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U.S. Wants to Open Web to World
Wednesday, October 30, 2002
By Kelley Beaucar Vlahos


WASHINGTON � The U.S. government wants to ensure that people living under the world's most repressive regimes have unfettered access to the Internet. Reps. Christopher Cox, R-Calif., and Tom Lantos, D-Calif., have joined Sens. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and John Kyl, R-Ariz., to introduce legislation that would create an Office of Global Internet Freedom to help people in countries like China and Saudi Arabia circumvent tight restrictions on their Internet access. "The development and implementation of technologies to defeat the Internet jamming and censorship are a logical next step in the struggle to defend human rights abroad," Lantos said when the legislation was introduced earlier this month. The new office, which would be funded with anywhere from $30 million to $50 million in taxpayer dollars, would help deploy existing software to Internet companies so that they can work around jamming technology and firewalls employed by governments to restrict access, said officials. The legislation is garnering tentative support from human rights observers and Internet privacy watchdogs, who say they back it as long as the United States does not engage in its own "filtering" of the Internet for use as a propaganda machine, a strategy that officials flatly deny wanting to employ.

"It would seem silly to have an office that wants to keep the Internet open engaging in filtering," said Chris Hoofnagle, legislative counsel for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a Washington, D.C., Internet privacy watchdog.

*****Now, tell me why I shouldn't be concerned for my own internet freedom?????*******

posted by An Old Curmudgeon 7:33 AM

 

Net providers snub UK data demands
Tuesday, October 22, 2002 Posted: 1616 GMT
LONDON, England (Reuters) --

The Internet industry has dealt a blow to Britain's tough anti-terrorism legislation by refusing to reveal personal cyber-data to police. It has turned down a request from Home Secretary David Blunkett to allow police and intelligence officers to access the personal records of their customers on request without the approval of a judge. The government's plans have drawn fire from civil liberties campaigners. "Millions of innocent users of telephone, email and internet will have their private communications information and their movements stored on the off chance it might be of use in the future," said Roger Bingham from Liberty, a civil liberties lobby group.

Blunkett's anti-terrorism surveillance plans urge Internet providers to store the personal information of British web and email users for longer periods of time. They also urge the Internet providers to make this personal information accessible to intelligence and law enforcement agencies, without seeking judicial approval. "Data retention is not intended to infringe the privacy of the law-abiding citizen but is designed to ensure that terrorism is in no way assisted by the developing technologies," said a Home Office spokesman. The Internet Service Providers Association (ISPA) are key players in the dispute and have told their members not to comply with the government's request, which they feel violates the Data Protection Act, 1998. "We do not feel we can recommend Internet Service Providers voluntarily to comply with the government's proposed code of practice," an ISPA spokesman told Reuters.

"There are other laws such as the Regulation Investigatory Powers Act, 2000 where law enforcement agencies can ask for personal information on approval by a judge." The Retention of Data legislation is a vital part of the government's Anti-Terrorism Crime and Security (ATCS) Bill, which was introduced as emergency legislation following the attacks on the United States on 11th September 2001. After the initial introduction of the bill last November, the Home Secretary is now trying to come to an agreement with the ISPA about adequate legislation. "Talks have not broken down with the government, there's a meeting scheduled between the ISPA and the Home Office next week," said an ISPA spokesman. "We support the broad aims of Government's Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act."

posted by An Old Curmudgeon 4:19 AM

 

�The Central Intelligence Agency owns everyone of any significance in the major media.�
William Colby, former CIA Director.

posted by Lorenzo 7:58 AM

 

Military Filming Protesters at D.C. Demonstrations (27-29 September 2002)
The above link will take you to a page on The Memory Hole where there are pictures of the U.S. Military photographing protesters at a peace rally in Washington, D.C. There was a time in Mythical America when the police departments in cities were responsible for targeting civilian activities the government found unacceptable. Now the true nature of the military junta that has taken over this country is fully evident ... marshal law can't be far away now.

posted by Lorenzo 6:51 AM

 

Lawrence Lessig's Supreme Showdown
(Steven Levy, Wired.com, October 2002)
In Eldred v. Ashcroft, his first argument before the Supreme Court � and only his second appearance before any court, in any venue � Lessig will attempt to convince the justices to overturn the 1998 Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act. To Lessig it is both an opportunity to make up for losing the prize that was snatched from him some four years ago, and a giant step in his crusade to stop a trend he fears may be inevitable: big-media dinosaurs controlling the Internet. . . . Today, Lessig is talking about the regulation of speech. He considers naive those who believe that the very existence of the Internet ensures free speech. That may have been part of the original Net code, he argues, but regulation may well disable that code. The freedom of the Internet didn't do much for Napster, did it? We may snicker that Congress is clueless, and chortle over the follies of record labels trying to catch up to the digital world. However, their laws and lawsuits have the potential to ruin the most idealistic aspects of the Net. Lessig believes it's already happening. . . . It's not just a vision he's promoting � it's a cause. His speech and his slides tell his Harvard audience the story of a valued commons of ideas threatened by big powers. The vast majority of intellectual property used to be in the public domain; now most is available only by permission. He takes particular delight in singling out the Walt Disney Company as the symbol of how the past is using its power to kill the future. . . . Because of the Bono Act, Lessig asserts, "no one can do to Disney as Disney did to the Brothers Grimm."

