpeace studies/conflict analysis. In economics,John Maynard Keynesprompted a division betweenmicroeconomicsandmacroeconomicsin the 1920s. UnderKeynesian economicsmacroeconomic trends can overwhelm economic choices made by individuals. Governments should promoteaggregate demandfor goods as a means to encourage economic expansion. Following World War II,Milton Friedmancreated the concept ofmonetarism. Monetarism focuses on using the supply and demand of money as a method for controlling economic activity. In the 1970s, monetarism has adapted intosupply-side economicswhich advocates reducing taxes as a means to increase the amount of money available for economic expansion. Other modern schools of economic thought areNew Classical economicsandNew Keynesian economics. New Classical economics was developed in the 1970s, emphasizing solid microeconomics as the basis for macroeconomic growth. New Keynesian economics was created partially in response to New Classical economics. It shows how imperfect competition and market rigidities, means monetary policy has real effects, and enables analysis of different policies.[240]
Psychology in the 20th century saw a rejection of Freud's theories as being too unscientific, and a reaction againstEdward Titchener's atomistic approach of the mind. This led to the formulation ofbehaviorismbyJohn B. Watson, which was popularized byB.F. Skinner. Behaviorism proposedepistemologicallylimiting psychological study to overt behavior, since that could be reliably measured. Scientific knowledge of the "mind" was considered too metaphysical, hence impossible to achieve. The final decades of the 20th century have seen the rise ofcognitive science, which considers the mind as once again a subject for investigation, using the tools of psychology,linguistics,computer science, philosophy, andneurobiology. New methods of visualizing the activity of the brain, such asPET scansandCAT scans, began to exert their influence as well, leading some researchers to investigate the mind by investigating the brain, rather than cognition. These new forms of investigation assume that a wide understanding of the human mind is possible, and that such an understanding may be applied to other research domains, such asartificial intelligence. Evolutionary theory was applied to behavior and introduced to anthropology and psychology, through the works ofcultural anthropologistNapoleon Chagnon. Physical anthropology would becomebiological anthropology, incorporating elements of evolutionary biology.[241]
American sociology in the 1940s and 1950s was dominated largely byTalcott Parsons, who argued that aspects of society that promoted structural integration were therefore "functional". This structural functionalism approach was questioned in the 1960s, when sociologists came to see this approach as merely a justification for inequalities present in the status quo. In reaction,conflict theorywas developed, which was based in part on the philosophies of Karl Marx. Conflict theorists saw society as an arena in which different groups compete for control over resources. Symbolic interactionism also came to be regarded as central to sociological thinking.Erving Goffmansaw social interactions as a stage performance, with individuals preparing "backstage" and attempting to control their audience throughimpression management.[242]While these theories are currently prominent in sociological thought, other approaches exist, includingfeminist theory,post-structuralism, rational choice theory, andpostmodernism.
In the mid-20th century, much of the methodologies of earlier anthropological and ethnographical study were reevaluated with an eye towards research ethics, while at the same time the scope of investigation has broadened far beyond the traditional study of "primitive cultures".
In the early 21st century, some concepts that originated in 20th century physics were proven. On 4 July 2012, physicists working at CERN'sLarge Hadron Colliderannounced that they had discovered a new subatomic particle greatly resembling theHiggs boson,[243]confirmed as such by the following March.[244]Gravitational waveswere firstdetectedon 14 September 2015.[245]
The Human Genome Project was declared complete in 2003.[246]TheCRISPR gene editing techniquedeveloped in 2012 allowed scientists to precisely and easily modify DNA and led to the development of new medicine.[247]In 2020,xenobots, a new class of living robotics, were invented;[248]reproductive capabilities were introduced the following year.[249]
Positive psychologyis a branch of psychology founded in 1998 byMartin Seligmanthat is concerned with the study of happiness, mental well-being, and positive human functioning, and is a reaction to 20th century psychology's emphasis on mental illness and dysfunction.[250]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_science
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Thehistory of technologyis the history of the invention of tools and techniques by humans. Technology includes methods ranging from simplestone toolsto the complexgenetic engineeringand information technology that has emerged since the 1980s. The termtechnologycomes from the Greek wordtechne, meaning art and craft, and the wordlogos, meaning word and speech. It was first used to describeapplied arts, but it is now used to describe advancements and changes that affect the environment around us.[1]
New knowledge has enabled people to create new tools, and conversely, many scientific endeavors are made possible by newtechnologies, for examplescientific instrumentswhich allow us to study nature in more detail than our natural senses.
Since much of technology isapplied science, technical history is connected to thehistory of science. Since technology uses resources, technical history is tightly connected toeconomic history. From those resources, technology produces other resources, includingtechnological artifactsused in everyday life.Technological changeaffects, and is affected by, a society's cultural traditions. It is a force for economic growth and a means to develop and project economic, political, military power and wealth.
Manysociologistsandanthropologistshave createdsocial theoriesdealing withsocialandcultural evolution. Some, likeLewis H. Morgan,Leslie White, andGerhard Lenskihave declared technological progress to be the primary factor driving the development of human civilization. Morgan's concept of three major stages of social evolution (savagery,barbarism, andcivilization) can be divided by technological milestones, such as fire. White argued the measure by which to judge the evolution of culture is energy.[2]
For White, "the primary function of culture" is to "harness and control energy." White differentiates between five stages ofhuman development: In the first, people use the energy of their own muscles. In the second, they use the energy ofdomesticated animals. In the third, they use the energy of plants (agricultural revolution). In the fourth, they learn to use the energy ofnatural resources: coal, oil, gas. In the fifth, they harnessnuclear energy. White introduced the formula P=E/T, where P is the development index, E is a measure of energy consumed, and T is the measure of the efficiency of technical factors using the energy. In his own words, "culture evolves as the amount of energy harnessed per capita per year is increased, or as the efficiency of the instrumental means of putting the energy to work is increased".Nikolai Kardashevextrapolated his theory, creating theKardashev scale, which categorizes the energy use of advanced civilizations.
