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Congress Considering CISPA Amendments
First time accepted submitter casac8 writes "As Friday's House vote on CISPA nears, it appears Congress members are getting nervous. Literally millions of people around the world have signed petitions voicing their opposition, and it appears Congress has heard their concerns, as House members are considering a number of amendments aimed at limiting the negative impacts the legislation would have on Internet privacy. For instance, one amendment likely to pass would tighten the bill's language to ensure its provisions are only applied in the pursuit of legit crimes and other rare instances, rather than whenever the NSA wants to target Joe Web-user. And another would increase possible liability on the parts of companies who hand personal information over to the government."
If only there were an option for those who don't want to be tracked by repressive governments...
I contacted my congressman to express my opposition. Anyone else?
Instead of a bad idea being completely codified, the completely bad concept will be codified with a few provisions that can be removed later.
That is, if this isn't the typical "leaders express concern" story before they vote for something heinous.
What? I can not take all your cheese?..well then.. let me have this slice..for now. I'll be back soon for more. You are truly a shrewd bargainer of cheese.
Looks a veto is looming..... http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-57421267-281/white-house-takes-aim-at-cispa-with-formal-veto-threat/ [cnet]
They can do what they want, doesn't matter any to me. I'm more than happy to throw them out. Are you?
It's sewage. Don't make it law. Flush it.
...of killing the damn bill.
expandfairuse.org
If only there were an option for those who don't want to be tracked by repressive governments...
The citizenry of a "Free Country" as America claims to be should not have to resort to such measures in order to hide their day-to-day activities from their government.
AccountKiller
The amendments are an attempt to get the foot in the door with CISPA. It's likely they hope to get the basic framework of CISPA in place and then do incremental revisions to the bill over time when the attention has died down.
The best part of the proposed amendments is the supposed liability for the companies violating privacy and handing over info to the government. How'd that work out with the massive illegal NSA wiretapping? Oh that's right, everyone was granted retroactive immunity and the whistle blower got criminal prosecution for his trouble. Somehow, I seriously doubt that the privacy provisions will carry much weight or have any teeth. This bill needs to die.
When all else fails, run.
A couple of points about this. First, if the recent Wired article on the under-construction Utah data center is accurate, mass spying is already underway with increasing volumes being planned. So I think it is fair to say that this is a reflection of Total Information Awareness and the post-Admiral Poindexter philosophy of spying: build it and let 'em try and take it away later. CISPA, then, is best thought of as a legal framework around existing and planned hardware buildouts. While I do not expect the Obama White House to be forthcoming with its real reasoning for threatening a veto, I presume that the real reason is that CISPA does not go far enough so far as the executive branch is concerned.
Dog is my co-pilot.
Amending it is not enough - the bill needs to be thrown out completely, to deliver a strong enough message to the authors that they need to stop trying to get this sort of thing through. It's not a very big deterrent from trying it again, but it's about the best we could hope for.
Does anybody believe this rhetoric that ultimately boils down to, "We'll only use it when it's appropriate, we promise?" Instead of ammendments made of empty promises, how about don't pass the bill?
The good news is the Government has heard your anger and protests! The bad news is they don't care. They still intend to pass the bill. Keep calling and writing your congressmen and senators!
I Donated to my Congressman's campaign to block you losers
Suck it hippy!
if you shut down CISPA, Lammar still has DISPA, EISPA, FISPA,...
If you did you'd notice it's about information sharing and that information is limited in scope. Instead you go on about NSA spying on people and other bullshit they're already doing under the authority of completely different bills.
ANY COMPANY THAT COOPERATES WITH THE FASCIST GOVERNMENT WILL HAVE ALL OF US QUIT AND SWITCH SERVICES. Then when their not around anymore the new companies run by young executives WILL NOT play nice and cooperate with the government. Put simply if they pass it and comcast/xfinity assists the government with our info we use someone else for internet.
While I do not expect the Obama White House to be forthcoming with its real reasoning for threatening a veto [cnet.com]...
Elections.