posted by Lorenzo 5:26 PM

 

Department of Education to Delete Years of Research From Its Website
(The Memory Hole)
The US Department of Education is in the process of overhauling its Website. One of its main goals is to remove reports, research, statistics, etc. published before 2001, especially material that doesn't support the Bush Administration's approach to education. However, The Memory Hole will be preserving much of this material. . . . The popular digests put out by the Educational Resources Information Center make up one big chunk of data that may soon disappear from ed.gov. ERIC, the 30-year-old data-collection center of the education world, produces about 160 digests a year from its 16 informational clearinghouses. The four-page briefing papers on "hot topics" address everything from class size to bilingual education. . . . This is the very definition of George Orwell's memory hole--destroying material that conflicts with the current political climate.

posted by Lorenzo 4:46 PM

 

Censorship In Paradise: New Zealand Thought Police Seize Books From Loompanics
(Russ Kick, Loompanics.com)
The government of New Zealand has decided that publications from Loompanics are not welcome in the country, and it's currently persecuting a married couple for the �crime� of ordering some books. . . . Movies must be approved by a government body before they can be released. Books aren't subject to that level of suppression, but the situation is still ugly. You see, New Zealand has a governmental agency called the Office of Film and Literature Classification, created by a 1993 law which unified the previous three agencies in charge of suppressing various media. Although the Office's name is classic Orwellian doublespeak, the title of the agency's head is hilariously forthright: Chief Censor of Film and Literature. . . . Among the media it �classifies� are �films, videos, magazines, computer discs, video games, CD-ROMs, printed clothing [e.g., tee-shirts], posters, sound recordings and playing cards.� . . . A book is assumed to be objectionable until the publisher or bookseller can prove that it's safe for the populace. Although written material doesn't have to be classified before being released, any government body or private citizen can request that a publication be reviewed. . . . Their third, fateful order was to Loompanics for Psychedelic Chemistry by Michael Valentine Smith. But that package isn't what showed up on their doorstep. On February 1, 2002, at 6:30 in the morning, five Customs officers climbed the front gate and pounded on the Setters' door. Once inside, the kiwi feds searched the place. �When we asked what was the reason for the search warrant,� John says, �the one in charge asked us if we knew a company called 'Loompanics' (apparently well known by New Zealand Customs) and mentioned the book Psychedelic Chemistry, ordered in my name, as the cause for the raid.� . . . The agents also snatched some issues of Cannabis Culture magazine, which is legal, surprisingly enough; a vaporizer, a device for inhaling the active compounds from �herbs�; the Setters' laptop computer; and three pot plants, which were basically treated as no big deal. For possession of cannabis, John paid a mere $350 fine (that's New Zealand dollars; in US currency, the fine was $155). It would appear that the Setters are in much more trouble with the State for the books they read than for the marijuana they owned. (Interesting side note: Although the authorities seized three pot plants, Daniela says that when the evidence was presented in court, it had mysteriously shrunk to two plants. This commonly happens to drugs that are seized.) . . . Let's emphasize one of the lessons we've learned about New Zealand: If you get caught with three marijuana plants, you will pay a $350 fine. If you get caught with three books about marijuana, you will pay a $6,000 fine. Kiwi tokers, if they're prudent, may want to stick to just smoking the stuff rather than reading about it. . . . the Thought Police in New Zealand have their heads up their asses. No matter how balmy and beautiful the locale, this is the preferred position for all censors.

posted by Lorenzo 4:08 PM

 

ACLU seeks protection for government cybercritics
Wednesday, October 02, 2002
By Michael A. Fuoco, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

In a case that could have free speech ramifications for the Internet, the American Civil Liberties Union asked the Pennsylvania Supreme Court yesterday to protect the anonymity of cyberspace critics of public officials. In a legal brief appealing an Allegheny County court ruling in a defamation case, the national and Pittsburgh offices of the ACLU asked the court to require plaintiffs in such lawsuits to prove they have suffered economic harm before they can learn the identities of their critics.

"The importance of anonymous speech can't be overstated," said Witold Walczak, Pittsburgh ACLU executive director and one of the attorneys for the defendant, who is known as "John Doe" to protect his identity. "All you need to do is look at all the important political and literary documents published pseudonymously, whether it was Thomas Paine's 'Common Sense' or 'The Federalist Papers' or Mark Twain.

"Unless the freedom to criticize anonymously is safeguarded, a vital democratizing element of the Internet will be lost."

posted by An Old Curmudgeon 11:40 AM

 

Police try to ban WTO protest web pages
The World Today - Tuesday, October 1, 2002 12:15

ELEANOR HALL: Confrontation between the government and anti-globalisation protestors has already begun, as Sydney prepares to host the World Trade Organisation meeting in November. Huge and often violent protests have been a regular feature of international business and trade meetings in recent years with the organisers using the Internet as a key planning device. Today, the New South Wales Police Minister has signalled he is determined to ban a number of protest sites which call for violent disruption of the Sydney summit. But as Jo Mazzocchi reports, that's angered Internet users and civil liberties groups which warn of a sinister agenda by the government, particularly with looming changes to some of the Federal laws governing web sites.

posted by An Old Curmudgeon 6:22 AM