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  10. <A name=1></a><IMG src="Greens-IslandsofResilience-1.png"><br>
  11. &nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>
  12. &nbsp;<br>
  13. <b>Islands of Resilience</b><br>
  14. <b>Comparative Model for Energy, Connectivity and Jurisdiction</b><br>
  15. <b>Realizing European ICT possibilities through a case study of Iceland</b><br>
  16. &nbsp;<br>
  17. &nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>
  18. &nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>
  19. Smári McCarthy and Eleanor Saitta<br>
  20. &nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>
  21. 1<br>
  22. <hr>
  23. <A name=2></a><IMG src="Greens-IslandsofResilience-2.png"><br>
  24. &nbsp;<br>Prepared at the request of:<br>
  25. on behalf of Members of the European Parliament&nbsp;<br>Christian Engström, Indrek Tarand, Carl Schlyter, Sandrine Bélier, Karima Delli, Eva Lichtenberger, Raül&nbsp;<br>Romeva i Rueda, Heide Rühle, Judith Sargentini, Bas Eickhout and Marije Cornelissen<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br><b>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>Prepared at the request of The Greens / European Free Alliance<br>&nbsp;<br>Authors:</b><br>
  26. <b>On behalf of Members of the European Parliament:</b><br>
  27. <b>&nbsp; &nbsp;</b>Smári McCarthy<br>
  28. &nbsp; &nbsp; Christian Engström<br>
  29. &nbsp; &nbsp;Eleanor Saitta<br>
  30. &nbsp; &nbsp; Indrek Tarand<br>&nbsp; &nbsp; Carl Schlyter<br>
  31. <b>Contributing Researchers:</b><br>
  32. &nbsp; &nbsp; Sandrine Bélier<br>
  33. <b>&nbsp; &nbsp;</b>Guðjón Idir<br>
  34. &nbsp; &nbsp; Karmima Delli<br>
  35. &nbsp; &nbsp;Jason Scott<br>
  36. &nbsp; &nbsp; Eva Lichtenberger<br>&nbsp; &nbsp; Paül Romeva i Rueda<br>&nbsp; &nbsp; Heide Rühle<br>&nbsp; &nbsp; Judith Sargentini<br>&nbsp; &nbsp; Bas Eickhout<br>&nbsp; &nbsp; Marije Cornelissen<br>
  37. <b>Produced by:<br>&nbsp;</b><br>
  38. <b>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;</b><br>
  39. <b>&nbsp; &nbsp; International Modern Media Institute<br></b>&nbsp; &nbsp; Laugavegur 3<br>&nbsp; &nbsp; 101 Reykjavík<br>&nbsp; &nbsp; Iceland<br>
  40. &nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>
  41. &nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>
  42. 2<br>
  43. <hr>
  44. <A name=3></a><IMG src="Greens-IslandsofResilience-3.png"><br>
  45. &nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>
  46. &nbsp;Distributed under the terms of the&nbsp;<br>
  47. Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike 3.0-unported License<br>
  48. <b>&nbsp;</b><br>
  49. 3<br>
  50. <hr>
  51. <A name=4></a><b>Abstract</b><br>
  52. Locale is rapidly becoming one of the most important competitive differentiators in the&nbsp;<br>provision of cloud-based information technology services. Broadly speaking, three&nbsp;<br>categories of issues define a locale's fitness for hosting the cloud: energy, connectivity, and&nbsp;<br>jurisdiction.<br>
  53. Energy is the largest cost center for most cloud hosts. Beyond price per kilowatt hour,&nbsp;<br>hosting companies must consider redundant network availability, power grid resilience,&nbsp;<br>environmental sustainability, climate, and equipment cooling requirements as core parts of&nbsp;<br>their energy strategy.<br>
  54. Connectivity is clearly essential for hosts, and differentiating factors here include total&nbsp;<br>installed bandwidth, current utilized bandwidth, hub redundancy, international uplink&nbsp;<br>redundancy, round trip latency, traffic shaping and network neutrality.<br>
  55. Jurisdictional issues are an area of emerging concern and awareness for cloud hosts, where&nbsp;<br>the landscape is shifting rapidly. &nbsp;Hosting companies are deeply affected by intermediary&nbsp;<br>liability, hosting liability, state and corporate surveillance, state and corporate censorship, the&nbsp;<br>accessibility of and cost of interacting with courts, corruption, and socioeconomic stability.<br>
  56. This report considers Iceland's relative competitive advantages and drawbacks as a hosting&nbsp;<br>locale relating to these issues.<br>
  57. 4<br>
  58. <hr>
  59. <A name=5></a><b>Table of Contents</b><br>
  60. <a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#4">Abstract</a><br>
  61. <a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#6">Introduction<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#7">Energy</a><br>
  62. <a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#7">Energy&nbsp;Sources<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#9">Energy&nbsp;Utilization&nbsp;and&nbsp;Pricing<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#10">Grid&nbsp;Resilience&nbsp;and&nbsp;Redundancy<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#11">Climate&nbsp;and&nbsp;Cooling</a><br>
  63. <a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#12">Connectivity</a><br>
  64. <a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#12">Submarine&nbsp;Cables<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#13">Installed&nbsp;and&nbsp;Utilized&nbsp;Capacity<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#14">Domestic&nbsp;Network<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#15">Round&nbsp;Trip&nbsp;Latency<br>Network&nbsp;Security<br>Future&nbsp;Connectivity&nbsp;Developments</a><br>
  65. <a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#18">Jurisdiction</a><br>
  66. <a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#18">Commercial&nbsp;Issues<br>Overview&nbsp;of&nbsp;Icelandic&nbsp;Information&nbsp;Regulation<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#19">Compatibility&nbsp;with&nbsp;European&nbsp;Union&nbsp;Directives<br>Intermediary&nbsp;Liability&nbsp;Limitations<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#20">Surveillance<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#22">Censorship<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#19">Data&nbsp;Protection<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#23">Human&nbsp;Resources<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#24">Icelandic&nbsp;Modern&nbsp;Media&nbsp;Initiative<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#25">Source&nbsp;Protection<br>Freedom&nbsp;of&nbsp;Information&nbsp;Act<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#26">Network&nbsp;Neutrality<br>Communications&nbsp;Protection&nbsp;and&nbsp;Communications&nbsp;Data&nbsp;Retention<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#27">Intermediary&nbsp;Liability&nbsp;Limitations<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#28">Libel&nbsp;Tourism&nbsp;Protection<br>Libel&nbsp;Reform&nbsp;and&nbsp;Publishing&nbsp;Liability&nbsp;Limitations<br></a><a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#29">Whistleblower&nbsp;Protection<br>Prior&nbsp;Restraint&nbsp;Limitations<br>Virtual&nbsp;Limited&nbsp;Liability&nbsp;Companies</a><br>
  67. <a href="Greens-IslandsofResiliences.html#30">Selected&nbsp;Bibliography</a><br>
  68. &nbsp;<br>
  69. 5<br>
  70. <hr>
  71. <A name=6></a><b>Introduction</b><br>
  72. This preliminary study is intended to give a birds-eye view of the primary factors pertaining&nbsp;<br>to energy, connectivity and jurisdiction in Iceland, as applicable to ICT1&nbsp;growth in general&nbsp;<br>and cloud hosting in particular.. It is necessarily narrow in scope and largely based on&nbsp;<br>aggregating publicly available information. As a result, some inaccuracies may exist, largely&nbsp;<br>due to poor information made available by private actors. A more in-depth follow up study&nbsp;<br>will &nbsp;remedy this by seeking out more detailed expert insights, detailed statistics, and&nbsp;<br>comparing against sourced cases.<br>
  73. Regardless, this report clearly shows the advantages Iceland has in relation to ICTs, as well&nbsp;<br>as showing some of its potential weaknesses and possible remedies.<br>
  74. Iceland’s key strengths are:<br>
  75. <br>
  76. Cheap and abundant energy generated from green, renewable, sustainable and&nbsp;<br>resilient energy sources, distributed over a well designed and resilient power grid.<br>
  77. <br>
  78. Increasingly good connectivity to the outside world with reasonable redundancy&nbsp;<br>and a large amount of unused capacity available for expansion, and a very highly&nbsp;<br>developed internal network with high resiliency.<br>
  79. <br>
  80. An advanced and stable jurisdiction, with clear information rights and regulations,&nbsp;<br>well structured administration, and well informed governing bodies.<br>
  81. Iceland’s main weaknesses are:<br>
  82. <br>
  83. Scale discrepancies both in energy generation and consumption which could&nbsp;<br>potentially threaten grid resilience in extreme cases. This can be improved with&nbsp;<br>further diversification of energy consumers, such as large-scale ICT deployments.<br>
  84. <br>
  85. Iceland’s data connectivity is provided by a relatively small number of submarine&nbsp;<br>cables connecting to the outside world, creating some network precarity. &nbsp;This is&nbsp;<br>currently being improved with the addition of new cables.<br>
  86. <br>
  87. International data transport bandwidth through submarine cables is currently&nbsp;<br>expensive. This could be mitigated by further investments, subsidies, or other&nbsp;<br>methods to reduce the price for connection, with the intention of increasing the&nbsp;<br>overall usage.<br>
  88. <br>
  89. Iceland has similar issues with blanket communications surveillance as in the EU,&nbsp;<br>which make it less attractive for hosting than countries where communications are&nbsp;<br>not monitored. This is hard to fix without political will in the EU.<br>
  90. <br>
  91. Wildcard properties exist in the implementation of the e-Commerce directive,&nbsp;<br>connected to injunctive powers that district sheriffs still have. This can be solved by&nbsp;<br>clarifying the instances under which injunctions can be made, and restricting the&nbsp;<br>issuing authority to courts.<br>
  92. Together Iceland’s key strengths form a very sound basis for the expansion of ICT in&nbsp;<br>Iceland, especially cloud hosting. &nbsp;Most of the weaknesses in Iceland’s position are either&nbsp;<br>
  93. 1&nbsp;Information and Communication Technologies<br>
  94. 6<br>
  95. <hr>
  96. <A name=7></a>structural weaknesses common amongst all EU member states or are relatively trivial issues&nbsp;<br>which can be resolved easily.<br>
  97. &nbsp;<br>
  98. <b>Energy</b><br>
  99. Energy is the largest cost center for most cloud hosting companies. Beyond price per&nbsp;<br>kilowatt hour, hosting companies must consider redundant network availability, power grid&nbsp;<br>resilience, environmental sustainability, climate, and equipment cooling requirements as&nbsp;<br>core parts of their energy strategy.&nbsp;<br>
  100. In our analytical model for energy, we asked the following questions:<br>
  101. <b>How prevalent are renewable energy sources in current electrical production?</b><br>
  102. 1.&nbsp;Less than 3% of all energy production based on renewable energy sources.<br>2.&nbsp;Between 4 and 40% of all energy production based on renewable energy sources.<br>3.&nbsp;Between 40 and 60% of all energy production based on renewable energy sources.<br>4.&nbsp;Between 60 and 97% of all energy production based on renewable energy sources.<br>5.&nbsp;More than 97% of all energy production based on renewable energy sources.<br>
  103. <b>How much can current electrical production be increased without the construction of&nbsp;<br>new (not currently planned) power plants?</b><br>
  104. 1.&nbsp;By less than 5% of current average power use.<br>2.&nbsp;By less than 25% of current average power use.<br>3.&nbsp;By less than 50% of current average power use.<br>4.&nbsp;By more than 75% of current average power use<br>5.&nbsp;By more than 100% of current average power use.<br>
  105. <b>What is the annual average price per kiloWatt hour for a commercial customer using&nbsp;<br>less than 2 GWh/year, including generation and distribution?</b><br>
  106. 1.&nbsp;&gt; 0.20/kWh<br>2.&nbsp;&gt; 0.14/kWh<br>3.&nbsp;&lt;= €0.14/kWh<br>4.&nbsp;&lt; 0.09/kWh<br>5.&nbsp;&lt; 0.07/kWh<br>
  107. &nbsp;<br>
  108. Iceland's national energy plan was last updated in November of 2011.<br>
  109. <b>Energy Sources</b><br>
  110. 7<br>
  111. <hr>
