AOL: We're Not Spying on AIM Users 310
The Llama King writes "America Online tells the Houston Chronicle's TechBlog that, despite a recent Slashdot posting to the contrary, AOL Instant Messenger's terms of service do not imply that the company has the right to use private IM communications, and the section quoted in the Slashdot article applies only to posts in public forums -- a common provision in most online publishers' terms of service. AOL spokesman Andrew Weinstein says flatly: 'AOL does not read person-to-person communications.' He also says AIM communiques are never stored on AOL's hard drives. The original Slashdot item was linked throughout the blogosphere -- it will be interesting to see if AOL can extinguish this fire." (Read more below.)
It could be that they don't actually take advantage of its terms, but the Terms of Service seem to broadly favor AIM's right to do exactly what they say they're not doing; rather than drawing any distinction between IM services and public forum posts, the actual terms seem clearly to apply to all AIM products. Here's how they put it:
AOL could probably erase many of the worries about conversation snooping if they would provide a definition of the words "post" and "submit" as used in the following paragraph of their ToS (which says it applies to "any AIM Product"), and explicitly disclaimed an "irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide right to reproduce, display, perform, distribute, adapt and promote" the contents of online conversations:For purposes of these Terms of Service, the term "AIM Products" shall mean AIM software (whether preinstalled, on a medium or offered by download), AIM services, AIM websites (including, without limitation, AIM.COM and AIMTODAY.COM) and all other software, features, tools, web sites and services provided by or through AIM from America Online, Inc. and its business divisions (e.g., Netscape) (collectively "AOL") and AOL's third-party vendors.
You may only post Content that you created or which the owner of the Content has given you. You may not post or distribute Content that is illegal or that violates these Terms of Service. By posting or submitting Content on any AIM Product, you represent and warrant that (i) you own all the rights to this Content or are authorized to use and distribute this Content on the AIM Product and (ii) this Content does not and will not infringe any copyright or any other third-party right nor violate any applicable law or regulation.
Maybe there should be an edit... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Right... (Score:4, Interesting)
Highly coincidental (Score:3, Interesting)
Is it possible to delete AIM accounts? (Score:5, Interesting)
Kidding me... (Score:5, Interesting)
To be fair, Slashdot at least says, on every page, " All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective owners. Comments are owned by the Poster. The Rest © 1997-2005 OSTG."
So, to tie it with a meme:
1. Register Anonymous Coward as your legal name
2. Find all AC posts.
3. ???
4. Profit!
At least it's good to see the "Blogosphere" really pays attention. They don't. Which, really, makes them just like journalists.
*ducks*
Re:No fire extinquishing here... (Score:5, Interesting)
The CIA and NSA are answerable to the government and, in theory, the people. AOL is answerable to its shareholders. The CIA and NSA will do what is necessary to carry out their mandate within the legal boundaries the government provides, AOL will do everything it can get away with to make money.
Quite frankly, I'd sooner trust the CIA and NSA and I'm a tinfoil hatter.
Re:Right... (Score:5, Interesting)
Money has a tendancy of corrupting. The bigger a company grows and the longer they are around the more likely you are to hear of some shady [slashdot.org] practices.
Please don't try to take a cheap jab at a company just for the sake of it being a company
I didn't for the sake of it being a company. I did it for the sake that they SAID in their TOS that they can. If AOL was meant to be a secure company then maybe I'd trust my secure communications with them.
Especially in this case since you've probably been leeching off AOL's servers for years without a second thought (you don't use the official AIM client with the revenue generating ads, do you?)
And why would I when they use interfaces [slashdot.org] I don't want and allow [slashdot.org] me to use someone elses for free?
Re:Answer (Score:3, Interesting)
(I know that isn't an option for everyone, but it is something to consider.)
Re:Right... (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm much more trustworthy of entities which are not in it for the money, and are actually forced to accept feedback.
Depends on what your definition of "is" is. (Score:1, Interesting)
AOL could probably
Or not. They can claim till they're blue in the face (or until some other newer tech controversy overshadows this issue) that they really aren't evil. But as the service provider to millions of generally untechnical internet users, they will be unlikely to give up their advantageous contract provisions with their userbase on the whole because those terms only count in one place: the courtroom. It's the same thing as with Craig's List. Craig has a great service. But read the tos. By posting, you agree to abide by the tos, and if you fall afoul of the tos, he can fine you for each post, and in order to fight those fines, you have to go to a California courtroom. Those provisions for fines I'm sure were instituted to fight the problem he/they are having with spammers and scammers, but after reading the tos (now that it is a huge box instead of a small one), and carefully working through posts in categories I've watched in the past, there are posts from legitimate individuals and small businesses that arguably can and do violate the tos but no one complains and no one flags the ads because even though they arguably violate the tos in one area, they appear to be legitimate ads that aren't in controversial categories such as stuffing envelope jobs or get rich while surfing for a small undisclosed fee categories.