Lenski's approach focuses on information. The more information and knowledge (especially allowing the shaping ofnatural environment) a given society has, the more advanced it is. He identifies four stages of human development, based on advances in thehistory of communication. In the first stage, information is passed bygenes. In the second, when humans gainsentience, they can learn and pass information through experience. In the third, the humans start using signs and developlogic. In the fourth, they can create symbols, develop language and writing. Advancements incommunications technologytranslate into advancements in theeconomic systemandpolitical system,distribution of wealth,social inequalityand other spheres of social life. He also differentiates societies based on their level of technology, communication, and economy:
In economics, productivity is a measure of technological progress. Productivity increases when fewer inputs (classically labor and capital but some measures include energy and materials) are used in the production of a unit of output. Another indicator of technological progress is the development of new products and services, which is necessary to offset unemployment that would otherwise result as labor inputs are reduced. In developed countries productivity growth has been slowing since the late 1970s; however, productivity growth was higher in some economic sectors, such as manufacturing.[3]For example, employment in manufacturing in the United States declined from over 30% in the 1940s to just over 10% 70 years later. Similar changes occurred in other developed countries. This stage is referred to aspost-industrial.
In the late 1970s sociologists and anthropologists likeAlvin Toffler(author ofFuture Shock),Daniel BellandJohn Naisbitthave approached the theories ofpost-industrial societies, arguing that the current era ofindustrial societyis coming to an end, andservicesand information are becoming more important than industry and goods. Some extreme visions of the post-industrial society, especially infiction, are strikingly similar to the visions of near and post-singularitysocieties.[4]
The following is a summary of the history of technology by time period and geography:
During most of thePaleolithic– the bulk of the Stone Age – all humans had a lifestyle which involved limited tools and few permanent settlements. The first major technologies were tied to survival, hunting, and food preparation. Stone tools and weapons,fire, andclothingwere technological developments of major importance during this period.
Human ancestors have been using stone and other tools since long before the emergence ofHomo sapiensapproximately 300,000 years ago.[5]The earliest direct evidence of tool usage was found inEthiopiawithin theGreat Rift Valley, dating back to 2.5 million years ago.[6]The earliest methods ofstone toolmaking, known as theOldowan"industry", date back to at least 2.3 million years ago.[7]This era of stone tool use is called thePaleolithic, or "Old stone age", and spans all of human history up to the development of agriculture approximately 12,000 years ago.
To make a stone tool, a "core" of hard stone with specific flaking properties (such asflint) was struck with ahammerstone. This flaking produced sharp edges which could be used as tools, primarily in the form ofchoppersorscrapers.[8]These tools greatly aided the early humans in theirhunter-gathererlifestyle to perform a variety of tasks including butchering carcasses (and breaking bones to get at themarrow); chopping wood; cracking open nuts; skinning an animal for its hide, and even forming other tools out of softer materials such as bone and wood.[9]
The earliest stone tools were irrelevant, being little more than a fractured rock. In theAcheulianera, beginning approximately 1.65 million years ago, methods of working these stones into specific shapes, such ashand axesemerged. This early Stone Age is described as theLower Paleolithic.
TheMiddle Paleolithic, approximately 300,000 years ago, saw the introduction of theprepared-core technique, where multiple blades could be rapidly formed from a single core stone.[8]TheUpper Paleolithic, beginning approximately 40,000 years ago, saw the introduction ofpressure flaking, where a wood, bone, or antlerpunchcould be used to shape a stone very finely.[10]
The end of the last Ice Age about 10,000 years ago is taken as the end point of theUpper Paleolithicand the beginning of theEpipaleolithic/Mesolithic. The Mesolithic technology included the use ofmicrolithsas composite stone tools, along with wood, bone, and antler tools.
The later Stone Age, during which the rudiments of agricultural technology were developed, is called theNeolithicperiod. During this period, polished stone tools were made from a variety of hard rocks such asflint,jade,jadeite, andgreenstone, largely by working exposures as quarries, but later the valuable rocks were pursued by tunneling underground, the first steps in mining technology. The polished axes were used for forest clearance and the establishment of crop farming and were so effective as to remain in use when bronze and iron appeared. These stone axes were used alongside a continued use of stone tools such as a range ofprojectiles, knives, andscrapers, as well as tools, made from organic materials such as wood, bone, and antler.[11]
Stone Age cultures developedmusicand engaged in organizedwarfare. Stone Age humans developed ocean-worthyoutrigger canoetechnology, leading tomigrationacross theMalay Archipelago, across the Indian Ocean toMadagascarand also across the Pacific Ocean, which required knowledge of the ocean currents, weather patterns, sailing, andcelestial navigation.
Although Paleolithic cultures left no written records, the shift from nomadic life to settlement and agriculture can be inferred from a range of archaeological evidence. Such evidence includes ancient tools,[12]cave paintings, and otherprehistoric art, such as theVenus of Willendorf. Human remains also provide direct evidence, both through the examination of bones, and the study ofmummies. Scientists and historians have been able to form significant inferences about the lifestyle and culture of various prehistoric peoples, and especially their technology.