  112. <A name=8></a>In 2009, Iceland’s total energy utilization was roughly 240 PJ2&nbsp;of primary energy sources,&nbsp;<br>which equates to roughly 67 TWh3. The primary energy sources were, in order of magnitude:&nbsp;<br>geothermal, hydroelectric, oil, and coal. Geothermal energy use was greater than all other&nbsp;<br>energy sources combined, while coal use was relatively minuscule. Energy use in Iceland&nbsp;<br>has risen substantially since the 1940’s with the industrialization of the country, which up&nbsp;<br>until roughly 1960 was almost entirely rural.<br>
  113. A vast amount of geothermal energy is used for house-heating (45%), followed by electricity&nbsp;<br>production (39%). In addition, it is used for snow-melting, swimming pools, fish farming,&nbsp;<br>greenhouses and for industrial purposes. In 2009 a total of 22.3 PJ of geothermal energy&nbsp;<br>was used for electricity production.<br>
  114. Only 18% of Iceland’s primary energy utilization comes from petrochemicals, of which&nbsp;<br>90% is oil and 10% coal. The majority of the coal is used by the iron smelting plant at&nbsp;<br>Grundartangi, with other industrial processes consuming the remainder. Almost no natural&nbsp;<br>gas is used in Iceland. Roughly 660 thousand tonnes of oil were used in Iceland in 2009,&nbsp;<br>of which 41% went to powering cars, 18% for aircraft, and 29% for fishing. Petroleum use&nbsp;<br>for cars has increased by 64% since 1990 in Iceland, contributing to the overall increase in&nbsp;<br>use. Oil is not used for electricity production except for some emergency backup generators.&nbsp;<br>Some towns have backup generators capable of sustaining basic operations throughout the&nbsp;<br>town temporarily, but the redundancy of the electricity grid renders this use minimal.<br>
  115. As a result, the electricity production in Iceland is almost exclusively from geothermal and&nbsp;<br>hydroelectric primary energy sources. The theoretical maximum energy production in Iceland&nbsp;<br>is 64 TWh per year from hydroelectric sources and between 10 and 30 TWh per year from&nbsp;<br>geothermal sources. However, for natural protection purposes substantial regions of Iceland&nbsp;<br>have been classified as natural reserves, parks, or other protected areas. In addition, certain&nbsp;<br>areas have been classified as energy reserves that will not be used in coming years, in part&nbsp;<br>for sustainability reasons. This lowers the effective energy available for production.<br>
  116. The current installed production capacity is 12.3 TWh per year for hydroelectric power,&nbsp;<br>and 4.6 TWh per year for geothermal power. After subtracting the protected and reserve&nbsp;<br>production categories, the total available hydroelectric and geothermal energy available for&nbsp;<br>future expansion is 11.91 TWh per year.<br>
  117. Variability of energy pricing and availability is a critical issue for data centers.&nbsp;&nbsp;As Iceland has&nbsp;<br>little or no hydrocarbon-based electricity production, electricity prices are largely unaffected&nbsp;<br>by fluctuations in the oil, gas, and coal markets, and will not be affected by supply chain&nbsp;<br>interruptions in these markets. &nbsp;This provides a critical level of energy resilience for the&nbsp;<br>Icelandic electrical system at the supply end. &nbsp;Cheap, reliable, resilience, and predictably&nbsp;<br>priced energy sources are, in combination, a significant advantage for potential hosting&nbsp;<br>companies.<br>
  118. 2&nbsp;Petajoules. 1&nbsp;PJ&nbsp;= 1015&nbsp;J<br>3&nbsp;Terawatt&nbsp;hours. 1&nbsp;TWh&nbsp;= 1012&nbsp;W·h<br>
  119. 8<br>
  120. <hr>
  121. <A name=9></a><IMG src="Greens-IslandsofResilience-9.png"><br>
  122. (Primary energy sources in Iceland 1940-2009. Inset: Proportional use. Top to bottom: Coal,&nbsp;<br>
  123. oil, geothermal and hydroelectric. Source: Orkuáætlun 2011)<br>
  124. <b>Energy Utilization and Pricing</b><br>
  125. In 2009, 74% of produced electricity in Iceland went to the aluminum industry, with roughly&nbsp;<br>4.9 TWh/year to Alcoa Fjarðarál, 4.0 TWh/year to Rio Tinto Alcan, and 4.0 TWh/year to&nbsp;<br>Norðurál. 6% of produced electricity was used in the services industry, 5% for iron smelting&nbsp;<br>plants, 5% for household appliances, 4% for utilities, 4% for general industries, and 1% in&nbsp;<br>agriculture.<br>
  126. 9<br>
  127. <hr>
  128. <A name=10></a><IMG src="Greens-IslandsofResilience-10.png"><br>
  129. (Electricity use 2009. From top to bottom: Fisheries, agriculture, general industries, district&nbsp;<br>
  130. heating, home use, steel mills, services and aluminum industry. Source: Orkuátælun 2011)<br>
  131. Energy use for household appliances accounted for 627 GWh in 2009, accounting for 7.1&nbsp;<br>B ISK (€44.3 million) &nbsp;in consumer use, including VAT. Average household electricity costs&nbsp;<br>in Reykjavík are 11.30 ISK/kWh, or €0.07/kWh. This rate is substantially higher than the&nbsp;<br>price for industry. &nbsp;In the case of the aluminum smelters, these rates are 30% lower than&nbsp;<br>the European average4, although the energy prices for aluminum smelting have been&nbsp;<br>confidential. Alcoa Fjarðarál reportedly paid between 28-35 USD/MWh in 2006, or roughly&nbsp;<br>0.044/kWh at 2006 exchange rates.<br>
  132. (Main power lines and power plants. Source: Landsnet. For realtime energy distribution&nbsp;<br>
  133. <a href="http://landsnet.is/raforkukerfid/kerfisstjornun/aflflutningurnuna/">figures, see&nbsp;http://landsnet.is/raforkukerfid/kerfisstjornun/aflflutningurnuna/</a>&nbsp;)<br>
  134. <b>Grid Resilience and Redundancy</b><br>
  135. Power grid resilience in Iceland is fairly high. The 61 power stations in Iceland are connected&nbsp;<br>with a circular grid which goes around the country, providing basic redundancy. In addition,&nbsp;<br>most power stations on the southwest corner have further grid redundancy simply due to the&nbsp;<br>higher population density and related network effects.<br>
  136. There are 50 hydroelectric power stations in Iceland, mostly small. There are 7 geothermal&nbsp;<br>power plants, and 4 fueled power plants—one that generates power through garbage&nbsp;<br>incineration, two diesel powered, and one methane plant.<br>
  137. 4&nbsp;<a href="http://www.mbl.is/greinasafn/grein/1026890/">http://www.mbl.is/greinasafn/grein/1026890/</a><br>
  138. 10<br>
  139. <hr>
  140. <A name=11></a>Some parts of the country, most notably the western fjords, are very poorly connected into&nbsp;<br>the grid and frequently get disconnected during the winter months due to poor weather&nbsp;<br>conditions. Power availability is maintained primarily with diesel generators when this&nbsp;<br>happens. Similarly, Flatey and Grímsey, two populated islands off the Icelandic west&nbsp;<br>and north coasts, respectively, are not connected to the main power grid, but are instead&nbsp;<br>powered by diesel generators.<br>
  141. Resilience is quite high on the southwest corner, where most economic activity is situated,&nbsp;<br>but the east coast has also improved substantially in recent years due to developments in&nbsp;<br>relation to the Kárahnjúkar dam project and the Alcoa Fjarðarál aluminum smelter.<br>
  142. The overall infrastructural elasticity on the power grid is high enough to handle most types of&nbsp;<br>outages due to line failures, power station shutdowns and disasters, but some very extreme&nbsp;<br>edge cases exist where grid resilience is threatened, notably sudden outages in production&nbsp;<br>units such as Kárahnjúkavirkjun, which could potentially lead to chain reactions of failures,&nbsp;<br>similar to the power outage at Itaipu power station in Brazil on 21 January, 2002. In general,&nbsp;<br>larger plants require larger transmission lines and inevitably cause more widespread&nbsp;<br>damage when they do fail. Similarly, larger consumption units may threaten grid resilience. &nbsp;<br>For instance, almost one third of Iceland’s total electricity consumption is used by a single&nbsp;<br>aluminum smelter, meaning that the unlikely edge case of an abrupt total disconnect would&nbsp;<br>momentarily increase the available electricity substantially. This kind of pathological outage&nbsp;<br>may however be mitigated by various means, not least the further diversification of power&nbsp;<br>production and consumption.<br>
  143. <b>Climate and Cooling</b><br>
  144. Estimates for data center energy utilization from IBM5&nbsp;suggest that roughly half of all energy&nbsp;<br>is used on cooling, and an additional fourth on heat waste, mostly due to internal electrical&nbsp;<br>resistance in system components. Therefore, a priori energy waste in typical data centers&nbsp;<br>is roughly 75% before any actual computation occurs. Mitigating this waste is clearly crucial&nbsp;<br>to the efficiency, cost-effectiveness and sustainability of any data center. The proportional&nbsp;<br>cost of cooling for data centers has risen dramatically over the past few years, relative to the&nbsp;<br>cost of hardware. &nbsp;Reduction in hardware deployments due to virtualization and increases&nbsp;<br>in system density have dramatically reduced equipment purchase costs as a proportion&nbsp;<br>of operating costs. &nbsp;As a result of this, component-level heat waste mitigation is a primary&nbsp;<br>industry research goal.<br>
  145. Increasingly, large data center operators have started to look to areas with relatively cold&nbsp;<br>climates. &nbsp;Cooling costs are significantly lower in cold areas, and most energy use in data&nbsp;<br>centers in those areas that goes to cooling is attributable to airflow management and de-<br>humidification rather than direct refrigeration. An example of this is the planned data center&nbsp;<br>that Facebook, Inc., is building near Luleå, Sweden6.<br>
  146. 5&nbsp;https://www-950.ibm.com/events/wwe/grp/grp030.nsf/vLookupPDFs/IBM%20BladeCenter%20&nbsp;<br>Product_Tikiri/$file/IBM%20BladeCenter%20Product_Tikiri.pdf<br>6&nbsp;http://online.wsj.com/article/BT-CO-20111215-712478.html<br>
  147. 11<br>
  148. <hr>
  149. <A name=12></a>In this respect, Iceland's climate is clear benefit for cloud hosting providers even though&nbsp;<br>it’s not nearly as cold as some more northerly locales. The oceanic climate contributes to&nbsp;<br>relatively stable temperatures over the year. Apart from insolation, there is relatively little&nbsp;<br>seasonal variation in the factors that contribute to data center cooling. On the negative&nbsp;<br>side, Iceland’s climate is generally rather humid, with an annual average of roughly 70.75%. &nbsp;<br>In order for outside air to be used for cooling purposes some dehumidification would be&nbsp;<br>needed.<br>
  150. <b>Variable</b><br>
  151. <b>Jan</b><br>
  152. <b>Feb</b><br>
  153. <b>Mar</b><br>
  154. <b>Apr</b><br>
  155. <b>May</b><br>
  156. <b>Jun</b><br>
  157. <b>Jul</b><br>
  158. <b>Aug</b><br>
  159. <b>Sep</b><br>
  160. <b>Oct</b><br>
  161. <b>Nov</b><br>
  162. <b>Dec</b><br>
  163. <b>Average temp. °C</b><br>
  164. -2.60<br>
  165. -2.59<br>
  166. -1.59<br>
  167. 1.37<br>
  168. 5.24<br>
  169. 8.49<br>
  170. 10.31<br>
  171. 9.58<br>
  172. 6.29<br>
  173. 2.75<br>
  174. -0.04<br>
  175. -1.91<br>
  176. <b>Insolation, kWh/m²/day</b><br>
  177. 0.11<br>
  178. 0.53<br>
  179. 1.31<br>
  180. 2.77<br>
  181. 4.11<br>
  182. 4.71<br>
  183. 4.16<br>
  184. 3.27<br>
  185. 2.17<br>
  186. 0.97<br>
  187. 0.25<br>
  188. 0.03<br>
  189. <b>Wind speed, m/s</b><br>
  190. 10.20<br>
  191. 10.27<br>
  192. 9.63<br>
  193. 8.42<br>
  194. 7.18<br>
  195. 6.51<br>
  196. 6.40<br>
  197. 6.63<br>
  198. 7.62<br>
  199. 8.85<br>
  200. 8.76<br>
  201. 10.41<br>
  202. <b>Humidity, %</b><br>
  203. 80<br>
  204. 78<br>
  205. 71<br>
  206. 69<br>
  207. 66<br>
  208. 63<br>
  209. 61<br>
  210. 67<br>
  211. 72<br>
  212. 77<br>
  213. 79.0<br>
  214. (Reykjavík average temperature, insolation and windspeed, source: Gaisma.com)<br>
  215. <b>Connectivity</b><br>
  216. Iceland’s connectivity to the outside world has improved substantially over the last two&nbsp;<br>decades. Since 1994, submarine fiber optics connections have existed to the Europe&nbsp;<br>and North America. Since 2004, domestic Internet connectivity has gone up from 81% of&nbsp;<br>households to 90%, compared to EU growth from 41% to 65%. Of the 10% of Icelandic&nbsp;<br>households not connected to the Internet, 40% (4% of the total) claim not to want an Internet&nbsp;<br>connection, whereas 25% (2.5% of the total) say it is due to price of connectivity.<br>
  217. <b>Submarine Cables</b><br>
