The Hamburg Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information said Tuesday that Facebook is in violation of European data protection laws through its feature that automatically recognizes facial features and “tags” users when others upload photos of them. The commission alleged that Facebook has created the largest biometric database in the world: It is [...]
South Korean regulators on Wednesday fined Apple USD $2,855 for collecting location information from its iPhone and iPad users. It is the first time Apple has been punished for collecting location information from users of its widely popular mobile computing products. The Korea Communications Commission (KCC) imposed the fine after it discovered that the iPhone [...]
UN Human Rights Special Rapporteur Dr. Ahmed Shaheed on Wednesday urged Iran to comply with his mandate seeking cooperation from Iranian officials. The mandate allows Iran to discuss and implement measures to meet its international human rights obligations, Shaheed said. The UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) adopted a resolution in March, appointing a Special Rapporteur [...]
A Guatemalan court on Tuesday convicted and sentenced four former soldiers to 6,060 years in prison each on war crimes charges related to the country’s 1982 Dos Erres massacre. Carlos Antonio Carias, Manuel Pop, Reyes Collin and Daniel Martinez were convicted of crimes against humanity for being members of a military force that killed more [...]
The National Diet of Japan , the nation’s bicameral legislature, voted on Wednesday to compensate those adversely affected by the recent Fukushima nuclear power plant meltdown. The law will create a fund that could start dispensing money to victims as early as August 10. Although the government has initially agreed to contribute two trillion yen [...]
A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that San Diego State University (SDSU) can deny funding and status as a student organization to two Christian groups that require members be of the same religion. A panel for the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that the SDSU nondiscrimination policy prohibiting all student organizations [...]
A lawyer for former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega announced on Tuesday that French authorities have agreed to extradite him to Panama. French Prime Minister Francois Fillon reportedly agreed to the extradition agreement on July 6. Noriega faces charges of human rights violations in Panama for crimes allegedly committed during his 1981-1989 rule. He was already [...]
An Australian judge on Wednesday froze the profits from a memoir written by former Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks . Hicks spent more than five years without trial in US custody after being captured in Afghanistan following the terror attacks of 9/11 . He wrote an autobiography last year entitled “Guantanamo: My Journey,” describing his [...]
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) on Monday filed suit in the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to challenge Costa Rica’s longstanding ban on in vitro fertilization (IVF) . The suit will be filed on behalf of 50 Costa Rican couples who have had to seek IVF procedures in other countries as a result [...]
An American Indian tribe in Washington state on Monday voted to adopt a new law recognizing same-sex marriage . The law, approved by the Suquamish Tribe council, extends marriage rights to same-sex couples on the tribe’s Seattle reservation. The tribe will be permitted to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples as long as each partner [...]
