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MIT, Boston College Refuse DMCA Subpoenas
phreakmonkey writes "Here's an interesting change of pace- According to today's Boston Globe, MIT and Boston College have both refused to turn over the identities of students to the RIAA under subpoenas. Citing failure of compliance with court rules and student privacy concerns, both colleges have refused to give out the names, addresses, or phone numbers of students based on their Kazaa screen names and IP addresses. I wonder how long the schools will be able to keep the RIAA's pack of lawyers at bay..."
More than simply the temporary blockade for the army of RIAA lawyers which that organization will refer to them as, these new subpoena challenges will hopefully catalyze a new set of appeals that finally lead to some kind of constitutionality ruling, by the Supreme court, about the controversial section of the DMCA which allows these privacy infringements, and consequently, about the heavily-industry-influenced DMCA as a whole...
If there's one thing I can say about the colleges who did this, it's that I have respect for them. By not backing down and not giving into the demands of coporate america, they are setting a precedent for others, and are showing that we are not all going to bow to them. Respect.
Canadian Cynic, canadian politics is less boring than you
I remember people saying: "Just wait until a child of a senator gets busted downloading MP3's". This story tells us why this is not going to happen. They pay the exorbitant tuition not only for the name of the school but also for other services. Including a protection of privacy you would not get anywhere else. And that's why no senator kid is going to get busted sharing some thousand mp3's.
Mod Points: Helping you keep your opinion to yourself.
RIAA members own the copyrights to the songs. What the bands say doesn't mean shit.
This is why it's effectively OK to share out Metallica tunes; Metallica has not gotten involved in the post-Napster RIAA actions and the RIAA can't sue for material they don't own.
More like, "how long will the schools be able to justify spending thousands of dollars to protect the identities of students breaking the law."
Please help metamoderate.
And the RIAA will say "never mind" and drop it, if it looks to be heading that way. They have a bully mentality, and no stomach for a legal showdown at the OK Corral.
They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
Having famous, reputable organizations defying the RIAA is very important, because it lends credibility to the fight against the music industry, which is crucial at this point.
Despite all this battling against the RIAA's lawsuits, though, it seems to me that the real issue here (which isn't being addressed) is not file sharing but everything the RIAA stands for and represents. Why isn't anyone attacking their price-fixing and essential monopoly of the industry? I know there was a lawsuit against them for the price-fixing, I believe, but I for one am not seeing any changes.
Obviously, I'm not the most informed on the details of the whole issue, but is it possible that the RIAA's big scare tactics and legal onslaught against file sharers is just to take peoples' eyes off of the real problem?
Hmmm password-protect = encryption
Term paper = copywrited
Hacker = Felon under DMCA. Bye bye capus cop! Welcome to federal pound-me-in-da-... prison.
Democracy: two wolves and a sheep voting on what's for lunch
Liberty: a well armed sheep expressing his rights.
It looks like sheep have arisen. I for one...
More than simply the temporary blockade for the army of RIAA lawyers which that organization will refer to them as
Considering MIT has a 5 billion dollar endowment, I doubt very much that the RIAA will be able to outspend them. Besides which, after a while you start getting diminishing returns when hiring lawyers; once you have a large legal team working fulltime on a case, throwing money at them doesn't do anything.
Ever hear of a wonderful thing called Due Process. Well, it's all going out the window now. Unless you are rich enough to hire some good lawyers you no longer have the right to Due Process.
If somebody believes they have evidence of criminal behavior they should have to take it to a Court of Law which would then issue a subpeona or warrent. But in our New World Order big corporations merely have to finger you and you are presumed guilty. So lovely.
That's a good question actually. It is a violation of privacy (I've never seen that called "privacy infringement"...are you affiliated with the RIAA?) because the DMCA allows the lawyers acting on behalf of the RIAA to obtain these subpoenas without sufficient judicial oversight. They file their claims with a clerk, pay the fee, and voila! Usually, to obtain a subpoena that grants the right to violate the Fourth Amendment, one must actually prove harm sufficient enough to justify the violation of that Constitutional right to a judge. But thanks to the good ole DMCA (a copyright lawyer's bestest friend!), the quaint notion that you must actually prove your case before being granted a subpoena has been neatly side-stepped.
Hmmmm....so let's apply your logic to another set of criminal circumstances. You're doing something illegal (selling crack), you are then caught, and you are then identified. See, when it comes to selling crack, the police have to actually identify the offender first in order to obtain a warrant. (And, by the way, warrants are issued by judges...not clerks.)
