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Michigan May Outlaw Anonymity Online
John Q .Public writes "The Detroit Free press is reporting in this article attempts by Law enforcement in Wayne County and the Michigan State Legislature to require ISP's doing business there to verify all e-mail addresses with valid phone numbers or credit cards. One free ISP already is willing to log all phone numbers for access by the police." That free ISP is K-Mart's BlueLight.com, which is just, in their words, "being a good corporate citizen." I'm sure they'll be very successful at identifying everyone except the criminals.
...but BlueLight is no longer free. See here for the details.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
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WolfSkunks for a better Linux Kernel
$Stalag99{"URL"}="http://stalag99.keenspace.com";
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# Canmephians for a better Linux Kernel
$Stalag99{"URL"}="http://stalag99.net";
Oh great, now for all us good citizens out there who actually use the internet properly (well, mostly) are required to give them our phone number? I hope there's nothing in those contracts about them giving our phone numbers out to telemarketers. I certainly don't want spam for dinner every night.
Kurdt
Kurdt
I'm not anti-social. Just pro-technology.
even if *they* aren't it looks like other places have to agree too. Problem here is that just b/c an ISP has your # linked to an email doesn't mean it is going to solve anything...
it isn't going to do any good anyway.
How is access to information about the ISP going to be of any use if these guys are using anonymous remailers or even hotmail? How about hushmail? If these guys are using P2P encrypted anonymous email accounts to trade illegal materials, ISP information isn't really going to be of much use, is it?
I mean, good luck catching the people making ISP. I'm all for punishing child abusers, but this just isn't a very effective way of doing it.
They're probably already logging the telephone number you're dialing in from anyway. Caller ID was standard with PRIs so I would think anyone dialing up to ISDN or 56K lines would have their number logged by the ISP's accounting software. Now, whether or not you can block it on your end is another thing. I didn't see much use in logging that info except if we were to have to deal with a script kiddie on our dialups. When the feds come knocking on your door it is nice to be able to give them a number so they get off your back.
Right!
Maybe the cops can nab Microsoft with their hands in everyone's pockets. Otherwise there is no purpose to this unless....
the cops are going to act as collection agencies for the ISPs.
I always thought the usual relationship between criminals and computers was criminals stealing computers.
...while there is Hotmail, yahoo mail, and all of the uncountable infinity of other free web-based email services out there? Are they going to require these services to demand a phone# as well, or am I missing something?
I game, therefore I am...
In fact, it's even more of a pain! If someone forges your account name and spams, you get a bunch of hate mail and have to put in a .procmailrc to send off a response saying "It wasn't me."
But in this scenario, if someone uses YOUR phone number on registration and does anything illegal, suddenly the jackboot thugs are kicking in your door. The affidavit for a search warrant is only as good as the information contained, and if you have to rely on an ISP for that info, it's easily subverted through misinformation or cracking. Essentially, it's making the ISP a witness with no ability to confront them and argue it except AFTER all your computer equipment has been confiscated.
That's the end of the new economy, folks.
:))
Now, it's just a digital piece of the old economy.
When I shop and communicate online, it is not more convenient than going to the store or making a phone call. It is sometimes faster, sometimes cheaper, and it is always more anonymous.
Let's say you want to order, say, satanic texts. You can go to the bookstore, but then your neighbors might see you do it. Especially if you are well known. If you go on the internet it might take 6 weeks, but nobody will see you do it. They might get a record of it, but you won't have to make any kind of public action, like going into an occult bookstore, that would make people even think to do it.
It's a situational, social kind of anonymity you get on the Internet.
Registration of every email address will destroy the avatars, the characters, the pirates, the trolls, and everybody else who uses situational, social anonymity.
Crime comes from anonymity, but so does creativity, innovation, and the courage to try new things. I know this from experience.
Goat sex free since 2001
I wonder... is this really that much different from someone using an anonymous postal dropbox, and paying cash for it? If the MI police force gets their way, where will it end? I'm simply at a loss for words.
The Misanthropic Bitch has an interesting essay about why laws against child pornography are exactly like 1984 . Unfortunately, I feel that it's nearly impossible to have a civilized discussion about child pornography since emotions tend to run so high on this issue. "We have to do this for the children! Save the children! Won't somebody please think about the children?"
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We have fought the AC's, and they have won.
Should those of us not in Wayne County be affected by its law enforcement measures? Of course not--they're not accountable to the rest of Americans. These issues should be resolved by nationally elected officials (if they're dealt with at all). I don't think that this could ever withstand national scrutiny; they'd be forced to deal with the real issues of privacy that are so casually dismissed in Wayne County.
For that matter, questions of anonymity online might be best dealt with by an international commission (for uniformity in dealing with supoened server logs, etc.). Of course, considering how much stricter European privacy laws are, that would be bad news for the FBI. I somehow doubt the USA is likely to listen to the rest of the world, but at the very least we should not let a few vigilantes in Wayne County set our privacy policy.
now, i'm all for finding and busting child pornographers, but this statement was ridiculous:
"This has nothing to do with free speech, but everything to do with giving law enforcement the tools they need to do their job in the information age."
how in the world do they justify saying that this has nothing to do with free speech? free services that do not require credit cards or phone numbers make email accessible to people who, through one reason or another, might not have *either.* but those people are not criminals and shouldn't be punished just because some fiend out there happens to use the same service. i know a squatter in ann arbor with no phone who needs to have an email address - is she now going to be cut off because of the short sightedness of law enforcement officials?
it is also relatively pointless to attempt to track user information to get to child pornographers, since REAL childporn mongerers have very well developed aliases and can hide in a ton different ways - a fake address, phone number, or credit card number can be provided.
too bad the law is just too blind to see where they're messing up.