What's the problem with the CL fines if he promises or makes it a practice to use it only against spammers and scammers (that we know of without being privy to confidential settlements)? Simple. CL is no longer owned exclusively by Craig Newmark or private individuals anymore. Ebay, a public traded company that is answerable to shareholders now owns a percentage of CL (25%?). CL must now answer to its shareholders including another public owned company. They now have a fiduciary duty to their shareholders regardless of how much of a do-gooder Craig Newmark is. What happens when Ebay increases their share? Or another shareholder sells their shares for millions to another company that wants to go head-to-head with Ebay, or is a competitor to CL itself and decides to drag CL's reputation through the mud by finding technical violations on their tos and forces CL management to hit up all the technical violators with fines over the last three or five years or more of posting? Or if the outside shareholder finds their own books in trouble, are about to miss a quarter big, and decides to shake the CL fine tree for some funds to boost the quarter temporarily and then worry about fixing CL's reputation at a later date after they dodge their own quarterly bullet? Or they decide to unload the shares instead of worrying about lost CL userbase?
Could AOL change their tos? Sure. Depends on how big the controversy gets, whether it impacts their bottom line, whether some other tech controversy or geopolitical event will draw attention away from this issue, or how successful their efforts are at explaining away any controversy regardless of whether one really exists or not depending on your point of view. If they clarify, they lose the edge they have in court over those very provisions. If they are able to weather the storm and retain those terms, the better it is for them next time they find themselves in court and in need of those provisions.
Would a slashdotter walk away from cable service if the only way of getting it was to provide a social security number? Walk away from cell phone service? Walk away from internet connectivity? Or would a slashdotter moan about it and in the next breath give
Re:Right... (Score:3, Interesting)
Two guys in a garage are not a publicly-owned corporation with a listing on a stock exchange, whereas larger corporations are. It's when corporations become large like this, and their only motivation is stock price, do they commonly exhibit the evil characteristics we're all so familiar with.
AOL can use copyrighted material w/o compensation (Score:5, Interesting)
Case 1:
Mr. Aspiring Songwriter writes a song, and asks some friends for their opinions. He sends the lyrics and an MP3 to friends using his AOL email and/or AIM. The song becomes big a year later. AOL searches their records, and finds he used the AOL network to transfer the work. According to this license, AOL may now:
- publish the song on the internet,
- include the song on CD,
- use the song in a movie,
- use the song in advertisements, and
- have their current boyband record it
without ever giving any compensation to the Mr. A.S.
Case 2:
Mr. Writer works on his book or movie script. He sends each chapter to his agent from his AOL email. AOL can use his work without compensation.
Case 3:
Mr. Small Business writes software. His team uses AIM to discuss the code being developed. AOL may use any of the code transferred on their network for any purpose without compensation.
Case 4:
Mrs. Sporting Goods owns a small store. It does not have an e-commerce website; her AOL email address is enough for the few online orders. One of her customers becomes famous. AOL may publish information about the athlete's purchases and any concerns discussed in her emails. (They may have difficulty justifying the use of the athlete's emails, unless the athlete also used AOL software.)
If this license was used by a small private business, the materials collected could soon become the most valuable resource of the business. AOL is already part of a major media conglomerate, and the threat of using all meterials transferred on their network without compensation is real. AOL's music and movie divisions should be drooling over the ability to find free resources.
It's not as simple as that. (Score:2, Interesting)
What if you send parts of your own already published book to a friend through AOL? Or someone elses? What if you send an mp3 disguised as your own that's really using some samples of some famous work (happens all the time with DJ/producers remixing famous tracks into their own special genre (i.e. drum n bass versions of hiphop songs)).
If AOL were to ever publish those tracks then the actual AOL user could be losing out but then AOL would get into hot water with any material that actually was already copywritten.
If its important, encrypt (Score:2, Interesting)
I have gotten most friends(that use windows) to switch to trillian, and have it automattically set up to do the 'secure link' which also helps w/ employers w/ prying eyes.
I believe that GAIM also allows encrpytion over AIM, but it isnt compatable w/ trillian's, which is unfortunate. I also believe that the Jabber protocol supports it depending on your server. (Google i hope when you launch your service, you include this function)
Re:Right... (Score:3, Interesting)
I agree. This whole hypefest may be a storm in a thimble but it reinforces the need to use an end-to-end encryption that you control. Personally I think Ethereal is a more real threat than the AOL ToS but the solution is the same.
For encryption, I'm not an advocate of gaim-encryption as the answer. It means that people all need to use Gaim and that's just not practical. Personally I think OTR [cypherpunks.ca] is a better option. As well as a GAIM plug-in it offers a proxy so that any IM tool can be made secure, and it addresses the weaknesses gaim-encryption ignores - from their FAQ:
Best of all, it's dead simple to use.Re:I read the TOS, it's just legal ass-covering. (Score:3, Interesting)
Let that be a lesson to folk writing contracts: if you do too much ass-covering, you wind up splattering shit all over.