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France Passes Harsh Three-Strikes Legislation, Again
shrik writes "After having it struck down as 'unconstitutional' by the Conseil Constitutionnel once, Sarkozy's controversial 'three-strikes' law (known as HADOPI) was once again passed by the French National Assembly, this time allowing for a judge to order the disconnection (without requiring the presence of the accused party!), thus placating some of the administrative concerns. Opponents say they will 'challenge the law again in front of the Constitutional Council because it deprives the accused of being able to defend themselves properly.' Coverage at Ars also points out a provision that says, 'all Internet users must keep their connections 'secure' and are responsible for what happens on them.'"
all Internet users must keep their connections "secure" and are responsible for what happens on them
Windows users..... RUN!
839*929
I know this is taking place in France, but in North America hasn't the RIAA already prosecuted people without notifying them they were being prosecuted?
every government trying to legislate safety and functionality into the internet. Hire competent engineers, pay them a fair salary, do not expect kickbacks, this system of interconnected computers and servers is a wonderful thing and it seems every time i turn around, another bureaucrat is trying to murder it in the name of re-election and approval ratings. the internet is for all mankind, but fatbodies in armani suits for some reason forget this.
to france: stop letting your government divert from the real issues. get back on track with employment and reform.
Good people go to bed earlier.
I wonder if they included a provision that excludes French National Assembly members from the three strikes.
Given enough time any connection can be compromised and if France's script kiddies are like all the others I wouldn't put it past them to pwn a couple of assembly member's connections. Since you are responsible for what happens on your connection...
If at first you don't succeed, bribe and bribe again.
How will this pass the European Unions "right to free speech" when you have no internet connection to communicate with anyone? Oh silly me, it's the French we're talking about, they never did give a cr@p about European laws unless it was in their favour.
Take Nobody's Word For It.
I LIKE leaving my wrouter unpassworded. I have a resource that costs me nothing it makes good sense to share. My neighbours do the same and are on a different ISP. The result? Near 0 downtime. But it seems this will be legislated away. It depresses me that since I got cable almost 10years ago my speed and capacity has dropped, reliability has dropped massively and is going to take another hit. Capitalism works very well on small individual items but clearly cannot deal with massive projects. Oh well at least its not as bad as cellphones...
It passed, but with a 285-225 vote, there's noticeably significant opposition. And that's just the lower house; it still has to go to a "parliamentary commission of seven senators and seven members of the lower house to pen a final draft that's acceptable to both houses". And that's if it's not blocked by another constitutional appeal.
So, just typical politicking bullshit you'd see across the pond over here, or really anywhere, nowadays, so that Jack can say he was for it and accuse Jane of being against it, to further some hatespeech... er, campaigning. I can't get too worked up until it's actually for real; there's just too much of this nonsense nowadays.
Essential Reading:
"...Member States often use European Union to achieve what can be spelled as âoepolitical launderingâ. The âoeTelecoms Packageâ gives a perfect example of such a deceptive maneuver, aimed at legalizing an european-wide "graduated response" against citizens, and stretching it even deeper as usual. How does it work?..."
How French Presidency Hides a Political Laundering Inside EU Telecoms Package
All countries should have a law that prevents their governments from being allowed to repeatedly reattempt to pass a law the got turned down once already. Especially when the law has already been found to be unconstitutional.
are you serious ? I didn't rtfa but do you have a source on this ? Stuff like this scares the hell out of me. You see France starts then rest of Europe wants to follow suit. Government mandated software ? Not on my box , reminds me of the trojan the german government is trying to push on all their citizens.
Coverage at Ars also points out a provision that says, 'all Internet users must keep their connections "secure" and are responsible for what happens on them.
That sounds great, especially to those of us who have to deal with the Great Unwashed Masses PC problems, but most users are doing good to find the power switch. Making them responsible for what happens to the internals of their PC without their knowledge in a rapidly evolving threat landscape that even security professionals struggle with at times is blaming the victim. It's not their fault Windows is a highly porkable product.
They're teaching young people how to use computers in school but, with few exceptions, they're not teaching them how to use them safely. In many schools it would be the blind leading the blind in security education. Most teachers don't know enough about PC security to make any relevant contribution to solving the bigger problem. Ultimately, it's like trying to fight a fully involved house fire with a garden hose.
I'm not sure what the answer is, but I am glad that it's someone else being heavy-handed and dickish for a change.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
Just wait until this really goes through pisses some people off and they find some "strange material" on Sarkozy's HDD or traffic through his internet connection.
So saying that a connection must be secure immediately raises the question: how secure?