  218. As of November 2011, there are four fiber optics cable links to Iceland: DanIce, Greenland&nbsp;<br>Connect, FarIce, and CANTAT-3, in order of decreasing capacity. Several projects have&nbsp;<br>been proposed to increase the number of fiber optics links to Iceland; of them, Emerald&nbsp;<br>Express is the furthest towards completion.<br>
  219. <b>Fiber optic cable</b><br>
  220. <b>Owner</b><br>
  221. <b>Total capacity</b><br>
  222. <b>Installed capacity</b><br>
  223. <b>Utilized capacity</b><br>
  224. CANTAT-3<br>
  225. Síminn<br>
  226. 7.5 Gb/s<br>
  227. None<br>
  228. Decommissioned<br>
  229. FarIce<br>
  230. Farice ehf<br>
  231. 720 Gb/s<br>
  232. Unknown<br>
  233. &nbsp;<br>
  234. Danice<br>
  235. Farice ehf<br>
  236. 5.2 Tb/s<br>
  237. ~20 Gb/s<br>
  238. &nbsp;<br>
  239. Greenland connect<br>
  240. TELE Greenland<br>
  241. 1.9 Tb/s<br>
  242. Unknown<br>
  243. &nbsp;<br>
  244. Emerald Express<br>
  245. Emerald Networks<br>
  246. 58.6 Tb/s (planned)<br>
  247. N/A<br>
  248. Under construction<br>
  249. &nbsp;<br>The CANTAT-3 was the first fiber optics cable connection to Iceland, greatly increasing the&nbsp;<br>country’s telecommunications capacity. Installed in 1994, it was disrupted in late 2006 and&nbsp;<br>was not returned to full capacity until mid-year 2007. The CANTAT-3 cable was retired in&nbsp;<br>
  250. 12<br>
  251. <hr>
  252. <A name=13></a>late 2010, due to age, operational costs, and low capacity.<br>
  253. Farice ehf operates two fiber-optic submarine systems as of late 2011. It is partially owned&nbsp;<br>by the Icelandic state and Arion bank, but a 20% stake is held by Faroese shareholders.<br>
  254. Their first system, FarIce, lies between Seyðisfjörður, Iceland and Dunnet Bay, Scotland with&nbsp;<br>a layover in Funningsfjørður in the Faroe Islands. From these locations it is backhauled to&nbsp;<br>Reykjavík, Edinburgh and Tórshavn respectively. It traverses a roughly 1,400 km route using&nbsp;<br>Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) transmission technology. It has been in&nbsp;<br>use since 2004 and is currently Iceland’s main communications line. Currently only roughly&nbsp;<br>3% of FarIce’s total potential capacity is installed, according to available sources.<br>
  255. Farice ehf’s second system, Danice, was laid in 2008 and connects Landeyjarsandur in&nbsp;<br>Iceland to Blaabjerg, Denmark, with a planned expansion to Eemshaven, Netherlands.&nbsp;<br>Despite having significantly greater capacity than FarIce, it is much less utilized and mostly&nbsp;<br>used as a redundancy cable for FarIce.<br>
  256. The most recent fiber optic connection to Iceland is through Greenland Connect, installed&nbsp;<br>in 2009 and owned and operated by TELE Greenland. It connects Milton, Trinity Bay,&nbsp;<br>Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, to Nuuk, Greenland, Qaqortoq, Greenland, and&nbsp;<br>Landeyjarsandur, Iceland. It contains two fiber pairs specified for 128 wavelengths carrying&nbsp;<br>10 Gb/s each. As its landing point in Iceland is co-located with the Danice cable, direct&nbsp;<br>bridging between them is possible.<br>
  257. The Emerald Express is a planned 6x100x100 Gb/s fiber optics cable from the United States&nbsp;<br>to Ireland with an offshoot to the Reykjanes peninsula in Iceland. Being constructed by&nbsp;<br>Emerald Atlantis, Ltd. and TE SubCom, Ltd., it is scheduled to enter service in late 2012 and&nbsp;<br>intends to facilitate ultra-low-latency connections to Europe and North America. Its Iceland&nbsp;<br>branch will presumably carry two pairs, one for connection to Ireland, the other to the United&nbsp;<br>States; the last pair connecting the US to Ireland directly.<br>
  258. <b>Installed and Utilized Capacity</b><br>
  259. Total capacity of installed fiber optic cables is currently around 7.8 Tb/s, not counting the&nbsp;<br>CANTAT-3 cable. However, endpoint equipment has only been installed for a fraction of this&nbsp;<br>capacity. The installed capacity is not known, but conservative estimates put it close to 200&nbsp;<br>Gb/s, or around 2.5% of the total capacity.<br>
  260. Current utilized capacity is also unknown, but various estimates can be used to arrive at a&nbsp;<br>figure. The combined foreign connectivity of universities and secondary colleges in Iceland is&nbsp;<br>currently 16.5 Gb/s through RHNet. As RHNet typically accounts for between 14.2%-14.9%&nbsp;<br>of total traffic through the Reykjavík Internet Exchange, it can be estimated that total foreign&nbsp;<br>bandwidth consumption is close to 120 Gb/s. This number may turn out to be severely&nbsp;<br>understated, but more detailed data is not available.&nbsp;<br>
  261. 13<br>
  262. <hr>
  263. <A name=14></a><IMG src="Greens-IslandsofResilience-14.png"><br>
  264. (Map of proposed Emerald Express cable. Source: Emerald Networks)<br>
  265. &nbsp;<br>Uplink redundancy to Europe is good due to the FarIce and DanIce cables going separate&nbsp;<br>routes. However, redundancy to the US is poor, since the only reliable connection is through&nbsp;<br>Greenland. Currently, in the case of an outage, rerouting would have to be through Europe—<br>presumably London. US redundancy will improve substantially when the Emerald Express is&nbsp;<br>completed.&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>Overall uplink redundancy is becoming better, providing more infrastructural elasticity&nbsp;<br>and greater resilience. The older emergency satellite redundancy is slowly becoming less&nbsp;<br>relevant and is probably not realistically needed.<br>&nbsp;<br>
  266. <b>Domestic Network</b><br>
  267. The main domestic telecommunications hub is RIX (Reykjavík Internet Exchange), which is&nbsp;<br>operated by ISNIC. This hub connects the main Internet service providers and data centers&nbsp;<br>together.<br>
  268. In general, domestic fiber optics and copper networks are operated by Míla, Fjarski and&nbsp;<br>Gagnaveita Reykjavíkur. Míla is a subsidiary of the formerly state-run phone company (since&nbsp;<br>privatized, currently known as Síminn). It operates a fiber optics ring around the country&nbsp;<br>which were installed by NATO, but has expanded it substantially and introduced additional&nbsp;<br>redundancy. It also operates fiber and copper networks in most settlements.<br>
  269. Fjarki is a subsidiary of Landsvirkjun, the (mostly) state owned power company.<br>
  270. 14<br>
  271. <hr>
  272. <A name=15></a>Gagnaveita Reykjavíkur is a subsidiary of Orkuveita Reykjavíkur, the Reykjavík city&nbsp;<br>power company. It provides mostly fiber to the home connections but also operates some&nbsp;<br>communications backbones within the Reykjavík metropolitan area.<br>
  273. <b>Round Trip Latency</b><br>
  274. Round-trip latency to Europe is generally low, but varies widely depending on destination city&nbsp;<br>and provider, origin location and provider, and various other variables. Generally speaking&nbsp;<br>the network latency has low stochasticity (“jitter”), averaging around 4ms (milliseconds),&nbsp;<br>suggesting natural latency rather than network congestion.<br>
  275. We did informal testing of multiple origin and endpoints on known locations to arrive at&nbsp;<br>some idea of latency trends. Typical round-trip times to London are close to 55ms; 31ms to&nbsp;<br>Copenhagen. Connections to Oslo trend around 70ms, Berlin around 71ms, and to Madrid&nbsp;<br>74ms. On connections closer to the uplinks, slightly better times were observed, while&nbsp;<br>household Internet connections showed slightly worse round-trip times. As such, none of this&nbsp;<br>was particularly unexpected.<br>
  276. The theoretical roundtrip time for a photon traveling over the big circle route from Reykjavík&nbsp;<br>to London is 12.64ms; to Copenhagen it is 14.02ms. Therefore the Copenhagen connection&nbsp;<br>is as close to reasonable expectations as is possible, while the London connection could&nbsp;<br>possibly be improved. The FarIce endpoint is in Edinburgh, so packets bound for London&nbsp;<br>must traverse potentially congested and slow UK networks after their initial arrival.<br>
  277. <b>Network Security</b><br>
  278. No major network security incidents have occurred in Iceland. Denial of Service attacks&nbsp;<br>happen on a relatively small scale on a fairly regular basis, but are easily mitigated with&nbsp;<br>standard techniques. No large scale online attacks have occurred in recent years, although&nbsp;<br>in some cases competent attackers have been able to disable individual service providers&nbsp;<br>for a number of hours. This is not considered to be more frequent in Iceland than in the EU,&nbsp;<br>based on anecdotal evidence.<br>
  279. Individual servers and home computers are moderately well protected from security threats&nbsp;<br>compared to other countries, owing to a fair degree of awareness, a comparatively low&nbsp;<br>incidence of pirated operating system software, and generally well configured routers on&nbsp;<br>home connections. That said, many computers run outdated operating systems with severe&nbsp;<br>security vulnerabilities, and many websites operate outdated web platforms, in particular&nbsp;<br>Wordpress and Joomla, which are common staging grounds for attack.<br>
  280. The Icelandic government is acutely aware of the threats posed to the security of networks,&nbsp;<br>and in recently proposed amendments to the telecommunications act, provisions are made&nbsp;<br>for the establishment of a CERT (Computer Emergency Response Team). This should&nbsp;<br>increase multi-party coordination and responsiveness in the case of online attacks or other&nbsp;<br>ICT-related emergency, and thus overall communications resilience.<br>
  281. <b>Future Connectivity Developments</b><br>
  282. A number of proposals have been made for future developments in connectivity in Iceland.&nbsp;<br>
  283. 15<br>
  284. <hr>
  285. <A name=16></a><IMG src="Greens-IslandsofResilience-16.png"><br>
  286. &nbsp;<br>One example which has frequently been brought up is that Iceland’s geographical situation&nbsp;<br>makes it ideal for connecting the American east coast, Europe, and East Asia, due to&nbsp;<br>the receding polar ice cover. Such a connection could land in Longyearbyen in Svalbard,&nbsp;<br>and have connections to Murmansk, some settlements along northern Siberia, and either&nbsp;<br>connect to Yakutsk via the Lena river or go through the Bering strait and connect to Alaska&nbsp;<br>on the one hand and Kamchatka and Japan on the other hand.<br>&nbsp;<br>This would shorten round-trip latency to East Asia substantially, as most current connections&nbsp;<br>go through the Mediterranean, down past India, and through the South China Sea. The&nbsp;<br>Longyearbyen connection would allow for redundancy to Norway through an existing&nbsp;<br>connection. &nbsp;Connections in Russia would help in Russia’s developing ICTs, as currently it is&nbsp;<br>estimated that 70% of Russian communications go through Sweden. However, it would be&nbsp;<br>vital to Europe’s communications security interests that such a connection have direct routes&nbsp;<br>to East Asia rather than an intermittent landing in Russia. There are numerous ways in&nbsp;<br>which such a proposal could be made beneficial to all parties, and it would open possibilities&nbsp;<br>for diverse applications from cross-continental high speed trading and currency arbitrage&nbsp;<br>to online gaming. For telephony applications, this connection would push the latency on&nbsp;<br>communications between Europe and East Asia down below the threshold of human&nbsp;<br>perception, itself a revolution in global telecommunications.<br>&nbsp;<br>Less ambitious potential developments that have been proposed include construction of&nbsp;<br>large data centers on the Reykjanes peninsula, construction of further fiber optics links to&nbsp;<br>Europe and America, and the establishment of data caches and mediation centers in Iceland&nbsp;<br>for high availability applications.<br>&nbsp;<br>
  287. (Example routes for a “polar express” cable; also shows autumn arctic ice cover)<br>
  288. &nbsp;<br>
  289. 16<br>
  290. <hr>
  291. <A name=17></a><IMG src="Greens-IslandsofResilience-17.png"><br>
  292. The Russian Optical Trans-Arctic Submarine Cable System (ROTACS) project aims to do&nbsp;<br>just that. According to an article&nbsp;<br>
  293. (ROTACS telecommunication project outline; source:&nbsp;<a href="http://barentsnova.com/node/1737">http://barentsnova.com/node/1737)</a><br>
  294. &nbsp;<br>
  295. (ROTACS and Arctic Fibre; source: Laser Focus World7)<br>