Metallic copper occurs on the surface of weathered copper ore deposits and copper was used before coppersmeltingwas known. Copper smelting is believed to have originated when the technology of potterykilnsallowed sufficiently high temperatures.[13]The concentration of various elements such as arsenic increase with depth in copper ore deposits and smelting of these ores yieldsarsenical bronze, which can be sufficientlywork hardenedto be suitable for making tools.[13]
Bronzeis an alloy of copper with tin; the latter being found in relatively few deposits globally caused a long time to elapse before true tin bronze became widespread. (See:Tin sources and trade in ancient times) Bronze was a major advancement over stone as a material for making tools, both because of its mechanical properties like strength and ductility and because it could be cast in molds to make intricately shaped objects. Bronze significantly advanced shipbuilding technology with better tools and bronze nails. Bronze nails replaced the old method of attaching boards of the hull with cord woven through drilled holes.[14]Better ships enabled long-distance trade and the advance of civilization.
This technological trend apparently began in theFertile Crescentand spread outward over time.[citation needed]These developments were not, and still are not, universal. Thethree-age systemdoes not accurately describe the technology history of groups outside ofEurasia, and does not apply at all in the case of some isolated populations, such as theSpinifex People, theSentinelese, and various Amazonian tribes, which still make use of Stone Age technology, and have not developed agricultural or metal technology. These villages preserve traditional customs in the face of global modernity, exhibiting a remarkable resistance to the rapid advancement of technology.
Before iron smelting was developed the only iron was obtained from meteorites and is usually identified by having nickel content.Meteoric ironwas rare and valuable, but was sometimes used to make tools and other implements, such as fish hooks.
TheIron Ageinvolved the adoption ofiron smeltingtechnology. It generally replaced bronze and made it possible to produce tools which were stronger, lighter and cheaper to make than bronze equivalents. The raw materials to make iron, such as ore and limestone, are far more abundant than copper and especially tin ores. Consequently, iron was produced in many areas.
It was not possible to mass manufacture steel or pure iron because of the high temperatures required. Furnaces could reach melting temperature but the crucibles and molds needed for melting and casting had not been developed. Steel could be produced byforgingbloomery iron to reduce the carbon content in a somewhat controllable way, but steel produced by this method was not homogeneous.
In many Eurasian cultures, the Iron Age was the last major step before the development of written language, though again this was not universally the case.
In Europe, largehill fortswere built either as a refuge in time of war or sometimes as permanent settlements. In some cases, existing forts from the Bronze Age were expanded and enlarged. The pace of land clearance using the more effective iron axes increased, providing more farmland to support the growing population.
Mesopotamia(modern Iraq) and its peoples (Sumerians,Akkadians,AssyriansandBabylonians) lived in cities from c. 4000 BC,[15]and developed a sophisticated architecture in mud-brick and stone,[16]including the use of thetrue arch. The walls of Babylon were so massive they were quoted as aWonder of the World. They developed extensive water systems; canals for transport and irrigation in the alluvial south, and catchment systems stretching for tens of kilometers in the hilly north. Their palaces had sophisticated drainage systems.[17]
Writing was invented in Mesopotamia, using thecuneiformscript. Many records on clay tablets and stone inscriptions have survived. These civilizations were early adopters of bronze technologies which they used for tools, weapons and monumental statuary. By 1200 BC they could cast objects 5 m long in a single piece.
Several of the six classicsimple machineswere invented in Mesopotamia.[18]Mesopotamians have been credited with the invention of the wheel. Thewheel and axlemechanism first appeared with thepotter's wheel, invented inMesopotamia(modern Iraq) during the 5th millennium BC.[19]This led to the invention of thewheeled vehiclein Mesopotamia during the early 4th millennium BC. Depictions of wheeledwagonsfound onclay tabletpictographsat theEanna districtofUrukare dated between 3700 and 3500 BC.[20]Theleverwas used in theshadoofwater-lifting device, the firstcranemachine, which appeared in Mesopotamia circa 3000 BC,[21]and then inancient Egyptian technologycirca 2000 BC.[22]The earliest evidence ofpulleysdate back to Mesopotamia in the early 2nd millennium BC.[23]
Thescrew, the last of the simple machines to be invented,[24]first appeared in Mesopotamia during theNeo-Assyrianperiod (911–609) BC.[23]The Assyrian KingSennacherib(704–681 BC) claims to have invented automatic sluices and to have been the first to use waterscrew pumps, of up to 30 tons weight, which were cast using two-part clay molds rather than by the 'lost wax' process.[17]The Jerwan Aqueduct (c. 688 BC) is made with stone arches and lined with waterproof concrete.[25]
TheBabylonian astronomical diariesspanned 800 years. They enabled meticulous astronomers to plot the motions of the planets and to predict eclipses.[26]
The earliest evidence ofwater wheelsandwatermillsdate back to theancient Near Eastin the 4th century BC,[27]specifically in thePersian Empirebefore 350 BC, in the regions of Mesopotamia (Iraq) andPersia(Iran).[28]This pioneering use ofwater powerconstituted the first human-devised motive force not to rely on muscle power (besides thesail).