What we need is something that I've only seen mentioned about other countries a couple of times (mostly in connection with one of the infamous virus writers) is pre-payed ineternet cards, similar to pre-payed phone cards. You go to the local K-Mart (oops, make that Walmart) and pick up a card good for 100 hours of Internet time. You're given a dialup number, a username and a password... all good for 100 hours. After that time you buy another card.
Thegreat thing about this is, no names. They don't have your name, they don't have your credit card number, they don't have your address, they don't have you SS#; they don't have anything. The only problem with it is that they can still, if they want to, track your phone number using caller ID. I suppose a legal solution to this (assuming we're not into Blue Boxes here) is to simply call the phone company and ask for that twenty dollars a month (or whatever the fee is) service which blocks caller ID from identifying your phone. Or, if you want, you can do it for free by dialing *67. And hell, since it's your computer dialing every time, not you, you can simply add it the beginning of the dialup number the first time and forget it.
Instant quasi anonymous internet usage. The flaw is that the ISPs could, if they wanted, not accept phone calls from blocked customers... but why would they bother?
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RumorsDaily
There's a bluelight special on identity rape. Bring your credit cards and phone numbers to ailse nine. Ash, you're needed in housewares.
BlueLight is out of that business and others are dying off or starting to charge. The fact is, free ISPs are learning what a lot of free web sites are learning. They are learning that it is tough to get all the revenue you need from internet advertising. Unless you are really big (CNN, Yahoo) you can't charge enough. Without the expensive software, services, and ad network that somone like RealMedia's OpenAdStream or DoubleClick provide it is difficult to make money selling internet ads. Your only hope is to have a great programming staff and ad sales people. Most companies are unable to create these necessities due to stupidity or lack of funds or both. This throws you back into the arms of Internet advertising companies. If you finally don't have money for them, you are screwed.
I think that the free internet will explode again when consumer bandwidth increases. When the average user has a 500Kb/s connection, the possiblities open up. This includes the advertising possiblities. I think that large interactive ads will be thrown in the way of the information the user wants, forcing them to sit through it. No ignoring the banners. More sites will use in house based ad servers to work around ad blocking software (block the ad, block the story). Articles will be unreachable without going through the ads. This type of advertising will bring success rates closer to television ads and thus raise rates and bring back the financial feasiblity of free internet businesses.
-- soldack
In other anti-liberal alarmist news: Ban streets! They're used, every day, by child pornographers to seek out underage prostitutes. Even now, as I write this, at least two child prostitutes are being abused via the medium of the public roadway, where they sell their service. Since the new "road" technology was introduced, a couple millennia ago, pedophelia has boomed, adopting the (not particularly informational) "superhighway" as its home. Unless we eliminate all roadways and sidewalks, there'll be no way to stop pedophiles from seeking out new victims. Advocation of free, anonymous access to roads is advocation of pedophelia, itself. Road and Sidewalk licenses will make America a happier, safer society. When the police take your mugshot, finger prints and name every time you walk outside your house, you'll know that your safe from the scourge of pedophelia, that public walkways so readily propagate.
> "These free services can be a haven for child pornographers."
I'm bad at math. Can someone please help me? Have I transcribed a digit wrong in the following equation:
Free e-mail = child pornography
I've done some simple regression analysis based on the above and have derived some more formulas that may be of interest to the population at large. They include:
cars = drunk driving
parents = child abuse
video games = 13-year-old killing machines
Please, spread the word. The math just works!.
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Sure, Michigan looks like a vanguard in this area, but it won't last for long.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
Why else would they call it bluelight.com?
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Freeper Logic
- Michigan suddenly having lots less ISP's willing to do business in the state. Onerous data collection and retention requirements that can be nicely bypassed by moving to a bordering state aren't exactly brilliant courtship moves towards commerce.
Another proud carrier of the $rtbl flag
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I was under the impression that anonymous communication is not an absolute right. It is a right such as privacy which have are limits. That is why, in the USA there are threshold requirements for search warrants. Recently a judge in Penn. set requirements for the release of user identification information -- similar to the requirements of a restraining order.
Anonymous communications allow you to speak out without fear of retribution, but it should not shield you from illegal activity. But then, the issue of what is illegal, talking bad about a communist government is illegal in that country, but not in another.
Linking a telphone number to a email account is not always effective. Who says that phone number has to belong to the person? Airport lounges, dealership witing rooms all have phones for people to use. What if the person sets up the account from a friends house? BTW> Hotmails sends the originiating IP with each email.
Fight Spammers!
I occaisionally post anonymously. Therefore, I must be a child pornographer.
