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Senate Votes To Kill FCC's Broadband Privacy Rules (pcworld.com)
The Senate voted 50-48 along party lines Thursday to repeal an Obama-era law that requires internet service providers to obtain permission before tracking what customers look at online and selling that information to other companies. PCWorld adds: The Senate's 50-48 vote Thursday on a resolution of disapproval would roll back Federal Communications Commission rules requiring broadband providers to receive opt-in customer permission to share sensitive personal information, including web-browsing history, geolocation, and financial details with third parties. The FCC approved the regulations just five months ago. Thursday's vote was largely along party lines, with Republicans voting to kill the FCC's privacy rules and Democrats voting to keep them. The Senate's resolution, which now heads to the House of Representatives for consideration, would allow broadband providers to collect and sell a "gold mine of data" about customers, said Senator Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat. Kate Tummarello, writing for EFF: [This] would be a crushing loss for online privacy. ISPs act as gatekeepers to the Internet, giving them incredible access to records of what you do online. They shouldn't be able to profit off of the information about what you search for, read about, purchase, and more without your consent. We can still kill this in the House: call your lawmakers today and tell them to protect your privacy from your ISP.
About what VPN i use.
What the subject says...
Alaska, here I come!
This is what we get when America votes Republican. Soon, someday very soon they will see the error of their ways and correct course. They had a great opportunity in this election, but the KKK and the Neo Nazis got out in force and voted for Trump.
Fatality
We'll make great pets
Yet another freedom evaporates thanks to corporate greed and political corruption
Someone should start a kickstarter to buy and release the browsing history of every US Senator who voted for this.
Thanks to Snowden we already know that Obama and his government were spying on everyone all the time anyway.
This just removes the fig leaf.
Yes, it means your ISP will spy on you.
But if this gets joe-six-pack-of-beer to sit up and pay attention then it may be worth it.
Besides, your ISP was already spying on you anyway.
If this means they can make some money by selling my info then perhaps my internet bill out-of-pocket will come down over time.
Anyone who's serious about security wouldn't rely on the ISP being on their side-- one would already be using strong encryption etc. for all communication if one were actually concerned about security.
I wonder how much Comcast/Charter/whoever would want for 50 Senators' web browsing and instant messaging history? I'd bet there's some juicy stuff in there, and customer data probably comes cheap...
+1
Once they have individualized information, all customers lose their bargaining power. They will know exactly how much you can be squeezed. Unless you are constantly on the vigil and constantly know the best price for each product, you will be taken to the cleaners.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
The Democrats would be on a lot higher moral ground if they had shown any outrage about the Snowden revelations and what the NSA is doing to Americans during the Obama administration.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Never in the history of this country has our privacy been eroded so fast!
What I'm seeing as the standout piece of information here is that this was only a law for a short time. This means it must have been legal to sell your information all along except for this short period of time. Now that someone has put a spotlight on it, I guess this will create jobs... in the web proxy industry. I detest both parties of government. If they aren't trying to oppress the majority with ridiculous laws they are trying to oppress the majority with a lack of sane laws.
I'm pretty sure if you polled voters, even those in red states, they'd mostly be against this. So why did the Senate do this? Because they get campaign funds and free campaign ads from big telecoms.
If this is not plutocracy in action, I don't know what the hell is.
Table-ized A.I.
That is what you get for voting for these politicians. But hey enjoy those tax cuts that you probably didn't get if you are not a millionaire.
To me I can not see how any smart technical person can vote for any Republican. As it stands today the GOP votes:
1. For mega corporations and monopolies from tech companies who are anti opensource
2. Believe climate change doesn't exist and is an invention of these elite socialists
3. Support Trump and his competency as shown on any news site
4. Hate highspeed internet and do not believe in infrastructure improvements
5. Believe more H1B1 visa immigrants are needed
6. Believe the bible should be taught in biology classes (it is in Texas!!)
7. Believe science should not be funded as it is only opinion oriented and not based on facts like you get from Church or Foxnews
8. Want more mega monopolies that limit internet and support throttling
9. Support snooping by corporations
10. Believe in unlimited funding by companies to elected officials to vote against your own self interests
11. Believes in old school coal and oil and does not want alternative sources of energy
Yes this post is going to anger MANY. But it HAS to be said. I lean libertarian myself but I am registering as a democrat as I feel as I.T. and science professionals who go to this site that the Republican Party is the biggest danger we face. Even more dangerous than Microsoft was back in the day.
