Feds Seek Google Records in Porn Probe

AP Via Yahoo ^ | 2006-01-19

[flashbunny]

The Bush administration, seeking to revive an online pornography law struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court, has subpoenaed Google Inc. for details on what its users have been looking for through its popular search engine.

Google has refused to comply with the subpoena, issued last year, for a broad range of material from its databases, including a request for 1 million random Web addresses and records of all Google searches from any one-week period, lawyers for the U.S. Justice Department said in papers filed Wednesday in federal court in San Jose.

Privacy advocates have been increasingly scrutinizing Google's practices as the company expands its offerings to include e-mail, driving directions, photo-sharing, instant messaging and Web journals.

Although Google pledges to protect personal information, the company's privacy policy says it complies with legal and government requests. Google also has no stated guidelines on how long it keeps data, leading critics to warn that retention is potentially forever given cheap storage costs.

The government contends it needs the data to determine how often pornography shows up in online searches as part of an effort to revive an Internet child protection law that was struck down two years ago by the U.S. Supreme Court on free-speech grounds.

The 1998 Child Online Protection Act would have required adults to use access codes or other ways of registering before they could see objectionable material online, and it would have punished violators with fines up to $50,000 or jail time. The high court ruled that technology such as filtering software may better protect children.

The matter is now before a federal court in Pennsylvania, and the government wants the Google data to help argue that the law is more effective than software in protecting children from porn.

The Mountain View-based company told The San Jose Mercury News that it opposes releasing the information because it would violate the privacy rights of its users and would reveal company trade secrets.

Nicole Wong, an associate general counsel for Google, said the company will fight the government's efforts "vigorously."

"Google is not a party to this lawsuit, and the demand for the information is overreaching," Wong said.

[flashbunny]

and I believe we've out a statist who has no clue what the constitution and bill of rights mean.

[Lazamataz]

Wiping all porn off the internet would be a good start.

"We had to destroy the village to save it" -- This ironic phrase first uttered in Vietnam would be the hallmark of any such effort. You would need to completely destroy the internet outright to even put a dent in porn.

Remember: We are but one country. The internet is global.

[dinoparty]

China outlaws porn? Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

[King of Florida]

Here is the problem with the specific action. There is no probable cause here to justify this information.

If an investigation reveals probable cause that a person used Google to search for child porn, then a subpeona would be valid for that person and that person only. But using subpeona powers in order to gather statistical information is a serious abuse of power.

"Probable cause" has nothing to do with anything here. That's a criminal concept. This is a civil action, and the government has issued a subpoena as part of discovery. Google is apparently going to move for a protective order, asserting trade secrets, confidential information, etc. (the latter involving personal/private information). The government will have to show a reasonable necessity for the info and that they cannot obtain such info otherwise.

[dinoparty]

Actually, I do. They were never intended to create the libertarian utopia, that's for sure.

[Senator Bedfellow]

If you were capable of singlehandedly protecting your children from the PLA or al Qaeda, I'd tell you to do that too. On the other hand, you are perfectly capable of properly raising your own children with respect to pornography, although you've apparently convinced yourself that you're unfit to do so. Perhaps we should take your word for it and have them removed to a better environment with more responsible caregivers.

Also, you may want to invest in a better dictionary - "illogic" does not mean "a concept that dinoparty is unwilling or unable to grasp".

[VictoryGal]

China outlaws all internet speech which is not state-sanctioned. You'd love it there, comrade. Why don't you go there instead of screwing up a free country?

[flashbunny]

no, you don't. You're abso-freaking-lutely clueless. You had no idea WHY the commerce clause was written, and when corrected on it, you act like it's justification for your big-government position.

[flashbunny]

hey, he KNOWS how this free country was supposed to operate.

The ghosts of Tom Jefferson told him that if anything happens between two states, the federal government has power over it!

[steve-b]

This is a civil action

No, it isn't -- who, exactly, is the government suing?

