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Electronic Frontier Foundation Politics Your Rights Online

Obama Administration Threatens CISPA Veto, EFF Urges Action 106

An anonymous reader sent in word that the Obama administration is threatening to veto CISPA in its current form because "The Administration, however, remains concerned that the bill does not require private entities to take reasonable steps to remove irrelevant personal information (PDF) when sending cybersecurity data to the government or other private sector entities. Citizens have a right to know that corporations will be held accountable — and not granted immunity — for failing to safeguard personal information adequately. The Administration is committed to working with all stakeholders to find a workable solution to this challenge." Ars has a few more details, the EFF urges U.S. citizens to oppose the bill, and one of the sponsors tweeted that those opposed to the bill are basement dwelling fourteen-year-olds. Note that the Administration still wants there to be some kind of comprehensive data sharing law in the name of cybersecurity, so this may very well rear its head again in the coming months.
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Obama Administration Threatens CISPA Veto, EFF Urges Action

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  • American politics is all over the board on so many things.

    What kind of United States citizen wants to oppose the POTUS on protecting citizens' rights from corporate interests?

    • by AlphaWolf_HK ( 692722 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @07:25AM (#43471087)

      That isn't what he's doing. He's asking that they share information, they just don't share irrelevant information. The EFF is in opposition by asking that no information be shared at all.

      It's basically one group wants to stick a rebar up your ass, Obama says "no, a silicone dildo with lube will do", EFF says "don't stick anything up our asses."

      • by pvera ( 250260 ) <pedro.vera@gmail.com> on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @09:13AM (#43472077) Homepage Journal

        It's basically one group wants to stick a rebar up your ass, Obama says "no, a silicone dildo with lube will do", EFF says "don't stick anything up our asses."

        I am so stealing your example.

      • It's basically one group wants to stick a rebar up your ass, Obama says "no, a silicone dildo with lube will do", EFF says "don't stick anything up our asses."

        Not really. One group wants to use the rebar. Obama says "we'll disguise it as a dildo".

        We know ever since the Yahoo data release years ago that there is no such thing as "anonymized" data. Removing "personally identifiable information" doesn't work.

        So even if Obama's proposed changes were adopted, it's still rebar.

    • by SJHillman ( 1966756 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @07:26AM (#43471099)

      I can think of a few
      - The citizens who own the corporations, or are sufficiently high enough in its organization to make wads of money off it
      - The citizens who think POTUS is on the right track, but is approaching it wrong or have issues with the current implementation
      - The crazy fuckers who oppose POTUS at every turn because he's black/Arab/has a white grandmother/The Man/Muslim/not Muslim/supports Israel/hates Israel/is from Kenya/is from Hawaii/is getting gray hairs/etc
      - The slightly less crazy fuckers who oppose POTUS at every turn because they oppose his general political stance, but don't have the time/effort to pick and choose which specific issues to oppose
      - and many more!

      • To clarify something here, it's easy for people on /. so scream "BUT BUT BUT the PEOPLE own the corporations!!11!", but every time that gets mentioned it is always left out that over the half the stock of U.S. corporations are owned by the top 1% of the population.

        When you say "the citizens own the corporations" you are basically saying the CEO class. They're the ones with the most stock.

        I don't think that was the intention here, but the "people own the corporations" argument as a way to say that the corpo

        • week* weak

          good f'n morning.

        • You're right about what I meant. The original poster was asking "what kind of citizen"? and I gave a few examples of them. However, as with the other examples, these are a small (but very vocal) minority of the overall population and in a true democracy would have almost no say in matters. However, there are people that think the big money CEOs shouldn't get any say, effectively denying them their rights as a citizen. I think they should get the same say as any other citizen ("one person, one vote" so to sp

          • by MickyTheIdiot ( 1032226 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @08:06AM (#43471413) Homepage Journal

            Absolutely. "One man one vote" is a phrase that comes to my mind a lot these days.

            I absolutely don't have a problem with CEOs voicing their opinions. I have a problem with their opinions holding perhaps one million times the weight mine does a private citizen. I don't even have a problem with a CEO opinion holding more weight than mine in certain cases (as experts, especially), but right now the private citizen means nothing. We keep hearing screams about "liberty," but as I read the constitution that's WAY out of line for what they believed liberty to be.

