7 ms·

Facebook supports horrible proposed Internet bill CISPA

163 points by voodoochilo 14y ago

leeoniya 14y ago
i would me much more concerned if the contents of my email box were shared than my FB profile. the government already has 100 ways to get at most of the info i give to facebook and the rest is pretty meaningless. if i want to do something questionable or off the radar, don't f*cking post it online or have a trackable device with you while doing it. common sense 101 here. case in point: if your data is transmitted without encryption or can be decrypted by anyone other than you, don't expect privacy, the law is much more flexible than AES.
tzs 14y ago
CISPA does not include domain seizure. Doctorow has a tendency to go for sensationalism instead of accuracy. His writings are getting close to going on my "automatically flag" list because of this.
- voodoochilo 14y ago
  agreed, but it does not need to be included either because they simply do it already.
  - tptacek 14y ago
    Words mean things. This is what Doctorow wrote: CISPA, the pending US cybersecurity bill, is a terrible law, with many of the worst features of SOPA -- surveillance and domain seizures and censorship and so on But 'tzs is right. CISPA does not include "domain seizures" or, for that matter, censorship. It's an information sharing mechanism.
- Natsu 14y ago
  You might then enjoy a more accurate critique of the law: https://www.aclu.org/technology-and-liberty/aclu-opposition-hr-3523-cyber-intelligence-sharing-and-protection-act-2011 https://www.aclu.org/technology-and-liberty/aclu-opposition-...
MattBearman 14y ago
The linked article doesn't have a source for this, but after a bit of digging I found this page - http://intelligence.house.gov/hr-3523-letters-support http://intelligence.house.gov/hr-3523-letters-support which does unfortunately list Facebook as a supporter. Looks like it's time to delete my Facebook account, sigh.
voodoochilo 14y ago
since i "cancelled" my FB account 15 months ago i miss nothing.
jgrahamc 14y ago
Shouldn't be any surprise there really. Facebook is now a major corporation and is listed alongside Microsoft, IBM, Symantec, Intel, EMC, and Oracle as supporting the bill. http://intelligence.house.gov/hr-3523-letters-support http://intelligence.house.gov/hr-3523-letters-support
Loque_k 14y ago
Its funny, I remember starting out on the internet, I would never put an ounce of "real" information on there and that was how people lived... now we have facebook/myspace/twitter/"blogging" and people are happy to disclose all types of personal information. Let alone geodata on photos. As far as I can tell CISPA will only give out the information you provide to them. As bad as it is, you can mitigate it by not giving people your information on the webz?
- Jilaris 14y ago
  I understand why some people can be upset, but when i think about what I enter into websites... are people really under the impression the government doesn't have this data? The government knows my credit card numbers, they know where I live, they know how much I make, etc. They don't give two shits that I bought new racketball glasses yesterday on Amazon, and they really, really don't care that I posted a new picture on facebook. It seems to me the people who are really upset with this bill are the people doing the illegal activity. Everyone is torn on the whole pirating issue (probably because they love consuming for free), but the fact is that it's still illegal in the US. I imagine the opponents of this saying "Oh, well, look at these rights they're taking away from us!!" while they've got six torrents in the background in an attempt to distract from the point.
  - Jach 14y ago
    See: "'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy": http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=998565 http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=998565
    - deleted 14y ago
      [deleted]
    - Jilaris 14y ago
      I had a long post that talked about this paper, which you may or may not still be able to see. If not, I'm replacing it with a much shorter version: A 28 page PDF, which is single column, and takes up about 25% of a page is an absolute joke. To think this has actually been deemed a "book" is outrageous. Also, it's padded with comments he received on HIS BLOG. He references fiction novels to prove points, and he generally skirts the question. I read the whole thing, which honestly seemed like it had no real point, and I still say (as a business intel guy): No company- no entity care about me or you unless we do something very wrong. We're so full of ourselves thinking "The government is going to read my e-mails!" The fuck they will; in the grand scheme of things, your e-mails are as important as goose shit. As I'm reading this PDF I get the feeling the author is under the impression that for every person on the planet there are two more in a backroom somewhere just following his life. We all need to get over ourselves. We're just not that important.
Xuzz 14y ago
Remember guys, this bill does pretty much nothing. If you read it, it simply allows some completely optional data sharing for prevention against attacks. However, in most cases, there is already no law against completely optionally sharing data with the government or private security firms. But, tptacek said it better than I can: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3815912 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3815912
- iamandrus 14y ago
  I'm trying to understand this bill better before taking a true stance on it. Is there a possibility that the powers that it grants can be abused?
  - zotz 14y ago