First, if the recent Wired article on the under-construction Utah data center [wired.com] is accurate, mass spying is already underway with increasing volumes being planned. So I think it is fair to say that this is a reflection of Total Information Awareness [wikipedia.org] and the post-Admiral Poindexter philosophy of spying: build it and let 'em try and take it away later.
Look at it this way. We will take it away, and what's left over can be donated to wikipedia to mirror the internet until the end of our existence.
From TFA...
U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., a lead sponsor, has said, the bill would "help the private sector defend itself from advanced cyber threats."
If that's really all the bill does, why is it needed? Why would intertube experts in "cybersecurity" need help from the morons in Congress to do their job?
The following might, or might not, be random data sent just to drive the NSA monitors nuts: 36599 76464 99006 12528 862 30068 26982 34658 32764 88115 14845 91533 77711 76363 3793 97990 68307 40928 48327 84342 29895 7296 9251 33722 51706 84452 21850 57248 34469 43000 19863 87259 18800 59098 59663 14702 57754 69653 68442 83150 21658 28472 35201 78999 13632 87928 74015 25053 30221 56156 15297 93035 23082 95959 22686 99437 4921 38296 90694 38732 95685 80621 51412 38107 23483 28301 7317 88681 78777 15983 11643 19624 70112 14995 37773 33607 44963 92741 14782 14709 20259 40543 57504 53223 13697 27471 86409 5686 79191 69484 15079 23050 27628 25521 81240 35071 57542 45197 11048 74781 29421 96380 35750 63365 92067 95125 24833 52775 9739 45347 60439 41135 44794 71088 54094 34248 22112 90321 98668 25467 38780 36022 56039 5748 85384 77557 4046 95851 13668 33449 5112 13486 19437 95196 13292 49605 9263 1033 6529 30107 84906 8423 16551 81888 10306 14530 30102 5473 22580 65044 52099 80396 10681 73471 53820 94039 13196 45354 77399 89816 80220 64904 31620 76402 3326 55087 93461 26113 42350 66518 24814 17602 68066 85295 24454 45731 95748 75484 61633 29738 6223 87984 79527 99787 38232 74338 14314 31508 88707 41325 48790 28334 76086 70234 8211 22218 5828 3281 10418 74769 kryton
When SOPA/PIPA were rejected, this success was attributed to the outcry and protest of the people. In fact the people had the support of a number of BIG corporations (like Google) who also felt threatened by the bills. Now that the corporations have been made partners and exempted from the bad effects, it's just us. We will see how well we do on our own, but I'm not very optimistic.
http://www.opencongress.org/contact_congress_letters/new?bill=112-h3523&position=oppose
Is it any wonder that our congress critters are screwing us in the ass every chance we get?
They have nothing to fear from us.
First off, we can't even touch them until the next election.
Second, even if we do vote them out, they have plenty of time to build up a cushy private sector job as a *reward* for stepping on our rights.
Third, because of one and two, the next guy that runs against them has no incentive to be any better.
Federal recall elections will solve this issue of corruption...which is unfortunately why the notion will never see the light of day. One may as well ask a rapist to cut his own dick off.
We the people are powerless to do a god damned thing by ourselves, and it's high time everyone who preaches all high and mighty about getting involved in politics instead of bitching about stuff they can't change realizes just how invincible our politicians really are, at least against us piddly voters.
Run for office? Corporate media will skin you alive if you try to derail their precious gravy train.
Vote the fuckers out? Can't do that till election time, and by then it's too late. Plus the next guy won't be any better because he knows he can just do the same routine as the guy you're voting out.
We need to go after their corporate backers too. Boycott any company that does more harm than good, and be vocal about your reasons. Support the companies that are the least evil. Make companies compete for your business on the basis of good karma. Don't do business with a company that has a better one competing with it. If a company is evil and has no competition, try to avoid doing business with it.
Please go tell your bosses to stop supporting CISPA. The threat here is not from the government, clearly they are willing to hand you complete impunity over a massive inadequacy to maintain privacy (and in fact, to allow the govt. to spy on users of your services without warrants at any time). The real threat here is that if you get this bill passed, you will have zero customers. Protect your users and the citizens of this country or cover your own ass and go out of business. This doesn't seem like a hard decision to make.