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Forcing consent before selling browser histories violates our free speech
- charliepark 7y agoA bit of a clickbaity HN link. Full article headline: "Forcing us to get consent before selling browser histories violates our free speech, US ISPs claim". And subhead: "That ain't the way life should be, Maine responds".
- kmod 7y agoHN has a 80-character title limit and it's not always clear how to paraphrase a longer title.
- saagarjha 7y agoHow about "Forcing consent before selling browser histories violates free speech, say ISPs"?
- jfengel 7y agoOr perhaps "ISPs say selling browser histories without consent is free speech". The difference is small, but it eliminates the tangles of who is doing what in the verbs "forcing" and "violates".
- baud147258 7y agoThat's the usual issue with Reg headlines, they need some trimming before fitting in the title limit here.
- hodgesrm 7y agoI am not a lawyer but the argument in the lawsuit does not look compelling, insofar as the Register describes it. This seems like a tactic to tie up enforcement while the plaintiffs lobby for more favorable laws in Maine and elsewhere.
- mirimir 7y agoAlthough I am not at all sympathetic to these ISPs, I do agree that privacy protections ought to apply uniformly to all sellers and service providers.
- bitxbitxbitcoin 7y agoI agree with you but there's arguably a line to be drawn between say the Facebooks or Googles of the world - where arguably you're giving consent by using the platform and there are others to choose from - and ISPs especially as there may only be one ISP available to you in rural Maine.
- sorenn111 7y agoNo need to go all the way to rural Maine. In NYC and SF, I've never had more than 2 options both of which are terrible and have the same faults and flaws. A 2 company oligopoly with high annoyance/cost of switching is not much better than monopoly.
- mirimir 7y agoPlease see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22386065 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22386065 Also, I wasn't just talking about ISPs and Internet firms. How is it OK for banks to sell data about their customers?
- AnthonyMouse 7y ago> Although I am not at all sympathetic to these ISPs, I do agree that privacy protections ought to apply uniformly to all sellers and service providers. ISPs are different because of the lack of competition. If you don't like Google you can use Duck Duck Go. If you don't like WhatsApp you can use Signal. If you don't like Windows 10 you can use Ubuntu (or, if you want to argue Windows is still a monopoly, Microsoft should move to the "monopolists" column and be subject to the stricter rules). In particular, in those cases the competitors actually do have meaningfully more respect for privacy. In markets where every reasonably available provider snoops and the market has high barriers to entry, that's a different situation.
- nullc 7y agoThe real headline should be that government agencies in the US are too addicted to getting easy data from ISPs via nearly due-processless administrative subpoena (or just by asking) to prosecute their unlawful wiretaps for what they are (e.g. 18 U.S. Code § 2511 federally, various laws at state level), so instead are wasting time and money twiddling around the edges and trying to restrict the selling instead of doing anything that would endanger the collection.
- pmoriarty 7y agoThis data shouldn't even be collected in the first place.
- miguelrochefort 7y agoWhy not? It's simply too valuable not to be collected.
- pmoriarty 7y agoBecause collecting it leads to using it, and using it leads to the surveillance dystopia we're just starting to get a taste of.
- bryanrasmussen 7y agothe other thread on this subject https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22375269 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22375269
- AnimalMuppet 7y agoAll privacy constraints violate free speech. HIPAA? Free speech violation. Banking privacy/secrecy regulations? Free speech violation. Protecting the identity of crime victims? Free speech violation. For that matter, laws against slander? Free speech violation. Laws against false accusation? Free speech violation. Laws against false advertising? Free speech violation. Laws against filing false tax returns? Free speech violation. Laws against perjury? Free speech violation. So, if free speech is your only lens through which you view the legal system, there are a lot of free speech violations that are currently (and correctly) encoded into law. Privacy violations are one major area. So this violates the ISPs free speech, in order to protect their customers' privacy? Sounds perfectly fine (and normal) to me...