On other occaisions, I employ strong cryptography. (OK, I use PGP now and then. . .) Thus, I must be a terrorist
Worse yet, I subscribe to such subversive beliefs such as "the Bill of Rights actually mean something", the HIGHLY politically incorrect concept of personal responsibility, I home-school my children, and perhaps worst of all, own a firearm.
At the rate things are going, I'm practically World War Three in a single package. I should march to the local police station, and turn myself in. After all, it's for the best interests of the children, and for the safety of society. . .
And make the net the same kind of crap that TV is. Give me back Citadel BBS's!!!
Another proud carrier of the $rtbl flag
1. Anonymous remailers such as Mixmaster
2. Open wireless
3. Zeroknowledge Freedom
It really bugs some people when they can't locate which door to kick in, doesn't it?
This has to be wrong...It says in the article that it is a democrat that wants to do this and we know that can't be correct. It is the republicans who want to take all our rights away!
the unbeliever
aim:dasubergeek99
yahoo!:blackrose91
ICQ:1741281
If you read the article, you'll see that the legislation is proposed. The title of the slashdot story implicates that the law has already been passed, and there is no time to avoid it. ;)
If you are not happy with this, don't just rant on a discussion board - write your congresspeople - state and national - and let them know your feelings. If you don't want to support "the man" with a 34-cent stamp, they all have email addresses, linked from the US Congress page.
A little more discretion in the story titles could save a lot of hot, uninformed comments. (For those who don't bother to read the article, that is!
The only people suffering from the proposed new laws would be the average law-abiding Internet citizen. The free ISPs will see a drop in subscribership as well. How many of you would honestly give away a credit card number or your home phone number to a free ISP, who's business model is based entirely on showing you advertisements? Child pornographers and Internet drug dealers will undoubtedly beat the system anyway, maintaining their anonynimity.
One easy way that I can think of to do this will be to buy a prepaid cell phone. Not one of those monthly subscription-based prepaid cell phones like AT&T offer, but more of the scratch-off recharge card variety. Sure, your Internet account may be traceable to a phone number, but that phone number won't be traceable to anybody.
The crooks win, the average person looses, and the law enforcement agencies realize what fools they've been when they realize the phone number on the free ISP account doesn't lead anywhere.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
First of all I want to point out that this is PROPOSED legislation. It doesn't mean it's law, yet, and it doesn't even mean the Michigan legislators are likely to consider it. It's just a crackpot idea somebody came up with.
Also, the proposal only applies to free providers -- so your local dialup won't be affected by this.
And lastly, this would never work. They're asking providers to keep valid credit card numbers or phone numbers on every one of their subscribers. First of all, what is to stop someone from using a fake phone or credit card number? The provider would have to physically call every single number, or trace every single credit card number, to verify them. Most free providers I can think of are not going to be too happy about needing to put so many resources to such a useless task.
And while Michigan has made some stupid decisions in the past, I have faith in its legislature that this idea will not go through; at least, not in its current form.
kugano
Well, this just makes me glad that I don't live in Michigan. However, if a law such as this were to pass it could set a dangerous precedent that other states will follow. I personally like the certain amount of anonimity that the internet affords, and I really don't want some law enforcement official to know that it was me who accessed the Natalie Portman Grits pr0n site.
Tracking people online is rathe similar to a police officer tailing you around out in the real world. Do police tail everybody in the real world, watching their every move to see if they are committing a crime? Of course not. The only tail the criminals or suspected criminals. So, why should it be any different online? Why should they be allowed to track everybody online. As the news post said, this law will most likely just identify everybody except for the criminals. This law sucks. If you live in Michigan I urge you to write your state legislature expressing your displeasure at such a law.
Geez... Next thing you know we'll be living in the UK where they screen all communications and insurance companies use genetic testing. ;)
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If Murphy's Law can go wrong, it will.
That's the end of the new economy, folks.
:))
Now, it's just a digital piece of the old economy.
When I shop and communicate online, it is not more convenient than going to the store or making a phone call. It is sometimes faster, sometimes cheaper, and it is always more anonymous.
Let's say you want to order, say, satanic texts. You can go to the bookstore, but then your neighbors might see you do it. Especially if you are well known. If you go on the internet it might take 6 weeks, but nobody will see you do it. They might get a record of it, but you won't have to make any kind of public action, like going into an occult bookstore, that would make people even think to do it.
It's a situational, social kind of anonymity you get on the Internet.
Registration of every email address will destroy the avatars, the characters, the pirates, the trolls, and everybody else who uses situational, social anonymity.
Crime comes from anonymity, but so does creativity, innovation, and the courage to try new things. I know this from experience.
Think I'm trolling? Just look at some of the absolutely lame excuses people use to avoid being accountable. Don't give me any of this freedom of speech rhetoric either, because everyone with an ounce of sense knows that utter freedom is a disaster within a group of people as accustomed to lying, cheating and stealing without pennance as the first world countries of this planet have become. In this world, you give anyone from a snot-nosed kid to snot-nosed adult an inch and they will be most sure to take it ten miles.