TheEgyptians, known for building pyramids centuries before the creation of modern tools, invented and used many simple machines, such as therampto aid construction processes. Historians and archaeologists have found evidence that thepyramidswere built using three of what is called theSix Simple Machines, from which all machines are based. These machines are theinclined plane, thewedge, and thelever, which allowed the ancient Egyptians to move millions of limestone blocks which weighed approximately 3.5 tons (7,000 lbs.) each into place to create structures like theGreat Pyramid of Giza, which is 481 feet (147 meters) high.[29]
They also made writing medium similar to paper frompapyrus, which Joshua Mark states is the foundation for modern paper. Papyrus is a plant (cyperus papyrus) which grew in plentiful amounts in the Egyptian Delta and throughout the Nile River Valley during ancient times. The papyrus was harvested by field workers and brought to processing centers where it was cut into thin strips. The strips were then laid-out side by side and covered in plant resin. The second layer of strips was laid on perpendicularly, then both pressed together until the sheet was dry. The sheets were then joined to form a roll and later used for writing.[30]
Egyptian society made several significant advances during dynastic periods in many areas of technology. According to Hossam Elanzeery, they were the first civilization to use timekeeping devices such as sundials, shadow clocks, and obelisks and successfully leveraged their knowledge of astronomy to create a calendar model that society still uses today. They developed shipbuilding technology that saw them progress from papyrus reed vessels to cedar wood ships while also pioneering the use of rope trusses and stem-mounted rudders. The Egyptians also used their knowledge of anatomy to lay the foundation for many modern medical techniques and practiced the earliest known version of neuroscience. Elanzeery also states that they used and furthered mathematical science, as evidenced in the building of the pyramids.[31]
Ancient Egyptians also invented and pioneered many food technologies that have become the basis of modern food technology processes. Based on paintings and reliefs found in tombs, as well as archaeological artifacts, scholars like Paul T Nicholson believe that the Ancient Egyptians established systematic farming practices, engaged in cereal processing, brewed beer and baked bread, processed meat, practiced viticulture and created the basis for modern wine production, and created condiments to complement, preserve and mask the flavors of their food.[32]
TheIndus Valley Civilization, situated in a resource-rich area (in modernPakistanand northwestern India), is notable for its early application of city planning,sanitation technologies, and plumbing.[33]Indus Valley construction and architecture, called 'Vaastu Shastra', suggests a thorough understanding of materials engineering, hydrology, and sanitation.
The Chinese made many first-known discoveries and developments. Majortechnological contributions from Chinainclude the earliest known form of thebinary codeand epigenetic sequencing,[34][35]earlyseismological detectors,matches, paper,Helicopter rotor,Raised-relief map, the double-action piston pump,cast iron, water powered blast furnacebellows, the ironplough, the multi-tubeseed drill, the wheelbarrow, the parachute, thecompass, therudder, thecrossbow, theSouth Pointing Chariotand gunpowder. China also developed deep well drilling, which they used to extract brine for making salt. Some of these wells, which were as deep as 900 meters, produced natural gas which was used for evaporating brine.[36]
Other Chinese discoveries and inventions from the medieval period includeblock printing,movable type printing, phosphorescent paint, endless powerchain driveand the clock escapement mechanism. The solid-fuelrocketwas invented in China about 1150, nearly 200 years after the invention ofgunpowder(which acted as the rocket's fuel). Decades before the West's age of exploration, the Chinese emperors of theMing Dynastyalso sentlarge fleetson maritime voyages, some reaching Africa.
TheHellenistic periodofMediterranean historybegan in the 4th century BC withAlexander's conquests, which led to the emergence of aHellenistic civilizationrepresenting a synthesis ofGreekandNear-Easterncultures in theEastern Mediterraneanregion, including theBalkans,LevantandEgypt.[37]WithPtolemaic Egyptas its intellectual center and Greek as the lingua franca, the Hellenistic civilization includedGreek,Egyptian, Jewish,PersianandPhoenicianscholars and engineers who wrote in Greek.[38]
Hellenistic engineers of the Eastern Mediterranean were responsible for a number ofinventions and improvementsto existing technology. TheHellenistic periodsaw a sharp increase in technological advancement, fostered by a climate of openness to new ideas, the blossoming of a mechanistic philosophy, and the establishment of theLibrary of AlexandriainPtolemaic Egyptand its close association with the adjacentmuseion. In contrast to the typically anonymous inventors of earlier ages, ingenious minds such asArchimedes,Philo of Byzantium,Heron,Ctesibius, andArchytasremain known by name to posterity.
Ancient agriculture, as in any period prior to the modern age the primary mode of production and subsistence, and its irrigation methods, were considerably advanced by the invention and widespread application of a number of previously unknown water-lifting devices, such as the verticalwater-wheel, the compartmented wheel, the waterturbine,Archimedes' screw, the bucket-chain and pot-garland, theforce pump, thesuction pump, the double-actionpiston pumpand quite possibly thechain pump.[39]
In music, thewater organ, invented by Ctesibius and subsequently improved, constituted the earliest instance of a keyboard instrument. In time-keeping, the introduction of the inflowclepsydraand its mechanization by the dial and pointer, the application of afeedback systemand theescapementmechanism far superseded the earlier outflow clepsydra.
Innovations in mechanical technology included the newly devised right-angledgear, which would become particularly important to the operation of mechanical devices. Hellenistic engineers also devisedautomatasuch as suspended ink pots, automaticwashstands, and doors, primarily as toys, which however featured new useful mechanisms such as thecamandgimbals.
TheAntikythera mechanism, a kind ofanalogous computerworking with adifferential gear, and theastrolabeboth show great refinement in astronomical science.
In other fields, ancient Greek innovations include thecatapultand thegastraphetescrossbow in warfare, hollow bronze-casting in metallurgy, thedioptrafor surveying, in infrastructure thelighthouse,central heating, atunnel excavated from both ends by scientific calculations, and theship trackway. In transport, great progress resulted from the invention of thewinchand theodometer.
Further newly created techniques and items werespiral staircases, thechain drive,sliding calipersand showers.