Anyone with an IQ over 100 who is not a millionaire and works in the I.T. field needs to stop supporting these guys.
http://saveie6.com/
I know the article wants us to think this is a red vs blue debate, but before you pass a judgement on the republicans, go and actually read the regulation. Go ahead. I'll wait. Now try to implement that. Good luck! The real problem is the refusal to comprompise between these blundering politcal parties. The untold story is it appears the republicans wanted a much simpler form of regulation and the democrats being in power would not negotiate. Now the tides have turned and rather than ammend the overreaching regulation, the republicans are sticking it to the democrats. Guess who loses when we vote on party lines? Us.
Guess I'm going to get a lot of spam for onaholes, lube and cheeze pizza.
I imagine just that would be very valuable. What are they thinking about today.. what news sites do they use...
Also the porn history of all the senators would be very interesting.
I can imagine reporters suing ISP's now for info on the senators if they sell the info to others and not to them.
On the plus side, the random advertising on all our web pages might actually be focused on stuff we'd want to buy, making the ads somewhat useful and interesting.
Laws like this DO NOT work both ways. They never have, and they never will. A stunt like this will not motivate politicians to change their ways, but merely to punish you. They are the ones with the means to enforce double-standards, and they absolutely will.
Know your place.
The Senate voted 50-48 along party lines Thursday to repeal an Obama-era law that requires internet service providers to obtain permission before tracking what customers look at online and selling that information to other companies.
The only way I can interpret this action is that Republicans value corporations over people.
wouldn't this be moot?
What's worse than no data? Poisoned data. A collection of data where you cannot tell which is legit and which is bogus.
What we need is a tool that simply opens a LOT of connections to a LOT of servers worldwide. No need to hide your browsing in VPN. Hide it in noise.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The FCC Broadband privacy rules, IMO where simply excessive regulation IMO. The real data collection occurs at websites (Google, facebook, slashdot, etc.)
Basically to target people with advertisements. We have all seen it. Search for "product x" on amazon, and you see adds for product x and competitors when you browse other websites.
The FCC privacy rules wouldn't change that. The FCC privacy rules also required additional paperwork, monitoring, etc. by the ISP's even though they couldn't mine traffic data. Thus increasing the costs of the ISP's.
If you are unhappy about these rules being repealed, then you have been unhappy since AlGore invented the internet.
For the kneejerks, I humbly offer the original document this Senate resolution references:
https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/...
I wonder if the Senate overturned this regulation because they hate privacy or because of the fact these are "legislature level" rules being enacted by unelected bureaucrats in the last days of an administration that did everything it could to control its citizenry without the approval of Congress.
And this is to say nothing of the fact that Google and their ilk shouldn't be allowed to indulge in their raging data collection fetishes without letting the big telcoms and isp's wet their beaks. Right?
I mentioned this elsewhere, so I'll mention it here:
From what I've been able to gather, this is about S.J. Res. 34, a resolution disapproving the rule submitted by the FCC in December 2016 about protecting privacy of broadband and telecommunications customers. I've only browsed through the FCC rule, so I don't know the complete details on it just yet, but I would hesitate to jump to conclusions here.
First, I'd like to know better what the rule itself says, because depending on how it's written, there may be acceptable grounds for rejecting it.
Secondly, do know that this rule only came into effect on January 3 of this year. So up until 3 months ago, these supposed protections didn't apply to anyone. So if this resolution does completely pass, that means we roll back to how things were at the end of last year.
I'm going to hold off on losing my mind until I get the chance to read up a bit more on the FCC rule and the details behind it. Sometimes knowing the context of something makes it a lot more understandable.
will be the first customers for this data as well as the Ministry Of Web Browning History.
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
For all the good it will do for you. Republicans own the House, the Senate, the Presidency, and about 2/3rds of the Governors currently. What they want they are going to get.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Of the two that actually stood a chance of winning? There wasn't a decent choice. There probably won't be a decent choice next time either. Both sides seem to cater to the corporations. I thought government was supposed to be for the people, but here it has become for the corporations.
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Pssst. The Senate does NOT rule the US. All legislation has to pass the House of Representatives, the Senate, and the President before becoming effective. This thing hasn't passed the House yet, and it hasn't reached the President's desk yet. I'm not telling you either the House or the President will likely derail it, but they might.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
1. It was an FCC rule, not a law passed by Congress. Resolution didn't repeal it. One section was struck because it didn't do anything to actually protect user privacy because of exemptions in rule, it didn't address privacy issues of services like Facebook, Google, Amazon.com, and because it likely violated 1st amendment protection of commercial speech by singling out ISPs while not addressing other communications service providers.
2. It was approved by the FCC 2-1 vote in late October 2016. It was a last minute decision that
3. It was scheduled to go into effect March 2 2017, but had been stayed after the election. The privacy rule has never been in effect.
