Hi all. I read that ISPs log your web usage, including sites, email, newsgroups, etc. That's pretty invasive. Does anyone know how long they keep the logs? Also, anyone know if universities also keep these logs, and how long? I've downloaded my share of warez and movies from newsgroups at school and would suck if all that is logged. Thanks.
My ISP - local in town - deletes all user activity each evening. One university I can speak about, does not keep the types of logs you are referring to, but monitors network traffic, so that unusual high bandwith activity can be spotted. In the computer labs, all workstations have Deep Freeze, so when rebooted, no files written to disk remain -- this would include, of course, any users' emails, internet cache, history, etc. When students sign up for computer use, they agree to adhere to the general principle that the computer is not the student's personal computer, and is to be used for university work only, which does include accessing their web email account, which they sign up for when enrolling. Most outside-of-class communication between students and faculty is by email and faculty web sites. -rich
They need to keep some logging in case of any disputes, reports of abuse or criminal activity. There has been discussion here in the UK about increasing data retention time. An article over at Wikipedia may explain this better than I: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_data_retention
Thanks guys. Rmus can you say which school that was? If not I understand I know there are a lot of internet privacy rules pertaining to commercial ISPs. Do you guys know if university ISPs are regarded as commercial ISPs and have to adhere to the same laws? I read some article about RIAA suing students at Purdue and other universities. Are universities more motivated to retain logs than ISPs or something?
ah I'll just call them and ask. I guess if you can ask a commercial isp you should be able to ask them.