Senate Proposal -Restrictions on Internet Freedom
Drew263
Birmingham, AL Posts: 602
Our government, both parties, are out of control..
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/04 ... -freedoms/
Senate Proposal Could Put Heavy Restrictions on Internet Freedoms
The days of an open, largely unregulated Internet may soon come to an end.
A bill making its way through Congress proposes to give the U.S. government authority over all networks considered part of the nation's critical infrastructure. Under the proposed Cybersecurity Act of 2009, the president would have the authority to shut down Internet traffic to protect national security.
The government also would have access to digital data from a vast array of industries including banking, telecommunications and energy. A second bill, meanwhile, would create a national cybersecurity adviser -- commonly referred to as the cybersecurity czar -- within the White House to coordinate strategy with a wide range of federal agencies involved.
The need for greater cybersecurity is obvious:
-- Canadian researchers recently discovered that computers in 103 countries, including those in facilities such as embassies and news media offices, were infected with software designed to steal network data.
-- A Seattle security analyst warned last month that the advancement of digital communication within the electrical grid, as promoted under President Obama's stimulus plan, would leave the nation's electrical supply dangerously vulnerable to hackers.
-- And on Tuesday the Wall Street Journal reported that computer spies had broken into the Pentagon's $300 billion Joint Strike Fighter project and had breached the Air Force's air-traffic-control system.
Nonetheless, the proposal to give the U.S. government the authority to regulate the Internet is sounding alarms among critics who say it's another case of big government getting bigger and more intrusive.
Silicon Valley executives are calling the bill vague and overly intrusive, and they are rebelling at the thought of increased and costly government regulations amid the global economic crisis.
Others are concerned about the potential erosion of civil liberties. "I'm scared of it," said Lee Tien, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco-based group.
"It's really broad, and there are plenty of laws right now designed to prevent the government getting access to that kind of data. It's the same stuff we've been fighting on the warrantless wiretapping."
Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W. Va, who introduced the bill earlier this month with bipartisan support, is casting the legislation as critical to protecting everything from our water and electricity to banking, traffic lights and electronic health records.
"I know the threats we face." Rockefeller said in a prepared statement when the legislation was introduced. "Our enemies are real. They are sophisticated, they are determined and they will not rest."
The bill would allow the government to create a detailed set of standards for cybersecurity, as well as take over the process of certifying IT technicians. But many in the technology sector say the government is simply ill-equipped to get involved at the technical level, said Franck Journoud, a policy analyst with the Business Software Alliance.
"Simply put, who has the expertise?" he said. "It's the industry, not the government. We have a responsibility to increase and improve security. That responsibility cannot be captured in a government standard."
A spokeswoman from Rockefeller's office said neither he nor the two senators who co-sponsored the bill, Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, and Bill Nelson, D-Fla., will answer questions on cybersecurity until a later date.
Obama, meanwhile, is considering his own strategy on cybersecurity. On Friday, the White House completed a lengthy review of the nation's computer networks and their vulnerability to attack. An announcement is expected as early as this week.
"I kind of view [the Rockefeller bill] as an opening shot," said Tien. "The concept is cybersecurity. There's this 60-day review underway, and some people wanted to get in there and make their mark on the White House policy development."
IT leaders hope the president will consider their argument that their business is not only incredibly complex and static, but that it also spreads over the entire globe.
If the United States was to set its own standard for cybersecurity, they say, it would create a host of logistical challenges for technology companies, virtually all of which operate internationally.
"Any standards have to be set at an international level and be industry led," said Dale Curtis, a spokesman for the Business Software Alliance. "This industry moves so fast, and government just doesn't move that fast."
Many Silicon Valley executives remain hopeful that the White House's recommendations will be more industry-friendly, following what Journoud said was a good dialogue with former Bush administration official Melissa Hathaway, who is leading the White House review and is considered a likely candidate for cybersecurity czar.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/04 ... -freedoms/
Senate Proposal Could Put Heavy Restrictions on Internet Freedoms
The days of an open, largely unregulated Internet may soon come to an end.
A bill making its way through Congress proposes to give the U.S. government authority over all networks considered part of the nation's critical infrastructure. Under the proposed Cybersecurity Act of 2009, the president would have the authority to shut down Internet traffic to protect national security.
The government also would have access to digital data from a vast array of industries including banking, telecommunications and energy. A second bill, meanwhile, would create a national cybersecurity adviser -- commonly referred to as the cybersecurity czar -- within the White House to coordinate strategy with a wide range of federal agencies involved.
The need for greater cybersecurity is obvious:
-- Canadian researchers recently discovered that computers in 103 countries, including those in facilities such as embassies and news media offices, were infected with software designed to steal network data.
-- A Seattle security analyst warned last month that the advancement of digital communication within the electrical grid, as promoted under President Obama's stimulus plan, would leave the nation's electrical supply dangerously vulnerable to hackers.
-- And on Tuesday the Wall Street Journal reported that computer spies had broken into the Pentagon's $300 billion Joint Strike Fighter project and had breached the Air Force's air-traffic-control system.
Nonetheless, the proposal to give the U.S. government the authority to regulate the Internet is sounding alarms among critics who say it's another case of big government getting bigger and more intrusive.
Silicon Valley executives are calling the bill vague and overly intrusive, and they are rebelling at the thought of increased and costly government regulations amid the global economic crisis.
Others are concerned about the potential erosion of civil liberties. "I'm scared of it," said Lee Tien, an attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco-based group.
"It's really broad, and there are plenty of laws right now designed to prevent the government getting access to that kind of data. It's the same stuff we've been fighting on the warrantless wiretapping."
Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W. Va, who introduced the bill earlier this month with bipartisan support, is casting the legislation as critical to protecting everything from our water and electricity to banking, traffic lights and electronic health records.
