Inside Comcast's Surveillance Policies

Monk writes "The Federation of American Scientists has obtained a recently disclosed Comcast Handbook for Law Enforcement which details its policies for divulging its customers' personal information. (Here's the handbook itself in PDF form.) All of Comcast's policies seem to follow the letter of the law, and seem to weigh customer privacy with law enforcement's requests. This is in apparent contrast to AT&T and a number of other telecommunication companies, which have been only too happy to give over subscriber records. According to the handbook, Comcast keeps logs for up to 180 days on IP address allocation, and they do not keep all of your e-mails forever (45 days at most). VoIP phone records are stored for 2 years, and cable records can only be retrieved upon a court order. The document even details how much it costs law enforcement to get access to personal data (data for child exploitation cases is free of charge)."

The law doesn't protect you

[MacDork]

The law doesn't protect you. You protect you. Encrypt.

Re:The law doesn't protect you

[Hijacked Public]

Also buy a rifle.

Re:The law doesn't protect you

[megaditto]

And when they ask you for your key and you won't give them, they throw you in jail and keep you there. Already happened to a few people.

Re:Secure your email

[waa]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Nothing incriminating in your email? Not worried about 'them' monitoring your emails? Think again.

"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety"
Ben Franklin

And BTW, encrypting email only takes a few minutes to set up and no (perceptible) time when signing/encrypting a message.

- --
Bill Arlofski

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.7 (GNU/Linux)
Comment: 'email [e-mail] for my public key'

iD8DBQFHFDdxcBKMMWOpTtwRAm7SAJ9sk5L6zOiACP91e8T2OJwMAl1xrQCbBxOS
z/z40E7hPJkxLSBUE1WuMDg=
=VH+Y
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

Re:Secure your email

[spud603]

There's a strong argument to be made to encrypt specifically because you have nothing to hide.
This is similar to the idea that you should not let the cops search your home without a warrant even though you don't have anything illegal inside. The more it becomes assumed that only the "bad guys" that are asserting their rights and/or privacy, the more likely such assertions will be thought of as indicative of bad behavior in and of themselves. If the feds assume I'm a criminal simply because I encrypt my email, then they are not doing their job effectively.

Re:The law doesn't protect you

[arthurpaliden]

Funny, rifles do not seem to be protecting the Iraqi people....

Re:Secure your email

[Ucklak]

Do I have anything incriminating in my email?
No

Do I care if they snoop in my email?
Yes

Will I encrypt my email because they're snooping?
No - in the case of confidential messages, they have always been dealt with cryptically.

Can I do anything about them snooping in my email - regardless if it's encrypted or not?
Absolutely not

Can we do anything about them snooping in my email?
We can try

I am such a low priority for them that as long as it doesn't disturb my day to day routine, I really don't worry about it. I don't even notice if they are even sniffing my packets.

It's like being robbed in your home when you're out. It doesn't matter if you have an alarm system or not, if someone wants property of yours, they will get it.
You can double lock your doors, put bars on the windows, pay for a monitoring service, or whatever, it will not stop a determined person from getting whatever they want to get.

That hassle of behavior is not worth it to me. Supporting a group or honest politician to stop the snooping is worth the hassle.

I'm not going to go downtown and walk across the street out of my way just to avoid the town crier (you know, every town has one, a crazy coot parked in the center of town that says the end of the world is coming). I will confront him if he confronts me.

Re:Secure your email

[Technician]

There is nothing incriminating in my email beyond sending stupid YouTube links to a buddy or bitching to the wife about who chooses whats for dinner.

My stock trades are not incriminating either, but they are not sent plaintext. They are also not sent on my ISP mail servers. Sometimes data security is simply data security to prevent mis-use in the wrong hands. There is nothing incriminating, but my credit card order details is not to be made public.

There is a reason to encrypt some sensitive data. ID theft of credit card information is just one of the many reasons.

Re:Secure your email

[ArcherB]

And this part is the key:
It could be worth your life to write a letter that might be seen as having the seeds of treason.

