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ISPs Claim a Privacy Law Would Weaken Online Security, Increase Pop-Ups (arstechnica.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the security-claims dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: The country's biggest Internet service providers and advertising industry lobby groups are fighting to stop a proposed California law that would protect the privacy of broadband customers. AT&T, Comcast, Charter, Frontier, Sprint, Verizon, and some broadband lobby groups urged California state senators to vote against the proposed law in a letter Tuesday. The bill would require Internet service providers to obtain customers' permission before they use, share, or sell the customers' Web browsing and application usage histories. California lawmakers could vote on the bill Friday of this week, essentially replicating federal rules that were blocked by the Republican-controlled Congress and President Trump before they could be implemented. The text and status of the California bill, AB 375, are available here.

The letter claims that the bill would "lead to recurring pop-ops to consumers that would be desensitizing and give opportunities to hackers" and "prevent Internet providers from using information they have long relied upon to prevent cybersecurity attacks and improve their service." The Electronic Frontier Foundation picked apart these claims in a post yesterday. The proposed law won't prevent ISPs from taking security measures because the bill "explicitly says that Internet providers can use customer's personal information (including things like IP addresses and traffic records) 'to protect the rights or property of the BIAS [Broadband Internet Access Service] provider, or to protect users of the BIAS and other BIAS providers from fraudulent, abusive, or unlawful use of the service,'" EFF Senior Staff Technologist Jeremy Gillula wrote.

9 of 86 comments (clear)

  1. Browsers could remove popup support. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If web browsers removed the code that implements popups, then it would be far less likely that they show up, regardless of what privacy laws are in place.

    1. Re:Browsers could remove popup support. by LinuxIsGarbage · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If web browsers removed the code that implements popups, then it would be far less likely that they show up, regardless of what privacy laws are in place.

      Modern Web Browsers have Popup blockers that block standard HTML popups, giving indication that a popup was blocked, with options to create an exception. However they still seem to allow popups created by other means (JavaScript, HTML5, etc). The result seems to be annoying popups still show up, but useful popups from a legacy application are blocked.

    2. Re:Browsers could remove popup support. by radams217 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Javascript Popups are not easier to ignore. They are much more invasive when you want to read an article or not have to mute your sound. The websites that do the follow me as a scroll video ads need to die a slow death.

  2. What they meant by sit1963nz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    " Privacy laws directly attack one of our income streams, our ability to collect, store, and sell your personal information"

    1. Re:What they meant by Altrag · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Basically yes, and they're implying that if you remove that income stream, they'll just go ahead and implement something even worse to be a new income stream.

      Of course, that leaves out the little tidbit that if they could actually use all those popups and shit as a revenue stream, they would already be doing it. Its not like ISPs are known to be terribly scrupulous.

  3. Oh my god! by Opportunist · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I had no idea what saint my ISP is. Just think how many ads and how much spam you'd get if they did NOT sell your personal information to advertisers and spammers.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  4. Re: Bogus by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    5x dipping. They often recive government subsidies as well.

  5. Re: Why oh why by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Because you ain't gonna do anything about it you cuck.

  6. Pop-ups and EULAs by thereitis · · Score: 2, Insightful

    This claim is a lie too, and we have no idea how any rational person could read A.B. 375 and think “maybe that will mean more pop-ups.” The best we can come up with is that since A.B. 375 would require Internet providers to get your consent before sharing your data, maybe they think that if they constantly pester people with pop-ups, they’ll succeed in wearing people down until they give their consent. If that’s really what Comcast and Verizon are implying, then lawmakers should understand the claim for what it really is: a threat to hold consumers hostage in the fight for online privacy. As with Lie #1, if big Internet providers have a better explanation, we challenge them to provide it publicly.

    Regarding pop-ups, IMO the whole "click to agree to this legally binding document" idea should be rethought. It's far too easy to embed all sorts of nasty stuff in EULA's and most people can't fully understand the implications even if they do take the time to skim/read through it.

    That would be like programmers saying: hey, read through the source code at this github address and if you click I Agree, then you are declaring you are ok with whatever the code is doing with your system/data, for better or worse. You don't understand it? Ah well, too bad. Hire a programmer to try and figure it out.

    The right to privacy and security should be inalienable rights, impervious to click-wrap agreements.