"I know the threats we face." Rockefeller said in a prepared statement when the legislation was introduced. "Our enemies are real. They are sophisticated, they are determined and they will not rest."
The bill would allow the government to create a detailed set of standards for cybersecurity, as well as take over the process of certifying IT technicians. But many in the technology sector say the government is simply ill-equipped to get involved at the technical level, said Franck Journoud, a policy analyst with the Business Software Alliance.
"Simply put, who has the expertise?" he said. "It's the industry, not the government. We have a responsibility to increase and improve security. That responsibility cannot be captured in a government standard."
A spokeswoman from Rockefeller's office said neither he nor the two senators who co-sponsored the bill, Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, and Bill Nelson, D-Fla., will answer questions on cybersecurity until a later date.
Obama, meanwhile, is considering his own strategy on cybersecurity. On Friday, the White House completed a lengthy review of the nation's computer networks and their vulnerability to attack. An announcement is expected as early as this week.
"I kind of view [the Rockefeller bill] as an opening shot," said Tien. "The concept is cybersecurity. There's this 60-day review underway, and some people wanted to get in there and make their mark on the White House policy development."
IT leaders hope the president will consider their argument that their business is not only incredibly complex and static, but that it also spreads over the entire globe.
If the United States was to set its own standard for cybersecurity, they say, it would create a host of logistical challenges for technology companies, virtually all of which operate internationally.
"Any standards have to be set at an international level and be industry led," said Dale Curtis, a spokesman for the Business Software Alliance. "This industry moves so fast, and government just doesn't move that fast."
Many Silicon Valley executives remain hopeful that the White House's recommendations will be more industry-friendly, following what Journoud said was a good dialogue with former Bush administration official Melissa Hathaway, who is leading the White House review and is considered a likely candidate for cybersecurity czar.
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Comments
agreed. started with Bush and being magnified under Obama. very bad path we are headed down. but who cares, you see how popular Obama is??!?! :roll:
This is such a fucking blatant display of control over the masses, it’s pathetic….can anyone tell me which of the ‘obvious’ reasons for this bill would have been prevented by yet another massive government body regulating it? You will never stay ahead of the hackers…every individual company or government agency should be responsible for their own security….the government having access to their digital data won't help anything...
It’s all about quelling dissent. Period.
I do have an image of 50 million arm chair activists rising up from their basements if the internet was cut off, tho…might be the one thing that could piss off this generation enough to stand up to something…
Rockefeller sponsored…pffft..
I completely agree with you.
Huh? It started long before Bush. Al Gore was one of the few politicians who tried to expand public access to the internet and he met a LOT of closed doors. That was in the 80s.
I don't see how it's getting worse under Obama. I mean, I work in the on-line industry and all I've seen is signs that regulations on my industry are being relaxed just a bit.
That goddamn Rockefeller clan can't keep their meddling fucking hands out of American affairs.
When ole Jay says, "I know the threats we face. Our enemies are real. They are sophisticated, they are determined and they will not rest", he isn't lying in the slightest.
WE are real.
WE are sophisticated.
WE are determined.
and WE
WILL NOT REST.
THAT is what Jay Rockefeller is so goddamn afraid of.
No amount of lying in the mainstream,
no siege of disinformation in the "underground",
and no number of proposed restrictions on our freedoms
will stop the winds of change from blowing the mask right off of the fucking farce that now calls itself "our" "government".
It is apparent to the world now.
I just spoke with two old friends of mine who i only get to see once in a while anymore.
Last i talked to either of them, they seemed relatively shocked and sickened by a few things i brought up -- like the fact that the King family proved in court that the Government killed Martin Luther King.
Fast forward 4 months, i go over for drinks, and when Ben Bernanke get mentioned, both of them go off about how the Fed has been an evil monster that some have tried to fight for 100 years, and that people have been murdered and reporters killed to keep it going. In fact i think the "farce that passes for our government" line is something i may have directly borrowed from one of these girls, in her little monologue.
WTF.
That was NOT my influence.
I never went down that road with them.
But some where over the course of only FOUR MONTHS two ladies i know went from not knowing\caring to having a seed planted that grew into a giant plant of rage and frustration with our current "regime".
What you are seeing now in the senate is a reaction to the fact that information is flowing too fast for these people to control ... they don't like it ONE BIT (no pun intended, har har).
At some point either the elite will have to stimulate (engineer) a popular revolution \ civil war \ violent protest or some other manufactured violent crisis
or they are going to have no basis for continuing their regime.
I know, i know.
I'm crazy, and none of this really happens.
I'm on the last 100 pages of Russ Baker's Family of Secrets and i could go on for hours about all the dirty and fucked up shit in that book -- just on the Bush family alone.
But sleep tight folks, because the bottom line is that it's always 10% crazies that get the job done.
Who do you think fought for, and then initially FOUGHT the American Revolution?
90% of the people could have either cared less, or were in direct sympathy with the British.
A good 10% to eventually 30% were the ones to push for the sake of the people, rights, and liberty.
That core which aggitated and organized early (think, The Sons of Liberty) being maybe 10%.
If I opened it now would you not understand?
Yes sir. And once you win, you can never let your guard down-- THEY will be at it again as soon as THEY are defeated. Constant vigilence is the price you pay for liberty.
End the Fed this weekend?
I can't find much solid information on End The Fed for my area.
The nearest one is probably Richmond, VA to me, but i can't seem to locate info on it.
Here is some motivation from the Tea Party in Raleigh.
BJ Lawson Gives Em Hell in Raleigh
Good stuff.
And more of it from Charlotte last year
makes me happy to see.
If I opened it now would you not understand?