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Michigan First With A Law That Could Outlaw VPNs
zaren writes "Holy frell, Taco, we're gonna be criminals! I was checking out Freedom to Tinker after reading the posting about that multi-state anti-VPN-style legislation, and I saw a new posting that says that Michigan has ALREADY passed such legislation, and it goes into effect on MONDAY, MARCH 31, 2003 . Guess I better tighten down the base station and batten down the hatches..."
Michigan residents being arrested on april fools' day because of a law that's a joke.
using namespace slashdot;
troll::post();
(b) Conceal the existence or place of origin or destination of any telecommunications service. What were legislators smoking when they wrote that clause? That's so ridiculously overbroad that it could even be interpreted to make it illegal to call someone from a payphone without telling them where you are.
Repeal the DMCA!
WTF?! I can't rip CDs to MP3s anymore and now it's illegal to use a VPN?
Honestly, I'm starting to feel guilty as soon as I start using a PC. I must be breaking some law as soon as I sit down.
It's about time for the otherwise useless ACLU to start some legal action. Finally, they'll have something to pursue that's worthy of their time.
Michigan doesn't seem to have made it to the 21st century yet.
Finally Microsoft windows is illegal!!!!
Any web browser can be used to access a proxy server making All web browsers illegal in Michigan. Since IE is so integrated into the software (that it can't possibly be removed), it makes all windows OS's illegal!
Of course this applies to all linux browsers, but we can remove those.
Ahh yes, the crap is piling up, and it aint the dairy cows.
THE WORLD IS GOING TO END!!!! eventually.
Every IP packet I pass through my ISP contains a source and destination IP address.
What else do they need to know?
"Your honour, at what layer of the OSI Network Layer model is this bill to be enforced?"
"Er, case dismissed."
(Yes I did RTFA)
This law has not one but two offensive clauses-
1(b) Conceal the existence or place of origin or destination of any telecommunications service.
1 (c) To receive, disrupt, decrypt, transmit, retransmit, acquire, intercept, or facilitate the receipt, disruption, decryption, transmission, retransmission, acquisition, or interception of any telecommunications service without the express authority or actual consent of the telecommunications service provider.
While 1(b) is probably the most obnoxious clause, 1(c) is not far behind... it makes it a "felony" to eg. hook two televisions on single cable connection and even make it a felony offense to put NAT boxen !! At our dorm, for World cup we put a computer with TV tuner card connected to cable connection and then used it to stream the transmission for people to watch in their rooms... HELL now we'll be criminals (and that too 'felony'!!) for that...
Fuck.
Who said "America- land of free" must now be turning in graves.
- mritunjai
This is ridiculous. In a broad sense, this would outlaw an PPP connection that assigns an ISP customer a different IP address with every session. Not only that but the nature of such legislation would outlaw virtual domains using Apache and could be applied to the way the Internet has come to work in a limited IP space. I mean, in order to find out who is who on a shared IP web server, you would have to have access to the configuration files.
With so many domains sharing IP addresses or having IP addresses provided by big companies such as HE there is an amount of obfuscation built in to the DNS system to allow flexibility on the host side. Can't they get busy with spam legislation instead?
Can't wait to pay another 5 bucks a month so my handicapped little brother can surf pokemon.
All this does is make the isp aware of how many machines I have.
A while back the ma-bells tried to charge for every phone you had in your house, and they succeded for several years.
This is another in a long line of atrocities commited by our elected representatives.
THE WORLD IS GOING TO END!!!! eventually.
"Hi, this is Mike. You remember me from yesterday? Yeah, well, I was wondering if I could "facilitate the recipt" of another couple of packets today. I was kinda thinking about maybe checking the weather."
...
"Kid, I'm giving you express authority to send you all the packets you want. Get the hell off the support line."
"Hi, this is Bob. I was wondering if I could decrypt something...I was thinking about buying a CD for my sister using https. Also, I..."
"Blanket approval. Go for it."
May we never see th
This is easy for me to write, I'm in Europe so can't participate; however, there have been calls for geeks to politicise, to make their voices heard...
