Submitted by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger
While everyone was distracted with the hullabaloo surround the artificial “debt ceiling crisis”, Congress did manage to get some work done. Unfortunately that work was in furtherance of eroding your right to privacy. Thursday, July 28, the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee submitted a bill (H.R. 1981) under the politically motivated and misleading name Protecting Children From Internet Pornographers Act of 2011, which was quietly lobbied for by conservative Republicans and the Department of Justice, voted in committee to advance regulations requiring Internet service providers to retain your account information. This information preserved would include not just your IP address, but customers’ names, addresses, phone numbers, credit card numbers and bank account numbers as well. The Judiciary Committee approved this bill in a 19-0 vote, rejecting a last minute amendment that would have required the retention of IP addresses only by 7-16.
It is helpful to note there is a distinction between “data retention” and “data preservation”. ISPs regularly destroy log records no longer required for business purposed. However, under the existing Electronic Communication Transactional Records Act, ISP’s can be required to retain log files or any record in their possession for up to 90 days at the request of a governmental entity. This data preservation policy would require ISPs to keep all log files and records related to commercial Internet accounts for 18 months. As this requirement would not apply to non-commercial accounts such as public access provided in Internet cafes and public libraries, any intelligent criminal could simply avoid logging by going to a public access point or by hacking into an improperly secured wireless network while the Internet traffic of individual law-abiding account holders across America would be recorded. As Rep. John Conyers (D – MI) succinctly put it, “The bill is mislabeled. This is not protecting children from Internet pornography. It’s creating a database for everybody in this country for a lot of other purposes.” Criticism of the bill came from both sides of the aisle with Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner (R – WI), the previous chairman of the House Judiciary committee, noting “I oppose this bill. It can be amended, but I don’t think it can be fixed… It poses numerous risks that well outweigh any benefits, and I’m not convinced it will contribute in a significant way to protecting children.”
Given that the Electronic Communication Transactional Records Act already provides for data retention upon request and the Protect Our Children Act of 2008, requires any ISP that “obtains actual knowledge” of possible child pornography transmissions to “make a report of such facts or circumstances” and backs that requirement with a $150,000 fine for the first offense and up to $300,000 for each subsequent offense, does H.R. 1981 do anything to further protect children or is it simply an invasion of your privacy and erosion of your rights that serves no legitimate governmental interest not already met by existing law? What do you think?
Source: CNETNews
~Submitted by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger
NoWay,
Maybe you didn’t bother to read section 2 of the bill or 18 U.S.C. 1956.
That’s awfully self-serving, Gene. Funny how you and Buddha agree on everything. I’m glad you think you kicked my ass back on that thread. You say that every thread.
kderosa,
Are you still against this Bill after reading it? If so, please explain why you would not support it.
Did you notice that, contrary to what Gene states “This data preservation policy would require ISPs to keep all log files and records related to commercial Internet accounts for 18 months” this Bill does not distinguish the data preservation based on it being a commercial or non-commercial account? It also does not require them to maintain more than the IP address which gets assigned during a specific period in time. It does not require them to maintain the records of which websites the user was visiting.
Here is the text of that section; `(h) Retention of Certain Records- A provider of an electronic communication service or remote computing service shall retain for a period of at least 18 months the temporarily assigned network addresses the service assigns to each account, unless that address is transmitted by radio communication (as defined in section 3 of the Communications Act of 1934).’.
It says nothing about “all log files and records” as Gene attempts to suggest.
I question whether Gene bothered to read the Bill before writing his article. I think it is more likely that he read about what someone else had to say about the Bill and plagiarized their flawed analysis. It is also possible that he just conflated what was taking place in China and this Bill. Either way, the analysis of the Bill is not an accurate representation of what the Bill would require.
Maybe we should be asking Gene how he arrived at the conclusions he did.
kderosa,
Are you still against this Bill after reading it? If so, please explain why you would not support it.
Did you notice that, contrary to what Gene states “This data preservation policy would require ISPs to keep all log files and records related to commercial Internet accounts for 18 months” this Bill does not distinguish the data preservation based on it being a commercial or non-commercial account? It also does not require them to maintain more than the IP address which gets assigned during a specific period in time. It does not require them to maintain the records of which websites the user was visiting.
Here is the text of that section; `(h) Retention of Certain Records- A provider of an electronic communication service or remote computing service shall retain for a period of at least 18 months the temporarily assigned network addresses the service assigns to each account, unless that address is transmitted by radio communication (as defined in section 3 of the Communications Act of 1934).’.
It says nothing about “all log files and records” as Gene attempts to suggest.
I question whether Gene bothered to read the Bill before writing his article. I think it is more likely that he read about what someone else had to say about the Bill and plagiarized their flawed analysis. It is also possible that he just conflated what was taking place in China and this Bill. Either way, the analysis of the Bill is not an accurate representation of what the Bill would require.
Maybe we should be asking Gene how he arrived at the conclusions he did.
Or you could stick to the topic of the thread instead of pursuing your paranoid vendetta against a poster who clearly kicked your ass the first time you posted here attempting to rewrite colonial history.
