Why Is Andrew Cuomo Pushing ISPs To Use Spyware On Everyone's Internet Traffic?

from the political-ambitions-over-common-sense dept

We've already covered NY AG Andrew Cuomo's ridiculous crusade to get ISPs to censor content in a misguided attempt to stop child porn. Obviously, stopping child porn is a good goal, but Cuomo's approach actually makes the problem worse and sets a dangerous precedent. First, rather than actually tackling the root of the problem, Cuomo simply demanded that ISPs block any site that he and a group he supports consider to be child porn. Of course, they have no legal requirement to block them (section 230 of the CDA was written to make it clear that ISPs are not at all liable here), but Cuomo got around that by promising to shame publicly any ISP that didn't implement his plan. This is the lowest of the low of political tricks, and it would simply be lying. An ISP may be quite committed to stomping out child porn, and could recognize that Cuomo's tactics actually make the problem worse, by not targeting the actual pornographers -- and Cuomo would still publicly splash their names across the news as not wanting to stop child porn.

In fact, a recent look at the details of Cuomo's highly publicized campaign found that Cuomo clearly exaggerated the extent of the problem for political benefit, forcing ISPs to block all of Usenet, despite 99.9997% of the 3.7 billion available Usenet articles being perfectly legitimate content. But that's not stopping Cuomo. In fact, he's going even further.

He's been sending ISPs a presentation from a company called Brilliant Digital that's offering a "deep packet inspection" system that could scan every file sent across an ISP's network and try to determine if it was child porn. Yes, Cuomo is suggesting that ISPs spy on every single file sent over their network now, 4th Amendment be damned. Brilliant Digital even claims that its system can trick users into sending files unencrypted, so even those who send encrypted traffic could be spied upon. Cuomo claims that he's not endorsing the product, but just thought ISPs would be interested in looking into it. Yet, given his heavy handed tactics earlier in this effort, it's pretty clear what message he's sending.

But why Brilliant Digital? If the name sounds familiar, it's because the company has an extremely sketchy past that has been touched on before. It was, effectively, one of the first surreptitious "adware" installs, back in the day, when it tried to secretly distribute a "legit" P2P file sharing system that would sit on top of the popular Kazaa and give you the option of paying for songs rather than just straight file sharing them. The software was downloaded and secretly installed on one million computers, before it was revealed.

This is the company our politicians want spying on every packet sent across the internet?

Not only that, but Brilliant Digital is also (of course) rather aggressive on the patent front, suing Streamcast for daring to make use of a hash system for trying to identify music tracks being shared over a P2P network. So we have an Australian spyware company that wants to scan every bit of traffic and identify it (even if it's encrypted), and it's being pushed by a US politician who has a history of trying to publicly shame companies into doing his bidding, even if it involves lying about them. And, the whole damn thing almost certainly violates the 4th Amendment.

Last week, we wrote about Paul Ohm's suggestion that we should create a stronger privacy law that outlawed deep packet inspection, as that would pretty much stop any attempt to break net neutrality without requiring special net neutrality laws. It's worth noting that such a law would also have the added benefit of making it doubly clear to Cuomo that such a program is quite illegal.

Filed Under: andrew cuomo, deep packet inspection, isp blocking, objectionable content, porn
Companies: brilliant digital

Andrew Cuomo's Blueprint For How Gov't Can Get ISPs To Censor Content

from the how-gov't-censorship-will-work dept

It looks like NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has put forth a nice blueprint for how politicians can "censor" online content without technically breaking a law themselves: just threaten to publicly humiliate ISPs who won't censor for you. The process was quite straightforward actually. Cuomo basically threatened that he would sue these ISPs for not agreeing to his own vendetta against "objectionable content" where a third party -- with no oversight -- gets to determine what's objectionable. Even though there is no legal reason why these ISPs need to block such content, Cuomo made it clear that the publicity around such a lawsuit, implying that the ISPs weren't against such objectionable content, would be a public relations nightmare.

So, one by one ISPs have been caving. Broadband Reports notes that at least two more ISPs have agreed to sign Cuomo's "rules" even if they're not even sure how they'll follow through on them. Of course, as we've pointed out, this is all about politics anyway, as following the "rules" will do absolutely nothing to stop the production or consumption of objectionable content.

Either way, now other politicians have the blueprint for censorship: simply threaten the ISPs that you'll sue them and publicly claim that they're unwilling to be "family friendly" or "protect the children" or any other buzzword.

