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Higher Education Fears Wiretapping Law
alphadogg writes "Institutions of higher education are up in arms over an FCC ruling on wiretapping they say could cost them billions of dollars in upgrades, expose their networks to more attacks, and jeopardize rights to privacy and freedom of speech.
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hate our freedom?
Could the answer be 'They have history departments'?
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Crudely Drawn Games
Higher education vs. government decisions... I do wonder who's in the right.
Ignore this signature. By order.
Remember, if it stops just one terrorist, it's all worth it!
OK, so it was only three weeks before 9/11. And it was some other country. But you have to give him credit for achieving his policy objective, not only in his own country, but in his opponent's country too.
I find it interesting about the things the universities are concerned with. It might just be the article, but it seems the main concern is the cost of the venture est. 400 - 500 dollars a student. The next concern is hackers and the last one is freedom of speech / stifling of research.
I would think that the universities would be worried more about the free speech implications rather than the cost... I don't think the cost issue will hold up in court that well - but free speech (hopefully would).
The only other thing is that the article mentions that a negative ruleing, could force even labtops on campus to be CALEA compliant. Since I'm a student at a university that requires students going into certain majors to have a labtop (to use and plug into the campus network) - I'm wondering if that means that we as students would have to modify our personal labtops (cause they interact with the campus network).
Sadly I bet the universities will compromise on this issue - rather than go to court.
There is always a frontier where there is an open and willing mind
Okay, I'll bite. You spelled it that way three times. What's a labtop?
You were 80% angel, 10% demon. The rest was hard to explain. - Over The Rhine
"Math in a song is good."-Linford
If you RTFA, the FCC ruling was expanded to ISP's. Universities are concerned that they may legally fit in the legal definition of an ISP. If so, then they would have to obey the same laws as, say AOL and MSN. If that happens and the FBI is investigating, say, someone on campus who with a child porn website, the University would be required to give the FBI access to the network to monitor traffic if a subpoena is granted for a tap. So, all in all, the Universities want to provide broadband internet service for all students, but not be classified as providers of internet service.
The previous comment is purposely vague and generalized, but all of the facts are completely true.
If you don't like the laws of this country, nobody is stopping you from picking up and moving your college/business/home someplace else.
Ahhh... that's the great thing about the good ol' USA. We don't have to just leave if we don't like the laws. We can write our representatives, vote, support candidates we like, camp out in front of the president's house, yell, complain, march and protest. Hell, you don't even have to be a citizen of this country or here legally to protest - as we've seen today.
Maybe the people with the different opinions aren't the ones that should leave, maybe it's the people who want to opress free discussions of ideas, like YOU.
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You got it all wrong. We're back to protecting the kids. Get your talking points right, junior. It'll be back to the terrorists in a year when that's back in style--or when Bush needs to stop making history as the first President to get negative approval rating numbers.
I like that summary, especially the order things are put in. "It's expensive, dammit! And omg, it exposes us to attacks!! And.. er... oh yeah, there's that freedom-of-speech thing, too." Very telling.
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Freedom of Speech means that you can speak with out reprisal. If you are affraid of what you are saying then that is an imposition of the freedom of speech. However, Freedom of Speech/Expression/Association is often used as a knee-jerk reaction when it doesn't apply.
However, Freedom of Speech is not the real issue, as you so well pointed out. We are devling into the 4th Amendment protections of 'Unlawful Search and Siezure,' and the implied freedoms of Privacy that has been recognized by the US Supreme Court. That is the real issue. Stating that the issue is Freedom of Speech is blurring the issues. You could also argue that this issue is related to the Due Process protections -- the assumption that everyone is a potential terrorist/criminal and as such their communications should be available.
More interesting is that the report that was released on Saturday or Sunday stated that their have been 3,501 abuses of the Patriot Act -- and that was what was admitted.
The views expressed are mine own and do not express the views of my employer.
