Saturday 21 February 2009

Sweeping new legislation proposed for the internet

CNET reports that bills have been introduced in both the House ( H.R.1076 ) and the Senate (S.436 ) that would require all ISPs and operators of millions of Wi-Fi access points including hotels, coffee shops, and home users, to keep records about internet usage for two years to aid police investigations. Both bills are called the "Internet Stopping Adults Facilitating the Exploitation of Today's Youth Act," or Internet SAFETY Act. The language of the bill says "A provider of an electronic communication service or remote computing service shall retain for a period of at least two years all records or other information pertaining to the identity of a user of a temporarily assigned network address the service assigns to that user."
According to CNET, this means that the law applies not just to AT&T, Comcast, Verizon, etc., and not just public Wi-Fi access points, but to individuals, homes, small businesses, large corporations, libraries, schools, universities, and even government agencies.

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