Another Internet Piracy Bill Introduced
Jim Dempsey, vice president for public policy at the Center for Democracy and Technology, said the following to U.S. News and World Report:
It’s a completely different issue [than SOPA]. This is about government monitoring. [SOPA] is about the First Amendment, [CISPA] is about the Fourth, but they both take a legitimate problem and try to tackle it with an overbroad solution.
EFF’s Rainey Reitman and Lee Tien claim the bill is so broad that it also includes intellectual property rights as part of “cyber security”:
The broad language around what constitutes a cybersecurity threat leaves the door wide open for abuse. For example, the bill defines “cyber threat intelligence” and “cybersecurity purpose” to include “theft or misappropriation of private or government information, intellectual property, or personally identifiable information.”
Yes, intellectual property. It’s a little piece of SOPA wrapped up in a bill that’s supposedly designed to facilitate detection of and defense against cybersecurity threats.
The language is so vague that an ISP could use it to monitor communications of subscribers for potential infringement of intellectual property. An ISP could even interpret this bill as allowing them to block accounts believed to be infringing, block access to websites like The Pirate Bay believed to carry infringing content, or take other measures provided they claimed it was motivated by cybersecurity concerns.
Auerbach and the EFF agree there may be need for legislation or at least congressional discussion on the topic, but remain unconvinced this bill is necessary:
There is a real debate to be had about what measures should be deployed. But there’s no real evidence to say we need this bill.
The analysis by Reitman and Tein concludes:
Congress is intent on passing cybersecurity legislation this year, and there are multiple proposals in the House and the Senate under debate. But none is as poorly drafted and dangerously vague as the Rogers bill. We need to stop this bill in its tracks, before it can advance in the House and before the authors can negotiate to place this overbroad language into other cybersecurity proposals.
This is what happens when politicians with very little technical savvy try to stick their noses into technical issues.
I seem to recall something about a road and good intentions….
What do politicians generally have savvy in anything other than litigiousness? 400+ laywers all trying to find ways to add new layers of law to an seemingly inexaustable amount of them.
No. This is what happens when crooked companies get crooked lawyers to lobby crooked Congressmen to make crooked law to manipulate the drooling citizenry for private gain.
Buying politicians is one of the best investments a company can make. Where else can you get a return of investment so large (sometimes 1000:1 return) so quickly?
I was trying to put the best possible light on it.
Instead of limiting everyone’s freedom and possibly destroying the internet in the process so the film and music industries can continue making money the same way they did for the past 75 years before the internet was invented, why doesn’t Congress reform copyright law for the modern age?
Theoretically, copyright law is something Congress should know something about. The internet plainly isn’t, judging by these ham-fisted attempts to regulate it at the behest of their campaign donors.
For crying out loud, if cars were invented today, the geniuses in Congress would take money from Big Buggy and write law to force people back into horse-drawn carriages.
Dear DRayRaven
It is time you learned the the Congress doesn’t make sense, they make policy!
Why should they do the right thing when they can Trojan Horse a Big Brother approach instead. Please note that each of these bills somehow allow the Government to Collect Information which is ‘None of their business’ and have nothing to do with the stated goal of the bill.
What that tells me it they aren’t struggling with The Market and how the public can properly benefit from the internet, they are looking for ways to bend the internet to their advantage.
“jd
Dear DRayRaven
It is time you learned the the Congress doesn’t make sense, they make policy!”
In my many years I have come to a conclusion that one useless man is a shame,two is a law firm,and three or more is a congress. — John Adams
The recording industry and Hollywood are just going to keep throwing money at Congress until they get their way. One of these days some really s***ty legislation is going to slip in through the backdoor and screw up the Internet for good.
It can drive an engineer to despair. With cloud computing, the coming quantum computing, the ocean of electronic detection and transmission, and the technical ignorance of the average American voter, the future is dark for any possible semblance of personal privacy. Dummies elect politicians who know less than they do,e,g, people like Al Gore who invented the web but did not know how to turn on a PC. The basic problem is that technologies which once was impossible, or beyond the wealth of even Uncle Sam, has evolved to be ubiquitous, at a fraction of a penny. It is now quite possible to mix grain size detectors, by the millions, in highway concrete, and send a signal to big brother. Or locate a sub in the depths of the ocean. Or, as attempted in the early days of gun walking, put secret transmitters in all small arms weapons. Or park a van on a street, and view all activities within a home. Or wear “sunglasses” which detects all human bodies without any clothes. Or listen to conversations in one high rise, from another building several blocks away. All of this has been within the capability of government employees for years. They are governed by a foul soup of technically out dated laws, and some times ignored Presidential directives.
Should the government have the legal authority to know every date and time stamped phone call you ever made? Without a search warrant? What about the content of your phone conversation? Without a search warrant? The location of your car, every minute of your ownership? The amount of electricity and water that you use? What you say to your wife, girl friend, confessor, or doctor? Every bank transaction you make? Is it legal to make ten million copies of the Mona Lisa, all identical at the molecular level, and thus destroying the worth of all original art works. The camera could be the size of a hat pin.