Are they responsible if a neighbor guesses a WEP password and downloads kiddie porn?
Are they responsible if they have a fully patched Windows box, with virus checking, but get compromised by a virus missed by those safeguards and become part of a botnet?
If a criminal breaks into the house while they're on vacation and makes a bunch of purchases with fraudulent credit card numbers, are they still responsible?
Legislatures all over the world pass laws that can't be enforced universally. They are trolling their constituents and trying to look busy to justify having a full time job. The problem is you get huge law books with thousands of obscure laws that have never been tested in court. The police, and by extension the state, can arrest anyone and find a law to justify it. While it might not stick in court yet, being arrested will generally cost you a great deal of money and embarrassment, many employers will fire you with no recourse, it can be used as justification for seizing assets in some cases, etc... Our only protections are the state's lack of interest in us as individuals, or aggressive protesting by the mob if we are visible enough.
Well, you don't have to have the software installed - but these software logs will be the only ones that will be easily used as proof that your computer was downloading stuff...
To my French Government: Stop Microsoft's monopole, don't allow computers' manufacturers selling MS Windows on every PC, that's not legal but that what they do and it's the hell to ask for a refund.
They're all ignorants !
So the copyright industry wants you kicked off the net for three mere accusations of copyright infringement. That could be as little as three songs. The songs sell for a buck on Amazon and iTunes. So for a mere three bucks the copyright industry wants you banned from the net for eternity.
Let's imagine a different law. Let's imagine that the banking industry gets fed up with people stealing pens out of their lobbies. These pens are expensive, a buck each. Imagine that a law is enacted stating that any person merely accused by a bank of stealing three pens is banned from the entire banking industry for the rest of his or her life.
Does anyone think such a law has any chance to be passed? Does anyone seriously think that such a law makes sense? Of course it would not and of course it does not. But in the crazy world of copyrights, people actually take the proposed three strikes law seriously.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
As your friendly conservative I must insist everyone stop picking on France!
France has always had a huge tradition of strong copyright law that in their mind, protects the artist. They foisted the Bern convention on the world and would probably make it so that the artist and his family would have copyrights for all eternity if they could. It's entirely different set of values that drives this. Even though the piece of it may not seem logical, we need to be culturally aware. We as American (and the British obviously) are based on anglo-saxon legal values, but France is not.
This is my sig.
probably not since Sarkozy gets kickbacks from the french entertainment industry.
Of course, it is quite entertaining when I am on my Linux box and a Windows looking "Warning" comes up saying the my "C:" drive is infected and that I need to run the "anti-virus" that has popped up.
It's NOT me! It's the meds! I'm on 1000mg of Fukitol.
"They have to keep their connection secure". Hmm...And how are they (the normal Joe Six-pack) supposed to do that? How do they know to make it secure? Will somebody offer training courses? Will somebody issue a certificate: "You are allowed to connect to the internet"? I would love to see that happening but the chances are obviously slim. I would love the OEMs to be responsible for training their customer: "You sir, if you wanna buy this shiny new computer, and want to connect it to the internet, must present a proof that you are capable of securing your connection". But, obviously, this won't happen :(.
It seems like all some shady person would have to do is target all the officials responsible for horrible legislation like this and make sure there computers are compromised and download tons of illegal files...
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
This is MY galaxy...go find your OWN!
For those that believe this is trollish, see that pair of links documenting the point...
...long this will be humored by the courts. Basically, the politicians are passing the most restrictive rules possible for consumers they can think of then tune them back until the courts let it pass. Why don't they just think up what would be considered fair in a free society then see what happens from there. I am not France, but would be interest to find out if this is how French society allows all its laws to be created.
Don't browse porn sites without noscript
Fixed that for you ;)
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
like fo rreal , rapists , murderers and other real crime that hurts people?
I think you'll find that laws are already in place to deal with such crimes.
Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
You don't treat the symptom, you treat the cause. Otherwise you may as well be jerking off. What causes crime? Poverty, lack of prospects for a future, and ignorance. You may deter one individual from committing more crimes by putting him in jail for life but that does nothing to dissuade the one after him and the one after that. Yes, there will always be the bad seeds, the one no amount of opportunity and guidance will help. But there will be fewer of them than what we have now if we address the causes.
Want to know how to set the drug problems straight in this country? Legalize and regulate the shit. Those who are hooked on the hard shit like heroin will get their maintenance dose from a government clinic for free. Those who aren't yet hooked will find it harder to score in the first place as the street supply dries up. And pot? For fuck's sake, give the growers licenses and let them operate like micro-breweries. Keep big business out of it, don't let their marketing departments start trying to manipulate public demand. Can you imagine how much peace would be had in Mexico if illicit drug money from the US dried up? Hell, just imagine knowing your flat won't get broken into by a junkie looking for shit to fence.