TheRoman Empireexpanded fromItaliaacross the entireMediterranean regionbetween the 1st century BC and 1st century AD. Its most advanced and economically productive provinces outside of Italia were theEastern Romanprovinces in theBalkans,Asia Minor,Egypt, and theLevant, withRoman Egyptin particular being the wealthiest Roman province outside of Italia.[40][41]
The Roman Empire developed an intensive and sophisticated agriculture, expanded upon existing iron working technology, createdlawsproviding for individual ownership, advanced stone masonry technology, advancedroad-building(exceeded only in the 19th century), military engineering, civil engineering, spinning and weaving and several different machines like theGallic reaperthat helped to increase productivity in many sectors of the Roman economy.Roman engineerswere the first to build monumental arches,amphitheatres,aqueducts,public baths,true arch bridges,harbours, reservoirs and dams, vaults and domes on a very large scale across their Empire. Notable Roman inventions include thebook (Codex),glass blowingand concrete. Because Rome was located on a volcanic peninsula, with sand which contained suitable crystalline grains, the concrete which the Romans formulated was especially durable. Some of their buildings have lasted 2000 years, to the present day.
In Roman Egypt, the inventorHero of Alexandriawas the first to experiment with awind-poweredmechanical device (seeHeron's windwheel) and even created the earlieststeam-powereddevice (theaeolipile), opening up new possibilities in harnessing natural forces. He also devised avending machine. However, his inventions were primarily toys, rather than practical machines.
The engineering skills of theIncaandMayawere great, even by today's standards. An example of this exceptional engineering is the use of pieces weighing upwards of one ton in their stonework placed together so that not even a blade can fit into the cracks. Inca villages used irrigation canals anddrainagesystems, making agriculture very efficient. While some claim that the Incas were the first inventors ofhydroponics, their agricultural technology was still soil based, if advanced.
Though theMaya civilizationdid not incorporate metallurgy or wheel technology in their architectural constructions, they developed complex writing and astronomical systems, and created beautiful sculptural works in stone and flint. Like the Inca, the Maya also had command of fairly advanced agricultural and construction technology. The Maya are also responsible for creating the first pressurized water system in Mesoamerica, located in the Maya site ofPalenque.[42]
The main contribution of theAztecrule was a system of communications between the conquered cities and the ubiquity of the ingenious agricultural technology ofchinampas. InMesoamerica, without draft animals for transport (nor, as a result, wheeled vehicles), the roads were designed for travel on foot, just as in the Inca and Mayan civilizations. The Aztec, subsequently to the Maya, inherited many of the technologies and intellectual advancements of their predecessors: theOlmec(seeNative American inventions and innovations).
One of the most significant developments of the medieval were economies in which water and wind power were more significant than animal and human muscle power.[43]: 38Most water and wind power was used for milling grain. Water power was also used for blowing air inblast furnace, pulping rags for paper making and for felting wool. TheDomesday Bookrecorded 5,624 water mills in Great Britain in 1086, being about one per thirty families.[43]
The Muslimcaliphatesunited in trade large areas that had previously traded little, including the Middle East, North Africa, Central Asia, theIberian Peninsula, and parts of theIndian subcontinent. The science and technology of previous empires in the region, including the Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Persian, Hellenistic and Roman empires, were inherited by theMuslim world, where Arabic replaced Syriac, Persian and Greek as the lingua franca of the region. Significant advances were made in the region during theIslamic Golden Age(8th–16th centuries).
TheArab Agricultural Revolutionoccurred during this period. It was a transformation in agriculture from the8th to the 13th century in the Islamic regionof theOld World. The economy established byAraband otherMuslim tradersacross the Old World enabled the diffusion of many crops and farming techniques throughout the Islamic world, as well as the adaptation of crops and techniques from and to regions outside it.[44]Advances were made inanimal husbandry,irrigation, and farming, with the help of new technology such as thewindmill. These changes made agriculture much more productive, supporting population growth, urbanisation, and increased stratification of society.
Muslim engineers in the Islamic world made wide use ofhydropower, along with early uses oftidal power,wind power,[45]fossil fuelssuch as petroleum, and large factory complexes (tirazin Arabic).[46]A variety of industrial mills were employed in the Islamic world, includingfullingmills,gristmills,hullers,sawmills,ship mills,stamp mills,steel mills, andtide mills. By the 11th century, every province throughout the Islamic world had these industrial mills in operation.[47]Muslim engineers also employedwater turbinesandgearsin mills and water-raising machines, and pioneered the use ofdamsas a source of water power, used to provide additional power towatermillsand water-raising machines.[48]Many of these technologies were transferred to medieval Europe.[49]
Wind-poweredmachines used to grind grain and pump water, the windmill andwind pump, first appeared in what are nowIran,Afghanistanand Pakistan by the 9th century.[50][51][52][53]They were used to grind grains and draw up water, and used in the gristmilling and sugarcane industries.[54]Sugar millsfirst appeared in themedieval Islamic world.[55]They were first driven by watermills, and then windmills from the 9th and 10th centuries in what are todayAfghanistan, Pakistan andIran.[56]Crops such asalmondsandcitrusfruit were brought to Europe throughAl-Andalus, and sugar cultivation was gradually adopted across Europe. Arab merchants dominated trade in the Indian Ocean until the arrival of the Portuguese in the 16th century.
