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DoJ search requests: Yahoo, AOL, MSN said "Yes"
d2viant writes "Elaborating on a previous article on Slashdot, it appears that the search engines which complied for Department of Justice requests for logs were apparently AOL, MSN, and Yahoo. According to the article, Justice is not requesting this data in the course of a criminal investigation, but in order to defend its argument that the Child Online Protection Act is constitutionally sound."
Does that make Google the sore thumb now?
If DoJ is truly interested in porn, especially child porn, will Google surrender all releated searches?
Virtual Betting on Facebook for non-geeks.
I'd guess google gets more searches than aol, msn, and yahoo combined.
but of course thats only from anecdotal evidence.
anyone here know those stats?
The giraffe video?
.
Giraffes. Who couldn't appreciate those long necks? So slender
Why confront me? It's obvious.
She's stalling until the police arrive.
"Nothing you saw was illegal - in the countries it was filmed. "
So appropriate.
I'll form my OWN solar system! With blackjack! And hookers!
....then at least in balls to stand up against , google wins by a tremendously big margin.
Time and time again we hear about privacy, freedoms and liberties in the US being restricted in favour of "security". This is just one small example in a field of many. Now I ask a question to all Americans: do you actually feel any safer? If you do, please explain.
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Is there a reason that the DoJ needs information from all of the search engines? At some point, can't we make a statistical comparison and say that since x% of results in AOL / MSN / Yahoo were for this subject, that google most likely is in the same area?
I mean are the users of google search that much different than AOL / MSN / Yahoo???
Does the DoJ need a complete analysis? If so, let's hand this over to the US Census bureau.
People. Get a grip. Most companies will comply with government subponeas. Don't get your hopes too high that Google will hold it's ground either. In fact I think they're playing with fire.
The ONLY way to protect against this sort of information being used by law enforcement is to never collect it in the first place. Only collect statistical obfuscated data and you won't have these problems - how valid and accurate your statistics based on aggregate data will be is another matter though.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Aren't subpoenas supposed to be reserved for matters where there is some kind of trial involved? Surely the government can't just subpoena information for research purposes.
Why would MSN, Yahoo, and AOL be so eager to cooperate? I can't believe that these corporations care one way or the other about people viewing porn. So what is it? Are they hoping that by cooperating they get some special favors later, or do they fear recrimination by the Bush administration if they refuse?
It is interesting how many of the other search engines outside of google bowed down to this. The reason for the search engine logs seems quite shady to me, and seems like a ruse just to get access for some other purpose. I have a feeling Google probaby detected this and has decided that the intent of the log request is much deeper and shadier than it looks.
I accidentally found out one day that its possible for not-so-legal images to show up on a google image search. (i was searching for something unrelated which happened to be close to the name of a magazine which isn't so nice. a european publication.) I'd bet a dollar to a doughnut that you could find worse stuff through GIS (images.google.com)
The thumbnails are stored at a google location.
Does that mean that Google itself is hosting illegal files?
The article makes the good point that all this data collecting is really useless. So the government finds out that millions of searches for porn takes place every 10 minutes. All that really says is that the porn industry is alive and well.
Unless they're planning on using this data to push anti-porn decency laws (which would be an abuse of power to say the least) the data doesn't suggest in the slightest the context in which the searches were made.
It's also unclear as to whether or not they were after information about percent of porn results in a non-porn search (for example: "breast cancer" as two unquoted words) or just the searches explicitly for porn or child pornography. What about people researching child pornography for a class? It's all so useless that this entire exercise is a waste of money and time at every level.
...and that's the way the cookie crumbles.
If the DOJ are not doing a criminal investigation, why do they have more rights to get the information that they want, when if I were to jump up and down asking for access from MSN, AOL, or Yahoo, I would just be told to go away?
I do not have a problem with them having access, as long as I can have access too. If they get away with this, next time I am left doing a research paper on the popular searching trends of people, I want them to open there databases up to me, too. That is the extent of what they are doing from what I see, just a research paper to prove a point.
This policy of spying started long before Bush and it will continue after the Bush administration. Citing this battle as one between Bush & Google seems short sided. I hate Bush as much as the next guy(or 49% of you) and it makes sense that the battle to protect privacy goes way beyond just this administration.
And the DoJ's boss invaded Iraq to find WMD.
--
make install -not war
And if we go back a few years, we can see all of this COINTELPRO data wasn't to stop foreigners, or even people doing illegal things, but to harrass people like Martin Luther King, or breakins to the Watergate hotel to bug the Democrats. Not like the Democrats have rolled this stuff back when they got into office, Clinton's staff was over-requesting FBI files of people during "filegate".
And we're told it's because of the "War on Terror", which is a war which they never say when it will end. It reminds me of Orwell's 1984, when the government is in a state of permanent war, or war preparation anyhow. I may be older than some Slashdotters, but when I grew up I was told the US only had foreign military bases because of the USSR, and if they weren't targets of attack by Moscow, we wouldn't have them there. A decade and a half after the fall of the Berlin wall, I'm now told we are in a new state of permanent war - the cold war has become the war on terror. American military bases still circle the globe - in fact they've expanded, especially in countries south of Russia and west of China. The Russians used to say America had bases all over the world not because of Russia, but because of American imperialism. I was always told this was false, the bases were there because of the possibility of Russian attack. A decade and a half later, what the Russians used to say rings truer than what the US used to say. In fact, the government has now changed its story, and wants us to forget they used to say that, and have us all concentrate on their new permanent war.
Google has been sued for not releasing the requested information.
There is no knowledge that is not power.
The COPA is a bad law. Bad in the sense that it is not doing what it truly seeks to do: curb child exploitation on the internet.
The DOJ is trying to go after child pornographers, but they are making laws for service providers.
This discrepancy is typical of old-school thinking. Stop the profitablility of such activity by going after the people making money in the process, but, especially on the internet, this only servers to inhibit legal providers of porn.
Thank you Dave Raggett
How do we know that AOL, MSN, and Yahoo have already complied?
When searching anonymously use a Proxy.
Religion for nerds. Stuff that really matters
Isn't this just wonderful? First, the government decides it is going to read e-mails and bug phone calls without warrants.
So is Google supposed to feel guilty now?
What's next: the rewards from the government if you "turn in" your neighbours for being Jewish?
Why, Kyle Varga of Alpharetta, GA? Why?
goatse.cx from Yahoo, MSN and AOL?
:)
;-)
Thanks to the Freedom of Information Act you will be able to find out!
God Bless America!
"Won't somebody please think of the children" Act.
"I'm going to f***ing bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I'm going to f***ing kill Google"
Quotes from the article here: http://news.com.com/Feds+take+porn+fight+to+Google /2100-1030_3-6028701.html?tag=nefd.lede
AOL response...
AOL spokesman Andrew Weinstein confirmed that the company received a subpoena from the DOJ but said the information from the ACLU was not accurate.
"We did not and would not comply with such a subpoena. We gave (the DOJ) a generic list of aggregate and anonymous search terms, and not results, from a roughly one day period. There were absolutely no privacy implications," Weinstein said. "There was no way to tie those search terms to individuals or to search results." He declined to elaborate.
Yahoo response...
Yahoo acknowledged on Thursday that it complied with the Justice Department's request but said no personally identifiable information was handed over. "We are vigorous defenders of our users' privacy," said Yahoo spokeswoman Mary Osako. "We did not provide any personal information in response to the Justice Department's subpoena. In our opinion this is not a privacy issue."
MSN response.... ?????
Please don't let the details hit you in the ass in reguards to AOL/Yahoo.
Enjoy,
It's just the normal noises in here.
.. me of the time when cmdrtaco "requested" his fiancee (in the form of a post) and she said "yes"
Because the motive stated, isn't always the real motive?
Because the administration appears to be getting away with removing all sorts of freedoms from their citizens using reasons such as this?
I agree completely with you that something should be done to crack down on Child Porn, is this really what they are after? Is the bill they are pushing through really going to help?
There have been so many reasons not to trust what they say at face value, is this yet another?
--- I've completed diagnosis of your problem and can classify it as a YOYO...You're On Your Own
Ashcroft vs American Civil Liberties Union
don't drop dox
I realize that complete ignorance is a Slashdot hallmark, but the majority of you really need to educate yourselves on this matter.