Politicians don't have the fucking stones to put forward this kind of legislation.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
So I can have Windows Zombies unhooked in France?
Great. Used correctly this law could raise the bar for internet security and security awarenes on behalf of the end-user.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
You've been marked troll, but you're quite right. The idea that the an average windows user can keep a PC secure, keep their wireless network secure, etc. is right up there with expecting the poor to get a fair trial in court. Admin is a day-in-day-out job of constant vigilence and few missteps -- by a professional-level definition of misstep. The average user probably makes their PC vulnerable in about 5 different ways for every new day they use it.
European Convention of Human Rights, Section 1
Article 6.1
In the determination of his civil rights and obligations or of any criminal charge against him, everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law.
Article 6.2
Everyone charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law.
Article 6.3
Everyone charged with a criminal offence has the following minimum rights:
(a) to be informed promptly, in a language which he understands and in detail, of the nature and cause of the accusation against him;
(b) to have adequate time and the facilities for the preparation of his defence;
(c) to defend himself in person or through legal assistance of his own choosing or, if he has not sufficient means to pay for legal assistance, to be given it free when the interests of justice so require;
(d) to examine or have examined witnesses against him and to obtain the attendance and examination of witnesses on his behalf under the same conditions as witnesses against him;
IANAL, but it you'd have an extremely difficult time proving 6.3(a) to the ECtHR if the guy didn't even know he was to turn up to court (Everyone sends read receipts, of course). The rest is just farce; An evidentiary hearing is not a trial, and as such innocense must be presumed under 6.2
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
Uhh, it might not be law, but you do realise that you're on a network will millions of other people, and that you have a responsibility to do your part in keeping everyone safe from hackers, identity theft, spam, etc. right?
If you don't realise that your system is insecure, that's one thing. But knowing it's insecure, that something needs to be changed, and not changing or hiring someone to take steps to help you, is just irresponsible.
It's ironic that france of all countries wants to introduce these laws. The french enlightenment and french thinkers shaped our modern view of how government should be kept from abusing it's powers (like Montesquieu's tripartite form of government). The idea was that all power should be shared so no single person or authority could abuse it.
With the Hadopi laws, the spirit of the tripartite system is basically side stepped. It only takes a single court to both judge and execute a punishment without the defendent even knowing he's accused of anything. Wow... It's rather funny really... unless you're french.
They're just doing what their employers want them to, jeez.
Question everything
In other words, we should always use encryption, and be sure it has no backdoors for untrusted entities like governments? Sounds good to me!
I'm pretty much in the same boat. My Windows box has gone for years without an infection, and without running active virus protection (I do weekly on-demand scans to ensure that it's clean, but nothing running in the background).
Windows is a dangerous thing in the hands of a novice, but if you're used to computers (which MOST people who would be willing to install and run Linux are), it's feasible to surf on a Windows machine without hosing it up.
And in reality, the primary concern about the matter here is securing your wireless network. IE, setting up WPA or the like. That's going to be an issue primarily focused on your router and knowing how to set it up.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
Long answer: this is the death of non-corporate backed hotspots.
Thankfully this piece of shit is 99% guaranteed to be blocked by the Constitutional Council.
But it's typical of Sarkoleon's governance. The media coverage of this whole thing has been almost as sickening as that of Fox wrt Obama's health care plan: unashamedly ignorant propaganda, ridiculous talking points, and Godwin galore. Did you know that opponents of the law were Nazi collaborators? That's what the head of a local Mafiaa repeated on the media, without being challenged much. That's particularly offensive considering that the most prominent opponents have names such as Bloche or Zimmerman.
Someone, somewhere will create something which messes up the logs made by this spy-software which is supposed to be used as proof of innocence. It will prove everybody is guilty of the most heinous crimes like downloading Britney 24x365 or images of Sarko standing next to tall women. Good luck prosecuting that...
--frank[at]unternet.org
I think that Internet in France will be full of people like you: Anonymous Cowards.
Um, you're replying to a comment about France's legislature passing a very enforceable law. They are defining liability: if your agent (computer) does something, you are responsible for what it did.
This is almost the exact opposite of the phenomenon that you're talking about. It simplifies law immensely (assuming they wrote it generally enough) and on top of that..
People say users can't deal with security issues, and maybe they are right, but it's also true that users are the best and only people who even have the slightest chance. Users don't, but nobody else can. Saying their computers are their computers, is a damn good step on the road to progress.