        • by Curunir_wolf ( 588405 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @08:30AM (#43471597) Homepage Journal

          To clarify something here, it's easy for people on /. so scream "BUT BUT BUT the PEOPLE own the corporations!!11!", but every time that gets mentioned it is always left out that over the half the stock of U.S. corporations are owned by the top 1% of the population.

          Do you have a reference for that? I've always heard that the vast majority is held in retirement account trusts, which would be a hell of a lot more than "the 1%", it would include everyone with anything other than SS to retire on.

          • Through my 401k, I own stock in several amoral multi-nationals. I have just as much control over them as I do the multi-national that employs me. Your argument is a purposeful distraction - basically propaganda for the criminal .001% that rule over everyone.

          • by suutar ( 1860506 )
            are those voting shares?
      • by Curunir_wolf ( 588405 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @08:28AM (#43471579) Homepage Journal

        This bill sucks. The supposed "veto threat" is just a way to make it more to his liking. He'll sign it no matter what. We should have learned by now that, in spite of Obama's rhetoric to the contrary, he consistently supports every initiative that supports or helps big corporations that gets to his desk. The only exception I can think of is the Keystone Pipeline, and even with that he claimed it was someone else's decision.

    • Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @07:53AM (#43471309)
      Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • by IndustrialComplex ( 975015 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @08:30AM (#43471591)

        I mean how can anybody even say we have a left and a right when the left POTUS is as pro big brother as the right or say we have a right when their POTUS blows through as much cash as any left winger.

        We do have a left and a right. What you are missing is the 'Up' and 'Down' which represents Authoritarian vs Libertarian.

        So you have a Left Authoritarian, and Right Authoritarian.

        So you really do get the option between left and right. What you don't get is choice for liberty.

        • Traditionally the political spectrum runs from Left (Anarchy) to Right (Authoritarian). What we have in this country is a mainstream Right leaning party with socialist tenancies and a mainstream Right leaning party with capitalist (or Corporatocracy) leanings. In recent years it has become popular to view political leanings on a two dimensional grid with Left/Right representing the X axis and Socialist/Corporatist representing the Y. Allowing for this both parties are fairly far to the right of the spect
          • by steveg ( 55825 )

            Um. So which one of our political parties is *not* Corporatist?

            I seem to have missed that part.

            • Ha, true. In reality they are but one party still tries to sale itself as being for the people.
            • Comment removed based on user account deletion
            • To correct and expound on GP's post, traditional Left and Right can both be Anarchy or Authoritarian. All political parties in the U.S. swing towards being authoritarian by being far right in terms of Economics trumping Individualistic Freedoms.

              The Libertarian movement in the U.S. is also far right and is a bastardization of Libertarian philosophies, so much so that they are not even considered Libertarian as their policies on free enterprise is counter to the core belief of Individual Freedom. "True" Liber

      • Fully agreed.
      • ...they need to make encryption as simple and easy as pushing a button...

        I quite agree, only I'd do away with the button. Always-on encryption is what users need today. This one step would eliminate the most egregious violations of the user's privacy by corporate, governmental, and criminal enterprises.

        If it's too late to add always-on encryption to the existing internet infrastructure, then so be it. We'll have to build another, more secure, network. The sooner, the better.

  • by Bananatree3 ( 872975 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @07:16AM (#43471043)
    You can count on this issue never going away. For all the corporately-fueled K St. lobbiests lurking in Congress, private citizens have *VERY* few friends. The Electronic Frontier Foundation [eff.org] is one of them, the American Civil Liberties Union [aclu.org] is another. Donations to these two organizations, and others like them are the only way to ensure these watchdog organizations stick around. Without watchdog organizations pouring over every amendment and potential bill we are FUBAR'd. Who else will be watching the watchers?
    • by MickyTheIdiot ( 1032226 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @07:55AM (#43471329) Homepage Journal

      I don't count the ACLU as a friend of the private citizen. At least I don't these days.

      They are constantly fighting for corporate rights because of supposed slippery-slope effects on everyone's rights. I can't see it that way. Due to the concentration of power corporations have due to their very legal nature I can't see how the rights of a corporation should legally be equal to that of an individual. By doing so you ensure a situation like the one we are in now where a corporation with enough lawyers can steamroll over any individual they want.