I do think you have a good legal argument with your final statement but the existence of proxies nullifies it on a technical level. (Then again, how often does technical common sense actually scale with legal theories?) How many of the 871 subpoenas obtained by the RIAA will turn out to be people running open proxies on the Internet? Last I heard, we haven't made that illegal yet.
"Privacy infringement"....I do like that term. It's a nice check on the power we've given to those who are rabid in their pursuit of unsubstantiated losses due to copyright infringement.
--K.
Sig: Bad people happen. Try to avoid being one of them.
I know this is all about file sharing and stopping P2P users from downloading copyrighted material but this issue has now transformed into something much larger.
The main issue is now your rights as guaranteed under our constitution. How the hell can the RIAA issue supoenas without judicial oversight? I'm not aware of any govermental department that can issue supoenas on a whim and on an as needed basis at the federal or local level. Our rights in the constitution guarantee us from unlawful prosecution so this RIAA gifted law as madated by paid off politicians is inherently flawed at it's core.
Is it going to take the RIAA busting in your house and holding you at gunpoint treating you as an enemy combatant to realize wtf is going on here? This is bordering on insanity. Prosecuting users at whim with little or no proof and throwing them into financial ruin over an mp3? These aren't the big fish or anywhere near it.
As said previously there is clear and open PIRACY not infringement in many foreign countries and our own where many elements play a part in mass producing cds and dvds to sell on the open market.
P2P is not the black market.
It is the sampling pool for future purchasers of the product the RIAA is demonizing into something that is to be resented and despised. I know there are people out there who just dl and don't buy but my experience is most do buy but as our rights are restricted and our choices limited how long will the buying continue?
I myself no longer buy because I'm not supporting the RIAA period. I have never seen a group of supposedly savvy business people be so ignorant to what is going on in their own market.
Consumers are voting with their wallets so now they want to sue us into submission? How is this progressive thinking?
I will not let the RIAA impose what they think is best for me.
I will not let the RIAA make my decisions on who, what, when, where, and how I listen and buy my music.
I will not give into to this bullying and I will not support them again.
A business entity is buying laws that restrict our freedoms and making downloading entertainment a crime more severe than violent crime with much harsher punishment. I keep asking myself when will people wake up to this and do something or in this case nothing-meaning boycotting cd/music sales?
The ramifications for these laws being passed are far reaching so take a cold hard look at what's going on before it's too late...
You aren't free to do anything, until you've lost everything.
I've read the first few replies to this, and aside from the fact that a lot of people seem to have misunderstood the situation (the colleges will comply, they're basically just objecting to incorrectly filed paperwork) everyone thinks this is great.
It is not an abuse of the court system to take legal action against someone who is breaking the law. The fact that these kids may be at college doesn't excuse being criminals.
If, as you say, it is the responsibility of the colleges to manage their own networks, then what do you say about a college that condones breaking the law by taking no action to prevent it?
If colleges don't take reasonable action to prevent the users of their networks breaking the law using those networks, then whose place do you think it is? Clearly central government don't have the resources to combat this problem effectively, which is why they pushed through the DMCA in the first place.
As usual, this comes down to "me, too" bitching about how unfair the RIAA is, and as usual it's aiming at the wrong target. You have a legitimate complaint that the RIAA and those they represent abuse an effective monopoly position to overcharge for the goods they sell. You do not have a legitimate complaint when people who have broken the law get chased down for it.
If the colleges concerned actually were trying to prevent that, they wouldn't be heroes, they'd be accomplices. However, since they're not, they're simply being professional and not giving out private details until a properly filed order requires them to do so.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
You do realize that if you get people boycotting the RIAA, all that will happen is that the RIAA will play with their statistics again...
"Oh look, CD sales are down another 5% - THOSE EVIL EVIL PIRATES are downloading even more than before! We must get more support from the courts to ruthlessly stamp out these non-consumers!"
Funny how they never seem to cite "Bands release crap that nobody wants to listen to", or "Nobody wants to buy a $18 CD with one good song on it" when it comes to the reasons people aren't buying their garbage...
N.
"Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence." - Charles de Gaulle
The subpoena is issued by the clerk of the district court upon a request containing: (1) the proposed subpoena, (2) a "copy of a notification described in subsection 512(c)(3)(A)," and (3) a sworn declaration that the subpoena seeks only the identity of the alleged infringer and will be used only to protect rights to the copyright. The clerk must "expeditiously issue" the subpoena if it is in proper form, with a properly executed declaration, and if the "notification filed satisfies the provisions of subsection (c)(3)(A)."
I'd like to see a clerk refuse to sign these forms. Our nation is composed of big guys and little guys, but we ALL have power to stop something we don't like. We can all hinder it's progress.
Imagine how ineffective the **AA's would be, if big institutions refused to honor subpoena's... if the clerks refused to ISSUE subpoena's even at the risk of losing their jobs... If juror's refused to convict the defendents... If the entire process was hindered by every chain link. If we, as Americans, refused to be branded as criminals and stood together.
We must all hang together, or we will surely all hang separately. - Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)
If you feel the statute involved in any criminal case being tried before you is unfair, or that it infringes upon the defendant's God-given inalienable or Constitutional rights, you can affirm that the offending statute is really no law at all and that the violation of it is no crime; for no man is bound to obey an unjust command. In other words, if the defendant has disobeyed some man-made criminal statute, and the statute is unjust, the defendant has in substance, committed no crime.
- Chief Justice Harlan F. Stone, (before the legislative branch bought out the judicial branch)
Hate to pop your bubble, but there is no violation of the 4th amendment here. The 4th amendment simply requires a warrant, sworn out by a court upon probable cause and that specifically describes the search and seizure to be conducted.
The second branch of the government (you know that pesky branch that is elected by the people), has instructed the courts via legislation, that evidence of illegal downloading is, ipso facto, sufficient evidence and probable cause. Therefore, there is no need for judicial review, and the clerk (who is an official of the court) can simply sign the supboena.)
Personally, I find it a bit refreshing that the representatives elected by the people are defining this instead of a few robed justices on a bench acting like dictators. We have too many judges making law already from the bench. The Arizona state supreme court has even had the temerity to rule on multiple occasions that amendments the state constitution violated the state constitution.
That, my friends, is tyranny.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
but the real issue is neither P2P nor the the RIAA's price-fixing and other disreputable goings-on.
The real issue, why BC and MIT said "Hey, wait a minute!" is Internet privacy. I agree with the previous poster who gave the nice example of the telephone service -- we expect (and should, given the tenets of the US) an assumed privacy in our communications. Once reasonable evidence is brought forth, conforming to the search and seizure laws, then communication can be monitored, and after that, the law can be brought down on the offender.
It seems to me that the RIAA is trying (and often succeeding) in skipping a step -- that of monitoring after evidence is brought forth (a la a search warrant). They're monitoring and then getting the names to prosecute.
Then again, I'm going off hearsay I read here.
if you live in a dorm, you have no rights. The aggreement that i remember signing (boston university) made it clear that the only privacy your entitled to is a bang on the door before you hear that master key sliding on in.
Um, that was just the first paragraph. We let these kids get into college with spelling and grammar like this but I still can't find a job? *sighs*
I would have to say that explosives are the most abused technology in all of history.
> Private companies can issue subpoenas!!
In a nation increasingly ruled by lobbyists, judges are just unnecessary middle-men for this kind of thing, and can be expected to be downsized out of the loop.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Thanks for the info but, far from popping my bubble, you just gave it a titanium lining. So basically, you're saying that subpoenas now carry the same power as warrants...only it's a media cartel instead of law enforcement that wields it and a clerk instead of a judge that grants it.
It sure is a good thing that the second branch of government always passes perfect laws since they represent all of us. Good point about the clerk being an official of the court...that's probably necessary but if it is, their powers need to be limited. Clever hack by the media cartels and their paid-off legislators (those pesky people that get elected and then promptly accept campaign money to blow off their constituents), I'll give them that.
While I'm with you that no one branch should ever gain too much power, I question your interpretation of the balance of powers...especially in light of today's environment. Where you seem to believe that the Judicial branch has too much power, I believe that the Legislative branch has been bought off and is no longer representative of its constituents. So while you see the Judicial branch saving us from the Legislative branch, I percieve the situation from the opposite point of view.
Tyranny can come from any direction, be it clueless judges, bought-off legislators, or power-happy executives. The goal of the constitution is to make these threats sufficiently at odds enough that the end result is palatable.
--K.
Sig: Bad people happen. Try to avoid being one of them.