Of course, you can't have the principle in place that users are responsible for their computers, without also making sure they have the power to control their computers. If your computer is doing things that you don't like, and if you are responsible for whatever it does do, then it's a requirement that you be able to maintain it.
There are some rather obvious implications, and we should expect a lot of complaining about such a principle from the very parties that bought this law. They are this close [imagine me holding my finger and thumb close together] to outlawing DRM, since no computer can serve two masters.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
That means ISPs are legally responsible for their clients misbehaviour!!!
I haven't gotten an infection on my Windows XP box in years.
XP itself is an infection all by itself.
Catalin Braescu
Ofaly.com
I'd probably switch to MacOS. Even though the ~$50 per year upgrades from 10.4 to 10.5 to 10.6 is annoying and expensive, the Macintosh OS is a heck of a lot easier to use than Linux. Also it's easier to find programs. For example my Netscape ISP's Web Accelerator works with the Mac, but not with Linux.
But for now I'll just stick with the cheap Windows system. (I haven't spent a dime since I got XP in 2002.)
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Noscript will not be helpful against malware exploiting bugs in displaying code (png library, video codec, ...). And don't say that won't ever happen. And yes, in principle you can block that, but I guess if you block all videos and images, you might as well just not surf the porn site anyway (or maybe there are ASCII porn pages somewhere?).
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
I have to wonder, exactly how are they planning on enforcing this in internet cafes and at wifi access point locations?
Net nannies are quite limited...
Maybe this means no more public internet access in France...so sad.
Back to dial-up, all you executives in airports, so we can associate your traffic with your company's ISP account...
Tourists, check those useless netbooks at the border...
"I love animals! Some are cute, others are tasty, what's not to like?" - Betsy Schroeder, Jeopardy contestant
Corporations are (supposed to be!) held in check by government, but who holds the government in check? Ah, the government itself does, you say. In the U.S., the three co-equal branches are supposed to hold each other in check. Yeah, right. What you get is stupid, arrogant, self-righteous, pompous, hypocritical, contemptuous corruptocracy of which this law is evidence in France. It is to be assumed that no one will need me to provide evidence of the pinnacle of all corruptocracies which we see in the U.S.
Ah, but you say The People are ultimately supposed to hold the government in check by turning the corrupt bastards out at election time. But what do you do if virtually every nominee for election is corrupt going in? And those who are not, and who miraculously defeat the incumbent, with the incumbent's huge built-in electoral advantage ... those not yet corrupt become sucked into the corruptocracy soon after their election.
Revolutions may clean things out for a time, but it always comes back. The U.S. has long since reached the point where the "revolutionary" home grown government has become far more tyrannical than the British Crown ever was.
They couldn't be broadcast anywhere in Europe lest they get instantly sued and convicted under hate speech laws.
Not that I like hate speech laws -- I'm a fan of the 1st amendment (in its modern interpretation). I oppose them because they are useless and have nasty side effects that end up stifling worthwhile speech.
However, if we have them, it's precisely because of and against inflammatory, racist, hate-mongering, war-mongering and plain lying messages routinely found on Fox. Just like while I am against the death penalty, I'm not going to go out of my way to save a noted psychopath.
I run 100% Linux at home. I do clean installs every 6 months. I do all my work from a non- privileged account.
All I was saying was that if the government was going to play wack-a-mole with me if they thought my connection was NOT secure, I would NOT be running Microsoft Windows.
Because even if you run Firefox, even if you run antivirus, even if you are careful what sites you visit and how you click on pop-ups to dismiss them. All that means is you are using best tactics available today. I would not want to bet that in the next 6 months someone won't find another way to produce a drive-by-download where your computer is co-opted or your data is hijacked from visiting a hacked website.
Not that such a thing could never happen on a Mac or on Linux. But the current track record in real world use for the last decade yields: 0 Exploits for Mac. 0 Exploits for Linux, 100's for Microsoft Windows. Wake me up when a default installs of Ubuntu start get fubar-ed.
vi +
Sarkozy is a nutter. France has double-standards just like in the Falklands War supplying Argentina with Exorcet missiles. Oh yes I never forget the Falklands. This is now war, and Sarkozy being such a short arsed bumblebee like Napoleon now thinks he can rule the world. Sarkozy is like a Hitler in the making! Can you not see this trait? You have been warned, Sarkozy is a dangerous man, doing charitable work as a diplomat in disguise to socially engineer other leaders in to his way of thinking, Make up your own mind.
All cows eat grass!