| |
|
Friday, August 18, 2006
|
|
Terry Cutler is a Canadian-based support engineer with Novell
and a certified Ethical Hacker, and wants to get the news out to people
on how they can and should protect their information and their
identities from the many pitfalls of the Internet age. The following is
a guide that he has provided to canada.com in order to inform our
readers.
A new illegal enterprise is preying on our citizens, attracting the
likes of criminals, gangs and illicit organizations. Crooks hack into
company computers to steal the private information -- and sometimes the
full identities -- of their customers.
And the fact is, many
companies who have been hacked fail to inform their customers about
what has -- or might have -- happened to such private information, and
there is no law that forces them to do so. (Ed. This was written from a Canadian point of view and not the US)
1:15:54 PM 
|
|
Businesses accused of helping the Bush Administration eavesdrop on customers could be in for a legal bruising
Telecommunications and Internet companies accused of working with the Bush Administration's domestic eavesdropping program could be in for more legal headaches, after a federal judge ruled Thursday that the warrantless wiretaps violated the constitution.
U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor in Detroit dealt a major blow to the White House in a 43-page opinion that said President George W. Bush exceeded his authority and that the program violated the First and Fourth Amendments protecting free speech and privacy. She ordered the National Security Agency to immediately halt a secret program that monitors telephone calls and e-mails of Americans that are in contact with suspected terrorists.
FUTURE FIGHT. The federal government plans to appeal the case, which appears headed for the Supreme Court. The American Civil Liberties Union, which brought the suit against the NSA, agreed to temporarily allow the wiretapping program to continue, while the Justice Dept. prepares to fight the court's decision at a hearing scheduled for Sept. 7.
U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said he was disappointed and that he and the administration "respectfully disagree" with the ruling, saying the program has been extremely effective and important to national security.
"I believe very strongly that the president does have the authority to authorize this kind of conduct in a time--particularly in a time of war," Gonzales told reporters at a press conference held shortly after the court's decision.
POLITICAL TALK. Lawmakers quickly recast the decision as a partisan issue, ripe for debate in November's elections. Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said the ruling was "the latest example of how the Bush Administration has jeopardized our efforts in the war on terror. The Administration's decision to ignore the Constitution and the Congress has come at the expense of the security of the American people." The subject line of an e-mail blast from the Republican National Committee read, "Liberal Judge Backs Dem Agenda to Weaken National Security."
Businesses accused of aiding the Bush administration in wiretapping could also be in for a legal bruising, say civil liberties groups that have sued telecom providers AT&T (T), Verizon (VZ), and BellSouth (BLS) for allegedly helping the NSA. The ruling could set a precedent other courts can't ignore.
"Every phone company that is assisting the government in its illegal surveillance would want to think long and hard before it continues that agreement," says Ann Beeson, the ACLU's lead attorney in the case. "There are already lawsuits claiming that their cooperation for the past several years is illegal and now that the judge has declared it is illegal, their liability increases. The risk is much greater from a business perspective."
12:44:29 PM
|
|
Wiretap Ruling Threatens Telecoms. ches_grin writes "Yesterday's ruling on the NSA warrantless wiretapping program could mean that businesses that assisted in the program are in for some serious legal problems. The judge's decision clearly dismissed out of hand the arguments of the telecoms, saying that the protections due journalists and lawyers was a clear matter of the public's best interests." --- From the article: "Businesses accused of aiding the Bush administration in wiretapping could also be in for a legal bruising, say civil liberties groups that have sued telecom providers AT&T, Verizon, and BellSouth for allegedly helping the NSA. The ruling could set a precedent other courts can't ignore. 'Every phone company that is assisting the government in its illegal surveillance would want to think long and hard before it continues that agreement,' says Ann Beeson, the ACLU's lead attorney in the case. 'There are already lawsuits claiming that their cooperation for the past several years is illegal and now that the judge has declared it is illegal, their liability increases. The risk is much greater from a business perspective.'" [Slashdot: Your Rights Online]
12:36:08 PM
|
|
Federal Judge Orders End to Warrantless Wiretapping. A federal judge in Detroit ruled today that the Bush administration[base ']Äôs eavesdropping program is illegal and unconstitutional. I[base ']ll leave analysis of Judge Taylor[base ']s reasoning to the experts (Jack Balkin, Orin Kerr, Dan Solove, Eugene Volokh, for starters). But I certainly agree with her quoting of Justice Warren at the conclusion of the opinion:
Implicit in the term [base "]national defense[per thou] is the notion of defending those values and ideas which set this Nation apart. . . . It would indeed be ironic if, in the name of national defense, we would sanction the subversion of one of those liberties . . . which makes the defense of the Nation worthwhile. U.S. v. Robel, 389 U.S. 258 (1967)
[michaelzimmer.org]
12:23:08 PM
|
|
WSJ Search History/Privacy Debate. The Wall Street Journal has published a debate (well, an e-mail exchange) between Kevin Bankston, a privacy lawyer at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and Markham Erickson, a lobbyist for Internet firms including Google and Yahoo, on the topic of the privacy of web search histories. Here[base ']s a choice excerpt where Bankston takes Erickson to task about innovation vs. monetization as the true motivation behind retaining user search history records:
Erickson: [sigma]This transactional information, separated from the personal information of the user, is used by companies to improve their abilities to provide more pertinent results for the user. Don[base ']t you think that companies should have the freedom to innovate by using transactional information to improve their products?