  296. TODO:&nbsp;<a href="http://barentsnova.com/node/1737">http://barentsnova.com/node/1737</a><br>
  297. 7&nbsp;<a href="http://www.laserfocusworld.com/articles/print/volume-48/issue-04/world-news/fiber-cables-to-span-the-arctic-ocean.html">http://www.laserfocusworld.com/articles/print/volume-48/issue-04/world-news/fiber-cables-to-span-the-arctic-<br>ocean.html</a><br>
  298. 17<br>
  299. <hr>
  300. <A name=18></a><b>Jurisdiction</b><br>
  301. Iceland is a parliamentary republic which gained independence from Denmark in 1944. It&nbsp;<br>is a member of the United Nations, the Council of Europe (CoE), the European Economic&nbsp;<br>Area (EEA), the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) and the North Atlantic Treaty&nbsp;<br>Organization (NATO), amongst others. It is party to numerous international agreements&nbsp;<br>including Schengen.<br>
  302. Iceland’s membership in the EEA means that outside of a few limited areas, all EU&nbsp;<br>commercial directives take effect in Iceland. In addition, both for conformity and utility,&nbsp;<br>Iceland has adopted various non-EEA relevant directives. This tendency has been&nbsp;<br>increasing as part of the preparations and negotiations for EU membership. As of 12&nbsp;<br>December, 2011, eight out of 33 chapters have been closed in Iceland’s EU accession&nbsp;<br>negotiations. Of particular interest to this report, the chapter on information society and&nbsp;<br>media is considered to generally already conform to the EU&nbsp;<i>acquis</i>.<br>
  303. <b>Commercial Issues</b><br>
  304. After the collapse of the Icelandic banking sector in 2008, the Icelandic Central Bank&nbsp;<br>(Seðlabanki Íslands) was authorized to put limitations on the flow of capital, in particular&nbsp;<br>those with no relevance to goods or services. The Central Bank is also authorized to require&nbsp;<br>domestic companies to deposit and exchange foreign currency. As of November 2009 all&nbsp;<br>restrictions have been lifted on new investments, and in practice trade from Iceland is not&nbsp;<br>hindered substantially by the capital restrictions.<br>
  305. VAT in Iceland is generally quite high, with most goods and services falling in the 25.5%&nbsp;<br>VAT category. However, law 163/2010 introduced new exceptions to the VAT law (law 50/<br>1988) which makes data processing and information provision, as well as “electronically&nbsp;<br>provided services” exempt from taxed capital flows.<br>
  306. Further, this law allowed an exemption from VAT for the importation of servers and related&nbsp;<br>equipment (i.e., equipment which is necessary for the functioning of the servers and is&nbsp;<br>only of direct benefit to the owners of the servers) in cases where the owners have official&nbsp;<br>residence in other member states in the EEA, EFTA, or the Faroe Islands, and do not&nbsp;<br>have fixed operations in Iceland in accordance with Icelandic tax law. This exception puts&nbsp;<br>more specific requirements, for example that the owners of the servers pay VAT in their&nbsp;<br>home country, that the purpose of the operations be of such a nature that it would require&nbsp;<br>commercial registration if it were domestic, that the servers were imported specifically for&nbsp;<br>the purpose of operation in a data center which their owner is in business with, that the&nbsp;<br>servers and other equipment are used only by the owners, but not for other purposes within&nbsp;<br>the data center, and that the servers be used from outside of Iceland. This exception is due&nbsp;<br>for reconsideration in late 2013, but as it stands is exceptionally beneficial for cloud hosting&nbsp;<br>providers.<br>
  307. <b>Overview of Icelandic Information Regulation</b><br>
  308. 18<br>
  309. <hr>
  310. <A name=19></a>Icelandic law conforms broadly to the European&nbsp;<i>acquis&nbsp;</i>regarding a number of different&nbsp;<br>information regulations.<br>&nbsp;<br>Telecommunications are in general governed by law 81/2003 (telecommunications act),&nbsp;<br>which implements EU directive 999/5/EC, regulation 2887/2000/EC, the Telecoms Package&nbsp;<br>(directives 2002/19/EC, 2002/20/EC, 2002/21/EC and 2002/22/EC), and directives 2002/58/<br>EC and 2002/77/EC.<br>&nbsp;<br>Electronic commerce and other electronic services are generally governed by law 30/<br>2002, which implements the e-Commerce directive (2000/31/EC), thereby establishing&nbsp;<br>intermediary liability limitations which are crucial to the functioning of Internet service&nbsp;<br>providers, hosting providers and data centers. The only practical failing of the Icelandic&nbsp;<br>implementation of the e-commerce directive is that allowance is made for injunctions&nbsp;<br>which, for historical reasons, can be issued by a regional sheriff (<i>sýslumaður</i>) without court&nbsp;<br>supervision. This has not caused problems in the context of intermediary liability limitations,&nbsp;<br>but has been used to stifle media on one occasion, and could potentially be abused further.<br>
  311. Media is regulated under the media law, 38/2011, which implements Audiovisual&nbsp;<br>Media Services Directive (2007/65/EC). Broadcast media is also regulated by the&nbsp;<br>telecommunications act (81/2003).<br>&nbsp;<br>Personal and private data is protected under law 77/2000, which implements the Data&nbsp;<br>Protection Directive (95/46/EC). Electronic signatures are allowed as a valid form of&nbsp;<br>signature under law 28/2001, and to this end a national authentication card scheme has&nbsp;<br>been developed and is being distributed as a feature of banking cards.<br>&nbsp;<br>Freedom of access to government information is defined in law 50/1996. This law has been&nbsp;<br>under review, and a broad-reaching proposal for a new freedom of information law was&nbsp;<br>submitted to the Parliament during its 139th term (ending in October 2011), but did not&nbsp;<br>pass. A small subset of the changes proposed in that law by the relevant parliamentary&nbsp;<br>committee were adopted into a new version of the bill which was submitted to parliament&nbsp;<br>at the beginning of the 140th term. This new version did not include provisions proposed&nbsp;<br>by the review committee regarding public registration of government documents and public&nbsp;<br>advertisement of confidentiality terms, reasons and durations for secret documents.<br>&nbsp;<br>With regard to intellectual monopoly rights, patents are defined in law 17/1991, biopatents&nbsp;<br>in law 58/2000, descriptions of electronic components are protected under law 78/1993,&nbsp;<br>trademarks under law 45/1997, and in particular corporate logos are protected under law&nbsp;<br>155/2002. Finally, copyrights are defined in law 73/1972, which implements EU directives&nbsp;<br>89/552/EEC, &nbsp;2003/4/EC, 2001/29/EC, 2001/84/EC, 91/250/EEC, 92/100/EEC, 93/83/<br>EEC, 93/98/EEC, 2004/48/EC (IPRED) and 2006/123/EC. Law 53/2006 defines specific&nbsp;<br>permissions regarding the collection of evidence pertaining to violations of intellectual&nbsp;<br>monopoly rights.<br>&nbsp;<br>
  312. <b>Compatibility with European Union Directives</b><br>
  313. As previously stated, Iceland’s laws regarding information technology and media are largely&nbsp;<br>in accordance with European&nbsp;<i>acquis</i>. However, in the European Commission’s Opinion on&nbsp;<br>
  314. 19<br>
  315. <hr>
  316. <A name=20></a>Iceland's application for membership of the European Union (COM(2010) 62)8, a few minor&nbsp;<br>issues are laid out.<br>
  317. The most salient issue is that the EU Data Retention Directive (2006/24/EC) has not&nbsp;<br>been transposed. This is however a trivial issue——the telecommunications act contains&nbsp;<br>provisions for data retention which originate from early drafts of the data retention, and is in&nbsp;<br>all regards equivalent to the Data Retention Directive. Therefore, transposition is a formality.&nbsp;<br>Data retention will be discussed further in the later section on electronic surveillance.<br>
  318. Also according to the opinion, while “the legislative and administrative structure is similar to&nbsp;<br>most EU Member States” the appointment procedures for the national regulatory authority&nbsp;<br>(the post and telecoms administration,&nbsp;<i>póst- og fjarskiptastofnun</i>) have to be revisited to&nbsp;<br>ensure &nbsp;transparency, objectivity, and high standards regarding security of tenure.<br>
  319. It goes on to say that “in the field of information society services, the main directives have&nbsp;<br>been transposed into the Icelandic legal order, i.e. the Directives on electronic signatures, e-<br>commerce and conditional access.”&nbsp;<br>
  320. <b>Intermediary Liability Limitations</b><br>
  321. Law 30/2002 on e-commerce and electronic services implements the e-commerce directive&nbsp;<br>(2000/31/EC), which provides indemnity for &quot;mere conduits&quot;, such as telecommunications&nbsp;<br>networks and Internet hosting providers.<br>
  322. There are few and mostly well defined exceptions to this indemnity:&nbsp;<br>
  323. <br>
  324. an injunction from a sheriff or court order<br>
  325. <br>
  326. an notice-and-takedown procedure regarding copyright infringement<br>
  327. <br>
  328. knowledge of child pornography<br>
  329. &nbsp;<br>The exception for general court orders without further definition is worrying, due to the&nbsp;<br>remnants of an magistrate system mostly abolished in 1991. Prior to this, the district “sheriff”&nbsp;<br>(<i>sýslumaður</i>) also served as magistrate and had the ability to, amongst other things, enact&nbsp;<br>injunctions. When their magisterial rights were revoked with the 1991 law, they retained&nbsp;<br>their ability to enact injunctions. Although this has not caused problems in terms of Internet&nbsp;<br>hosting, a sheriff’s injunction was used in 2009 to prevent the state broadcaster, RÚV,&nbsp;<br>from airing a story pertaining to a leaked large loan book from the bank Kaupþing. As the&nbsp;<br>injunction was revoked when the injunction had failed, it was never taken to court, so its&nbsp;<br>veracity under the constitution was not tested.<br>&nbsp;<br>The exceptions should probably be improved by clarifying which exact circumstances can&nbsp;<br>trigger such exceptions, as well as restricting the injunction measures to actual courts.<br>
  330. <b>Surveillance</b><br>
  331. The Telecommunications Act (Law 81/2003) was amended in 2005 to include provisions&nbsp;<br>for data retention. It applies to telecommunication providers and its current implementation&nbsp;<br>mandates the retention of records of all connection data for 6 months. It states that&nbsp;<br>communications companies may only deliver information on telecommunications in criminal&nbsp;<br>
  332. 8&nbsp;<a href="http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/pdf/key_documents/2010/is_opinion_analytical-report.pdf">http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/pdf/key_documents/2010/is_opinion_analytical-report.pdf</a><br>
  333. 20<br>
  334. <hr>
  335. <A name=21></a>cases or on matters of public safety. It also states that such information may not be given to&nbsp;<br>others than police and public prosecution.<br>
