EFF: Senate Puts ISP Profits Over Your Privacy
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According to EFF, "The Senate just voted to roll back your online privacy protections":
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/03/senate-puts-isp-profits-over-your-privacy
Arstechnica also wrote about this: "The US Senate today voted to eliminate broadband privacy rules that would have required ISPs to get consumers' explicit consent before selling or sharing Web browsing data and other private information with advertisers and other companies."
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/03/senate-votes-to-let-isps-sell-your-web-browsing-history-to-advertisers/
I don't understand how ISPs can sell users' private data to advertisers, when people are already paying money for the service?!
More information about this topic is here: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/03/five-creepy-things-your-isp-could-do-if-congress-repeals-fccs-privacy-protections
And here's a link to take action: https://act.eff.org/action/don-t-let-congress-undermine-our-online-privacy
I called my Senators and Representatives, they all voted against it ... thankfully. It narrowly passed, I honestly cannot believe this is being turned into a partisan issue when it only has to do with privacy. If Republicans were not bought out by telco they may actually begin to serve their constituents.
I am a translator!
I never trusted my ISP. I always assumed they did this. I would.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VPN
https://www.torproject.org/
All of the Democrats (and independents that caucus with them) voted against it, and all but 2 Republicans voted for it (the other 2 did not vote). Also, Rand Paul (the "libertarian") wants to have it both ways -- he cosponsored the bill but then missed the vote so that he can say he didn't vote for it. Just an observation.
One of my senators in Florida a D voted no, the other senator from Florida an R voted yes
The house voted for the bill: http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2017/roll200.xml. It will soon become law after Trump signs it.
It may be a bit less straightforward than the EFF would lead us to believe.
That being said, relying on your ISP to protect your privacy isn't wise, even *with* the "best" regulations.
I will trust the EFF over Breitbart any day. Marsha Blackburn is bought by the telecom industry. https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/meet-marsha-blackburn-big-telecoms-best-friend-in-congress
I side with EFF on a lot of things, but so-called "Net Neutrality" and government run so-called "community broadband" I cannot get behind at all, period.
Leftists may see that Vice article as a slam against Blackburn. It read like a glowing endorsement to me.
If I may ask, is there anything in particular you find undesirable about net neutrality or communal broadband networks?
Good question.
Here is a very good article on net neutrality: https://mises.org/library/net-neutrality-scam
tl;dr The internet is amazing and keeps getting better. But under the guise of a bogey man that doesn't exist, the feds usurped power, and given enough time, will micromanage it to death.
As for municipal (government) run broadband, you're making the government the gatekeeper. And governments have a bad history of engaging in anti-freedom behavior much more than private businesses. Now, do I support the "last-mile" monopolies that many municipalities give to ISP's? Also, hell no. I don't want government enforced monopolies, either.
Basically, my position is to keep the government's filthy hands off of the internet as much as possible.
What about the companies' filthy hands? Notice that they (Google, Facebook, Verizon, Comcast, etc.) then collaborate the government's secret services, as Snowden showed.
USA's Internet is terrible. You are lucky if you have a choice between two ISPs in your city. Here is the result of the "invisible hand of the market": a gang-like division of the territory!
Although Europe is becoming worse, it has a much better Internet than the USA. With competing ISPs, prices are lower and the bandwidth broader. In France, for less than 30€/month, you get a fiber connection, unlimited phone calls to most of the world and literally hundreds of TV channels. And, as always, the situation in Scandinavia is even better.
Net neutrality has nothing to do do with "review[ing] the fairness of Google’s search results, Facebook’s news feeds and news sites’ links to one another and to advertisers (...) forcing Apple and Netflix to offer apps for BlackBerry’s unpopular phones, oversee[ing] peering, content-delivery networks and other parts of the interconnected network that enables everything from Netflix and YouTube to security drones and online surgery". You should not blindly believe what the Wall Street Journal publishes. The rest of the article you publish is no better. I would even say it is full of lies/absurdities like "[net neutrality] is, states, employing coercive means can seize goods and services and allocate them according to certain political goals and the goals of people in positions of political power".
Net neutrality means technical intermediaries (such as ISPs) are not allowed to discriminate packets (based on who sends them, receive them or their content). They must act as simple pipes: nothing goes slower/faster, nothing is modified in the way. Nothing more. An important consequence is: a dominant actor (e.g., Netflix) will not remain dominant simply because it can deal with ISPs to get a faster connection to its site, a slower connection to its competitors, a slower BitTorrent protocol, ads on Web pages that the ISP adds, etc. That, is real free market: the best actor wins, playing fair.