In a few years, with fMRI, it is expected that the CIA, psychiatrists, and opposing attorneys will be able to read your mind, your most private thoughts, without your permission.
The ancient basis of law, was that the crown was limited in its intrusion into a person’s life. But technology has moved the barriers. If we had adults in our legislature, they should weigh the pros and cons of this new and enormous power, and enact real IT laws, e.g declare cyberwar on a hacking nation/group. What does this mean? I am not hopeful of an informed legal basis.
almost every law proposed or passed is worded vaguely. is is done on purpose. if a law provides explicit and a literal meanings, it would undermine the further porpose of driving our country toward a dictatorship. they would be useless laws to the subtle destruction of our country. executive orders have already bypassed our congress. rulings by federal commissions have also accomplished making congress irrevelant. all that is done with a purpose, thses politicians are not fools, only the people, who keep electing them to congress are.
Is CISPA A Government Trojan Horse?
U.S. Government Can Use CISPA Internet Spying To Control and Forfeit Businesses—Seize Your Property:
CISPA: The Cyber Information Sharing and Protection Act if passed by Congress would allow U.S. Spy and other government agencies to share Americans’ confidential Internet and other information with Government Certified Self Protected Cyber Entities, Certified Cyber Entity Employees and Elements in both government and private sectors to help protect them—against Cyber threats.
However—CISPA would also allow Government agencies, police and government quasi/contractors (WITHOUT WARRANTS) OR LIABILITY to take out of context—any innocent hastily written email, fax or other Internet activity to allege a crime or violation was committed to cause a person’s arrest, assess fines or civilly forfeit a business or person’s property. There are more than 350 laws and violations that can subject property to government asset forfeiture. Government civil asset forfeiture requires only a civil preponderance of evidence for police to forfeit property, little more than hearsay. No one need be charged with a crime. Corrupt Police can even create the hearsay.
Government can use CISPA to (certify any Self Protected Cyber Entity or their employee—to spy on their employers and clients: (CIVIL Asset Forfeiture Incentive). U.S. Government is not prohibited from paying any Government Certified Cyber Self Protected Entity or Employee; or Element part of government forfeited assets or other compensation that result from the aforementioned providing U.S. Government a corporation’s or clients’ private/confidential information—that (now) require a warrant or court order.
Federal Government currently contracts on a fee/commission-sharing basis with Self Protected Cyber Entities, Elements and Contractors that have security clearances to participate in facilitating arrests and Government asset forfeitures.
It is expected U.S. Government, police and private contractors’—Civil Asset Forfeiture of Americans’ property will greatly escalate if CISPA is passed allowing Government certified private cyber entities and their employees—No Warrant Searches of persons’ and Businesses’ confidential Internet Information—that can be handed over to the government e.g. private emails, faxes, phone and transmitted files for investigation, prosecution and asset forfeiture—circumventing the Fourth Amendment.
CISPA Internet Spying: Since CISPA was passed by the House, two additional cyber-security bills have been created in the Senate called, “The Cyber Security Act of 2012” and “SECURE IT Act”. Both bills appear unconstitutional; appear designed to circumvent the Fourth Amendment and public Freedom of Information Requests.
The Cyber Security Act of 2012 formally known as S. 2105 was created by Senate Democrats, Joe Lieberman and Susan Collins. Similar to CISPA, the Cyber security Act of 2012 would abolish legal walls that stop Federal government and private companies sharing information.
The SECURE IT ACT: S.2151 was introduced by Senate Republicans on March 1st 2012: would (require) federal contractors to alert government about any cyber threats, forcing such communications between government regulators and corporations. The SECURE IT Act authorizes sharing of persons’ private Internet information (without a warrant) going beyond what is necessary to report a believed cyber threat.
SECURE It Act fails to create a regulatory system at the Federal level to oversee cyber-security threats opening the door for persons’ and businesses’ confidential information to be misused and misappropriated by government agencies and private sector government certified cyber entities.
Under CISPA: Government should be prohibited from using so-call (Certified Self Protected Cyber Entities, their Employees) and Elements to circumvent the Fourth Amendment; escape Public Freedom of Information Requests.
CORRUPTED: Government Certified Self Protected Cyber Entities and Employees, U.S. Government Agencies, Contractors and Police too easily may use someone’s confidential Internet Information, e.g. transmitted files and private emails collected (without warrants) to extort Americans, corporations, politicians; for compensation target a businesses’ competitor; or sell private information gleaned from warrant-less Internet Surveillance.
If CISPA is passed allowing NO Warrant private self protected cyber entity spying, some Internet writers and political activists might be dead-meat under NDAA. Americans who write on the Internet or verbally express an opinion against any entity of U.S. Government or its coalition partners—may under The Defense Authorization Act of 2012—be deemed by U.S. Government (someone likely to engage in, support or provoke violent acts or threaten National Security)— or (Belligerent) to order an American writer or activist’s indefinite prison detention.