The information given out by the other companies, and requested from Google, is completely divorced from any personally identifying data.
The only privacy issue in this whole thing is the privacy of Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, and the other corproration asked for this data. Since Slashdot readers generally haven't minded the government sticking their noses into other companies' private business in the past, I doubt they'd be so up in arms if they really understood whose privacy was at stake here.
So we should do our part: let's swamp Google with sex searches!!!
the DoJ supplies a list of phrases that they would like the number of queries for in comparison to the total number of queries. I personally would have no problem with google or any other search engine supplying those details, of course without the infomation of who actually searched for it.
It's going to be interesting -- Can Google outsmart the government like Microsoft did, or will the bottomless goverment eventually destroy Google and take over all the logs, or even operate Google as a govermental service?
Virtual Betting on Facebook for non-geeks.
They said that they're testing the constitutionality of COPA.
That generally means that the Attourney General is suing to remove the injunction barring him from enforcing that law (that's generally how they stop a law, by the way, which is one reason people often sue the Attourney General).
That said, I believe that Google contends that the request is over-broad among other things (i.e. they want a hell of a lot of information from Google that would be expensive to produce when Google did nothing wrong here).
That doesn't mean that they will be able to quash it. Google might well merely get to limit the data they can get to something not very expensive to produce.
Disclaimer: IANAL, I merely read Groklaw. There's a lot I don't know about the law, and I'm basing the above supposition only on what I've seen of the articles concerning this on Slashdot. They may well be incredibly wrong.
I'm not getting it. How do random anonymous search results of any kind assist in determining whether something is constitutionally sound? I take it that they want to make sure the Act is not trampling on anybody's constitutional rights, correct? I'm trying to imagine what you could possibly learn with regards to that, from search results. You can see percentages of people searching for particular things and what they wind up getting as a result. Ok, so you know roughly what random people of unknown ages are searching for, and you have a rough idea of where they might choose to land. I can't find the link to constitutional issues here, so I just have to say: wtf?
I agree completely. It is absurd to think that there should be restrictions on the government’s power. There is no reason whatsoever that the government should not just be able to demand information and property from persons or businesses. Yes, support the President and all that he and his Administration and appointies choose to do without any question or oversight!
Join Tor today!
"Following the incredible reversal in the "Google vs DoJ" case, the Supreme court confirmed that kids watching porn is all right as long as it is kids porn.
Sesame Street is the first to react with the DVD (thought lost) title "Frogs'n Sow - Peggy Gets It !"
On other news, the pope died of a heart attack while watching what he thought were Sesame Streets Re-run, and GW Bush commited seppuku with a preztel on seeing the show.
Now the Dow-Jones, with the barrel @ 199$, the Emirates decided to buy the US of A..."
Do I really need to put a "/laugh, it's funny" marker ? 8p
It takes 40+ muscles to frown, but only four to extend your arm and bitchslap the motherfucker
I really hate children. The war against adulthood has forced me to make a choice, and that is... I hate children. More importantly... I hate the parents of children who think they have any more right than the rest of us.
Ok, I dont really hate children, but you can see my frustration with this and the arguement "its for the good of the children"
People dont even use the V-chip, and those same people will lobby our government with hopes of ridding the planet of porn.
Microsoft and Apple should just build in a complete censorship layer into their OS that can be attributed to a certain user level account.
That way if your child searches breast... and finds a sweet pair of titties... its your own dam fault and not googles.
Anyone who voted Republicrat or Democan, shut up and go sit on the sidelines.
You've already demonstrated that you want an intrusive, activist government, you have no room to complain now. You ASKED FOR THIS.
______________________________________
A vote against a Libertarian candidate is
a vote to abolish the Constitution itself
Well, if proxies are still around, will they start getting their logs too?
Does no good for child pornography if it was accessed through a series of 6 different connections. It's like playing where's waldo in a maze.
"I'm a well-wisher, in that I don't wish you any specific harm."
To be honest - I've been skeptical about Google for some time. I was not sure how I felt about a company who's sole purpose in life was to perform the same services as Yahoo! but market it as "not evil". Sucessfully so, I might add. I honestly doubted their "Don't be evil" mission.
After reading up about the other companies quietly folding under White House pressure, I am honestly relieved to see SOMEONE finally standing up for the rights of our citizens. Rights are NEVER erroded all at once. The day will never come when we wake up and the amendment about free speech is removed from the Consitution. The day WILL come, however, when we wake up and the free speech amendment means nothing because several iterations of the "Patriot Act" have erroded what it really means.
People in this country need to seriously wake the fuck up. We've been through several iterations of errosion of our rights under this white house. Allow me to sum up: 1) Plame's identity leaked (treason according to the law - I eagerly await the hangings), 2) The Patriot Act (need I say more?), 3) CIA spying on US citizens (notice how quickly W. moved on catching the traitors that leaked that), and 4) This request for search records. The day is rapidly approaching when we wake up and our rights will not mean anything ALL IN THE NAME OF PROTECTING US FROM [insert irrational fear here].
Today, I for one, take my hat off to Google. At the least, even if they are required to acquiese in the end, it garned media attention on the shifty White House request. It will be a long time before I doubt "Don't be evil." again.
At least now we know that Microsoft and Yahoo aren't just aiding the Chinese government in opressing citizens, they're happy to help out the US Government.
Justice is not requesting this data in the course of a criminal investigation, but in order to defend its argument that the Child Online Protection Act is constitutionally sound."
Sure they aren't. And NSA is only wiretapping terrorists.
Kythe
With the security implications piling up, is it time the free software community put together an anonomized and privacy-conscious search utility?
<p>
If the not-so-secret police feel confident in this kind of brazen fishing expedition, for information which is not even tied to a particular case or crime, there is no telling how far it will go. Sensible people should not rely on the "morals" of big business. Who cares if Google is the good guy today? The fact that they are in a position to collect huge masses of information AND feel no compulsion to delete it marks Google as A BAD THING<font size="-2"><sup>TM</sup></font>. Tomorrow or next week, they could hand everything over.
<p>
Where is the 16yo who will write the Google killer? Or maybe the Internet dream is dead? When Stallman got tired of corporate intrusion into his life, he began the free software movement. When will the anti-information movement begin, the movement to create software that refuses to remember, that anonymizes automatically, that protects our ability to be curious today and in the future?
<p>
TAZ
Oh, c'mon...they could have complied with that request in 20 minutes. If there's one thing that google DOES have, it's stats on absolutely everything to do with their business. Including search term frequency without a doubt. And that's the kind of thing they'd have available to analysts pretty much instantaneously.
So if Google didn't comply with this, it's because they specifically opposed it, not because it will be a hassle. So I say, Go Google!
...that anyone who has anything to hide will use Google exclusively.
And is there anyone anywhere without a single skeleton in his or her closet?
Find environmentally and socially responsible products on http://buy-right.net
for google, but lets get something straight. Google is doing this for a reason, and it's not to "stick it to the man". They are getting HUGE. They're looking to be bigger than Microsoft somewhere down the line and even with a "Don't be Evil" slogan, distrust is already bubbling up in some of the populace. Another portion of the populace still trusts them but are weary of them. This is to show the public that they're personal and private data is safe with them. It's a PR move. They'll sell it to other companies, no problem. But if they can make a media issue about how they refuse to give it up the government, maybe they've earned some trust in a few. And based on the comments both here and at Digg.com over the issue, it's played right in their favor.
Redirect all queries to our websites from *.gov IP addresses to goatse.cx. :)
I think Google should comply with the request... ...by running it through something like CAPTCHA and providing the information as hard copy.
-- Terry
Guess what. The Gov subpoena of the logs is a *symptom* of the problem. The real problem is that these search engines are even keeping this information to begin with. Put this way, if it's not the Gov coming after the logs, then it's companies trying to get access to them to garner value - including Google.
I just asked my wife what she thought and her immediate response was, "That's ok, I use Google". :)
Is Google being told they have to turn over ALL the logs or only logs which involve child porn searches?
What happens if the search returned no results?
Will Google also turn over which link the user clicked on?
Yes you too can be a true Patriot and give your information freely using Patriot Search http://blog.outer-court.com/patriot/
This must be some kind of plot set up by some kind of Power because it sounds so ridiculeous, seriously, who needs all that data to know what you can know by just typing the requests your-self. Must be set up by the same people who like having a date stamp on your printers or magnetic code on your money(ps: use a magnet on your money if you want to verify this, your money will be attracted).
