Sunday, July 22, 2007

kenyan techies headed to jail

Kenyan techies headed to jail...

By Rebecca Wanjiku

If the new Kenya Communications Amendment bill becomes law, all Kenyan techies and computer owners with pay a fine of shs 1 million, or risk a jail term or both.

Why?

Section 86 of the KCA bill states that...

No person shall

Operate an electronic Certification system

Update a repository

Administer a sub-domain in the ccTLD

To do the above one requires a license, or face the penalties.

Michuki Mwangi, the chief executive officer of KENIC, reckons that there are many Kenyan techies who have been infringing on this rule and will face the full force of the law once its assented.

In interrogating these issues, Michuki asks, what is a repository? He argues that a repository could constitute a computer hard disk, mainly because the bill has not defined what a repository is.

“I have a self signed certificate, I create sub-domains and so many other Kenyans do. The government will have to give 32million potential sub-domain users. That’s a whole load of licenses to issue,” said Michuki.

Section 87 and 88 provides that:

The dot KE registry and the Digital Certificate Registry need a license

Michuki reckons that .KE model is globally recognized and in deed South Africa wants to follow up but adds that the new law will open room for subdivision of the registry, provided one can pay the license.

For instance in south Africa, the .CO.ZA , .AC.ZA and other domains were operated by different entities and this is the time they are trying to integrate registry operations under one registry.

“It has the right intentions but just needs a bit of tweaking and rewording. The bill could have captured other areas of IT like local content matters were not well addressed,” said Michuki.

Ends

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Stephen Muiruri
P.O Box 872-00200
Fax: +254 20 3751521
Nairobi.
Tel: +254 20 33751672 (Office), 8562845 (House)
E-mail: smuiruri2000@yahoo.com

July 27, 2007.


The Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative
B-117, Second Floor, Sarvodaya Enclave
New Delhi - 110 017
INDIA
Tel: +91-11-2685-0523, 2652-8152, 2686-4678
Fax: +91-11-2686-4688
E-mail: chriall@nda.vsnl.net.in

Dear Sir/Madam,

Re: CHRI job

I'm a Kenyan aged 36 years and until recently the Crime Editor for the Nation Media Group, a leading media house in East and Central Africa. I was in charge of the Crime Section and my responsibilities included researching, investigating, writing, editing and coordinating reporting in the areas of crime, investigations and human rights.

I joined Nation Media Group in 1995 as a trainee reporter and rose to the level of an editor in January this year when I was hounded out of office. I worked in a busy newsroom of the leading media house in East and Central African which exposed me to tough challenges of working for long hours with minimum supervision and meeting strict deadlines.

I wish to apply for a CHRI job and I'm willing to work at its Headquarters in New Delhi, India, or any other station suitable for me. I have a keen interest in writing matters to do with human rights and social justice.

I was last year commissioned by the Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative to write a report titled Patterns of Policing in Kenya: A Media Content Analysis of the Nation and Standard . Among the areas the report covered are at extra-judicial killings, torture, arbitrary arrest and detention, role played by the administration in policing, policing of political activities, police criminality and police reforms. I submitted the final draft around February this year and it's awaiting publication.

I have attached my curriculum vitae and two relevant writing samples which were published in the Daily Nation.

The first story, titled Police chief in the spotlight after four killed during riots, was published in the on October 29, 2005. The other story was titled Police furious over VP Awori's plan to free 20,000 prisoners and it was published on February 21, 2005.

Kindly consider my application.

Yours sincerely,


Stephen Muiruri.