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Blog of Neelie KROES

Vice-President of the European Commission

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Archive for January, 2012

Cloud computing: building a European cloud partnership

Monday, January 30th, 2012
| Number of views :8743

Last week I was in Davos at the World Economic Forum. A chance to speak with many interesting people and gain a lot of real insight about trends in the wider world.

You can read my impressions from some of those meetings elsewhere on this blog .

But a principal reason for being there was to announce an exciting new initiative on cloud computing – the European Cloud Partnership. An important step forward to making the EU not just cloud friendly, but cloud-active. Here’s my announcement in detail:

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Blogging from Davos – I meet Thorbjørn Jagland, Secretary-General of the Council of Europe

Friday, January 27th, 2012
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Meeting T. Jagland in Davos

On Wednesday I promised to keep you updated on my meeting today in Davos with Mr Thorbjørn Jagland, the Secretary-General of the Council of Europe.

As I expected, it was a very fruitful meeting. We discussed the developments regarding media freedom in Hungary after last years’ intervention by the European Commission , the critical report by the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Mr. Hammarberg and the ruling by the Constitutional Court last December.

We agreed that Hungary needs to act quickly to reassure all those who have concerns, to show that it is serious about protecting freedom of expression and media pluralism.

Mr. Jagland confirmed to me that the Council of Europe is ready to play its role and to prepare a comprehensive opinion on the media legislation and its application in practice – if or when Hungary would request such an assessment.

But of course that would just be a first step. The most important thing would be that the authorities would commit to accept and implement any concrete recommendations that would be made by the Council of Europe, which has been setting standards for fundamental rights protection in Europe for over half a century!

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Blogging from Davos – I meet Myanmar industry minister Soe Thein

Friday, January 27th, 2012
| Number of views :3592

I meet Soe Thein, Myanmar Industry Minister

Today, also while in Davos, I met Myanmar Industry Minister Soe Thein, one of those supporting the current reform agenda. He heads Myanmar’s investment commission and is a key political actor shaping economic reform and liberalisation.

There is currently very encouraging progress in political, economic and social reforms in Myanmar, changes which will help developing relations with the EU. We welcome the release of political prisoners. But of course, we have other important expectations – like free and fair elections on 1 April, the release of remaining political prisoners, and conciliation with the various ethnic groups. Read the full entry

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Blogging from Davos – Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook

Friday, January 27th, 2012
| Number of views :4367

I "friend" Sheryl

While at the World Economic Forum in Davos this morning, I had an important discussion with Sheryl Sandberg, Chief Operating Officer of Facebook; we talked about protecting children, and new data protection rules.

One of my priorities under the Digital Agenda is to ensure that children use new technologies in the safest way possible to learn, play, communicate and be creative. Facebook is already one of the parties to the EU’s Safer Social Networking Principles. But keeping children safe online is a shared responsibility, for all sectoral players, wherever they lie along the value chain – they all have a role to play, depending on how their devices or services engage with children as users. Read the full entry

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I’ll be Tweet-chatting next Monday, 30 January

Thursday, January 26th, 2012
| Number of views :10847

I’m really positive about how the Internet helps – not just one-way communication – but genuine interaction. So I am happy to announce that I will have another tweetchat on Monday 30 January, 3pm to 3.30pm (Brussels time). Anyone can join in. This is an opportunity for you to send in comments or questions on my recent announcement on cloud computing, on privacy online, and on the Commission’s recent proposal to revise data protection rules across Europe (on which my blog is here).

This is why I would like to get your questions and comments on these issues – and of course others. Just send me a tweet from any time now – using the #askneelie hashtag – and I’ll do my best to respond on Monday. I look forward to a great live-chat with all of you!

[Update 2 Feb: results of the tweetchat available in HTML, .ods or Excel format; or see the follow -up blog]

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Latest developments on media freedom in Hungary

Wednesday, January 25th, 2012
| Number of views :4942
Vaire Vika Freiberga

Vaire Vika Freiberga, photo under CC license by Aivis Freidenfelds

I am on my way to the World Economic Forum in Davos where I will present my plans for setting up the European Cloud Partnership – but more on that in the coming days.

I first wanted to share the latest news with you regarding the situation of media freedom and pluralism in Hungary. Yesterday I met with the CEO of Klubradio, a radio station in Hungary with a lot of often quite critical political commentary. He told me that they have lost 8 local frequencies in 2011 alone (as and when their previous rights expired, and that a new frequency assignment to Klubradio last year for the key Budapest region had been retracted by the incoming Media Council) – isn’t that worrying?  It seems that high music content has been given priority over political commentary and discussion in the latest tender for Budapest. EU Member States have a wide discretion in setting the conditions for open tenders for radio frequency, so this trend has to be carefully examined. However, I have written to the Deputy Prime Minister of Hungary last week to ask for clarifications on the overall situation.