What it boils down to is that things are reaching a point where overly restrictive and intrusive snooping mechanism is a borderline necessity as a way of yanking the chain of those who screw everyone else endlessly without repercussions because the mashed potato legal system in any developed nation allows it to happen time and time and time again. Considering the choir I'm currently preaching to, I have no doubt that any responses to this will contain the words "Nazi", "Orwellian" or "fascist", but I'm so fucking sick of having my house and car vandalized (as an example) by people who know goddamn well that being caught red-handed carries absolutely no penalty that I'm willing to sacrifice a certain measure of freedom in the short term in order to get a good night's sleep. If you want someone to blame for the repeated attempts to compromise small pieces of your supposed freedom, I encourage you to look directly in the mirror.
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Slashdot: News For Zealots. Stuff That's Hypocritical.
I think that the free internet will explode again when consumer bandwidth increases. When the average user has a 500Kb/s connection, the possiblities open up.
I think so too, but in the other direction. When people have cheap, high speed internet at home, they will start to run their own servers. Since they expenses are already paid, they don't need to generate income for their site and/or bandwith, and can focus on meaningful content. I don't think it will be easy for the big companies to create extremely flashy sites with little content, using unavoidable ads, to compete with the content-rich home user. Of course, the home user can never dream to built a site like CNN's, but like you said, CNN can afford not to have unavoidable ads, because they get enough hits (and their content is relatively cheap because the research has already been done for their TV channels).
For example, I run a rec.puzzles archive at home, no banners, no ads, simple makeup, just the content. Bandwith is limited, but will undoubtedly increase in the future. My bandwith requirements (due to lack of images) stay modest. Somebody with a commercial site, with similar content as mine is going to have a hard time getting viewers if they force the user to download tons of annoying ads before they can view the content.
It also doesn't matter that a big company can through money around to lure viewers to their site, because Google will advertise mine for free.
A) for non-free ISPs, if I don't pay my bill, they should be able to contact me, and if it goes to a collection agency, that agency should also be able to contact me
B) the information can be released to the authorities with a subpoena
It must NOT EVER be sold to ANY third party, or otherwise be made available to ANYONE.
The idea here is that it's easier to track down people who do break the law. If you aren't breaking the law, then only your own ISP has the information, which I don't think is unreasonable at all.
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$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
so, if i haven't got an e-mail address i can't use the internet? hum. or the other way around, if i don't have a phone i can't use the internet? !nerds are weirdos.
Should those of us not in Wayne County be affected by its law enforcement measures? Of course not--they're not accountable to the rest of Americans. These issues should be resolved by nationally elected officials (if they're dealt with at all). I don't think that this could ever withstand national scrutiny; they'd be forced to deal with the real issues of privacy that are so casually dismissed in Wayne County.
But there is a beautiful outcome to this. Should this pass, then it only effects ISP's based in Michigan. ISP's in other states will not have this silly law. People can then choose to use other ISP's or the ISP's can move across the border into Canada/Ohio..et cetera. My fear is that if this were considered at the national level, such legislation would pass anyway.
On another note, each state has differing levels of Constitutional protection for anonymity and privacy. (I actually believe Michigan's Constitution is much more protective of privacy than other state Constitution.) Each state will have different laws...and then people can choose whatever fits their needs.
The radius protocol allows the logging of the CSID (calling station ID - your phone number) along with the IP address you are given and your username. This information is sent to the radius servers after you have been authenticated and are connected to a dialup session, and then logged. Collecting and logging this information is the default configuration for most radius servers and NAS's (network access servers - modem pools.)
It is important that most ISP's collect this information because it is the only way to track you down if you are doing something illegal or against their usage policy (such as spam.) We whine about spam enough on slashdot, but the only way for ISP's to cut off the users is to prove from these logs that they were the ones that did it. Yes, this information could be used for more sinister purposes, but so could your phone records, credit card purchases, etc.
Free ISP's have an even tougher time though because if they cut off a spammer, the spammer will just create another free account and continue with their game. The only way to stop this is to require some identifying information from the user so that it is more difficult to create multiple accounts when one is shut down. A credit card is a natural choice because it can be verified.
Once again, the potential for abuse exists, but most ISP's these days also have your credit card information (from when you paid) which they can easily match up with the other information I mentioned previously. So, in the end, is it that different than what is already going on? And what do you expect from a FREE ISP? You need to pay for it somehow, and often that is through your demographic information. If you don't like it, go to another ISP and pay cash, you have a choice.
Fundamentally, there is no requirement for anonymity on the Net, If you can guarranty three conditions:
Removing anonymity can be a large benefit to everyone (not just law enforcement), as it creates a much greater threshold of responsibility that is lacking now (and, in my opinion, is very, very bad). But before we do it, you have to guarranty that the beneficial purposes of anonymity aren't going to be lost. Until I see legal bills proposing the above, I'm not interested in people's ideas that we outlaw anonymity. It's a package deal - you want to get rid of (most) anonymity? Give me those rights. Otherwise, no deal.
-Erik
There are always four sides to every story: your side, their side, the truth, and what really happened.
I know the dialin lines for the university of minnesota had the opportunity for ANI when they did their upgrade several years ago. *67 doesn't block that. Be afraid, be very afraid.
Readng this as a European and someone who has worked for (even setup) a very large ISP, I am a little amused by this. EU data protection legislation is indeed considerably stricter than US legislation (if indeed there is any US equivalent in most cases). However EU access for the LEAs (Law Enforcement Authorities) is probably considerably more liberal - maybe its just better codified.
