EFFector 17.26: Action Alert - Induce Act Hearing Rescheduled - Keep Up the Pressure! (fwd)

———- Forwarded message ———-
Date: Thu, 15 Jul 2004 16:39:46 -0700 (PDT)
From: Effector List <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Subject: EFFector 17.26: Action Alert - Induce Act Hearing Rescheduled - Keep Up
the Pressure!

EFFector Vol. 17, No. 26 July 15, 2004 [email protected]

A Publication of the Electronic Frontier Foundation ISSN 1062-9424
In the 298th Issue of EFFector:

* Action Alert: Induce Act Hearing Rescheduled - Keep Up the Pressure!
* CAPPS II Cancelled: Department of Homeland Security Puts
Stake in the Heart of Passenger-Profiling System
* Citizens Unite for "Computer Ate My Vote" E-Voting Rallies
* The DoJ Report on PATRIOT: Style, Not Substance
* Audible (Not So) Magic
* Join EFF for Freedom Fest 2004 on August 4th - LinuxWorld
Attendees Invited!
* MiniLinks (19): Breaking Down Councilman
* Staff Calendar: 07.23.04 - Wendy Seltzer speaks at BlogOn,
Berkeley, CA; 07.26.04 - 07.28.04 - Wendy Seltzer speaks at
PFIR's "Preventing the Internet Meltdown"; 07.30.04 - 08.01.04
- Kevin Bankston, Annalee Newitz, Seth Schoen, and Wendy
Seltzer speak at Defcon 12, Las Vegas, NV; 08.04.04 - EFF
Holds Freedom Fest 2004, San Francisco, CA
* Administrivia

For more information on EFF activities & alerts:
<http://www.eff.org/>

To join EFF or make an additional donation:
<https://secure.eff.org/>

EFF is a member-supported nonprofit. Please sign up as a member today!

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* Action Alert: Induce Act Hearing Rescheduled - Keep Up the Pressure!

The Senate Judiciary Committee has taken the Inducing Infringement
of Copyrights Act (Induce Act, S.2560) off the fast track,
scheduling a hearing on the bill next Thursday. This is good
news for the public, but the recording industry is going on the
offensive, turning up its rhetoric in an effort to scare common
sense out of the debate. In a letter sent to the Judiciary
Committee and all 100 senators, RIAA president Mitch Bainwol
insists that critics of the bill are missing the point, and
that the Induce Act is a "moral behavioral test that targets
the bad guys."

But the wording of the legislation itself doesn't support
Bainwol's claims. By making it illegal to "aid, abet, or
induce copyright infringement," the Induce Act could make
companies liable for violations committed by their customers.
This extends liability so far that it threatens both current
and future technologies. Under the Induce Act, creators
of the next iPod or VCR would be forced to subject
themselves to approval from every major copyright holder
before even getting to market. That's too high a price to pay
to satisfy the recording industry in its witch-hunt for
peer-to-peer file sharing.

More than 6,000 EFF supporters have already written to their
senators to stop the Induce Act from giving copyright
holders this kind of veto power over new technologies.
Now it's time to turn up the volume. Forward this message
to five of your friends, family members, or co-workers, and
ask them to support copyright balance, not copyright
bullies.

Send a letter to stop the Induce Act today:
<http://action.eff.org/action/index.asp?step=2&item)18>

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* CAPPS II Cancelled: Department of Homeland Security Puts Stake
in the Heart of Passenger-Profiling System

Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge announced yesterday that
development of CAPPS II - the government's controversial airline
passenger surveillance program - will not continue.

According to USA Today, Ridge responded to the question of
whether the program could be considered dead by gesturing
"as if he were driving a stake through its heart,"
and answering, "Yes."

Said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Lee Tien, "Finally, the Department
of Homeland Security has recognized what EFF has been saying
all along: the proposed CAPPS II system would be an ineffective,
expensive, and unnecessary invasion of travelers' privacy."

For this breaking news item:
<http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2004_07.php#001734>

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* Citizens Unite for "Computer Ate My Vote" E-Voting Rallies

Activists Deliver 350,000 Petition Signatures to Support
Election Integrity

On Tuesday, July 13, thousands of people in 19 states sent a
powerful message to policymakers: election integrity matters.
Participants in the "Computer Ate My Vote" Day of Action
delivered 350,000 petition signatures calling for
voter-verifiable paper ballots. They also asked local election
officials to support auditable voting machines. The day was
a huge success, generating major media coverage all across
the country.

