Privacy of communication must be protected – Opposition MPs
THE Kaieteur News maintains its criticisms of the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) for the release of “confidential” information, which has been emphatically rejected by GRA’s Commissioner-General, Mr. Khurshid Sattaur.
Joseph Harmon
The Kaieteur News’ assertions follow a day after the filing of criminal charges for tax evasion against its publisher, Mr. Glenn Lall.
And the newspaper itself is at the centre of concerns over the violation of privacy, following its publication of alleged emails between senior public and government officials, as well as those of former President, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo, which do not relate to the criminal charges that have been filed.
LEGITIMATE DISCLOSURES
Mr. Khemraj Ramjattan, AFC Leader
One prominent attorney-at-law acknowledged that, as reported, the Guyana Chronicle’s article on the alleged remigrant duty-free scam was the result of an overall review of the status of the remigrant support scheme, which is offered by the current Administration.
The article saw the “legitimate disclosure” of facts of the alleged scam and in turn led to the filing of six criminal charges, altogether, against four parties involved, including Mr. Lall and his wife, Mrs. Bhena Lall.
The charges follow the seizure of two vehicles allegedly at the centre of the duty-free scam. The two vehicles in question, PRR 8398 and PRR 8399, were handed over to GRA and impounded at the Authority’s warehouse at the end of August, after an hour-long standoff between GRA officials and the Brijnanans’ son, Sankar, a high-ranking GRA employee. An investigation was then launched to ensure that procedures and policy, as well as the provisions of the law were adhered to. The vehicles were imported under the remigrant duty-free concession arrangement, but have been in the possession of Lall and his wife.
“The media has the right to gather news from any source by lawful means. One of the main things journalists have to consider is whether the newsgathering or publishing process violated certain legal principles,”
Ramesh Dookhoo
the lawyer told the Guyana Chronicle, on the condition of anonymity.
VIOLATION OF PRIVACY
The source added: “There is a certain amount of deflection happening here, there is a move by the Kaieteur to divert the attention from the real issue, which is violation of privacy.
According to the lawyer, the Kaieteur News is trying to deflect attention from the fact that it accessed alleged private emails, a gross violation of privacy, by putting the spotlight on an alleged “plot” to muzzle the local paper.
“In one breath the paper is alleging that documents were released by the GRA, for which it has launched a massive campaign of criticism, and in another, the paper itself has violated laws of confidentiality and privacy,” the source said.
The legal expert cited three benchmarks against which the violation of privacy can be measured: was the document obtained illegally; has the newspaper violated a sphere of privacy; and is the newspaper guilty of overzealous reporting.
Additionally, according to the ‘Reporter’s Handbook: Invasion of Privacy and the Media: The Right To Be Let Alone’, invasion of privacy by intrusion is defined as: “One who intentionally intrudes, physically or otherwise, upon the solitude or seclusion of another or his private affairs or concerns, is subject to liability to the other for invasion of privacy, if the intrusion would be highly offensive to a reasonable person.”
MANY QUESTIONS
Many questions are now being posed as to how the local daily, known for sensationalism, came into possession of the alleged emails and who authorised the use of the said alleged private correspondences.
The GRA’s Commissioner-General himself has called for a police investigation as to how and who fabricated his email, providing the Kaieteur News with copies of the published correspondences.
A tax analyst at the GRA said that assuming the alleged emails did come from Sattaur’s office, the email itself never mentioned anything implicating Kaieteur News.
“In my mind, this is clearly a fabrication by Mr. Lall and Mr. Harris to avoid the laws being applied to Kaieteur News,” the analyst said.
SERIOUS CONCERNS
General-Secretary of A Partnership for National Unity (APNU), Mr. Joseph Harmon, told the Guyana Chronicle that there have always been “serious concerns” about the security of communication between people.
“We have even had cases where communication between our party members are hacked, and the question is how are they accessed…whether we had the capacity here to do so or not is something I am not sure of,” he said.
The General-Secretary stressed that the privacy of information and communication exchanges ought to be treated as private.
“Every email you send passes through a network and if this is information that comes into the hand of someone, you have to know how to treat with it. The privacy of your communications must be protected,” Mr. Harmon said.
According to him, this problem is something that can be looked at in the Parliamentary Committee, reviewing the moves to address reforms in the telecoms sector.
“Since the committee’s work is not complete, we can look into this and see if and how we can provide protection to the Guyanese people,” Mr. Harmon assured.
Leader of the Alliance For Change (AFC), Mr. Khemraj Ramjattan, was firm in his contention that laws related to privacy, confidentiality and security of online communications must be enforced.
“All the laws related to privacy must be enforced …we are filled with laws, we have no deficiency of laws, but they are not adhered to,” he said.
ROLE OF SERVICE PROVIDERS
Meanwhile, given that GRA’s internet service provider in this matter is the Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Company (GT&T), the Guyana Chronicle contacted the company’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO), RK Sharma, for a comment.
However, Mr. Sharma was not available for comment. Also, the company’s public relations department, up to press time had not responded to this newspaper’s questions over the company’s policies on the privacy, confidentiality and security of information passed over its network, both as it relates to communications via mobile phone and via their DSL internet service.
The Guyana Chronicle also contacted Digicel, Guyana’s other major telecommunications operator, with a similar query.
A statement from the company said, “Currently traffic related to all Digicel subscribers are secure, whether it be voice or data services, including emails through our network. Persons should also take the necessary precautions to password protect their devices to ensure maximum security.”
MORE LAWS NEEDED
President of the Caribbean Association of Industry and Commerce (CAIC), Mr. Ramesh Dookhoo, commenting on the issue, has called for the political parties represented in the National Assembly to look at the legislation that deals with information sharing, the E-Commerce legislation, which has not been tabled in the National Assembly or passed.
The draft bill was intended to provide for the legal recognition of electronic writing, electronic contracts, electronic signatures and original information in electronic form in relation to commercial and other transactions and to provide for the facilitation of electronic transactions and related matters.
“We had a big seminar at Liliendaal and all of civil society and Information Technology specialists were there to discuss the legislation and a lot of work was put into it. This piece of law makes it criminal to hack emails, but it was never addressed. Now there is no law in Guyana to protect you if your emails are hacked,” he said.
Dookhoo added that this is something that must be revisited.
“We need to get this legislation on the ground,” he stressed, “It is something that must be looked at. I don’t know if sending an e-bill is legal, but we are doing it.”
The CAIC Head bemoaned the political gimmickry surrounding the issue and called for concrete action in addressing this.
“The private sector is quite clearly fed-up and what we and the Guyanese people want is for real civil issues to be in place. If we look at the emails that were published in the Kaieteur News they are the emails of two prominent people in our society, but there is no law in place. We need to act,” he said.
The Attorney-General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Mr. Anil Nandlall, was unavailable for a comment regarding the work to be done in terms of legislation to address this problem, as he is currently abroad.
extracted from the Guyana Chronicle
