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AT&T to Help MPAA Filter the Internet?
Save the Internet writes "Ars Technica is reporting that the MPAA is trying to convince major ISPs to do content filtering. Now, merely wanting it is one thing, but the more important point is that 'AT&T has agreed to start filtering content at some mysterious point in the future.' We're left to wonder about the legal implications of that, but given that AT&T already has the ability to wiretap everything for the NSA, it was only a matter of time before they found a way to profit from it, too."
No we're not. When AT&T permitted NSA to infiltrate/subvert its network in order to monitor all domestic and foreign Intarweb traffic, it broke enough privacy laws that the legal consequences would require the dissolution of the company.
Unlike Arthur Andersen and the Enron scandal, AT&T and the other US telcos are "too big to fail". Because no penalty can be assessed without bankrupting AT&T, no penalty can be assessed, period.
Now that the precedent has been set for some crimes (to date, those involving national security), there's nothing to stop it from being applied to other crimes (namely, those involving copying pictures of a cartoon mouse, or sounds emitted from a plastic-titted starlet).
As prophesized by the late, great Douglas Adams, the legal implications to AT&T are as follows:
"Have you any idea how much damage that bulldozer would suffer if I just let it roll straight over you?" said Mr. Prosser.
"How much?" asked Arthur.
"None at all," replied Prosser.
Neither MPAA nor ISPs should be able to see the content we are exchanging and be in the position to filter it. Even with SSL, where the server can theoretically be accessed by anyone, the computational requirements of establishing a session will choke the filters. Add some captchas and you are gold.
How many times must this myth bubble to the surface? ISPs ARE NOT COMMON CARRIERS (at least in the USA).
If ISPs were common carriers, there would be no 'net neutrality' debate - it'd be a settled matter.
-Isaac
I am not a lawyer, and this is not legal advice. For Entertainment Purposes Only.
doesn't matter. a corporation's right to profit overrides any rights of mere consumers (yes, consumers, not citizens).
they would prefer those removed anyway. they're competition.
AT&T knows this and is acting just as if those laws did not exist becuase they know that they will not be enforced against them. They aided the NSA after all. AT&T can no longer be thought of as a company in a free market. They are now effectively a governmental entity.
Until they can figure out how to filter spam effectively and efficiently, this is just vapor. What do they plan on doing? "Oh look a .mp3 file, lets block it" type filter? That's retarded.
FTFA:
"...given the money and time that will be required to implement such a system..."
Indeed. Did you guys not learn anything from DRM? How about copy protection? Maybe the anti-virus arms race will jog your memory? Oh wait, I know how about 09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0? Still nothing?
There's always going to be faster gun, and you cannot "invent" a solution around that.
boycott slashdot February 10th - 17th check out: altSlashdot.org
--
So who is hotter? Ali or Ali's sister?
Laws and "status" are only important if the current government wants to prosecute them.
Obviously, the current government does not. And sadly, I suspect, it will be some time before we get one that does.
So lets see what will happen. People will start encrypting their connections. Then presumably AT&T will block or degrade encrypted connections ( thus causing security issues ). Now, queue stenography. TCP/Noise in images, audio and video clips. With a strong cipher encrypted data is mathematically indistinguishable from noise unless you have the key. Lets see their filters distinguish between an audio stream recorded using a noisy microphone and a stream containing an encrypted stream overlay. I'm sure their servers won't have any problem whatsoever trying to do image analysis on every single webcam simultaneously. Then you can proceed to trying to distinguish a noisy video from one with encrypted data embedded in it. Really, AT&T and pals, here is a message for you. The great firewall of China fails at censoring the net, and that one is run by the fucking government. You seriously think you can do better ( worse) than the PRC and still make a profit? Good fucking luck.
What in the hell is going on. The sad thing is.. IT WILL happen and you wont be able to do a dam fucking thing because that is how America works.
I for one, welcome our regular censoring, anti american corporate overlords.
