Italian MEP Wants To Eliminate Anonymity On the Internet 223
m94mni writes "The European Parliament wants to monitor your Internet searches for child porn offenders, as previously reported. The declaration was adopted yesterday, and in an interview with the Swedish news outlet Europaportalen.se, the Italian MEP behind the declaration, Tiziano Motti, shares his views on the Internet and anonymity. In essence, Motti wants to completely eliminate anonymity on the Internet. 'Each upload of text, images, or video clips must be traceable by the authorities', says Motti. This is in line with the secretive UN initiative Q6/17, revealed two years ago." The doublespeak here seems to go beyond the imprecision of automated translation.
"Think of the children" (Score:5, Insightful)
"And hand over all your freedom"
Why does that work?
Fighting child porn justifies anything (Score:5, Insightful)
It is a sad state of our societies that child pornography can be invoked to justify absurd and highly unethical changes that would infringe of fundamental rights. It is almost certain that these would fail to successfully deter those seeking child porn but conveniently would be easy to use by the police and political system to silence dissent.
But I'm sure that fact is just a coincedence...
Re:"Think of the children" (Score:5, Insightful)
The Internet and communication technologies in general threaten power. Don't be surprised if power tries to protect itself.
Crying wolf (Score:5, Insightful)
If they keep this up, it's going to dilute honest, real efforts to fight child pornography because people will be conditioned to equate "child pornography" with "government power grab".
Re:Fighting child porn justifies anything (Score:4, Insightful)
Silly me. I forgot that our 'elected' officials have the good of the public in mind when extremely broad and unaccountable legislation to combat a problem that already consumes a vastly disproportionate amount of resources to its frequency and severity. It is a good thing that our public servants are so incorruptable and service oriented that they would take care of us like this.
Well I guess my concerns are completely unfounded, thanks for reassuring me.
Re:Solve Problem by Legalizing Child Pornography (Score:4, Insightful)
It is interesting to point out that child sex offenses have an average sentence in 2009 of 41 years, where first degree murder has an average sentence of 34 years.
There are over 300 people serving "indefinite civil confinement" for child pornography. Many states adopted these rules for sex offenders during the last 15 years, and in many of these states NOBODY has EVER BEEN RELEASED after being placed in such a confinement. This is de facto "life sentence" for possession of digital images.
I won't even BEGIN to argue that the creation of child porn is a good thing, but I will strenuously argue that its mere possession does not warrant a life sentence, regardless of what sort of doublespeak you can come up with about which sort of non-human that person is and what sort of evil deeds they "might one day do".
Will they let us see ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Will they let us see everything that politicians do?
Or is this surveillance all one-way?
Re:Will they let us see ... (Score:1, Insightful)
Oh very much so. Mr. Motti is very clear in that the world consists of three groups of people:
Government/authorities, who are infallible and benevolent without fault
Citizens/Children/Women, who can be mildly mischievous at times, but at ultimately harmless, and should at all times be protected from
Criminals/Child abusers, who must be found, hunted to extincion, preferrably locked up for good, or quietly submitted to a mental institute or so.
In the world Mr Motti presents to those who listen, there is never an overlap between these groups.
Sounds like drugs (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:"Think of the children" (Score:5, Insightful)
Who is we? (Score:4, Insightful)
It is pretty amazing but not suprising just how misguided the above poster is.
It is indeed a very a good question asked by the gp, where does it say anonymity on the net is a fundamental right.
Because WE declare it so? Who is this WE? Because part of "WE" seems to want this anonymity to end.
Entitlement only works if you are willing to fight for your entitlements. Not just shout very loudly about them on some nerd forum.
It sounds like he's Berlusconi's bitch... (Score:5, Insightful)
Basically Berlusconi via a proxy, Motti, is using a classic "Think of the children..." argument in order to convince people of the need to remove anonymity from the internet when really he wants to eliminate anonymity to be able to track down political adversaries. It's classic misdirection. I'm just surprised that he thinks the rest of the world does not see through his ruse, but then again, like Putin, he is a very arrogant man accustomed to acquiescence.
Re:"Think of the children" (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:"Think of the children" (Score:3, Insightful)
One problem is that it's not an easy fix. E.g. if a list of all connections you make is recorded for "child protection" then what happens when there's a murder investigation? They, quite rightly, get a warrant which lets them look at the pre-existing data. They have a right to look at anything which they know of and which is likely to help them.
The real problem is that once that mechanism exists it is used for private lawsuits and is abused for tracking down dissidents in repressive countries (which might include your one in future). There's nothing that can be done to avoid it if the data is available.
Re:"Think of the children" (Score:5, Insightful)
When Google does it, lawmakers see it as an evil corporation infringing civil liberties.