I agree with half of what you said, in as much as the mega-corps are in bed with the government and spy on us and collude to remove market competition.
But having FedGov step in and tell ISP's what they can and cannot do with their own hardware, equipment and capital is ridiculous.
Guess what, in a free-market if your ISP is throttling your connection and you don't like it, get a different ISP.
You are lucky if you have a choice between two ISPs in your city. Here is the result of the "invisible hand of the market": a gang-like division of the territory!
Again, that's not the market. That's government-enforced monopolies. But I agree it's a problem. Hopefully some day a completely distributed internet will exist and pay-for ISP's as we now know them will become a thing of the past.
That's government-enforced monopolies.
No, it is not. It is Verizon and Comcast dividing up the territory to not compete. In this way, they can propose a terrible service at an outrageous price. The customer has no other choice.
Then what's stopping a third company from coming in and competing? Or what's to stop neighborhood or community co-ops from owning the last mile?
I understand the frustration here. I live in the middle of nowhere and I only have one provider as an option. And it's slow-ass DSL. I would love to have cable internet.
I want the internet that people in San Francisco get, but in reality, that's not going to happen. It takes time. Rome isn't built in a day, and letting FedGov get involved isn't going to make anything better. Let's work on finding real solutions instead of empowering a bureaucracy (which is subject to regulatory capture).
Sorry if that was not clear Net neutrality does not aim to be an antitrust act. Those are two separate topics. But I deem essential to have laws against against both problems.
The investment for a third company to come in and compete is huge. Especially is the existing ISP refuses to rent its cables.
I know it's huge. That's why I cut these companies some slack if or when they agree "you go here and we'll go there and cover more people instead of competing over the same small scraps."
A lot of people like to point to Europe or Japan or something, but an example of how much easier it is for them is Germany who has a population of 80 million people in a land mass the size of Montana.
Where I live, it's miles and miles and miles in between very small towns and neighborhoods. There are many parts not far from where I live that have no internet service at all, unless they want to do satellite.
And even satellite is hampered by laws such as fair access doctrine. For example, I would gladly pay quadruple for internet if I could get quadruple the amount of GB every month. But nope, I'm not allowed to. Meanwhile, my neighbor who uses the internet 5 minutes a day to check her email pays the same amount as me and uses but a fraction of the bandwidth I do. So, instead of getting faster internet through satellite, I get slower, but unlimited, internet through DSL.
If you really want awesome internet, it's in your best interest to get government out of the situation as much as possible.
A lot of people like to point to Europe or Japan or something, but an example of how much easier it is for them is Germany who has a population of 80 million people in a land mass the size of Montana.
Take Norway. One of the least densely populated territory in the world: 15.5 inhabitants/km² (35 in the USA) but one of the country with the greatest Internet connectivity: 96.3% of the population was connected to Internet in 2014 (73% in the USA), with the third best average speed in 2015: 18.8 Mb/s (8.7 in the USA). The average cost for a 10 Mb/s connection (with unlimited data) is below US$ 40/month.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_in_Norway
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_in_Europe_by_number_of_Internet_users
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Internet_connection_speeds#Akamai_Q4_2015_global_average_connection_speeds_rankings
https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/country_result.jsp?country=Norway
Norway was one of the first country that adopted Net neutrality guidelines, in early 2009: http://eng.nkom.no/technical/internet/net-neutrality/net-neutrality/_attachment/9222
That doesn't really mean much if the majority of the population is huddled in a few cities and not spread out evenly throughout the country.
In 2015, 80.5% of the total Norwegian population is urban. Less than the American population (81.6%).
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/no.html
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/us.html
And, yes, people live in the far north (with glaciated terrains) and have Internet connections:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Norway_population_density.gif
It is impressive how you are ready to find any excuse to dismiss facts and save your ideology.
It is impressive how you are ready to find any excuse to dismiss facts and save your ideology.
"Faced with this ideological dilemma, free-market advocates resolve the cognitive dissonance by rejecting the reality rather than acknowledging that their axiom is fundamentally flawed."
https://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2014/aug/29/libertarian-ideology-natural-enemy-science
;-)
I stand corrected.
Still, comparing Norway to the United States is like comparing apples to oranges. Governments don't scale very well. A very small, homogeneous society with low unemployment rates, low prison rates, who gets their defense subsidized by the United States is hardly an example of how the US FedGov should regulate its internet.
Why not push for these regulations you love so much at the state level and leave the Feds out of it?
