Top News Article | Reuters.com:


AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A Dutch technology company has breathed life into a project to rid the Internet of suffixes such as .com, and instead offer single names which can be countries, company names or fantasy words.

Such a system, which enables countries, individuals and firms to have a Web address which consists of a single name, offers flexibility and is language and character independent.

"The plan is to offer names in any character set," said Erik Seeboldt, managing director of Amsterdam-based UnifiedRoot.

UnifiedRoot offers practically unlimited numbers of suffixes, unlike the short list of suffixes currently in use. Its offer is different from other "alternative root" providers such as New.net which offers to register names in front of a small range of new suffixes, such as .club and .law.

"We've already had thousands of registrations in a single day," said Seeboldt after the official opening of his 100-strong company which has installed 13 Internet domain name system (DNS) root servers on four continents.

Dutch airport Schiphol is one of the early customers. Registering a name costs $1,000 plus an annual fee of $240. Companies can then invent additional Web site addresses in front of their top-level domain (TLD) name, such as flights.schiphol or parking.schiphol.

Critics argue alternative root companies such as UnifiedRoot introduce ambiguity because they bring a new set of traffic rules to the Web which are, certainly in the beginning, only recognized by a limited number of computers around the world.

"Those who claim to be able to add new 'suffixes' or 'TLDs' are generally pirates or con-men with something to sell," said Paul Vixie, who sits in several committees of the California-based Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) with day-to-day control of the Web, on his CircleID blog.

WELCOME

Others are more welcoming.

"The existence of alternate roots, and the possibility of new ones, provides a useful competitive check on ICANN," said Jon Weinberg, a member of ICANNwatch which keeps a critical eye on ICANN.    Continued ...

Posted by mikki at 08:40 PM | Permalink

BS?:

Recently ICANN's
Chairman was thus quoted:

Q: Critics say the U.S. government basically controls the Internet.

A: That's bulls—t. I'm sorry, I'm not supposed to say that to reporters, but that's just a very bad misunderstanding. Ninety-nine percent of the Internet is in private hands. If you've got a computer at home, and a cable box or DSL line, you own a piece of the Internet. Most of the Internet is owned by the private sector, by businesses, by ISPs, by individuals, by governments—well, that's not [the] private sector, but it's not ICANN either and it's not the United States.

Rubbish.

The Internet is like the sea - the vast bulk is not subject to any particular
authority.

However like the seas, the Internet has its Panama and its Suez; the internet
has its Molucca Straits.

ICANN stands astride the naming systems of the internet just as Panama,
Egypt, and Indonesia stand over the oceans' most critical shipping lanes.

ICANN sprung from the loins of United States Department of Commerce. 
The DoC frequently denies its role as parent, but it has most overtly and
forcefully confirmed ICANN's dependency on, and subservience to, the United
States.

Nothing happens at the top layer of the internet's naming system without
ICANN approval.  And nothing happens in ICANN that is not subject to the
advice and consent of the United States Department of Commerce.

The Department of Commerce/ICANN system has suppressed competition, has cost
consumers of domain names billions of dollars, and has obstructed innovation
across the entire internet.  ICANN has destroyed the internet end-to-end
principle by forcing decisions about top level domains to flow through ICANN's
expensive and arbitrary procedures.

So for ICANN's chairman to imply that the US government is not using ICANN to
control a critical part of the internet is an exercise in misdirection and is,
ultimately, untrue.

And to add insult to injury, ICANN has adopted rules, most notably the
privacy-busting WHOIS and the trademark-uber-alles UDRP that reach out and
impose a supra national law on all of those end-user "personal"
computers that ICANN's chairman claims are not the property of the US or under
the control of ICANN.  If the US or ICANN do not have internet-wide powers,
then why are we users of the internet forced to list our names, addresses, and
other information in the WHOIS database and why are we forced to submit to
ICANN's UDRP?

Posted by mikki at 12:42 PM | Permalink

EFF Files Class Action Lawsuit Against Sony BMG:

Company Should Repair Damage to Customers Caused by CD Software

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), along with two leading national class action law firms, today filed a lawsuit against Sony BMG, demanding that the company repair the damage done by the First4Internet XCP and SunnComm MediaMax software it included on over 24 million music CDs.