  336. According to COM(2010) 62, an analytical report accompanying the communication from&nbsp;<br>the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council containing the Commission&nbsp;<br>Opinion on Iceland’s application for membership to the European Union, Iceland has&nbsp;<br>not currently implemented the Data Retention Directive. This directive is currently being&nbsp;<br>discussed (December 2011) in the Icelandic Parliament, however there are complications&nbsp;<br>owing to the fact that the Data Retention Directive, 2006/24/EC, came into effect one year&nbsp;<br>after the Icelandic Data Retention provisions, which have not since been overturned or&nbsp;<br>amended. However, the 2005 law which established data retention in Iceland was made&nbsp;<br>at the request of the Icelandic police chief (<i>Ríkislögreglustjóri</i>), making use of the current&nbsp;<br>discussions that were then ongoing in the European Commission about the issue. Therefore,&nbsp;<br>the implementation of data retention is structurally equivalent to the data retention directive,&nbsp;<br>although formally the EU directive has not been implemented.&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>During discussions in the Icelandic parliament about the (formal) implementation of&nbsp;<br>the data retention directive, some parliamentarians were surprised to find that such a&nbsp;<br>broad surveillance law already existed in the telecommunications act. There have been&nbsp;<br>discussions, both public and within the parliament, about the potential abolition of data&nbsp;<br>retention. &nbsp;However, this would impede the EU membership process and is therefore unlikely&nbsp;<br>to gain traction without any political support from within the EU.<br>&nbsp;<br>There is an ongoing discussion about granting police enhanced surveillance rights, in&nbsp;<br>the form of proactive investigative measures aimed at counteracting organized crime and&nbsp;<br>terrorism. Although these measures have not yet been implemented, there is currently a&nbsp;<br>resolution proposal being processed in the parliament. &nbsp;The interior minister, Ögmundur&nbsp;<br>Jónasson, has independently stated that he is preparing proposals for such a law. The&nbsp;<br>scope of such a law is unknown, but it is clear that proactive investigation measures would&nbsp;<br>necessarily have to include expanded rights for telecommunications surveillance.<br>&nbsp;<br>Wiretapping and other electronic surveillance is regulated under the Telecommunications &nbsp;<br>Act (81/2003) and further defined in Rules no. 837/2006 on Electronic Surveillance9.<br>&nbsp;<br>Both data retention and surveillance support add to operating costs and jurisdictional&nbsp;<br>uncertainty for cloud hosting providers, especially given the complexity of unsettled&nbsp;<br>international cross-jurisdictional issues.<br>&nbsp;<br>A new bill has been proposed in the Parliament, by the Interior Minister, for the&nbsp;<br>establishment of a CERT team. The proposal as it stands contains provisions for allowing&nbsp;<br>the CERT team to perform limited surveillance of a computer network, having been granted&nbsp;<br>permission to do so by the network operator. It also gives the CERT team the right to report&nbsp;<br>illegal activities on the network to the police. This combination could potentially be abused&nbsp;<br>as a gateway to blanket surveillance, as has been noted in a memo issued by the Icelandic&nbsp;<br>
  337. 9&nbsp;<a href="http://www.personuvernd.is/information-in-english/greinar//nr/610">http://www.personuvernd.is/information-in-english/greinar//nr/610</a><br>
  338. 21<br>
  339. <hr>
  340. <A name=22></a>Digital Freedoms Society10, but with greater restrictions (such as a ban on deep packet&nbsp;<br>inspection and identification of individual users or network analysis that could compromise a&nbsp;<br>user’s identity), it could serve to improve network security.<br>
  341. <b>Censorship</b><br>
  342. No state censorship is currently practiced in Iceland.&nbsp;<br>
  343. Corporate censorship has been employed by telecoms providers in a few cases, at request&nbsp;<br>of police and child protection authorities. Most notable was the anonymous forum site&nbsp;<br><i>Ringulreið</i>, which was accused of being a center for cyber-bullying. After the major telecoms&nbsp;<br>providers, Síminn and Vodafone, voluntarily censored access to the site from its users, the&nbsp;<br>site was shut down by its operators.&nbsp;<br>
  344. Some ISPs, most notably Síminn, the largest ISP in Iceland (formerly the state telecoms&nbsp;<br>company) offer parental filtering services to their customers on an opt-in basis. Such&nbsp;<br>blocking software is largely controlled by end-users, although it is somewhat unclear by&nbsp;<br>which criteria websites are added to these filter lists. However, no anti-competitive, political&nbsp;<br>or religious censorship has been noticed in these systems.<br>
  345. Over the last year, it can be argued that abuse of libel law has been on the rise. Journalists&nbsp;<br>and commentators have been increasingly found guilty of libel for comments made on online&nbsp;<br>media. In particular, one journalist has been found guilty for directly quoting an interviewee,&nbsp;<br>whose statement was considered to be libelous by the court. In another case, an elderly&nbsp;<br>woman was found guilty of libel for a Facebook comment wherein she made a value&nbsp;<br>judgement on the characters of the claimants. Of course, in each of these cases there are&nbsp;<br>competing interests and some uncertainty left to the courts, but many have commented on&nbsp;<br>the potential chilling effects associated with such lawsuits and have called for reform.<br>
  346. <b>Data Protection</b><br>
  347. Data protection is regulated under law 77/2000, which implements EU Directive 95/46/EC&nbsp;<br>(Data Protection Directive) and parts of EU Directive 97/7/EC (Equal Treatment in Social&nbsp;<br>Security Directive). The day-to-day management of compliance is managed by the Data&nbsp;<br>Protection Authority.<br>
  348. Various rules and regulations apply with regards to data protection that might have&nbsp;<br>relevance to data centers and information hosting, specifically:<br>
  349. <br>
  350. <a href="http://www.personuvernd.is/information-in-english/greinar//nr/610">Rules&nbsp;no. 837/2006&nbsp;on&nbsp;Electronic&nbsp;Surveillance.</a><br>
  351. <br>
  352. <a href="http://www.personuvernd.is/information-in-english/greinar//nr/441">Rules&nbsp;no. 698/2004&nbsp;on&nbsp;The&nbsp;Obligation&nbsp;to&nbsp;Notify&nbsp;and&nbsp;Processing&nbsp;which&nbsp;requires&nbsp;a&nbsp;<br>Permit.</a><br>
  353. <br>
  354. <a href="http://www.personuvernd.is/information-in-english/greinar//nr/442">Rules&nbsp;no. 299/2001&nbsp;on&nbsp;security&nbsp;of&nbsp;personal&nbsp;data</a><br>
  355. <br>
  356. <a href="http://eng.domsmalaraduneyti.is/laws-and-regulations/nr/1042">Regulation&nbsp;no. 322/2001&nbsp;on&nbsp;Management&nbsp;of&nbsp;Personal&nbsp;Information&nbsp;by&nbsp;the&nbsp;Police</a><br>
  357. 10&nbsp;Full disclosure: one of the authors of this report, Smári McCarthy, co-signed the memo&nbsp;<br>in question and is a board member of the Icelandic Digital Freedoms Society at the time of&nbsp;<br>writing.<br>
  358. 22<br>
  359. <hr>
  360. <A name=23></a><IMG src="Greens-IslandsofResilience-23.png"><br>
  361. <b>Human Resources</b><br>
  362. Iceland is a highly educated country. Out of a workforce of 181,000 people, 33.3% have&nbsp;<br>primary education, 38.2% have vocational education, and 28.1% have university education.<br>
  363. After the financial crisis started in 2008, unemployment rose from 1.01% in 2007 to 8.13%&nbsp;<br>in 2010. Recent reports suggest that the unemployment rate is going down, but that has not&nbsp;<br>been confirmed by publicly available statistics.<br>
  364. A 2006 OECD report showed that the number of scientific and engineering publications&nbsp;<br>in internationally recognised journals had increased at an average annual growth rate of&nbsp;<br>5.7% since 1998 and that between 1991 and 2001, the number of publications per million&nbsp;<br>population increased by 50%, from 403 to 610, compared to averages of 416 and 556 in&nbsp;<br>those same years in the EU15. At that time, Iceland ranked eighth in the number of&nbsp;<br>citations per paper (worldwide). The financial crisis caused some reductions in innovation&nbsp;<br>and research &amp; development funding, but this primarily had the effect of shifting researchers&nbsp;<br>further into private sector research operations and startup companies. On the other hand,&nbsp;<br>the Icelandic Innovation Center has started a number of seed labs where startup companies&nbsp;<br>and small proprietors can rent inexpensive office space.<br>&nbsp;<br>
  365. Bala Kamallakharan has noted11&nbsp;that 2011 was a record year for insolvencies in Iceland,&nbsp;<br>while the number of new company registrations has dropped significantly. This could&nbsp;<br>perhaps be attributed to unavailability of capital available to startups, or perhaps deflation&nbsp;<br>of the last decade’s bubble. Without suitable employment for its highly skilled labor force to&nbsp;<br>absorb, Icelanders will either resort to leaving for better opportunities abroad or remain idle&nbsp;<br>domestically letting their considerable talent go to waste. &nbsp;<br>
  366. 11&nbsp;<a href="http://www.startupiceland.com/2012/01/2011-has-been-record-year-in-iceland.html">http://www.startupiceland.com/2012/01/2011-has-been-record-year-in-iceland.html</a><br>
  367. 23<br>
  368. <hr>
  369. <A name=24></a>&nbsp;<br>Either way, the combination of experienced researchers, high unemployment rate, low rate&nbsp;<br>of startup and high insolvency rate suggests that unless Iceland continues to experience an&nbsp;<br>increase in “brain drain”, where well educated people seek employment outside the country,&nbsp;<br>a significant underemployed or unemployed workforce will exist in Iceland.<br>&nbsp;<br>
  370. <b>Icelandic Modern Media Initiative<br></b>On&nbsp;July&nbsp;16th&nbsp;2010,&nbsp;the&nbsp;Icelandic&nbsp;Parliament,&nbsp;Alþingi,&nbsp;unanimously&nbsp;adopted&nbsp;a&nbsp;parliamentary&nbsp;<br>resolution&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;develop&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;Iceland&nbsp;&nbsp;advanced&nbsp;&nbsp;legislation&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;protection&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;rights&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;<br>information&nbsp;and&nbsp;free&nbsp;speech.&nbsp;Since&nbsp;then,&nbsp;the&nbsp;<i>Icelandic&nbsp;Modern&nbsp;Media&nbsp;Initiative</i>,&nbsp;or&nbsp;IMMI,&nbsp;as&nbsp;it&nbsp;<br>was&nbsp;called,&nbsp;has&nbsp;been&nbsp;in&nbsp;development,&nbsp;both&nbsp;inside&nbsp;the&nbsp;government&nbsp;ministries&nbsp;and&nbsp;institutions,&nbsp;<br>and&nbsp;within&nbsp;Icelandic&nbsp;civil&nbsp;society.&nbsp;The&nbsp;originators&nbsp;of&nbsp;the&nbsp;IMMI&nbsp;initiative&nbsp;founded,&nbsp;in&nbsp;2011,&nbsp;the&nbsp;<br>International&nbsp;&nbsp;Modern&nbsp;&nbsp;Media&nbsp;&nbsp;Institute,&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;synacronymous&nbsp;&nbsp;civil&nbsp;&nbsp;society&nbsp;&nbsp;organization&nbsp;&nbsp;working&nbsp;<br>towards&nbsp;ensuring&nbsp;that&nbsp;the&nbsp;goals&nbsp;and&nbsp;spirit&nbsp;of&nbsp;IMMI&nbsp;are&nbsp;met&nbsp;in&nbsp;Iceland,&nbsp;and&nbsp;sharing&nbsp;the&nbsp;ideas&nbsp;<br>and developments with the world at large.<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>
  371. <b>Subject area</b><br>
  372. <b>Status</b><br>
  373. <b>Notes</b><br>
  374. <b>Source Protection</b><br>
  375. <b>Complete</b><br>
  376. <b>Media law + constitution</b><br>
  377. <b>Freedom of Information Act</b><br>
  378. <b>Pending&nbsp;</b><br>
  379. <b>New law replacing older law +&nbsp;</b><br>
  380. <b>ratification</b><br>
  381. <b>constitution</b><br>
  382. <b>Communications Protection</b><br>
  383. <b>Pending&nbsp;</b><br>
  384. <b>Changes to law + constitution</b><br>
  385. <b>ratification</b><br>
  386. <b>Intermediary Liability&nbsp;</b><br>
  387. <b>In development</b><br>
  388. <b>Changes to law + constitution</b><br>
  389. <b>Limitations</b><br>
  390. <b>Publishing Liability Limitations</b><br>
  391. <b>In development</b><br>
  392. <b>Changes to law</b><br>
  393. <b>Whistleblower Protection</b><br>
  394. <b>In development</b><br>
  395. <b>Changes to law + constitution</b><br>
  396. <b>Prior Restraint Limitations</b><br>
  397. <b>Pending&nbsp;</b><br>
  398. <b>Constitution + regulatory changes</b><br>
  399. <b>ratification +<br>In Development</b><br>
  400. <b>Judicial Process Protections</b><br>
  401. <b>On hiatus</b><br>
  402. &nbsp;<br>
  403. <b>Network Neutrality</b><br>
  404. <b>Pending&nbsp;</b><br>
  405. <b>Constitution</b><br>
  406. <b>ratification</b><br>
  407. <b>Virtual Limited Liability&nbsp;</b><br>
  408. <b>On hiatus</b><br>
  409. &nbsp;<br>
  410. <b>Companies</b><br>
  411. <b>Freedom of Expression Prize</b><br>
  412. <b>On hiatus</b><br>
  413. &nbsp;<br>
  414. 24<br>
  415. <hr>