George Bush is not going to have you executed if you look like you may be "seeding the seeds of treason". Hell, if that were the case, all he'd have to do is show up at a anti-war rally and shot the people carrying the signs calling for revolution! Why bother paying Comcast? The King of England read mail to keep himself in power. The feds read mail to prevent a terrorist from killing hundreds, thousands or possibly millions of people while crippling the world's economies. One was a group of freedom fighters trying to gain independence and human rights from a dictator. The other is a government trying to save the lives of its population from those who want an oppressive religion based world government. To compare the two really isn't valid.

Also, I could not find that quote you mentioned, although it seems more of an argument for freedom of the press than anything else. A search for the first paragraph only links back to an earlier slashdot post of yours. Although I'll go ahead and take what you say at face value, and it does seem to be something that Hentoff would say, but it seems odd that it's not posted anywhere on the web.

I searched for the author and found this about Nat Hentoff from his Wiki page:

In February 2003, Hentoff signed a letter circulated by Social Democrats, USA advocating the removal of Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq on human rights grounds, citing reports detailing Hussein's disregard for fundamental liberties. In March and April of that year Hussein was deposed by a US-led invasion, launching the ongoing Iraq war. In summer 2003, Hentoff wrote a column for the Washington Times in which he supported Tony Blair's humanitarian justifications for the war. He also criticized the Democratic Party for casting doubt on President Bush's pre-war assertions about Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction in an election year.

So I guess you are pro-life and support our presence in Iraq too?

Re:Secure your email

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Besides, these guys are not looking for prosecution, they are looking to identify and bust terrorism cells. They are looking to stop the next terrorist attack. They are looking to intercept supplies such as bomb making materials and replace them with something inert. Yes, an email will be evidence, but when it comes to terrorism, they require a open and shut case with multiple arrests. They don't want to pop you for looking for weed.

Could you be any more naive?

Just how many terrorists attacks have we had in the US? Why are you still knee-jerking on a crime that kills less people world-wide (including Israel) than drown in bath-tubs?

As for "they require a open and shut case with multiple arrests" WTF are you talking about? Do you know how many people in Guantanamo are part of "open and shut cases?" NONE. Do you know how many were even "picked up on the battlefield?" Hardly more than 5%.

How about the thousands arrested in NYC during the republican convention who were then just conveniently released without charges?

Recent history is chock-a-block full of cases where OUR government abused civil rights - when they couldn't find something legit to bust someone for, they stretched to find anything to pin on them - like popping you for looking for weed.

I never said that. I said they would take a close look, wasting their time and doing MORE of what you didn't want them to do in the first place. If they can't get your email, they may listen to your phone calls. They may start tailing you. They may start investigating the people you email. Why? Because you thought it would be super cool spy stuff to encrypt your email to keep the evil G-Men out.

Yeah, and if enough people do it then this goddamn fear-mongering will have to end because there won't be enough people in the world to take it to the next level for every one of them.

Besides, even the SS didn't really need to evesdrop. If they wanted information, they'd kick down your door, torture your little girl until YOU cracked, and put you on a train somewhere with a bunch of people with stars sewn into their clothing.

You make that statement as if it is some kind of justification to bow down to the man because he'll do whatever he wants anyway. You have got to be trolling, either that are you are some kind of Martin Niemöller [wikipedia.org] wannabe.

Re:Secure your email

[shmlco]

"Getting people to use encryption is always a tough sell, because most people, to be perfectly frank, lead lives that are so completely boring that nobody would ever want to read their mail, and they know it."

Or the flip side of the equation. Many are already placing already anything and everything about themselves on MySpace and Facebook. With so much information already public and available, what's to hide?

Clarification please...

[shaitand]

'and cable records can only be retrieved upon a court order'

Are they saying that comcast will hand over identity and ip records WITHOUT a court order? The only 'balanced' policy would be to turn over nothing to law enforcement without a court order and even then to oppose the order if possible.