ACTION ITEMS (help spread the word):
1) Don't dither. Go ahead and sign up at page below right now. As of
this
writing, the 30K+ signatures total is embarrassingly small. Doesn't begin
to cut mustard, though, on a per country basis, NL's response stands out.
2) Chain email this post to everybody EU based on your address book, post
synopsis and links on newsgroups, blogs, etc.
3) Anyone with good HTML/Web page bldg skills? PLEASE offer your help
with
that page to the Xs4All's Legal Dept guys --the ones behind that page.
Their contact details listed on any whois is current, in addition to their
home page.
----------------------------------------------------
.... sad news requiring your immediate attention, courtesy of the
Electronic
Frontier Foundation (EFF) (if unaware, your civil liberties union for all
things software, electronic gadgets, and the Internet, if you will).
The proposed EU wide introduction of this surveillance law is so thorough
an
invasion of privacy Bush and the rest of the D.C. junta would be most
proud
of. And we don't need to contrast the high rhetoric of present European
privacy laws and the actual handling on the ground across the continent,
do
we?, let alone enshrining anything as draconian as this. Which are those
Canadian anonymizers again?
Even if you don't give a hoot about your privacy and others',
wholeheartedly
trust the inherent goodness and efficiency of governments, guess who will
pay for all this? ISPs and telecoms? Try again.
Signing up for this petition is a little laborious, and the site could've
been better designed. Surprisingly amateurish considering it's from
Xs4All.nl, a mainstream Dutch provider. But the good news is, they come
from a long established libertarian tradition. Bear with it, OK?, and
sign
on at
http://www.dataretentionisnosolution.com
whether they clean it up soon or not (scroll all the way down for more
links, all in good working order as of this writing).
----------------------------------------------------
ACTION ITEMS (help spread the word):
1) Don't dither. Go ahead and sign up at page above right now. As of
this
writing, the 30K+ signatures total is embarrassingly small. Doesn't begin
to cut mustard, though, on a per country basis, NL's response stands out.
2) Chain email this post to everybody EU based on your address book, post
synopsis and links on newsgroups, blogs, etc.
3) Anyone with good HTML/Web page bldg skills? PLEASE offer your help
with
that page to the Xs4All's Legal Dept guys --the ones behind that page.
Their contact details listed on any whois is current, in addition to their
home page.
----------------------------------------------------
Cheers,
H.
Amsterdam,
Netherlands
----------------------------------------------------
<snip>
----- Original Message -----
From: EFFector list
To: H.
Sent: Friday, September 02, 2005 8:18 PM
Subject: EFFector 18.30:Action Alert - Stop Millions of Europeans From
Being
Treated Like Criminals
<snip>
Spying on telephone and Internet traffic should be law enforcement's last
resort - carefully limited to protect the privacy of innocent people,
conducted only during critical investigations. Unfortunately, the
European
Union is contemplating passing laws that would treat all of its citizens
like criminal suspects.
Next week, the Justice and Home Affairs Council of the EU Council of
Ministers will consider forcing phone companies and Internet service
providers (ISPs) to collect and keep records of their customers' private
phone calls and Internet communications, as well as the location data for
their mobile devices. And within the month, another wing of the EU, the
European Commission, will unveil a draft law to make creating these
records
of people's private communications compulsory all across Europe.
What will the records contain? If these proposals become law, European
telcos and ISPs would be compelled to log and retain for inspection
everything from the telephone numbers of every phone call, to the personal
computer address of everyone who sends and receives email, to the time
stamp, date, and size of every message sent. They may even be forced to
log
every website Internet users visit. And it doesn't stop there - they
could
also be required to log and keep records of everyone's actual physical
location through their mobile devices.
What's worse, all of this information would remain on file for periods
ranging from six months to three years, to be handed over to *any*
"competent authority" - not just in serious criminal or terrorist
investigations, but for *any* inquiry, for the open-ended purpose of "the
prevention, investigation, detection, and prosecution of criminal
offenses."
These proposed laws don't just threaten the privacy and freedom of EU
citizens, they threaten the privacy and freedom of people all around the
world. Any communication routed through Europe could be caught in this
dragnet. And if the EU adopts mandatory data retention, it will make it
that much easier for other governments, including the United States
government, to push for similar measures. Indeed, the US Department of
Justice has already expressed interest in just such an arrangement.
(See;
http://news.com.com/Your+ISP+as+Net+watchdog/2100-1028_3-5748649.html)
Show European decision makers that they're making a global mistake. Join
30,000 other concerned activists from around the world in signing a
petition
by European Digital Rights (EDRI), an alliance of more than 20 European
civil liberty groups that is leading the fight against these dangerous
proposals.
Sign the petition:
http://www.dataretentionisnosolution.com
The EU Commission's current draft data retention proposal:
http://www.edri.org/docs/EUcommissiondataretentionjuly2005.pdf
The EU Council's draft:
http://www.edri.org/docs/Data-retention-council-draft-29062005.pdf
<snip>
----------------------------------------------------
ACTION ITEMS (help spread the word):
1) Don't dither. Go ahead and sign up at page above right now. As of
this
writing, the 30K+ signatures total is embarrassingly small. Doesn't begin
to cut mustard, though, on a per country basis, NL's response stands out.
2) Chain email this post to everybody EU based on your address book, post
synopsis and links on newsgroups, blogs, etc.
3) Anyone with good HTML/Web page bldg skills? PLEASE offer your help
with
that page to the Xs4All's Legal Dept guys --the ones behind that page.
Their contact details listed on any whois is current, in addition to their
home page.
----------------------------------------------------
|