When those same lawmakers (Steve Conroy, yes you) do it it's seen as protecting one's constituents. No apparent hypocrisy here...
I, for one, don't welcome our democratically elected totalitarian overlords. There's a slippery slope between "protecting the children" and spying on one's own citizens for political and religious reasons (family values, banning facebook/youtube because of Mohammed, silencing minorities like the Yugur, Dirty War in Argentina etc)
Intelligence organizations already have enough powers post 9/11, no?
Re:Who is we? (Score:3, Insightful)
That isn't to say certain websites cannot or shouldn't require you to identify yourself to access them, but on a whole requiring your computer to identify who you are while you're online is about equivalent to some supposed V-Chip that observes you through your TV or taps your phone calls while you're phone sexing your girl.
Re:Fighting child porn justifies anything (Score:5, Insightful)
No anonymity means no whistleblowers.
No anonymity means retaliation against critics.
No anonymity means no privacy for personal choices.
No anonymity means arguments will be judged by their poster rather than their content.
No anonymity means oppresive regimes can identify disidents.
The government does not have a right to monitor my every action in the real world or online. I don't have anything 'to hide', but I don't see why some bureacrat ought to have a record of which political party I discuss online, what flavour of porn I view, who my friends that I chat with are, which diseases I'm reading up on, how much time I spend on ebay, or if I am looking up information on euthanasia. All those are valid and legal activities (assuming said porn isn't child porn) that I have no desire to share with the world. Why not start implanting everyone with GPS tracking devices so that we can monitor anytime an adult nears a child to prevent pedophilia. It is an outrageous affront to our personal privacy and constitutional rights (in most countries).
Specifically this proposed bill violates articles 13 (personal liberty is inviolable), 15 (freedom and confidentiality of communication), and 21 (freedom of speech, writing, and communication). Arguably it also violates the underlying principles of articles 14 (the home is inviolable), 17 (right of peaceful assembly), and 18 (right to form associations).
Re:Dirty Move (Score:5, Insightful)
At least as low as the people who have used DWIs/gun-violence/terrorism/boobies/other-boogiemen-of-the-day to infringe on our rights?
This is targetted at Tor, I2P and Freenet (Score:4, Insightful)
...and certain sites like Wikileaks, which uses its own private Tor-based network.
So right now we have the USA crying over "national security" and Italy weeping for the children. That covers the "Terrorism" and "Child Porn" buzzwords. Soon we will learn that drug lords and illegal immigrants use the Internet, too...
Re:Fighting child porn justifies anything (Score:2, Insightful)
So, yes, I'm rambling, but my point is simple: I don't want my privacy to be invaded and I have my reasons, even if crazy and slightly insane. The fact of the matter is, though, they're still my rights, and I'm sure we all agree that our privacy is something we want because it's OURS to do with as we want.
Re:"Think of the children" (Score:1, Insightful)
I just hope they realize they're destroying the lives of our future children.
Re:Fighting child porn justifies anything (Score:5, Insightful)
The right to anonymity does not imply that every possible forum of speech must have a provision for anonymity.
No "provision for anonymity" is necessary; all that is necessary to preserve the right is not to actively take it away. Nor is it necessary to "make it legally mandatory to facilitate anonymity everywhere" -- what an absurd strawman. Just don't interfere with it, and it will facilitate itself just fine, as it's currently doing.
And if it's a right, then it's a right everywhere. That is one of the main differences between rights and priveleges.
Re:GNAA RULEZ! (Score:5, Insightful)
what if....
what if you've got a 'speed' up plugin for your browser that spiders and preloads loads of stuff, there could easily be links to all kinds of stuff and it would/could look like your browsing, and the files will be stored and cached on your computer.
and anyone not wanting to get caught will use one of the many ways of proxying yourself, or a public connection, or a hacked connection / proxy.
gees, some one needs to give the people that run the world an education, or at least pass a law making it a requirement that all laws are run by several experts, hobbyist and professionals in the field for the obvious and not so obvious errors and pointlessness or even counter productiveness of the legislation being passed. Maybe even run a few fake trials based on the legislation and see what kind of prosecution vs defense comes up.
I would expect that the defense side have an open forum so that anyone can contribute and discuss the prosecution and so aid the defense, we want our laws to be as good as possible and waste as little time as possible. And we want as few of them as possible.
Time spent making them in the first place is time and money saved later down the line, and it would also give some people a little 'respect' in the only profession that comes lower than lawyers and bankers when it comes to honor and decency.
