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Fri 20 Dec, 2002 10:49 am
Bush Administration to Propose System for Monitoring Internet
By JOHN MARKOFF and JOHN SCHWARTZ
The Bush administration is planning to propose requiring Internet service providers to help build a centralized system to enable broad monitoring of the Internet and, potentially, surveillance of its users.
Do you think this is any different from wire tapping, for which a court order I believe is still required?
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/20/technology/20MONI.html?todaysheadlines
This would also give them access to Webcams -- although that's policed by the sites who offer Webcam service as to content, it is disconcertingly prophetic that the televisons on the wall in "1984" had cameras spying on the viewers. Of course, there is a huge movement to keep the Internet unregulated and a public domain and this is one of the consequences. What one has to be concerned about is what direction our government is headed. The FBI, CIA and NSA all now have the authority to peruse the Internet which they didn't have before. I believe it is the responsibility of every concerned citizen to watch this closely.
Since you ask for opinion, au, I see no difference between email and chat rooms than telephones, so far as snooping are concerned. Now, posts on a forum such as this strike me as quite different, in that requiring a court order to read these comments are a bit like the same requirement for reading the letters to the editor column in the daily paper.
Not quite the same as 1984 yet, LW. We can still turn our cams off.
I did say "prophetic," roger. I just consider it a warning to watch very closely what the adminstration or any administration does propose in the name of "protecting us." Now if they could only protect us from the automobile driver -- thousands of people are killed in automobile accidents.
Well, as is stated in the article, I think it's hard to say what this means until the actual technology that is being considered is made public. This could be bland and benign or the "1984" reference could be quite appropriate..
We're reaching a point where little we do anymore will be considered private and confidential. And all in the name of protecting us from terrorists. Of course, there's no way that the gov't could monitor all of us all the time, but I worry about those unfortunates among us who will come under this kind of scrutiny.
Then again, folks who install webcams in their homes would seem to be more than willing to share their private moments with the rest of the world. Or am I not understanding something here?
D'artagnan wrote: Then again, folks who install webcams in their homes would seem to be more than willing to share their private moments with the rest of the world. Or am I not understanding something here?
lmao Well, I don't know what you use your Webcam for but I've used mine while chatting with my mother a few times via NetMeeting. Not everyone that has one is a porn star!
The technology to hack in and turn on your Webcam is already available, more sophisticated, I fear, because it could have covert government sanctions. All the more reason to have a personal firewall and hopefully the technology to patch the holes up will stay ahead of what any government could come up with. I know this gives rise to the same tired platitudes like, "if you're not doing anything wrong, you shouldn't worry about the government spying on you." If that isn't falacious thinking, I don't know what is.
Now here, we are in total agreement.
"if you're not doing anything wrong, you shouldn't worry about the government spying on you." If that isn't falacious thinking, I don't know what is."
roger
True anyone can sign on to a website such as this a read whatever is written, that is not in question. What is are the contents of e-mails which I should think are no different from phone calls.
Sorry, fishin', to imply that anyone with a web cam is a porn star wannabe. I'm actually ignorant about the technology and only see it marketed as some sort of spy device. Certainly using it to talk with one's mom seems benign!
No need to apologize D'artagnan! I was just funnin' at your comment! When I reda it the first that went through my head was "Whoa! What kinda Webcam users have I been missing?" lol
Not even a little bumping and grinding a la Gypsy Rose Lee or Elvis? What a boring Webcam.
This particular consequence, and many others of the same nature, are right at the top of my list of possible ugly futures - if we end up involved in a long term 'war on terrorism'.
War state against state, such as ww 1 or 2, seem to me to have been far more outwardly directed than, for example, the commie scare in the fifties. We can imagine what surveillance techniques and privacy incursions McCarthy would have pushed through if all this electronic communication was going on then.
Because terrorists operate internally, secretly, and in disguise...there is the possibility that all our neighbors are involved. The threats to our liberties in such a scenario scare the hell out of me.
It is one of the key reasons I am so hesitant about war with Iraq, the unresolved Palestinian problem, and even the huge spread between the have and have not countries.
Re: Bush Administration to Propose System for Monitoring Int
From the article:
Quote:A technology that is deployed without the proper legal controls "could be used to violate privacy," he said, and should be considered carefully.
I absolutely agree, but that does not mean that it will be deployed without appropriate legal controls. If the government does move to implement this, I think it will be important to ensure that they do so in such a way that personal privacy and liberty are safeguarded to the greatest degree possible.
I am currently neither for nor against implementing this program, seeing as I do strong arguments each way. I simply wanted to weigh in here to point out that the argument that something can be abused, does not in and of itself mean that thing should not be done.
In the name of homeland security, the Bush administration has proposed this Internet access which is just another government invasion of privacy.
I have nothing to hide. I do, though, agree with Lightwizard. We should all stay focused on privacy issues as Dubya continues his limping presidency.
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Posted: Fri Dec 20, 2002 9:49 am Post: 42888 -
My curiosity is this.
Change has landed in USA?
Forget about your moon landing