Circuit Writer Version 8.0

By Jim Scheef

The events and stories of this past month have been earth-shattering in their importance, so I will get a little note out of the way right now: last month (version 7.11) finished my eighth year writing this column. I can never understand people who say they have nothing to write about.

This month the theme is the Constitution of the United States of America, and yes, I will tie this into computers. When the Constitution was submitted to the states for ratification in 1787, many people were concerned that the rights and freedoms for which they had just fought so long and hard were not codified, were not guaranteed, in the original seven articles of the Constitution. A compromise was needed to gain approval in Massachusetts and some other states. The compromise was the agreement to follow the Constitution with a set of amendments that we know today as the Bill of Rights. The first of these amendments reads as follows: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” This month the First Amendment has been much in the news.

Here is the first computer tie-in, otherwise known as Net Neutrality. Net Neutrality is more than which web sites have the fastest speed, or what devices you can connect to the Internet. Net Neutrality is free speech. It is who has the right to determine which messages can reach the recipient and if other messages have priority over other messages. The “agreement” between Verizon and Google could lead to a tiered “private” Internet where extra-cost premium traffic takes precedence over regular traffic from folks like us. Could this lead to stifling the free exchange of ideas? The level playing field provided by the Internet has given groups from the smallest blogger to the Ku Klux Klan, all the various Tea Partiers and WikiLeaks the same ability to publish. How many people would be using Linux today if free software did not have the same ability to make a website as Microsoft does? Of these examples, perhaps the most important is the person with something to say who starts a blog.

Net neutrality really is about free speech. The flow of information has changed dramatically over the last twenty years. Ask the people who used to work for daily and weekly newspapers all over the country. Media consolidation has drastically reduced the number of news outlets. Cable television has not countered this trend; it has made it worse, as these outlets are owned by the same corporations as the remaining newspapers and radio stations. As the number of corporations owning media outlets has decreased, our ability to hear independent ideas shrinks every day.

The one remaining open media is the Internet, but not if the telecommunications companies are allowed to control the flow. Here is some suggested reading. The first is Senator Al Franken’s op-ed on CNN (tinyurl.com/2vsgxbz), which is the most lucid explanation of the issue I have found. Next are reviews of the Verizon-Google deal; first from EFF (tinyurl.com/373gut2) that explains the relation between this deal and FCC regulation of the Internet, and then another on Ars Technica (tinyurl.com/24jcf8u) “Google-Verizon NN pact riddled with gaping loopholes” that explains the evil. For some lighter (as in depth, not humor) reading, take a look at “What Would a 'Private' Internet Look Like?” on ABC News (tinyurl.com/2vnts72).

I believe the Verizon-Google deal is an outgrowth of a federal circuit court ruling that the FCC does not have the authority to mandate net neutrality in the manner it currently proposes. Read about this in an Op-ed piece from the New York Times from April, “An Internet for Everybody” (tinyurl.com/ydy8wma) by Susan Crawford (former special assistant to President Obama for science, technology and innovation policy, now a professor at the University of Michigan Law School).

Keep in mind that free speech is not a left or right, conservative or liberal issue. When someone or something impinges on anyone’s speech, we are all diminished. It never hurts to tell your Congresspeople how you feel about an issue and I urge you to do so. Your letter or email could be what shapes their opinion on this issue.

Well, one last blog. I include it only for the humorous irony, “Tea Party groups out against net neutrality” by Sara Jerome of The Hill. She writes that Tea Party groups object to FCC regulation of the Internet on free speech grounds: “The free-speech argument holds that, by interfering with how phone and cable companies deliver Internet traffic, the government would be thwarting the free-speech rights of providers such as AT&T, Verizon and Comcast.” Sorry, but you just can’t make this stuff up.

My hat is off to Research In Motion (RIM), the Canadian makers of the Blackberry smart phone. It is so secure that governments are threatening to block the devices unless RIM provides these governments with a back door allowing them to read every email sent to or from Blackberry devices in these countries. Wow! That must be some encryption they use! Of course these governments, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia and India are only asking for the same access they assume RIM is providing to the United States government. See “BlackBerry Security Stance Sows Anxiety” in the NY Times (tinyurl.com/2vmwb8g) for a good synopsis of the story.

Digging a little deeper, we find that this is not the first time the UAE has tried to get access to Blackberry emails, the first time, they did not ask so nicely. Read this post on Engadget “Etisalat BlackBerry update was indeed spyware, RIM provides a solution” (tinyurl.com/m52l6y). It seems that Etisalat, the wireless carrier in the UAE, sent an SMS to their customers asking that they download and install a “performance enhancing” update. Those who installed the patch noticed vastly decreased battery life. Rather than coming from RIM, the patch was coded by SS8, a U.S. security firm, to reroute email to government servers. In other words, UAE used social engineering to get Blackberry users to install spyware on their phones. RIM has issued a removal tool on their website at tinyurl.com/lr93tx. Like I said before, you can’t make this stuff up.

Aren’t you glad we live in a country that guarantees your free speech so we can be sure that our government is not spying on our email! If you think this is unimportant, read “Digital Privacy: If You've Done Nothing Wrong, Do You Have 'Nothing to Hide'?” by Barton Gellman at (tinyurl.com/25m9xkg). I particularly like: “Oracle's Larry Ellison (“the privacy you're concerned about is largely an illusion") is the guy who wants to supply software for a national ID system.”

The first freedom mentioned in the First Amendment is that of religion and there is no computer tie-in for this one. The founding fathers thought that religious freedom was so important, that religion is actually mentioned in the original seven articles of the Constitution. Article VI specifies, among other things that “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” Given this level of importance, it would seem insane to deny any religious group the right to build a community center on private property anywhere in this country. To do so in lower Manhattan where we, as a nation, were attacked by terrorists who it was said at the time “hate us for our freedoms”, would serve only to make true what our detractors say about us. There have been so many news stories, editorials and op-ed pieces on this topic, I make no reading recommendations. Besides, you’ve probably already made up your mind and it is unlikely that anything I could say or suggest is going to change that.

The opinions expressed here are the author’s and not necessarily those of the Danbury Area Computer Society, its board or officers.