Bankston: Markham, you say that Internet companies don[base ']t match up users[base '] personal information, yet that[base ']s exactly what AOL stores [~] search logs tied that can be tied to particular user screen names, which can be matched up with your billing information. Other search engines with account-based services also can tie their search logs to your particular screen name or email address, and then there are IP addresses, cookies and other methods of tracking individual users.
Furthermore, and contrary to your suggestion, these search logs reveal much more information than directory assistance logs; they[base ']re more like a print-out of your brain. A quick spin through the AOL logs via aolsearchdatabase.com, or a browsing of some of the more notable search histories being discussed on the bulletin board at data.aolsearchlogs.com [~] will demonstrate that. These logs represent the most secret hopes, deepest fears and dirtiest laundry of every user. They provide a snapshot of incredibly intimate events and ideas, often revealing personal problems, financial difficulties, medical ailments, sexual preferences, and more.
I[base ']m all for innovation, but at what cost? Does Google really need a decade of search histories to innovate? I think that rather than innovation, what you[base ']re talking about is monetization: data-mining all of this private information for marketing information, whether to be used internally or sold to business partners.
[via John Battelle]
[michaelzimmer.org]
12:21:03 PM
|
|
On Google, User Images and Identifiability. Loren Baker at Search Engine Journal has an extensive look at how Google might leverage their acquisition of Neven Vision to help identify and inter-connect users[base '] various web products (blogs, forums, social networking sites, etc) that might not otherwise be shared under a common login. The conclusion:
[sigma]if social networking is the future of online communication and Google is going to use Social Network profile information to personalize their search engines, but does not have a way of identifying the owner of the profile on some social networks due to no advertising in the network or no Google partnerships, what is one object or identifer that most users or members of Social Networks, Blogs, and Forums post that Google can use Neven Vision to help define that user? Their photo.
[michaelzimmer.org]
12:18:57 PM
|
|
WASHINGTON, Aug. 17 -- A federal judge in Detroit ruled today that
the Bush administration's eavesdropping program is illegal and
unconstitutional, and she ordered that it cease at once. District Judge Anna Diggs
Taylor found that President Bush exceeded his proper authority and that
the eavesdropping without warrants violated the First and Fourth
Amendment protections of free speech and privacy. "It was never
the intent of the Framers to give the president such unfettered
control, particularly where his actions blatantly disregard the
parameters clearly enumerated in the Bill of Rights," she wrote, in a
decision that the White House and Justice Department said they would
fight to overturn. A hearing will be held before Judge Taylor on Sept.
7, and her decision will not be enforced in the meantime pending the
government's appeal. The judge's ruling is the latest chapter in
the continuing debate over the proper balance between national security
and personal liberty since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, which
inspired the eavesdropping program and other surveillance measures that
the administration says are necessary and constitutional and its
critics say are intrusive. In becoming the first federal judge to
declare the eavesdropping program unconstitutional, Judge Taylor
rejected the administration's assertion that to defend itself against a
lawsuit would force it to divulge information that should be kept
secret in the name of national security. "Predictably, the war
on terror of this administration has produced a vast number of cases,
in which the states secrets privilege has been invoked," Judge Taylor
wrote. She noted that the Supreme Court has held that because the
president's power to withhold secrets is so powerful, "it is not to be
lightly invoked." She also cited a finding in an earlier case by the
Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit that "whenever
possible, sensitive information must be disentangled from nonsensitive
information to allow for the release of the latter." In any
event, she said, she is convinced that the administration could defend
itself in this case without disclosing state secrets. Judge Taylor's
ruling came in a suit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union
on behalf of journalists, scholars, lawyers and various nonprofit
organizations who argued that the possibility of eavesdropping by the National Security Agency interfered with their work.
12:16:06 PM
|
|
|
© Copyright 2006 Paul Hardwick.
Last update: 9/2/06; 4:25:49 AM.
|
|
|
