The *Coast Guard* produces skiffy? Who knew?
Yeah, I did qualify them as "dubious", which may have been an understatement, but I have great faith in the critical thinking skills of Teresa's readers. :)
There are some dubious (and badly-organized) statistics on this page; I guess it all comes down to how you define "harmed"...
Dynamic IP assignments have long been logged, both for dial-up users and those assigned IPs by DHCP. It's not too onerous; all you really need is to record the IP, an user ID, and the start and end time of the assignment. Some ISPs routinely keep these logs for a while, to track down abuse; others (British Telecom is one who comes to mind) only keep them for a few days (48 hours, in the case of BT).
I know people keep talking about "recording emails and IMs" and so on, but the bill only seems to mention the "name and address" and so on of customers; I interpreted this as an attempt to thwart paedophiles using "free trials" from ISPs, or hopping between dial-up providers every month, and force their (former) ISPs to retain their former customers' records long enough to give the government a chance to subpoena them. Every other industry has data-retention laws, why not IT?
I realize it says "at a minimum", but the expense associated with more complete recording of users' internet activitiy, not to mention the technical challenges of automagically identifying "exploitative" material, are going to ensure this bill goes nowhere.
Much more worrisome is the reporting requirement, that an ISP tell the government when a customer has the "potential" to access exploitative content. News flash - if you're reading this, you, potentially, have access to kiddie pr0n, and your ISP has "facilitated" this access...
| Year | Number of comments posted |
|---|---|
| 2007 | 6 |
Total: 6 comments. View all these comments on a single page.
The most recent 20 comments posted to Making Light by Nemo:
Show all comments by Nemo.