Begin forwarded message:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: March 6, 2007 10:42:50 AM PST
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Dubya vs WWW -- "You've Got NAILED!"
JUSTICE DEPARTMENT TAKES AIM AT IMAGE-SHARING SITES
Feds try during a private meeting to convince sites that allow
photos or videos to be uploaded to monitor users, News.com has
learned.
By Declan McCullagh
CNET News.com, March 2, 2007, 4:00 AM PST
http://news.com.com/Justice+Department+takes+aim+at+image-sharing
+sites/2100-1028_3-6163679.html?tag=nefd.lede
The Bush administration has accelerated its Internet surveillance
push by proposing that Web sites must keep records of who uploads
photographs or videos in case police determine the content is
illegal and choose to investigate, CNET News.com has learned.
That proposal surfaced Wednesday in a private meeting during which
U.S. Department of Justice officials, including Assistant Attorney
General Rachel Brand, tried to convince industry representatives
such as AOL and Comcast that data retention would be valuable in
investigating terrorism, child pornography and other crimes. The
discussions were described to News.com by several people who
attended the meeting.
High Impact
What's new:
Officials from the U.S. Department of Justice held a private
meeting to persuade Internet industry representatives to keep
records of who uploads photographs or videos.
Bottom line:
The meeting accelerates the Bush administration's effort to require
Web sites to keep track of customers' actions on the Internet, a
practice known as data retention.
A second purpose of the meeting in Washington, D.C., according to
the sources, was to ask Internet service providers how much it
would cost to record details on their subscribers for two years. At
the very least, the companies would be required to keep logs for
police of which customer is assigned a specific Internet address.
Only universities and libraries would be excluded, one participant
said. "There's a PR concern with including the libraries, so we're
not going to include them," the participant quoted the Justice
Department as saying. "We know we're going to get a pushback, so
we're not going to do that."
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has been lobbying Congress for
mandatory data retention, calling it a "national problem that
requires federal legislation." Gonzales has convened earlier
private meetings to pressure industry representatives. And last
month, Republicans introduced a mandatory data retention bill in
the U.S. House of Representatives that would let the attorney
general dictate what must be stored and for how long.
Supporters of the data retention proposal say it's necessary to
help track criminals if police don't immediately discover illegal
activity, such as child abuse. Industry representatives respond by
saying major Internet providers have a strong track record of
responding to subpoenas from law enforcement.
Wednesday's meeting represents the latest effort by the Bush
administration to increase the ability of law enforcement and
intelligence agencies to monitor Internet users.
Since 2001, the administration has repeatedly pushed for more
surveillance capabilities in the form of the Patriot Act and a
follow-up proposal that --if it had been enacted-- would have given
the FBI online eavesdropping powers without a court order for up to
48 hours.
Often invoking terrorism and child pornography as justifications,
the administration has argued that Internet providers must install
backdoors for surveillance and has called for routers to be
redesigned for easier eavesdropping. President Bush's electronic
surveillance program, which was recently modified, has drawn an
avalanche of lawsuits.
ISP SNOOPING TIMELINE
In events first reported by CNET News.com, Bush administration
officials have said Internet providers should keep track of what
Americans are doing online. Here's the timeline:
June 2005: Justice Department officials quietly propose data
retention rules.
December 2005: European Parliament votes for data retention of up
to two years.
April 14, 2006: Data retention proposals surface in Colorado and
the U.S. Congress.
April 20, 2006: Attorney General Alberto Gonzales says data
retention "must be addressed."
April 28, 2006: Democrat proposes data retention amendment,
followed by a Republican.
May 26, 2006: Gonzales and FBI Director Robert Mueller pressure
Internet and telecom companies.
September 26, 2006: Politicians suggest that Web hosts and
registrars might have to comply. Search engines are also mentioned.
January 18, 2007: Gonzales says administration will ask Congress
for new laws.
February 6, 2007: Republicans introduce mandatory data retention
"Safety Act."
The Justice Department's request for information about compliance
costs echoes a decade-ago debate over wiretapping digital
telephones, which led to the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law
Enforcement Act. To reduce opposition by telephone companies,
Congress set aside $500 million for reimbursement and the
legislation easily cleared both chambers by voice votes.
Once Internet providers come up with specific figures, privacy
advocates worry, Congress will offer to write a generous check to
cover all compliance costs and the process will repeat itself.
The Justice Department did not respond to a request for comment on
Thursday. The U.S. Internet Service Provider Association, which has
been critical of data retention proposals before, declined to comment.
Because the Justice Department did not circulate a written proposal
at the private meeting, it's difficult to gauge the effects on Web
sites that would be forced to record information on image uploads
for two years. Meeting participants said that Justice officials
(including Brand, the assistant attorney general for legal policy
and a former White House attorney) did not answer questions about
anonymously posted content and whether text comments on a blog
would qualify for retention.
In practice, some Web businesses already make it a practice to
store personal information forever. Google stores search terms
indefinitely, for instance, while AOL says it deletes them after 30
days.
David Weekly, a San Francisco-area entrepreneur who founded popular
Wiki-creation site PBWiki.com, said the Justice Department's
proposal would be routinely evaded by people who use overseas sites
to upload images. (PBWiki, which recently raised $2 million from
Mohr Davidow Ventures, lets people embed photographs on pages they
create with a point-and-click editor.)
If the proposal were to become law, PBWiki would already be in
compliance, Weekly said. "We already keep all that data pretty much
indefinitely because it's invaluable for us to mine and figure out
how people use services," he said. "How do they use services now
versus a year ago? Was February a bad month for traffic?...We
already have the data there. It's already searchable. It's already
indexed."
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