The Muslim world adoptedpapermakingfrom China.[47]The earliestpaper millsappeared inAbbasid-eraBaghdadduring 794–795.[57]The knowledge ofgunpowderwas also transmitted from China via predominantly Islamic countries,[58]where formulas for purepotassium nitratewere developed.[59][60]
Thespinning wheelwas invented in theIslamic worldby the early 11th century.[61]It was later widely adopted in Europe, where it was adapted into thespinning jenny, a key device during theIndustrial Revolution.[62]Thecrankshaftwas invented byAl-Jazariin 1206,[63][64]and is central to modern machinery such as thesteam engine,internal combustion engineandautomatic controls.[65][66]Thecamshaftwas also first described by Al-Jazari in 1206.[67]
Earlyprogrammable machineswere also invented in the Muslim world. The firstmusic sequencer, a programmablemusical instrument, was an automated flute player invented by theBanu Musabrothers, described in theirBook of Ingenious Devices, in the 9th century.[68][69]In 1206, Al-Jazari invented programmableautomata/robots. He described fourautomatonmusicians, including two drummers operated by a programmabledrum machine, where the drummer could be made to play different rhythms and different drum patterns.[70]Thecastle clock, ahydropoweredmechanicalastronomical clockinvented by Al-Jazari, was an earlyprogrammableanalog computer.[71][72][73]
In theOttoman Empire, a practical impulsesteam turbinewas invented in 1551 byTaqi ad-Din Muhammad ibn Ma'rufinOttoman Egypt. He described a method for rotating aspitby means of a jet of steam playing on rotary vanes around the periphery of a wheel. Known as asteam jack, a similar device for rotating a spit was also later described byJohn Wilkinsin 1648.[74][75]
While medieval technology has been long depicted as a step backward in the evolution of Western technology, a generation of medievalists (like the American historian of scienceLynn White) stressed from the 1940s onwards the innovative character of many medieval techniques. Genuine medieval contributions include for examplemechanical clocks,spectaclesand verticalwindmills. Medieval ingenuity was also displayed in the invention of seemingly inconspicuous items like thewatermarkor thefunctional button. In navigation, the foundation to the subsequentAge of Discoverywas laid by the introduction of pintle-and-gudgeonrudders,lateen sails, thedry compass, the horseshoe and theastrolabe.
Significant advances were also made in military technology with the development ofplate armour, steelcrossbowsandcannon. The Middle Ages are perhaps best known for their architectural heritage: While the invention of therib vaultandpointed archgave rise to the high risingGothic style, the ubiquitous medieval fortifications gave the era the almost proverbial title of the 'age of castles'.
Papermaking, a 2nd-century Chinese technology, was carried to the Middle East when a group of Chinese papermakers were captured in the 8th century.[76]Papermaking technology was spread to Europe by theUmayyad conquest of Hispania.[77]A paper mill was established in Sicily in the 12th century. In Europe the fiber to make pulp for making paper was obtained from linen and cotton rags.Lynn Townsend White Jr.credited the spinning wheel with increasing the supply of rags, which led to cheap paper, which was a factor in the development of printing.[78]
Before the development of modern engineering, mathematics was used by artisans and craftsmen, such asmillwrights, clock makers, instrument makers and surveyors. Aside from these professions, universities were not believed to have had much practical significance to technology.[79]: 32
A standard reference for the state of mechanical arts during the Renaissance is given in the mining engineering treatiseDe re metallica(1556), which also contains sections on geology, mining and chemistry.De re metallicawas the standard chemistry reference for the next 180 years.[79]Among the water powered mechanical devices in use wereore stamping mills, forge hammers, blast bellows, and suction pumps.
Due to the casting of cannon, theblast furnacecame into widespread use in France in the mid 15th century. The blast furnace had been used in China since the 4th century BC.[13][80]
The invention of the movable cast metal typeprinting press, whose pressing mechanism was adapted from an olive screw press, (c. 1441) lead to a tremendous increase in the number of books and the number of titles published. Movable ceramic type had been used in China for a few centuries and woodblock printing dated back even further.[81]
The era is marked by such profound technical advancements likelinear perceptivity,double shell domesorBastion fortresses. Note books of the Renaissance artist-engineers such asTaccolaandLeonardo da Vincigive a deep insight into the mechanical technology then known and applied. Architects and engineers were inspired by the structures ofAncient Rome, and men likeBrunelleschicreated the large dome ofFlorence Cathedralas a result. He was awarded one of the first patents ever issued to protect an ingeniouscranehe designed to raise the large masonry stones to the top of the structure. Military technology developed rapidly with the widespread use of thecross-bowand ever more powerfulartillery, as the city-states of Italy were usually in conflict with one another. Powerful families like theMediciwere strong patrons of the arts and sciences.Renaissance sciencespawned theScientific Revolution; science and technology began a cycle of mutual advancement.
An improved sailing ship, the nau orcarrack, enabled theAge of Explorationwith theEuropean colonization of the Americas, epitomized byFrancis Bacon'sNew Atlantis. Pioneers likeVasco da Gama,Cabral,MagellanandChristopher Columbusexplored the world in search of new trade routes for their goods and contacts with Africa, India and China to shorten the journey compared with traditional routes overland. They produced new maps and charts which enabled following mariners to explore further with greater confidence. Navigation was generally difficult, however, owing to theproblem of longitudeand the absence of accuratechronometers. European powers rediscovered the idea of thecivil code, lost since the time of the Ancient Greeks.
Thestocking frame, which was invented in 1598, increased a knitter's number of knots per minute from 100 to 1000.[82]
Mines were becoming increasingly deep and were expensive to drain with horse powered bucket and chain pumps and wooden piston pumps. Some mines used as many as 500 horses. Horse-powered pumps were replaced by theSavery steam pump(1698) and theNewcomen steam engine(1712).[83]
The revolution was driven by cheap energy in the form of coal, produced in ever-increasing amounts from the abundant resources ofBritain. The BritishIndustrial Revolutionis characterized by developments in the areas of textile machinery, mining,metallurgy, transport and the invention ofmachine tools.
