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Irish Politician Calls For Crackdown On Open Source Internet Browsers
An anonymous reader writes "An Irish politician has called for tougher controls on the use of open source internet browsers. He said, 'An online black market is operating which protects the users’ anonymity and operates across borders through the use of open source internet browsers and payments systems which allow users to remain anonymous. This effectively operates as an online supermarket for illegal goods such as drugs, weapons and pornography, where it is extremely difficult to trace the identity of the buyers. We need a national and international response to clamp down on this illicit trade.' The politician added that the U.S. had 'taken action' to address this, but he seemed surprised that their solution was only 'temporary.'"
Posting as ac because I am both Irish and drunk, I forgot my password
I think I speak for all people who know much of anything about computers when I ask, "what?".
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Call me when a bill to this effect has some chance of passing, otherwise I am not interested. There is no idea so dumb or ill-informed that there isn't going to be some politician, somewhere, proposing it. That doesn't mean anyone else in that legislature takes it seriously, possibly even the proposer isn't serious and is just mouthing off for political reasons. This just isn't worth anyone's time to read about.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
It sounds like he's talking about Tor and/or Silk Road.
It's hard to tell from the article whether he's advocating a crackdown on browsers and Tor, or the criminal activity.
If it's just the criminal activity then he's being sensible, otherwise he's being obtuse.
Obviously, this person has no clue as to how the internet, or software works...
Logic is the beginning of reason, not the end of it.
Seems like this rather confused politician is confusing Firefox with Tor. And I bet if he knew who was funding Tor, his head would explode.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
The only people who deserve no taxes in Ireland are those multinationals with accountants who drink a double Irish coffee with their Dutch sandwich.
Are there any browsers produced in Ireland that such a policy would affect?
How in the heck did the idea of 'privacy' which, used to be one of the tenets of western civilization become something that our elected leaders (who are supposed to be on OUR side) actively try to quash? What is wrong with that picture. Did we learn nothing from the USSR and the Iron Curtain?
It's only the buyers that he wants to track?
Does he want to know who is customers or competitors are?
Does it go on forever?
There are web browsers based on the work of the Firefox and Chromium open source projects that allow browsing a parallel web with enough anonymity that users feel safe using it to trade in prohibited weapons, prohibited drugs, and prohibited sexually explicit works. One of them is the Tor Browser Bundle. And I think the "payment system" part refers to Bitcoin and the other coins that vary in the exact proof-of-work problem, such as Namecoin (Bitcoin with a parallel DNS tacked on), Litecoin (Bitcoin with Tarsnap's Scrypt hash), and Dogecoin (very Litecoin, much meme, so cash, wow).
This just goes to show how people who know nothing about computers shouldn't be in a position to make public statements about them. I mean, while we're at it, why don't we ban cars from driving on the road just so that bank robbers can't use them as getaway vehicles?
Yeah you shouldn't be held accountable for every cent. The US government on the other hand cannot account for trillions and that's justifiable.
I mean, if we can complain about things that are going to bring the world down around our ears, surely stupidity outranks firefox.
Let us know how that works out.
I agree with the people above, it sounds like he's confusing Tor and Firefox. For my part, I'm a member of an on-line community and am dealing with their 64-year-old admin who refuses to let anyone post live links in the discussion forum because "it's a security risk" and won't allow any images, or media. She's wondering why this little web community is dying.
You sometimes need to keep old people away from the keyboard.
---- The above post was generated by the Turing Institute. Maybe.
confusing Firefox with Tor
I don't see how Firefox with Tor is so confusing.
This reminds me of when Senator Orin hatch wanted to develop technology to destroy peoples computers if they were caught downloading anything that was copyrighted.
I actually witnessed this exchange live on C-SPAN.
Excerpt from an article that's no longer up:
"No one is interested in destroying anyone's computer," replied Randy Saaf of MediaDefender Inc., a secretive Los Angeles company that builds technology to deliberately download pirated material very slowly so other users can't.
"I'm interested," Hatch interrupted. He said damaging someone's computer "may be the only way you can teach somebody about copyrights."
The senator, a composer who earned $18,000 last year in song-writing royalties, acknowledged Congress would have to enact an exemption for copyright owners from liability for damaging computers. He endorsed technology that would twice warn a computer user about illegal online behavior, "then destroy their computer."
"If we can find some way to do this without destroying their machines, we'd be interested in hearing about that," Hatch said. "If that's the only way, then I'm all for destroying their machines. If you have a few hundred thousand of those, I think people would realize" the seriousness of their actions.
"There's no excuse for anyone violating copyright laws," Hatch said.
The NSA snooping revelations have spooked quite a lot of people, including engineers who design protocols. Anonymous browsing will not remain a niche for "paranoid" people - it will become available in mainstream systems.
Don't be so hard on poor O'Donovan. I don't know how to get those newfangled "Tweat" things on Prodigy or CompuServe either.
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
You'll have to find a piece of paper, a pen, an envelope, and a stamp. Tweeting won't work here.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
Fine Gals. Look who's talking!