      The ACLU is not the friend of the private citizen until they step back and say "yeah, corporations deserve rights, but they should be second-tier, below the rights of the individual citizen." Until they do that they are on the side of corporate anarchy, whether they realize it or not.

    • by visualight ( 468005 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @08:13AM (#43471471) Homepage

      The people who live in Lansing Michigan are to blame for this. I was just looking at the Mike Rogers video on youtube and wishing he represented my district so I could vote against him.

      Then I realized that I can still hate on everyone who lives in Lansing Michigan because Mike Rogers is ultimately *their fault*.

      To put it another way, All of us need to hold the people of respective districts responsible for what their congressmen do.

      Fuck You Lansing, CISPA is your fault so do something about it. Oh, and fuck Mike Rogers for thinking he's smarter than the average 14 year old.

      • by Anonymous Coward

        The people who live in the USA are to blame for this. I was just looking at the George Bush video on youtube and wishing he represented my country so I could vote against him.

        Then I realized that I can still hate on everyone who lives in the USA because George Bush is ultimately *their fault*.

        To put it another way, All of us need to hold the people of respective countries responsible for what their presidents do.

        Fuck You USA, war in the Middle East is your fault so do something about it. Oh, and fuck George Bush for thinking he's smarter than the average 14 year old.

        I changed that for you so you can see what you sound like. Everytime someone mentions Bush, you Americans go on about how he's the fault of the other Americans (+ gerrymandering). But when you're not the one being blamed, it seems you think it's fine to blame everyone in the area.

      • Please don't let CISPA's other co-sponsor, Democrat Dutch Ruppersberger, off the hook. He is just as responsible for CISPA as Mike Rogers is. Many of us were gerrymandered into Ruppersberger's 2nd District of Maryland last election (thanks Annapolis!) and are terribly ashamed that our new representative is advancing this abortion of a bill for a vote.

        So, if I may -- Fuck You Baltimore County, Maryland -- as much as it pains me to say that about the place where I was born and raised, it is well deserved.

  • "I do not believe the administration knows how to work with a legislative body," Rep. Rogers said. "We have come a long way on some of their points."

    No he cant work with legislative bodies. A good case for when compromise is not always the best course. Yet another way for government to get private information from private companies, never mind private companies sharing amongst themselves. Someday soon the time will come when what you buy is recorded, say you buy viagra. Not only will you start getting of

    • This is a serious question, I don't know the answer. Does HIPAA protect pharmaceutical purchases? If you buy Viagra from (insert international online pharmacy here), that might be a little different. But for a legit online/in-person pharmacy this seems protected info, and there's enough old ladies/gents out there who'd go apeshit on their legislators if their pill-buying habits were being bought/sold like Facebook likes...
      • Yes, prescription medication information is covered under HIPAA in various ways.

      • Re:HIPAA? (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Curunir_wolf ( 588405 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @08:45AM (#43471787) Homepage Journal

        This is a serious question, I don't know the answer. Does HIPAA protect pharmaceutical purchases?

        I does now. But it won't after the gun control "universal background" check gets passed. There is an explicit exemption in there for all medical providers to share information with the background check system. So if you're prescribed anything from Haldol to Ritalin to Prozac (and any other flavor of SSRI), or even Wellbutrin, you'll be flagged as having a mental illness and unable to purchase a gun, and probably have any you own confiscated. They already do that in New York and California.

        It's a good idea, but a bad implementation. It's a sledgehammer approach better implemented by relying on psychiatrists and psychologists evaluations. It will sweep up a lot of veterans that are no danger to anyone but the bad actors on the streets.

        • We agree about one thing: you *are* a crackpot. This is another Glenn Beck urban myth. In fact, there was a bogus story last week about exactly this kind of thing happening -- a local police force confiscated a guy's guns because he had been prescribed an anti-depressant. The local Clear Channel station picked it up and interviewed a local attorney who whined for 15 minutes that "I told you sol! I told you this would happen!" The next day, it turned out that the story was misreported and the local poli
          • That was sure a long post with little more than "La la la I can't hear you" head-in-the-sand reaction. There is a lot more to the story that you could have found if you hadn't latched on to the first denial you had found and dismissed anything said by people that you have ideological differences with. The New American [thenewamerican.com] has some good coverage of the whole story. Whatever you heard about something "misreported", you have characterized it in an even less true way. The fact is, the guy had to appeal to the S [ynn.com]

  • by dkleinsc ( 563838 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @07:25AM (#43471089) Homepage

    We're 41-year-old basement dwellers, you insensitive clod!