The "Computer Ate My Vote" rallies were sponsored by EFF,
MoveOn.org, VerifiedVoting.org, TrueMajority, Computer
Professionals for Social Responsibility, Democracy for
America, Common Cause, and countless local activists. Our
friends at TrueMajority were kind enough to send these
highlights:

~ Colorado
Crowd estimates ranged up to 250 at the rally, which was attended
by state officeholders and candidates in addition to long-time
voting activists from Boulder and Denver. Things got exciting
when about 50 of those folks crossed the street to deliver
their 13,411 petition signatures to Secretary of State Donetta
Davidson's office, where they were intercepted by building
security and then city police. After some negotiation, the group
was allowed into the building. They asked to see the Secretary
or a representative, only to be provided with an unintentional
bit of comic relief when the receptionist claimed "they're all
out to lunch."

~ Maryland
Ben Cohen - TrueMajority President and co-founder of Ben &
Jerry's Ice Cream - was joined by state senators and
delegates of both parties at a rally in Annapolis staged
by local activist group TrueVoteMD and attended by more than
100 citizens. Local television affiliates, National Public
Radio, and at least six print journalists showed up to take
in the festivities. Governor Robert Ehrlich would not
accept our stack of petitions, citing "homeland security
concerns," but did allow a delegation to speak to Lt.
Governor Michael Steele. "It was really the best America
has to offer," Cohen reported. "Average citizens who are
concerned about our democracy, taking time out of their
lives to help make sure our elections are fair."

~ Texas
About 150 activists packed a hearing room in the Texas
statehouse, spilling out into the hallway and cheering the
remarks of paper ballot activist Bev Harris and computer
security expert Dan Wallach. "It got really rowdy," said
Abbe Delozier, one of the rally organizers. Sign-toting
Code Pink activists outside added to the atmosphere.
Television news crews and major state print outlets like
the Dallas Morning News and the Texas Observer asked so
many questions that the event stretched on for two hours.

~ Ohio
Over 200 folks rallied at the statehouse, along with balloons,
banners, and a 6 foot-tall smoking, buzzing mockup of a
malfunctioning voting machine. ABC, NBC and CBS affiliates
attended, and two film crews recorded the delivery of
the petitions.

There are a lot more good stories, but EFFector isn't big
enough to hold them. Check out the links below for more
information about e-voting, plus a sampling of the press
coverage of this extraordinary day.

EFF "Verify the Vote" campaign:
<http://www.eff.org/e-vote/>

"Voting Machine Critics Rally Across the Nation, Seeking Paper
Trail by November":
<http://www.eff.org/cgi/tiny?urlID"3>
(AP)

"Remember Chads? They've Hung Around":
<http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20040713/6359064s.htm>

"E-Voting Backup Is Demanded":
<http://166.70.44.66/2004/Jul/07142004/utah/183377.asp>
(The Salt Lake Tribune)

"Demand for Paper Trail Escalates":
<http://www.wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,64205,00.html>

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* The DoJ Report on PATRIOT: Style, Not Substance

Responding to growing public and congressional criticism of the
USA PATRIOT Act, the Department of Justice this week released a
new report singing its praises.

As other commentators have already pointed out, the DoJ report,
entitled "Report from the Field: The USA PATRIOT Act at Work,"
contains precious little new or meaningful information. Instead,
it functions primarily as a public relations vehicle, parroting
the DoJ's well-worn party line about the benefits of the Act
while failing to address specific and legitimate concerns
about how PATRIOT is being used and whether the new investigative
powers it grants are actually necessary for fighting terrorism.

For example, the report contains absolutely no discussion of the
most controversial PATRIOT provisions, including sections 215
and 505, which gave the DoJ broad new authority to demand
your private records with little or no judicial oversight, and
section 213, which authorized delayed notice, or "sneak and
peek," searches.

At the same time, the DoJ glosses over any problems with the
PATRIOT sections that it deigns to cite. For example, the report
speaks glowingly of PATRIOT's changes to the criminal definition
of providing "material support" to terrorists, yet fails to
mention that one federal court has already found this new
definition unconstitutional.