  416. <A name=25></a><b>Source Protection<br></b>The&nbsp;&nbsp;protection&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;sources&nbsp;&nbsp;refers&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;measures&nbsp;&nbsp;which&nbsp;&nbsp;forbid&nbsp;&nbsp;journalists&nbsp;&nbsp;from&nbsp;&nbsp;exposing&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;<br>identity&nbsp;of&nbsp;their&nbsp;sources&nbsp;without&nbsp;the&nbsp;source’s&nbsp;permission.&nbsp;The&nbsp;purpose&nbsp;of&nbsp;such&nbsp;measures&nbsp;is&nbsp;<br>to&nbsp;&nbsp;increase&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;willingness&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;security&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;sources&nbsp;&nbsp;who&nbsp;&nbsp;consider&nbsp;&nbsp;themselves&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;be&nbsp;&nbsp;at&nbsp;&nbsp;risk,&nbsp;<br>when&nbsp;&nbsp;providing&nbsp;&nbsp;information&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;criminal&nbsp;&nbsp;wrongdoing,&nbsp;&nbsp;corruption,&nbsp;&nbsp;negligence&nbsp;&nbsp;or&nbsp;&nbsp;other&nbsp;&nbsp;socially&nbsp;<br>unacceptable behavior to journalists.<br>&nbsp;<br>Journalistic&nbsp;&nbsp;source&nbsp;&nbsp;protection&nbsp;&nbsp;was&nbsp;&nbsp;implemented&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;Icelandic&nbsp;&nbsp;law&nbsp;&nbsp;38/2011&nbsp;&nbsp;(the&nbsp;&nbsp;media&nbsp;&nbsp;act).&nbsp;<br>The source protection clause is defined in article 25., which states:<br>&nbsp;<br>
  417. Employees&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;media&nbsp;&nbsp;organizations&nbsp;&nbsp;which&nbsp;&nbsp;have&nbsp;&nbsp;been&nbsp;&nbsp;licensed&nbsp;&nbsp;or&nbsp;&nbsp;registered&nbsp;&nbsp;with&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;media&nbsp;&nbsp;committee&nbsp;<br>are&nbsp;&nbsp;forbidden&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;expose&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;identity&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;source&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;articles,&nbsp;&nbsp;books,&nbsp;&nbsp;retellings,&nbsp;&nbsp;announcements&nbsp;&nbsp;or&nbsp;&nbsp;other&nbsp;<br>material,&nbsp;regardless&nbsp;of&nbsp;whether&nbsp;it&nbsp;has&nbsp;been&nbsp;published,&nbsp;if&nbsp;the&nbsp;source&nbsp;or&nbsp;the&nbsp;author&nbsp;requested&nbsp;anonymity.&nbsp;<br>Employees&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;media&nbsp;&nbsp;organization&nbsp;&nbsp;are&nbsp;&nbsp;also&nbsp;&nbsp;forbidden&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;release&nbsp;&nbsp;data&nbsp;&nbsp;which&nbsp;&nbsp;contain&nbsp;&nbsp;information&nbsp;<br>regarding the source or author in such circumstances.<br>The&nbsp;rule&nbsp;in&nbsp;the&nbsp;1st&nbsp;paragraph&nbsp;also&nbsp;applies&nbsp;to&nbsp;those&nbsp;who,&nbsp;due&nbsp;to&nbsp;connections&nbsp;to&nbsp;the&nbsp;media&nbsp;organization&nbsp;<br>or&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;production&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;material&nbsp;&nbsp;has&nbsp;&nbsp;gained&nbsp;&nbsp;knowledge&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;identity&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;source&nbsp;&nbsp;or&nbsp;&nbsp;author,&nbsp;&nbsp;or&nbsp;&nbsp;has&nbsp;<br>attained data to that effect.<br>Source&nbsp;protection&nbsp;under&nbsp;paragraphs&nbsp;1&nbsp;and&nbsp;2&nbsp;can&nbsp;only&nbsp;be&nbsp;relieved&nbsp;with&nbsp;the&nbsp;permission&nbsp;of&nbsp;the&nbsp;source&nbsp;or&nbsp;<br>the author, or on the basis of article 119 of the law on the prosecution of criminal cases, no. 88/2008.12<br>
  418. &nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>In&nbsp;&nbsp;addition&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;stipulation&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;new&nbsp;&nbsp;media&nbsp;&nbsp;law,&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;proposed&nbsp;&nbsp;constitution&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;Iceland&nbsp;<br>contains, in article 16, the statement:<br>&nbsp;<br>
  419. The&nbsp;protection&nbsp;of&nbsp;journalists,&nbsp;their&nbsp;sources&nbsp;of&nbsp;information&nbsp;and&nbsp;whistle-blowers&nbsp;shall&nbsp;be&nbsp;ensured&nbsp;by&nbsp;law.&nbsp;<br>It&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;not&nbsp;&nbsp;permitted&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;breach&nbsp;&nbsp;confidentiality&nbsp;&nbsp;without&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;consent&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;person&nbsp;&nbsp;providing&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;information&nbsp;<br>except in the process of criminal proceedings and pursuant to a court order.<br>
  420. &nbsp;<br>This&nbsp;provides&nbsp;equivalent&nbsp;protection&nbsp;under&nbsp;the&nbsp;constitution,&nbsp;if&nbsp;ratified,&nbsp;ensuring&nbsp;that&nbsp;the&nbsp;source&nbsp;<br>protection clause would not be removed from law without referendum.<br>&nbsp;<br><b>Status: Complete.<br>&nbsp;</b><br>
  421. <b>Freedom of Information Act<br></b>Access to government documents and records is mandated in Iceland by law 50/1996, (the&nbsp;<br>information act). The current Icelandic FOI law does not conform to CoE convention, and it&nbsp;<br>does not match the standards set in the Aarhus convention for environmental information.13<br>&nbsp;<br>An updated information act was proposed at Alþingi in 2011, however, due to end of term&nbsp;<br>in late September 2011, the bill did not complete the third reading in parliament and was&nbsp;<br>therefore dropped. It has since been reintroduced with many of the changes merged in and&nbsp;<br>multiple improvements made, however, the newly proposed version does not meet the high&nbsp;<br>standard the bill had previously achieved.<br>&nbsp;<br>IMMI submitted an 8 page report and a 84 page change comparison of the two bills to&nbsp;<br>the constitutional and regulatory committee of Alþingi in February 2012#, criticizing the&nbsp;<br>government’s backpedaling against the changes that had previously been proposed in&nbsp;<br>
  422. 12&nbsp;The exception in article 119 of law 88/2008 applies to the case where criminal proceedings for serious offences cannot be&nbsp;<br>resolved without the identity of the source or author being exposed. In such cases, it has been recommended although it is not&nbsp;<br>stipulated in statutes, that the identity first be exposed to the judge&nbsp;<i>in camera</i>, so that the judge can appropriately measure the&nbsp;<br>potential risk to the source against the benefit of the source’s exposure. This is generally considered an acceptable limitation to&nbsp;<br>the otherwise absolute source protection clause.<br>13&nbsp;The Aarhus convention was ratified by law 131/2011.<br>
  423. 25<br>
  424. <hr>
  425. <A name=26></a>parliamentary committee. At the moment, the committee work is proceeding.<br>&nbsp;<br>Cautious optimism suggests that the committee will once again restore the bill to its former&nbsp;<br>state and that it will be accepted. If this is the case, the norm for access to information&nbsp;<br>in Iceland will be altered from being a ‘publish on request’ regime to ‘publish by default’&nbsp;<br>regime.14&nbsp;Then, any documents which are not published can be at least listed along with&nbsp;<br>information about why it has been held back and FOI requests can be made for those&nbsp;<br>documents specifically. This change is the most important alteration of many.<br>&nbsp;<br>In the meantime, the new proposed constitution of Iceland has guaranteed a substantial&nbsp;<br>improvement of information rights.15<br>&nbsp;<br><b>Status: Pending ratification</b><br>
  426. <b>Network Neutrality<br></b>Network&nbsp;&nbsp;neutrality&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;very&nbsp;&nbsp;broad&nbsp;&nbsp;concept,&nbsp;&nbsp;but&nbsp;&nbsp;generally&nbsp;&nbsp;refers&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;idea&nbsp;&nbsp;that&nbsp;&nbsp;each&nbsp;&nbsp;node&nbsp;<br>operating&nbsp;&nbsp;on&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;network&nbsp;&nbsp;should&nbsp;&nbsp;be&nbsp;&nbsp;considered&nbsp;&nbsp;equal&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;all&nbsp;&nbsp;others&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;terms&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;access.&nbsp;<br>Numerous&nbsp;governments&nbsp;and&nbsp;corporations&nbsp;have&nbsp;instantiated&nbsp;various&nbsp;forms&nbsp;of&nbsp;censorship&nbsp;and&nbsp;<br>containerization#.&nbsp;&nbsp;Due&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;technical&nbsp;&nbsp;limitations&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;IPv4&nbsp;&nbsp;space,&nbsp;&nbsp;almost&nbsp;&nbsp;every&nbsp;&nbsp;end-user&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;<br>the&nbsp;&nbsp;Internet&nbsp;&nbsp;can&nbsp;&nbsp;be&nbsp;&nbsp;considered&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;an&nbsp;&nbsp;aberration&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;end-to-end&nbsp;&nbsp;principle&nbsp;&nbsp;often&nbsp;&nbsp;from&nbsp;&nbsp;NAT&nbsp;<br>(Network&nbsp;Address&nbsp;Translation),&nbsp;this&nbsp;makes&nbsp;their&nbsp;nodes&nbsp;second&nbsp;class&nbsp;citizens&nbsp;of&nbsp;the&nbsp;Internet.&nbsp;<br>There is a lot to be done in terms of network neutrality.<br>&nbsp;<br>This&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;going&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;be&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;topic&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;many&nbsp;&nbsp;years,&nbsp;&nbsp;but&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;now&nbsp;&nbsp;IMMI&nbsp;&nbsp;has&nbsp;&nbsp;decided&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;take&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;first&nbsp;<br>steps.&nbsp;&nbsp;Article&nbsp;&nbsp;14&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;proposed&nbsp;&nbsp;constitution&nbsp;&nbsp;creates&nbsp;&nbsp;an&nbsp;&nbsp;obligation&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;government&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;<br>protect&nbsp;the&nbsp;Internet,&nbsp;with&nbsp;the&nbsp;same&nbsp;constraints&nbsp;as&nbsp;those&nbsp;on&nbsp;free&nbsp;speech&nbsp;in&nbsp;general.&nbsp;Although&nbsp;<br>those&nbsp;&nbsp;limitations&nbsp;&nbsp;should&nbsp;&nbsp;definitely&nbsp;&nbsp;be&nbsp;&nbsp;questioned,&nbsp;&nbsp;this&nbsp;&nbsp;must&nbsp;&nbsp;be&nbsp;&nbsp;considered&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;substantial&nbsp;<br>victory,&nbsp;&nbsp;as&nbsp;&nbsp;no&nbsp;&nbsp;country&nbsp;&nbsp;currently&nbsp;&nbsp;even&nbsp;&nbsp;mentions&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;Internet&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;its&nbsp;&nbsp;constitution,&nbsp;&nbsp;let&nbsp;&nbsp;alone&nbsp;<br>defends it:<br>&nbsp;<br>
  427. The&nbsp;government&nbsp;shall&nbsp;guarantee&nbsp;conditions&nbsp;that&nbsp;are&nbsp;conducive&nbsp;to&nbsp;open&nbsp;and&nbsp;informed&nbsp;public&nbsp;&nbsp;discussion.&nbsp;<br>Access&nbsp;to&nbsp;the&nbsp;Internet&nbsp;and&nbsp;information&nbsp;technology&nbsp;shall&nbsp;not&nbsp;be&nbsp;curtailed&nbsp;except&nbsp;by&nbsp;a&nbsp;decision&nbsp;of&nbsp;a&nbsp;court&nbsp;<br>of law and on the same substantive conditions that apply to restrictions on the freedom of expression.<br>
  428. &nbsp;<br><b>Status: Pending Ratification</b><br>
  429. <b>Communications Protection and Communications Data Retention<br></b>In&nbsp;the&nbsp;interests&nbsp;of&nbsp;protecting&nbsp;privacy&nbsp;and&nbsp;source&nbsp;confidentiality,&nbsp;protection&nbsp;of&nbsp;communications&nbsp;<br>is a vital ingredient to any coherent information regulation strategy.<br>&nbsp;<br>The&nbsp;protection&nbsp;of&nbsp;communications&nbsp;is&nbsp;a&nbsp;wide&nbsp;project&nbsp;that&nbsp;can&nbsp;be&nbsp;roughly&nbsp;split&nbsp;into&nbsp;two&nbsp;tasks.&nbsp;<br>On&nbsp;the&nbsp;one&nbsp;hand,&nbsp;removing&nbsp;existing&nbsp;threats&nbsp;to&nbsp;communications&nbsp;protection&nbsp;from&nbsp;law,&nbsp;and&nbsp;on&nbsp;<br>the other hand establishing new protections for communications.<br>&nbsp;<br>In&nbsp;&nbsp;January&nbsp;&nbsp;2012,&nbsp;&nbsp;as&nbsp;&nbsp;Alþingi&nbsp;&nbsp;was&nbsp;&nbsp;debating&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;adoption&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;European&nbsp;&nbsp;Union’s&nbsp;&nbsp;Data&nbsp;<br>Retention&nbsp;Directive,&nbsp;IMMI&nbsp;produced&nbsp;a&nbsp;report&nbsp;outlining&nbsp;the&nbsp;dangers&nbsp;of&nbsp;blanket&nbsp;data&nbsp;retention.&nbsp;<br>In&nbsp;&nbsp;committee,&nbsp;&nbsp;IMMI’s&nbsp;&nbsp;views&nbsp;&nbsp;got&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;support&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;Privacy&nbsp;&nbsp;Directorate,&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;this&nbsp;&nbsp;led&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;<br>parliamentary&nbsp;&nbsp;committee&nbsp;&nbsp;requesting&nbsp;&nbsp;that&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;directive&nbsp;&nbsp;be&nbsp;&nbsp;postponed&nbsp;&nbsp;indefinitely&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;that&nbsp;<br>the&nbsp;foreign&nbsp;minister&nbsp;inform&nbsp;the&nbsp;European&nbsp;Union&nbsp;that&nbsp;Iceland&nbsp;would&nbsp;not&nbsp;be&nbsp;implementing&nbsp;the&nbsp;<br>