@OS,
Let me remind you of what you stated just a few short hours ago;
“Gene’s family has been close to our family for forty years and one of my son’s closest friends is one of the Howington boys. Next question?”
A non-denial denial followed by a request for more questions.
I supplied the next questions.
“[W]hy not just unequivocally state that you know that Gene Howington has never posted as Buddha is Laughing on this forum?
[T]hat he has never used the Buddha is Laughing identity in any way?
And that you know that Gene Howington has never posted as any other identity in this forum?
And that you know that Gene Howington has neer posted before GeneH’s first post on this forum on July 7, 2011?”
And now you back down with a weasly non-defense.
“I do not have do defend Gene, Mike or anyone else here.”
One can only wonder why.
Noway, I declare you and kderoda have lost. For your consideration, re:impartiality, I am not a lawyer, I am a web dude barely hanging on in LA, and the only money I get is from computer work for an apolitical dog den and a non-partisan movie review site. I read this blog because I love the law.
Can we please move on?
James in LA,
“Sign me up for a root canal during a vasectomy rather than read any more of these really inane posts from either of you. You could have just written one post with these two words: BOO-HOO.”
So glad I didn’t have a mouth full of food or drink when I read that.
🙂
OS,
I have a problem when one side of a debate declares themselves to be the winner. That is something that must be determined by an impartial party, not the participants. Increasing the group size of like-minded thinkers does not change the fact that they are still appealing to their own authority for a determination.
” It is he who is trying to have it both ways. And, yet you fail to criticize him.”
So what? Kderosa and noway, you have made your point a gazillion times and the answer remains the same: what about it? Who cares? Do you need to fill up this blog with another million words full of childish rants to state what you have already stated?
Sign me up for a root canal during a vasectomy rather than read any more of these really inane posts from either of you. You could have just written one post with these two words: BOO-HOO.
@JT: The thread hijacking is getting out of control. There exist civil remedies.
I do not have do defend Gene, Mike or anyone else here. They are much more heavily armed than any of the trolls. One slapdown after another and trolls think they are winning? I call that poor reality testing. Gene, et al, do not need defending. Neither do I. Some trolls are not even worth responding to, so I don’t. There is an old saying that love and hate are not opposites. Indifference is the opposite of both. I am indifferent.
kderosa No, Gene Howingtonis being criticised because he is trying to erase his sordid past posting as Buddha is Laughing. It is he who is trying to have it both ways. And, yet you fail to criticize him.
Ditto
@Mike Spindell, I’m waiting for you to calm down and get back to rational argument. Otherwise I’d just be wasting my time. Howington already abandoned that thread.
@GeneH, you put your partisanhip in question by writing in a partisan manner and then denying it. had you taken a fair position from the outset, there’d be nothing to criticise on a bill that probably will never get passed or signed if it has, as you calim, only the support of one party.
Also, you’re funny, Howington, when are you going to put the Budha clown nose back on and complete the picture?
Lastly, did you notice how your friend, the ananymous, Otteray Scribe, has failed to come to your defense yet again even after he hinted that he would and is commenting regularly on other threads. Shame about that.
“Isn’t it interesting how kderosa wants to talk about anything other than the topic of this thread?”
Gene,
The man simply doesn’t have game. I’ll bet he’s a hit at the country club and local rotary. They do hypocrisy well in those places and the one disdained never notices the smirks behind his back, but does feel some sensory disquiet in his gut, when he’s confronted with false bonhomie. This is what attracts them here like moths to a flame, their striving to prove themselves, even though lacking the capacity.
Isn’t it interesting how kderosa wants to talk about anything other than the topic of this thread? Or any thread for that matter once he’s done regurgitating his talking points?
Kenny,
You’re conflating him and Buddha in the past because they both made/make mincemeat out of every feeble attempt at argumentation you put up. The boys at the country club wouldn’t dare criticize you, nor would the shop keepers of Bryn Mawr. Given your performance here though i could only wonder how they snicker at you behind your back. It is as I said before, a matter of no consequence merely used by you as a smokescreen to cover your own incapacity.
I’m still waiting for the “devastating” proofs you’ve promised, but failed to deliver.
@Mike Spindell
“My only problem with your anonymity is that you attack Gene for his lack of anonymity.”
No, Gene Howingtonis being criticised because he is trying to erase his sordid past posting as Buddha is Laughing. It is he who is trying to have it both ways. And, yet you fail to criticize him.
“You’re worried about privacy and anonymity, yet at the same time you have a problem with my anonymity.”
Noway,
My only problem with your anonymity is that you attack Gene for his lack of anonymity. That is hypocritical. I know by the way that there is little to be hidden on the internet, which is why I use my real name. Since you seem to agree that nothing is hidden why not use yours, or are you the sockpuppet I accuse you of being. Based on your own logic there would be no other reason.
NoWay,
And the small lake on kderosa’s property was featured on television for many years.
What? Never heard of the “Pond Derosa”?
*****
I think the real spelling of the ranch was Ponderousa.
😉
“That is one of their most prominent strategies.”
Only in the darker recess of your fetid mind, Mike.
“Your commentary is awash, to the point of drowning, in Grover Norquist talking points.”
Does Norquist ven have talking points other than for tax issues?