You're going to have to excuse me for being highly cynical of the idea that the same monster that has been caught spying on every bit of telecommunication in the world is somehow going to make my internet life better.
You can believe that if you want. But I don't.
Actually, the Norwegian unemployment rate is similar to that of the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_unemployment_rate. As for low prison rates, that might have to do with the Norwegian prison system, which attempts to rehabilitate rather than punish. Still, I don't see what these things, along with diversity/homogeneity and defense, have to do with the Internet!
It's well known that the US fudges its unemployment numbers big time. Our unemployment is much worse than the Bureau of Labor will admit.
The point I'm trying to make is that the US is a crumbling empire with a ton of problems. This country is on the brink of a civil war, for crying out loud. It doesn't surprise me that a small country that has its act together in many regards is able to get better internet. And it's not because of the magic wand their government waves.
"It is impressive how you are ready to find any excuse to dismiss facts and save your ideology."
Relax, the country is not on the brink of a civil war.
As for Finland:
FICORA actively intervenes in competition problems detected on the broadband and telephone markets, which enables new and innovative service providers to enter the markets. For consumers, this means versatile, high-quality and affordable telephone and broadband services.
https://www.viestintavirasto.fi/en/internettelephone.html
Fixed Broadband
As of February 2017 you can pay about €20 per month for a 20 Mb/s ADSL connection. A 50 Mb/s connection may be €25 per month, a 100 Mb/s connection may be €30 per month, and 1000 Mb/s may be €40 per month.
Mobile Broadband
As of February 2017 you can pay about €15 per month for a 21 Mb/s 4G connection. A 50 Mb/s 4G connection may be about €18-24 per month, a 100 Mb/s 4G connection may be about €23-30 per month, and a 300 Mb/s 4G connection may be about €50 per month.
There are rarely data restrictions on fixed network usage in Finland; you can download an unlimited amount with no "excess" fees or reduction in connection speeds. This is not always the case with mobile network usage, but unlimited data packages are increasingly common.
http://www.expat-finland.com/telecommunications_and_media/isp.html
No data caps, no throttling, affordable -- even on mobile with unlimited tethering allowed. ;-)
"...mega-corps are in bed with the government and spy on us and collude to remove market competition."
It's exactly why they want net neutrality to be scrapped.
In 2015, after much public debate, the Federal Communications Commission passed rules mandating net neutrality — the idea that all data should be treated equally by internet service providers. The rules labeled broadband internet a utility under Title II of the Telecommunications Act. Under the new regulations, internet providers can’t block or throttle legal traffic, or prioritize certain traffic in paid “fast lanes.”
“We have a very broken marketplace in the United States, and absent government intervention, there's no reason that would change,” she explains. “There's no real competition to the local cable actor in most American places.”
Towns often have just one big internet provider, she says. “So, they're not under any pressure from either competition or oversight to upgrade networks to fiber, to lower prices.”
“Look, they're not acting nefariously. It's just not in their interest to invest, to support economic growth and social justice, which is what we need from infrastructure. Most other infrastructure in America is not controlled by private parties.”
https://www.pri.org/stories/2017-03-09/what-could-happen-net-neutrality-under-new-fcc
The real bogey men of internet spying are Google, Facebook and FedGov, not the ISP's. The ISP's really couldn't care less about your traffic usage, except when FedGov makes them go after DMCA violations, etc.
Furthermore, ISP's are easy to beat with VPN and Tor. It's the services that you log into or require javascript to run you've got to watch out for.
All I'm saying is that this repeal is not "the Republicans selling out your privacy" like it's been billed as. It's a little more complicated than that.
That being said, it's not like "the Republicans" aren't *known* for selling out your privacy. Just like the Dems, they're both guilty of being disrespectful of our privacy. But this is one case where they've done a good thing.
Emphasis on colluding to remove competition.
You can bypass surveillance to an extent but you can't choose from monopolies*.
Magic Banana said it:
Net neutrality means technical intermediaries (such as ISPs) are not allowed to discriminate packets (based on who sends them, receive them or their content). They must act as simple pipes: nothing goes slower/faster, nothing is modified in the way. Nothing more. An important consequence is: a dominant actor (e.g., Netflix) will not remain dominant simply because it can deal with ISPs to get a faster connection to its site, a slower connection to its competitors, a slower BitTorrent protocol, ads on Web pages that the ISP adds, etc. That, is real free market: the best actor wins, playing fair.
*It is Verizon and Comcast dividing up the territory to not compete. In this way, they can propose a terrible service at an outrageous price. The customer has no other choice.