  430. 14&nbsp;meaning that instead of FOI requests having to be made for each document individually in order to obtain a private copy for&nbsp;<br>dissemination, which is a slow and complicated process, the rule will become that government publishes all documents publicly&nbsp;<br>by default, for instance in an online database.<br>15<a href="http://www.stjornlagarad.is/english/">&nbsp;http://www.stjornlagarad.is/english/&nbsp;Articile 15 (English PDF available from the website)</a><br>
  431. 26<br>
  432. <hr>
  433. <A name=27></a>directive.<br>&nbsp;<br>This&nbsp;&nbsp;however&nbsp;&nbsp;was&nbsp;&nbsp;not&nbsp;&nbsp;enough,&nbsp;&nbsp;as&nbsp;&nbsp;Iceland&nbsp;&nbsp;has&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;law&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;data&nbsp;&nbsp;retention&nbsp;&nbsp;clause&nbsp;&nbsp;(paragraph&nbsp;<br>3,&nbsp;&nbsp;article&nbsp;&nbsp;42,&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;telecommunications&nbsp;&nbsp;act,&nbsp;&nbsp;81/2003,&nbsp;&nbsp;amended&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;2005),&nbsp;&nbsp;which&nbsp;&nbsp;predates&nbsp;<br>the&nbsp;&nbsp;EU’s&nbsp;&nbsp;Data&nbsp;&nbsp;Retention&nbsp;&nbsp;Directive&nbsp;&nbsp;by&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;year.&nbsp;&nbsp;IMMI&nbsp;&nbsp;has&nbsp;&nbsp;argued&nbsp;&nbsp;against&nbsp;&nbsp;this&nbsp;&nbsp;clause,&nbsp;&nbsp;both&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;<br>newspapers and in opinions to parliament, and has drafted a bill for the removal of the act.<br>&nbsp;<br>More&nbsp;&nbsp;recently,&nbsp;&nbsp;IMMI&nbsp;&nbsp;was&nbsp;&nbsp;asked&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;submit&nbsp;&nbsp;proposals&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;improvement&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;certain&nbsp;&nbsp;articles&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;<br>the&nbsp;&nbsp;telecommunications&nbsp;&nbsp;act&nbsp;&nbsp;being&nbsp;&nbsp;added&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;introduce&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;Computer&nbsp;&nbsp;Emergency&nbsp;&nbsp;Response&nbsp;<br>Team&nbsp;&nbsp;(CERT)&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;Icelandic&nbsp;&nbsp;law,&nbsp;&nbsp;so&nbsp;&nbsp;as&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;better&nbsp;&nbsp;balance&nbsp;&nbsp;against&nbsp;&nbsp;privacy&nbsp;&nbsp;concerns.&nbsp;&nbsp;In&nbsp;&nbsp;these&nbsp;<br>proposals, IMMI included the following proposal:<br>&nbsp;<br>
  434. Paragraph 3 of article 42, requiring the retention of telecommunication data, is dropped.<br>
  435. Appended to article 42 is a new paragraph:<br>Parties&nbsp;&nbsp;other&nbsp;&nbsp;than&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;sender&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;receiver&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;electronic&nbsp;&nbsp;packet-switched&nbsp;&nbsp;communications&nbsp;&nbsp;are&nbsp;<br>forbidden&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;inspect&nbsp;&nbsp;or&nbsp;&nbsp;electronically&nbsp;&nbsp;process&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;payload&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;packets.&nbsp;&nbsp;Headers&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;metadata&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;<br>packet-switched&nbsp;communications&nbsp;shall&nbsp;only&nbsp;be&nbsp;stored&nbsp;for&nbsp;the&nbsp;period&nbsp;needed&nbsp;to&nbsp;resolve&nbsp;the&nbsp;routing&nbsp;of&nbsp;the&nbsp;<br>communications and security measures as per article 47. a.<br>&nbsp;<br>
  436. This&nbsp;&nbsp;would&nbsp;&nbsp;effectively&nbsp;&nbsp;remove&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;data&nbsp;&nbsp;retention&nbsp;&nbsp;provisions&nbsp;&nbsp;from&nbsp;&nbsp;law,&nbsp;&nbsp;if&nbsp;&nbsp;adopted,&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;<br>simultaneously&nbsp;&nbsp;improve&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;communications&nbsp;&nbsp;protection&nbsp;&nbsp;by&nbsp;&nbsp;making&nbsp;&nbsp;it&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;criminal&nbsp;&nbsp;offense&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;<br>intercept&nbsp;and&nbsp;inspect&nbsp;communications,&nbsp;by&nbsp;methods&nbsp;such&nbsp;as&nbsp;Deep&nbsp;Packet&nbsp;Inspection.&nbsp;It&nbsp;is&nbsp;our&nbsp;<br>hope that this provision be adopted in law.<br>&nbsp;<br>In&nbsp;&nbsp;addition&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;this&nbsp;&nbsp;development,&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;proposed&nbsp;&nbsp;constitution&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;Iceland&nbsp;&nbsp;contains&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;clause&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;<br>article&nbsp;&nbsp;11&nbsp;&nbsp;expressly&nbsp;&nbsp;forbidding&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;search&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;communications,&nbsp;&nbsp;except&nbsp;&nbsp;with&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;valid&nbsp;&nbsp;court&nbsp;<br>order.16<br>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br><b>Status: Pending ratification &amp; in further development</b><br>
  437. <b>Intermediary Liability Limitations<br></b>The&nbsp;&nbsp;original&nbsp;&nbsp;idea&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;limited&nbsp;&nbsp;liability&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;telecommunications&nbsp;&nbsp;intermediaries&nbsp;&nbsp;comes&nbsp;&nbsp;from&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;<br>development&nbsp;of&nbsp;the&nbsp;Communications&nbsp;Decency&nbsp;Act&nbsp;in&nbsp;the&nbsp;United&nbsp;States&nbsp;around&nbsp;1996.&nbsp;Since&nbsp;<br>then,&nbsp;the&nbsp;European&nbsp;Union&nbsp;has&nbsp;adopted&nbsp;the&nbsp;e-Commerce&nbsp;Directive,&nbsp;which&nbsp;implements&nbsp;similar&nbsp;<br>limitations.&nbsp;&nbsp;The&nbsp;&nbsp;directive&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;implemented&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;Iceland&nbsp;&nbsp;as&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;electronic&nbsp;&nbsp;commerce&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;other&nbsp;<br>electronic services act (30/2002), and has equivalent measures.<br>&nbsp;<br>Immediately&nbsp;&nbsp;on&nbsp;&nbsp;exploring&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;intermediary&nbsp;&nbsp;liability&nbsp;&nbsp;limitations&nbsp;&nbsp;(ILLs)&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;Icelandic&nbsp;&nbsp;law,&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;<br>striking&nbsp;flaw&nbsp;presents&nbsp;itself&nbsp;in&nbsp;the&nbsp;form&nbsp;of&nbsp;“general&nbsp;court&nbsp;orders”.&nbsp;This&nbsp;phrasing&nbsp;is&nbsp;very&nbsp;vague&nbsp;<br>and&nbsp;&nbsp;more&nbsp;&nbsp;importantly&nbsp;&nbsp;lends&nbsp;&nbsp;itself&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;being&nbsp;&nbsp;understood&nbsp;&nbsp;that&nbsp;&nbsp;district&nbsp;&nbsp;sheriffs,&nbsp;&nbsp;who&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;Iceland&nbsp;<br>have&nbsp;&nbsp;injunctive&nbsp;&nbsp;powers,&nbsp;&nbsp;can&nbsp;&nbsp;issue&nbsp;&nbsp;takedown&nbsp;&nbsp;orders.&nbsp;&nbsp;IMMI&nbsp;&nbsp;has&nbsp;&nbsp;an&nbsp;&nbsp;interest&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;tightening&nbsp;&nbsp;this&nbsp;<br>language, and intends to make proposals to do so in the coming months.<br>&nbsp;<br>More importantly though, ILLs have been under attack globally in recent years. A great many&nbsp;<br>changes&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;strategies&nbsp;&nbsp;relating&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;intellectual&nbsp;&nbsp;monopoly&nbsp;&nbsp;enforcement,&nbsp;&nbsp;protection&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;official&nbsp;<br>secrets&nbsp;and&nbsp;political&nbsp;attempts&nbsp;at&nbsp;opening&nbsp;doors&nbsp;for&nbsp;corruption&nbsp;have&nbsp;revolved&nbsp;around&nbsp;eroding&nbsp;<br>ILLs.&nbsp;&nbsp;In&nbsp;&nbsp;order&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;counteract&nbsp;&nbsp;this&nbsp;&nbsp;trend,&nbsp;&nbsp;IMMI&nbsp;&nbsp;has&nbsp;&nbsp;partnered&nbsp;&nbsp;with&nbsp;&nbsp;several&nbsp;&nbsp;organizations&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;<br>explore&nbsp;what&nbsp;can&nbsp;be&nbsp;done&nbsp;to&nbsp;define&nbsp;a&nbsp;legal&nbsp;and&nbsp;technical&nbsp;defense&nbsp;of&nbsp;both&nbsp;Internet&nbsp;endpoints&nbsp;<br>and&nbsp;&nbsp;intermediaries&nbsp;&nbsp;that&nbsp;&nbsp;can&nbsp;&nbsp;better&nbsp;&nbsp;withstand&nbsp;&nbsp;political&nbsp;&nbsp;attempts&nbsp;&nbsp;at&nbsp;&nbsp;erosion.&nbsp;&nbsp;This&nbsp;&nbsp;work&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;<br>early stages, but some results are scheduled for July 2012.<br>&nbsp;<br><b>Status: In development</b><br>
  438. 16&nbsp;<a href="http://www.stjornlagarad.is/english/">http://www.stjornlagarad.is/english/&nbsp;Articile 11</a><br>
  439. 27<br>
  440. <hr>
  441. <A name=28></a><b>Libel Tourism Protection<br></b>Libel tourism is the act of a company or individual choosing to pursue lawsuits against&nbsp;<br>individuals or companies in a country with a low threshold for libel lawsuits. Legal extortion&nbsp;<br>schemes have been perpetuated with companies being tried in countries such as England&nbsp;<br>and Wales even if the defendant resides elsewhere in the world. This is a form of forum&nbsp;<br>shopping. Implementing laws that prevent or diminish the effects of libel tourism in Iceland&nbsp;<br>will protect Icelandic citizens and residents from this kind of forum shopping. It’s fairly&nbsp;<br>important that people can predict with some certainty where, if anywhere, they will be&nbsp;<br>taken to court. This also applies to companies, who base a lot of their operational security&nbsp;<br>on knowing the legal environment. In this way, ending libel tourism will encourage foreign&nbsp;<br>investment and provide financial security for companies operating here already.<br>&nbsp;<br>For now, Iceland has a mechanism. As a signatory of the Lugano treaty, Icelandic courts&nbsp;<br>can decide not to uphold foreign court verdicts which go against the rule of law in Iceland.&nbsp;<br>This means that a libel verdict from a foreign country can be challenged in an Icelandic court&nbsp;<br>on the basis of article 34 of the Lugano treaty if it comes from a country with a substantially&nbsp;<br>different burden of proof for libel than Iceland does. This has not been tested, but is currently&nbsp;<br>our best bet.<br>&nbsp;<br>In the meantime, British libel reform efforts are going well, and coupled with a well written&nbsp;<br>libel law in Iceland, may be sufficient to put an end to libel tourism - at least in Iceland. When&nbsp;<br>that is finished, the bigger issue of International Forum Shopping remains.<br>&nbsp;<br><b>Status: Complete / Untested solution</b><br>