EFF is pleased that Sony BMG has taken steps in acknowledging the security risks caused by the XCP CDs, including a recall of the infected discs. However, these measures still fall short of what the company needs to do to fix the problems caused to customers by XCP, and Sony BMG has failed entirely to respond to concerns about MediaMax, which affects over 20 million CDs -- ten times the number of CDs as the XCP software.

"Sony BMG is to be commended for its acknowledgment of the serious security problems caused by its XCP software, but it needs to go further to regain the public's trust," said Corynne McSherry, EFF Staff Attorney. "It is unconscionable for Sony BMG to refuse to respond to the privacy and other problems created by the over 20 million CDs containing the SunnComm software."

The suit, to be filed in Los Angeles County Superior court, alleges that the XCP and SunnComm technologies have been installed on the computers of millions of unsuspecting music customers when they used their CDs on machines running the Windows operating system. Researchers have shown that the XCP technology was designed to have many of the qualities of a "rootkit." It was written with the intent of concealing its presence and operation from the owner of the computer, and once installed, it degrades the performance of the machine, opens new security vulnerabilities, and installs updates through an Internet connection to Sony BMG's servers. The nature of a rootkit makes it extremely difficult to remove, often leaving reformatting the computer's hard drive as the only solution. When Sony BMG offered a program to uninstall the dangerous XCP software, researchers found that the installer itself opened even more security vulnerabilities in users' machines. Sony BMG has still refused to use its marketing prowess to widely publicize its recall program to reach the over 2 million XCP-infected customers, has failed to compensate users whose computers were affected and has not eliminated the outrageous terms found in its End User Licensing Agreement (EULA).

The MediaMax software installed on over 20 million CDs has different, but similarly troubling problems. It installs files on the users' computers even if they click "no" on the EULA, and it does not include a way to fully uninstall the program. The software transmits data about users to SunnComm through an Internet connection whenever purchasers listen to CDs, allowing the company to track listening habits -- even though the EULA states that the software will not be used to collect personal information and SunnComm's website says "no information is ever collected about you or your computer." If users repeatedly requested an uninstaller for the MediaMax software, they were eventually provided one, but they first had to provide more personally identifying information. Worse, security researchers recently determined that SunnComm's uninstaller creates significant security risks for users, as the XCP uninstaller did.

"Music fans shouldn't have to install potentially dangerous, privacy intrusive software on their computers just to listen to the music they've legitimately purchased," said EFF Legal Director Cindy Cohn. "Regular CDs have a proven track record -- no one has been exposed to viruses or spyware by playing a regular audio CD on a computer. Why should legitimate customers be guinea pigs for Sony BMG's experiments?"

"Consumers have a right to listen to the music they have purchased in private, without record companies spying on their listening habits with surreptitiously-installed programs," added EFF Staff Attorney Kurt Opsahl, "Between the privacy invasions and computer security issues inherent in these technologies, companies should consider whether the damage done to consumer trust and their own public image is worth its scant protection."

Both the XCP and MediaMax CDs include outrageous, anti-consumer terms in their "clickwrap" EULAs. For example, if purchasers declare personal bankruptcy, the EULA requires them to delete any digital copies on their computers or portable music players. The same is true if a customer's house gets burglarized and his CDs stolen, since the EULA allows purchasers to keep copies only so long as they retain physical possession of the original CD. EFF is demanding that Sony BMG remove these unconscionable terms from its EULAs.

The law firms of Green Welling, LLP, and Lerach, Coughlin, Stoia, Geller, Rudman and Robbins, LLP, joined EFF in the case. Sony BMG is also facing at least six other class action lawsuits nationwide and an action by the Texas Attorney General. EFF looks forward to representing the voice of digital music fans in the resolution of these disputes between Sony BMG and consumers.

For more on the Sony BMG litigation, see:
http://www.eff.org/IP/DRM/Sony-BMG/

EFF's open letter to Sony:
http://www.eff.org/IP/DRM/Sony-BMG/?f=open-letter-2005-11-14.html

Posted by mikki at 10:39 PM | Permalink

Texas AG vs Sony Spyware (Alan Wexelblat):


Texas' Attorney General has filed suit against Sony for violations of that state's anti-spyware laws, as well as consumer protection charges. The suit is civil in nature, rather than criminal, asking for up to USD 100,000 per violation.

