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The Courts Government Your Rights Online News

Washington Judge Overturns Privacy Law 36

Posted by michael from the corporate-free-speech dept.
joeflies writes "Washington state regulations were enacted to protect phone customer privacy. The opt-in policy regulation was overturned by a judge who found in favor of Verizon, seeing it as a potential violation of free speech."
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Washington Judge Overturns Privacy Law More

Washington Judge Overturns Privacy Law

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  • Ugh! (Score:5, Informative)

    by Asprin ( 545477 ) <gsarnoldNO@SPAMyahoo.com> on Thursday February 13, 2003 @08:48AM (#5293854) Homepage Journal

    The law wasn't overturned, a preliminary injuction was granted suspending the law while the case is pending.

    RTFA!

    • How is Verizon not being able to sell information on their customers a violation of free speech? Selling personal customer data doesn't fall into free speech!
    • Okay I'll demonstrate my near total ignornace of this issue and suggest that surely the time is ready for a Internet Users Association with some catchy acronym. With millions of members such a body would act as a counterweight to the RIAA and the MPAA.

  • All US residents should expect a copy of the Judge's ruling to be mailed to their homes unless they contact the court by phone to "opt-out."

  • So, would it be... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by FroMan ( 111520 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @09:06AM (#5293940) Homepage Journal
    So, would it be free speech to sign the Judge up for every mailing list and phone call list we can find?

    <knee-jerk-without-reading-article>

    Oh well... What seems to bother me the most is not the phone calls that I can tell someone, "don't call me!" What really bothers me is when you get like 5 phone calls a night and no one is there when you pick up. You can't tell them to remove you from the calling list if you don't get to talk to them.
    • At least in my opinion.

      Do judges not get telemarketing calls, or are they just not bothered by them? Conspiracy theory might suggest that telemarketers are careful not to call judges so that they won't understand why the public hates this so much.

      What bothers me the most about this is that the primary consideration here is there ability to sell and share this information with other entities. If they have a business relationship with you, at least there is some justification for them calling, although it is weak if they are selling other services. On the other hand, they do have to be more careful with customers, since they might decide to 'opt-out' of their service altogether.

    • Re:So, would it be... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by dschuetz ( 10924 )
      What really bothers me is when you get like 5 phone calls a night and no one is there when you pick up. You can't tell them to remove you from the calling list if you don't get to talk to them.

      Sure you can. They called you, they've got a responsibility to allow the call to complete. Otherwise, I'd say, you could sue them not only for ignoring your legally delivered "do not call" request (just because they don't listen doesn't mean you didn't ask), but also could charge them with telephone harassment (last I heard, repeated hang-ups could get you in trouble). I'd argue that they have a reasonable expectation that someone they call might ask to be put on a list, and by using an auto-dialer that hangs up on 4 out of 5 simultaneously-dialed calls 'cause one of them answered first shouldn't be an excuse to shirk that responsibility. At least, I'd love to see a smart lawyer argue that.

      Of course, if they don't provide any CID information, then you'll never be able to figure out who to sue.

      It's interesting that this story comes the same day that the Congress decided to fund the FTC's opt-out list.

      I still say, as I have many, many times before, that none of these remedies will help, in the long run. I get more tape-recorded calls now (which are illegal in the first place) than normal telemarketers. If they're ignoring the law prohibiting taped messages, they'll just ignore opt-in or opt-out laws, too. It all comes down to knowing who called you (which you can't because the FCC crippled caller-id regs), and having the time to bother with suing them (which nobody does).

      • I had one of those strings of calls where I would get 5 or six hangup calls a night, no caller-ID info. This went on for about 4 weeks. After the first week, I contacted the phone company about harrasment. They told me I had to file with the police department, so I did. It took the PD 3 fucking weeks to approve the trace and notify the phone company, and by then the calls had stopped. Back to step zero. Lather, rinse, repeat.

        Automated dialing should be outlawed. Period. I want this judges home phone number, address, and email address. I want him spammed, junkmailed, and telemarketed to death. Asshole. Commercial speach is not free speach.
        • Not to be picky here... commercial speach is spelled commercial speech. Similar to free speech.

          I would hate to have you send a message to this judge and have him think anti-spammer/telemarketers are all unliterate [sic].
          • Until /. has a built-in spell checker, I reserve the right to have a typo or 4.
            Yes, I know how to spell speech, but sometimes my fingers don't.

            In other words, you were being picky.
            • Wasn't meant to offend. Fat fingers is fine, but spelling speech wrong 4 or so times in a post can sometimes show a thinking error. Especially when everything else seemed to be spelled fine.

    • By Minnesota state law, it is illegal for an auto dialer to dial unless there is someone on their end to take the call. Hanging up because more people answered than you have operators for is illegal. Since one end point is in minnesota, this law applies for out of state tellemarketers too. (Though enforcing it for out of the US is tricky, that hasn't been a problem)

      This seems to work fairly well, At least I don't know anyone in MN who complains about hangups.