    If one is a fan of the National Security State, this is a great bill. For the rest of us, not so much. https://www.cdt.org/blogs/greg-nojeim/112cyber-intelligence-bill-threatens-privacy-and-civilian-control https://www.cdt.org/blogs/greg-nojeim/112cyber-intelligence-... : - The bill has a very broad, almost unlimited definition of the information that can be shared with government agencies notwithstanding privacy and other laws; - The bill is likely to lead to expansion of the government’s role in the monitoring of private communications as a result of this sharing; - It is likely to shift control of government cybersecurity efforts from civilian agencies to the military; - Once the information is shared with the government, it wouldn’t have to be used for cybersecurity, but could instead be used for any purpose that is not specifically prohibited.
    - tptacek 14y ago
      What information that service providers and app providers are currently not authorized to share under the 1986 ECPA would become lawful to share under this act?
      - zotz 14y ago
        The vagueness of this bill IS the problem. Vagueness in the law makes for really bad laws. Give me one reason I should support this bill.
effigies 14y ago
Are people really under the impression that Google and Facebook opposed SOPA for surveillance reasons? SOPA would have broken the Internet so fundamentally that they couldn't continue operating without special immunity from the US Government. Failing something that serious, I wouldn't expect them to be on my side, generally speaking.
jellicle 14y ago
A short summary of CISPA: -- any large internet company can share your data with the government; they can't be sued for it. The U.S. will end up with large data hoses stuck into all large internet companies. -- any large internet company can share your data with the RIAA/MPAA/private copyright police; they can't be sued for it. The copyright police will end up with large data hoses stuck into all large internet companies. That's about the start and the end of it. If you think it's great that the RIAA/MPAA will end up with the ability to suck down everything that Google/Facebook/Twitter/Verizon/Comcast/etc. know about you, with no subpoena or other legal process required, based on their allegation that you are infringing their copyrights, then you should be cool with this bill. If you think it's great that the NSA will end up with the ability to suck down everything those companies know about you based on their allegation that you are a threat to national security, again with no legal process required, then you should be cool with this bill. If you don't think that's great, you should probably oppose this bill.
- tptacek 14y ago
  Here's the actual text of the bill, which of course doesn't say any of that: http://www.opencongress.org/bill/112-h3523/text http://www.opencongress.org/bill/112-h3523/text Boing Boing, the EFF, and Demand Progress have seized upon the words "theft or misappropriation of private or government information, intellectual property, or personally identifiable information", claiming that they betray an intent for CISPA to be used as a tool for antipiracy. But, of course, "DVD rips" are just one of a zillion kinds of "intellectual property", most of which is obviously worth protecting. The real problem with this bill is that it doesn't do anything that private industry already does. ISPs already share information about attacks between themselves. The ECPA already allows potentially private information to be shared as part of good-faith investigations of computer misuse. I am personally much more cynical about the motives of major anti-CISPA activists.
  - jellicle 14y ago
    >Here's the actual text of the bill, which of course doesn't say any of that: Of course it does. Learn to read. >Boing Boing, the EFF, and Demand Progress have seized upon the words "theft or misappropriation of private or government information, intellectual property, or personally identifiable information", claiming that they betray an intent for CISPA to be used as a tool for antipiracy. Yes, they "claim" that a law about the theft of intellectual property is about anti-piracy. Heavens to Betsy! What will they claim next? >I am personally much more cynical about the motives of major anti-CISPA activists. Do tell! What are the motives of Boing Boing, the EFF and Demand Progress? They hate America, right? Sorry tptacek, but your above comment is truth-free. If you have any actual comment on the bill, feel free to make it. The bill says exactly what I said it says.
Locke1689 14y ago
Meta note: while usually it's considered good practice to leave the title of the article, when the title of the original article is extremely opinionated without direct explanation (this specific article is about Facebook supporting CISPA, not CISPA being bad), I would consider it good practice to rewrite the title to moderate the language.
loverobots 14y ago
Horrible for us and internet in general, but probably as good as Facebook Inc can do to protect ITS own, vast, interests. What if a key US Senator offered them help with a privacy /cookie tracking bill in exchange for supporting this? It's just one of the many possibilities. Remember the Verizon-Google neutrality thing?
smilinggila1 14y ago
it's an election times, you have your votes to make the difference. why show any surrender. use it to stop this bill. If republican is behind this then vote for them, so did with the dems but if both of them inside then just vote them out. As for the presidential election, push to all the candidates in which running for the primary and the one who now incumbent. Vote for the law from one of your party; then you're history. what I truly meant is that you have to power right now. so use it. if any of the presidential candidate party supported this bill, tell those presidential candidates either the challenger or the incumbent; that the support from the people who love the freedom is lost forever for them and their party should any of the candidate party member who sit on the congress or senates support this bill. Against it then we'll support your candidancy; is just that plain and simple. Truly there's no need to black out the net. Please shared this to every one that love the freedom ASAP.