Only police officers can be commit entrapment. If I leave my bike on the street you have no right to steal it, if I wear a miniskirt you have no right to rape me.
Regardless, downloading files is legal, so he must've been guilty of uploading them. The RIAA must have downloaded 5 songs which they owned the copyright to, from him.
Of course, the words "shall not infringe" don't leave a lot of room for interpretation....
I'm thinking about our campus. For the student VLAN, we have a DHCP server. Right now, anyone can come on campus, plug into a port, get an IP and launch Kazza.
There really is no way of tracing someone down unless we find the machine online and go see who is plugged in that port.
All that is assuming that someone did not forge the MAC address to be someone elses.
So, a school could turn over student info, and that student would have to expend tons of $$$ to prove it wasn't them, or just cave and pay off the RIAA extortion. (Sounds like SCO)
What's next, laws requiring a certain amount of logging everywhere? And who is gonna pay for this? Are the gonna outlaw dumb hubs?
The second branch of the government (you know that pesky branch that is elected by the people), has instructed the courts via legislation, that evidence of illegal downloading is, ipso facto, sufficient evidence and probable cause. Therefore, there is no need for judicial review, and the clerk (who is an official of the court) can simply sign the supboena.)
The question here is "who decides that the evidence is legitimate?" Currently, it's a group with an interest in the case. Judicial oversight is needed to prevent errors and abuse.
Example: Let's say I'm Vice President of Asskissing at the RIAA. My neighbor buys a nice shiny new car, which pisses me off because I should have a better car. So I arrange for my underling to issue a subpeona to the university my neighbor's kid goes to. The kid's dad gets notified by the University and hilarity ensues.
Sound far-fetched? Maybe it is. But it's not entirely unheard of for folks given power to abuse it.
Now, say I want to improve efficiency in the Legal Department. Is it a big stretch to send out form-letter subpeonas to anyone sharing a file that could be infringing before evaluating whether the file is actually in violation? Of course not. I'd stamp out subpeonas by the thousands then decide who to sue.
So, yes, I think it should go through a judge. The ability to obtain personal information about any user based on his or her IP address is too easily abused without oversight.
FINALLY, a large, respected organisation telling the RIAA to go fuck themselves until they bleed.
As far as I'm concerned, the RIAA has driven more people to illegal file sharing than any other force or organisation, and they've done it deliberately just so they can get indignant and prosecute those same people.
Fucking RIAA. At least have the decency to treat the musicians better than dirt.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
the recording industry organization provides a KaZaA screen name, an Internet Protocol, or IP, address, and a list of songs it says were shared from the location.
A LIST of files. No actual files, just a list. The actual file called "Metallica - Master of Puppets" could conatin my voice saying "Lars, this was your last album worth buying" repeating over and over again to fill the 5.53 time slot. Everyone knows these are out there and I swear I read in the past about the RIAA doing this themselves to water down the results. How can a list of file names possibly stand up in court? I am not sticking up for copyright violators but the RIAA was no real evidence here.
Bad boys rape our young girls but Violet gives willingly.
Nowhere has it ever been said that owning a CD gives you the right to download the songs on that CD. You do have the right to make a copy of your own, but there is nothing establishing your right to download them.
What's more, based upon the current rulings of the US courts (with the exception of the Kazaa ruling) it seems rather likely that a judge would reject that justification.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
My evidence:
1) Article title: "BC, MIT decline to name students in music-use case", as opposed to "music-piracy" or "song-stealing" case. OR
2) "The recording industry's strategy -- pursuing both high-profile users with hundreds of megabytes of music as well as small-time downloaders -- is intended as a wake-up call to Internet music enthusiasts like Alexa Bedell-Healey - as opposed to "illegal file-swappers" or "song-traders"
Any article can be written to have a slightly positive or negative tone while still remaining "truthful" to the facts of the story. The name of the game to write more "positive" sounding articles like this one that portray the RIAA in a slightly negative light.
blue
No, the net is not private and having that expectation is very foolish. however, all that is being stated by freeuser is that normal due process be applied to the accused as would be done for other crimes. I don't see how stealing music warrants such harsh treatment. Come on, its just MUSIC. Its not like people are being accused of 20 counts of 1st degree murder.
As far as I'm concerned, I do not have to open my door for ANY lawyer, whether hired by my neighbor, or by the RIAA, no matter how much hot air they blow out of their asses. Its all posturing until I have my day in court.