    • And what about the attic dwelling 14-year-olds? #annefrank
      • by SJHillman ( 1966756 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @07:49AM (#43471277)

        Anne Frank's diary would have likely been considerably shorter if she had access to Facebook or other social media. The Reich would have probably been monitoring it pretty closely. We've recently seen how the Internet can help revolution in some countries, but none of them have been under an iron grip as tight by a country with the resources of Nazi Germany, in which case the Internet would probably have been used against the people more than helping them.

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Who's going to hold the government accountable? They don't even have to disclose when they lose your personal information. Yeah corporations don't always have your best interests at heart, but neither does the government. It seems like a lot of people misplace their faith in them. You want to protect your personal information? Don't give it out. When I'm at the register and they ask me for my phone number? I tell 'em no. Sometimes I'm not even nice about it. If they press me I tell them I don't hav

    • by SJHillman ( 1966756 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @07:54AM (#43471321)

      Withholding the information will work for now while this stuff is still in turmoil. However, if it becomes established across all businesses, then where will you go to buy food if no one will sell it to you without your phone number? What about a car? A home or apartment? I'm not so paranoid that I object to giving out a little personal information (like a ZIP code) but I don't like the idea of giving companies information not directly relevant to the business we're doing. If you're shipping me something, I can see why you would need my phone number. If I'm buying it in-store, then you don't need that. Unfortunately, most people will just give whatever information is asked for... I've had people give me their SS# or bank PIN because they misunderstood me when I was asking for something else.

      The general masses don't understand that information is the ultimate smart bomb... it can be used to target a single individual with almost no collateral damage and can be launched from anywhere in the world at any time with no warning. The only defense is to protect the information and prevent it from spreading as much as possible.

  • by codewarren ( 927270 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @07:42AM (#43471205)

    that 14 year old basement dwellers do not have rights and are not really people.

    • by ebno-10db ( 1459097 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @07:46AM (#43471237)
      14-year-old basement dwellers may be the only Americans left with an appreciation of the Bill of Rights. Maybe that's the age when you learn about the Constitution in detail. I suggest everyone take an annual refresher course.
    • [Everyone knows] that 14 year old basement dwellers do not have rights and are not really people.

      FINALLY Everyone is thinking of the Children!
      They just don't think very highly of them, is all...
      Choosy Mom's can't choose Beggars?

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Yup, what an inane example - 14 year old basement dwellers. I, for one, remember what it was like being marginalized as a teenager by "the grown ups who know better" and don't take kindly to this kind of remark.

  • So I guess "Land of the Free" is now the equivalent of "Unlimited Internet". Guess we'll need to insert a fast-talking legal disclaimer guy into the national anthem now.
  • by sirlark ( 1676276 ) on Wednesday April 17, 2013 @08:10AM (#43471451)

    Citizens have a right to know that corporations will be held accountable — and not granted immunity —

    Like the telecomms weren't granted immunity?

  • The only person that would call opponents "14 year old basement dwellers" are 14 year old basement dwellers. Whoever elected a 14 year old to congress is an idiot.

    Congressman, you've been called. Score -5, Troll for you.

  • I don't have a basement to put my soon-to-be 14 year olds in.
  • Republicans are totally out of touch with people. Rogers is a Republican. So he has an excuse for being totally out of touch with people.

  • one of the sponsors tweeted that those opposed to the billare basement dwelling fourteen year olds.

    How rude!

    Arise! Arise, and make your voices heard, basement-dwelling 40 year olds! >:-(

  • The president threatened to veto the 2012 NDAA as well. Then, they amended the bill to grant government the power to indefinitely detain U.S. citizens on U.S. soil without charge trial or access to legal counsel and he signed.

    Guess he's holding out for the "Internet kill switch" provision he's been wanting for years.

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