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The Battle for Net Freedom

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US judge orders hundreds of sites "de-indexed" from Google, Facebook. After a series of one-sided hearings, luxury goods maker Chanel has won recent court orders against hundreds of websites trafficking in counterfeit luxury goods.

US judge orders hundreds of sites "de-indexed" from Google, Facebook

A federal judge in Nevada has agreed that Chanel can seize the domain names in question and transfer them all to US-based registrar GoDaddy. The judge also ordered "all Internet search engines" and "all social media websites"—explicitly naming Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Bing, Yahoo, and Google—to "de-index" the domain names and to remove them from any search results. Music Industry Mulls Suing Google Over “Pirate” Search Results. The recording industry considers filing a lawsuit against Google for allegedly abusing its dominant market position to distort the market for online music.

Music Industry Mulls Suing Google Over “Pirate” Search Results

Industry groups including IFPI and the RIAA want Google to degrade links to "pirate" websites in its search results. IFPI has obtained a "highly confidential and preliminary legal opinion" to see if they can force Google to step up its anti-piracy efforts though a lawsuit. It’s no secret that the entertainment industries believe search engines are not delivering enough when it comes to protecting copyright works. Two months ago the RIAA and IFPI accused Google of massively profiting from piracy and obstructing efforts of rightsholders to reduce the availability of illegal content. Thus far, this row between Google and the entertainment industries has largely taken place behind closed doors, but a confidential document circulating among music industry executives shows that a lawsuit is also being considered. WordPress Plugin Unblocks Censored Sites, Including The Pirate Bay.

A new WordPress plugin makes it dead easy to uncensor blocked websites.

WordPress Plugin Unblocks Censored Sites, Including The Pirate Bay

In just a few clicks people can setup their own proxy site with the popular blogging software. An essential tool for people whose speech is restricted by oppressive regimes, and handy for downloaders in The Netherlands, Italy, Finland and other countries where ISPs are blocking The Pirate Bay. Additionally, the plugin partially defeats the PIPA and SOPA bills in the US. There’s been a lot of talk about censorship lately. Last week the Internet witnessed the largest protest in its history, against the Internet censorship bills PIPA and SOPA.

Breaking News: Feds Falsely Censor Popular Blog For Over A Year, Deny All Due Process, Hide All Details... How the US Justice Department legally hacked my Twitter account. Before my Twitter case, in which the US Department of Justice has demanded that the social media site hands over personal information about my account which it deems necessary to its investigation of WikiLeaks, I didn't think much about what rights I would be signing off when accepting user agreement in my computer.

How the US Justice Department legally hacked my Twitter account

The text is usually lengthy, in a legal language that most people don't understand. Big Brother in Your Pocket: How Police Use Your Cell Phone to Track You - Conor Friedersdorf - Technology. Officers in numerous states and cities get detailed information from cell-phone carriers without a warrant -- and legislators ought to stop them.

Big Brother in Your Pocket: How Police Use Your Cell Phone to Track You - Conor Friedersdorf - Technology

The Surveillance Catalog - The Wall Street Journal. As the Internet has grown to handle more data, monitoring companies have had to keep up.

The Surveillance Catalog - The Wall Street Journal

Interception now can mean taking all the traffic from the Internet backbone and funneling it through devices that inspect the packets of data, determine what is inside them, and make decisions about whether to copy them for law enforcement. Why the Jones Supreme Court Ruling on GPS Tracking Is Worse Than It Sounds - Rebecca J. Rosen - Technology. While the justices unanimously agreed police violated a suspect's Fourth Amendment rights, the Court split on whether the government can track you without a device.

Why the Jones Supreme Court Ruling on GPS Tracking Is Worse Than It Sounds - Rebecca J. Rosen - Technology

Last fall the Supreme Court heard a case concerning whether police in Washington DC were in violation of the Constitution when they tracked the car of a suspected drug dealer's wife using a GPS device they installed on the car. U.S. v. Jones: Protecting Privacy in the Digital Age. As technology makes surveillance easier and cheaper, courts are grappling with how to apply the Fourth Amendment in the digital age.

U.S. v. Jones: Protecting Privacy in the Digital Age

Prior to beepers, GPS, people checking in on Foursquare, and social networks, law enforcement monitoring of suspected offenders was limited by the constraints of manpower, budget and the risk that the officers following suspects might themselves be seen. But now an increasing amount of information about people’s whereabouts, activities, purchases and intentions can be gleaned digitally, without an officer ever leaving the station. The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision this month in United States v. Jones provides little guidance about which activities might be considered searches, which require warrants, and which voluntary disclosures to third parties might waive Fourth Amendment rights.

