At 8:18 PM 9/24/96, Robert Hettinga wrote:
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------------------------------ Brave Old World: Reflections on Europe in the Digital Age by Steven Carlson; 20 Sep 1996 ------------------------------
** So Much Fuss About A Bottle Of Ketchup
Hungarian police recently sent a fax around to the local Internet service providers (ISPs) asking them to provide lists of their users in Esztergom, a small town outside of Budapest. It seems somebody had planted a bomb in a bottle of ketchup. Since everyone knows you can download bomb-making instructions from the Internet, the police figured they should investigate the local users. No, I'm not making this up.
So, Hungary has GAK -- Government Access to Ketchup. Good to know the 57 Varieties are now considered munitions. On a more serious note, perhaps legal experts here could comment on something I've been wondering about. Could ISPs in the UlS. be compelled to report on the browsing and net surfing habits of their customer base? To make this clear, I don't mean in a specific criminal case, where the records are searchable under a warrant. I mean a blanket order that all ISPs compile and forward records. Were I an ISP, I would probably say, "Hell no! They're my records and the Fourth Amendment says my records are to be secure unless a proper court order is issued. Besides, my fee for generating each kilobyte of records is $100,000, nonnegotiable." (I think I've answered my own question, namely, ISPs would be under no obligation to report on customer activities, absent a proper warrant, and consistent with the ECPA.) However, ISPs are _not_ accorded the same status as priests, lawyers, and others with such privacy privileges (and obligations). Would it be legal for an ISP to offer for sale such records? Or to voluntarily go to the cops? (There's a certain new ISP with tight links to a quasi-religious group much in the news lately, and some have speculated that this ISP may be monitoring certain users....) --Tim May We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^1,257,787-1 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."