Re:GNAA RULEZ! (Score:2, Insightful)
The issue is not the current directive (which is bad enough as it is, though... Would you like to have the same kind of registration of regular mail?) but the Written Declaration that mr Motti authored, and which was adopted by the Parliament on Thursday.
The Written Declaration calls for an extension of the Directive to search engines in order to combat 'pedophiles' and child abuse. In the interview linked, he states that this was unintentional, but that 'everyone knows what a search engine is, but no one knows what a 'content provider' is'. So apparently he wants every 'content provider', which from my reading seems to be the same as 'hosting platform', or basically, anywhere you can upload content, to retain information about the uploader and make this information available to the 'proper authorities'.
There seems to be quite some confusion about exactly what the Declaration implies, since the reference to the data retention directive is indirect (reference number only, no explanation as to what it is), and has been completely omitted in the huge promotion effort which has seen the EP flooded with posters, pamphlets and pretty girls imploring the MEPs to sign. Add to this Mottis failure to acknowledge the problematic implications, and his inconsistent attitude towards the reference in the Declaration, and you have a proper political mess, which no doubt will be used by the Commission as both an affirmation that Parliament supports the legality of the data retention directive, and as a tool to initiate further extensions.
And as for the difference between 'what sites I visit' and 'what I do on those sites'.. The difference is not as big as one would like. And again, compare this to similar conduct away from the internet and you get a pretty frightening society.
Captcha: repeal, how fitting.
Re:"Think of the children" (Score:3, Insightful)
It does not suffice to be an emotional creature! (I hate to say it, but only on a geek site...;)
It also requires people to not be dominant but passive. Meaning they don’t check anything for themselves and hence have to buy into the reality of others.
It is my opinion that modern social engineering was used to make people that passive. And that it was intentional, even if it was done unconsciously. But the bad food definitely and feeling of powerlessness in our way too large communities helped in making people lethargic.
It is also my opinion, that if they can do that, we can too. And we can even do it better than them, because we definitely would do it consciously and also they wouldn’t expect it.
LOL (Score:2, Insightful)
So yeah, right, war against the pedos... When the government of Berlusconi, of all people, says it, it's a lie.
That man likes himself some barely legal girls in parties, and while nothing confirms he goes with actual minors, suspicions have been raised.
Of course we'll never know if it's true, or if the denied claims are the effect of his political power.
Shame this wonderful tool can't be used against politics by the citizens (politicians who like dirty play *will* abuse it for sure against rivals).
I bet many politicians will surely regret this eventually. Power is not forever and precisely politicians are the type to have bizarre fetishes.
Re:It sounds like he's Berlusconi's bitch... (Score:2, Insightful)
Yep, a little background is probably needed. Lately the italian government has been subject of a much more intense scrutiny from journalists not lined up to the "official truth" and private individuals, due to the reluctance from the main opposition to act (or, more probably, acquiescence to the situation) and the complete subservience of television news services.
This has ended up in some scandals for Berlusconi even more embarrassing than the usual,even for a guy that has been found guilty of Mafia connection with a group that used to liquify the children of their enemies inside vats of acid [wikipedia.org]: Prostitution rings related to the rebuilding of the city of Aquila, Intentional disservices inside Hospitals which refused to give bribes to the Department of Health,the discovery ot the full approval in the past of mafia crimes by some members of the government, you name it.
So lately the main (and basically,the only) italian party has tried to silence such "annoyances that tarnish the image of Italy abroad", as Berlusconi once said, by closing or imposing a strict control to all news services not directly controlled, depriving both the parliament and the magistrature (which, of lately, had taken a more aggressive approach to the situation) of a lot of powers, and lately, a new law that in theory would make illegal any kind of journalistic investigation, any whistleblower revelation, and the publication and achievement of any legally-mandated wirettapping until any investigation is over, basically making a good part of the aforementioned processes a farce.
As you may imagine, I am clearly not impartial to the whole situation, but even the remaining part of the remaining right-wing politicians and industrial groups are more than ashamed with the whole situation. Despite a clear minority of support, the P.D.L.(party of freedom, love the irony) party has used the tactic of saturating the regional election pools with their own representatives, which in turn basically elect the actual government.
Unfortunately, most the population is completely apathetic to situation, as they seems to care only to soccer (most of such laws are being proposed during the world cup, accidentally) and the various local reality shows.
Re:"Think of the children" (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:GNAA RULEZ! (Score:5, Insightful)
Hitler was real at least. (Score:3, Insightful)
Even if Hitler was 60+ years ago, he actually did try to take over the world. The talk about the pedophile elite on the other hand, what evidence do they have that this pedophile elite even exists? And even if it does exist somewhere, it's probably not going to be in the sort of numbers that would require this level of surveillance.