>If you don't like the laws of this country, nobody is stopping you from picking up and moving
One of those laws is the Constitution. It's the root law of the US.
Some people seem not to like the Constitution. For example, they want to do mass searches without probable cause. One such person is rumored to have called it "just a God-damned piece of paper".
Are you, perhaps, suggesting that people who pass laws like USAPATRIOT, who imprison with charge or trial, who seize property without court authority and who torture their alleged enemies ought to leave the country? Wouldn't you prefer they stay so we can give them the fair trials they have denied to others?
You are aware, I hope, that during a significant number of those conflicts we lost a lot more of our freedoms than we are currently discussing even the potential of losing right now...
I'm not defending the current administration's policies, but I just think that you should be careful drawing historical comparisons before you know where they're going. President Lincoln -- who history has treated quite favorably -- declared and imposed martial law, suspended habeas corpus, and arrested people that today would probably be termed "political dissidents," including a few members of Congress. (The anti-war Democrats known as the "Copperheads" were the common target.)
When the arrests and courts-martial were declared blatantly unconstitutional by the Supreme Court (under Taney), Lincoln simply ignored the ruling until the conclusion of the war. You can Google this, just type in "John Merryman" or check out Ex parte Merryman (the ruling that was ignored).
That's one of the more well-known and egregious violations, but there are others; the persecution of the Germans in World War I, the Japanese in World War II, and a host of other things, any of which can and were argued to be necessary at the time owing to extenuating circumstances.
So by drawing a historical parallel between 9/11 and any other "war period" in our history, you can quite easily play into the hands of a pro-oppression argument, because there is ample historical evidence for periods of relative oppression (or at least, of substantially reduced civil liberties) during conflicts, followed by a return to normalcy afterwards.
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This is not a good time in history to mess with law enforcement (subpoena or not), especially at the federal level. They effectively can and will do what they want.
There's a good argument that the reason you give to not mess with law enforcement is actually a good reason TO challenge law enforcement.
politics hat off)
:-)
(infosec hat on)
There was a recent scandal in Greece about massive eavesdropping. Many government phone calls were getting involuntarily "conferenced" to multiple prepaid cellular phones. Nobody's caught the perpetrators.
This was done with the "lawful intercept" feature of the telco switching equipment. Depending on the nature of the phone calls it might have been a national security issue.
"Lawful intercept" is a huge security bypass. Bad guys will be highly motivated to exploit it. They won't have to breach physical security either, because CALEA (if memory serves) requires the ISP to offer law enforcemnt remote access.
The threat model also has to include unauthorized users at the law enforcement agency ("Hey, what's this sticky note on the monitor at the CALEA terminal?"). Next worry about the law enforcemnt officer with a personal agenda, e.g. a stalker. Then consider the amount of money in computer crime these days, and ask whether the CALEA operators will be the first incorrutible cops in history. Then reread _The Art of Deception_ and imagine what the next Kevin Mitnick could get the police to do.
That's off the top of my head. For a client I'd get really paranoid
Some people seem not to like the Constitution. For example, they want to do mass searches without probable cause. One such person is rumored to have called it "just a God-damned piece of paper".
Such is the way of the facist. The foundation and ideals of his country run contrary to his own narrow and simplistic view of the world. He believes in absolutes, homogeneity, hierarchies, divine right, power and the right to use it.
The facist's deepest desire is to dominate those he feels are beneath him, without oversight or accountability. As he sees fit. The Constitution expressly forbids this to him, and thus is beneath contempt. It becomes, a document of the weak, a powerless writ of those beneath him, a meaningless formality, just a God-damned piece of paper.
That piece of paper is the only thing standing between you and the raw, unrestrained brutality of a brownshirted mob. I suggest you defend what's left of it before the pack brays with delight as they gleefully devour the carcass of your free society.
May the Maths Be with you!
Clockwurk did a much better job of comparing the two than I could ever hope to do:
(Mod me underrated if you want to mod this post up; I don't want to karma whore off of someone else's work.)
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