PATRIOT was originally sold to Congress and the public as an
anti-terrorism measure, but nearly a third of the cases the DoJ
cites do not involve terrorism at all. Instead, provisions that
strip us of our most fundamental rights as U.S. citizens are
being used to investigate garden-variety crimes like credit
card fraud.

Any incursion on our civil liberties must be clearly justified,
but this report fails to show that pre-PATRIOT surveillance powers
were inadequate. The only real benefit the DoJ cites, and
repeats in example after example, is investigative speed - with
fewer judicial safeguards to comply with, investigators were
able to do their work faster. But speed alone does not justify
removing these critical safeguards - if it were, we would
dispense altogether with the constitutional requirement
that investigators get search warrants to come into our homes,
or wiretap orders to listen to our phone conversations.

"The Department of Justice report on PATRIOT is a prime example
of 'style over substance,' offering little concrete information
about the Act's uses or potential abuses," said Kevin Bankston,
EFF attorney and Bruce J. Ennis/Equal Justice Works fellow.
"The American people should not blindly accept the DoJ's
PATRIOT propaganda, but, rather, should demand that Congress
undertake a comprehensive review of PATRIOT's implementation."

Ask Congress to review PATRIOT:
<http://action.eff.org/action/index.asp?step=2&item)25>

More about the USA PATRIOT Act:
<http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/Terrorism/PATRIOT/>

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* Audible (Not So) Magic

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has been
touting technologies offered by Audible Magic as the cure for
peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing on university (and high school!)
campuses. The company has also been making the rounds of
congressional offices in Washington, DC, talking up its
technologies as a silver bullet for P2P infringement.

While we at EFF support universities taking steps to educate staff
and students about copyright law and control excessive bandwidth
usage, it's important that universities are not sold expensive,
ineffective solutions simply to appease the public relations
needs of the RIAA. EFF Staff Technologist Chris Palmer took a
close look at how Audible Magic's "filtering" technology works
and argues that it's no silver bullet.

"Session encryption for file transfers based on ephemeral keys
represents a cheap, easily implemented countermeasure that would
effectively frustrate Audible Magic's 'filtering' technology,"
writes Palmer. "Based on publicly available information, it
does not appear that this vulnerability can be easily remedied.
Should Audible Magic's technology be widely adopted, it is
likely that P2P file-sharing applications would be revised
to implement encryption. Accordingly, network administrators
will want to ask Audible Magic tough questions before investing
in the company's technology, lest the investment be rendered
worthless by the next P2P 'upgrade.'"

EFF analysis: "Audible Magic - No Silver Bullet"
<http://www.eff.org/share/audible_magic.php>

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* Join EFF for Freedom Fest 2004 on August 4th - LinuxWorld
Attendees Invited!

Join EFF and three Bay Area bands for an afternoon of live music
and outdoor fun at EFF's Freedom Fest 2004, generously sponsored
by Red Hat. The free outdoor concert will be held at Yerba Buena
Gardens on Wednesday, August 4th, 2004, from 5 to 8 p.m., just
across the street from the LinuxWorld Conference at Moscone
Center in downtown San Francisco. Featured artists are Austin
Willacy, Josh Fix and the Furious Force, and Megan Slankard Band.

If you can't make it in person, tune in online for the live
webcast.

<http://www.eff.org/freedomfest/>

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* miniLinks
miniLinks features noteworthy news items from around the Internet.

~ Fair Use or "Fair and Balanced"
Lawrence Lessig's recent op-ed on the fair use argument for
using clips from Fox News to criticize its reporting:
<http://www.lessig.org/blog/archives/variety.pdf>

~ Understanding the Media Monopoly
A great introduction to the FCC's controversial media ownership
rules (or lack thereof). Required reading:
<http://www.sfbg.com/38/42/cover_freepress.html>

~ Big Content/Big Tech Form New DRM Consortium
The new conglomeration will focus on finding ways to jam
Hollywood-friendly restrictions into home networks:
<http://news.com.com/2100-1025_3-5268315.html>

~ Breaking Down Councilman
Orin Kerr with a wonderful post on why the decision is such
bad news for privacy:
<http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2004_07_14.shtml#1089840267>

