Slashdot Mirror
China Wants UN To Help Trace Sources On Internet
An anonymous reader brings us a CNet story, which begins:
"A United Nations agency is quietly drafting technical standards, proposed by the Chinese government, to define methods of tracing the original source of Internet communications and potentially curbing the ability of users to remain anonymous. The U.S. National Security Agency is also participating in the 'IP Traceback' drafting group, named Q6/17, which is meeting next week in Geneva to work on the traceback proposal. Members of Q6/17 have declined to release key documents, and meetings are closed to the public. The potential for eroding Internet users' right to remain anonymous, which is protected by law in the United States and recognized in international law by groups such as the Council of Europe, has alarmed some technologists and privacy advocates. Also affected may be services such as the Tor anonymizing network."
I think the right to be anonymous (if you choose) outweighs the "need to track down and prosecute scammers, spammers, and other criminals."
There are other ways to trace scammers...follow the money. In order to scam you, they must create a pathway for funds to travel from you to them.
Cheers,
when the americans and the chinese have the same goals
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
It's only a right insofar as you're not committing any crimes.
Like, for example, criticizing a tyrannical regime?
I'm glad you weren't in charge in 1773.
"Make it ten--I am only a poor corrupt official."
--Captain Louis Renault (Claude Rains), Casablanca
The United Stats (TFS:"The U.S. National Security Agency is also participating in the "IP Traceback" drafting group") and major western corporations (PDF linked from article) also support the proposal. What a surprise.
"What's distressing is that it doesn't appear that there's been any real consideration of how this type of capability could be misused," said Marc Rotenberg"
Wait... How can you correctly use this service? It seems like something only the clandestine agencies and major corporations of the world would like to see happen.
Anyways, according to TFS, this proposal would almost certainly have to modify existing protocols. Can't that be blocked by the CS/Engineering community members who sit on respective committees? Can international/national governments really force IETF to do something, as the article claims?
Okay, so what about a country like China that makes it a crime to be a dissident? *
Make no mistake, this is a bad, bad thing.
[setenv rant=ON]
* For example, those two old ladies that were sent to "re-education camp" during the Olympics because they had the temerity to go through the official application process required to use the official protest area set aside by the Chinese government for the specific purpose of allowing peaceful, nondisruptive demonstrations. They only made that area available to satisfy international concerns, (ie, to give the IOC a fig leaf to hide behind on rights issues), and then used it as a trap to catch any of their own citizens that might be lulled into thinking it was safe to speak.
China does not give a dusty rat turd about rights (of their own citizens, or anyone else's), as clearly demonstrated by their willingness to disingenuously double back on their promise of allowing protests. They gambled that the rest of the world would stand by and let it happen, instead of rightfully shaming the Chinese government for their actions, and judging by the international response (practically nil), they were right.
[setenv rant=OFF]
I prefer rogues to imbeciles because they sometimes take a rest.
Steve Bellovin (granddaddy of IP firewalling) gives his (strongly negative) opinion here. He points out that it would be in seeming contradiction to the UN Charter.
When anonymous internet is a crime, only criminals will have anonymous internet. As usual, this would be a law that will almost exclusively affect the law abiding, except for a few idiots who don't know what they're doing. When those are caught, Chertoff will describe them as technical geniuses, tell us what a great thing it is that we have the even better technical geniuses at DHS to track down these criminal masterminds, and then make an example of them at the show trial. Meanwhile, Chinese dissidents will be getting their organs harvested while they're still squirming on the table.
Insightful and funny are really the same thing, except one has a punch line.
There is no way this idea will be able to get past any open UN boards. Kind of goes against the human rights charter of the UN.
I was with you until you said this. You clearly have much more faith in the UN than I do. The organization that gave us the Universal Declaration of Human Rights now deems it appropriate to make Libya the chair of the Human Rights Commission.
The UN has no principles. If it did it would kick members out of the General Assembly who refuse to follow the Declaration of Human Rights. At the very least this would include China, Libya, Israel and half of the Arab World. Hell, it'd probably include my own country (the United States) as well, given our actions in the last seven years.
The UN is useless. The only reason it hasn't gone the way of the League of Nations is because of nuclear weapons. Mutually assured destruction has done more to prevent another World War than the UN ever did.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
No. The difference between these two types of anonymity is that the former actually protects you against a tyrant, while the latter only protects you against a nice, law-abiding, touchy-feely tyrant who'd never torture your name out of the journalist.
No, that is not okay, not if you're doing anything actually important with your anonymity. It wouldn't be okay even if the ISP's and everyone else involved could actually be trusted to obey the laws - which they can't, as the whole telcom wiretap issue and following retroactive immunity proves.
The problem is: what happens when the malicious scum is the accuser, rather than the accused ?
"Accountability" sure sounds nice, until you realize just who you're be accountable for.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.