Someone ask him what his position is on the internet being "a series of tubes".
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
Pro tip, just because it is online, or open source, does not make human nature any different.
Some people will beat their spouse or hire a hitman. Some people will be addicts. Some will sell to the addicts. Some will fondle their niece.
Claiming some tool is enabling these behaviors and ignoring that tool's greater benefit greater benefit to society is either fear-mongering or blind unthinking fear (possibly instilled by other fear mongers). If the former, you are the worst kind of control hungry sociopath to use fear to restrict others. If the latter, you are a puppet and a simpleton. in either case, you do not deserve to be in any position of leadership.
Silence is a state of mime.
Internet Explorer and Safari are produced in Ireland for tax purposes.
Since when did being open and free to all become the problem here?
Probably just a fan of Tetris, whose author has claimed in an interview that free software "destroys the market".
... that nothing he said makes a slightest bit of sense. Literally none at all.
A few times I've heard an Irish use the term "gobshite" and I wasn't sure what it meant 'till today.
Just when you think that you have grown beyond caring, theses guys manage to poke beneath the shield and hit the "AAAAAARRRGGGHH" button !!
I am sorry for taking this seriously, but after the Bank Bailouts, the corruption, the incompetency, the cover-ups and the sheer fuck-wittery of the past
years, they attack OPEN SOURCE BROWSERS !!
What more can one expect from politicians that:
- kowtow-ed to the EU on the Maastricht Treaty re-Vote, (It puts the lotion in the basket, and votes again and again until the answer is YES)
- sold 3 generations of their own people out, in the form of a bank bailout for *private* non-system critical banks,
- have no concept of Justice whether social, civil or criminal
- have no concept of public probity, of duty or what to be a servant of the people actually means
- assume in blind arrogance that their own short-sighted, small-town, bigoted, religion-ridden, never questioned views are "NORMALITY"
and those of everyone else, are simply illegal.
In short. Olympic level Assholes.
Winking and smiling and smirking, crapping out their "hokesy/folksy" catchphrases, with constant shit eating grins.
Concepts such as free speech, right to privacy, equal treatment before the law, due process, ... are considered amusing or just dismissed,
womens' rights (especially reproductive rights),
out of hand, by these troglodytes.
For example, the implicit assumption that *all pornography* is simply illegal!
The US and Britain have blanket surveilled every Irish citizen for generations, and this cringing *lackey*
assumes that *law enforcement* was the purpose.
Call me harsh, but I interpret the failure of elected representatives to protect .the rights of their citizens,
in the face of blatant intrusions, as more than incompetence, more than failure.
It is treachery.
Following the usual, endless cycle, whenever social unrest threatens, the Haves in Ireland, ... the opposition is simply disenfranchised.
push the Have-nots to emigrate. Since, conveniently, the non-resident cannot vote, there
was, is and will never be any pressure on the ruling elite to change any of their policies
And nothing changes.
I dream of another Ireland.
A country where an informed electorate hold their elected leaders to account, demand the
definition and enforcement of just laws which protect individual and public rights.
A truly Free Ireland.
Until then, I apologise to the world that we are represented by these fools and that
you have to listen to their blather.
(R)ule in Hell or (S)erve in Heaven [R]?
He forgot to include the words "pedophiles" and "terrorists" in his call for a crackdown. I would've expected better from an Irishman.
Because low cost and easy to acquire doors from doormakers (there might even be discount door sellers !) protect children from being seen when they get abused.
Join, the remove all doors movement, we provide you the feeling of being better people, because you can morally pic on others that don't want to declare to you why they love to fuck asses or wear sissy dresses, or just want to be who they are .. unwatched & unsuppressed.
It's cheaper than actual freedom, and it makes keeping track of us easy as a cowbell.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
saying Open Source browsers leads to anon browsing leads to black market deals
just like
iron leads to knives leads to stabbings: obvious conclusion, ban iron, yes?
As usual, you can substitute the word "cash" or "gold" in.
Cash and gold take a lot longer to send from one continent to another than Bitcoin.
... and the fact that that idiotic Irish luddite can be elected as a politician says a lot about those who voted for him !!
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Ireland doesn't really matter. It's the Midwest of the United Kingdom.
--
Only on Slashdot does an AC get modded Informative for pointing out that the LHC is in Europe.
The combination of your post and your .sig is sadly hilarious.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
What is that "Senior System Engineer/Architect" thing doing in a slashdot sig?
Furthermore, your sig says: "Notice: If you post anonymously do not expect a reply" and you just replied to an anon!
You seem to have problems following basic algorithms which is questionable for a " Senior System Engineer/Architect".
Take care nevertheless man ;-)
--
Senior master/architect of the universe
Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
Heck, I'm sure you can also merge Tor with Internet Explorer if you were silly enough.
It would infringe copyright. The key difference here is that merging privacy tools with a browser distributed under a free software license does not infringe copyright.
