Slashdot Mirror
Bookseller Purges Records to Avoid PATRIOT Act
Skyshadow writes "Vermont Bookseller Bear Pond Books has announced that they will purge their sales records at the request of customers . This would effectively sidestep typically insideous a provision of the PATRIOT Act which allows government agencies to secretly seize sales records. The store's co-owner, Michael Katzenberg, put it this way: 'When the CIA comes and asks what you've read because they're suspicious of you, we can't tell them because we don't have it... That's just a basic right, to be able to read what you want without fear that somebody is looking over your shoulder to see what you're reading.' Now if only certain other booksellers would show that same conscience, we might have something here."
Vote some decent congressmen in and maybe we can win the country back!
Does this remind anyone of Farenheit 451? You know, where they burn the books so people won't revolt against the government? This is a similar restriction placed upon our libraries and bookstores that silences any mention of a subpoena for a list of books a certain individual has purchased or borrowed.
I still don't understand how Mr. Ashcroft and his DoJ thugs got PATRIOT through Congress. Oh wait, I forgot! Our US Congress was so freaked out by September 11 and thought that somehow if they took away Americans' right to privacy and freedom from harassment that this world would somehow be a better place!
$DEITY bless $NATION
Where's a HERO tag when you need one?
Aren't you Americans glad you live in such a free country? Aren't you glad your beloved constitution actually MEANS something?
...and don't worry...OUR fun loving Canadian government will follow right along in due course.
Welcome to the NEW New World Order.
The Patriot Act is a violation of what my father fought for in Korea and Vietnam, and what I stood for while in the military.
I am upset that people are associating the Patriot Act with conservatism. Violation of my rights isn't conservative, its facism. Fellow conservatives need to speak up. We DO need some stronger laws and enforcement tools, and I do believe this is a passing problem, but only if we speak up.
Some may compare our current situation to that during the Civil War (oxymoron if there ever was one) when Lincoln suspended Habius Corpus, but I don't feel the two events can be compared in this way. The threat is real, more real than that era, but not as localized.
Until then, destroying sales records is a legal way to not comply with this over reaching Act. Hopefully, others will follow their lead.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
They shouldn't be keeping records about who buys what books in the first place. I know what I buy, and I have the ability to look for new reading material in catalogs, libraries or via social contacts. Why is a bookseller keeping track of my book purchases any better than a government keeping track?
But still, why should I trust this bookseller? Sure, they claim that they won't manage any lists of customer purchases... but how do I, as a customer, know that they don't have some lists somewhere?
And even if they don't have lists, they might have knowledge in their heads or on scraps of paper or whatever. All this is fair game when it comes to the law... perhaps just not as accessible as an explicit list.
I remember when my sister was asked about her former (fired) boss by her new boss. "Don't worry", he said, "we'll seal all this so that you can talk freely".
Nothing was written down. But when the new boss took the stand, he discussed the details of what my sister had said.
So much for records; so much for corporate promises.
The CIA does not, and is not allowed, to opperate within the borders of the united states. It may be the FBI or NSA that comes looking but CIA is strictly for international matters.
And I highly doubt they would be interested in what books a person reads, but that's just me.
charge the bookstore for subverting a law ?
I mean, they're out in the public saying they're knowingly taking steps to hinder a possible request from the Feds for information.
Purging sales records is one way to get a government agency off your back. Unless it's the IRS.
I wonder if the management has thought through all the implications of their new policy.
It wouldn't take much to add a provision (were it passed) to make retention of such records mandatory. Rather like walking in to see a psychologist here (Canada) and asking him/her not to keep records, knowing that they could be subject to subpoena -- they'll tell you they must by law keep records, with certain minimum information.
On another sobering note, in 1983 the Supreme Court of Canada allowed evidence of a newspaper clipping found in an accused's home as sufficiently probative to admit, despite the potential prejudice of propensity evidence -- aka: "See? He's the kind of person who would do this." He had been charged with heroin smuggling from Hong Kong. The article was titled: "The heroin trade moves to Pakistan." This flew in the face of all caselaw on that point, but has been followed since. The lesson being: what you read can be held against you! The case is R. v. Morris [1983] 2 S.C.R. 190, if anyone is interested.
This is overall a great thing, but still an elaborate publicity stunt ;-). I'm pretty surprised that this made /. news, but then again.