Posted by mikki at 10:38 PM | Permalink

Watch what you Google for.... (Tom Mighell):

If you're planning on committing murder, make sure you research your crime anonymously. In a murder trial going on in Raleigh-Durham, an inspection of the defendant's computer revealed that he had searched the words "neck," "snap," "break," and "hold" on a search engine before his wife died. The computer evidence also apparently indicates that the defendant allegedly researched lake levels, water currents, boat ramps, and access to the lake where his wife's body was later discovered.

When we talk about e-discovery, we're not just talking about e-mail and Word documents with embedded metadata -- we're also talking about your browser's search history. Properly harvested, it can definitely yield some interesting evidence.

Posted by mikki at 10:36 PM | Permalink

Law Firms Fight Over Blame in Patent Failure:


Facing a negligence suit by an ex-client, Coudert Brothers is trying to deflect blame to the next place the client took its business: Duane Morris. Coudert is trying to persuade a Superior Court judge to order Duane Morris or former partner Edward Lynch to pay up if Coudert loses or settles SenoRx's suit alleging the firm missed some patent-filing deadlines that cost it money. That strategy, of course, hasn't sat well with Duane Morris, which has requested that Coudert's indemnity suit be thrown out.

Posted by mikki at 11:20 AM | Permalink

As one who receives, on average, two junk faxes per day, most of which include graphics that waste my toner and paper, I would be all for such a ban. It's not free speech when I have to pay for it.

Junk Fax Ban Draws Challenge:


California's tough new anti-junk fax law is pushing the envelope -- literally. The state wants advertisers to stick to mail when sending unsolicited promotions. After Jan. 1, 2006, it will be a crime for fax marketers to send unsolicited faxes without the express, written consent of the recipient, even for marketers outside California faxing ads into the state. But now, the National Chamber of Commerce Litigation Center has filed a suit in federal court challenging the law.

Posted by mikki at 11:19 AM | Permalink

Flushing the 'Net Down the Tubes:


Doc Searls has written a brilliant piece framing the battle for the 'Net at Linux Journal. The piece is long, but if you take the time to read just one essay on the 'Net and the politics surround it this year, read this one. If you're involved in public policy, it's especially important that you take the time to understand what's at stake here. One of Doc's main points: we haven't framed the conversation correctly and our poor choice of words makes the argument seem overly technical and arcane when it's really about freedom, markets, and innovation.

Posted by mikki at 11:09 AM | Permalink

WSIS Deal: Oversight:


The UN Secretary-General has been invited to "convene a new forum for multi-stakeholder policy dialogue." Everyone can see his/her hearts' desires in the WSIS deal: ICANN can believe that it has survived for another day; governments can believe that they will have "an equal role and responsibility for international Internet governance"; and there will be an enormous meeting in Greece by the second quarter of 2006 to start the Internet Governance Forum going.

Posted by mikki at 11:08 AM | Permalink

Sony Folds Tent, Recalls CDs:


Pummeled into submission by angry consumers and the media, Sony BMG agrees to pull all CDs containing copy-protected software and provide fixes for computers affected by the technology -- and hopes the whole mess just goes away.

Posted by mikki at 11:02 AM | Permalink

RIM 'very comfortable' with NTP patent workaround | CNET News.com:


Research In Motion is more than just fine with a software upgrade it may deploy in a bid to work around the patents involved in its legal dispute with patent holder NTP, its co-chief executive said Wednesday. "It's a software upgrade that we're very, very comfortable with and we've done focus groups with," RIM Co-Chief Executive Jim Balsillie told investors in New York. "We're just finishing testing."

Posted by mikki at 05:04 PM | Permalink

The WSIS Deal:


There is considerable coverage this morning (or this evening in Tunis) on the last minute WSIS deal struck yesterday. The gist of the coverage rightly reports that the U.S. emerged with the compromise they were looking for as the delegates agreed to retain ICANN and the ultimate U.S. control that comes with it (note that there is a lot in the WSIS statement that may ultimately prove important but that is outside the Internet governance issue including the attention paid to cybercrime, spam, data protection, and e-commerce). This outcome begs the questions -- what happened? And, given the obvious global split leading up to Tunis, what changed to facilitate this deal?

