La Salle’s Institute of Governance’s “Patrolling the Internet: Mapping the Policy Terrain” research project also saw that (the next paragraphs are slightly edited paragraphs from the actual research study): There is an amalgam of proposals housed in the Philippine Congress that encourages the use of Internet monitoring and social control mechanisms in preventing crimes allegedly…

The La Salle researchers saw that Republic Act 9775 allows the government to exercise “decentralized monitoring” of the Internet. Here, slightly edited, is the research project’s chapter on that subject:

The Anti-Child Pornography law (Republic Act 9775) was passed on October 13 last year and signed on November 17 by President Gloria Arroyo. The law creates an Inter-Agency Council Against Child Pornography, which is tasked by the law itself with promulgating the implementing rules and regulations of R.A. 9775. The following is the La Salle…

The La Salle researchers praise Republic Act 9775 for its intentions.  But it identifies areas where “sneaking surveillance and filtering” could happen against the moral aims of the law.

La Salle research findings show need to balance morality issues with human rights The newly enacted Republic Act 9775, the Anti-Child Pornography Law, could be misused or even abused to curb Filipinos’ right to use the Internet and deprive them of other civil liberties. This is the carefully weighed warning made by scholars at De…

Our country has gone through many kinds of crises. Crises that are both man made and considered acts of God. Which in my opinion is a very bad term. Why is it that we call a sad natural catastrophe an “act of God” and when times are good and victorious we credit it to ourselves?…

MANILA, Philippines – A Greek court has ordered the auction of the MV Aetea Sierra to pay for the wages of its Filipino crew members, the Department of Foreign Affairs said the other day.

MANILA, Philippines–The rehabilitation of the mothballed 620-megawatt Bataan Nuclear Power Plant (BNPP) may cost roughly P45 billion, according to a report submitted Friday to the state-owned National Power Corp.

BY the time this column comes out, the commotion stirred by yet another disclosure of a TV-actress/former presidential daughter about her marriage will have died down. The revelation was made on national television on Sunday. The following day, everyone from strangers sharing the same space in the elevator to bank tellers (while efficiently facilitating multiple…

Meaning of human rights MANILA, Philippines – Human rights refer to the “basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled.” Human Rights Include “civil and political rights, such as the right to life and liberty, freedom of expression and a equality before the law as well as social, cultural and economic rights, the…

MANILA, Philippines – Public school teachers serving in the May 2010 presidential elections will start training on the automated poll system this March in accordance with the timetable of the Commission on Elections (Comelec), the Department of Education said yesterday.

MANILA, Philippines – The excess supply of office space in Metro Manila caused by the global financial crisis will be absorbed mostly in the first half this year as the business process outsourcing sector (BPO) continues to grow, according to global property consultancy firm Jones Lang LaSalle Leechiu (JLLL).

MANILA, Philippines – Liberal Party (LP) presidential candidate Sen. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III has seen his margin dwindle to single digit in the race against Sen. Manuel “Manny” Villar Jr., results of the Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey revealed yesterday.

19 January 2010, Quezon City. –While the most affected economic sectors are merely recovering from the global economic crunch, Philippine Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) remains robust. The sector remains as one of the major drivers of growth of the country’s economy.

PARIS, France—Pollution from Asia is boosting levels of ozone in the skies above the western United States, a trend that could hamper US efforts to meet tougher smog standards, experts said on Wednesday.

THE number of jobless Filipinos rose last year because of weak economic growth brought about by the global financial crisis. The National Statistics Office (NSO) said Thursday that the number of unemployed Filipinos reached 2.8 million in 2009, or an annual unemployment rate of 7.5 percent.

MANILA, Philippines – The simmering “silent conflict” between two erstwhile allied poll watchdogs has spilled into the Commission on Elections (Comelec). The Parish Pastoral Council for Responsible Voting (PPCRV) has asked the Comelec to junk the petition for accreditation filed by the National Citizens’ Movement for Free Elections (NAMFREL) as a citizen’s arm in the…

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The global economy is poised to grow 2.7 percent this year after shrinking in 2009, the World Bank said Wednesday in a report highlighting risks to a “fragile” recovery.

MANILA, Philippines – The World Bank expects the Philippines to rebound from a modest 1.4-percent growth in 2009 to a considerable 3.5-percent expansion this year, the multilateral financial institution said in its latest report.

WASHINGTON — The Arroyo administration has failed to do anything substantial to liberalize the economy of the Philippines as it continues to slide from being one of Asia’s richest economies to being one of its poorest, a 2010 Index of Economic Freedom report said.

MANILA, Philippines – Militant group Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan) yesterday questioned the accreditation by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) of nine administration-linked party-list groups, saying the administration may be creating a “power block” in Congress to push Charter change.

MANILA, Philippines – The Philippines continues to suffer from weak freedom in business, investment, property rights, and even in fighting corruption. In its 2010 Index of Economic Freedom, Washington-based think tank Heritage Foundation put the country in 109th place.

Angela Cropper, Deputy Executive Director, United Nations Environment Programme, in her keynote address to the Commonwealth Peoples Forum (CPF) held in Trinidad and Tobago in November 2009, argued passionately for an ecological civilization and supported a partnership between the UNEP, International Labour Organization (ILO), International Organization of Employers (IOE) and the International Trade Union Confederation…

Philippine Airlines union president Edgardo Oredina did not sound optimistic when he apprised members of the Philippine Airlines Employees’ Association late last year about the financial predicament of PAL and the state of the global aviation industry.

The first shipment of highly radioactive waste from the UK has left the Sellafield nuclear site, the BBC has learnt. It has been loaded onto a ship specifically designed to carry nuclear waste that will sail for Japan later.

MANILA, Philippines–Free trade agreements with large neighboring markets that took effect starting Jan. 1 and provide for the gradual removal of tariffs will pare off up to P9 billion from government revenues this year.

MANILA, Philippines – International rights group Human Rights Watch on Wednesday blamed the Philippine government for allowing the proliferation of private armies of political leaders, which resulted in the “horrendous” massacre of 57 people in Maguindanao province last November.

WASHINGTON D.C. – Two Asian economies were declared the freest in the world, although the 16th Index of Economic Freedom showed the global recession forced many countries to intervene in their economies. The annual survey of economic freedom is prepared by the DC-based Heritage Foundation and The Wall Street Journal.

General Santos City — Some 1,600 workers of various fishing companies here may lose their jobs within the next few weeks as a result of the fishing ban that started earlier this month in the critical high seas off the Western and Central Pacific Ocean, an official of the Department of Labor and Employment (DoLE)…

The Comelec decision dismissing three petitions to disqualify President Estrada and the Supreme Court decision throwing out The Vanguard petition also to disqualify him should now debunk the black propaganda of the Nacionalista and Liberal camps that Erap will be disqualified or will withdraw from the 2010 presidential race.