163 points by voodoochilo 14y ago

i would me much more concerned if the contents of my email box were shared than my FB profile. the government already has 100 ways to get at most of the info i give to facebook and the rest is pretty meaningless. if i want to do something questionable or off the radar, don't f*cking post it online or have a trackable device with you while doing it. common sense 101 here. case in point: if your data is transmitted without encryption or can be decrypted by anyone other than you, don't expect privacy, the law is much more flexible than AES.

tzs 14y ago

CISPA does not include domain seizure. Doctorow has a tendency to go for sensationalism instead of accuracy. His writings are getting close to going on my "automatically flag" list because of this.

voodoochilo 14y ago
agreed, but it does not need to be included either because they simply do it already.
- tptacek 14y ago
  Words mean things. This is what Doctorow wrote: CISPA, the pending US cybersecurity bill, is a terrible law, with many of the worst features of SOPA -- surveillance and domain seizures and censorship and so on But 'tzs is right. CISPA does not include "domain seizures" or, for that matter, censorship. It's an information sharing mechanism.
Natsu 14y ago
You might then enjoy a more accurate critique of the law: https://www.aclu.org/technology-and-liberty/aclu-opposition-hr-3523-cyber-intelligence-sharing-and-protection-act-2011 https://www.aclu.org/technology-and-liberty/aclu-opposition-...

MattBearman 14y ago

The linked article doesn't have a source for this, but after a bit of digging I found this page - http://intelligence.house.gov/hr-3523-letters-support http://intelligence.house.gov/hr-3523-letters-support which does unfortunately list Facebook as a supporter. Looks like it's time to delete my Facebook account, sigh.

voodoochilo 14y ago

since i "cancelled" my FB account 15 months ago i miss nothing.

jgrahamc 14y ago

Shouldn't be any surprise there really. Facebook is now a major corporation and is listed alongside Microsoft, IBM, Symantec, Intel, EMC, and Oracle as supporting the bill. http://intelligence.house.gov/hr-3523-letters-support http://intelligence.house.gov/hr-3523-letters-support

Loque_k 14y ago

Its funny, I remember starting out on the internet, I would never put an ounce of "real" information on there and that was how people lived... now we have facebook/myspace/twitter/"blogging" and people are happy to disclose all types of personal information. Let alone geodata on photos. As far as I can tell CISPA will only give out the information you provide to them. As bad as it is, you can mitigate it by not giving people your information on the webz?

Jilaris 14y ago
I understand why some people can be upset, but when i think about what I enter into websites... are people really under the impression the government doesn't have this data? The government knows my credit card numbers, they know where I live, they know how much I make, etc. They don't give two shits that I bought new racketball glasses yesterday on Amazon, and they really, really don't care that I posted a new picture on facebook. It seems to me the people who are really upset with this bill are the people doing the illegal activity. Everyone is torn on the whole pirating issue (probably because they love consuming for free), but the fact is that it's still illegal in the US. I imagine the opponents of this saying "Oh, well, look at these rights they're taking away from us!!" while they've got six torrents in the background in an attempt to distract from the point.
- Jach 14y ago
  See: "'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy": http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=998565 http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=998565
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
  - Jilaris 14y ago
    I had a long post that talked about this paper, which you may or may not still be able to see. If not, I'm replacing it with a much shorter version: A 28 page PDF, which is single column, and takes up about 25% of a page is an absolute joke. To think this has actually been deemed a "book" is outrageous. Also, it's padded with comments he received on HIS BLOG. He references fiction novels to prove points, and he generally skirts the question. I read the whole thing, which honestly seemed like it had no real point, and I still say (as a business intel guy): No company- no entity care about me or you unless we do something very wrong. We're so full of ourselves thinking "The government is going to read my e-mails!" The fuck they will; in the grand scheme of things, your e-mails are as important as goose shit. As I'm reading this PDF I get the feeling the author is under the impression that for every person on the planet there are two more in a backroom somewhere just following his life. We all need to get over ourselves. We're just not that important.