Posted by mikki at 04:49 PM | Permalink

All your reviews belong to Amazon.com | The Register:


All your reviews belong to Amazon.com
Patent grab triple whammy
By Andrew Orlowski in San Francisco
Published Saturday 12th November 2005 05:04 GMT
Amazon.com has been granted three detailed patents covering purchase circles, consumer reviews, and search results in the form of products from multiple product categories.
It's a sweeping landgrab which puts e-commerce rivals on the alert. The techniques granted to Amazon.com by the patent office are already ubiquitous on commercial and social networking web sites.

Patent 6,963,848 filed March 2, 2000 and granted November 8, covers "Methods and system of obtaining consumer reviews".
Patent 6,963,867, filed on March 31, 2003, covers "Search query processing to provide category-ranked presentation of search results".
Patent 6,963,850, filed on August 19, 1999 covers "Computer services for assisting users in locating and evaluating items in an electronic catalog based on actions performed by members of specific user communities".

Posted by mikki at 09:17 AM | Permalink

Sony BMG faces three lawsuits over controversial anti-piracy software:


Sony BMG is facing three lawsuits over its controversial anti-piracy software. Revealed in late October by Windows expert Mark Russinovich, the software copy protection system hides using virus-like techniques. One class-action lawsuit has already been filed in California and another is expected in New York

Posted by mikki at 03:52 PM | Permalink

Top News Article | Reuters.com:


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. court shut down three Internet companies for secretly bundling malicious "spyware" with ring tones, music programs and other free high-tech goodies, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission said on Thursday.

The malicious software tracked victims' Internet activity, hijacked their home pages and deluged them with unwanted "pop up" ads, the FTC said.

The assets of Enternet Media Inc. and Conspy & Co. Inc., based in California, and Iwebtunes, based in Ohio, have been frozen pending further court action, the FTC said. The court also ordered all three firms to halt downloads of the software.

Enternet Media and Iwebtunes could not be reached for comment. Conspy did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

According to a complaint filed in district court in Los Angeles, Enternet and Conspy bundled their malicious software with music files, song lyrics and cellular telephone ring tones offered free on a range of Web sites. The software was also disguised as a security upgrade for Microsoft Corp.'s Internet Explorer Web browser.

Posted by mikki at 02:44 PM | Permalink

US court rules for 'gripe website' owner | The Register:


A US court has ruled that a disgruntled customer of an insurance firm cannot be sued for defamation over statements he made on his “gripe site” because those statements are protected free speech.
The case dates back to May 2000, when Ronald DiGiovanni obtained a service warranty – provided by Pennsylvania insurance company Penn Warranty Corp – for his 1994 GMC Sonoma truck.

The truck broke down, but Penn Warranty denied DiGiovanni's warranty claim. Consequently, he brought a small claims action against the firm, alleging breach of contract. The dispute eventually settled with a payout of $2,500.
But DiGiovanni was still unhappy. He set up a 45-page website – PennWarrantyLitigation.com – complaining about the firm. The site was available online for a few weeks in January 2004 but is no longer operating.

Posted by mikki at 09:46 AM | Permalink

The U.N.'s Threat to the Net:


United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan, writing in The Washington Post, declared that it is a "mistaken notion" that the U.N. "wants to 'take over,' police or otherwise control the Internet." Unfortunately, neither the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), the WSIS' Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG) or the Secretary General's column give comfort to those committed to cyber-freedom.

Posted by mikki at 09:39 AM | Permalink

Wired News: Net Chat Anoints Public Figure:


Can mention on the net turn an ordinary citizen into a public figure with severely limited abilities to fight libel and defamation lawsuits? According to a Florida judge's ruling -- perhaps the first of its kind in the United States -- the answer is yes.

In an Oct. 21 ruling, Florida circuit court Judge Karen Cole threw out a defamation case against two TV stations because she deemed the plaintiff -- a Jacksonville woman -- to be a public figure who had been subject to "substantial" internet debate.

In the eyes of the law, public figures are usually politicians or celebrities, who have limited rights to claim that they've been libeled or defamed, thanks to a 1964 ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Among other things, Cole said plaintiff Eliza Thomas had become a public figure because there had been "substantial public debate" regarding her and her husband on the internet.

Thomas claimed First Coast News, a joint operation of two TV stations, defamed her while reporting her efforts to remove the feeding tube from her brain-damaged husband, who is on life support.

In the wake of the Terri Schiavo debate, which also took place in Florida, Thomas' case is controversial enough.

