| Submit your comments on this article |
| Science & Technology |
| Web sites must keep records of who uploads photographs or videos |
| 2007-03-07 |
| 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. 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. 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... Next up, a new law that mandates that photo copies of the Internet be provided to the government. |
| Posted by:Anonymoose |
| #9 Sounds like an excellent business opportunity - I don't guess that mini-island in the English Channel is still available, but some cash-poor government somewhere would have to be desirous of being the host country for half the world's internet addresses in exchange for not cooperating with the US (or France) on internet control. (Look what Liberia and Panama have done for the shipping industry!) |
| Posted by: Glenmore 2007-03-07 18:20 |
| #8 .com went underground just in time! |
| Posted by: Frank G 2007-03-07 18:17 |
| #7 No more surfing certain sites for me...(Hey! Get your mind outta' the gutter; I was thinkin' about the "conservative" sites which will no doubt be labelled as "porn" by certain portions of the government). (And I have never, ever, visited a porn site - and I have a bridge to sell you (being single, unattached, and not dead in my lower extremities (not to mention extremely fond of the female body))). :-) |
| Posted by: FOTSGreg 2007-03-07 18:10 |
| #6 too hbell with the justice dept, i'm more worried about my wife finding the porn |
| Posted by: sinse 2007-03-07 17:45 |
| #5 In response, I'm uploaded pictures of the Justice department banging donkeys. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2007-03-07 17:16 |
| #4 Hey, I'm absolutely positively .100% sure it will only be used to bust pedophiles. |
| Posted by: gorb 2007-03-07 16:38 |
| #3 uploads photographs or videos in case police determine the content is illegal and choose to investigate In other words, the 5th ammendment and the 4th ammendment no longer apply. |
| Posted by: Deacon Blues 2007-03-07 16:36 |
| #2 All in preparation for the day, soon to come, when everything is illegal. |
| Posted by: Master of Obvious 2007-03-07 16:16 |
| #1 Dumbest idea I've heard in a LONG time. And what about fauxtography?>Is a fauxtograph the same as a photograph?+Who's responsible for the Photoshop? = HOW WILL WE PROTECT THE CHILDREN???? |
| Posted by: Scooter McGruder 2007-03-07 16:16 |