Tuesday, December 10, 2013

World's Leading Authors Condemn NSA Surveillance

Clockwise from top left, eight of the people who have signed the petition: Hanif Kureishi, Björk, Arundhati Roy, Don DeLillo, Ian McEwan, Tom Stoppard, Margaret Atwood and Martin Amis

State Surveillance Of Personal Data Is Theft, Say World's Leading Authors -- The Guardian

• 500 signatories include five Nobel prize winners
• Writers demand 'digital bill of rights' to curb abuses

More than 500 of the world's leading authors, including five Nobel prize winners, have condemned the scale of state surveillance revealed by the whistleblower Edward Snowden and warned that spy agencies are undermining democracy and must be curbed by a new international charter.

The signatories, who come from 81 different countries and include Margaret Atwood, Don DeLillo, Orham Pamuk, Günter Grass and Arundhati Roy, say the capacity of intelligence agencies to spy on millions of people's digital communications is turning everyone into potential suspects, with worrying implications for the way societies work.

They have urged the United Nations to create an international bill of digital rights that would enshrine the protection of civil rights in the internet age.

Read more ....

My Comment:  It is not going to happen (i.e. a UN charter on digital rights).

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