Before invention of machinery to spin yarn and weave cloth, spinning was done using the spinning wheel and weaving was done on a hand-and-foot-operated loom. It took from three to five spinners to supply one weaver.[84][85]The invention of theflying shuttlein 1733 doubled the output of a weaver, creating a shortage of spinners. Thespinning framefor wool was invented in 1738. Thespinning jenny, invented in 1764, was a machine that used multiple spinning wheels; however, it produced low quality thread. Thewater framepatented by Richard Arkwright in 1767, produced a better quality thread than the spinning jenny. Thespinning mule, patented in 1779 bySamuel Crompton, produced a high quality thread.[84][85]Thepower loomwas invented by Edmund Cartwright in 1787.[84]
In the mid-1750s, thesteam enginewas applied to the water power-constrained iron, copper and lead industries for powering blast bellows. These industries were located near the mines, some of which were using steam engines for mine pumping. Steam engines were too powerful for leather bellows, so cast iron blowing cylinders were developed in 1768. Steam powered blast furnaces achieved higher temperatures, allowing the use of more lime in iron blast furnace feed. (Lime rich slag was not free-flowing at the previously used temperatures.) With a sufficient lime ratio, sulfur from coal or coke fuel reacts with the slag so that the sulfur does not contaminate the iron. Coal and coke were cheaper and more abundant fuel. As a result, iron production rose significantly during the last decades of the 18th century.[13]Coal converted tocokefueled higher temperatureblast furnacesand produced cast iron in much larger amounts than before, allowing the creation of a range of structures such asThe Iron Bridge. Cheap coal meant that industry was no longer constrained by water resources driving the mills, although it continued as a valuable source of power.
The steam engine helped drain the mines, so more coal reserves could be accessed, and the output of coal increased. The development of the high-pressure steam engine made locomotives possible, and a transport revolution followed.[86]The steam engine which had existed since the early 18th century, was practically applied to bothsteamboatand railway transportation. TheLiverpool and Manchester Railway, the first purpose-built railway line, opened in 1830, theRocket locomotiveofRobert Stephensonbeing one of its first workinglocomotivesused.
Manufacture of ships' pulleyblocksby all-metal machines at thePortsmouth Block Millsin 1803 instigated the age of sustainedmass production.Machine toolsused by engineers to manufacture parts began in the first decade of the century, notably byRichard RobertsandJoseph Whitworth. The development ofinterchangeable partsthrough what is now called theAmerican system of manufacturingbegan in the firearms industry at the U.S. Federal arsenals in the early 19th century, and became widely used by the end of the century.
Until theEnlightenment era, little progress was made inwater supply and sanitationand the engineering skills of the Romans were largely neglected throughout Europe. The first documented use ofsand filtersto purify the water supply dates to 1804, when the owner of a bleachery inPaisley, Scotland, John Gibb, installed an experimental filter, selling his unwanted surplus to the public. The first treated public water supply in the world was installed by engineerJames Simpsonfor theChelsea Waterworks Companyin London in 1829.[87]The first screw-downwater tapwas patented in 1845 by Guest and Chrimes, a brass foundry inRotherham.[88]The practice of water treatment soon became mainstream, and the virtues of the system were made starkly apparent after the investigations of the physicianJohn Snowduring the1854 Broad Street cholera outbreakdemonstrated the role of the water supply in spreading the cholera epidemic.[89]
The 19th century saw astonishing developments in transportation, construction, manufacturing and communication technologies originating in Europe. After a recession at the end of the 1830s and a general slowdown in major inventions, theSecond Industrial Revolutionwas a period of rapid innovation and industrialization that began in the 1860s or around 1870 and lasted untilWorld War I. It included rapid development of chemical, electrical, petroleum, and steel technologies connected with highly structured technology research.
Telegraphydeveloped into a practical technology in the 19th century to help run the railways safely.[90]Along with the development of telegraphy was the patenting of the first telephone. March 1876 marks the date that Alexander Graham Bell officially patented his version of an "electric telegraph". Although Bell is noted with the creation of the telephone, it is still debated about who actually developed the first working model.[91]
Building on improvements in vacuum pumps and materials research,incandescent light bulbsbecame practical for general use in the late 1870s. Edison Electric Illuminating Company, a company founded by Thomas Edison with financial backing fromSpencer Trask, built and managed the first electricity network. Electrification was rated the most important technical development of the 20th century as the foundational infrastructure for modern civilization.[92]This invention had a profound effect on the workplace because factories could now have second and third shift workers.[93]
Shoe production was mechanized during the mid 19th century.[94]Mass production ofsewing machinesandagricultural machinerysuch as reapers occurred in the mid to late 19th century.[95]Bicycles were mass-produced beginning in the 1880s.[95]
Steam-powered factories became widespread, although the conversion from water power to steam occurred in England earlier than in the U.S.[96]Ironclad warshipswere found in battle starting in the 1860s, and played a role in the opening of Japan and China to trade with the West.
Between 1825 and 1840, the technology ofphotographywas introduced. For much of the rest of the century, many engineers and inventors tried to combine it and the much older technique ofprojectionto create a complete illusion or a complete documentation of reality. Colour photography was usually included in these ambitions and the introduction of thephonographin 1877 seemed to promise the addition ofsynchronized sound recordings. Between 1887 and 1894, the first successful shortcinematographicpresentations were established.
Mass productionbroughtautomobilesand other high-tech goods to masses of consumers.Military researchand development sped advances including electroniccomputingandjet engines. Radio andtelephonygreatly improved and spread to larger populations of users, though near-universal access would not be possible untilmobile phonesbecame affordable todeveloping worldresidents in the late 2000s and early 2010s.