      Personally I have a better option that works for me: my cell phone. I have a land line because DSL requires it (and no other broadbad is avaible to me for less) but I don't attach a phone to the line. Call my cell phone or you won't get me. Telemarketing calls are illegal to cell phones.

  • Or would it be free speach to... (Score:3, Informative)

    by 0x69 ( 580798 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @09:13AM (#5293979) Journal
    Would it also be 1st-Amendment-protected free speach to call the Judge at home to inform her of one's own opinions on the right to privacy?

    Or would that be harassment, since the victim would be one of the more-equal-than-us rich & powerful class, not a peon (like most of the folks suffering from endless telemarketing calls)?
    • That's an interesting question. If would be speech, but would it be free? If you called once privately, probably not harassment. If you called repeatedly, probably harassment. If you called once as a member of a campaign to call this person, probably harassment (conspiracy).

      A letter, though, would be appropriate. Not that judges are supposed to respond to public opinion in the slightest.
    • A few weeks back NPR had an article on this topic, centered around a court case in California involving Nike, sweatshop allegations, and Nike's "our act is now clean" ad campaign.

      I don't remember all of the details, but the news article left the impression that the court is chomping at the bit to have a case that allows them to examine the merits of 'individual speech' vs 'commercial speech.' It left me with the feeling that the concept of 'truth in advertising' is about to be gutted in favor of 'freedom of commercial speech.'
      • I'm all in favour of Nike winning this. I feel my "All emnployees of Nike are rapists and murderers" advertising campaign will be a huge success.

        But seriously, most of the few exisiting restrictions on freedom of speech cover freedom of honest speech. The classic example of shouting "Fire" in a crowded theatre is an example of dishonesty, so is libel and so is truth in advertising
        • I can quite readily agree with your point of view. I honestly don't know enough about the Nike case to have my own judgement on it, I was just disturbed by other aspects of the news piece. I certainly won't argue that perhaps personal rights are being overexercised in the US today, but I feel that the balance is against personal responsibility, not corporate rights.

          I just have this ugly feeling that we're about to see a new field which will come to be commonly called "editorial advertising." It will look enough like advertising to help sell a product, but at the same time will look enough like "opinion" to pass a "freedom of commercial speech" muster. On its own, this wouldn't necessarily be bad, but why would they need new protections if the ad would have passed truth in advertising?

          IMHO, it will be like the emergence of soft money after campaign reform laws limited hard money.
      • Hmmm...if Nike sells shoes for a while advertising "we're now virtuous" but keeps the little kids working 84-hour weeks over Maim & Kill shoe machines at the factory, can they be hit with a class-action lawsuit by customers who say that Nike obtained their money under False Pretenses? (Or similar law - IANAL.)
  • Would he mind if i stood up in the middle of HIS courtroom, and started reading from ALT.SEX.GERBILS at the top of my lungs?

  • It might violate free speech but... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Steve Cox ( 207680 ) on Thursday February 13, 2003 @09:43AM (#5294167)
    ...this isn't about free speech. Its about free listening.

    People are just as free to speak as they are to listen, and should not be FORCED to listen to what they don't want.

    Steve.
  • It's all about whether they can sell customer's account information.

    They may not be able to target me directly, and don't have all the information about me, but how does that stop them from saying what they want to say?

    This is like saying that laws against stealing blank paper are a violation of freedom of speech because they prevent me from printing.
    • And if they value their customer's business, they'll value their customers privacy. The fact that a judge is saying that they can sell customer information means I will NEVER use Verizon as a phone company/ISP.
      • Actually, that's something I meant to mention. From my point of view, they're a telephone company! They make money selling a telephone service, and the information was supplied for this purpose.
        • Yes, they are a telephone service. I pay them (the tel-co) for a phone number and the right to make calls. In addition, the telephone number is considered my private property for how ever long I keep the account. That being said, I also get to choose whether I can block other people from seeing my number (caller id block) and whether it's listed in the phone book or not. For the Direct Marketers Association to claim they have unlimited rights to MY phone number pisses me off. It pisses me off even more when I know my own phone company is providing them these lists (with other personal information, just the other day I got a telemarkter trying to sell me an unsecured Visa, he knew ME SPECIFICALLY (I'm Joseph A Nagy Jr, my father is (obviously) Sr)). If my telco [blomand.net] was selling my info and I knew about it, I'd switch to another phone company, whether or not the price was higher. If there was no other company, I'd look into re-activating my cellphone (which I just might do anyways).

  • Juxtoposition (Score:3, Interesting)

    by parliboy ( 233658 ) <parliboy@ g m a il.com> on Thursday February 13, 2003 @11:49AM (#5295085) Homepage
    Does anyone else see a problem with Verizon taking this stance here, but taking the opposing stff when third parties request their records to pursue piracy concerns?

    Verizon has no problem divulging your records. They just don't want to do it for free.
  • Govenrment seems so concerned about private property rights these days while free speach protection seems to be loosing ground. Why not in this case? Look at it this way. I can't silence the person standing on the sidewalk in front of my house but I surely can kick him out of my yard. Why should my phone be any different?

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