This is an attempt to subpoena private information for no purpose other than to advance the government's political agenda, and as such is an outrageous abuse of the system.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

including a request for 1 million random Web addresses and records of all Google searches from any one-week period, lawyers for the U.S. Justice Department said in papers filed Wednesday in federal court in San Jose.

Ummmm....point of order here...

Constitution of The United States of America:

4th Amendment
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated; and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized.

The word "random" simply doesn't cut the mustard.

[dinoparty]

Funny, I never saw your response to my argument about the barriers to commerce that would be created by a state by state approach to internet porn. Must have missed it. Can you point it out for me?

[flashbunny]

oh dear lord are you serious or just trolling?

The govenrment is NOT in place to do everything. It is there to do the things ordinary citizens CAN'T do themelves.

National defense CAN NOT be done by one person.

Keeping their kids from looking at porn online CAN be done by one parent.

Sheeesh.

[flashbunny]

That's because it was just as idiotic as your other posts. You have no clue what you're talking about, countless others have told you the same, but you keep yakking like you're the only one who really gets it.

Maybe that should be your first clue. Nobody is buying your BS.

[steve-b]

You're abso-freaking-lutely clueless. You had no idea WHY the commerce clause was written, and when corrected on it, you act like it's justification for your big-government position.

On his home page, dinoparty claims to be a lawyer.

Evidently, they don't teach the Constitution (the actual written one, as opposed to the one pulled out of judges' arses) in law school these days.

[flashbunny]

how in the heck is this a 'civil' action???

[fmonkey]

Wiping all porn off the Internet would be a good start.
Then why not turn off your computer and stop using it? Almost every technology on the Internet was designed, created, and mastered by the people that distribute porn. The message board you're using, the user name and password you enter to post messages on the message board, the streaming video you get from foxnews.com, the streaming audio you get when listening to Rush. Like it or not, the porn industry does 'give back' to the community.
That and your argument is almost exactly like the "take everybody's guns away and their won't be anymore gun crime" argument. Just as a heads-up (and I know I'm new here), but those arguments normally don't go over really well here.

[Arthalion]

Truth be told, the state can't filter it anyway. While the constitutional issues with COPPA were numerous, the biggest problem with it is that it's a feel good law that will accomplish little. The vast majority of porn sites are NOT American, they're run out of Europe and Russia where relaxed sexual attitudes and younger ages of consent makes finding models easier. COPPA would have required American porn companies to restrict access to porn, but only a minority of sites would have been affected. Even its effect on the operation of American owned sites is debatable, since many would simply relocate to offshore servers or sell their sites to foreign competitors. Since the Internet doesn't recognize national boundaries, these changes wouldn't even be noticed by the webs users.

Unless we want to emulate the Chinese by separating from the Internet, and creating a government run network that can only access "approved" foreign sites, enforcing regulations on the Internet is akin to herding cats. Case in point, the Can-Spam act. Technically, pornographic spam is already illegal in the United States, and yet we're bombarded with it anyway. Why? Because the marketers simply offshored their spamming services to get around the laws. American law doesn't apply to a spammer in the Bahamas or Russia, and an email from Manila arrives just as fast as an email from Boston.

[shempy]

Already did...commerce clause.

The commerce clause might apply to the porn you have to pay for, but the law they are trying to revive, the 1998 Child Online Protection Act, "would have required adults to use access codes or other ways of registering before they could see objectionable material online." Well guess what? The porn you have to pay for already requires that. So they are talking about the free stuff. Free means there is no commerce.

[Itzlzha]

Wiping all porn off the internet would be a good start.

I see that you are not familiar with the concept of Feedom...as in "Freedom of Speech", nor are you familiar with Voltaire.

See, Free Speech is not just for Speech we like or agree with.

If you do not like something, and do not want to see it...here's a hint...don't LOOK for it! Nor should your Kid be doing so.

Now, conversely...we should prosecute porn purveyors that actively target kids, use misleading URL's or redirects. That is wrong, and so is kiddie porn. Being able to block Kiddie Porn offshore sites should also be do-able.

But you do not have the freedom to tell anyone what they can or cannot see. You may choose to block access to it, but not the product itself.

That is Constitutional.