Energy and engine technology improvements includednuclear power, developed after theManhattan projectwhich heralded the newAtomic Age.Rocketdevelopment led to long range missiles and the firstspace agethat lasted from the 1950s with the launch of Sputnik to the mid-1980s.
Electrificationspread rapidly in the 20th century. At the beginning of the century electric power was for the most part only available to wealthy people in a few major cities. By 2019, an estimated 87 percent of the world's population had access to electricity.[98]
Birth controlalso became widespread during the 20th century.Electron microscopeswere very powerful by the late 1970s and genetic theory and knowledge were expanding, leading to developments ingenetic engineering.
The first "test tube baby"Louise Brownwas born in 1978, which led to the first successfulgestational surrogacypregnancy in 1985 and the first pregnancy byICSIin 1991, which is the implanting of a single sperm into an egg.Preimplantation genetic diagnosiswas first performed in late 1989 and led to successful births in July 1990. These procedures have become relatively common.
Computers were connected by means of local area,telecomandfiber optic networks, powered by theoptical amplifierthat ushered in theInformation Age.[99][100]Thisoptical networkingtechnology exploded the capacity of the Internet beginning in 1996 with the launch of the first high-capacitywave division multiplexing(WDM) system byCiena Corp.[101]WDM, as the common basis for telecom backbone networks,[102]increased transmission capacity by orders of magnitude, thus enabling the mass commercialization and popularization of the Internet and its widespread impact on culture, economics, business, and society.
The commercial availability of the first portable cell phone in 1981 and the first pocket-sized phone in 1985,[103]both developed by Comvik in Sweden, coupled with the first transmission of data over a cellular network byVodafone(formerlyRacal-Millicom) in 1992 were the breakthroughs that led directly to the form and function of smartphones today. By 2014, there were more cell phones in use than people on Earth[104]and The Supreme Court of the United States of America has ruled that a mobile phone was a private part of a person.[105]Providing consumers wireless access to each other and to the Internet, the mobile phone stimulated one of the most important technology revolutions in human history.[106]
The Human Genome Project sequenced and identified all three billion chemical units in human DNA with a goal of finding the genetic roots of disease and developing treatments. The project became feasible due to two technical advances made during the late 1970s: gene mapping by restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) markers and DNA sequencing. Sequencing was invented by Frederick Sanger and, separately, by Dr. Walter Gilbert. Gilbert also conceived of the Human Genome Project on May 27, 1985, and first publicly advocated it in August 1985 at the first International Conference on Genes and Computers in August 1985.[107]The U.S. Federal Government sponsored Human Genome Project began October 1, 1990, and was declared complete in 2003.[107]
The massive data analysis resources necessary for running transatlantic research programs such as theHuman Genome Projectand theLarge Electron–Positron Colliderled to a necessity for distributed communications, causing Internet protocols to be more widely adopted by researchers and also creating a justification forTim Berners-Leeto create theWorld Wide Web.
Vaccinationspread rapidly to the developing world from the 1980s onward due to many successful humanitarian initiatives, greatly reducing childhood mortality in many poor countries with limited medical resources.
The USNational Academy of Engineering, by expert vote, established the following ranking of the most important technological developments of the 20th century:[108]
In the early 21st century, research is ongoing intoquantum computers,gene therapy(introduced 1990),3D printing(introduced 1981),nanotechnology(introduced 1985),bioengineering/biotechnology,nuclear technology,advanced materials(e.g., graphene), thescramjetanddrones(along withrailgunsand high-energy laser beams for military uses),superconductivity, thememristor, and green technologies such asalternative fuels(e.g.,fuel cells, self-driving electric andplug-in hybridcars),augmented realitydevices andwearable electronics,artificial intelligence, and more efficient and powerfulLEDs,solar cells,integrated circuits,wireless powerdevices, engines, andbatteries.
Large Hadron Collider, the largest single machine ever built, was constructed between 1998 and 2008. The understanding ofparticle physicsis expected to expand with better instruments including largerparticle acceleratorssuch as the LHC[109]and betterneutrino detectors.Dark matteris sought via underground detectors and observatories likeLIGOhave started to detectgravitational waves.
Genetic engineering technology continues to improve, and the importance ofepigeneticson development and inheritance has also become increasingly recognized.[110]
Newspaceflighttechnology andspacecraftare also being developed, like the Boeing'sOrionand SpaceX'sDragon 2. New, more capablespace telescopes, such as theJames Webb Space Telescopewhich was launched to orbit in December, 2021, and theColossus Telescope, have been designed. TheInternational Space Stationwas completed in the 2000s, andNASAandESAplan ahuman mission to Marsin the 2030s. TheVariable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket(VASIMR) is an electro-magnetic thruster for spacecraft propulsion and is expected to be tested in 2015.[needs update]
TheBreakthrough Initiativesproject plans to sendthe first ever spacecraft to visit another star, which will consist of numerous super-light chips driven byElectric propulsionin the 2030s, and receive images of theProxima Centaurisystem, along with, possibly, thepotentially habitable planetProxima Centauri b, by midcentury.[111]
2004 saw thefirst crewed commercial spaceflightwhenMike Melvillcrossed theboundary of spaceon June 21, 2004.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_technology
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Stigler's lawconcerns the supposed tendency ofeponymousexpressions for scientific discoveries to honor people other than their respective originators.
Examples include:
Since that definition predated Boyce and Codd's own definition by some three years, it seems to me that BCNF ought by rights to be calledHeathnormal form. But it isn't.[12]
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_examples_of_Stigler%27s_law
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The following is a list of historically important scientificexperimentsand observations demonstrating something of great scientific interest, typically in an elegant or clever manner.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_experiments
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