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Law Requires Italian Web Cafes to Record ID
Armadni General writes "CNN is reporting that a new Italian law requires that all businesses offering public internet access, such as web cafes, to identify and record all customers. While supporters of this law trumpet its anti-terrorism potential, still others see no such advantage and bemoan this invasion of personal privacy. 'They must be able, if necessary, to track the sites visited by their clients. [...] Contents of people's e-mail is, however, supposed to remain private and can only be made available to law enforcement through a court order. Italy also obliges telecommunications companies to keep traffic data and European ministers agreed last week to require the carriers to retain records of calls and e-mails for a maximum of two years. The European Parliament's two largest groups endorsed the data retention initiative on Wednesday despite complaints from privacy advocates and telecoms, and the full body is expected to adopt a bill next week.'"
It's just bad to to have to submit to this law... /. is the very bottm... :(
But having to read it on
Grammar Zealots: please spare a non-english writer (lastknight dot com)
Three cheers for fake ID!
POKE 36879,8
Luckily I am well-versed in the ancient art of JAPing over Tor, and I have studied the lost techniques of Knoppix burning.
Global warming is a cube.
If the cops really think that ID should be required, why aren't they stepping up and doing something more effective, such as a computer login or swipecard?
Good luck securing all the open wireless access points by law enforcement.
But probably the ones with open WLANs wil be 'guilty' of anything accused. Someone simply *has* to go to jail!
Perhaps one or two virus authors could have been caught. Maybe, and then probably not. But today, with all those open wireless networks, the law is pointless. It only affects the poorest people, those who need email, or are trying to find a job online, but don't have a computer at home.
First off, I realy think the proposal of the EU minister would have /. article on its own.
merrited a
It's such a broad assault on the privacy of European citizens that I
don't think there is anything comparable in European history, yet, for
most people who only follow the mainstream press, it's an absolute
non-story. There is close to no coverage at all.
To spell it out again, information about all your telephone calls (that
is, for example, who you called and when), all your email (that is whom
did you write to and when) and all the websites you visited will be
recorded and stored for at least 6 months and up to 24 months.
As to who will be able to use this information, this is of course left
very vague and surprise, surprise, the music industry is already
lobbying to have access to this data.
Really, this proposal that will probably make it through the parliament
will change Europe in a very, very worrying way and nobody seems to be
upset about it. It's frustrating and scary.
P.S.:
I just read on spiegel online (a german news site), that the Italian law
leads to a lot of web cafes closing their door, because customers are
not willing to take this bs.
Alas ! That the same thing was voted in France a couple weeks ago...
Bah, our Minister of the Interior, Nicolas Sarkozy, is best buds with the Bush administration, so what can a guy do ? :-(
I remember a few years back in the dial-up days trying to get net access in Italy, it took a whole lot of documents and bureaucracy, we had to get a friend who was a real resident to put it under his name. I don't think you can do anything in that country without atleast having some kind of passport or ID photocopied and stamped.
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Well it may come to that. When on vacation in Spain and Austria I noticed a variety of billing methods for net labs. The most common was 'quisiera usar Internet' - 'bien, usa ordenador numero ocho'. and settle payment when you left. (Sorry if my Spanish is wrong!) Some did make you pay upfront for half hour blocks with a temporary login and password. (Printed out on a POS docket). Others were timed with a coin slot.
That was mainly net access in pay by the hour computer labs. Whilst there wasn't any ID check it's not too far removed.
For actual cafes, whose main revenue is food and drink the following scenario might apply: Some multinational coffee chains already have membership swipe cards that allow for rewards such as a free coffee after every umpteenth purchase. Every time you buy coffee and a muffin you might get, say, 15 mins free net access -forcing you to go back for more food to extend your time. Premium members might pay for credits in advance. Beats sticking a coin in a slot every 10 minutes.
It seems to have an out of proportion effect on our lives for the damage it currently causes. This is not to belittle the victims, but we are letting something that has miniscule effect on the populace as a whole CONTROL US.
Or at least let the politicians control us through FUD. Any politician that utters the word "terrorism" along with a bill that they think "needs" to get passed to "protect" us should be voted out ASAP anyway.
But imagine if nations like the US spent their kind of anti-terrorism money on, something basic, like national healthcare. Would that have saved or benefited more lives than "fighting the war on terrorism?"
Yes, the upcoming EU directive and the Italian law cover that. They are not asking for the data, only the connection metadata (sender/recipient, time of login, IP address, etc). When you receive mail from a suspected terrorist, it makes you a suspect too. Encrypt that.
Blaaargh! These damned Americans and their Big Brother.... oh.
First, the "Big Brother" directive being forced through the EU which mandates logging of all end-points used in communications.