The best excuse for a President, a King or others *insert your words*, is God. God has still yet to find an excuse.
From the article you linked: "Google objected to the government's subpoena, saying it would reveal trade secrets by providing the data and disclose personally identifiable information about its users. In response, the government said it would keep the data secret and that the request wasn't for personal information."
Google is really starting to tick me off. Please see my previous post and its responses documenting my personal case (and apparently others) where my searches when logged into my Google account and the personalized homepage have been logged despite the fact that I NEVER OPTED IN! Once I found a way to opt out, I did promptly, but I never was given notice of this fact when I signed up and it appears they changed their privacy policy without me knowing it. Yeah, sure, I should check the link but seriously, that is responsible (or even evil).
And now, Google is saying "it would reveal trade secrets by providing the data and disclose personally identifiable information about its users." Yeah, you mean users like me who NEVER WANTED MY HISTORY RECORDED! Perhaps spying on my Internet habits qualifies as trade secrets. I'm seriously thinking of never again logging into Google account online again because they have LOST MY TRUST. Sorry...someone has to say this.
This sig donated to Pater. Long live
Wow. This really is a government operation.
I kid you not.
Please establish a hypertext link to this message. Spread the word!
Do you really think that real child pornographers are going to look for things through Google without any kind of redirection?
What do they think, that we criminals are stupid? Anyone heard of proxies, remembering/bookmarking URL's, non-USA search engines?
This is really a stupid thing going on. This government and laws passing in the "great" United States of America makes me remember of the witchhunt for "communists" about 50y ago. It's happening all over again but now you just have to accuse that neighbour you don't like of filesharing, terrorism or kiddie-porn-searches. And anyone remembers those commies from half a decade ago? No, media, government and agency's are all trying to cover it up as if it never happened or that 'it wasn't that bad'.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
You should fear the Bush administration. I can't give away names, but I know a world class surgeon who has created several new abdominal surgeries. He was a whistle blower, or tried to be. A few monthes before Bush's re-elction, my friend tried to blow the whistle on a very large health care institution that was looking the other way while a handful of doctors knowingly killed patients. The Bush administration was directly involved through lucrative government contracts and personal ties to those looking the other way.
They followed my friends family, threatened his life as well as the lives of his wife and children, had him fired and blacklisted.
Now he works in the ER handling drug addicts and shootings. On one occasion someone tried to take his life, coming into the ER, pretending to need emergency care, asking for him by name and then trying to strangle him in one of the rooms. Only to be thwarted and disappear.
I wish this story wasn't true. You should fear them.
"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
Down with the career politician! SUPPORT TERM LIMITS
A friend of mine is a chef and found out the hard way...do NOT google for a "loose meat sandwich"!!!
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
First, I don't buy DOJ's argument here about why they want the data... I think they just want to sift through to figure out what they could learn about bogeymen^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H terrorists if they monitored searches more routinely.
That aside, if anyone actually gave a shit about what kids were viewing on the 'net, they'd simply make a *.kids restricted TLD. A private board could oversee it, chartered to only allow kid-safe sites to remain registered. (What the criteria for "kid-safe" are, I don't really care... no porn, advertising, swearing, forums, bright colors, insightful thoughts, whatever. Who cares, just as long as it's "safe for the children.")
It's simple as hell to restrict access only to IP addresses in the *.kids TLD, so people can have a padded, safety-scissors-shaped "internet" for their kids, without attempting a (futile) lobotomy of the broader Internet.
I think kids are great. Their parents are usually fine, too. It's just the fucking "moral" Crusaders that drive me insane.
(Well, actually, evesdropping governments piss me off even more. Bush should be impeached and tried, so we can determine whether he is actually guilty of ordering illegal searches.)
One issue which I think was fuzzy in the earlier post and in this one is what the DoJ is actually concerned with. Are they looking to find child porn-related searches, or are they looking for the amount of (legal) porn sites returned in searche results (which may inadvertently expose children to porn)? Or are they looking at both? These are two very different issues, and I'm curious if anyone can enlighten us as to the real situation.
If you can read this sig, you're too close.
In fact, I feel less safe. WAY less safe. Now I have to worry about all the people in the world who are pissed at me for being an American, the new people in the world who hate me because W has pissed them off, and now I have to worry about my own government spying on me and throwing me in jail if I type something into a search engine that returns something naughty.
And that can happen without you doing anything wrong. Ever type in a search that returned a few surprises? How about your wireless access point. Are you SURE it can't be hacked? You BETTER be.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
One could argue that because of the Afghan and Iraq wars, all the focus for the "terrorists" is on/in the middle east. Now while I'll generally agree with this assertion, it can also be said that because of the Iraq war, there are far more "terrorists" to be afraid of.
At this point, I agree with one of my fellow responders - I'm now more afraid of the government then of the "terrorists". Although, this is only very shortly followed by my fear of the "American people".
For example - the president institutes a secret spying campaign on the American people that is expressly forbidden by the law (as well as known by NSA agents as "it's something that we all know you just don't do") that was designed to avoid all checks and balances (in this case, judicial oversight). Now, the idea of "checks and balances" is a central tenant of the founding fathers vision of what was to become America. This is something that I was taught in primary school. And yet, when one of the major American news organization did a poll on if the president should have gotten warrants (read: judicial oversight) in this campaign, only 56% said that he should have (I could only find this story in the Google cache which claims only 47% believe he should have gotten warrants - far scarier).
That right there scared the living shit out of me! Only 56% (or 47%) of the (responding) population has a sense that the idea of an Executive with unchecked power is a bad idea!?!?
Danger, Will Robinson, Danger!
"1984" was ment to be a warning, not a guidebook. You hear that Kim Jong-il!? BushCo?!
I just wanted to point out that even if Google removes the IP, Cookie and Account information from the search records this would be nowhere near enough to avoid identifying me or my friends and our personal interests. In many cases the search terms I have used would be enough to both identify me and my friends and our various interest. For example, recently when I was looking for a long lost friend of mine who happens to share the same interest as me I typed in my name and his name with various terms reflecting our common interests. I did this because I might be able to better locate him by his name and his interests and I used my own name too in case he had a page up with my name on it. Furthermore, because I moved recently I have typed in various complex searches that could geographically identity the the neighborhood I live in, where I just moved from, and my personal interest in detail. Now, I for one would be able to handle this becoming public knowledge but I am sure in my friends case he would not. Given this, I see no way that they can check every one of a million terms to prevent this and even then it would mean someone was looking at them to do so. I find this offensive and it is a major invasion of my privacy.
Pissed Off
P.S. In thinking about it more, by using fuzzy search logic to look for various relationships between search terms one could use things like spelling mistakes, subject of terms, geographical nature of terms, and any time references to focus on one person even without a name. Take this scenario with just two searches, a person types in "Hunter, Kansas, ex Mormon, gay, men, Saturday, meatting" and then later "Hunter Kansas, soccer club, officers, meatting" A fuzzy search for close terms would bring them both up. Now Hunter Kansas being a really small town makes it more than likely that the person who misspelled "meeting" in the same odd way both times is the same person and a quick check on line shows the soccer club meeting the person was looking for only has 5 officers 3 of which happen to be women and 2 men one of which is married and Jewish you also find their names and images. Do you see what could happen? The two searches are not so odd. People type in where they are, what their looking for, and when in order to find somethings close by all the time. Well now they know they probably have an Gay, Ex-Mormon who goes to Saturday meetings in Hunter Kansas, the person's name, and his image. They have gained information that the person in no way intended to share publicly. I am sure you can see the risk even with just search terms alone.
They don't want us to feel safer. They want us to be scared. To be scared of the foreigners, and scared of each other. If we are scared and alone, we cannot cooperate to control the government. If we are scared of foreigners, then we will be willing to allow the government more latitude to control us. And it is working. If we are locked up in our homes alone, afraid, and unable to act or speak out, then we cannot build the momentum necessary to coordinate political reform.
Look at recent reports of police infiltrators in anti-war groups. Even seniors groups. And the feebs are saying things like 'we dont like their communist tendencies'. To them, anyone working together is a communist unless they are govt, or military. Those are a-ok.
