Information science distinguishes between the semantic forms/intangibles of data, information and knowledge. Data (e.g. an attribute of a data record in a relational database) does not have any ...meaning by itself. Information is data brought into context (e.g. data related to its primary key), and knowledge is the collection of information for useful intent (e.g. a database). This paper investigates the mapping of semantic forms in information science (i.e. data, information, knowledge) to correlative concepts in information law (primarily data protection legislation) with a view to investigating how such semantic forms are legally protected. The paper first proposes a data, information, knowledge, rules (DIKR) hierarchy in the context of relational database theory, and interprets this hierarchy with respect to data protection concepts. The paper then gives an in-depth discussion of the elements of the DIKR hierarchy (data, information, knowledge, deduced knowledge, induced knowledge) and how they relate to the EU Data Protection Directive 95/46/EC. These relationships are summarized in the form of a two dimensional correlation matrix. Finally the paper discusses how the semantic forms identified are protected under the EU Data Protection Directive, and gives insightful observations about the connection between information law and information science.
The European Union (EU) directive on personal data and resulting data protection legislation of EU member states require from data controllers, a notification of their activities to the appropriate ...supervisory authority. Included in this notification is also a description of the data or categories of data which are processed. Legislation in some EU member states (e.g. Slovenia) require that not only a description but also a concrete list of personal data attributes needs to be included in this notification. In such cases it is sometimes difficult to ascertain in concreto whether some collected attribute represents personal data (and should therefore be included in the list of attributes) or whether it is a non-personal attribute. Similarly, under the EU directive data subjects have various rights, including the right to access their data, and data controllers are sometimes faced with the problem of determining whether various data items constitute personal data. Further, the impending case in the European Court of Human Rights arising out of the decision of the UK case of Durant v Financial Services Authority (which narrowed the scope of personal data) has added some uncertainty to the interpretation of the EU directive. In view of the legal uncertainty regarding what constitutes personal data, this paper examines whether relational database design principles can be applied to identifying personal data. Using this approach, the paper explores various parallels between personal data identification and principles of relational database design. The paper thus makes a novel contribution to the ongoing uncertainty in data protection law. The paper also discusses the wider issue of applying computing/scientific principles to interpreting the law.
This article analyzes what presently constitutes one of the most problematic aspects of search engines' and Internet archives' practices: the protection of personal data and copyrighted material. ...These issues are often sidelined in favour of the quickest possible development of ever more fashionable e-services. Yet the lack of consideration for these issues may hinder the development of various e-services as all kinds of legal claims and suits may be brought against service providers, particularly in the European Union, which is fond of drafting complex legislation in the field. This paper shows how typical search engines and Internet archives work and the legal issues to which their practices give rise. The examples used are Google and Internet Archive, and their policies. It is argued that many of the legal checks and balances they offer with respect to the protection of personal data and copyrighted material leave a great deal to be desired. The article concludes by providing a short list of possible remedies that could, at least provisionally, alleviate some of the most urgent problems.
Development of e-government in Slovenia Vintar, Mirko; Kunstelj, Mateja; Dečman, Mitja ...
Information polity,
2003, Letnik:
8, Številka:
3,4
Journal Article
Recenzirano
E-government has been a hot topic in the public administration research community for some time now. While still considered by some to be merely a technological phenomenon, it also includes ...organisational changes in public administration, development and implementation of new business processes, discovering better and faster ways of providing public services and offering entirely new services, not known before. In this article we try to look at the development of e-government in Slovenia from both perspectives, technological and organisational. We explore the public administration presence on the Internet, the services it provides and the back-office systems that support them. The current state of electronic services provided by various public administration bodies is examined, both from the end user's perspective and from a technological point of view. We present the current state of e-government with respect to the action plans it has committed itself, while relying on well-known methodology adopted by the European Commission. PUBLICATION ABSTRACT
Mo6S3I6 nanowire networks of interest are found to change their resistance in response to the presence of analyte vapors. The vapor sensing behavior is quantitatively described very well ...phenomenologically in terms of the concentration of adsorbed analyte molecules in the contact tunneling junctions, and an expression is derived for the dynamics and sensor resistance in terms of analyte vapor pressure. The time response of the sensor is observed to follow simple adsorption–desorption kinetics. The network sensor shows very clear selectivity, whereby the response is related to the dipole moment of the analyte. The response function favors rapid detection of small analyte concentrations.
In the article, we review recent literature on fiscal sustainability with particular reference to problems that are specific to transition countries. While the original literature on fiscal ...sustainability is chiefly focused on industrial countries there are by now few works that have focused on fiscal sustainability in transition countries. Consequently, the article’s purpose is to assess the short-, medium- and long-term sustainability of fiscal policy (under set assumptions) on the national level in the great majority of transition countries which we divide into three main groups, i.e. Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), Southern and Eastern Europe (SEE) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Based on simple mainstream theory measures of fiscal sustainability, the results indicate that fiscal sustainability seems to be a problem in many transition countries, particularly in CEE (e.g. Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland) and the SEE region (e.g. Albania and Croatia).
Telecommunications sector is charaterized by oligopolistic market structure with one dominant player (erstwhile or extant state monopoly) and one or more smaller players. In the case of Slovenia, the ...dominant player is Mobitel d.d., while the smaller ones are Si.mobil d.d., TusMobil d.d. and some others. Form the competition protection's point of view (where there are three major areas of competition abuses, horizontal mergers, vertical and horizontal agreements and abuse of dominant position), the telecommunications sector is relatively unproblematic in the first two of these areas, but problems abound in the third area: abuse of dominant position. National competition authoritiy (NCA) take care of all three kinds of abuses. In addition to this, telecommunications are also characterized by (ex-ante) industry regulation. Purpose of this article is to describe typical anticompetition abuses that arise in telecommunications sector from the legal and economic point of view and point to the relevant formal tests that the NCAs are using in order to determine the presence or absence of certain abuses.
Charge transport measurements on flexible Mo6S3I6 molecular wires of different diameters are best described by tunnelling through Tomonaga–Luttinger liquid segments, which is in some cases modified ...by environmental Coulomb blockade arising from deformations or imperfections. The unique S‐bonding chemistry of Mo6S3I6 wires and gold nanoparticles enables self‐assembly of large molecular‐scale inorganic networks. The topological characteristics of networks indicate an intrinsic tendency to self‐organize into a scale‐invariant critical state.
Mo3S6I3 nanowire–gold nanoparticle network (AFM topographical image, size ∼8 × 4 µm2).
PDF