The system is broken, and the country is dead.
Actually, there are numerous cases in the past (around 2000-2002) of "content owners" trying to sue OSPs and ISPs. When good lawyers have been involved on the part of the OSPs/ISPs, as long as take-down notices have been properly handled, the cases have been thrown out of court. Some smaller ISPs and OSPs - in some of the earliest(IIRC) have settled. That trend died after the "content owners" started losing the cases against bigger OSPs/ISPs. I seem to remember NetCom as being one of them. The initial problem - back then - was that some of the suits pre-dated the DMCA (the DMCA not always being a bad thing). In some of those earlier cases, judges (with no technical knowledge of how the Internet works) had even ruled against ISPs/OSPs - ones that would have been protected by the DMCA.
Now, there has been an argument that an ISP/OSP who does start filtering that "unfilterable" content is opening themselves up to tons of lawsuits for anything they miss - part of the argument is that they are no longer providing the role of (just) a transport mechanism, since they are picking what content does - or does not - go through their pipes.
This situation may grow into something that tests that legal theory. I've personally talked to lawyers who think such actions would damage an ISPs/OSPs Safe Harbor claim. But then again, it's not their opinion (since it hasn't been tried yet) that matters... it's the outcome of any lawsuits that stem from AT&T failing to filter content that they should have.
While they may get blanket immunity from the **AA over such errors, other content owners have been looking for a wedge in (again numerous lawsuits) to hold OSPs/ISPs liable. After all, it is far more profitable - I mean easier to recoup losses - to win a lawsuit against an AT&T than against John Doe.
This also brings in the grey area of certain judges deciding that if AT&T can manage to filter certain types of content or traffic, then everyone should - opening more doors to suing OSPs/ISPs. At least in that particular case, the OSPs/ISPs have one particular clause in the DMCA still in their favor - which is (poorly paraphrased) an exclusion from being required to do so if that method makes the service unusable or creates ridiculous undue hardship on the ISP/OSP (for instance, a 20 person ISP needing to hire a team of thousands, or install tens of thousands of servers to be able to filter traffic in real time). That part of the DMCA though is kind of vague on specifics... leaving it open to interpretation... thus, what AT&T can do, and afford to do... most ISPs/OSPs cannot - but would a judge of questionable technology and Internet knowledge understand that?
StarTrekPhase2 - The Five Year Mission Continues!
What stops you from using encryption? Encrypt all your traffic. Go through a little trouble and some processing and less headaches will be there from snooping, theft, lies, fraud or other crimes committed by those pretending to serve you.
If we used encryption for everything, in all our endeavors, it would be hard for them to declare something mainstream illegal. They tried it with alcohol, remember what happened? Mafia was an example of the free market prevailing, everyone wanted alcohol, and they got it, regardless of whether the government said it was bad, or even ammended the Constitution to ban alcohol... Even after being driven underground, the actual free market prevailed... alcohol remained available, despite ALL of the efforts of the government to deny people to buy and use what it was they desired. Of course, afterwards it was "allowed" again, merely because the state wanted to tax it... and it was allowed to do so, because the masses were just that... ignorant.
" What luck for rulers that men do not think" - Adolf Hitler
Encrypt it to where? Encryption requires the endpoint be the other side of the conversation. It isn't just something anyone can decide to do for all their online activities. Unless you mean encrypt everything out to some proxy and then to the rest of the internet.
Two things generally stop one from encrypting their communications.
Sure, the people here on /. can set this stuff up, but the average user cannot. The only way this will happen is if we come up with a way to blanket encrypt everything that comes out of a box, and then enable it by default. The end user won't even realize they are protected, but it gives you another feature bullet point for those who care.
I have been trying for years to use encryption on my IM convos, but only have one friend that bothers to encrypt his end too. It's a shame that new shiny software that gets popular doesn't leverage that popularity to encrypt-by-default.
Self-referential Sigs are cool on /. these days...
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