Today, the independent high-level group on freedom and pluralism of the media – that I had set up in October last year – met for the second time. You might recall that I had asked the group to draw up a report for the Commission with recommendations for the respect, protection, support and promotion of pluralism and freedom of the media in Europe by the end of this year. They discussed the situation in Hungary (as well as other Member States – such as Italy and France) and were given a presentation by an expert on the Assessment of the Consistency of Hungary’s Media Laws with European Practices and Norms. For instance, the study notes that the Hungarian media authority has a concentration of powers unique across Europe.  I can highly recommend that study if you want to learn more on this issue.

In the press conference after the meeting, the chair of the group, Prof. Vaira Vike-Freiberga (former President of Latvia) stated that Hungary had put itself in a position of potential danger to media freedom and the Government would be wise to consider how to get out of it. You can listen to the parts of the press conference here and here.

Lastly, on Friday, I will sit on a panel in a discussion titled “Leadership in the Information Age” in Davos with Mr Thorbjørn Jagland, the Secretary-General of the Council of Europe (the body responsible for the European Convention on Human Rights which has helped protect us since 1953.) He and his colleague Thomas Hammarberg, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, are quite crucial in protecting the media freedom in Hungary and across Europe – therefore I am very keen to discuss current risks and challenges to media freedom with him and how we can further improve our cooperation in the future. I will keep you updated.

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Happy Chinese New Year!

Monday, January 23rd, 2012
| Number of views :12288
Dragon Chinese New Year under Creative Commons license

CC license - Rainer Calderon

To all those celebrating Chinese New Year, wherever you are in the world, a very happy Year of the Dragon to you!

A bit of research on the Internet (where else?) reveals that the Dragon is the innovative entrepreneur, intensely powerful yet flexible, and the bringer of great fortune (remind you of anything…?). All of which suggests to me that 2012 should also be the year of ICT!

(See here for a more serious take on our ICT cooperation with a country that has come on a good deal in ICT uptake – now having over half a billion Internet users – but where there is still a troubling lack of progress in securing online freedoms).

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Why we need a sound Do-Not–Track standard for privacy online

Friday, January 20th, 2012
| Number of views :22397

This really is privacy and data protection week! In Brussels there is the Computers, Privacy & Data Protection conference and the Commission is soon adopting its proposal for a reform of the European Data Protection legal framework (which I wrote about here).

So today, a blog on how I want to ensure privacy and user control when you’re browsing online: in particular, a standard known as “do not track” (DNT) that I hope will have a big role to play for the future of online privacy.

First a bit of background: what is “do not track”, and why is it so important? Read the full entry

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2012: a year to help people stay active and healthy for longer

Wednesday, January 18th, 2012
| Number of views :5473

2012 Is the European year of Active Ageing and solidarity between generations – launched today.

It couldn’t come at more important moment. Today most of us realise that staying active is the key to a healthy life. And I, for one, am proof that you can enjoy leading a full life at the age of 70. I believe that we should be allowed to continue being active long after official retirement age – and I think I’m not the only one. And it doesn’t have to mean paid work – it can also be volunteering, helping out in the community or pursuing a hobby – whatever it is, staying active means you are more likely to stay healthy and independent for longer. Read the full entry

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Cloud Computing and Data protection reform

Friday, January 13th, 2012
| Number of views :17001
Data protection rules have big impacts on cloud computing

Credit kexino.com, creative commons license

One of the big topics as we head into 2012 is definitely protection of personal data. The Commission will propose a reform of the current 15-year-old framework in a few weeks. The main issues were already clearly flagged in the Commission communication just over a year ago. My colleague Viviane Reding has spoken about this already a lot in the past few months, setting out her thinking on a number of concrete elements that will be put forward, such as harmonising and better enforcing rules across the EU. From the Digital Agenda perspective, I’m working very closely with Viviane on this, for two reasons:

First, because data protection is an important part of wider cloud computing issues. After 12 months of intensive discussions and consultations, I am currently preparing the first in a series of concrete announcements related to the European Cloud Computing Strategy. I want Europe to be not only cloud-friendly but cloud-active: the right common rules could enhance cloud development, but the wrong choices on data protection would cut off lots of potential uses and business offerings before they’ve even started. At the World Economic Forum in Davos, I will announce a concrete project aimed at making it easier for buyers – particularly public sector buyers – to cooperate on requirement definitions and possibly pool their resources when procuring Cloud Computing services.

And second because there’s more to data protection than cloud computing (and vice versa) since data protection is relevant to almost all digital activity. In particular when we use the Internet, almost anywhere we go, we leave data traces behind. And we are all of us rightly concerned with the question of what companies, and governments, do with this personal data.

When it comes to individual privacy in the digital age, my view is clear: I want to see the principles of transparency, fairness and user control running through everything. Transparency so that citizens know exactly what the deal is. Fairness so that citizens are not forced into sharing their data. And user control so that citizens can decide – in a simple, informed and effective manner – what they allow others to know. And all of this should be combined with better regulation principles, imposing only the minimum legal and administrative burdens needed to achieve these goals.

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