Logging an IP address and forcing the ISP give out private information about you are two very different things.
I feel like I'm in Wonderland, sometimes. The RIAA does not control your food or water supply. They aren't your landlord. Their sole power is to offer a certain subset of music for sale, and to decide on the terms under which it will be sold. If they decided not to sell any of their music to anyone at any price, what would be the net effect? A lot of pissed off artists and consumers, sure, but everyone would live right through it.
Hate the RIAA? Don't like their business model and practices? Then don't do business with them! If you're a music consumer, go to clubs, buy microlabel and band-pressing CDs, swap non-RIAA mp3s, and enjoy. If you're a music producer, release your tunes through some other channel.
Why is this so hard for people to deal with?
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
It's not *stealing*. It's copyright infringement, a horse of a very different color.
Stealing means that the original owner no longer has it, which is obviously untrue in the current incarnation of file sharing networks.
You download a song from me, and I *still* have my copy. I haven't lost a thing. There's been no damage done to my system. Oh, sure, a miniscule amount of bandwidth has been "consumed" (if such a thing is possible), but that's about it.
However, because I shared the song, and you downloaded it, we're *both* guilty of copyright infringement.
The RIAA/MPAA have done a wonderful job of equating "File Sharing" with "Stealing". A classic case of spin doctoring, if you will. After all, isn't photocopying a page from a book at the library copyright infringement? Everyone does it, and it's condoned by most people, including the library. It sure doesn't sound as bad as stealing.
So do everyone a favor, and call it what it is, not what the *AA would like it to be.
-- Karma is for people who think they matter.
Maybe i'm mistaken, but i thought that you could only know if someone was downloading a file using kazaa if they were downloading it off of you. In this news article it said that the student was download a Radiohead song, does that mean that the RIAA had to be the one sharing the file? Are they allowed to do that and still retain the right to sue?
OK... My turn. I call bullshit on this.
"Public internet" is a meaningless term here, just confusing the issue - you may as well talk about "public phones." The fact that people have to take precautions to secure their machines in no way relates to their _right_ to privacy - any more than the fact you have to lock your doors to keep out crooks reflects on your 4th Amendment Rights (that's "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects..." in case you're curious).
Attempting to compare accidentally publishing content on a webpage with someone reverse-engineering a communications system to eavesdrop on its participants AND allowing out-of-band personal information about them be released at someone's whim without the oversight of a judge... It doesn't fit, does it.
That's the real point of all of this. Not that you should be totally secure in your right to privacy against all other concerns, but that a court and a judge have to sign off on breaching that trust. DMCA, incredibly, gives the RIAA (just some private corporate entity) the power of a judge-and-court to arbitrarily invade your private life if (by their own determination) they suspect you've committed a (really underwhelming) crime - and that, I think, is what we're concerned about.
No matter _what_ the suspect is doing, searches at the whim of a corporate entity without the oversight of a judge... I'm sorry, there's no mincing words. it is black-letter unconstitutional, and categorically unamerican.
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
So downloading songs wasn't illegal a year ago, so...most songs in my library can't be used in any arguement by the RIAA. Correct?
No. It means you can't be sued for sharing files a year ago. You could, however, be sued NOW.
No one seems to get this.
Your IP address isn't what's at issue here, although the RIAA's eavesdropping on a peer to peer network does have components of eavesdropping on email or other communication systems in my opinion (look to intent; the RIAA doesn't play by the rules of the system, and for a definite purpose).
The issue is whether or not we still have the sacred, black-letter constitutional requirement for a judge to approve a search warrant... or if we just gave the power of a judge to some random private entity, so that it can invade privacy all over the countryside, without any oversight, at the least provocation... at best being "corrected" later, at great expense and long after the horses are out of the barn door.
It's the whim of the RIAA now, not the judgement of a court... and that's what doesn't fly in this country. Make light of it at your peril - many, many people bled into the earth to secure this right for you. No private citizen, picking suspects at their sole discretion, should decide whose person and privacy should be violated. We have checks and balances for a very good reason.
--
Bill of Rights cramping your style? Try China!
Want to Know How to Cheat the GPL? Read On!
In fact, MIT's lawyers determined that what the RIAA wanted them to do was illegal, and if there's anything MIT doesn't want, it's lawsuits from the families of students. In order to avoid liability, MIT in fact has to resist the subpoena as much as possible (I'd actually be interested to know if any Northeastern studetns and families are considering suing Northeastern over complying with subpoenas there).