It will probably get a lot worse before people become stung enough to stand up for themselves. Time will tell whether changes in technology will help balance the equation, or keep it tipping in favor of centralized state power.
I hope it doesnt tip too much further. This can be a really nice place to live when we have good leaders who have a plan to make life better for people, and not just more orderly for themselves.
Precendents in constitutional law include phrases like "substantial" or "compelling" government interest, as reasons to squeeze the edges of various constitutional rights.
So it's possible to imagine a legitimate legal argument pointing to research on how often searches return material harmful to minors, and arguing that the government interest justifies the COPA law. Then if the judges are doing their job they will
ask whether the law in the minimum possible restriction and subject the government's argument to "strict scrutiny".
I am not a constitutional lawyer and this is not necessarily the DOJ's motive.
...what's wrong with submitting this data to the government? Assuming that no IP addresses or login information is given (they aren't asking for that) what is Google "protecting" us from?
In my eyes, if there is data out there about search habits in general, what's wrong with the public (ie: government) using that information to make a decision?
Would we rather the government base decisions and reports on heresay?
I almost wonder if this is just a publicity stunt by Google to boost it's No Evil score. If the data were requested by - say, MIT - they'd hand it over without thinking.
-David
are added to a "list" of potential terrorists?
Bush + Impeachment
Who will guard the guards?
I don't have to worry about some unknown foreign army coming in, kicking in my door, and taking me to some unknown foreign place.
Now, I know my own government will kick in my door, declare me an enemy combatant, and send me to guantanemo.
Yeah....it's not much different....but the unknown is a pretty scare thing to me. So, yes, I feel safer. I know my terrorists.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
add up all of the "national security" issues that have led to domestic spying, or issues such as this one, and we see a very disturbing trend. anyone who is not VERY worried is ignorant of history.
Talking to Geeks is like eating jello with a chainsaw, interesting, but painful.
Dude you suck.
Definitely kids in porn is nothing new.
For the Americans yes it is a real children.
http://saveie6.com/
...search engine indexes you.
That's fine.. just go use msn or yahoo so the government gets it all. People should be CHEERING for google for taking a stand.
These search engines have no right and no compulsion to turn over any customer data, anonymous or otherwise, in response to politically motivated fishing expeditions.
Agreed.
The 'get a grip' comment (ignoring the connotation a person of dubious taste and even more dubious sense of humor might put on it, in a thread peripherally involving porn) is most appropriate, also. Our rights are not gone. Yeah, yeah, 'eternal vigilance' yadayada...
What is striking about the responses in this thread is the sight of otherwise intelligent people adding 1+1 and getting "C" and of course, CONSPIRACY starts with "C" so it all fits together!!! Fuck Bush!! Slippery slope arguments CAN be made, but valid ones not so easily, and certainly not crediby by people who refer to the "Red Scare" as if it were entirely a manipulative invention of the US Government.
Nor can such arguments credibly be made by anyone who tries to attribute our government's lamentable tech/IP/patent policies to the 'neocons' or Republicans or Christian Right. That just shows your agenda. If your really want to be vigilant about your rights, be cynical about ALL governmentoidal entities...the Dems whore out to the media companies and the Repubs whore out to the Baptists, and don't EVEN try to pretend either one is the Good Guys. Be cynical about Google, as well.
Though I guess if Google has record of your search terms for 'Caulkin nude clown' or 'labia dumplings with anus sauce' or something like that, it would justify a pretty hysterical response from you...
You know who you are.
"To be fair, I was left completely unsupervised." ~Anon
This is just an attempt to divert the public's attention from Bush's violations of the constitutional framework by refusing to obey the laws that Congress has passed and refusing to allow executive oversight of his actions by the judicial branch. If we become distracted by one of Rove's tricks now then we will be the last generation to have lived in the American republic the way it was originally conceived, with three branches checking and balancing the power of the other two.
Liberals call everyone Nazis yet they are the closest thing to it.
Their biggest trade secrets is that the world turns around Britney Spears according to the searchs!
On a more serious note, Google hire a lot of smart people and I think they are more than just protecting trade secrets, they must be tired that the gov put his noze everywhere where it doesn't belong. Today for porn, tomorrow for what, to know if you are Democrat, Republican, Libetarian or Independant?
History teaches one thing, it repeats it-self.
In case someone doesn't know it, the joke is from the latest Penny Arcade comic.
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?typ e=internetNews&storyID=2006-01-19T200124Z_01_N1930 3715_RTRUKOC_0_US-GOOGLE-PORNOGRAPHY.xml
Palaces, barricades, threats, meet promises
I generally agree with you, and the parent, and the "get a grip" commentor, although I wouldn't make any assumptions about how personally identifiable the data is or isn't without being able to see the data myself.
I also don't tend to support slippery-slope arguments, because they're a fallacy.
My issue is with the nature of the requests from the Feds; they're not using the data to pursue a criminal, they're not using the data as evidence in a criminal case, they're not even using the data for purely statistical reasons. They're using the data to try to support their case for a stupid Act that has twice been struck down by appeals courts.
Then there's the fact that the federal government has already received the data it requested from three other major search engines. Why is it so important to them to get Google's, too? What does Google have that the others don't?
For that matter, what grounds does the government have for issuing a subpoena for documents in a non-criminal case? At this point, it looks suspiciously like the federal government is abusing its power in the judicial branch to support its legislative branch.
So now a block of searches associates the name Geekotourist with rockets and with one or two addresses. Does this affect my privacy if these searches are clumped together?
Did Yahoo/AOL include any white pages or yellow pages searches while doing the government's homework? Does the government expect Google to keep all Google Local searches out of the "1 week of searches"? The white page and local style searches leak personal info like mad.
Or what if a search was designed to check on one's personal privacy, for example:
And while Y/AHOOL didn't provide "the results of the searches" to the gov't, I assume the gov't will be re-running them. The searches 'Cameras near 742 Evergreen Terrace' combined with 'photographing children' may have just been me helping with photos at a birthday party or finding a portrait studio. But its going to be analyzed by people who think 15-degrees-of-separation is a reasonable search.
From the prescient (and unfortunately being used as an anti-guidebook) best essay this century on Why Privacy is a Fundamental Human Right [just substitute 'Porn' for 'September 11' as the excuse the gov't gives, it comes out the same]:
"But though we tend to take it for granted, privacy - the right to control access to ourselves and to personal information about us - is at the very core of our lives. It is a fundamental human right precisely because it is an innate human need, an essential condition of our freedom, our dignity and our sense of well-being.
"If someone intrudes on our privacy - by peering into our home, going through the personal things in our office desk, reading over our shoulder on a bus or airplane, or eavesdropping on our conversation - we feel uncomfortable, even violated.
"Imagine, then, how we will feel if it becomes routine for bureaucrats, police officers and other agents of the state to paw through all the details of our lives: where and when we travel, and with whom; who are the friends and acquaintances with whom we have telephone conversations or e-mail correspondence; what we are interested in reading or researching; where we like to go and what we like to do.
"If we allow the state to sweep away the normal walls of privacy that protect the details of our lives, we will consign ourselves psychologically to living in a fishbowl. Even if we suffered no other specific harm as a result, that alone would profoundly change how we feel. Anyone who has lived in a totalitarian society can attest that what often felt most oppressive was precisely the lack of privacy.
But there also will be tangible, specific harm.
"The more information government compiles about us, the more of it will be wrong. That's simply a fact of life.
"...But if our privacy becomes ever more systematically invaded by the state for purposes of assessing our behavior and making judgments about us, wrong information and
Comment removed based on user account deletion
> Suuuurrre they did. Why don't you submit a link from a credible source, numbnuts.
a gename=article&articleid=A61251-2001Oct2&node=nati on/specials/attacked/archive
y /0,6903,560624,00.html
a sp?ID=9721
Sorry, I forgot my opponents are all idiots and can't handle high tech like Google. But I'm here trying to help ya out so..
Credible.. How about the WaPo?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac3/ContentServer?p
Headline: U.S. Was Foiled Multiple Times in Efforts To Capture Bin Laden or Have Him Killed
Slight;y less cannonical for you lefties, but mainstream media nonetheless, I give you The Guardian:
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/international/stor
Headline: Resentful west spurned Sudan's key terror files
A little more bloggish, but Horowitz runs a fairly reputable operation, he ain't some idiot in his pajamas
http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.
