Hawaiian Politician Wants To Track Everyone Online Because Someone Doesn't Like Her... Backs Down After Public Backlash

Privacy

from the bad-legislating dept

Fri, Jan 27th 2012 2:59pm — Mike Masnick

Always beware of politicans pushing legislation because of a personal experience. Declan McCullagh has the story of an astoundingly, ridiculously broad data retention bill in Hawaii that would require anyone who provides internet access to keep a detailed dossier on every website everyone who uses their service visits (tied to their name). The bill includes a broad definition of internet access provider, such that anyone who provides free WiFi may be forced to keep this same info. Furthermore, it has no privacy provisions at all -- such as requiring the data be encrypted or even forbidding service providers from then selling the data.

The really stunning part of the article, however, is that when McCullagh asks the Hawaiian state Senator who introduced the Senate version about the background of the bill, it becomes clear that the politician in question doesn't appear to know what's in the bill, nor understand the implications of her own bill. Instead, it comes out she introduced it as a favor to another politician who had a "personal experience" this is intended to deal with:

Democrat Jill Tokuda, the Hawaii Senate's majority whip, who introduced a companion bill, S.B. 2530, in the Senate, told CNET that her legislation was intended to address concerns raised by Rep. Kymberly Pine, the first Republican elected to her Oahu district since statehood and the House minority floor leader.

"I was asked to introduce the Senate companions on these Internet security related bills by Representative Kymberly Marcos Pine after her own personal experience in this area," Tokuda said. "I would defer to her on the origins of these bills as she has done the research and outreach, and been the main champion of this effort."

What happened with Pine? Apparently a "disgruntled web designer" had created a website about Pine that calls her a crook and says she owes him money. It sounds like a typical "I don't like this person" website. There are lots of them out there, and they can be obnoxious... but that's no reason to completely destroy everyone's privacy online. Pine also claims that her email was hacked, though it's not clear if that was related.

I'm sure it's no fun to be the subject of someone saying mean things about you online. Or to have your email hacked. Those things suck. But to then rush out to pass massive data retention laws that take away people's privacy seems like a massive overreaction.

Thankfully, with enough public backlash, Pine is apparently backing down somewhat, admitting that the bill probably went too far. It's great that she's realizing this now... but shouldn't politicians be expected to understand these kinds of things before they try to regulate?

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Filed Under: backlash, data retention, hawaii, kim pine, privacy

24 Comments

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Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2012 @ 3:17pm

Silly Mike, you forget. Politicians are stupid.
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Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2012 @ 3:23pm

She should ask Google for that. They already keep data on everything you do online.
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Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2012 @ 3:23pm

Re:
Not stupid, just cheap.
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Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2012 @ 3:57pm

And this does what different from HR 1981?
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gorehound (profile), 27 Jan 2012 @ 4:11pm

Re:
haha ! And they come in two sizes
Republican or Democratic Sizes Available only
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Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2012 @ 4:24pm

Pass a bill like this
And I would set up quite a few virtual machines on a spare computer at home to Stumble every 30(?) seconds or so after I choose ALL of the options on StumbleUpon. :-P

On a serious note the people in politics really need to get a tech clue.
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MrWilson, 27 Jan 2012 @ 4:36pm

If she thinks having one person post hateful stuff about her online, just imagine what would happen if she'd managed to get such a bill passed...
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Nathan F (profile), 27 Jan 2012 @ 4:45pm

Re:
She wasn't thinking... about the unintended consequences that is.
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The Groove Tiger (profile), 27 Jan 2012 @ 5:03pm

Re: Re:
They weren't that cheap. Just ask Dodd.
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abc gum, 27 Jan 2012 @ 5:18pm

Both Jill Tokuda and Kymberly Pine should prepare for the Streisand Effect.
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Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2012 @ 5:39pm

Not Biased
Up front, I hate BOTH political parties. But it seems the Dems (supposedly �the people�s party�) are attacking our Rights as of late.

NDAA for starters, Obama should have Vetoed on Constitutional basis.

NY State Senators attacking Free Speech.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111001/00002316160/ny-state-senators-say-weve-got-too-mu ch-free-speech-introduce-bill-to-fix-that.shtml

Holders' DOJ going after EVERYONE!
Including wanting to lie on FOIA requests.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111104/16003216640/justice-department-drops-its-reques t-to-be-allowed-to-lie-response-to-foia-requests.shtml

Sending attack dogs against Sen Wyden for asking legit Constitutional questions.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111012/10072216326/senator-wyden-asks-president-obama -isnt-congress-required-to-approve-acta.shtml

Govt backlash of promised Govt transparency.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111214/03264917079/freedom-information-document-du mp-ice-about-domain-seizures-almost-totally-redacted.shtml

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111 012/11465316328/dhs-says-no-to-requests-public-affairs-contact-numbers-hysterically-cites-privacy-co ncerns.shtml

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111010/04043716279/nytimes-sues-federal-governmen t-refusing-to-reveal-its-secret-interpretation-patriot-act.shtml

Jerry "Moonbeam" sanctioning illegal cell phone searches.