..this was its reaction: http://i.imgur.com/M6SDzGZ.gif
I'll tell you what this is all about:
http://boingboing.net/2013/10/11/w3cs-drm-for-html5-sets-the.html
Soon, all compliant browsers will have to be opaque, in order to have DRM that will protect Netflix and other streaming services. Independent browsers will disappear. Open source browsers will be a big hole in the plan to completely lock down the internet once and for all and cannot be allowed to exist. Irish politicians have learned their globalization lessons well and know on which side their bread is buttered. He may not be the most eloquent advocate, but he knows what the agenda is.
We are very close to the end of the internet as we know it. I've long said that the internet is turning into cable television. Now the transformation is almost complete.
http://mostlysignssomeportents.tumblr.com/post/72759474218/we-are-huxleying-ourselves-into-the-full-orwell
You are welcome on my lawn.
Go home Patrick O' Donovan, it's obvioius that you're drunk.
The Amarri pray for god, the Caldari pray for profit. the Gallente pray for peace, but the Minmatar pray their ships hol
Do they have electoral recall in Ireland?
If you aren't part of the solution, then there is good money to be made prolonging the problem
I believe you have trouble with the English language. "Do not expect" does not mean what you think it does, or at least what you just portrayed. Consider the meaning of the terminology and re-think your position.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
And here again we see a fine example of someone "explaining" something they truly have no clue about. PHB (pointy hair boss) picks up on recent buzzwords and tries to use them to sound smart.
"If it's "anonymous" they must be hiding something! And open source can make things anonymous! So open source users are hiding something, like drugs and guns and other evil things! Oh think of the children!"
Apparently he doesn't realize black markets existed looong before the internet ever came around.
"Dear Sir,
That's retarded, and you're retarded for saying it.
Respectfully,
your name."
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I wonder what he means by "Law enforcement agencies in the United States have recently taken action to address this issue” - I'm not really aware of any actions against "open source internet browsers" (although they're certainly thinking hard about tor and tor browsers). Or is he talking about the internet dragnet that became common knowledge last year?
A rather terse teacher in Beaulieu
Had a class which was very unreaulieu;
In a fine fit of pique, he resigned, so to spique:
Dear Headmaster,
I'm leaving.
Yours treaulieu,
Beaulieu
Unfortunately, Patrick O' Donovan wasn't born then.
Reading such a clueless screed, I expected another clueless old luddite. Imagine my surprise to find out this schmuck is 37 years old!
drink THAT much.
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
Whenever some idiot politician opens his mouth and crap like this comes out, I wonder what wisecrack would come out of Mark Twain's mouth or erupt from his vitriolic pen. Perhaps he would rehash something like what he wrote for a newspaper in 1866 when he was living in California:
"And speaking of steamboats reminds me of an incident of my late trip to Sacramento. I want to publish it, as showing how going north on the [Sacramento] river gradually enfeebles one's mind, and accounts for the strange imbecility of legislators who leave her sensible men and become the reverse, to the astonishment of their constituents, by the time they reach their seats at Sacramento."
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
see what abusing alcoholic beverages can do to you ?
he probably had way too much guinness that night !
Which emphasizes the use of condoms is a good thing.
Of course - since he's Irish then he's probably a catholic, so that means that a condom probably wasn't an option.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKFa6sVH_1k
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
Since studies have shown this is used in nearly 100% of all illegal communications between illegal drug traffickers, weapons dealers and pornography distributers, we should really start looking for a way to ban the alfabet.
...and on Figure 4 you can observe a prime specimen of the "butthurt" species.
There is nothing wrong with the Internet tubes per se, as long as they are used in the right manner.
I would say I am embarrassed to be Irish but I am not. Dumb asses are spread pretty evenly throughout the world. This one just happens to be Irish. He displays the intellectual rigor I have come to expect from our politicians. Badly educated and unthinking. Nothing new here.
I do fear for the future however.
First of all, it's "frist psot", and secondly, anonymous coward is awesome -- he gets a ton of frist psots.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
When you have a town drunk, vomiting in gutters, pissing in alleys, driving away tourists, the obvious solution is to elect them to public office, where you can keep an eye on them, busy them and forget about them. UNTIL the day they blather out some rye whiskey induced blather about browsers. Then you just flat ignore them, theyll go away and drink some more. Problem solved.
*Repent!Quit Your Job!Slack Off!The World Ends Tomorrow and You May Die!
And let's be honest, Boston is more Irish than Cork.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
If you were irish and sober...
Why not ask if he's a leprechaun - it's more likely!
The big problem is that criminals are accessing the internet using public-domain inventions that are intrinsically anonymous. I mean, of course, by using keyboards.
Until we have a properly secure keyboard -- with govt approved letter order, built-in camera, and a mandatory license needed before you can use it -- the bad guys will continue to score easy wins against our freedoms.
Back off! That dude makes 3+ million a year at Google!
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
Google may need to find a new fool.
...confronted with things they cannot blow up. If you're anonymous on the Internet, conducting anonymous commerce, you cannot be senselessly slaughtered with a bomb.