House panel approves bill forcing ISPs to log users’ web history

Discussion in 'privacy general' started by hawki, Jul 29, 2011.

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  1. hawki

    hawki Registered Member

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    House panel approves bill forcing ISPs to log users’ web history


    July 28, 2011 @ 9:41 pm



    The House Judiciary Committee approved legislation on Thursday that would require Internet service providers (ISPs) to collect and retain records about Internet users' activity.

    CNET reported [1] the bill would require ISPs to retain customers' names, addresses, phone numbers, credit card numbers, bank account numbers, and temporarily-assigned IP addresses for 12 months.

    The bill passed by a vote of 19 to 10, and is aimed at helping law enforcement track down pedophiles.

    "The bill is mislabeled," Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), a senior member of the panel told CNET. "This is not protecting children from Internet pornography. It's creating a database for everybody in this country for a lot of other purposes."

    The Protecting Children from Internet Pornographers Act of 2011 (H.R. 1981) was sponsored by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX) and Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL)

    “When investigators develop leads that might result in saving a child or apprehending a pedophile, their efforts should not be frustrated because vital records were destroyed simply because there was no requirement to retain them," Smith said Thursday.

    "This bill requires ISPs to retain subscriber records, similar to records retained by telephone companies, to aid law enforcement officials in their fight against child sexual exploitation."

    The American Civil Liberties Union and 29 other organizations sent a letter (PDF [2]) to Rep. Smith on July 27, claiming that "any data retention mandate is a direct assault on bedrock privacy principles."

    "The data retention mandate in this bill would treat every Internet user like a criminal and threaten the online privacy and free speech rights of every American, as lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have recognized," Senior Staff Attorney Kevin Bankston of the Electronic Frontier Foundation said.

    "Requiring Internet companies to redesign and reconfigure their systems to facilitate government surveillance of Americans' expressive activities is simply un-American. Such a scheme would be as objectionable to our Founders as the requiring of licenses for printing presses or the banning of anonymous pamphlets."

    The bill is supported by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the National Center for Victims of Crime, the National Sheriff’s Association, the Major County Sheriff’s Association, the International Union of Police Associations and the Fraternal Order of Police.

    URL to article: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/07/...s-bill-forcing-isps-to-log-users-web-history/
     
  2. J_L

    J_L Registered Member

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    Lame and unrelated excuse for outright totalitarian monitoring. I'm glad I don't live in USA either.
     
  3. cm1971

    cm1971 Registered Member

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    Sad to say that I do. Our politicians have run off the rails on a crazy train.
     
  4. luciddream

    luciddream Registered Member

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    They may be able to sell that propaganda to the average John & Jane Q, oblivious, good tax paying American... but anybody capable of cognitive thought can see through the facade for what this really is.

    I've really been kicking the idea around of getting a VPN service lately. Seeing this article removes any doubt, and I encourage my fellow security conscious Americans to do the same, especially if they use P2P. It costs $7.50/mo. for the service I'm looking at. Money well spent.
     
  5. x942

    x942 Guest

    I am glad I don't live there either. Not sure what is worse for you guys; This or the unconstitutional Super Congress BS. :thumbd: Lets hope this doesn't rub off on canada :(
     
  6. Reimer

    Reimer Registered Member

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    You know, this has been making its rounds on the internet quite a bit and not to downplay the seriousness of the bill but it needs to be clarified that there is no such mention of logging web history.

    When you title an article "forcing ISPs to log users’ web history", 90% of people are going to assume that this means the ISPs will log every single web page you go to and/monitor other communications. It's sensationalist.


    It clearly says what actual information is to be logged in the second paragraph. This data is already logged by the ISP. It seems this bill merely forces the ISPs to retain these logs for a mandatory 18 months instead of the 1-2 months they retain them for now.
     
  7. treehouse786

    treehouse786 Registered Member

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    thank you for clarifying that :thumb:
     
  8. stap0510

    stap0510 Registered Member

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    I hate to break your bubble, but:


    All that the article talks about is "subscriber records".
    No where in the article is explained what information these records actually contain.

    I can tell you that within the EU, that has data retention legislation, all the ip-addresses where you connect to (that also includes websites) are being stored for law enforcement purposes.

    So please, explain to me where this US legislation says someting that doesn't resemble it's EU-Data retetion counterpart?
     
  9. Reimer

    Reimer Registered Member

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    Well here's the actual Bill text that the article refers to
    http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?c112:2:./temp/~c112otduyI::

    and if there's something else with more ambiguous use of language that refers to logging web history then I would be wrong.
     
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