Second, the elimination of anonymous access, via cybercafes and pre-paid phone cards. This closes the present loopholes in the implementation of Big Brother.
Third, the creation of EU-wide databases that are accessible to police forces before criminal acts occur. Yes, this data will be abused, sold, stolen, leaked. It always happens.
Forth, the creation of new types of "crime". See the French proposal to outlaw free software, proposals to criminalise patent infringement, etc.
Fifth, the creation of EU juduicial and police structures to enforce these crimes. See EPO tribunals, EU arrest warrant, extradition for crimes like "piracy", etc.
Interesting to note that all references to "terrorism" were removed from the compromise ammendments that will be voted on Wednesday. This wave of anti-privacy legislation has nothing to do with terrorism (that was just the stick) and everything to do with autocrats in business and in government that feel they have lost control of new technology and will do anything to regain it.
The real targets of these laws are downloaders, tax evaders, petty and less petty crooks... it'd be justified if the EU was sinking in a sea of crime, but since crime rates have been falling year on year...
Europe's privacy advocates are rightly worried. It is the sheer speed of the assault (all happening in a few months) that has left most of us staggered. No time to lobby, no time to mount a resistance, almost no time even for journalists to notice what's happening.
Lastly, and most worryingly for EU citizens, is the way criminal law and new definitions of crime are being created by the unelected Council and Commission burocracy - these groups have basically coerced the European Parliament into accepting "compromises" or being left out of the legislative process completely.
In other words... we cannot vote these laws away. There is no mechanism for appeal. There is no supreme court. There is no constitution. When French and Dutch voters threw out the consitution, they threw out a last chance for European democracy. If only they had known...
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It's about data mining, it's about control... they want to be able to have access to unlimited information at our expense. Right now governments are pushing their authority as far as they can, just to see how far they CAN go. And apparently they can do whatever the fsck they want.
As a Frenchman, I had wished that Europe in general would remain a beacon of personal freedom while the U.S. ate away its people's freedom in the name of "freedom" (Patriot Act, anyone?). But unfortunately the reality of things is quite different.
Don't know about you folks, but to enter the library in C.U.N.Y. you had to show valid ID. That part of the "law" does not really worry me, since good terrorists will have fake Id in any case it won't hamper their activities that way. Those in country illegally for non-terror activities will be severly hampered, but that is another issue entirely. The real story is tracking your electronic communication. We know that if done right, this con help track those that are using the internet for subversive intententions such as for kidnapping, bombings and... distribution of music files :)
At some level the ability to be able to track such activity and use it by linking it with to people that were in the internet cafe at the time is quite desirable, especially after part of your neighbourhood gets destroyed and it comes to light that those responsible used various internet technologies in public places to plan, fund and implement it. However, its going to be a lot of information to be stored and looked over to find patterns of information, etc. Who is going to do that? A beaucracy who has problems gettingout from under its own feet, or a privately contracted firm (with individuals who have interests in sharing such information secretly with others)?
This is a mess logistically, and they should know it. It sounds good at one level, but how many petabytes of info are going to be generated and scanned? They might as well just use Carnivore or whatever the USA uses and be done with it... as if it will really help before an attack, or to catch the person who really came up with the idea of the attack... or the bankers or "charitable organisations" from whom the funds came.
For every present, there is a past
This law has been around for at least one year, possibly more.
It got passed after a terrorist group who killed two Italian senior civil servants (Marco Biagi in 2002 and Massimo d'Antona in 1999) used an internet cafe at the Rome main train station to send messages to Italian newspapers claiming responsibility for the assassinations.
Generally, this law was ignored, partly because the terrorists mentioned above (the last survivors of the Red Brigades, a major communist group thoroughly defeated during the eighties) were quickly rounded up and arrested.
But when it turned out that the Islamic terrorists responsible for the 2004 Atocha Station bombing in Spain (over 200 dead) also used internet cafe's to co-ordinate their actions, policemen started to go round internet cafe's threatening them with closure and prosecution if they did not keep records of the people visiting them.
Needless to say, this law is completely useless. If you want to preserve your anonimity when in Italy, go to the smaller places. Most do not bother checking your ID card and have no CCTV, contrary to the big places (which are usually run by Telecom Italia). But make sure you have a Knoppix bootdisc because very few use any antivirus and their PC are full of malware.
Sadly, my country is not famous for its respect of civil liberties. The state and the police often abuse their power and do not miss the opportunity offered by someone abusing the system to further extend their powers to intrude into people's privacy.
And instead of protesting and ask for a more just society, people take the easy route and try to get around the law whenever possible. It's all screwed up.