  442. <b>Libel Reform and Publishing Liability Limitations<br></b>The&nbsp;media&nbsp;law&nbsp;from&nbsp;2011&nbsp;introduced&nbsp;new&nbsp;rules&nbsp;regarding&nbsp;media&nbsp;liability.&nbsp;However,&nbsp;since&nbsp;its&nbsp;<br>adoption,&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;number&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;court&nbsp;&nbsp;cases&nbsp;&nbsp;have&nbsp;&nbsp;been&nbsp;&nbsp;heard&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;Reykjavík&nbsp;&nbsp;which&nbsp;&nbsp;cast&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;shadow&nbsp;&nbsp;on&nbsp;<br>the reform and point at a deeper structural fault in the current libel regime.<br>&nbsp;<br>Although&nbsp;&nbsp;media&nbsp;&nbsp;liability&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;defined&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;print&nbsp;&nbsp;law&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;superseded&nbsp;&nbsp;by&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;media&nbsp;&nbsp;law,&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;<br>terms&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;libel&nbsp;&nbsp;itself&nbsp;&nbsp;are&nbsp;&nbsp;defined&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;chapter&nbsp;&nbsp;XXV&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;criminal&nbsp;&nbsp;act,&nbsp;&nbsp;which&nbsp;&nbsp;treats&nbsp;&nbsp;violations&nbsp;<br>of&nbsp;&nbsp;privacy&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;libel&nbsp;&nbsp;as&nbsp;&nbsp;equal&nbsp;&nbsp;criminal&nbsp;&nbsp;offenses.&nbsp;&nbsp;Under&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;criminal&nbsp;&nbsp;act,&nbsp;&nbsp;it&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;illegal&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;make&nbsp;<br>truthful&nbsp;&nbsp;accusations,&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;offend&nbsp;&nbsp;somebody&nbsp;&nbsp;publicly&nbsp;&nbsp;or&nbsp;&nbsp;privately,&nbsp;&nbsp;or&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;make&nbsp;&nbsp;unfavorable&nbsp;<br>comments&nbsp;&nbsp;about&nbsp;&nbsp;deceased&nbsp;&nbsp;persons.&nbsp;&nbsp;As&nbsp;&nbsp;these&nbsp;&nbsp;are&nbsp;&nbsp;criminal&nbsp;&nbsp;offenses,&nbsp;&nbsp;they&nbsp;&nbsp;have&nbsp;&nbsp;assigned&nbsp;<br>imprisonment&nbsp;penalties&nbsp;from&nbsp;1&nbsp;to&nbsp;4&nbsp;years,&nbsp;as&nbsp;well&nbsp;as&nbsp;fines,&nbsp;although&nbsp;imprisonment&nbsp;is&nbsp;rarely&nbsp;<br>used in practice.<br>&nbsp;<br>The&nbsp;&nbsp;global&nbsp;&nbsp;trend&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;libel&nbsp;&nbsp;law&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;move&nbsp;&nbsp;it&nbsp;&nbsp;away&nbsp;&nbsp;from&nbsp;&nbsp;criminal&nbsp;&nbsp;sanctions&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;into&nbsp;&nbsp;tort&nbsp;&nbsp;law,&nbsp;<br>making&nbsp;it&nbsp;a&nbsp;civil&nbsp;offense,&nbsp;punishable&nbsp;only&nbsp;by&nbsp;fines.&nbsp;Alongside&nbsp;this,&nbsp;the&nbsp;scope&nbsp;of&nbsp;libel&nbsp;is&nbsp;to&nbsp;be&nbsp;<br>narrowed,&nbsp;&nbsp;making&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;truth&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;valid&nbsp;&nbsp;defense&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;ensuring&nbsp;&nbsp;that&nbsp;&nbsp;people&nbsp;&nbsp;cannot&nbsp;&nbsp;be&nbsp;&nbsp;brought&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;<br>charge&nbsp;for&nbsp;making&nbsp;value&nbsp;judgements&nbsp;against&nbsp;another’s&nbsp;character.&nbsp;It&nbsp;should&nbsp;be&nbsp;legal&nbsp;to&nbsp;call&nbsp;a&nbsp;<br>person&nbsp;a&nbsp;jerk,&nbsp;although&nbsp;it&nbsp;is&nbsp;questionable&nbsp;whether&nbsp;you&nbsp;can&nbsp;call&nbsp;somebody&nbsp;a&nbsp;murderous&nbsp;jerk&nbsp;<br>without backing it up with evidence.<br>&nbsp;<br>IMMI&nbsp;&nbsp;has&nbsp;&nbsp;completed&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;basic&nbsp;&nbsp;research&nbsp;&nbsp;needed&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;implement&nbsp;&nbsp;these&nbsp;&nbsp;changes&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;drafted&nbsp;<br>a&nbsp;&nbsp;bill&nbsp;&nbsp;which&nbsp;&nbsp;aim&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;alleviate&nbsp;&nbsp;at&nbsp;&nbsp;least&nbsp;&nbsp;most&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;existing&nbsp;&nbsp;concerns.&nbsp;&nbsp;Due&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;parliamentary&nbsp;<br>scheduling rules, it cannot be introduced until the autumn of 2012.<br>&nbsp;<br><b>Status: Pending</b><br>
  443. 28<br>
  444. <hr>
  445. <A name=29></a><b>Whistleblower Protection<br></b>A&nbsp;whistleblower&nbsp;is&nbsp;a&nbsp;person&nbsp;that&nbsp;tries&nbsp;to&nbsp;disclose&nbsp;or&nbsp;report&nbsp;information&nbsp;on&nbsp;situations&nbsp;affecting&nbsp;<br>the&nbsp;&nbsp;public&nbsp;&nbsp;that&nbsp;&nbsp;may&nbsp;&nbsp;evidence&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;criminal&nbsp;&nbsp;activity.&nbsp;&nbsp;Protection&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;individuals&nbsp;&nbsp;reporting&nbsp;<br>institutionalized&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;corruption&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;paramount.&nbsp;&nbsp;They&nbsp;&nbsp;may&nbsp;&nbsp;be&nbsp;&nbsp;providing&nbsp;&nbsp;relevant&nbsp;&nbsp;information&nbsp;<br>to&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;public&nbsp;&nbsp;record,&nbsp;&nbsp;such&nbsp;&nbsp;as&nbsp;&nbsp;data&nbsp;&nbsp;or&nbsp;&nbsp;testimony&nbsp;&nbsp;about&nbsp;&nbsp;relevant&nbsp;&nbsp;matters&nbsp;&nbsp;like&nbsp;&nbsp;public&nbsp;&nbsp;health,&nbsp;<br>passed&nbsp;incidents,&nbsp;crime,&nbsp;government&nbsp;biases,&nbsp;democracy&nbsp;undermining&nbsp;practices,&nbsp;violations&nbsp;of&nbsp;<br>constitutional rights, corruption and bribery.<br>&nbsp;<br>Threats to whistleblowers come from corporate interests, governmental interests, criminal&nbsp;<br>activities, biases inherent in legal and judicial officials and systems. Whistleblower&nbsp;<br>protections must include a right to anonymity, physical, financial and social security.<br>&nbsp;<br>As&nbsp;the&nbsp;threat&nbsp;models,&nbsp;institutional&nbsp;settings&nbsp;and&nbsp;personal&nbsp;complexities&nbsp;of&nbsp;whistleblowing&nbsp;vary&nbsp;<br>widely,&nbsp;&nbsp;this&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;perhaps&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;most&nbsp;&nbsp;complicated&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;IMMI’s&nbsp;&nbsp;tasks.&nbsp;&nbsp;While&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;lot&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;development&nbsp;<br>work&nbsp;&nbsp;has&nbsp;&nbsp;been&nbsp;&nbsp;put&nbsp;&nbsp;into&nbsp;&nbsp;this&nbsp;&nbsp;issue&nbsp;&nbsp;already,&nbsp;&nbsp;we&nbsp;&nbsp;feel&nbsp;&nbsp;that&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;adequate&nbsp;&nbsp;protection&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;<br>whistleblowers cannot be completed without deep investigation.<br>&nbsp;<br>As&nbsp;&nbsp;one&nbsp;&nbsp;core&nbsp;&nbsp;issue,&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;idea&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;corporate&nbsp;&nbsp;personhood&nbsp;&nbsp;must&nbsp;&nbsp;be&nbsp;&nbsp;challenged.&nbsp;&nbsp;Disregarding&nbsp;<br>other&nbsp;arguments&nbsp;for&nbsp;doing&nbsp;so,&nbsp;it&nbsp;is&nbsp;very&nbsp;important&nbsp;that&nbsp;it&nbsp;not&nbsp;be&nbsp;decided&nbsp;that&nbsp;companies&nbsp;and&nbsp;<br>other&nbsp;corporate&nbsp;vehicles&nbsp;have&nbsp;a&nbsp;right&nbsp;to&nbsp;privacy,&nbsp;as&nbsp;this&nbsp;would&nbsp;pit&nbsp;whistleblower&nbsp;activities&nbsp;up&nbsp;<br>against&nbsp;&nbsp;privacy&nbsp;&nbsp;and&nbsp;&nbsp;data&nbsp;&nbsp;protection&nbsp;&nbsp;law,&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;sanctity&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;which&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;equal&nbsp;&nbsp;importance.&nbsp;&nbsp;It’s&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;<br>fight&nbsp;nobody&nbsp;should&nbsp;have&nbsp;to&nbsp;fight.&nbsp;That&nbsp;said,&nbsp;there&nbsp;has&nbsp;been&nbsp;no&nbsp;such&nbsp;ruling&nbsp;in&nbsp;Iceland&nbsp;and&nbsp;it&nbsp;<br>is not foreseeable that that will change; it’s merely one issue of many that must be monitored&nbsp;<br>and pro-actively taken action on.17<br>&nbsp;<br><b>Status: In development</b><br>
  446. <b>Prior Restraint Limitations<br></b>Prior&nbsp;&nbsp;restraint&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;banned&nbsp;&nbsp;under&nbsp;&nbsp;article&nbsp;&nbsp;73&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;Icelandic&nbsp;&nbsp;constitution.&nbsp;&nbsp;A&nbsp;&nbsp;slightly&nbsp;&nbsp;stronger&nbsp;<br>implementation&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;prior&nbsp;&nbsp;restraint&nbsp;&nbsp;limitations&nbsp;&nbsp;are&nbsp;&nbsp;introduced&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;new&nbsp;&nbsp;constitution,&nbsp;&nbsp;which&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;<br>pending ratification.<br>&nbsp;<br>Outside&nbsp;of&nbsp;constitutional&nbsp;guarantees,&nbsp;IMMI&nbsp;also&nbsp;has&nbsp;an&nbsp;interest&nbsp;in&nbsp;protecting&nbsp;against&nbsp;abuse&nbsp;<br>of&nbsp;&nbsp;injunctions&nbsp;&nbsp;by&nbsp;&nbsp;sheriffs,&nbsp;&nbsp;who&nbsp;&nbsp;still&nbsp;&nbsp;have&nbsp;&nbsp;injunctive&nbsp;&nbsp;authorities&nbsp;&nbsp;as&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;holdover&nbsp;&nbsp;from&nbsp;&nbsp;their&nbsp;&nbsp;now&nbsp;<br>abolished&nbsp;&nbsp;tribunal&nbsp;&nbsp;role.&nbsp;&nbsp;This&nbsp;&nbsp;fits&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;with&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;discussion&nbsp;&nbsp;of&nbsp;&nbsp;Intermediary&nbsp;&nbsp;Liability&nbsp;&nbsp;Limitations&nbsp;<br>stated above, and IMMI expects to be able to address these two concerns jointly.<br>&nbsp;<br><b>Status: Pending ratification<br>&nbsp;</b><br>
  447. <b>Virtual Limited Liability Companies<br></b>Icelandic&nbsp;corporate&nbsp;law&nbsp;is&nbsp;currently&nbsp;somewhat&nbsp;hostile&nbsp;to&nbsp;foreign&nbsp;ownership&nbsp;from&nbsp;outside&nbsp;the&nbsp;<br>European&nbsp;Economic&nbsp;Area&nbsp;(EEA).&nbsp;The&nbsp;idea&nbsp;of&nbsp;Virtual&nbsp;Limited&nbsp;Liability&nbsp;Companies&nbsp;is&nbsp;to&nbsp;allow&nbsp;<br>for&nbsp;&nbsp;virtually&nbsp;&nbsp;defined&nbsp;&nbsp;corporate&nbsp;&nbsp;entities,&nbsp;&nbsp;whereby&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;ownership&nbsp;&nbsp;is&nbsp;&nbsp;somewhat&nbsp;&nbsp;ephemeral,&nbsp;&nbsp;as&nbsp;<br>long&nbsp;&nbsp;as&nbsp;&nbsp;the&nbsp;&nbsp;owners&nbsp;&nbsp;adhere&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;certain&nbsp;&nbsp;Icelandic&nbsp;&nbsp;transparency&nbsp;&nbsp;requirements.&nbsp;&nbsp;In&nbsp;&nbsp;that&nbsp;&nbsp;way,&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;<br>virtually&nbsp;operated&nbsp;commpany&nbsp;would&nbsp;have&nbsp;tax&nbsp;obligations&nbsp;and&nbsp;operational&nbsp;safe&nbsp;harbor&nbsp;rights&nbsp;<br>in&nbsp;&nbsp;Iceland&nbsp;&nbsp;like&nbsp;&nbsp;any&nbsp;&nbsp;other&nbsp;&nbsp;company,&nbsp;&nbsp;but&nbsp;&nbsp;gets&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;operate&nbsp;&nbsp;virtually&nbsp;&nbsp;in&nbsp;&nbsp;exchange&nbsp;&nbsp;for&nbsp;&nbsp;some&nbsp;&nbsp;strict&nbsp;<br>guarantees of transparency and such.<br>&nbsp;<br>
  448. 17&nbsp;For more detail see::&nbsp;<a href="http://immi.is/Press_Release:_IMMI_Status_Update,_April_2012">http://immi.is/Press_Release:_IMMI_Status_Update,_April_2012&nbsp;</a><br>
  449. 29<br>
  450. <hr>
  451. <A name=30></a>This&nbsp;&nbsp;issue&nbsp;&nbsp;has&nbsp;&nbsp;more&nbsp;&nbsp;to&nbsp;&nbsp;do&nbsp;&nbsp;with&nbsp;&nbsp;creating&nbsp;&nbsp;a&nbsp;&nbsp;pleasant&nbsp;&nbsp;investment&nbsp;&nbsp;environment&nbsp;&nbsp;than&nbsp;&nbsp;explicitly&nbsp;<br>improving&nbsp;the&nbsp;information&nbsp;regime&nbsp;in&nbsp;Iceland.&nbsp;For&nbsp;that&nbsp;reason,&nbsp;it&nbsp;has&nbsp;been&nbsp;relegated&nbsp;to&nbsp;the&nbsp;set&nbsp;<br>of the last things we aim to accomplish in this set, and is therefore on hiatus for now.<br>&nbsp;<br><b>Status: On hiatus.<br></b>&nbsp;<br>&nbsp;<br>
  452. <b>Selected Bibliography</b><br>
  453. <br>
  454. Orkustefna fyrir Ísland; Stýrihópur um mótun heildstæðrar orkustefnu;&nbsp;<a href="http://www.nea.is/media/gagnasofn/Orkustefna-fyrir-Island.pdf">http://<br>www.nea.is/media/gagnasofn/Orkustefna-fyrir-Island.pdf<br></a>&nbsp;<br>
  455. <br>
  456. Iceland. What a Great Place to Put a Data Center; Verne Global / Martin Hannigan;&nbsp;<br><a href="http://www.uknof.org.uk/uknof12/Hanningan-Undersea.pdf">http://www.uknof.org.uk/uknof12/Hanningan-Undersea.pdf</a><br>
  457. &nbsp;<br>
  458. <br>
  459. <a href="http://www.os.is/gogn/Skyrslur/OS-2010/OS-2010-07.pdf">Orkuspá fyrir Ísland 2010-2050; Orkustofnun;&nbsp;http://www.os.is/gogn/Skyrslur/OS-<br>2010/OS-2010-07.pdf<br></a>&nbsp;<br>
  460. <br>
  461. Benchmarking Study on Iceland as a Location for Data Centre Activity; Invest in&nbsp;<br><a href="http://www.invest.is/resources/files/invest.is/BDC%20Report.pdf">Iceland Agency;&nbsp;http://www.invest.is/resources/files/invest.is/BDC%20Report.pdf<br></a>&nbsp;<br>
  462. <br>
  463. Mikil arðsemi af raforkusölu til stóriðju; Vísir;&nbsp;<a href="http://www.visir.is/mikil-ardsemi-af-raforkusolu-til-storidju/article/2011712209851">http://www.visir.is/mikil-ardsemi-af-<br>raforkusolu-til-storidju/article/2011712209851<br></a>&nbsp;<br>
  464. <br>
  465. <a href="http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/15/62/36648108.pdf">Policy Mix for Innovation in Iceland; OECD;&nbsp;http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/15/62/<br>36648108.pdf</a><br>
  466. 30<br>
  467. <hr>
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