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The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

washingtonpost.com

131–140 of 534 posts

Re: The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

#131
post #19

This, right here, is the consequence of the withdrawal from politics many geeks advocated very strongly in an earlier time. "Everything is corrupt, it doesn't matter"... turns out to only be a viable philosophy when things mostly work well enough . What we have in protections and freedoms were purchased through a ton of hard work by prior generations: the liberty to slack and think that it just works ok is a nice sid…

I always interpreted that resignation as "both sides are terrible, so I'm going to keep voting for my side". I wonder how many people really felt strong enough about politics to claim both sides are equally bad and then decided not to vote on that basis alone.

[deleted]

Re: The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

#132

Before getting all spun up, I'd dig a little deeper on the issue than what the WaPo does in this piece. These regulations were only voted on late in 2016 and never went into effect. To do the regulations, the FCC reclassified the internet as basically ye olde telephone system, which then made it subject to their purview based on laws created in the 1930s. This is classic overreach. Congress never gave this authority…

I'm confused. If these rules that were repealed never went into effect, or only partially, does that mean that our data was already (or is currently) being sold?

Does this legislation explicitly condone the collection or sale of browsing data? (I'd still rather have the protection than not, but can't seem to find a good detailed explanation.)

Re: The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

#133
One aspect of this that is being missed is how well this illustrates the inability of the Democratic party to take advantage of an obviously advantageous situation.

It's a no brainer that most people would recoil at the idea of everything they do on the Internet suddenly being for sale. It would be super easy to come up with at least a dozen relatable nefarious use cases and stuff them into TV commercials and ads and tying it to the Republican party.

But nope, silence. It's almost like they don't want to be in power. It feels like I live in a de facto one-party state.

Re: The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

#134

Before getting all spun up, I'd dig a little deeper on the issue than what the WaPo does in this piece. These regulations were only voted on late in 2016 and never went into effect. To do the regulations, the FCC reclassified the internet as basically ye olde telephone system, which then made it subject to their purview based on laws created in the 1930s. This is classic overreach. Congress never gave this authority…

So as it's going to be a flame war apparently I've deleted the comment.

I'd just like to register my opinion that I don't see Washington Post is an objective, nor even a trustworthy source at this point. When they print something it's often worth looking deeper into I believe.

Re: The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

#135

Before getting all spun up, I'd dig a little deeper on the issue than what the WaPo does in this piece. These regulations were only voted on late in 2016 and never went into effect. To do the regulations, the FCC reclassified the internet as basically ye olde telephone system, which then made it subject to their purview based on laws created in the 1930s. This is classic overreach. Congress never gave this authority…

"The lesson here really is that if the issue is really important, then get an actual law passed instead of trying to contort regulatory authority based on laws from the 1930s."

That's silly. That's like saying phone doesn't deserve protection from wiretapping because there never was a law specifically against it.

Re: The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

#136
post #56

This thread may grow long and maybe turn to the topic of HTTPS. SSL with SNI exposes plaintext hostnames/domainnames on the wire for anyone to read, aggregate and sell, not to mention tamper with. It should be an optional extension. For many users it adds no benefit. For some users, it breaks their software and adds needless complexity. Now the privacy advocates have a reason to dislike it too. Just say no to SNI.

Please describe a way to do SSL without the domain being visible that can work for most sites.

What would you encrypt the hostname with?

Re: The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

#137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't just say the regulations are old and therefore invalid because they're old. Remember, the telephone industry was regulated because telephone companies merged and cooperated to create regional monopolies and destroy competition, all at the expense of consumers. Comcast, Time Warner and the like have all been doing the same.

You also can't just say that the internet is the same as POTS. The FCC has scarcely been better than these companies. It has a history of being a revolving door for companies. Consider what RCA/FCC did to Armstrong back in the day. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edwin_Howard_Armstrong Just because the FCC does something doesn't mean its good, legal, or whatever. It's just what 3 of 5 unelected, unaccountable appointee…

With regards to this, I absolutely can.

Re: The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

#138

Before getting all spun up, I'd dig a little deeper on the issue than what the WaPo does in this piece. These regulations were only voted on late in 2016 and never went into effect. To do the regulations, the FCC reclassified the internet as basically ye olde telephone system, which then made it subject to their purview based on laws created in the 1930s. This is classic overreach. Congress never gave this authority…

So as it's going to be a flame war apparently I've deleted the comment. I'd just like to register my opinion that I don't see Washington Post is an objective, nor even a trustworthy source at this point. When they print something it's often worth looking deeper into I believe.

That's entirely incorrect. The Republicans own actions, and absolutely nothing else, portrays them in a bad light.

Re: The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

#139

Please do not complain into the echo chamber of comments here. Please take a moment to support the EFF, call your representatives, and speak to friends and family. EFF: https://www.eff.org/ Find your reps: https://tryvoices.com/

interestingly enough the top comment is argues the regulation in question is overreach so I think you're giving the HN community too little credit.

Re: The House just voted to wipe out the FCC’s landmark Internet privacy protections

#140
post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_...

No, he's correct, about 7% of republicans in the house didn't vote for the bill.

And 0% of Democrats in the house voted for the bill. This bill is 100% owned by the GOP.
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