The US Department of Justice (DOJ) on Monday released a much anticipated 2004 Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) inspector general report detailing controversial interrogation techniques used on terror detainees. According to the report, interrogators threatened suspects´ family members and conducted mock executions. The report also details other controversial techniques such as waterboarding and acknowledges that interrogators used techniques that they knew had not been approved by DOJ lawyers.
A Swiss government official is demanding that Google immediately shut down its Street View Maps service in the country, but the company said Monday that it would discuss the matter with the privacy rights regulator.
The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit [official website] ruled [opinion, PDF] Friday that Yahoo is not required to pay royalties for songs played over Internet radio. Several recording companies, all owned by Sony Corp, originally sued in 2001, claiming that Yahoo´s online radio service, LAUNCHcast, was interactive, requiring the payment of royalty fees, because it allowed listeners to skip songs [NYT report]. The appeals court´s decision upheld a 2007 lower court ruling in which a jury decided that skipping songs did not make the program interactive, finding:
Yolanda Espinosa’s eyes darted this way and that. Her hands trembled. For Ms. Espinosa, a cocaine and heroin addict in desperate need of a fix, a new Mexican law decriminalizing the possession of small quantities of drugs had a definite appeal.
Google is to be sued for $15 million (£9 million) by an anonymous blogger who was unmasked by the internet search company.
Nokia has pledged to strike back at Apple and produce mobile phones that will compete effectively with the U.S. technology company´s iPhone.
President Obama took his health care message to talk radio Thursday, telling listeners of Philadelphia-based host Michael Smerconish that he wants to overhaul the nation´s ailing health care system out of necessity rather than politics.
The Honduran Supreme Court on Saturday announced that ousted President Jose Manuel Zelaya would face charges for violating the constitution if he returned from exile, creating a potentially deal-breaking obstacle to a proposed agreement to end nearly two months of political turmoil.
A Chinese court has jailed four people for spreading their bootleg "Tomato Garden" version of Microsoft´s Windows XP program, in what the Xinhua news agency called the nation´s biggest software piracy case.
Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) [official website] rapporteur Dick Marty [BBC profile] on Friday called on [press release] European countries to show accountability for their role in assisting the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) [official website] in using secret prisons [JURIST news archive]. The statement follows reports [ABC News report] that the CIA held high value terrorists in a secret prison in Lithuania.
A judge in the US District Court for the District of South Dakota [official website] issued a ruling [opinion, PDF] Thursday clarifying what doctors in South Dakota are required to tell women seeking an abortion before performing the procedure, partially upholding a state law. Judge Karen Schreier upheld a provision of a South Dakota abortion law [text] that requires doctors to tell women that an abortion terminates a real, unique human life, but not that abortion increases the risks of suicide and depression.
Former UBS [corporate website] banker Bradley Birkenfeld was sentenced [press release] to 40 months in prison Friday for helping a client avoid paying over $7.2 million dollars in taxes. Birkenfeld admitted to helping a California real-estate developer hide $200 million to avoid paying taxes and has cooperated with the government in its investigation of employees of Swiss banks that the government says take advantage of Switzerland´s strict confidentiality laws to help Americans hide money and avoid paying taxes.
The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has called for a widespread investigation into concerns that the dominance of four companies in local bus services outside London has led to higher prices. After an initial five-month inquiry, the OFT said that it plans to refer the £3.6 billion sector to the Competition Commission.
After a Chicago student gained national fame for editing a picture of President Obama in the image of the Joker villain from "The Dark Knight" and posting it to Flickr, some of the focus, especially among the tech community, quickly shifted to Flickr for removing the image.
A lawsuit filed on Wednesday against some of the most shadowy Internet criminals — gangs based in Eastern Europe that electronically break into business computers, steal banking passwords and transfer themselves money — is being used to pry information from a group that is nearly as reclusive as the hackers: banks whose computers have been compromised.
A judge in the US District Court for the Northern District of Ohio [official website] ruled [opinion, PDF] late Tuesday that the federal government cannot freeze the assets of an organization suspected of terrorism ties without probable cause. Judge James Carr also ruled that the government must tell the organization the basis for the asset freeze and give the organization the opportunity to defend itself. The ruling came in the case of Kindhearts for Charitable Humanitarian Development [ACLU materials], which sued the federal government in 2008 after the US Treasury Department´s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) [official website] froze its assets in 2006, alleging it was providing support to US-designated terrorist group Hamas [JURIST news archive]. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) [advocacy website] brought the suit [complaint, PDF] on plaintiffs´ behalf. ACLU cooperating attorney Hina Shamsi said [press release]:
Judge Reggie Walton of the US District Court for the District of Columbia [official website] issued a ruling [opinion, PDF] Wednesday that severely curtails the federal government´s ability to use hearsay evidence in trials against Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive] detainees.
Ten European Union (EU) nations have agreed to accept Guantanamo Bay [JURIST news archive] detainees, and five more are giving the matter serious consideration, according to a Thursday Washington Post report [text]. While Britain, France, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, and Spain [JURIST reports] have all either taken or publicly agreed to take detainees, administration officials said four other countries have privately agreed to accept detainees.
The Obama administration should not re-sign and ratify the Rome Statute [text] and join the International Criminal Court (ICC) [official website], according to a study [text] released Tuesday by the Heritage Foundation [advocacy website]. According to the report, the ICC lacks checks on its power, is a threat to national sovereignty, and could cause complications to military cooperation between the US and its allies. The report concludes:
The law affects all stores, production facilities and service providers within the Federal District, which encompasses the city limits. Nearly 9 million people live inside the district and another 10 million reside in surrounding communities that make up greater Mexico City.
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