MIT may be willing to comply with a proper subpoena (and, in fact, pretty much has to agree to comply with a truly proper one), but this could be the beginning of a long process. First, the subpoena has to be filed in a court that has jurisdiction over MIT; then they has to be given sufficient time to obey the law regarding informing the students. But it is also possible that subpoenas filed without a judge's approval (which may be done under the DMCA) may be unconstitutional, which is working its way up the court system.
By the time a subpoena reaches MIT which they can follow without being liable to suit by students' families, these students may well no longer be students, and the IP addresses may no longer be theirs, and the records may have been routinely purged.
For that matter, by now the students (who have seen their pseudonyms in the local paper and on slashdot), may have gotten different KaZaa names and IPs, such that when the RIAA gets the proper paperwork through, the address will be registered to one Jack Florey, resident of fifth east, who was just here but left down the stairwell at the other end of the hall... and, of course, the current records will be long gone, per institute policies, as required by federal law.
Instead, buy from independent non-RIAA musicians and labels. You'll have to look around on the Web to find those, but you should be able to find one to match your tastes no matter what they are. If record sales go up, but the RIAA labels go even deeper into red-ink, it'll be obvious that piracy is not the problem, no more excuses to make bad laws. It really won't take a lot of this to blow the labels right out of the water.
They're losing money anyway. They blame piracy. If they lose money a hell of a lot faster, what good is a "name brand" when customers see the name and automatically buy elsewhere? The label owners will see a bunch of "tainted brands" losing them money. The mulitnationals will unload fast to investors who will only want the catalogs and artist catalogues. Who will want to buy a CEO who managed to turn a $5 billion company into a $500M company?
CDBaby has a quite a few. Some with downloadable music.
Or check my sig to hear another one. We've got downloadable MP3s, too.
If you aren't sure whether an artist is RIAA or not, check RIAA Radar search to see if the artist is listed.
Every dollar spent on non-RIAA label music is another nail in the coffin of the RIAA and its record company members.
Tech Public Policy stuff
Ownership of culture. That's what it boils down to. American culture is owned by corps. It's taken to the extreme. Hell you can't even sing "Happy Birthday" to someone at work unless you pay the RIAA a royalty.
A people's culture is a lot like food and water. And there's a huge cartel that owns most of American culture. And they keep changing the laws, so they will keep owning it forever.
This is wrong.
yes, maybe the RIAA has rights to those logs..
maybe they do need them to investigate people that are infringing upon their copyrights.
But it should be a judge to decide whether or not the RIAA has the right to do so, the RIAA should not have the right to decide for itsself
What? Me? Worry?
A legal expectation is not the same thing as a reasonable expectation.
If I leave my front door unlocked and leave on a two-week vacation, I am legally entitled to the presumption that nobody has the right to enter.
My insurance company might be able to argue that I was negligent and that they aren't liable. But the thieves will not be allowed to argue that I had no reasonable expectation that my property would not be stolen.
A valid distinction can still be made between Internet communications that are intended to be private communications and those that are offered to the public at large. There is nothing improper about searching web sites for download links. Searching private communications on the other hand is improper and illegal, no matter how easy it is to do.
The difference is the difference between government and private entities. It's wrong to turn over inherently governmental functions to private entities. Would you feel comfortable, for example, entrusting all the murder investigations in your area to a private corporation? Or would you feel better if those investigations were carried out by government employees who are at least nominally motivated by the pursuit of justice instead of a profit motive?
The same thing is true of tax collections. The IRS, despite all the negative (and mostly untrue) media coverage that preceded the 1998 Restructuring Act, is motivated not just to collect tax but to do so in ways that do not make a mockery of serving the common good, a concept that private entities do not grasp in any way. Look at it this way: Law enforcement should be done by the government, not private entities. Slashdotters have been pretty unanimous about that and, I think, rightly so. Well, collecting taxes is law enforcement.
Who was it who said that the power to tax was the power to destroy? Do you really feel comfortable with handing over the enforcement component of that power to any private entity?
Yep.
For most of it, I've been nonexistent. But for a substantial portion of the time I've been around, I was a tax collector.