4. It was an attempted power grab of the FCC over that of the FTC which, up until a ninth court of appeals decision in 2016, had regulatory jurisdiction over broadband data providers. Expect more regulatory reform to reverse the 9th court's ruling and to make it a requirement that any major change to a regulatory agency jurisdiction will need congressional approval first.
This is just another successful implementation of the Muslim witch hunts. It's got NOTHING to do with IP companies selling information to make extra cash. If you told your IP to not keep information regarding your web browsing, now they can. This means government surveillance got a shit load easier. Best thing you can do for now is use a VPN outside the U.S. and U.K. owned territories and only go to HTTPS websites. Just be aware that Chrome keeps in constant communication with Google. Turn off and delete your saved passwords and forms if you use it in a web browser. Any sync is risky. Saving a form is just stupid anyway. You can add code to a web page to have a form and then have your browser auto fill it out, but not make it visible to you. HTTPS Everywhere, NoScript,Privacy Badger, and uBlock Origin are your best friends. You really shouldn't use Windows or Mac anymore either. Google fiber already forces users to agree to have their connections monitored as they see fit. You also got to realize the reason AI is important is because it's important for government surveillance. It's nothing more than a godlike digital fingerprinter. You dummies keep posting FB pics and never sign out of stuff. So honestly, I'm kind of worried this Bill is a distraction because it will be useless in a year or two.
No more warrants needed to get everything you do online. If you research how to get rid of Trump, Trump will find you and throw you in jail or have you exterminated - this is just the beginning. We are doomed. No joke.
The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution provides, "[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures.
If they can sell it, they certainly can give it away without impunity.
Republicans showing they are anti-consumers and pro-corporations.
If you support the Senate resolution to keep the FCC from regulatory overreach, then call the EFF (+1 415 436 9333) and tell them, HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!1
But those emails! It would have been a disaster to have a president under FBI investigation, right?
You are welcome on my lawn.
Used IRS on political enemies, and then lied about it, then claimed to have fixed it, and still did it.
Lied to family of Chris Stevens after he was killed.
Used CIA/NSA to spy on Justice Roberts and Donald Trump, his political enemies (whistleblower came out with this yesterday)
Made a deal with Iran letting them develop nuclear weapons.
Doubled the national debt to $20 TRILLION, while telling us deficit spending is UnAmerican.
Had Clapper lie to the public about spying on all US citizens (Snowden whistleblew that)
Allowed illegal immigrants, who last week raped a 14 year old girl in her school.
Continued allowing refugees after numerous mass murders by Islamic Terrorists on US soil.
Shipped thousands of guns into Mexico causing hundreds killed there, including border agent Brian Terry, and then REFUSED to answer questions about it.
Should I go on, or do you think killing and raping our citizens is acceptable?
To give out all the personal information on our beloved senators and their browsing habits. Expect to see a lot of porn sites on the R side.
Now you KNOW you don't. What are you going to do about it?
Is there a plugin for this? Even having the plugin installed would throw any data gathered into question
Twinstiq, game news
While we're on the topic, what is a cheap prosumer VPN device that I can just plug between my WAN modem and my LAN switch? Just needs to be high perf and support standard VPN providers. Blocking certain domain requests would be cool too.
We see corporations go to great lengths to make sure their own data is protected by law and monetized but individual's personal data can be spied on and sold without consent or compensation. If I were to use my Internet connection to analyze my ISP's traffic I am an unauthorized hacker who could receive a prison sentence; my ISP on the other hand could profit by selling my location browser history to the highest bidder with no repercussions under this proposed law.
Being that corporations are entities defined by the State and gain all their power from the State let there be no doubt that the Republicans that support this bill value the power of the State over the individual, antithetical to their publicized platform of limited government and individual rights.
If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be-T J
Who are DINOs that that voted for cloture on this one?
We've been sitting on a bunch of data from the employees of the DoD, CIA, NSA, FBI and others. And our business partners in Russia and North Korea are eager to get a copy of it. This could be a "gold mine" for us.
Have gnu, will travel.
Selling anonymous usage data has been in the rules since day 1. Duh. That changed 5 months ago. Now by reverting to the old way people are saying the internet will die?
Pull your heads out of your collective asses.
Well, so much for the argument that the Democrats and Republicans are just the same.
Not one Democrat voted for this bill. Not a single one.
You are welcome on my lawn.
But isn't this already the business model of practically every company? Even Uber collects data about locations and rides on everyone. It's one of the staples of the advertising industry.