Take an example like Freeserve - the largest UK ISP, based mostly on a pay-as-you-go model (ie call charges). To be able to use anything other than the most basic access you must disclose (or specifically not withhold), the telephone number you are calling from (this is passed to the ISPs equipment by the telco unless you specifically configure your equipment to withhold it). All mail (at least all SMTP sessions) is forced through the ISP mail servers and hence logged (this was apparently bought in as an anti-spam measure and is effective in that spam from this ISP is negligable compared to many of the smaller competitors).
The T&Cs and privacy policy mention Freeserve.com reserves the right to access and disclose individually identifiable information to comply with applicable laws and lawful government requests, to operate its systems properly or to protect itself or its users.
So the EU may have stronger data protection, but there is a well defined process that any LEA can request this sort of data about anyone if they can come up with approriate requirements and convince the people who issue the papers to obtain this information. It also appears, for example, that web logs, which are caught by the transparent proxy caches, would also count as traffic data and so be very easy for an LEA to request
Is this a bad thing... I've tended to assume that controlled LEA access to basic data is a norm, and so find it strange when US people go orbital about this, but are quite happy about companies selling the stuff off for money with no controls... I guess its a cultural issue to some extent
Personally, with due process and control I am happy about the EU situation, although the LEAs (especially in the UK), do try and push things too far in their favour
I'd be curious to see how many people in law enforcement have thier online activity being snooped, and what thier feelings are. Any geeks out there working at an ISP in Wayne County? Does your average employee at an ISP have access to the browsing/posting habits of anyone and everyone using that ISP?
I don't think BlueLight is based in Michigan, or the other free ISPs they pressured.
Far from you being able to choose what laws you operate under, you might end up with all national ISPs operating under the most restrictive laws of all the states.
Regardless, if there were a patchwork of state laws, you might have your rights determined by what state the server is kept in. I'd prefer to have some vague idea of what laws I'm operating under.
Before everyone gets alarmist, let's look at it from the other perspective - what benefits would traceability bring? With freedom comes responsibility. If you say something bad about someone in real life that's not true, then you get sued for libel/slander. Thus, in real life, I have the ability to defend my reputation if you slag me off. On the internet, at present, I don't. In real life, if you distribute abusive material, you get tracked down and arrested. Why should the internet be any different? Just think of all the benefits that would come with knowing that anything you posted on the 'net could be traced back to you. Spamming would become a thing of the past. Some well-known cases of identity theft on newsgroups would never have happened. Junk mail - bye bye. Pirated games - syonara. Suddenly, everyone gets the credit they deserve, or the bad rep they deserve. Everything becomes fair again. All you have to give up to get this is your anonymity. If you're not doing anything wrong, you've got no worries there anyway. If you are, too bad. I don't understand why people feel they have the right to freedom and the right to anonymity. Remember, with freedom comes responsibility. ...He said, in an anonymous posting. :-)
But the CSID is blocked with *67 when it's a local call. And AFAIK, Cisco doesn't have any special mojo with the phone cops. Do they?
CEE5210S The signal SIGHUP was received.
That's ANI (automatic number identification), which is transmitted to owners of toll free numbers regardless of the state of blocking/non-blocking of Caller-ID. The rationale is that if the toll free business is paying for the call, that business is entitled to caller information.
CEE5210S The signal SIGHUP was received.
Of course, with companies, the individual has the ultimate control: he or she need not give the information out to begin with. With "law enforcement", that isn't usually an option. Unlike private transactions, where you can choose to forego some service or product for reasons of privacy, there isn't any choice about giving the police any information they want. If you try to stand on your rights, questions like, "D'ya think anyone's videotaping this?" open your eyes pretty quickly. Whether we as Americans have any rights at all seems to depend on the whim of the judge hearing our case.
I'm not saying, by the way, that I think that international standards are a necessary or sufficient answer to this problem. Ultimately, universal encryption may be the only real solution.
Randall.On a visible but distant shore, a new image of man;
Property law should use #'EQ, not #'EQUAL.
It seems that, every time the subject of pedophiles is raised, everyone must preface their statements with: "I loath pedophiles as much as the next, but..." What do we gain from announcing this? We absolutely should not explain our right to privacy in these terms! We should stop distinguishing ourselves from criminals all the time. We are law abiding citizens who shouldn't have to beg for our rights! It only demeans our position to do so.
Child pornographers are known to hide their evil deeds behind locked doors. Have you ever seen child pornography happening out in public? No! That's because they're at home, safely locked behind evil, evil deadbolt locks where they do unspeakable things. It's time for law enforcement to crack down on the evil doorlock industry for supporting the child pornography industry, and the people who traffic in these tools of the child pornography trade.
What can we do?
1) Write you legislator and ask for law to outlaw the manufacture and trade in doorlocks.
2) Boycott all hardware stores where doorlocks are sold. Be nice about it. Tell them why you are boycotting them, and explain how, by trafficking in doorlocks, they are unwittingly furthering the torture of children, and the destruction of children's lives.
