Comments on: CISPA brings Reddit’s SOPA warriors in force

By: Alphaclass3

Alphaclass3 — Sat, 14 Apr 2012 06:34:00 +0000

Man, you sure drank the corporate kool-aid they offered you, good boy. Chinese software pirates hope the pirate bay shuts down, less competition for them. They not only offer the software, they print the boxes the software comes in so it looks legitimate.

The Fed can’t shutter the pirate bay, but they could potentially shut down DNS availability to link Americans to the pirate bay. That would have no effect on China.

The Chinese are not stealing our trade secrets from the pirate bay, they are stealing them through corporate and government espionage. That stuff is already coveted under current laws. When you have corporate sponsorship of a government Bill, it is usually for the benefit of the corporation, and less competition.

By: jhdale

jhdale — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 18:21:00 +0000

There’s nothing in HR 3523 as posted (could be amended later, but let’s talk about the actual bill as proposed) that lets the US government demand any information whatsoever. It doesn’t even state that the US government should request information to be voluntarily provided. It does allow certain companies to voluntarily provide “cyber threat intelligence” which is defined as “information in the possession of an element of the intelligence community directly pertaining to a vulnerability of, or threat to, a system or network of a government or private entity.” So for example a purchase history, address, pictures, etc could only be provided if they “directly pertain” to a vulnerability.

There are other laws that may permit information to be demanded (via subpoena, national security letters, etc) but no new powers to demand information are provided in this law.

So having read it, I don’t see the problem with this law as currently posted.

By: Jeffrey Pritz

Jeffrey Pritz — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 18:13:00 +0000

They shut down Megaupload and stormed Kim Dot Com’s home in New Zealand. Jurisdiction, Jurisschmitckton. . .

By: Samuel Grguric

Samuel Grguric — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 18:07:00 +0000

Forget the Pirate Bay. It’s just an example and a very bad one.This is about any and all websites, especially where concerning streaming and social networking. The question is, do you want the US government to be able to demand a site to give them any information they request about any user (This includes all information the site has access to such as purchase history, address, pictures, comments… etc).Note: they would not need any type of warrant as long as it is “consistent with the need to protect.”

By: Chasingvictory18

Chasingvictory18 — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 17:47:00 +0000

I’m just confused on how the us government can shutdown the pirate bay if its outside their jurisdiction

By: miked

miked — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 17:08:00 +0000

…..

By: dave

dave — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 17:06:00 +0000

Pirate war? wtf.. who’s the photoshop expert who did that? It is a disaster. Why would you reuse such a stupid image?

By: jhdale

jhdale — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 17:05:00 +0000

I read through it but it doesn’t seem that bad to me. Section b2A seems to say that they still have to respect their privacy policy and the other sections are pretty good about specifying “threat” information, not just any information (and “cyber threat intelligence” is even defined, not left completely open-ended). b3B seems to say the recipient is not obligated to act on the information, opposite of SOPA where the recipient was not liable if they did act but might have been if they didn’t.

Basically it seems to me that all this does is permit companies handling online security to share information about threats (e.g. viruses, exploits, security holes) with each other and with the government.

My only question is whether this is necessary. Are there circumstances where it is currently forbidden?