... muhuhhuhaaaa
A company can spy on you and an "agency" needs a warrant from a judge ...
Hm ... /me peeking his nose
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
but it doesn't hide the URL you've requested,
LOLS /., but they probably think they are the smartest person here.
I love reading paid liberal posters posts. Its so obvious they don't belong on
Someone (eg: open source, anti-malware companies,etc...) could write a OS service that sits in the back ground and simulates fake randomized browsing, email, social media habits so user data collected would be useless. User habits could even be traded among people of the same brosing network, sort of a BitTorrent for web access habits.
Letters begging our "elected" "representatives" to do the right thing most certainly have not worked, and every criminal in charge of this debacle gets further and further away from any legal punishment with every amendment bill and law that passes.
This won't change until the "strongly worded letters" are replaced by flaming tar and searing pitchforks.
The american people had best hurry, too, because pretty soon there'll be Skynet's army between these liberty-hating bastards and our last few shreds of hope.
you can always leave and build your own Internet...
isn't that what most of you libertarian-types keep saying?
The 'socialists' gave the FCC the power to prevent this, asshole.
Gave the power 5 months ago, was it even implemented yet? Apparently for nearly 8 years it was not important. In reality it was just a "mine" planted for political games, a manufactured talking point.
Also in reality this "socialist" president was quite fond of surveillance, drones, extrajudicial killings of US citizens, etc.
Yet another freedom evaporates thanks to corporate greed and political corruption
Actually this "freedom" never made it out of the vapor stage. The power to enact the policy was given last October, it wasn't to be actually implemented until around now. No "freedom" has been lost because no such "freedom" had ever been acquired. We are still operating under the same rules Obama thought were just fine during his 8 years, when he and his party needed corporate donations. And as if Hillary wouldn't have drafted the policy in some weak manner with workarounds for corporations so her corporate donations could keep rolling in.
"The peoples" love being spied on by mega corporations. Thanks for having our backs and making Amerika Great Again.
Who said there was not a dime's difference between the party's?
One gave us our constitutional rights in the digital universe, the other took them away
I leave the math to the more rational among us.
I'm just curious. It seems odd.
If we had robust competition in Internet providers and I could just say 'screw you!' to the ISP selling my information to third parties and sign up with the ISP that, like duckduckgo.com, promises to protect my privacy as a selling point.
Unfortunately the current ISP's came from the overly-regulated (at local level) cable providers who used regulatory capture to establish regional monopolies, then politely behind the scenes refused to compete with each other. These business practices (and the county, City, and State regulators that where accomplices) make me sick.
You get what you deserve.
Although it's very clear Republicans are wholly owned subsidiaries of big corporations it's very clear to me the real issue is legal bribery of our politicians. It's a damn shame that most people get so easily distracted from non-issues or just simply find all this boring to care. Removing money from politics would very likely make republicans less likely to sell their votes to the highest bidders.
If we're gonna be the data they sell, their services should be free of charge to ISP users.
Astro
Given (assume for argument) that there is no proxy setup by ISPs --- what is the functional difference (related to privacy) between VPN & HTTPS? HTTP I get - but with DNSSec and SSL what information can be gleaned from HTTPS?
Yes - I know what a VPN is - use them everyday. But what I don't understand is....what info of value is leaked from HTTPS ? Simply DNS lookups? They can't see inside the stream. OR--- is the concern that a lot of sites & apps are still using HTTP such that there's enough value to be gathered?
My company uses a web proxy and require MiM certificates installed - allowing them to monitor everything. Plus- DNS doesn't work (nslookup www.google.com returns nothing)... however typing https://www.google.com/ works and the certificate is NOT Google. Seems that Chrome was changed recently so you can't see who the issuer is anymore.
Do those who voted in favor of this know that their OWN browsing can and will be captured by their ISP, and the info sold to others?
Are they aware that their spouse, children, and relatives will have this data captured and sold?
Or, are those who voted in favor of this just saying that it is good for business and, thus, must be good for all Republicans?
It is laughable at really, that ISP people think they can travel back in time and claim ownership or part ownership of what someone else has said, done, or thought of first. History cannot be erased. If they can't handle customer 'comment' data belonging absolutely to the customer then they should not present a system capable of taking comments. If they can't handle customer data belonging absolutely to the customer then they shouldn't present a system capable of taking data from the customer.
Simple solution: Why not use PureVPN coupled with TOR and keep your smart devices on a separate router just like I am doing and forget about everything.
Did trump already sign off on this? good thing I use TOR, TAILS, purevpn and duckduckgo. So i think I will be safe. I wonder what right they will take away next?