Reid, Leahy & Dodd backing the MPAA against the people.
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Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2012 @ 6:04pm

Politicians have been called crooks for as long as there have been politicians. They usually aren't such babies about it, though.
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Manfred Manfriend, 27 Jan 2012 @ 7:12pm

Is this the site?
Looks like this is the one: http://www.kympineisacrook.com/

Clearly considering the way she is responding to these allegations, and serious nature of the allegations means that more digging needs to be done...
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Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2012 @ 8:13pm

Re: Not Biased
Obama can't vetoe anything he doesn't have a majority rulling party, he needs to compromise and that means he needs to deal with republicans.

The problem is not one or the other party is how the system is setup, those parameters are the things the define the outcome.

The input regulates the output in other words.
It doesn't matter who you got there, it will always have the same end result, it is not about democrats or republicans is about how the system is setup that make it easy to ignore the rights of the citizens they govern.
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Rapnel (profile), 27 Jan 2012 @ 8:38pm

Hawaiian crack down under public lashings? oh... I have to slow down. Not entirely unlike some other folks.
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Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2012 @ 9:43pm

Re: Re: Not Biased
BS, The President can veto any bill he wants, per the Constitution. Bill Clinton wasn't a wuss and vetoed many bills when the GOP held congress. He shut the govt down and made the GOP look like a bunch of asses. Obama should have vetoed NDAA until they took out the indefinite detention bill embedded in the 2012 NDAA.
http://www.salon.com/2011/12/16/three_myths_about_the_detention_bill/

Scapegoating to a system that is "against us" is again BS. The system is set up for a single, brave person to make a stand like Sen Wyden is with ACTA.
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toyotabedzrock (profile), 27 Jan 2012 @ 10:14pm

Beware Of Republican Bearing Bills
Beware Of Republican Bearing Bills
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That Anonymous Coward (profile), 28 Jan 2012 @ 2:30am

OMFFSM...
From the cnet article about this...
"� H.B. 2288 wasn't primarily based on her own experience of being subjected to a political attack site. "It's really all the victims that have come forward after this," she said. And crimes "relating to child pedophiles and things like that." "

Its for the children!!!!!!

I didn't do this so I could suppress people who might out my bad acts, we have to stop child molesters!

Has she not watched the Wizard of Oz enough to know that no matter how big the display is to distract people someone always pulls the curtain aside and reveals the truth?
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The Devil's Coachman (profile), 28 Jan 2012 @ 6:35am

Re:
Yep, that's all they ever need to say to justify their fascism - "It's for the children!" or "It's to fight terrorism!". Then, the mouth-breathing boneheads who comprise the majority of the electorate lap it up and say, "Yes! Please give us some more!", and the country continues its devolution into Idiocracy, which is now an irreversible process.
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Michael Langford, 28 Jan 2012 @ 10:28am

Re:
You don't have to use google.
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Anonymous Coward, 28 Jan 2012 @ 11:20am

Re: Pass a bill like this
People go into politics because they are baffled by the magic picture box.
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That Anonymous Coward (profile), 28 Jan 2012 @ 9:54pm

Re: Re:
In this case it looks like she has been doing some seriously underhanded things and this just looks like a way for her to be able to get all sorts of evidence against her accusers without a long court battle or looking skeezy, because the data is just there...
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swapnil, 29 Jan 2012 @ 9:32am

can't believe someone can be that dumb
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jenn, 7 Aug 2012 @ 8:37pm

facts?
The problem with your article here is it is based on incorrect facts. What happened is one misinformed person incorrectly reported what the bill was asking for. What was not reported is that your info is already stored. The bill was asking to hold the information longer because by the time law enforcement was getting subpoena for the information, the information was purged. (in 6 months) If a child was molested or kidnapped, this could make a big difference in catching the person responsible. The people who would have access to your info would not change. They would still require court orders for that info. So in short, they were not asking for any thing different then what already occurs, only that they are required to store the information longer than 6 months. PERIOD. Everyone kept reporting the same incorrect information until it was just stated as fact, when really, it was all wrong. Look into it. I saw someone mention it on TechHui site and checked it out myself. Really amazing how easy it is to make people believe untrue information. Apparently everyone is too wrapped up in thinking there is a conspiracy to actually look into the facts.

AND What Pine backed down on, was the bill about web designers specifically as it had some gray areas she didn't anticipate. 2 different bills.
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