I thought the right wing was all for local/state rights and should be fine with local governments providing broadband. But guess what, it turns out that Republicans are for states' rights only when the Democrats are in control. ;)
If a municipality wants to provide "community broadband" I would not want FedGov to prevent that, nor do I think any other non-RINO Republican would. So, you're right. Republicans (non-RINO's) are for states' rights.
The repeal of this legislation does not do anything to prevent local municipalities from providing "community broadband."
Now, in my own municipality, I would be against it, for sure.
But Republicans are okay with states preventing municipalities from providing municipal broadband. This is similar to when Texas banned cities from banning fracking and Michigan banned plastic bag bans. Another example of this is when Sean Spicer criticized Dan Malloy for not enforcing federal (not the state's responsibility to enforce) immigration law. Sean Spicer/Donald Trump are not "RINOs," they are the face of the modern Republican party.
Immigration is a federal issue. One of the few things FedGov was explicitly tasked to do in the Constitution, unlike 99% of the other junk they do.
Also, the only repercussion from the Feds is ending of funding for local/state police, which is fine by me as I'd like to see the Feds get out of giving grant money to local/state police altogether anyways.
As for the battle between states and cities within them, again, not a federal issue.
Yes, since it is a federal issue, the states are allowed to tell their police not to enforce it. It is not the states' responsibility to help enforce it.
And if you support states' rights, it doesn't make any sense to oppose cities' rights within the states (just replace the state with cities and the federal government with the state, and make the same arguments you already make for states' rights). At least if your support for states' rights is a matter of principle, which I strongly suspect it isn't.
I completely agree. The states can tell their police not to help the feds. And the feds can stop giving the states federal grant money for their police. See how that works?
I'm in favor so much of states rights, that I support secession. It's something the left wingers would *never* grant to the right wingers when states like Texas grumbled about leaving the Union.
The difference, however, is that Calexit and such are *widely* supported by right wingers.
You're not going to beat the right wingers when it comes to states rights. We've been down this path a lot longer than these newbies on the left.
If the federal government actually supports state rights, they should give grant money to all of the states regardless of their internal policies, or not give any grant money at all.
Of course Calexit is supported by right wingers, because that is who it would benefit. California is one of the sanest states in the Union as well as the most populous, and Republicans would be elated if they were to leave. Of course, most Californians don't support secession, and secession is illegal (there was a war over it). Speaking of Texas, do you support states' "rights" to own slaves? For sure, the government made the right decision to not let them secede.
And yes, we aren't trying to beat anyone on states rights, this isn't a competition. We are simply pointing out the right's hypocrisy on states' rights. Right wingers don't actually care about states' rights except when they can use it to oppress people (like the one time when states tried to secede). EDIT: Republicans -> right wingers. That time, the Democrats were the right wingers.
"California is one of the sanest states in the Union"
You're out of your mind.
"or not give any grant money at all."
I support that 100%
"secession is illegal"
That means nothing. America seceded from the British. Furthermore, there's no guarantee another war would be fought if California decided to secede. Right wingers want to let them go and there's no excuse like ending slavery to justify waging a war over keeping it. The only reason many leftists don't want California to secede is because they aren't interested in independence. They just want to rule over others.
The mere fact that you think California is the sanest of states is exactly why people like me don't want to share a government with people like you.
"You're out of your mind."
Well, I'm only telling the truth. California is doing pretty well, and gives to the federal government more than it takes.
"Right wingers want to let them go"
Not even Californians want to go, so that would not be "letting". You're out of your mind.
Also, answer my question: do you think Texas had a "state's right" to own slaves?
"California is doing pretty well"
California has a massive budget deficit and one small turn in the economy could put it into bankruptcy. California has a lot of problems beyond just economic.
"Not even Californians want to go"
Most don't want to go, but the Calexit movement didn't pop up for no reason. Actually, there are several California counties that want to secede from CALFORNIA!
"do you think Texas had a "state's right" to own slaves?"
It's a fair question. To be honest, if you want to get down to it, I don't really believe in "rights" at all. For anybody. Life is just a gigantic pissing battle. It always has been and it always will be.
In general, people are going to do what they believe is in their own best interest, justice be damned.
At least you admitted it. You don't care about states' rights.
That's not what I said. It's just that "rights" is a fiction.
I'm not even sure how we got onto the topic of states rights. There are power plays in action both at the state and federal level. I believe local control over decisions that affect my life is better than federal control. If you prefer to have big decisions being made thousands of miles away, that's your choice. Nothing I can do about that.
Edit: Deleted comment. Replaced in correct location.
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