"E-readiness" refers to a country's ability to take advantage of the Internet as an engine of economic growth and human development. E-readiness has several components, including telecommunications infrastructure, human resources, and legal and policy framework.
An e-readiness assessment can be used as an information-gathering mechanism for countries as they plan their strategies for ICT development. It can help a society better understand what impediments to Internet development exist and what initiatives are needed to overcome them.
There are several self-assessment guides available online. These somewhat complicated documents try to be non-prescriptive - that is, they do not purport to tell countries what to do. They pose a series of questions or indicators and ask users to rate their country to determine its stage of development. Recommendations for the legal and regulatory framework that might make a country's system more conducive to Internet development and e-commerce are implicit throughout the guides. Two of these guides are found at:
The NGO "bridges.org" has published a "Comparison of E-Readiness Assessment Models," which analyzes the two guides above and others. It describes what they measure, including the tools' underlying goals and assumptions. Use this report to better understand the various approaches to e-readiness assessment.
Several prominent international bodies have developed principles for Internet policy. There is striking overlap among these recommendations. They provide the starting point for policy development:
One issue that frequently arises as countries seek to promote e-commerce is the validity of electronic contracts and other electronic documents. This issue has two aspects:
To a limited extent, these questions can be resolved fairly simply by a law providing that "a signature, contract or other record may not be denied legal effect, validity or enforceability solely because it is in electronic form."
The United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL) adopted a model law on electronic commerce in 1996. We are preparing an analysis of its positive and negative aspects.
Legislation based on the UNCITRAL Model has been adopted in 8 countries: Australia, Bermuda, Colombia, France, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of China, Mexico, Ireland, Philippines.
There may, however, need to be exceptions to the general acceptability of electronic documents, in cases of particularly momentous matters. The US law, for example, does not apply to wills (documents for the distribution of property upon death) nor to divorce or child adoption matters. Also, the use of electronic means must be voluntary and mutually acceptable to the parties; for example, businesses cannot avoid consumer protection responsibilities by posting required information only online.
Online, these issues can be solved by the use of the modern cryptography, which can authenticate a person's identify, prove the integrity of a document and bind the identity of a person with the contents of a message or file, thus providing non-repudiation. In practice, however, this is very complicated. Among other things, it requires some root of trust: somewhere in the system there must be one or more trusted parties -- authorities that can then certify, using encryption, other, lesser entities. One very difficult question is, who should be the certifying authority - do we trust the government to play that role? Is there sufficient information for a reliable marketplace to develop? Should the governmentlicense certificate authorities? Does industry have a role in accrediting such authorities, pursuant to standards developed by private industry?
These issues and others are discussed in the following resources:
Final note of caution: Some commentators have over-emphasized the importance of electronic and digital signature laws. For many countries seeking to promote e-commerce, there are many barriers that cannot be overcome merely by adopting an electronic or digital signature law. Conversely, countries can make great strides without an electronic or digital signature law. The United States, to take an extreme example, did not have a federal electronic signature law until June of 2000, and still does not have a digital signature law.
Freedom of expression is a human right protected under international law. Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides that "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 and regardless of frontiers." Similar language appears Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (CCPR), in Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR), and in Article 13 of the American Convention on Human Rights.
In the age of the borderless Internet, the protection of a right to freedom of expression "regardless of frontiers" takes on new and more powerful meaning.
148 countries have ratified the CCPR http://www.unhchr.ch/pdf/report.pdf
41 countries have ratified the ECHR http://conventions.coe.int/treaty/EN/cadreprincipal.htm
For more information, see "Regardless of Frontiers: Protecting the Human Right to Freedom of Expression on the Global Internet" (1998) http://www.cdt.org/gilc/report.html
Privacy protection is a critical element of consumer and user trust in the online environment and a necessary condition for the development of electronic commerce. Three international organizations have developed guidelines or rules that set forth basic consumer privacy protections:
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) -- Guidelines on the Protection of Privacy and Transborder Flows of Personal Data (Privacy Guidelines) (1980) http://www.oecd.org/dsti/sti/it/secur/index.htm
Council of Europe -- Convention for the Protection of Individuals with Regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data (1981). http://conventions.coe.int/treaty/EN/cadreprincipal.htm Articles 4 - 10 set out the basic principles for data protection.
European Union -- Data Protection Directive (1995) http://europa.eu.int/eur-lex/en/lif/dat/1995/en_395L0046.html Articles 5 - 17 spell out in somewhat more detail the basic privacy principles.
Internet Privacy Guidelines (23 February 1999) -- practical, non-binding advice for Internet users and service providers http://www.coe.fr/dataprotection/rec/elignes.htm
A good overview of the privacy rules and recommendations issued by the Council of Europe http://www.coe.fr/dataprotection/eintro.htm
An important step for countries seeking to promote the development of the Internet is to privatize their state telephone monopoly and introduce competition in telephone services, in order to attract investment, spur infrastructure improvements and drive down prices. The process of privatizations requires countries to set up a regulatory authority to address issues like competition, interconnection, and pricing.
There are lots of documents (free online, but usually in English) that either describe the process as a "case study" or are designed to give guidance to policymakers. Here are some pointers:
E-commerce and the Internet in general give new significance to an old problem in international law: when does a citizen of one country or a corporation with its place of business in one country fall under the jurisdiction of the courts of another country? For example, can a trademark holder in France sue a company using the same trademark in Germany for infringement because the German company has established a Web site that is available to French consumers? And which law of trademark applies -- the German law of the French law?
These issues, with implications for privacy, freedom of expression and consumer protection, are being discussed in several forums.
The Hague Conference on Private International Law has been drafting an international convention in an effort to set international rules for determining the court in which foreign parties can be sued and when countries must recognize the judgments of foreign courts. The latest draft of the Hague Convention can be found at http://www.hcch.net/e/workprog/jdgm.html
Excellent compilations of background materials and commentary are available at http://www.cptech.org/ecom/jurisdiction/hague.html and http://www.ilpf.org/
Some argue that crafting a convention to address jurisdictional issues will take too long and that alternative dispute resolution may provide an interim solution. The World Intellectual Property Organization helped craft a policy instituted in late 1999 by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, the organization charged with managing the Internet's domain name system, for resolving trademark disputes involving domain names. Others complain, however, that the ICANN process is one-sided in favor of business interests.
WIPO has launched other initiatives aimed at addressing some of the questions surrounding applicable law and jurisdiction raised by the Internet, including draft guidelines for how the same trademarks in different countries can coexist on the Internet.
Here are links to course materials used by three of the leading law professors specializing in Internet law in the US. The first two are general overview courses, covering such topics as jurisdiction, content controls, privacy and intellectual property. The third focuses on intellectual property, but the online syllabus for the third course includes a very useful orientation program on the Internet that could well serve as an introduction to either of the two general courses.
Status Report on EU Electronic Communications Policy
The European Union has adopted requirements for telephone companies to open their networks to competition. This document summarizes EU policy and the status of implementation as of December 1999.
OECD
Policy Requirements for the Information Society
An early overview of the policy framework. For other OECD documents on topics ranging from online consumer protection to digital divide to ecommerce, go to: http://www.oecd.org/dsti/sti/it/
OECD
Understanding the Digital Divide (2001) A very useful overview.
Overview of GIPI Policy Principles - A Legal and Regulatory Framework Promoting Internet Development