If every university and college student turned him/her self into the police on Monday morning for being in violation of this new law, the system would choke. It'd get a hell of a lot of media attention too. Something has to be done... these laws, largely unenforceable, continue to be passed... each one errodes the rights of ordinary people...
I simply can't fathom how a law this monomentally stupid has been passed... but it's got to be challenged. A mass protest would certainly expedite it and might prevent similar laws from being passed in other states where they're being considered.
Back in the bad old days (prior to Jan. 1, 1984), you could only get a phone from AT&T. They owned Western Electric, which was the only manufacturer of telephone equipment. They owned the lines (there were some exceptions where GTE had a local market). If you wanted a phone, you had to accept the whole package.
You had to lease your phones from them -- you couldn't buy them. You had to pay extra for DTMF (Touch-Tone [TM]). Your monthly bill was based on the base rate times the number of phones plus the base local call charge plus the incredibly overpriced long distance calls, which themselves worked on a minimum of three minutes and charges were rounded up to the next whole minute.
They stifled technology much more so than IBM, even when it hurt them. It became cheaper and easier for them to have customers using DTMF, but because people wanted it rather than the damned dialing wheels, they kept on charging premiums, which meant they had to keep those old number nine crossbars in the COs rather than (or in addition to) the electronic switches.
The whole idea of ringer equivalence existed so they could shoot a charge down your line and know how many phones you had. If it didn't match, they'd come over for a "technical visit". If they saw signs that you had more than the paid/claimed number of phones, they'd either hardwire the phone in the jack or remove other jacks. You had to let them; it was their equipment.
People used to huddle around a phone to listen and talk at the same time because Ma Bell wanted you to pay twice as much to have two people at home talk to a caller at the same time.
ISPs are trying this game, requiring you to use their hardware, accept their version of "normal use", and pay per computer rather than for the amount of data transfer so they can claim "unlimited" or "flat-rate service. It may be illegal based on the same decision which finally allowed people to buy their own phones, have as many as they wanted and use them as they saw fit.
This needs to be stopped quickly. Lawyers need to compare these laws to the Orders from Judge Harold Greene which stopped AT&T doing this, and have this bad legislation removed. You people in Michigan need to get started!
woof.
Today the RIAA announced it was pushing for legislation that made the use of chairs illegal
"Pirates sit down to make these illegal copies that are destroying society" said an RIAA spokesperson "This is all about making it uncomfortable for the pirates"
When questioned as to the many valid uses of chairs the spokesperson replied "Sure this will have a minor effect on some people, but isn't that worth it to protect the American way of life and ensure the success of democracy that rides on the music and movie industries, what are you some sort of Communist or one of the Al Q'uada people.... guards arrest this person"
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
Now, what is an "unlawful telecommunications access device"? That is answered under 750.219a which is entitled:
Section 219 defines an unlawful device as:
I read this to mean to hijack someone else's "telecommunication device".
If you read the section further, this applies to illegal cable descramblers and stuff like that.
I think we can all agree that FRAUD is bad.
The
I fail to see anything in this amendment that applies to VPNs. It appears to be specifically designed to target phone phreaking. It's all about screwing with telecoms services. VPNs don't do that.
They don't obtain telecoms services without intent to pay (1a), they don't conceal the origin or destination of the traffic (1b), and they don't intercept, disrupt, re-transmit, or otherwise fuck with your, or anyone else's, service (1c).
Unless you've deliberately cracked your ISP in order to run your VPN, you've not fallen foul of this law.
Get some perspective.
[Interestingly, this does appear to make IP address spoofing illegal - but I consider that to be a good thing.]
You got it. You need to read this legislation in the light of all the other legislation out there, signed into law or proposed. A Police State needs for everyone to be a criminal on paper, to have that potential,to be able to use that against them. Look at oregons proposed policial demonstration law. Walk in the street in a demonstration, you are facing 25 years to life. Use a normal router, with how it normally works, you are a criminal. Go into patriot act 1 and now 2, which they are migrating to different other bills to get it passed. Misdemeanors can be classed as supporting terrorism. You really don't want to be classed as a terrorist. You can become an un-person very quickly, and it wouldn't be in there if they weren't planning on using it, even more extensively than they are now. The gestalt with computers in general is that computers allow anonymous and semi anonymous and easy communications for the average person. Police States don't like that.
