Thursday, January 19, 2006

Fed's force Google to reveal private info

So.. Google actually IS trying to not be evil. They're fighting the government's demand.
It has just come to light that the federal government is trying to force Google to reveal all searches conducted in a one-week period, as well as records for 1 million Web addresses.

The effort is part of a government campaign to revive an anti-pornography law, the 1998 Child Online Protection Act, which the Supreme Court struck down two years ago. The law attempted to ensure that only adults visited porn sites by requiring that visitors register, or use access codes, before gaining entry to such sites. Now, the Bush administration is back in court, trying to prove that these requirements are the only realistic way of preventing minors from accessing online porn.

What remains unclear is why the government would need records from Google--which is, after all, a private company and not an investigative arm of the Department of Justice.
Too bad Yahoo can't claim the same thing.
Yahoo Inc., based in Sunnyvale, Calif., acknowledged on Thursday handing over search data, but insisted no personal information on users was given to government attorneys. The disclosure followed reports that rival search engine Google Inc. had refused to comply with a similar subpoena, issued last year.
I'm not all that excited about kids getting into porn sites .. not good...but these guys regularly take 'common' causes (like stopping terrorists by illegally listening in on US citizens phone conversations, and now this) and using these common causes to IGNORE the laws we have in place that make this a free country.

What the hell, let's just start over. How about throwing out that pesky constitution thing that keeps getting in the way and writing a new one (Hey Mr. Attorney General... whip something up for us and slip it into that case titled 'The Constitution"...no one will notice, at least not for awhile).

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An excellent read from an ex-evangelical.

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