But there's a twist: The state attorney general's office is investigating whether Thomas had something to do with her husband's injuries, raising the prospect of criminal charges. Thomas claims her husband was injured when he tripped over a dog in the kitchen.

The ruling could set an informal precedent and influence other courts, said Jacksonville media attorney George Gabel.

Gabel, who represented the TV stations against Thomas, successfully fought off the defamation suit by, in part, pointing to web coverage of the plaintiff's legal battle over her brain-damaged husband.

Posted by mikki at 09:34 AM | Permalink

Top News Article | Reuters.com:


LOS ANGELES (Billboard) - Complaints continue to mount regarding a controversial CD copy-protection initiative by Sony BMG Music Entertainment.

Artists and consumers' initial concern was that the digital rights management technology does not work with iPods. Now a growing number of music fans charge that the security software behaves like spyware and may create security vulnerabilities in users' computers.

The matter drew increased attention in technology circles October 31, when software developer/computer security expert Mark Russinovich began blogging the details of problems he experienced after using his computer to play the copy-protected CD of "Get Right With the Man" by Van Zant, a Southern rock act signed to Columbia Records.

Russinovich posted that Sony BMG's DRM drained resources from his computer processor, even when the CD was not being played, and was extraordinarily difficult to locate and uninstall. When he finally deleted the software, his computer's CD player stopped working. "This is a clear case of Sony taking DRM too far," he wrote.

Within 24 hours, online tech-news sites including SlashDot and CNet had posted news about Russinovich's account. And by November 2, Sony BMG had posted instructions on its own site (cp.sonybmg/xcp) for removing the DRM.

Posted by mikki at 06:37 PM | Permalink

CNN.com - FBI agents bust 'Botmaster' - Nov 4, 2005:


LOS ANGELES, California (Reuters) -- A 20-year-old man accused of using thousands of hijacked computers, or "bot nets," to damage systems and send massive amounts of spam across the Internet was arrested on Thursday in what authorities called the first such prosecution of its kind.

Jeanson James Ancheta, who prosecutors say was a well-known member of the "Botmaster Underground" -- or the secret network of computer hackers skilled at bot attacks -- was taken into custody after being lured to FBI offices in Los Angeles, said U.S. Attorney's spokesman Thom Mrozek.

A bot is a program that surreptitiously installs itself on a computer and allows the hacker to control the computer. A bot net is a network of such robot computers, which can harness their collective power to do considerable damage or send out huge quantities of spam.

Posted by mikki at 09:30 AM | Permalink

Unsecured Wi-Fi would be outlawed by N.Y. county | CNET News.com:


According to a new proposal being considered by a suburb of New York City, any business or home office with an open wireless connection but no separate server to fend off Internet attacks would be violating the law.

Politicians in Westchester County are urging adoption of the law--which appears to be the first such legislation in the U.S.--because without it, "somebody parked in the street or sitting in a neighboring building could hack into the network and steal your most confidential data," County Executive Andy Spano said in a statement.

The draft proposal offered this week would compel all "commercial businesses" with an open wireless access point to have a "network gateway server" outfitted with a software or hardware firewall. Such a firewall, used to block intrusions from outside the local network, would be required even for a coffee shop that used an old-fashioned cash register instead of an Internet-linked credit card system that could be vulnerable to intrusions.

Posted by mikki at 09:12 AM | Permalink

CDT, CIPPIC File Complaints Against Alleged Spyware Distributors:


The Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) and the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC) today asked the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Canadian Competition Bureau to investigate the business practices of Montreal-based software distributor Integrated Search Technologies and several of its business partners. In complaints filed with the FTC and the Competition Bureau, CDT and CIPPIC allege that Integrated Search Technologies (IST) and its affiliates have engaged in a widespread campaign of installing unwanted software on users computers, and have done so using unfair and deceptive practices prohibited by federal law. The complaints come as part of CDT's ongoing effort to root out the most egregious distributors of spyware, adware and other unwanted technologies.

Posted by mikki at 09:06 AM | Permalink

Tech firms back Bush Net effort | CNET News.com:


WASHINGTON--Less than two weeks before a United Nations summit on the Internet begins, technology firms including Google, IBM and Microsoft are supporting the Bush administration's efforts to maintain the United States' unique influence over domain names.

In what amounted to a public effort to back the status quo, those firms sent representatives to an event here organized to highlight what some participants touted as the security and stability of the current form of Internet governance. MCI, BellSouth and Cisco Systems also participated.