This is REAL stuff in all our faces. You can't keep up with it now,laws, laws,laws and more new laws, daily. It's at the federal level and all the state levels, assaults against born-with rights, just being a normal person, are fully underway, it's not theoretical or tin foil hat. This article is an example of just another one. Add 'em all up. Pretty spooky.
Thanks for sending that letter, looking forward to see what they say, if you get a credible response.
Ok you guys are just being a little to anal retentive with the words.
First off disguising origin. Anyone with half a brain knows you cannot get a location from an IP address. What they mean by it is IP Spoofing. If I'm a Comcast customer, I can't set my network to trick others into thinking I'm on Verizon, AOL/TW's, etc. If I am a Comcast customer, then I cannot disguise my IP to say otherwise. If the law needs my physical location, they can go through the legal channels and get it from Comcast.
CID blocking is iffy. I do not think this wouild be affected as it would force SBC and such to discontinue services like Privacy Manager. Second the biggest concern is telemarketing. The FCC is setting up the National Do Not Call list in July with enforcement in September. Why worry?
VPNs would be legal at this point because a) No state legislature is going to tell a corporation (Borders, the big 3 auto makers come to mind) that they can no longer use thier legit VPNs. And if they go after legit personal VPNs, one could claim discrimination based on that. Now if your ISP bans VPNs (which is thier right) then this law is moot anyways. b) Comcast et al do not ban VPNs to my knowledge nor do they ban use of NAT. I bet they love NAT because instead of charging you $10-15 for more IPs, they can charge you and others $40/mo for other individuals. Last I heard, Comcast only cares about multiple computers if they are hogging bandwidth or if non-customers are getting regular access (meaning sharing with neighbors via 802.11, etc.)
Can you think of any modern applications that this law is really targeting? Cell phone cloning and cable descramblers come to mind fast.
Anonymous Cowards generally receive no replies because you're a coward and I'm a bitch
I'll bite. I presume you're making a reference to Michigan relaxing it's handling of permits to Carry a Concealed Weapon (CCW) that occured about a year and a half ago from today. The media around here wasn't too for the idea, and they made it sound like every idiot out there could get one. I'm sure you looked up the legal rules behind getting one if this matter concerns you, but I'll repeat some of them here for other Slashdotter's that might not be from Michigan:
Once you meet all this criteria, you're subjected to a 30-90 day waiting period while they evaluate you, and before approval you must appear in front of a board so they can take a look at you and make sure you're not a total nut that talks to himself.
Now, my asterik after the 3 year misdemeanor thing. This means any type of misdemeanor, you know, like an expired license plate, fishing without a proper license (mistakes happen), getting caught with a beer when you're 20 years old.
On top of that, there's a slew of places that you cannot take one into. Namely schools (where they're probably needed most), any establishment that serves alcohol (Pizza Hut, Red Lobster), college classrooms or dorms, and religious worship buildings (unless you have permission). You can carry it to school though, if you stay in your car, and if the child you're dropping off is your own blood child. You can't drop off your step kids though, because people that drop off step kids at school are more likely to pull a gun and start firing that people dropping off their blood children. Or something.
Ah, and to go along with that rule about not taking it anywhere alcohol is served, you can't carry if you've got a BAC at or over 0.02 percent. That's less than a single beer. Come home from work still strapped, have a beer, and then take out the garbage and you'd better remember to remove your weapon before you step out of the house. You're in violation of the law if you don't. Wonderful.
So, if you really think Michigan's full of a bunch of gun toting conservatives you're wrong. It's full of a bunch of liberals who actually tightened the restricions on a CCW while making it look like every nutjob in Michigan could carry a pistol just to scare the snot out of people.
One more point, there's another segment of the population that can carry a gun: criminals. They don't have any of the restrictions the law abiding population does though. Nice that we gave them a list of places where they know good people CAN'T have guns now, isn't it?