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Time Warner To Comply With Wiretap Law
rekkanoryo writes "Time Warner Cable is taking steps to comply with the Communications Assistance For Law Enforcement Act, which requires telecommunications providers 'to help police conduct electronic surveilance.' Note that broadband providers are not yet required to comply with the law, but the FBI has stated its desire to force broadband providers under the law's jurisdiction. Invasion of privacy anyone?"
That's funny, on my other tabbed paged right now I'm reading about the formalities of moving to Canada
Now would be the time to get using PGP and similar software.
Broadband providers say the FBI's request would, for the first time, force cable providers that sell broadband to come under the jurisdiction of 1994's Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA), which further defined the already existing statutory obligations of telecommunications carriers to help police conduct electronic surveillance. Telephone companies that use their networks to sell broadband have already been following CALEA rules.
Ok, fair enough I suppose. But the fact however, as has been pointed out here, is that not all programs are being written in the US. To make IM, VoIP, IRC, and or whatever other type of program that allows communication over IP have backdoors is bad enough. But to expect that every program on the planet has one is just downright silly. But, thats not really the bad part...
Under CALEA, police must still follow legal procedures when wiretapping Internet communications. Depending on the situation, such wiretaps do not always require court approval, in part because of expanded wiretapping powers put in place by the USA Patriot Act.
Bad, bad, bad. Is it so much to ask for due process here? I mean it's part of our own set of friggen laws. Is it so much to ask that the Feds follow the laws before they make new ones?
What happens if they don't comply? This is a serious case of "resistance is futile." Time Warner and the FBI are just playing their proper roles. Congress is the group that needs a clue.
Laws are for people with no friends.
That kind of thing won't work. At least not for the more sophisticated criminal networks, who will surely use encryption to do away with wiretapping.
It's like banning guns in the hope that criminals won't get them either. They will still do what they are used to do, but by other means.
Good Dog. I'm tired of this erosion of my rights. Yeah, 9-11 was a Bad Thing (tm) and something had to be done, but the situation is getting out of hand. It ain't just GWB, either. The lawmakers as a whole are either reacting to or catering to the fear factor.
Wiretapping has worked pretty well in the past... but with the proper legal steps taken first (court orders, whatever). Even this has been abused, but I can't see how wholesale wiretapping can be a good thing, ever.
Quote: "Legal experts said the 85-page filing includes language that could be interpreted as forcing companies to build back doors into everything..."
How would they enforce this with regards to encryption technologies?
My point is if people have something to hide, then they will use whatever mechanism there is out there to hide it. Can authorities really achieve their goals by simply imposing wiretapping laws on broadband providers?
I think it'd be pretty difficult or impossible (depending on what you do) to encrypt all internet transactions. Email should be pretty straightforward, but what do you do about HTTP, FTP, IRC, and all the other protocols which are completely built around unencrypted transmission? The best rule to go by, it seems, is: "If you don't want someone to read it, don't send/receive it".
How much more can be possibly do to make ourselves puppets for other nations?
Well, we could outsource all of our coding work overseas, putting actual coding and QA in the hands of a foreign government. That'd be a good start.
What? What's everyone looking at?
Oh.
El riesgo vive siempre!
Given some previous announcements of Time Warner to get into the phone biz (http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/36287 for one example), they would already be required to comply with wiretap laws. Nothing surprising here.
Don't blame the provider for the law. Blame your lawmaker.
Dump the IRS - http://www.fairtax.org
Megacorporations, for once, have amazing power to do a huge amount of good for freedom in this country - by refusing to comply.
Oh god no. The day corporations stop complying with the laws you don't like is the day they'll stop complying with the laws you do like.
Environmental regulations? Out the window. OSHA laws? Gone. Child labor? Hiya kids, grab a pick and head to the mines. We can go back to the early part of the century when companies could spy on their workers' private lives in order to ensure they were living "morally".
AOLTIMEWARNER: We are AOLTIMEWARNER. Resistance is futile.
FBI: Exterminate! Exterminate!
AOLTIMEWARNER: Your unique markets will be added to our own until all media is an even gray mass of mediocrity.
FBI: Exterminate! Exterminate!
AOLTIMEWARNER: And, um, we, uh, you know. Customer privacy and, um.
FBI: The only interest we have in privacy is its total extermination!
AOLTIMEWARNER: Yeeeah. Um, look, we're going to go over there for a while and-
FBI: Obey all FBI commands! Obey instantly! Obey without question! Obey! Obey! Obey! Obey! Obey! Obey! Obey!
AOLTIMEWARNER: Uh, OK.
FCC: Breasts are evil!
To quote the great Kurt Vonnegut, "...and so on."
--- Ban humanity.
Well , the can. All they have to do is 'pinky swear' that it is part of a National Security Matter. Just like they said the USA PATRIOT act would be used only against terrorists. Well, till they used it against that strip club owener is Vegas who has NO TERRORIST TIES>
In short, they lie.
C'mon people.
The internet is a PUBLIC network of public content. Where the hell does anyone get the idea that there is a concept of privacy involved here?
(This is not intended to be sarcastic, rhetorical, nor trolling.)
If you have (or seek) private information, encrypt it (or have it encrypted), (have it) wrap(ped) it in a
If you don't want the Government to watch what you are saying and/or doing, then don't give them anything to watch.
This isn't a Bush or Ashcroft thing... this is a technology thing. Any time technology is seen as capable of doing something, ANYTHING, you can bet someone will try do do so... without regard to whom is in charge.
The problem with socialism is that they always run out of other people's money. - Margaret Thatcher
Face it people, all this surveillance is going to happen. The government is going to have complete information about you and contrl over you in a few short years. The Internet can be a great tool for communication and education, just like television could have been. It can also be a tool for control, just like television is.
America is in the hands of the bad guys, and within our lifetimes we will have a totalitarian government ruling a flock of consumer/workers who generate wealth for the top 2%. Just like in the good old days, only with HDTV. It's pretty much that way now, but in the future it won't be a secret, and people won't really care as long as the can buy cheap gas, eat Big Macs and watch American Idol on a 42-incher.
I've come to the conclusion that it's just the way the human race works. Some people take charge because the rest let them. Unless you are one of those take-charge types, the best thing you can hope to do is take care of yourself, your family and other people you care about, stay under the radar and live as well as possible. Democracy is like every other good thing that survives until They Who Must Own Everything figure out how to hack it.