Xuzz 14y ago

Remember guys, this bill does pretty much nothing. If you read it, it simply allows some completely optional data sharing for prevention against attacks. However, in most cases, there is already no law against completely optionally sharing data with the government or private security firms. But, tptacek said it better than I can: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3815912 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3815912

iamandrus 14y ago
I'm trying to understand this bill better before taking a true stance on it. Is there a possibility that the powers that it grants can be abused?
- zotz 14y ago
  If one is a fan of the National Security State, this is a great bill. For the rest of us, not so much. https://www.cdt.org/blogs/greg-nojeim/112cyber-intelligence-bill-threatens-privacy-and-civilian-control https://www.cdt.org/blogs/greg-nojeim/112cyber-intelligence-... : - The bill has a very broad, almost unlimited definition of the information that can be shared with government agencies notwithstanding privacy and other laws; - The bill is likely to lead to expansion of the government’s role in the monitoring of private communications as a result of this sharing; - It is likely to shift control of government cybersecurity efforts from civilian agencies to the military; - Once the information is shared with the government, it wouldn’t have to be used for cybersecurity, but could instead be used for any purpose that is not specifically prohibited.
  - tptacek 14y ago
    What information that service providers and app providers are currently not authorized to share under the 1986 ECPA would become lawful to share under this act?
    - zotz 14y ago
      The vagueness of this bill IS the problem. Vagueness in the law makes for really bad laws. Give me one reason I should support this bill.

effigies 14y ago

Are people really under the impression that Google and Facebook opposed SOPA for surveillance reasons? SOPA would have broken the Internet so fundamentally that they couldn't continue operating without special immunity from the US Government. Failing something that serious, I wouldn't expect them to be on my side, generally speaking.

jellicle 14y ago

A short summary of CISPA: -- any large internet company can share your data with the government; they can't be sued for it. The U.S. will end up with large data hoses stuck into all large internet companies. -- any large internet company can share your data with the RIAA/MPAA/private copyright police; they can't be sued for it. The copyright police will end up with large data hoses stuck into all large internet companies. That's about the start and the end of it. If you think it's great that the RIAA/MPAA will end up with the ability to suck down everything that Google/Facebook/Twitter/Verizon/Comcast/etc. know about you, with no subpoena or other legal process required, based on their allegation that you are infringing their copyrights, then you should be cool with this bill. If you think it's great that the NSA will end up with the ability to suck down everything those companies know about you based on their allegation that you are a threat to national security, again with no legal process required, then you should be cool with this bill. If you don't think that's great, you should probably oppose this bill.

tptacek 14y ago
Here's the actual text of the bill, which of course doesn't say any of that: http://www.opencongress.org/bill/112-h3523/text http://www.opencongress.org/bill/112-h3523/text Boing Boing, the EFF, and Demand Progress have seized upon the words "theft or misappropriation of private or government information, intellectual property, or personally identifiable information", claiming that they betray an intent for CISPA to be used as a tool for antipiracy. But, of course, "DVD rips" are just one of a zillion kinds of "intellectual property", most of which is obviously worth protecting. The real problem with this bill is that it doesn't do anything that private industry already does. ISPs already share information about attacks between themselves. The ECPA already allows potentially private information to be shared as part of good-faith investigations of computer misuse. I am personally much more cynical about the motives of major anti-CISPA activists.
- jellicle 14y ago
  >Here's the actual text of the bill, which of course doesn't say any of that: Of course it does. Learn to read. >Boing Boing, the EFF, and Demand Progress have seized upon the words "theft or misappropriation of private or government information, intellectual property, or personally identifiable information", claiming that they betray an intent for CISPA to be used as a tool for antipiracy. Yes, they "claim" that a law about the theft of intellectual property is about anti-piracy. Heavens to Betsy! What will they claim next? >I am personally much more cynical about the motives of major anti-CISPA activists. Do tell! What are the motives of Boing Boing, the EFF and Demand Progress? They hate America, right? Sorry tptacek, but your above comment is truth-free. If you have any actual comment on the bill, feel free to make it. The bill says exactly what I said it says.

Locke1689 14y ago

Meta note: while usually it's considered good practice to leave the title of the article, when the title of the original article is extremely opinionated without direct explanation (this specific article is about Facebook supporting CISPA, not CISPA being bad), I would consider it good practice to rewrite the title to moderate the language.

loverobots 14y ago

Horrible for us and internet in general, but probably as good as Facebook Inc can do to protect ITS own, vast, interests. What if a key US Senator offered them help with a privacy /cookie tracking bill in exchange for supporting this? It's just one of the many possibilities. Remember the Verizon-Google neutrality thing?

smilinggila1 14y ago

it's an election times, you have your votes to make the difference. why show any surrender. use it to stop this bill. If republican is behind this then vote for them, so did with the dems but if both of them inside then just vote them out. As for the presidential election, push to all the candidates in which running for the primary and the one who now incumbent. Vote for the law from one of your party; then you're history. what I truly meant is that you have to power right now. so use it. if any of the presidential candidate party supported this bill, tell those presidential candidates either the challenger or the incumbent; that the support from the people who love the freedom is lost forever for them and their party should any of the candidate party member who sit on the congress or senates support this bill. Against it then we'll support your candidancy; is just that plain and simple. Truly there's no need to black out the net. Please shared this to every one that love the freedom ASAP.