Your ISP as Net watchdog

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Arbitrary or Despotic Control

Hi, OButterball.

The key to your definition is "arbitrary or despotic control". The nature of our democratic republic is resistant to such control. The data retention law, if put into effect, would have to be passed by Congress. (i.e, it's not part of current law). Even if the law should get passed, citizens who didn't like the law would still have the power to "throw the bums out" in the next election, and get the law repealed. To use your zoo analogy, we decide who the zoo keepers are, and how much power they have. For the kind of threat to freedom you're talking about to exist would take a military coup.

Further, I would submit that, where it pertains to the Internet, we're much closer on the continuum to anarchy than despotism. There are all kinds of things you can do on the Internet that are illegal that currently aren't controlled or controlable (e.g., pirating software and music, exchanging child porn, etc.).

The other thing you have to remember is that this information is already collected, for technical and security reasons.

We need to remember that this is not just about child pornography. (I think the article's focus on child pornography is unfortunate.) The same information can be used to prosecute people for network attacks, identity theft, virus attacks, etc. Some of these things have national security implications, and aren't mitigated by people keeping an eye on their kids (which I agree with you about, by the way).

I think some of this Big Brother/1984 talk is overblown. What we're talking about is keeping people accountable for what they do online, the same as we do in the "real world".

Further, I would question your categorization of the information being sought as "private information". What web sites you visit is *not* a private affair. Your IP address is known to your ISP's server. It's known to the destination server, and it's tracked by all the servers it hops on in between. Your expectation of privacy in such a situation is nil.

Here's Comcast's privacy policy:

http://www.comcast.net/privacy/

I would submit that this is one of those trade-offs that we make to ensure both security and the proper amount of freedom on the Internet.

Posted by: bhartman36   Posted on: 06/17/05 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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