--sex
Very popular slashdot journal for adul
I was, as a result of this post, going to create a list on Amazon cataloging a number of books that might make the government look at me a little closer. Little did I know, someone had already done just that :\
Here.[amazon.com]
Anybody remembers that AD that shows how america would have been if everybody was not free? The one that takes place in a library... Where a guy is gonna get arrested...
Remember that???
that some are opposing such horrible violations of our rights. I only hope that they do not pay a terrible price for fighting against this.
The truely sad part of this, is that this is not the worse. This admin has been not only stealing so many of our rights, but also taking away our ability to know what is going on. Public scrutiny of all processes (check and balances) is just as important to prevent abuses.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I think the problem is finding decent congressman. Remember, these people come from the population. The politicians don't suck, the population sucks if this is the best we have to offer. An ignorant population is easy to control. I bet the people who ran out and bought duct tape and plastic think the PATRIOT act is a great idea. Considering what it is the name, "PATRIOT act", makes me want to vomit.
I have com to the the conclusion that in general us Americans give up lots of our rights (think freedom) without a fight for the illusion of protection. We are no better protected than we were before this abomination to our freedom, American politics at its finest.
Think about that while you eat your red, white, and blue cake.
aren't they required to keep logs of the books their customers take out? they can't just delete that information, can they??
"The cup... the drop... it's a YES!"
What's really bad is that it's not a tradeoff. These right restrictions and constitutional violations will not give us extra security.
-Derick
Amendment IX
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Amendment X
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
==
Just because you're not specifically guaranteed the right to privacy anywhere, doesn't mean you don't have it. The only way you _wouldn't_ have it would be if the constitution specifically said, "the federal government shall have the right to invade the private lives of citizens."
--
http://nemilar.net - Not your grandmother's soup kitchen
ISPs and search engines are affected by the Patriot Act also. The authorities can claim that search terms are part of the URL, because they get logged with the URL in normal httpd logging. Therefore they fall under the definition of "routing and addressing" information that is subject to "tap and trace device" scrutiny. Judges are required to approve orders for such scrutiny without a showing of probable cause.
Google saves your cookie ID, your IP number, your search terms, the date and time stamp, and your browser configuration with every search request you make to Google, and Google retains all this data indefinitely, and Google will not comment on their dealings with the authorities.
But this is cool because Google has cute colored letters in their logo, right?
Yet another reason to support your local retailer, instead of some monstrous mega-billion dollar international conglomerate that pays people minimum wages and operates nothing more consumer friendly than giant warehouses wherever rent is cheap. There's no "community" when you buy from these giants. Stroll down to your local bookstore (or any small retail establishment). You'll be surprised at pricing, selection, and customer service.
How about buying from your local bookseller and paying cash?
Prevent email address forgery. Publish SPF records for y
Wow, someone who actually believes this. You should be tranquilized, tagged, and returned to the wild so scientists can study your habits because you are a rare and fascinating aberration.
Here's a brief summary of what the Church Committee came up with in 1975: link. A few select quotes from the article sited:
Here's a fine page with many links to goverment documents such as the Church Committee's and the Rockefeller reports on CIA abuses within the U.S.: link
Now of course all these things are in the past, and the Church report defanged the CIA right? Right? Surely the CIA would never do that again... But it really doesn't matter, as the USA PATRIOT Act gives the CIA pretty much a free hand at intelligence gathering in the US anyway.
-dameron
Also, wouldn't a bookworm terrorist just purchase books in cash and give a false name and zip code? Kind of defeats the whole tracking thing.
That is why the USA PATRIOT act is so stupid... it does very little (if anything at all) to increase security and everything to limit the rights of everyday citizens.
Governments who attempt to have complete control over it's citizens never work out. They fall. I believe America will fall unless Bush 'n pals are taken out of office and we congress gets it's act together.
Real US patriots would never put the USA PATRIOT act into place.