Filed Under: andrew cuomo, censorship, isp blocking, objectionable content

Comcast Caves To Cuomo

from the seems-like-extortion dept

Remember last week, when NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo threatened Comcast with a lawsuit, if it didn't start blocking access to a list of "objectionable" content? It was quite clear that Cuomo's threat had no legal basis -- as the law is quite clear that, as a service provider, Comcast is not responsible for what happens on the network -- but Cuomo stated (just as clearly) that he would sue anyway, and associate Comcast in peoples' minds with objectionable content. Unfortunately, it looks like the bullying threat worked: Comcast has agreed to support Cuomo's proposal. There's simply no legal basis for this, and it opens up a seriously slippery slope in saying that ISPs can block access to "objectionable" content. Yet, apparently, it's just not worth it to stand up against politicians who want to paint you as a supporter of child porn, even if that's completely ridiculous.

Filed Under: andrew cuomo, isp blocking, objectionable content, porn
Companies: comcast

Andrew Cuomo Gloats Over Getting AOL To Do What It Already Does

from the nice-work dept

We've already pointed out how ridiculous it is for NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo to be pressuring ISPs to start blocking news groups and access to certain websites with "objectionable" content. Doing so actually makes the problems Cuomo is trying to fix worse. That's because he's not actually going after the source of the problem, meaning that it will continue to exist and just be harder for law enforcement officials to track down. This is pure political theater with Cuomo getting his name in the headlines for pretending to solve the problem, when all he's really done is get some ISPs to sweep the problem under the rug -- where it's only going to fester more.

Even more ridiculous, however, is the latest announcement from Cuomo, gloating over the fact that two more ISPs, AT&T and AOL will join with the ISPs from the original announcement and cut off access to newsgroups and objectionable websites. In the case of AOL, this is especially ridiculous since it's already done this for many years. Declan McCullagh even got AOL to admit: "We have not changed any policies or procedures as part of today's announcement."

Of course, "we're doing what we've always done" doesn't make good headlines for ambitious politicians.

Filed Under: andrew cuomo, isp blocking, porn
Companies: aol, at&t

How Cuomo's Anti-Child Porn Efforts Will Make The Child Porn Problem Worse

from the driving-it-underground dept

In discussing NY Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's success in getting ISPs to block a list of child porn sites and newsgroups, we noted that it wouldn't do a damn thing to stop child porn. The reality is that it may actually make the problem worse. It turns out that these efforts to make it harder to access child porn have serious unintended consequences: basically, those involved with child porn still have plenty of ways to access it, but it's much more underground than before. It makes it that much harder for law enforcement officials to track down those actually responsible and to stop child porn at its source. Again, it's a noble goal to try to stop child porn, but making ISPs block access to sites isn't the answer. And, the fact that those ISPs are admitting that they're blocking more than just the list makes those unintended consequences even worse. What Cuomo has done is make it harder to stop child pornography while also opening the door to others censoring the internet.

Filed Under: andrew cuomo, isp blocking, porn

NY Pressures ISPs Into Blocking Child Porn Websites, News Groups

from the good-goal,-bad-approach dept

New York's Attorney General, Andrew Cuomo, has a history of using his position to threaten big companies into agreeing to take responsibility for something that isn't their responsibility. He did it when he got advertisers to pay fines because their ads showed up in adware -- without ever explaining what was actually illegal. And, now he's done it again in getting a bunch of ISPs (Verizon, Sprint and Time Warner) to agree to block a list of websites and newsgroups that are listed as being purveyors of child porn. The ISPs are also giving Cuomo's office over a million dollars, ostensibly to help wipe child porn off the internet. If that's Cuomo's goal, this isn't the best way to do it -- though, it will get him plenty of press coverage for bullying companies into doing something they aren't required to do under law.

In fact, the state of Pennsylvania tried to do pretty much the same thing, back in 2002, but focused on actually passing a law (unlike Cuomo, who just bullied the companies into "agreeing.") And, of course, a federal court tossed out the law as unconstitutional. The goal is certainly noble. Getting rid of child porn would be great -- but having ISPs block access to an assigned list isn't going to do a damn thing towards that goal. The blocked sites will reappear elsewhere. Those who want access, even to the blocked sites, will simply find encrypted tunnels to hide their paths. Basically, this won't do much of anything, other than increase costs for ISPs.

Even worse, it runs a huge risk of starting ISPs down a very slippery slope of being willing to ban access to online content. No one's against that when it's child porn, but who's reviewing the list to make sure it's really child porn? How hard is it to slip a site that someone just doesn't like into the list? Furthermore, once these ISPs have shown that they're willing to block certain sites, then politicians will quickly look to increase that list beyond just child porn to other types of sites that they find objectionable. It sets a dangerous precedent.

Putting the responsibility on the ISPs is the wrong solution (and, honestly, the folks who are pro-net neutrality should be seriously worried about this -- as it's a clear violation of what they say net neutrality is all about). If the content itself is illegal, go after those actually responsible for the content. Not the service providers. Sure they make for easy targets and big headlines (backed up with that hefty cash "settlement" right to Cuomo's office), but they're not the ones responsible.

Filed Under: andrew cuomo, isp blocking, new york, porn
Companies: sprint, time warner, verizon