CDR: Re: A helpful ruling on "anonymity"

[Declan McCullagh]

See also:
http://www.nytimes.com/2000/10/17/technology/17ONLI.html
http://www.techserver.com/noframes/story/0,2294,500269480-500419504-502600227-0,00.html

-Declan

On Mon, Oct 16, 2000 at 09:16:15PM -0700, Tim May wrote:
> 
> This is a helpful ruling. No kidding. No spoof.
> 
> --fair use excerpt begins-0-
> 
> Monday October 16 4:29 PM ET
> Anonymous Net Posting Not Protected
> 
> 
> By CATHERINE WILSON, AP Business Writer
> 
> MIAMI (AP) - In a ruling that challenges online anonymity, a Florida 
> appeals court declared Monday that Internet service providers must 
> divulge the identities of people who post defamatory messages on the 
> Internet.
> 
> Critics of the ruling say it could have a chilling effect on free 
> expression in Internet chat rooms.
> 
> ....
> Lauren Gelman, public policy director with the Electronic Frontier 
> Foundation, is concerned that other courts could follow the lead of 
> the 3rd District Court of Appeals in approving subpoenas.
> 
> ``This kind of speech happens all the time in all kinds of chat 
> rooms,'' Gelman said. ``We don't want to see these subpoenas become 
> regularly used to cause people to self-censor themselves.''
> 
> ``The court had the potential to set an important precedent about the 
> right to speak anonymously on the Internet,'' Lidsky said. ``The 
> courts are eventually going to have to come to grips with this issue 
> and decide how broad free speech rights are in cyberspace.''
> 
> 
> --end excerpt--
> 
> Lidsky doesn't get it. There is no "right to speak anonymously on the 
> Internet" (or anywhere else). If Alice observes Bob make a comment, 
> and Alice chooses to speak about her observations, or is required by 
> a court to speak about her observations, Bob cannot assert some 
> "right to anonymity."
> 
> Now, had the court said that all words must be traceable, must be 
> signed, and so on, then this would be a different kettle of fish. But 
> they didn't. The court just said, in this case, that the usual 
> process of discovery and production of evidence is not trumped by 
> some claim of a "right to anonymity."
> 
> No surprises there.
> 
> This is helpful because it pushed anonymity back into the 
> technological arena, where it belongs.
> 
> 
> --Tim May
> -- 
> ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
> Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
> ComSec 3DES:   831-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
> W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
> "Cyphernomicon"             | black markets, collapse of governments.
>