FCC Moves Corporatization Of Internet Forward Kurt Nimmo Infowars.com May 15, 2014
In addition to the bandwidth issue, commissioners are concerned about large ISPs blocking websites The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has approved a plan that would allow large ISPs to charge sites like Netflix more to receive preferential bandwidth treatment over smaller companies and websites with less resources. The change, approved in a three-to-two vote along partisan political lines, “could unleash a new economy on the Web,” The Washington Post reports today. This new economy will undoubtedly result in less choice for consumers and lead to what may be termed the “televization” of the internet. In other words large players like NBC and Disney will effectively monopolize the medium as they now do with cable and broadcast television. “Smaller companies that can’t afford to pay for faster delivery would likely face additional obstacles against bigger rivals. And consumers could see a trickle-down effect of higher prices as Web sites try to pass along new costs of doing business with Internet service providers.” In addition to the bandwidth issue, commissioners are concerned about large ISPs blocking websites. In February, FCC chairman Tom Wheeler said new rules would prevent content blocking. In January an appeals court, however, ruled the FCC rules represented overreach and gave Verizon and other ISPs new latitude in determining prices for providing Netflix, Amazon, Google and Ebay. The plan, in addition to raising prices, will also allow large ISPs to hobble sites deemed politically and socially unacceptable, from pornography to hacker sites and, importantly, alternative media and political sites. FCC Set to Take up Net Neutrality and What Consumers Will Pay http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCpk6qsFIvk
Ted Cruz Bill Would Ban ‘FCC’s Latest Adventure In Net Neutrality’ Joel Gehrke The Washington Examiner May 15, 2014
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, wants Congress to ban "the FCC's latest adventure in 'net neutrality,' " saying the proposed changes to Internet regulations would damage the industry. "A five-member panel at the FCC should not be dictating how Internet services will be provided to millions of Americans," Cruz said in a Wednesday afternoon statement. "I will be introducing legislation that would remove the claimed authority for the FCC to take such actions, specifically the Commission's nebulous Sec. 706 authority. More than $1 trillion has already been invested in broadband infrastructure, which has led to an explosion of new content, applications, and Internet accessibility. Congress, not an unelected commission, should take the lead on modernizing our telecommunications laws. The FCC should not endanger future investments by stifling growth in the online sector, which remains a much-needed bright spot in our struggling economy." Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., has also denounced the proposed rules unveiled by FCC chairman Tom Wheeler. "The latest proposed rules by Wheeler -- what he's really talking about is creating a fast lane where people can pay to have their content treated unequally," he told Time. "That's not net neutrality. That's pay for play. That's antithetical to net neutrality." Wheeler tried to contradict such charges in an April 24 blog post. "The allegation that it will result in anti-competitive price increases for consumers is also unfounded," he wrote. "That is exactly what the 'commercially unreasonable' test will protect against: harm to competition and consumers stemming from abusive market activity."
DOJ: Americans Have No 4th Amendment Protections At All When They Communicate With Foreigners Mike Masnick Tech Dirt May 15, 2014
We've already questioned if it's really true that the 4th Amendment doesn't apply to foreigners (the Amendment refers to "people" not "citizens"). But in some new filings by the DOJ, the US government appears to take its "no 4th Amendment protections for foreigners" to absurd new levels. It says, quite clearly, that because foreigners have no 4th Amendment protections it means that any Americans lose their 4th Amendment protections when communicating with foreigners. They're using a very twisted understanding of the (already troubling) third party doctrine to do this. As you may recall, after lying to the Supreme Court, the Justice Department said that it would start informing defendants if warrantless collection of information under Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act (FAA) was used in the investigation against them. Last October, it finally started alerting some defendants, leading courts to halt proceedings and reevaluate. As two of those cases have moved forward, the DOJ is trying to defend those cases, and one way it's doing so is to flat out say that Americans have no 4th Amendment protections when talking to foreigners. The Supreme Court has long held that when one person voluntarily discloses information to another, the first person loses any cognizable interest under the Fourth Amendment in what the second person does with the information. . . . For Fourth Amendment purposes, the same principle applies whether the recipient intentionally makes the information public or stores it in a place subject to a government search. Thus, once a non-U.S. person located outside the United States receives information, the sender loses any cognizable Fourth Amendment rights with respect to that information. That is true even if the sender is
a U.S. person protected by the Fourth Amendment, because he assumes the risk that the foreign recipient will give the information to others, leave the information freely accessible to others, or that the U.S. government (or a foreign government) will obtain the information. This argument is questionable on so many levels. First, it's already relying on the questionable third party doctrine, but it seems to go much further, by then arguing that merely providing information to a foreign person means that it's okay for the US government to snoop on it without a warrant. The DOJ further defends this by saying, effectively, that foreign governments might snoop on it as well, so that makes it okay: Moreover, any expectation of privacy of defendant in his electronic communications with a non-U.S. person overseas is also diminished by the prospect that his foreign correspondent could be a target for surveillance by foreign governments or private entities. With this, it appears the DOJ is trying to attack the idea of the reasonable expectation of privacy that has been the basis of the 4th Amendment in the US. They're effectively arguing that since foreign governments might look at the info too, you should have no expectation of privacy in any communications with foreigners and thus you've waived all 4th Amendment protections in that content. That's crazy. In fact, they flat out admit that they're stripping Americans of any 4th Amendment rights with this claim, noting that communicating with foreigners means you've likely "eliminated" your 4th Amendment protections. The privacy rights of US persons in international communications are significantly diminished, if not completely eliminated, when those communications have been transmitted to or obtained from non-US persons located outside the United States. The implications of this argument, if upheld by the court is staggering. It would seem to fly in the face of basic logic and historical 4th Amendment law, all discussing how it's the expectation of privacy that matters. And I'm fairly certain that most of us who regularly communicate with folks outside the US have quite a reasonable expectation of privacy in such communications (though, to be fair, I've been much more actively using encryption when talking to people outside the US lately).
As Jameel Jaffer of the ACLU points out, this eviscerates basic Constitutional protections for many Americans: The government's argument is not simply that the NSA has broad authority to monitor Americans' international communications. The US government is arguing that the NSA's authority is unlimited in this respect. If the government is right, nothing in the Constitution bars the NSA from monitoring a phone call between a journalist in New York City and his source in London. For that matter, nothing bars the NSA from monitoring every call and email between Americans in the United States and their non-American friends, relatives, and colleagues overseas. In the government's view, there is no need to ask whether the 2008 law violates Americans' privacy rights, because in this context Americans have no rights to be violated. I'm curious if anyone wants to defend this as a reasonable interpretation of the 4th Amendment, because it seems quite clearly a complete bastardization of what the 4th Amendment says and how courts have interpreted it over the years. MORE DOCUMENTS HERE FCC Set to Take up Net Neutrality and What Consumers Will Pay VIDEO BELOW http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCpk6qsFIvk
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