Because it's home to 200 million Internet users and nearly half of the world's electronic commerce, the United States is in a unique position to ensure there's not a slowdown in Net growth, Michael D. Gallagher, the U.S. Commerce Department's assistant secretary for communications and information, said at the event. The gathering was organized by the Information Technology Association of America.

"The U.S. does not support top-down intergovernmental control of the Internet," Gallagher said at a panel discussion composed of technology industry and government representatives. "We do not believe in adding an inter-governmental layer of bureaucracy over such a dynamic medium as the Internet."

Posted by mikki at 08:59 AM | Permalink

Google book scanning still on hold | CNET News.com:


Google plans to resume its library book scanning "soon," a Google spokesman said Thursday.

The company had halted the scanning in August to allow copyright holders time to contact Google and opt out. At the time, the search giant said it would resume scanning on Nov. 1, but three days into the month it still had not, said spokesman Nate Tyler.

"We're getting to it. It's an operational thing," he said.

Tyler declined to be more specific about the timing, but did say that scanners will start with older parts of the participating library collections, which tend to include more public domain and out-of-print books than books still under copyright, he added.

The company is embroiled in lawsuits over its plans to scan, digitize and make searchable public domain and copyright-protected books from the university collections of Oxford, Harvard, Stanford and Michigan, and from the New York Public Library.

Posted by mikki at 08:58 AM | Permalink

BBC NEWS | Technology | Microsoft scans British Library:


About 100,000 books in the British Library are going to be scanned and put online by software giant Microsoft.
The books, which are out of copyright, will be digitised from 2006 and put online as part of Microsoft's book search service next year.

Microsoft is already working with the Open Content Alliance (OCA), set up by the Internet Archive, to put an initial 150,000 works online.

A separate global digital library plan by Google is also under way.

The search giant is spending $200m (£110m) to create a digital archive of millions of books from four top US libraries. It is also digitising out-of-copyright books from the UK's Oxford University.

Posted by mikki at 08:24 AM | Permalink

Speaking Volumes, Part II (Donna Wentworth):

Tim O' Reilly has excellent one-stop shopping for this weekend's debate about Google Print library on Dave Farber's IP list. Here, a snippet that's helpful for explaining what the Authors Guild and publishers are asking for in the name of copyright (hyperlink, mine):

Google is making it possible for us to find books we want to buy (or borrow from the library, which isn't a crime just yet). Google is not letting us read books for free. Not even close. Does anyone really think that someone who wanted to read Angle of Repose would instead use Google Print and decide that the snippet of Stegner was sufficient?

So what are the Authors Guild and the publishers complaining about? They're complaining that Google hasn't offered to share the profits that might accrue thanks to ads Google may someday display, or that are attributable to the marginal increase in general Google traffic. But on what basis do they claim entitlement to that brand new revenue stream? The money is not based on the public copying the book -- which is what copyright protects against -- it's based on the public FINDING the book in the first instance.

Now I suppose that the Authors Guild folks want to claim that they should get a share of any way of making money related to locating their works. That's an interesting argument, but it's not a copyright claim. If copyright owners approached libraries and demanded a share of library funds because of the existence of the card catalog it would be difficult to stifle the giggles. Yet isn't the same thing going on here? Stealing an analogy from law Prof Tim Wu, we have never given real property owners the right to "opt out" of any mechanism that helps people find their property -- maps. That's just not in the bundle of rights you get when you buy a home and preventing location tools is also not in the bundle of rights that come with copyright.

Posted by mikki at 10:50 PM | Permalink

CDT Applauds New Industry Push for Internet Privacy Legislation:


Announcing today that it would support national Internet privacy legislation, Microsoft Corp. joined a growing group of major high-tech companies that support the creation of robust federal rules to protect citizens' privacy rights online. With companies like Microsoft, Hewlett Packard and eBay aligning themselves with public interest advocates in the call for stronger privacy protections, momentum is now clearly on the side of those advocating for a robust new federal law, CDT President Jerry Berman said. "While we have not reached consensus on all of the provisions of a privacy bill, we applaud Microsoft 's willingness to work actively with other high tech companies, consumer organizations, and policy makers to make serious privacy legislation a reality."

Posted by mikki at 10:46 PM | Permalink