Yep, you're absolutely right. That's why the last time Congress foolishly forced the IRS to turn over a portion of our delinquent accounts receivable to private companies for collection, those companies did such a stellar, highly motivated job of collecting money. (That's sarcasm, in case you didn't realize.) All that "piece of the action" motivation did was cause those private collectors to go ape shit. There were documented cases of telephone calls being made to debtors at 4:19 AM. The number of documented violations of the Fair Debt Collection Act were nearly uncountable. And when all was said and done, the private contractors used more man-hours at a higher cost to collect the money than the control group of government employees. The final figures indicated that IRS Revenue Officers not only collect money more efficiently than the private sector (almost THIRTY times more efficiently) but they do so without abusing debtors at all hours of the day and night and without running roughshod over their right to be treated like human beings.
Knee-jerk reactions of "The government is incompetent at everything!" are not something I can overcome with logic, so ignore this post if you wish. But the fact remains that the IRS collects debts far more efficiently and humanely than any private enterprise.
Even if that weren't true, I'd argue that it's wrong to give law enforcement power to private entities because of the abuse that inevitably happens. But you take your pick of which argument you like, the practical or the moral. I'm ready to defend both approaches.
I'll bet you can count on one finger the number of organizations that have both your SS# and a complete, itemized breakdown of everything you earned as well as near-complete insight into how you live your life and plan your finances since you entered the work force, all in one place. That one place is the IRS. Even your mortgage lender on
The US has this too. It was even in the Bill of Rights over 220 years ago. It's called "Illegal Search & Seizure", yet the DMCA passed anyhow. If there is any constitutionality in the US today, it'll get overthrown or DMCA will become an amendment (and the later will not happen because you need a 3/4 vote by the people (not reps/companies)).
Nope. Law enforcement is law enforcement and law enforcement should be done by the government. Unless, of course, you think there are degrees of importance in the law and some laws are so minor in importance that they should be handed over to private entities for enforcement. Is that what you're saying?
Yep and yep.
Yes, I realize the first cite is a biased bit of testimony by a Union wonk. However, obtain and read the cited references contained therein before you pass judgement.
The second link is even more interesting. Authored by a function that can only justify its existence by finding things wrong with the IRS, it goes to great lengths to say, in effect, "Well, contracting for private agencies to do tax collections was a giant cluster-fuck when it was tried before, but things have changed and you ought to try it again." For those of us on the inside, reports like this one are an endless source of amusement. But the central facts remain: private contractors have been tried, they performed poorly, and a comparison to the standards of performance upheld by IRS employees shows that Revenue Officers are multiple times more efficient at collecting taxes than private entities. And even if some pols want to try it again, I doubt anything will change those facts.
As an aside, if you actually read the report, you can work out the efficiency/effectiveness ratios for yourself. The 30x figure comes from an admittedly liberal interpretation of the internal report cited on page 5. I can't locate it on the web, but even accepting the TIGTA-biased summary of that report contained in my cite, the IRS is at least 5 times as efficient as the private sector. I suggest you ask your local IRS office for a copy of the full internal report, IRS Private Sector Debt Collection Pilot Program dated October 1997, if you want the full numbers.
Well, first there's the basic (totally flawed) bias held by a number of folks that hiring government employees is never the answer to anything. Government should be smaller, not larger, no matter the circumstances. That's just wrong-headed, but it's also an essentially religious belief (i.e. a belief based on faith, not facts) and I won't attempt to rectify your thinking there.
However, a bit of tedious explanation of how government budgeting works is, apparently, in order. I now realize that you are not familiar enough with the process to understand what's going on. My apologies; I should have realized sooner. This stuff can be a bit arcane.
So what am I talking about? Here tis: Hiring more Revenue Officers (and Revenue Agents and Tax Compliance Specialists, etc.) requires the government to spend money. Someone has to put a dollar entry on a budget and get Congress to approve it. That's hard.
Letting a contract for a private entity to collect taxes is, by contrast, nearly without cost. A few people have to be paid to read through the bids, make a decision, and oversee the process, but the cost is nominal. Nothing ever comes out of pocket because the contractors are only paid a percentage of what they collect.
Are you getting the idea? Even though contractors are FAR less efficient than Revenue Officers, they don't cost any out-of-pocket money. It's WAY easier for politicians to support programs that don't cost any money than it is to support programs that cost money, even if the programs that cost money might be far, far more profitable 5 years down the road. Hell, that's a couple of elections away! Who cares about that?! Basically, we're dealing with the same sort of short-term thinking and "next-quarter" mentality that so thoroughly sucks in the private sector.