I know there are pedophiles, rapists, and generally sick individuals in the world. But most estimates are that it's less than 5% of the population. Even in prison it's less than 5% of prisoners. So we are getting into a frenzy over a fear that isn't based on any known statistics.
If they come out with a statistic that 20% of the people on the internet are rapists, pedophiles, terrorists, or just all around dangerous individuals, then maybe putting surveillance on the internet to protect the children makes sense. But to do this level of surveillance without there being millions of dangerous criminals, risks creating an environment where the technology itself and the political pressure PRODUCES the criminals AFTER the fact.
Do we expect them to built the technology, the prisons, and hire a bunch of cops, and not use it against us? Once the technology, the prisons, and the cops are in place, then it's just a matter of tweaking the laws so as to generate as many or as few criminals as they want.
That is the problem. The laws create the criminals, the technology and cops catch the criminals, and the prisons house them. Usually the technology comes first, then the prisons get built, then the cops get hired, and finally the laws are tweaked so that it looks like the cops are doing their jobs. The law gets tweaked for political reasons, think of the drug laws which were tweaked in the 80s and resulted in over a million prisoners in the USA.
Re:Dirty Move (Score:3, Insightful)
If only they would take away the right to drive petrol powered vehicles. Many lives would be saved.
Lower the drinking age, raise the driving age (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:"Think of the children" (Score:3, Insightful)
Because humans are emotional creatures and threatening children evokes an immediate emotional response. It makes people act. And this action is not necessarily taken after the appropriate amount of thought and discussion. In fact, if you get people worked up enough, they won't be able to think at all and will have no choice but to follow your directions. The Internet and communication technologies in general threaten power. Don't be surprised if power tries to protect itself.
You are right: governments actually hate the Internet. We are at a stage that we simply can say, "go away government; we don't need you anymore."
Think about it. Today's level of hyper-connectivity can allow *ordinary citizens* to directly participate in everything the government normally does for (or TO) them.
Expect a nasty fight in the coming years and decades, as governments become increasingly more and more irrelevant -- and your average Joe finally starts to wake up and realize this.
Fascism... (Score:3, Insightful)
At its finest. Citizens need no anonymity or privacy from their government, if they aren't doing anything wrong. And those that speak out and complain need to be investigated more closely as they are a threat to the stability of their government.
Re:"Think of the children" (Score:3, Insightful)
But because they are the majority, they will always represent a deadly threat. Anyone who has their ear can sway enough of them to cause serious trouble.
And we see this happening all the time. Did it not happen in Bosnia with the ethnic strife there in the recent past? The Hutu/Tusi genocide? Not to mention the Bush regime, the Nazi era, and so on?
Look at the educational system in the United States. Sucks. But why? Think of what the people of the US would become if its educational system didn't suck!!!!!
Re:GNAA RULEZ! (Score:4, Insightful)
> Are you sure of the age of *every* picture in your porn collection? For each picture can you direct an investigator to the appropriate Custodian
> of Records? And are you sure the model didn't lie about their age to get the gig?
Well, why wouldn't you assume that to be the case. Afterall, I am sure that there has never been a well known public case of a girl who was a porn star underage, and then whose real age came out. Never! [wikipedia.org] Ever! [wikipedia.org]
You don't even need an internet connection to end up with "Child Porn" and not even realize it, its been happening for years.
-Steve
some additional info (Score:4, Insightful)
One of the MEPs who started this initiative Mr Motti is an interesting figure. After the vote on the Telecoms package - one of the MEPs who initiated this topic - Mr Motti already foreshadowed his intentions:
Also notable is, how much he is is interested in anonymity and blogs:
In another speech Mr Motti also addressed freedom of speech in Italy, i guess this points in the same direction like what is happening currently in Italy regarding google.
On an ironic side note Mr Motti also seems to be highly interested in setting up cameras in kindergartens:
and
It's ironic, how someone fighting pedophilia wants to setup cameras in childcare centers.
all his debates [europa.eu] are available, also his parliamentary questions [europa.eu]
You realize the fate of Christianity... (Score:3, Insightful)
Fitting, that an Italian MEP should seek to be the new Pontius Pilot - V2.0, as it were. Or would he be 4.0, after Mao and Stalin?
Re:Dirty Move (Score:1, Insightful)
It's a movie quote from Sneakers.
Whistler: I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
Bernard Abbott: Oh, this is ridiculous.
Martin Bishop: He's serious.
Whistler: I want peace on earth and goodwill toward men.
Bernard Abbott: We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Martin Bishop: You're just gonna have to try.
Bernard Abbott: All right, I'll see what I can do.
Whistler: Thank you very much. That's all I ask.