Headline: How Clinton Kept Bin Laden Free
Democrat delenda est
Instead of fighting this in court if the government was really interested in statistics ...they could pay a few students to just google for 2 weeks and make their own statistics on how often porn turns up...What's the point of asking a search engine to give this.
Are they really interested to make an argument or is it 1984 revisited...
Oh Come on now! This is the most obvious karma fraud I've seen.
Nice algo:
1) Find any article that relates to privacy or rights or freedom
2) Post the same quote from Benjamin Franklin
3) Do nothing!!!
4) Rake in some insightful comment
Let my karma burn, but I'll call bullshit off you. If I had mod points, I would have given you -1 (Redundant).
I'm much more funny, interesting and insightful than the moderators think
Twice in one day, Google shows their fat middle finger to a bunch of splooge-sucking weasels. Okay Google, we take it back. You're not becoming Microsoft. We love you again.
Unfortunately, that works only in rarity, and usually fails if you have lobbyists in defense.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
Since everybody else is saying "no", I'll say "yes". I think that Americans feel a lot safer.
At least, they feel a lot safer than they did on September 12, 2001. Americans were pretty spastic then, and that's why PATRIOT Act I was passed pretty quietly. They were scared. I was scared. It was pretty frickin' scary.
Today, they feel a lot safer. The follow-up attack that everybody expected never materialized. They're not glued to CNN. They're not kissing their wives perhaps a final good-bye on the way out the door going to work. (I did.) They've gotten more or less back to normal. They're still kinda scared, but since I grew up with Mutually Assured Destruction breathing down my neck, me and a lot of other Americans are kind of used to low-grade, continual fear.
That's the Devil's Advocate answer. Now, do they feel safe for the right reasons? Maybe; maybe not. Why haven't there been any more attacks? Because we invaded Afghanistan and knocked out the Taliban? Because of the invasive techniques the FBI and NSA are using? Because of ordinary law enforcement? Because one big attack was all Osama had in him? I don't know.
And, as another poster pointed out, none of that has anything to do with porn. Neither me nor any of my friends is afraid of porn, so I don't have a read on that. Do "ordinary Americans" feel that their kids are being protected from porn? Probably not, but not for Bush's lack of trying; the laws he's tried to pass have all been struck down.
Would they feel safer if they had been passed? I doubt it. This is a stupid law they're trying to justify, and they're going about it in an offensive way. I appreciate Google saying "no", and I hope the courts back them up.
will they use all my searches for "doj lawyer-raping" against me? it's really just a fantasy ... i don't mean to do anything illegal and if any doj lawyers get wrongfully imprisoned and raped over and over and over and over and over and over, well, just remember that the innocent have nothing to fear
is that this seems on the face to be the worst attempt for the "Laziest Ass Ever" award..The US gov. wanted search terms that may or may not allow people to access adult and possibly illegal (in the US at any rate)images and content. Instead of spending the time and effort of court filings I'm sure the time could be better spend digging a tunnel to China or something. Offer any teenager $50 to show how they get porn and I'm sure you'll get alot more relevent data than asking some corporation how they think someone in Nowheresville Idaho finds pictures of pretty girls on the internet...They (US Gov.) could have just as simply turned to the prison system and gotten better data than from Yahoo or AOL. I'm sure there's a child molester or two who'd love to share what they know about internet porn for a private room. I applaud Google for saying no to a request for a list anyone could have made up using a dictionary and thesaurus.
Worthy to note that AOL serves up Google results, both paid and organic. Google's total marketshare, by those numbers, is 46.4%.
Our LEADERS ARE A BUNCH OF NAZI BASTARDS. How come you people dont get it. You know the story about throwing a frog into boiling and it hops out. But if you put the frog in cool water and crank the temp up slowly you will kill it. Well folks your all in the kettle and its getting hot in here.
You generally don't dig in your heels until they come calling for personally identifiable information. Then you call in the lawyers and fight the good fight. Google isn't doing this to be noble, they are doing this to protect trade secrets.
So what? This is not a federal issue. This is a partisian issue, where one side wants to support some laws that they're pushing through. They should not be able to obtain data for this reason. I sure as hell don't want to start even the slightest precedent of Google searchers being available to the federal government without a damned good reason. Wanting to make lobbying easier to re-establish censorship laws does not qualify, in my book.
Any program relying on (nontrivial) preemptive multithreading will be buggy.
The Republic I grew up loving is on life support, at best.
I think the Republic you thought you grew up loving was an illusion. Today, the US government probably has fewer ways of getting away with screwing you, screwing other nations, or restricting your speech than ever before. That doesn't keep them from trying, but that's what governments always do--it's part of the package. Furthermore, you have more ready access to education and information and more social mobility than ever before.
The debt is real, but ultimately not due to any particular policy--it's just that the rest of the world is starting to recover from colonialism and WWII and become serious competition again; Americans will have to get used to being less wealthy relative to the rest of the world.
the point of child pornography laws is to prevent the exploitation of minors, in the US minors are considered anyone under the age of 18. it's not like anyone cares what sexually excites you, if you are aroused by girls who look like they are 12, then as long as they are actually 18 then you're not corrupting anyone (by law). it is very nessecary to keep these laws in place because young people are easily influenced by those who are older, so much so that it can be considered a form of abuse when you involve them in sexual acts, clothed or unclothed.
"Constitutionally sound" is now determined by the results of fishing through search engine logs? Proof positive that there's been some hard-drinkin' high school drop-outs appointed to high-level positions in DC.
I hope not. I hate child porn and all that, but that doesn't mean that big brother should be watching everything.
Agreed.
But if they're gonna be watching me (I personally like Yahoo for the combination of search and headlines), I can assure them that they're going to get a hell of a show. I'll go so far as to create a spider which hunts for kitty porn ("MmMMMmm... Next we have Fluffy the Persian. She's an 8-year-old who can lick her own ass and likes it when her 30-year-old master rubs her stomach.") and then pipes keywords and sentences from that directly into Yahoo and then uses the search results to find more sites to spider.
Naturally, being my first real programming project since University, it will be released open-source in case the community happens to have suggestions on how I can improve its efficiency.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
Oh, give me a break. "Regulation" vs. "Freedom" is such a meaningless black and white simplistic world view that it's almost totally useless.
The basic wrong here is on the private side, not the public side. The companies are simply handing data over to a potentially coercive entity when asked.
Yes, in this case it happens that the government is that entity. That the government has requested this data is annoying and dangerous in other ways, of course. But because it's a government (and not, for example, a private company) at least it had to do so in public, as part of an open process, as required by court regulations and procedure. So we know about it, and can argue/discuss it (i.e. democracy), and provide feedback to the companies involved (i.e. the "free" market).
Not to mention that these same regulations that too many shallow, broad-brush Libertarians so kneejerkly detest are what Google will likely use to fight the handover request.
I agree this is totally possible without massive amounts of information being collected. (A big issue among privacy advocates of slashdot) First off, local ridings, cities of residency, etc, can be derived from one simple piece of information; your zip code. While not proof against multiple accounts for achieving many clustered zip code comments, having only highly moderated comments filter into it would help eliminate dupe account holders from voicing twice. The emails, or for bigger impact printed and mailed in (by a doner of costs and labor), could then be sent to the appropriate people (yes, reach multiple levels) by a simple database query. Hell I'll even offer to do the monkey's job of doing data entry for the zip codes versus congress' emails. If someone's willing to start the project and do the database, and those of us who want comments submitted agree to enter our zip codes in the system, we could create a torrent of response to anything, similar to the response over the whole .xxx domain debacle.
Just the other day, I was reading the Gmail-is-too-creepy.com website. One of their main arguments is that Google retains all information. They go to say that the government can easily read these after 180 days.
It's obvious that the author of the website doesn't believe in the "Do no evil" creedo. There are couple of entities (Yahoo, that guy that tried to sue Google for not ranking his website(s) highly enough) who simply don't like Google and their seemingly Microsft-esque monopoly and power.
It's nice to see Google take a stand and live up to their "do no evil". Even though the DoJ request is not part of a criminal investigation, how long after the COPA study will they keep the logs they obtained from AOL, Yahoo and MSN?