3) Park yourself near the checkout line of said hardware stores, and anytime you see someone headed toward the checkout with a doorlock point at them and, very loudly, shout "Child molester! Child molester! He's got a doorlock!" If they procede with their purchase, follow them into the parking lot shouting the same. Then follow them home, get their address and publish it in the local newspaper and on the web. That should stop them.
4)Start keeping list of everyone you know that uses doorlocks. Ask them what they have to hide.
5)And while we're at it, we need to do away with that Fourth Ammendment thingie, too.
Given that there are several Supreme Court precedents upholding the right to speak anonymously, how can they possibly expect this to survive challenge?
/.
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
So, then because I have fifteen or so friends using email addresses which reside on my box, I will need to register every one of them with the police? Including my SPAM email address?
Spring is here. Don't believe me, look outside!
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I am Moldy.
Why did you think it was called PEDophilia, just like PEDestrians?
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
I wonder what "public forum" legally means on the internet ? What is the definition ? The internet is not owned or governed by "the public". How can there be a "public" forum ?
That the Internet has empowered people like nothing else since the typewriter or printing press...and there are those (in power) that simply don't like it! Look at China...where it was illegal to even possess a typewriter until recently. Law inforcement (read..the MAN) doesn't WANT the "little people" to have the ability to express ourselves to the masses..despite WHAT the constitution says. Look at the government's policy on short wave broadcasting for example. It took (losing)a court case to make the U.S. govt. back down and allow private ownership of shortwave stations. Why? Because the govt. said that "They had the exclusive right broadcast outside U.S. Borders..lest the rest of the world get the 'wrong idea' of how things are in the U.S.". Now we have the 'net..where anyone can put up a web site and virtually ANYONE in the world can see it. This must scare the living shit out of those in power! This has nothing to do with kiddie porn or fraud or anything else. It has to do with POWER. To put things in a nutshell..the genie has been let out of the bottle. Power has been transferred...and those that LOST it want it back! Pure and simple......
geez! does anybody know how to get onto these porno- crackdown police teams?? a pretty educating job!
At least the rest of you in the country don't have to constantly hear about its damned "Internet Crime Task Force", which has 40-year-old deputies online pretending to be 14-year-old nymphomaniacs in order to lure people to Wayne County in order to arrest them.
Every single time they succeed, the TV news trumpets their efforts to "protect your children" to the rooftops, never pointing out how unlikely it is that there are real 14-year-olds out there making arrangments to meet 30 year old out-of-state men they've never seen and never have talked to at hotels for sex...
There's no "we" in team, only "me"
People are entirely valid when they accuse anonymity of protecting criminals. However, its protection is not merely limited to the socially unconscious, it also applies to the thousands of people, who can voice their opinions without fear of violent retribution. Although, the United States constitution does not grant us the freedom of anonymity, it does gaurantee us the right to speech and the right to live without fear. If these rights can only be protected, by allowing citizens to remain nameless than so be it. Until the rise of the internet such anonymity was nearly impossible, being published in a newspaper or magazine could be difficult if your views deviated from that of the publisher. In breaking that sort of freedom you are approaching a complete breech of our rights and freedoms as American Citizens
A rabbit in the hand is worth 4 in the cage
Welcome to reality kiddos, you're not anonymous online no more than you're anonymous walking down the street. Nor should you be.
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This is just a detail, the whole discussion is about outlawing anonymity. It doesn't matter if bluelight is free or cost 2 million a month, this is not what the discussion is about. You can't just dismiss the whole discussion because of an insignificant detail. I guess you must be smarter than everybody on /. because you knew they weren't free anymore. Bravo.
Do we deserve either then?
What I envision happening is a few perps will get busted, then the internet annon idea melts down. Then what? Think these perps will just go away?
IRChat>...Geez d00dz, y got buzted. Whut we gunna do?
IRChat>...Do what we always do, find another way.
From what I understand, these folks wont stop until they are dead. They will just find another way to abuse. Besides, any system that can't be abused isn't worth a damn. Think about it.
I liked the idea about annon cards bought for 100 hours, because things are abused LEGALLY day in and day out. Big Brother is watching.
This mind intentionally left blank.
The KKK a bunch of sheetheads? You decide!
ISP anonymity was a given, anyway.
Using my IP address, timestamp, and a warrant,
the Man can usually 'convince' my ISP to backtrace the IP to a name.
However, there are tools that can provide a decent level of anonymity:
Freedom - Privacy for everyone. Easy to use, relatively fast, and the Linux client is open source.
Based in Canada so Carnivore shouldn't be a problem.
SafeWeb - SSL surfing proxy, so your lan-mates/ISP can't snoop on your traffic.
Anonymous Remailers - MixMaster remailers can provide a very good level of email anonymity.
I don't have a link, but info is pretty easy to find.
There are tons more, these are just a few well-known tools.
--K
You have to take this kind of crap seriously. Be offended by the stupity displayed by the "journalist" who would say something like:
Anyone who has worked at an ISP probably realizes how easy it is to get information on users. Law enforcement is just tired of those pesky warrants and due process and privacy protections. Don't the bleeding hearts and liberty freaks understand what a dangerous, nasty world we live in?
The dream of law enforcement agencies would allow unreasonable search and seizure of httpd logs, radius logs, nfr logs, and anything else they might like to throw into the pot.