-Derick
Let me be frank with you people, John Ashcroft could care less what you read. There is no clerk in the government right now fishing book sales records looking for the enemy within. Now, you can bet your ass that when they arrested the buffalo 6 they tried to find out what books they checked out from their local library or bought from a local book store. Why? The answer is of course, DUH. If they bought a bunch of books on chemistry that had information that could be used to make bombs, then they had better start busting their asses to figure ot if any had been made and where they went. Meanwhile, you and I have not had our civil liberties infringed one single bit. This is pure scaremongering on the parts of some groups and ignorant fear on the part of others. Ponder this, you have expose a terror cell and don't capture one of them. You find out at the local book store they were buying books on flying small aircraft. Ah ha! You have a lead! The level of paranoia some people have about patriot really perturbs me. Most of the patriot act was an excuse to update federal surveillance and evidence gathering to account for the computer age and also to close various loopholes that kept them from doing some no-brainer stuff. As a customer though, I feel good that a bookstore will toss my records. That is between them and me. However, I feel government should be able to access the records that are there if there is an imperative national security interest. Most of you would agree with that statement, and lo and behold that is what patriot does.
Never overestimate the end user. -jeramy b. smith
Kind of interesting to here about this when I heard on the Screen Savers that eBay is more than willing to hand over any user's information to the goverment without a supeona or court order. Here is a link to the original artical where the senior council for eBay had a close door meeting with cyber crimes divisions of goverment agencies.
All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. --Edmund Burke
Two quick thoughts (in no particular order):
First, I've always personally associated a right to be secure in my person, papers, home and effects (Ammendment 4) to be a reference to privacy of some sort. Maybe I'm just weird.
Second, when thinking about privacy issues we would, I think, do well to distinguish privacy and anonymity.
Never disturb your enemy while he is busy making a mistake.
I am an adminsitrator at a public library and was told to remove all records and log files that contained information about our patrons. The library's board of trustees chose this even though it could cost them government money.
Someone up further on the list spoke eloquently about how John Ashcroft and Gov't clerks don't give a rat's patute (say it phonetically) about what we're reading. Unfortunatly, this isn't true necessarily. I live in Denver, which was mentioned in either the article or the post, and frequent the Tattered Cover. This is the store that had it's rights to preserve records w/o the gov't having a warrant challenged. Fortunatly, they won. However, as with many things, the government found a loophole, the Patriot act. The case here with the Tattered Cover was a person who bought a book that was something to the effect of 'Making Meth in your Basement.' They tried to take records without a warrant once, and it's a slippery slope, in my opinion. Now here's a scary example. Your a highschool or college student, or even a graduated person, who wants to read about chemistry. Either to cram for an exam, or just because. You go down to the bookstore, and buy three textbooks. Suddenly, John Ashcroft is at your door, calling you a terrorist, and taking you to jail. Because you wanted to remember the chemical formula for methane? (CH4) That's a little much to me.
"For I am the Alpha and the Omega, the begining and the end, the first and the last. Wow, this is crazy stuff!"
"Destroy science and religion. Science would re-emerge exactly the same; but not religion." - Penn Jillette, paraphrased
how much of an information about you can be gleaned from Slashdot comments ?
All you goatse terrorists , you better stop.
Siggy Say, Siggy Do
Why not quote the 4th amendment? It's very clear about what circumstances are required for the government to invade your personal life:
Amendment IV The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Indeed, the bookstore records should be considered "papers" and protected, so this whole business of "knocking down stovepipes" between government and private databases is FUCKING UNAMERICAN!
The language of the constitution is so clear and the intentions are so obvious, that it is equally obvious that it has been broken. You have the right to assemble, to say, pray, and publish what you will. You have the right to bear arms. You will not be put upon by the military. The government can't harrass you without real evidence you are a criminal. The court system will not be used to abuse you. You will have a jury if you are sued. Bail will not be used instead of a conviction. You will not be abused in jail. All of these things have been violated recently with perhaps the exception of the 3rd. I'm not aware of any involuntary quartering of troops, unless eminent domain aquisitions for military bases are considered.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
Both parties together represent the ideal combination of ideologies needed to create a system ripe for mass-control of the populace. The Democrats don't really represent the better parts of the left, they represent the worst and same for the Republicans on the Right. IMO our system would be a lot more (Classical) Liberal if it were a 3 way control by the Libertarian, Green and Reform parties.
The people have on paper usually two choices. Two choices isn't a choice, it's a coin flip and a mockery of representative republican values. Both parties have tried for years to convince the public that having 10-190 people officially registered on the ballot is irresponsible because it creates chaos somehow. Having two people on the ballot is akin to having only one choice in most races. Hell in my last congressional election, we had literally only one choice for the House.