I can't wait to see how this works out.
It seems to me that the best approach is to make any information from Google be of less than optimal quality.
It would be trivial to use generate quite literally millions of trivial search queries and poison any data mining attempts.
I'd be all for large numbers of searches for "pregnant teenage nurses in latex"
I think that speaks for itself. Child pornography laws are not just about exposed skin; they're around to prevent the exploitation of children in which Knox was very obviously (and self-admittedly) involved.
riiight, because privite companies never invade anyone privacy. our govt is already run by the private industry, not much would change.
Thanks, Yahoo.
You're going to get what you deserve.
"Worthy to note that AOL serves up Google results, both paid and organic. Google's total marketshare, by those numbers, is 46.4%."
In the context of this story, that's irrelevant. Regardless of how AOL obtains its search results that amount to 9.9% of total searches, those results are being turned over to the DOJ. The marketshare that Google controls as to whether they get turned over to the DOJ is only 36.5%.
-- "I never gave these stories much credence." - HAL 9000
Action-Reaction-Solution.
A: Goverments try to control search engines.
R: People don't like this invasion of their privacy
S: Gifted OpenSource patriots create a solution.
Here's an idea to get you guys started:
Distributed search engine.
A software that resides on the users machine. Automaticly indexes pages visited. Urls stored in cleartext (or pgp or some kind of 2way encryption scheme?), indexed words could be stored as md5 or something like that. Searches through the software would take place through a distributed network, like bittorrent and similar p2p networks where users connect to each other and forward searches. To keep this network ethical, one could add the option of "banning" words locally on the client (not indexing, relaying, responding on) words (in indexed text or url) that one finds unethical, give the power of censorship to the people.
Perhaps an idea to work on? I'd love to see something like this, an absolute secure method of conducting searches, without the "fear" of being logged by advertisers, gigantic international corporations or oppressive goverments.
Firefox plugin perhaps?
Google have always logged every search, along with the 'Google Cookie' of the machine searching. All "Search History" does is associate it with your Google account.
How many people can read hex if only you and dead people can read hex?
I couldnt help but smile when I read "No child left behind..." Do yourself a favor to cheer yourself up...listen to George Carlin's Life is worth losing - track 6 about 07:30 minutes in.
My issue is with the nature of the requests from the Feds; they're not using the data to pursue a criminal, they're not using the data as evidence in a criminal case, they're not even using the data for purely statistical reasons. They're using the data to try to support their case for a stupid Act that has twice been struck down by appeals courts.
Care to reconcile those two paragraphs? In what way is the handing over of user data in those circumstances not the establishment of a very bad precedent and a very slippery slope?
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
Wait, was hate-google-day yesterday? Everyone else seems to be being neutral, maybe I overslept...
I mod down anyone who says "I will be modded down for this", regardless of the rest of their comment
Read anything about the case, and you'll see that parent post broadly overgeneralized. Google it.
"Banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies." -Thomas Jefferson
Confession!
Leave out the "we" in the future okay? No need to make it any easier for them. Oh and this isn't a witch hunt. It is a "keep the childeren safe from X" where X this time is XXX.
Apparently they want to know how many google for porn because that will tell them how many people google for porn. How they will determine how many kids google for porn I don't know. Perhaps they just want to make it impossible to google for porn because that is the only way to keep the childeren safe.
Won't somebody think of the childeren is a nice way to say surrender all your adult rights and privileges and reduce society to the level of a kindergarden.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I don't see how being ruled by intrusive corporate overlords is any better.
Me I don't expect to be flying anywhere's near your fascist police state, nor flying through your airspace, nor crossing your 49th ... until all your fascist and communist leaders are removed from positions of authority ... remember - you brought it all on yourselves ... and now Cheney states that usurping and infringing your RIGHTS are okay and in fact justified!!??
to back up his fascist buddy BUSHie???? wake the fsck up before the real world does it for you ...
and you wonder why the whole world's against you, well, wasn't that precisely how the war against the first Hitler was won?
to arms, my brothers, and let FREEDOM reign throughout the lands ...
Question Authority before IT questions You
Why should my company disclose information that is private to the government? If the UK government wants a scrap of information from me, it should be in supporting the work of the police investigating a crime. If the UK government contacted me for stats on most popular pages on my site, I'd consider giving it to them for one reason - because they pay me for it. And when I say "consider", I'd have every right to tell them that they can't have them.
I think people are misunderstanding the whole nature of this law and the controversy around it. It's NOT about child porn.
The purpose of this law is to increase censorship on all porn, even legal porn, and it's driven by the Christian Right Wing, supposedly to protect children from viewing it.
That's why it's initially a 1st amendment issue (freedom of speech) which is now becoming a 4th amendment issue (unreasonable search and seizures) as the admin asks for private records. But make no mistake, the dispute is not a "child porn" issue, it's a censorship issue, supposedly to protect children. Big difference.
Child porn is already aggressively investigated by the DOJ, and it's an entirely separate thing. In those investigations, the DOJ has no trouble getting warrants which all the major companies including Google are happy to comply with to catch child pornographers.
It's also a pretty sneaky move by the admin, because obviously nobody likes the words "child" and "porn" anywhere near each other, which distorts and misrepresents the whole issue. So to anyone who took the bait, congrats, you've been had by the Bush admin and their clever spinners.
=P
Since no one has to sign into google to use it the only thing that the searches can be traced back to is the ip address which then can be linked to the isp and then to the users account which 99.99% of the time is going to be registered to someone 18+ years of age. So my question is how is this going to provide information of what children (under 18) are searching for on google. Real answer is that they are not concerned about children and just want to eliminate porn or any page that is not about jesus altogether by using the idea of it is "hurting the nations children".
It's not just you guys. We have this sort of crap in the UK, too.
One of my favourite political comments of recent times came from Lord Hoffman, a Law Lord (our highest judicial authority). In the conclusion of a review of our recent "anti-terrorist" legislation, he stated:
I take some small comfort in the fact that the tide seems to be turning. Tony Blair has been handed a string of defeats in the House of Lords this week, including a heavy slap-down of his ID card proposals. In Parliament, there are enough rebels in his own party that even with his undeserved absolute majority of seats, he's unlikely to pass any further draconian legislation without making major concessions. His political career is effectively over, and when he goes, hopefully he'll take the heavy-handed Home Secretary types like Straw, Clarke and Blunkett with him.
Now all we need is some sort of written constitution so we can immediately overturn previous laws like the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001, and the Civil Contingencies Act 2004, and we might restore some semblance of civil liberty in this country. We can but hope...
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
I'm thinking of that cold knot of fear that fills these @##holes when they read these sorts of stories and I don't bad at all. Everyone who exploits or assists in the exploitation of children deserves all the bad things that will happen to them. Those people should consider that in this world freedoms are constantly being eroded and the rocks they are hiding beneath are getting turned over. In the name of national security right now and as we speak the United States government is grinding away through the internet and flagging anything and everything regardless of whether google provides logs. Other law enforcement agencies are already monitering your favorite child porn website/forum/mailing list/whatever and are already building a case against you. That 14 year old girl you think you've been grooming to meet for sex is really a 40 year old Ohio police officer who has you on the line and is slowly reeling you in. Yup, it's a world of fear and waiting to be caught for child porn creeps. Freedom is no shield against your criminal acts. Enjoy.
Enjoy your Karma, after all you earned it. Feel your Karma Joe, feel it burn.
Wow!
As a long-expatriated Canadian, I don't know whether to be terrified or proud, after reading the report (well, most of it). Terrified at what Canada is doing to her citizens, but proud of the gentleman, whom I had not heard of before, who so eloquently summarizes everything that is wrong with current initiatives collecting excessive personal information.
The subject who is truly loyal to the Chief Magistrate will neither advise nor submit to arbitrary measures (Junius)
For search, I always preferred Yahoo to Google. Not any more. Because Yahoo caved to the DOJ, and Google stood up for its users, I'll use Google now.
I think I never went on AOL.com in 10 years and even less search something with their engine... Last time I searched something on yahoo was in 1999 maybe, last century... and what is MSN? I never went to their site too.
Before google I used lycos, now I only use google, and clear cookie from time to time.