The forces of anti-privacy have offered up hackers and pornographers as reasons to give up privacy. I am just afraid that they will be bright enough to use spammers and pull in some of you people.
Legislation is pointless. Zero Knowledge Systems, anonymous, etc, will be impossible to stop. Just get a shell account in the Netherlands for a few bucks and be anonymous from there. The fact that the net has no borders will offer some protection from a clueless/fascist government.
Republicans are Nazis. LetsRiot!
Think about that for a minute.
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First, there are commerce clause issues - what's Michigan doing regulating the interstate operations of the internet? I doubt that most /.ers would be really happy if Michigan were to be slapped down for this reason, as this would imply that the federal government might be allowed to impose this sort of restriction.
Second, there are first amendment issues. Historically, the Supreme Court has held that anonymous speech is protected, in the sense that a law prohibiting anonymous speech (actually pamphlets in one case) simply because it is anonymous, is unconstitutional. This could be strong support for Michigan ISPs who choose not to know the identity of their users; these would almost have to be free ISPs as they couldn't send out bills. (Or, as another poster has pointed out, one can imagine collecting fees through something like calling-card sales).
It won't be a whole lot of help to ISPs who do know the identity of their subscribers but don't want to release it. These, confronted with a search warrant based on suspicion of illegal activity, won't have much choice except to comply. It is this sense that the right to anonymity is not absolute.
Next, we'll have to register our name, address, telephone number and credit card numbers every time we mail a letter. No more anonymously dropping your electric bill payment in the convenient corner mailbox. Or maybe those perverts don't use the US Mail any more.
33 arrests and just 12 convictions in over two years of operation? I don't know how may people are working on this, but it seems like either the problem is vanishingly small or the police working on it are completely inept.
Kudos to NetZero for not complying with an unreasonable demand from a jackbooted thug.
Time for the good citizens of Michigan to vote that asshole out of office.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Excellent point. Thanks for making it.
Don't you hate it when your id is a close match for someone elses?
I completely agree. I don't understand why people are so resistant to having the ability to catch criminals. What they concerned them is the vigilance required to ensure that the laws that one can be punished for remain reasonable.
The internet is public domain. If we obviously want the cops to patrol the streets, shouldn't we want them to protect people on the net as well?
A private conversation on the street is comparable to using PGP and neither is outlawed. However, an illegal verbal act (threatening someone for example) is illegal to do on the street, and should likewise be illegal in a public chatroom.
What are the "slipery slope" issues that I'm missing here? I don't mind if my web traffic is monitored, as long as the info is not used commercially.
-Avi
Of course, this was really only to be expected from K-mart, which tries to have "family friendly" as its middle name. Note that K-mart also promised to start carding for mature-rated computer games last October. (I don't know whether it actually does or not, as I haven't had any mature-rated video games come through my line since then. K-mart seems to card for just about everything else, though--alcohol, cigarettes, lighters, lighter fluid, non-tobacco imitation cigarettes and snuff--that's right, you have to be over 18 to buy shredded mint leaves!--knives, tire irons, even wheel ramps and cans of fix-a-flat--we can't have a little kiddie inflate someone to death, can we?--and so forth.)
--
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
You had to give a valid credit card to your ISP to get an account. Your credit card providor knows your phone number. Law enforcement agencies can find you by this trail. If you selected a reputable ISP they are not going to give out your personal details voluntarily because they want to keep your account. What's the problem? Are you doing something you shouldn't be doing? Why not leave a trail of accountability for your actions on the internet? And for the record, I live in Michigan.
As an Irish citizen, married to a US citizen who was born and bred in Michigan, I have had an outside, yet extra-USA, interest in this State for a few years.
Michigan seems to me to be the most polarised State in the Union: Democrat yet Republican, WASP yet Afro-American, Conserative yet Liberal... it all exits in Michigan.
Klck-klack, klick-klack... the switch is thrown back and forth.
In the 1980's in Britain the Prime Minister, known as Thatcher, used Scotland as a testing ground for social programmes (Poll Tax).
Has Michigan become the "litmus test" State?
Do Michiganders feel that they are being used to test social policies and issues (concealed-carry of firearms as one example) so the Federal government can determine what goes right and wrong in the big picture? Are the corporations (and their legal depts.) following suit?
cheers
front
Of course this is an important issue from the standpoint of individual liberty, but that's not where this plan will fail if it goes through.
These cops are fools or totally bored if they want to become the complaint department for the Internet. Every home user who adopts a firewall for the first time and then starts going through the log files and gets all freaked out is going to start calling them and demanding to know why so and so is "hacking" me and it's your responsibility to arrest this sonofabitch.
On the other side, they'll have somebody running some little app they downloaded off a security site six months ago and totally forgot about who's gonna swear up and down they don't know what this guy is talking about becuase they really don't.
Multiply above times --oh, say ten thousand.
If these silly cops think they've got the man hours to sort that stuff out then maybe they've got too many heads on the payroll. Fact is, cops are like counselors in most situations and they always have to respond to the loudest complainer. If this goes through, they're gonna get a major earful and it's undoubtedly going to result in otherswise needless and potentially violent diputes that they are going to be essentially powerless to resolve. While not being of much assistance, the cops will be highly capable of aggravating the circumstances by bringing the image of armed officers into the fray, thus heightening the paranoia of the conflicting parties who are already feeling defensive because they don't really know the strength of their own arguments.
