Mayra Pertossi of the Associated Press reports: Valuing truth over the right to privacy, Argentina’s Congress has authorized the forced collection of DNA from people who might have been born to political prisoners slain a quarter-century ago — even if they don’t want to know their birth parents. Rights activists hope that the new law…
AU: Police to have power to strip-search at random
Tom Reilly reports: Police will soon have sweeping powers to search people at random, including strip-search, even if there is no reasonable suspicion those targeted have done anything wrong. The ”stop and search” tactic is part of a law and order crackdown set to be passed by State Parliament, despite the Government conceding that the…
NV: Metro admits to improper release of criminal history data
J. Patrick Coolican reports: At least 12 Metro employees have been found since 2005 to be improperly accessing and disseminating criminal history information for reasons unrelated to police work, according to a Metro filing in a recent lawsuit. Given Metro’s roughly 6,000 employees, that means one in 500, or 0.2 percent, have been caught improperly…
Viviane Reding picked to re-write EU data protection laws
Paul Meller reports: Viviane Reding, the European Commissioner who for the past five years has championed consumer rights in the telecommunications and IT arenas, has been picked to take charge of a re-write of the European Union’s 15-year-old data protection laws due to start next year. Reding is famous for slashing the cost of roaming…