DiploFoundation is currently accepting applications for the 2010 Internet Governance Capacity Building Programme (IGCBP10). This online programme is designed to improve Internet Governance (IG) related knowledge and skills for participants mainly from developing countries and assist them to participate in the global decision-shaping debates IG. The deadline for applications is February 12, midnight UTC/GMT.

The Programme also facilitates community building among individuals with different national, cultural, and professional backgrounds.

Diplo also has an open call for applications for applicants from African-Caribbean-Pacific (ACP) states, a programme funded by the Secretariat of the ACP Group of States and the European Union and in partnership with seven ACP institutions.

Read more about IGCBP01 here. European applicants can view the call for applications here. ACP Programme applicants can view the call for applications here. To apply, download the online applications for  IGCBP10 and European applicants, and for ACP Programme applicants.

In the first case of its kind, an Australian court has ruled that an Internet Service Provider cannot be responsible for illegal downloading. iiNet, Australia’s third largest ISP, was taken to court by a group of 34 movie production houses.

The group included the Australian divisions of Universal Pictures, Warner Brothers and 20th Century Fox. They claimed that iiNet was guilty of copyright infringement for not preventing illegal downloads of films. 

Read full story here.

An influential group of British MPs and peers has said the government’s approach to illegal file-sharing could breach the rights of Internet users. The Joint Select Committee on Human Rights said the government’s Digital Economy Bill needed clarification.

It said that technical measures – which include cutting off persistent pirates – were not “sufficiently specified”. In addition, it said that it was concerned that the Bill could create “over-broad powers”.
Read full story here.

Cyber attacks on the European Union’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) have prompted the executive European Commission to revise its Internet security guidelines, the Commission said on Thursday, February 4.

The ETS is the 27-country European Union’s main tool to force industry to cut greenhouse gases. The Commission said fraudulent transactions had been carried out, with fake emails sent to users asking them to log on to a malicious website and disclose their user codes and passwords.

Read full story here.

The president of the Internet Service Providers Association of Nigeria (ISPAN), Chief Samuel Adeleke has been named the chairman of the 2010 edition of annual Nigeria Digital Sense forum, which focuses on the evolutions on the Internet Governance Forum (IGF).

Disclosing this in Lagos, on behalf of the organisers, executive director of operations at Digital Sense Africa,  Nkemdilim Nweke, said the best person to take over the chairmanship of the event from Chief Chima Onyekwere, was Adeleke. She calls to mind that Chief Onyekwere who presided over the forum last year at the Golden Gate Ikoyi-Lagos, is the chairman of Linkserve Group, the pioneer ISP firm in the country, while Adeleke is the chairman and chief executive officer, Steineng Limited since January 1999. Read full story here.

Meanwhile, leading Global System for Mobile communications (GSM), MTN Nigeria Communications Limited, has finalised plans to back this year’s edition of the Nigeria Digital Sense forum. Read full story here.