That's why this isn't going to be implemented for long even if it does pass through the legislature.
Not that I'd be caught dead getting my Internet service from K-Mart anyway.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Imagine if you came across an e-mail discussing an H-Bomb attack on New York. What's the moral thing to do there? Do you alert the government, potentially save a million lives,
You would also have to be careful to examine the context. This could well be part of an play by email wargame. Just because something is discussed does not necessarily mean that the writer is planning or intending to perform the action being discussed.
Hay I'm from the U.K, so according to our government we have no privacy or online rights. Sucks man!
In the UK you use 141 to block CLID.
But most UK ISP's restrict your connection if they don't receive a valid CLID, for example blocking certain ports (nullrouting 110 and 25 is a favourite, no email for you!).
I don't know about the situation in the US, but in the UK (and most of Europe) if you use a free phone number (0800, 0500 et al) then CLID gets sent whether you like it or not. I suppose it's because the company paying for your free phone call have a right to know who's spending their money.
...everybody send me £10.
Once I have around £100,000 I'll set you up a big fat mailserver, using Inmarsat, on a fishing boat in international waters (five miles off the north-west coast of Scotland).
In fact, I'm not sure that the RIP bill is valid in Scotland. We have very different laws from England, so there may be a hole...
s w i n g e r !
First it was make a new bunch of CDs with all the naughty words removed, now this. Gee can't imagine them not selling guns though that would be unamurrican.
Whoa. Someone out there is stepping in the cow dung rather foolishly. :u tion/amdt1.html ...Talley v. California,\166\ the Court struck down an ordinance which
banned all handbills that did not carry the name and address of the
author, printer, and sponsor; conviction for violating the ordinance was
set aside on behalf of one distributing leaflets urging boycotts against
certain merchants because of their employment discrimination. The basis
of the decision is not readily ascertainable. On the one hand, the Court
celebrated anonymity. ``Anonymous pamphlets, leaflets, brochures and
even books have played an important role in the progress of mankind.
Persecuted groups and sects from time to time throughout history have
been able to criticize oppressive practices and laws either anonymously
or not at all . . . . [I]dentification and fear of reprisal might deter
perfectly peaceful discussion of public matters of importance.'
Case study
http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/senate/constit
Someone should have these people write out 10,000 times the Constitution
III.IIVIVIXIIVIVIIIVVIIIIXVIIIXIIIIIIIIVIIIIVVIII
What is is with Michigan and the Bill of Rights? It seems like every other week there is legislation coming out of that frozen waste that tries to do away with a small part of the Constitution, Bill of Rights etc....I'm glad I live somewhere else....
Jaysyn
There is a war going on for your mind.
No kidding. When the K-Mart first went in here (1979-ish, I belive), they took your picture when you wrote a check. Pissed my dad off so much I don't know if he's ever been back.
There's only two songs in me, and I just wrote the third. --TMBG
Gotta agree that that is a distinct possiblity. It really seems the net is being driven towards TV and vice versa. I hope that some parts of the good old net survive but I don't know if it is possible. With respect to your home net, I worry that ISPs are going to continue to limit upstream bandwidth for residential customers to force them into expensive commercial contracts to run servers. AFAIK, @Home has a limit of around 100kb/s for their cable modem service. What is to stop them from dropping it to something like 28.8? Yikes! I used to run a site off of a digital 56kb connection. It sucked...two or four modems (in those days speeds) could max it out.
-- soldack
That's all. Nothing else.
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The (Hopefully) Great Slashdot Blackout
By contrast, modems are symmetric, and the upstream network infrastructure beyond the dial POPs uses symmetric capabilities, so modem ISPs don't have that problem.
Disclaimer: If this were corporate policy, I'd be wearing a suit and tie instead of a t-shirt.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
First off, I find the assumption that everyone and their Metroid has one or more credit cards tiresome... I have zero, and plan on keeping it that way for the foreseeable future. What are these people thinking, asking that email address be matched up with phone numbers/credit card numbers? They want to make things easier for stalkers or what? (crack ISP, pull joe@isp.org's phone number, etc.)
- White Knight of the Order of Mihoshi Enthusiasts
If it were an 800-, 888-, or similar toll-free number (just like 0800, 0500 in the UK), then another service, called ANI (automatic number identification) kicks in, and the recipient always gets the called party's number (barring operator assistance or somesuch).
Does a US nickle (five cents, about 2 1/2p) still work as a 20p coin in the payphones in the UK :)?
CEE5210S The signal SIGHUP was received.
"I stand second to none in supporting Talley's right of free speech -- but not his freedom of anonymity. The Constitution says nothing about freedom of anonymous speech. "
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Free Mac Mini
I mean what about public facilities with internet acess like schools and library's. Are they going to have to keep track of all there users at all times and keep records of who was on when. It'senseless as well because how many criminals use there real name or would pay for internet acess with a credit card when they know they are wanted or are activly commiting crimes. Personally I think this isn't going to catch that many people and is just going to turn into a right to privacy issue.
UTUCDamon: The only sure thing in the future is uncertainty.