The average slashdotter is too sheltered or politically and socially immature to see most of those points. Who here thinks a lot of the Right loves the PATRIOT Act? FreeRepublic is a very right wing website and when the PATRIOT part deux was discussed, no less than 85% of the posts were calling for Bush and Ashcroft's heads on pikes out on 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue if they seriously pushed it.
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
Which politician is man or woman enough to lead the fight to undo these un-American powers? We know that in the Senate only Feingold resisted, although colleagues have become braver since. And yet the nation remains enthralled to right wing fantasies, driven hysterical by an irresponsible administration and its cynical Democratic allies who use fear to control the public as ranchers use cattle prods.
The hour demands a Lincoln; all we have is a Bush! Is there no one in office with love great enough for our freedom to save it?
longer than 3 months. It it's demanded for legal reasons, we don't have it. The deal is that for this to be legally solid, you must maintain the same policy for all users without exception. This means no .pst or .ost (offline outlook folders -oh god now you know I use MS). What's nice is: this forces people to maintain their email, and thus their jobs a little better. Of course, it's not the most popular policy my IT dept offers.
Companies have had this concept for years. Typical document retention policy is "useful life" - for contracts, it'd be life of contract + 6.5 years. For crap records, it's as long is it's relevent, then whack it immediately.
And the reason is simple - all this junk needs to be stored, which costs money, and managed - which costs more money. Then, if someone wants it (and you have it), you have to find it - that's a ton of money... then the lawyers etc. get to review it, and that's a fortune, over a freakin post-it note that would never be used in your favor, meaning at best it won't be used against you in a suit... more often than not, it'll simply provide the cause needed for them to request more documents.
Yick.
help me i've cloned myself and can't remember which one I am
the fact is that everyone good enough for the job either is smart enough to know that they don't want the job, or while more qualified, could easily be smeared to death by the Democrats, Republicans, or anyone else really. People think that US leaders should be exemplary, but get angry if you tell them that Jefferson had slaves and that Washington had a 'hemp garden'. Perhaps if they weren't elected by hypocrites it would be easier to get quality candidates rather than a lesser of two evils.
In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
People whom we help get arrested also bought...
Amendment XI should have been, "Any leader caught violating any of the first 10 amendments shall be set afire as to cause unimaginably painful death."
Perhaps then we wouldn't continuously get ourselves into cycles of Constitution shredding/rebuilding. What's missing from the US Constitution is, quite frankly, consequences. There's no provision for punishing a bad, or abusive sitting government. What's worse, in today's surveillance society, a good old fashion revolution is downright impossible. Since when is it treasonous to save your country from your government?
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
Just wait until Patriot Act THE SEQUEL
IANAL, but as far as I can tell, the Fourth Amendment seems to imply it:
I don't think it is too big of a stretch to apply "papers" to modern electronic records of purchases, medical records, email, etc. If my reasoning is correct, then the Fourth Amendment would not only forbid the CIA from searching our purchase records without a warrant, etc., but it would also forbid something like the Total Information Awareness database.
I think the Fourth Amendment is kind of a sibling to the Fifth Amendment. Whereas the Fifth protects us from having to testify against ourselves, the Fourth protects us from having our bodies, homes, things, and records (including electronic?) testify against us, at least without some kind of due process.
The people who wrote the Constitution had suffered under British rule. They had soldiers forced upon them, living in their homes, going through their things. If the soldiers saw anything suspicious, they would just report it, and that person could be sent to England for trial. (Think about the TIPS program, replace the soldiers with the cable guy, and you have the exact same situation.) These people knew what privacy violation felt like, they had had no privacy, not even in their own homes.
That this right to privacy, to "be secure in our persons, houses, papers and effects", was one of the first to be violated by the Attorney General is reprehensible. That it was violated (and continues to be violated) in the name of "security" is ridiculous. But then, we are living in the times where CNN ("the most trusted name in news" -- what a laugh) has declared that Congress does not believe in the First Amendment. Heck, I'm surprised they let the company execs of Enron, et al, take the Fifth!
"The path of peace is yours to discover for eternity."
Japanese version of "Mothra" (1961)
Every order is organized by year newest to oldest. Every order is clickable to bring up the exact specifics of what was ordered: the number of shipments, the tracking numbers, what was order, it's price, and totals (shipping, tax, subtotal, grand total).