One Per Cent: FBI releases plans to monitor social networks. Jim Giles, consultant UPDATE: The FBI refused to answer specific questions from New Scientist, but did provide a statement on the scope and legality of the software it wishes to build: "The intent is to view publicly available open source, non-private social data that is readily available on the open internet.

One Per Cent: FBI releases plans to monitor social networks

The application will not focus on specific persons or protected groups, but on words that relate to "events" and "crisis," and activities constituting violations of federal criminal law or threats to national security. Examples of these words will include lockdown, bomb, suspicious package, white powder, active shoot, school lock down, etc. The FBI uses publicly available open source information to identify immediate or emerging threats to national security or violations of federal criminal laws, to provide situational awareness and to establish a common operating picture. (Image: Patrick George/Ikon Images/Getty) Obama Pushes for New Internet-Privacy Law to Protect Consumers. Proof of Game of Thrones’s excellence is that the quiet phrases are sometimes more arresting than the bloodiest betrayal and revenge.

Obama Pushes for New Internet-Privacy Law to Protect Consumers

When Varys the Spider, the ultimate scheming courtier, hisses, “I serve the realm,” I don’t doubt that he means it, by his own flickering lights. A Clunky Cyberstrategy. </em>Soon after Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was ousted from power last year, protesters stormed the Egyptian national security headquarters, in which police records are housed. Some Egyptians found files the authorities had compiled about them. Others uncovered files focusing on friends and colleagues. A Privacy Manifesto in Code: What If Your Emails Never Went to Gmail and Twitter Couldn't See Your Tweets? - Alexis Madrigal - Technology. A new tool under development by Oregon State computer scientists could radically alter the way that communications work on the web. Privly is a sort of manifesto-in-code, a working argument for a more private, less permanent Internet. Does CISPA Have Sufficient Safeguards? SHARING: THE RIGHT CYBERSTRATEGYMike Rogers Every day, U.S. businesses are the targets of cyber-espionage operations sponsored by countries such as China and Russia.

The cost is significant: Every year, U.S. industry suffers huge losses of valuable research and development data and other sensitive information (not to mention the increased costs associated with securing data). Estimates are hard to come by, but numbers in academic literature range from $2 billion to $400 billion per year.

Piracy Debate

Twitter's Misguided Flirtation with Censorship - By Uri Friedman. Google Now Censors The Pirate Bay, isoHunt, 4Shared and More. Google has expanded its search blacklist to include many of the top file-sharing sites on the Internet, including The Pirate Bay. Exposed: Massive New Spy Center Built to Track Your Emails and Phone Calls. March 21, 2012 | Free Speech for Computers? Email and web use 'to be monitored' under new laws. 1 April 2012Last updated at 09:24 ET.

Turning the internet into a police state. ‘We will be strong in defence of freedom’, the UK coalition government declared in its founding agreement before taking power. Was our interview with LulzSec hacker an FBI set-up? - tech - 14 March 2012. Hacks of Valor. </em>Over the past year, the U.S. government has begun to think of Anonymous, the online network phenomenon, as a threat to national security.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Keith Alexander, the general in charge of the U.S. World War 3.0. Two years earlier, Thackeray had helped the U.S. Secret Service run Operation Sun Devil, one of the first crackdowns on illegal computer hacking. The Curious Case of Internet Privacy. Private space: Author Cory Doctorow in his study. Internet freedom threat posed by Hillary Clinton’s State Department and Anonymous. The Rise of Europe's Private Internet Police - Rebecca MacKinnon. Child protection web filters censor BNP, lifestyle and technology sites.

Fugitive hacker Christopher Doyon, or Commander X, tells why Anonymous ‘might well be the most powerful organization on Earth’ Tweet With Caution - By Jamie Bartlett and Carl Miller. Britain Unveils Electronic Mass Surveillance Plan. FBI Wants Backdoors in Facebook, Skype and Instant Messaging. America's Spy State: How the Telecoms Sell Out Your Privacy.

Senators Consider Banning Automatic Media Sharing on Facebook. Police Censor Google, Facebook and 8,000 Other Sites by Accident. "Keyboard Cops" by Naomi Wolf. DMCA: Horrors of a Broad and Automated Censorship Tool. Judge Demands Disclosure of Private Facebook Photos.