This clipped from the Friday EFF alert:
: . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . :
* EFF Challenges FCC's Jurisdiction Over Internet Services
On Friday, the DC Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral
arguments in a suit brought by EFF and a coalition of public
interest, industry, and academic groups challenging the
FCC's unjustified expansion of the Communications Assistance
for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA). By forcing broadband
Internet and interconnected voice over Internet Protocol
(VoIP) services to become wiretap-friendly, the FCC ignored
CALEA's plain language and threatened privacy, security, and
innovation.
When Congress controversially passed CALEA in 1994 and gave
the FCC powers to mandate backdoors in traditional telephony
systems, it expressly exempted "information services" such
as the Internet. Yet after a petition from the FBI and
other federal law enforcement agencies, the FCC ruled last
year that companies like Vonage and private institutions
that provide Net access must redesign their networks to
facilitate wiretaps. On Wednesday, the FCC announced that
these service providers would have to foot the bill -- an
estimated $7 billion dollars for the universities alone.
The FCC completely failed to give the law enforcement
petitions the "hard look" that the public deserves when
massive government surveillance proposals are on the table.
While the FCC's unfunded tech mandate will undoubtedly harm
the public, the government made no showing that there was
any need to extend CALEA to Internet services at all.
Indeed, just this past Monday, the Administrative Office of
the U.S. Courts issued its annual wiretap report -- which
revealed that only 8 court orders for Internet wiretaps were
issued in 2005, down from 12 orders in each of the years
2003 and 2004 -- and the report contains no indication that
law enforcement had any problems in conducting these
electronic surveillances.
Petitioners in American Council on Education v. FCC include
the American Library Association, the Center for Democracy
and Technology, Electronic Privacy Information Center,
EDUCAUSE, Pulver.com, and Sun Microsystems.
More on CALEA and the petitioners' briefs:
<http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/CALEA/>
News.com, "FCC approves Net-wiretapping taxes":
<http://news.com.com/FCC+approves+Net-wiretapping+taxes/2100-1028_3-6067971.html?tag=nefd.lede>
For the 2005 Wiretap Report:
<http://www.uscourts.gov/wiretap05/contents.html>
For this post:
<http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/archives/004624.php>
: . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . : . :
John A. Resotko
Head of Systems Administration
Michigan State University College of Law
208 Law College Building
East Lansing, MI 48824-1300
email: [log in to unmask]
Phone: 517-432-6836
Fax: 517-432-6861
Current Chairperson of the
MSU Network Communications Committee
|