Attack the source problem *cough* Patriot Act *cough* not Amazon.com, BarnesandNoble.com, or whoever you want to smear because of some hivemind mentality.
If you don't want even record of the sale you need not shop at all, online or offline.
There is always going to be some paper trail; no matter if its a reciept, a CC statment, or the cashier remembering you.
A business in this era of consolidation purging it's records, thus disabling itself from selling you more crap in the future via Spam or (at a minimum) junk mail? The only way that would work is if they were only in the business of selling books. That isn't going to happen as long as they can afford a consultant who can whisper fairy tales about that mythic beast "synergy" in the CEO's ear.
Face it. Most businesses these days are not what they claim to be on their signs - booksellers, grocers, bakers. They're many businesses lumped together under one roof that are just as comfortable selling you your morning coffe or a cemetary plot. Thanks to consolidation, only multiheaded hydras survive. And sometimes, the customers suffer instead of benefiting.
"Prepare for the worst - hope for the best."
Is this going to cause Radio Shack to start asking our name, address & phone number again when we purchase a few led lights.
"It comes from a very ancient democracy, you see..."
"You mean, it comes from a world of lizards?"
"No", said Ford, who by this time was a little more rational and coherent than he had been, having finally had the coffee forced down him, "nothing so simple. Nothing anything like so straightforward. On its world, the people are people. The leaders are lizards. The people hate the lizards and the lizards rule the people."
"Odd", said Arthur, "I thought you said it was a democracy."
"I did", said Ford. "It is."
"So", said Arthur, hoping he wasn't sounding ridiculously obtuse, "why don't the people get rid of the lizards?"
"It honestly doesn't occur to them", said Ford. "They've all got the vote, so they all pretty much assume that the government they've voted in more or less approximates to the government they want."
"You mean they actually vote for the lizards?"
"Oh yes", said Ford with a shrug, "of course".
"But", said Arthur, going for the big one again, "why?"
"Because if they didn't vote for a lizard," said Ford, "the wrong lizard might get in. Got any gin?"
"What?"
"I said", said Ford, with an increasing air of urgency creeping into his voice, "have you got any gin?"
"I'll look. Tell me about the lizards."
Ford shrugged again.
"Some people say that the lizards are the best thing that ever happened to them." he said. "They're completely wrong of course, completely and utterly wrong, but someone's got to say it." - Douglas Adams, So long, and thanks for all the fish, chapter 36.
"It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it." - Eugene V. Debs
So, I haven't read your prized constitution, but, before you go and rely upon it for your well-being, you might all want to have another wee glance at it again. :o/
Then go read it before you express an opinion on it.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
I've got an idea. The public is generally considered very bad at governing itself right? (In terms of making logical descions) Masses of people tend to act on whims, emotions, and whatever the "group" feels at the moment. Mob mentality on a grand scale if you will. I suppose that this is because people don't tend to think logically in these kinds of situation, whether because they don't want to think for themselves out of laziness, lack of time, or lack of resources to educate themselves. I don't know. What if a public service was started that during elections, say maybe.. the whole week before the election, every TV station has a voter education segment that reviews each canditate and issue in a non-partisian fashion. And I don't mean just a half hour election primer sitcom deal. I'm talking every channel, several hours worth of information. Does anyone think this might help?
"I murder kittens, robot. Whats it to 'ya?" - Badguy
' Now if only certain other booksellers would show that same conscience, we might have something here."
dude, you forgot to put slashdot's affiliate ID in the BN link.
...Just great, I bought 2600 with my check card a few times. Guess that will come back to haunt me.
I trust you don't have a lock on your door? If so, you're sacrificing a little bit of liberty for a little bit of security, and therefore deserve neither.
I trust you're legally allowed to kill anybody who annoys you? No? Because then they'd be able to do the same to you? Ooops...liberty for security.
Just because a dead white man says something, and you (mis)quote (and mis-attribute, but that's beside the point) it, out of context, no less, does NOT make it the wisdom of the ages.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
To put it another way, the individuals most likely to strive for political power are those with a desire to control others and reduce personal liberty. Those who just want to live their lives in peace, according to their own will, are those least likely to strive for political power. And there we have the reason why, as time progresses, the US government becomes more expensive, more corrupt, and more oppressive.