"Science will win because it works." - Stephen Hawking
What they're doing is trying to make the argument that a crime hypothetically could be committed under circumstances like those on your security tape. It's like they're looking at the tapes from Pump-n-Go's chain of convenience stores and saying "Man, all those Snickers bars are there for the taking -- we have to intervene as a society to prevent shoplifting."
This log request isn't about showing that particular kids saw particular sites. It's an attempt to make the argument that the government has a "clear and compelling interest" in enforcing (already-determined-to-be-unconstitutional) anti-pRon internet laws. Justice is trying to show that ordinary searches get back dirty sites so often that the government has to intervene -- you knew it was coming -- to protect the children.
They seem to have missed the other half of those earlier court decisions, in which the two earlier laws were shot down because less restrictive approaches than requiring a credit card to get at stuff were available. The idea of minimal intrusion isn't on these people's radar, not when it comes to personal rights. Here they are, asking to see every search on Google in an open-ended fishing expedition for Crissakes. Man.
(I'm still trying to get my head around the time and money spent on analysts [or developers or whoever] just to determine which sites are the dirty ones in the search returns. Way to spend my taxes, small government conservatives. How much money did Ashcroft spend to cover the torso of that statue behind him during press conferences, again?)
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
Wow! Am I glad I dont use MSN or Yahoo! search. I don't really trust either company. I only deal with Yahoo! because they bought out Flickr.
"Politicians always tell the truth, when they're calling each other liars."
Especially with that Osama tape being released recently. Looks like nothing that the US has done to protect itself has actually caused it to protect itself. Instead of scanning your own citizens' search records, you should be finding Osama. Wtf?! OMG OSAMA IS IN TEH LOGS
Thank goodness someone said it. I received the distinct impression that the nonsense over gay marriage was just bush pouncing on one area he could count on to divide the people up because he had unpopular resolutions at the time. Most people seem to think that if they support one contentious issue, they're going to have to just support the president overall.
How to use coral cache: http://slashdot.org.nyud.net:8090/~oscartheduck
Simply amazing that Google does continue to do what I believe is "the right thing" in just about every case that comes to my attention.
Yahoo, AOL, and MSN all just roll over for the DOJ without a single nod towards customer privacy. I feel cheated by all of them, and will probably use Google exclusively now. Is there no one in those giant organizations that even stopped for a second to consider the possible ramifications of just giving up massive databases to the federal government, especially after it's become quite clear that they have been involved in illegal spying activities as it is?
I have to hand it to Google here. I know it's probably not my interests they have in mind but their own, but I still applaud them for sticking to the "do no evil" mantra.
Excuse my speling.
Making The Bar Project
Canada and Iceland are my fallback countries.
I hear you loud and clear.
I am so very tired of US politicians hiding behind "the children". Doesn't matter to me if it's Hillary cracking down on video games or Dubya/Gonzalez raising a stink about search engines. I want the nanny state to die a horrible, painful, and decisive death.
Most of you here on /. who are parents understand what I mean. Yes, society does have an obligation to its most vulnerable and impressionable citizens, and it's in everyone's interest to have them become happy and productive adults. And oh yeah, water is wet.
But much of this ends at the parents' doorstep.
I'm seriously entertaining becoming a parent soon myself, and I promise all of you that I will not insist that the rest of society does my job, which by the way I'm volunteering for.
--- The American Way of Life is not a birthright. Hell, it's not even sustainable.
This is worrying indeed. Google sued..Google lost stock value (1.9 % out of 5.2% risen this year). This means that by defying the DoJ, they're hurting their stockvalue. A public company has the obligation to maximise value to their stockholders, which means it's directly against Google's interest to defy the DoJ. So ironically while this might be the idealistic course of action for Google, and perhaps the trade-secret aspect can be defended, from a buisness perspective Google will be encouraged not to repeat performance in the future if the trade-secret aspect *can't* be defended.
You know we put adult content proxy filters in place to protect the children from stumbling on Porn and the government thinks that this is not enough, yet email boxes get filled with Porn. If M$ was really interested in supporting government programs to prevent childern from being exposed to Porn, possibly they cold clean up MY BULK MAIL FOLDER!
Please mod me 1 or troll. It's where the truth is these days, even on Slashdot. Beware the power of moderators everywh
Poor AskJeeves, always getting left out of the fun... They should start a new advertising campaign around the slogan, "Need access to millions of searches? Ask Jeeves!!"
The following are quick links for each popular search engine to perform the search:
Google
Yahoo
MSN
AOL
If a lot of people did it every day, it would eventually skew popular queries, and send a little message, should Google loose the fight.
It's on my blog already. If a ton of people do the same, and get a big campaign going, it could be interesting.
And how is getting a number of perverts searching for "15 year old nude" an unreasonable search, especially if the individuals are never individually identified?
It's unreasonable.
I would wager, that not a few persons enter a search string like that may be:
a) 15 year olds, self conscious about their own physical development.
b) 15 year olds, curious about the physical development of their peers.
c) Parents entering less explicitly worded strings, who are concerned about their childs physical development.
d) Professionals entering a less explicitly worded string over the course oftheir normal duties.
If any of these cannot use the power of the internet to accomplish these things without the Government labeling them a pervert, then it's clear that something is very wrong with the society they live in. Why should everyone suffer needlessly because of the very, very few who have ill intent?
May the Maths Be with you!
Don't just worry about the possibility of criminal prosecution or even enemy combatant detention... worry about the fact that if information about you is collected, sorted, and has anything others might perceive as negative, all it takes is a bad seed releasing the information to various parties to fuck you over.
If you've got a Born Again boss and you've been perusing a sacriligious website, or something that might mean that you're gay or had an abortion...
How hard would it be to bribe (or social engineer) some $30k/year civil servant into giving up info about you?
500GB of disk, 5TB of transfer, $5.95/mo
Remember that all of these companies, especially Google and Microsoft, think the next big thing will be to put a search engine on your desktop.
Google has stated their goal is to index all human information. Microsoft wants to compete in the search engine space, and is pursuing similar goals.
I'm not about to permit any company to search my desktop if they will just hand over my search criteria (and maybe my indices!) any time anyone asks.
This is a perfect example of why not being able to control your own personal information is bad. It's more than just Choicepoint or some hacker getting into a database. It's about the gov't being able to go fishing by polling lots of companies about you until they find one that will just say "OK".
...why doesn't the DOJ asks NSA for a copy of Google logs?
So, like, they don't know about usenet, right?
Google: A Patriot's Letter
When will the People expect their leaders to subject to the same laws that immediately get the rest of us locked up? When will the People realize that soon no rights or freedoms will be left and shortly after that nobody will be left to ask why YOU were taken away and held forever, denied due process.
Wake the fuck up America, vote out ALL encumbents and have every single criminal in office see their day in court for breaking a law that should be blind.
http://www.lp.org/
Save the Children Gift of Hope ...
Give a gift that inspires hope. Donate, sponsor, shop or join Save the
http://www.savethechildren.org/
What more can I say?
like g-a-r-y, only different
This is worrying indeed. Google sued..Google lost stock value (1.9 % out of 5.2% risen this year). This means that by defying the DoJ, they're hurting their stockvalue. A public company has the obligation to maximise value to their stockholders, which means it's directly against Google's interest to defy the DoJ. So ironically while this might be the idealistic course of action for Google, and perhaps the trade-secret aspect can be defended, from a buisness perspective Google will be encouraged not to repeat performance in the future if the trade-secret aspect *can't* be defended.
yes, but i think it would be even more against google's interests as i would think that a good number of the stock holders of google are either geeks (who are likely paying attention to this), or people playing stocks. if they just roll over and give the information, the geeks get pissed at it and sell the stock. stock price drops, then the people playing stocks unload it as its droping and thus begins the cycle.
upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
"A public company has the obligation to maximise value to their stockholders"
Bullshit. They have an obligation to do whatever their bylaws say they must do, and that only within ethical boundaries. Google was very specific that they have no obligation to maximize shareholder value. When you buy Google, you are just along for the ride.
I am glad that people with moderator points are able to so effectively recognize satirical writing.
Join Tor today!
well, it looks like all my google searches for "president bush fucking dogs" and "president bush sucking cock" will go unnoticed
Google is a search engine used by the entire world, not just America. Why should Google turn in the queries being searched by the rest of the world to the US govt??!