"Engineering a crisis" does not necessarily mean planting bombs. It can mean training extremists, over decades, perhaps to fight wars in places like Afghanistan, and then when these extremists turn and attack their original sponsors, leaving the doors open. See the BBC documentary, "the Power of Nightmares" for a good analysis of how both sides (western and islamic extremists) have created conflict in order to hold onto power.
The most convincing argument I've heard against the conspiracy theories is that it would require a level of capability that is beyond the general incompetence that defines most government. I don't accept that any government possesses a sense of morality. Indeed, the state is driven by the ammoral self-interest of individuals, and without checks and balances, the state generally becomes extremist.
The current assault on European civil society is so well orchestrated that it shows how efficient the state can be when it is really motivated. So no, I don't think it's nonsense to accept the possibility that "terrorism" is so useful to the current crop of politicians that if it had not existed, they'd have gone and created it.
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The law needs to pass the Corkey test. What happens when someone of a low IQ decides to follow the instructions of "plug and play". I would suspect the manufacturers to be more responsible that the end user. For example, what about when grandma decides to take home a wireless router and she does not secure it and someone uses it for an illegal purpose? How will the court convict someone who can't program a VCR? Where is the Mens Rea (guilty mind)? Sure, the act might be there, but was the intent?
The only other option is to force everyone to get a special license to use this kind of equipment. If wi-fi is that dangerous, then govenment might do that. And I'm sure they could think of a nice name for the tax... "Defending on-line liberty act".
If cable companies are moving to digital content with television, it is only one step away from securing their whole network, so that nobody unauthorized can get on. Everything will be DRM'ed, and the network will be closed.
After recording your information you get a plastic card (the chain of cafes in question is Internet Train). With this card I can surf away at any Internet Train in Italy. And how exactly does that thwart terrorism?
For starters: I didn't try to read the magnetic stripe, which can be done with any 30$card reader, but I can't imagine that it's very hard to make sense of it and alter it appropriately. But I wouldn't even have to be technically savvy. I could just pay a junkie 20 Euros that he obtains such a card. The card can be lost or stolen and how exactly do you monitor such a vast amount of data?
Italy is turning into a nation of fucking Fascists under Berlusconi and it ain't a pleasent sight.
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
Sadly, in the UK, we have a nice little law (with lots of nice little holes in it) that basically says "give us your password. And your private key. And any session keys you may have used. What, you don't have that information any more? OK, see you in two years when you get out of jail". Fun.
For the love of God, please learn to spell "ridiculous"!!!
I can see Congress passing a law to where you must present ID that conforms to the coming Real ID Act of 2005 before connecting to the Internet at a public conveyance. No more anonymous connections here in the USA such as going into libraries or places that offer free Internet.
What happens when someone of a low IQ decides to follow the instructions of "plug and play". I would suspect the manufacturers to be more responsible that the end user. For example, what about when grandma decides to take home a wireless router and she does not secure it and someone uses it for an illegal purpose?
Someone may be able to get away with that defense once or twice; after that, manufacturers will put big warning labels in their manuals and make the defaults more secure (that's already happening, actually).
How will the court convict someone who can't program a VCR? Where is the Mens Rea (guilty mind)? Sure, the act might be there, but was the intent?
Intent is not necessary; carelessness that harms others is sufficient for legal consequences and responsibility.
If cable companies are moving to digital content with television, it is only one step away from securing their whole network, so that nobody unauthorized can get on. Everything will be DRM'ed, and the network will be closed.
The more people behave irresponsibly with digital content, the more of an excuse those companies have. So, don't give these people an excuse.
When I was backpacking through Italy this summer I was suprised to find the aformentioned policies (or parts of them) in place and in use in every internet cafe I stopped in. They always checked my ID and some even asked me to see my passport. Now, it wasnt the most pleasant feeling when somebody asked you to get your passport out to check your email.. but I always got the same reply: "I know, sorry... New regulations.."
I guess the data retention aspect of this law would be new, but otherwise much of it is already in place!
... I have studied the lost techniques of Knoppix burning.
Your knoppix-fu is easily defeated by their BIOS-fu, Configuring a public system to *only* boot from the hard drive is necessary to prevent bypassing anti-virus software and installing malware. Your fu is only useful against weaklings who fail to update BIOS settings.
will be subverted, in time and to varying degrees. The Internet is no exception.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
>Think about this for a second.
I have been thinking about this for many years.
>So you want to go into a private business, rent computer time and an internet
>connection, conduct whatever behavior you want on their systems and then leave, totally
>anonymously,
Yes, that is exactly what I want. And I let other do the same on my connection.
>with no accountability for what you did on their systems?
I am always responsible for what I do. That does not mean that I want everything I do recorded.
I also want to go into a bar or hotel room without being recorded by hidden microphones.
Now excuse me, I'll be installing Tor.
?SYNTAX ERROR