~ Barbie-in-a-Blender Day
The students at FreeCulture.org announce a unique campaign to
promote free speech and fair uses of copyrighted material:
<http://www.freeculture.org/blog/?pG>

~ Fair Use and Academic Publishing - Q & A
An online colloquy by the Chronicle of Higher Education, featuring
EFF's Wendy Seltzer:
<http://chronicle.com/colloquylive/2004/07/copyright/chat.php3>

~ Bionic Mexican Politicos Vow to Fight Crime
We're totally serious. Mexico's attorney general says that a
microchip implanted in his arm - and the arms of other staffers -
gives him access to a futuristic crime database and allow him
to be located if kidnapped:
<http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,64194,00.html>

~ Canadian P2P Redux
The RIAA's analog in Canada, the CRIA, appealed the recent ruling
that essentially legalized P2P:
<http://news.com.com/2100-1025_3-5266337.html>

~ 100% Increase in Number of Files Downloaded Using P2P
Two new studies suggest that peer-to-peer file sharing is
booming, despite a yearlong campaign of lawsuits and
congressional saber-rattling. We're not going to say we told
you so, but…
<http://uk.news.yahoo.com/040713/80/exvnl.html>

~ The Evils of…Used Books?
Publishers are scared that easy-to-find offerings from used-book
vendors will sink the industry:
<http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/12/technology/12ecom.html>
(Registration unfortunately required.)

~ Dispatch from the Copyright Wars
Dan Gillmor's Sunday column looks at recent developments - good
and bad - in the legislative battles over copyright reform:
<http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/9129662.htm>

~ Plot Hole Discovered in Hollywood's Story on Piracy and Profits
A new study from Tinseltown says that movie piracy is on the rise.
But last week they also announced that the industry is healthier
- and more profitable - than ever before:
<http://news.com.com/2100-1025_3-5262427.html>

~ Ask Not for Whom These Copyright Bills Toll
PC World examines this year's crop of copyright bills and finds
that business interests are once again trouncing the public's
rights:
<http://pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,116791,00.asp>

~ Who's Really Looking Out for Artists Online?
P2P companies are developing ways to pay artists - without the
support of record labels:
<http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200407/s1149743.htm>

~ Aussie Faces Extradition for Copyright Infringement
This is the first that we've heard about extradition for copyright
offenses, but it probably won't be the last:
<http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2004/07/07/1089000225628.html>

~ Hollywood Rolls Out New Piracy-Resistant Screeners
Will it work? We think this quote from Academy President Frank
Pierson may turn out to be accidentally prescient: "It certainly
looked foolproof to us":
<http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/9068782.htm>

~ VoIP Running the Regulatory Gauntlet
The budding Internet telephony industry is under a number of
government microscopes. Declan McCullagh wonders if it will
survive the scrutiny:
<http://news.com.com/2010-1028-5256334.html>
EFF on the application of pre-existing wiretap laws to VoIP:
<http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/CALEA/>

~ Squatters Leave Kerry-Edwards Campaign Homeless on the Web
Domain name speculators have snapped up the most obvious choices
for the Democratic ticket's web presence:
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A32169-2004Jul6.html>
(Registration unfortunately required.)

~ California Email System Springs a Leak, Sends Employee Data to…
Sweden?
The strange story of a Swedish company that's been randomly
receiving sensitive emails - employee salary data and financial
info, for instance - from a California county for two years:
<http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,116808,00.asp>

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* Staff Calendar
For a complete listing of EFF speaking engagements (with
locations and times), please visit:
<http://www.eff.org/calendar/>

~ July 23 -
Wendy Seltzer speaks at BlogOn
UC Berkeley Haas School of Business
Berkeley, CA
8:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m.
<http://www.blogonevent.com/blogon2004/>

~ July 26-28 -
Wendy Seltzer speaks at PFIR's "Preventing the Internet Meltdown
Los Angeles, CA
<http://www.pfir.org/meltdown>

~ July 30 - August 1 -
Kevin Bankston, Annalee Newitz, Seth Schoen, and Wendy Seltzer
speak at Defcon 12, Las Vegas, NV
<http://www.defcon.org/html/defcon-12/dc-12-index.html>

~ August 4 -
EFF holds Freedom Fest 2004
5:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
Yerba Buena Gardens
San Francisco, CA

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* Administrivia

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Editor:
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[email protected]

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