This is not about privacy, this is about an already overpowerful and clearly corrupt Government further overstepping boundries and making another grab for power in the further erosion of rights. Their track record of failure, mismanagement and losing billions of dollars not already wasted speaks for itself.
If you feed a monster, even a little at a time, that monster will grow larger and you will be the next meal.
This job the Government seeks to do is the job of the parents. If they want to catch pedophiles, that is the job of law enforcement NOT the Executive branch. Existing tools are in place for law enforcement to use for this purpose, perhaps they need more training if they are not up to par. We are talking about ignoring the checks and balances of the Constitution and moving full steam towards outright fascism. Additionally, the stunt artist is the Government as focus now pulls on things like this instead of more critical already exposed issues like Scooter Libby, Jack Abramoff, Iraq, account failures, Osama Bin Laden still running wild, and the list easily goes on. The Federal Government needs to detach itself fully from running and dictating the lives of its citizens, and moves like this are in the opposite direction which is the reason for concern.
http://www.lp.org/
I don't need a babysitter or Big Brother for my everyday life, I need somebody to protect my Constitution, my rights and freedom, and the sovereignity of this nation.
Germany gave Hitler just an inch.
The World gave Hitler juas an inch.
Soon enough Prescott Bush was finanching the 3rd Reich and laundering money for them while the world was thrown into WWII for survival.
Iran overpowered their government and mixed in religion with it, now they face an extremely oppressive regime.
"Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. When change is absolute there remains no being to improve and no direction is set for possible improvement: and when experience is not retained, as among savages, infancy is perpetual. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. In the first stage of life the mind is frivolous and easily distracted, it misses progress by failing in consecutiveness and persistence. This is the condition of children and barbarians, in which instinct has learned nothing from experience."
-George Santayana, The Life of Reason, Volume 1, 1905
US (Spanish-born) philosopher (1863 - 1952)
We have been down this path already, it led to the American Revolution. It is the Federal Government pulling a stunt here, not Google.
hypothetical? its the law of the land.
As to the exclussions, well, true. The exclussions you mention are pretty clear in the law.
However, you could probably successfully fight the exclussions with the equal rights ammendment. Constitutional ammendments tend to hold more weight than laws passed by Congress. Also, the law doesn't say that women and older men can't own guns. It just excludes them from being in a position to have the "right" to one.
OTOH, Since its up to Congress to define who constitutes the militia, they could just change the law to exclude anyone who is not an active member of the military.
"it doesn't present a clear-cut answer to the dispute about universal access to guns"
true, thus all the heated debates
The 2nd ammendment say the right is neccessary to maintain the militia, it simply says "the right", not the "right of members of the militia". Some will construe "the right" to mean a "universal" right, others see the 2nd ammendment as limited to members of the military. The 2nd ammendment reserves the right to ensure we have a militia however, it doesn't say who they are. It also leaves undefined who can "own" an arm. Bearing and owning are not the same thing.
Currently have a strange situation as a result of not defining "arms" well. One could easily call both a sling-shot and a nuclear bomb, arms (and be well understood). However, I expect the govt would give you more grief for one.
People tend to fill the gaps with the things that meet their own view points.
----- If communism is a system where the government owns business, what do you call a system where business owns govern
Bush is just doing the bidding of the mentally incapacitated freaks of the religous right. When you look at all religious extremists; judaists, christianists, or islamists, they all set out to achieve the same thing - erroding your freedoms, forcing you to conform to their rigid view on 'morality', and trying to indoctrinate and control you. We must stand up to these people. It is not to late for those of us outside the US, where a good proportion of us are not blind believers in contradictorary medieval religious texts and superhuman beings. These people are as bad as any other anti-social elements in our society. It is our ability to emphasise with each other that leads to a society that does not dissolve into chaos, not some medieval rigid dogma. Trying to force other people to accept your dogma shows a lack of empathy for the rest of humankind, and therefore makes religon disasterously harmful, as has frequently been proved throughout history. Bush should concentrate on sorting out some of his own messes like Iraq, the US federal deficit, the right to return for the people of Palestine, 'Intellectual Property' law, under taxation, environmental policy, and Afganistan before pandering to the concerns of the lunatic extremists of religous sects like the republican party.
"I want to see CLEAR and PRESENT DANGER"
Wasn't that the reason for invading Iraq.
"No terrorist state poses a greater or more immediate threat to the security of our people and the stability of the world than the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq." - President Bush
"And we believe he has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons," - Vice President Cheney
What I am wondering is if we end up in a situation where we really are in danger, will anyone believe it? will I?
----- If communism is a system where the government owns business, what do you call a system where business owns govern
I will go on a limb here:
This is about testing or validating or creating an alternate pipeline to enhancing the surveillance or terror AND money laundering activities. Really, with the replacements to Carnivore and Echelon, what is the next best thing? Well, try the cached search engine pages that the governments DON'T already have in their huge Fujitsu/Hitachi iron-core Ma-Bell mag cores. This is about making a huge "real-time" engine of mapping.
Look at it this way: I watched an Andy Lau film "Full-time Killer". He showed his new student how he gets his instructions. A certain news paper, a specific page, a specific paragraph. He already knows the columns (standing instruction/plan) and he just takes a call about the page and paper. He then assembles the bits of words and arrives at his assassination target.
Now, imagine the search engines being used in a similar manner. Bad Boss has his silent sentinels out there. The Bad Boss and his key killers tweak things (business activities, complaints or demonstrations, whatever) to cause search engines to respond by producing certain types of pages. These pages, tho in the billions, might have nuggets of instructions, say encoded graphics. Not ALL of the pages need be in the top 10. This way, the instructions might take TIME (say 2 weeks, give or take) to be delivered, but the pre-determined graphic would at least 'key' the right pages. Then, as long as the assassins or killers/whatever-you-call-them are of the same mindset as their Big Bad Boss, they will KNOW what their instructions are. All they have to wait for then is an actual 'go command'.
Maybe there is some ass-quivering set of fears oozing in the WH, 10 (?) Downing and a few other places.
OK, I'll try to get back to the thicker side of the limb before it snaps.
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
Voting.
Kick the bums out...
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
That is because the government is allowing corporations to run them. When a business is being intrusive, that is because the customer signed their rights away. It's called 'read the fine print.' The government is not allowed to do so, but since the worthless are wanting the government to take money at gunpoint since the worthless think the world owes them a living they are actually asking for an intrusive governmnet.
Read more about it here.
Sounds like you just do not like to be reminded you are a narrow minded fascist NeoCon jackass.
If you don't like a very relevent quote that points out the obvious, directly from a Founding Father, then you can just take your ass to Iran with all the other zealots with no freedom and enjoy your life there.
Asshat, do yourself a favor and quit braying.
http://www.geocities.jp/artanisjp/327tende.htm
At work the song "Tenderly" (Ella Fitzgerald, Roberta Flack, and others remaking) was on. I don't really like it, so over the eyars I made mild fun of it.
You took my lips, so tenderly. I got tired of it, so in front of my boss I said, "OKAYYYY, So he took your lips! What ELSE did he do?"
Then I searched Google for:
female artist jazz song "you took my lips" kksf
(which got no hits)
and whittled ti to:
female jazz song "you took my lips"
and finally got a few hits.
So, Dick, Rummy, Bushy and others... chew on HER lips. There's even mentioning of ages, a girl 12... when the song was sang.... ALL INNOCUOUS....
image Word: RAIDED
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
The GP was not comparing Clinton to Bush in any way that I can discern.
Trying to excuse Bush's moral corruption and illegal behavior by claiming that he's not as bad as Clinton was is akin to saying that stabbing people isn't as bad as shooting them.
The reason that there is more Bush-bashing than Clinton-bashing these days is quite simple - Clinton is no longer in power.
I'm sure that when the other Clinton wins in 2008, all of the Clinton apologists will be falling all over themselves saying that "she's not as bad as Bush was", and that "You Clinton haters are all alike, and you're united in your insanity." (although they will probably tack on "right-wing conspiracy" in there somewhere).
The sad fact is that the vast majority of presidents over the past 50 years have sucked, majorly sucked.
Saying that one isn't as bad as another isn't saying much of anything at all.
Those who sacrifice security to condemn liberty deserve to repeat history or something. - Benjamin Santayana