Indian Police Demand Internet Monitoring In Bombay 33
h4rm0ny writes "Both the BBC and the Houston Chronicle are running stories about planned monitoring of customers at cyber cafes in Bombay. Cafe owners have responded by organising into a group to oppose the moves.
The police want cafes to demand photo id, a home address and maintain records of access for at least a year. The Great Deamons of Justification have been invoked - Terrorism, Paedophillia, Hackers and in this case Users of Adult Sites. On the cafe owner's part - they are countering with questions of liability for verifying customer details and the issues of privacy.
India remains a country with a very low percentage of the population having their own internet connection. Bombay's 3000 cafes are used by approximately 1.5 million people so these new laws would give the police much larger scope to monitor people's online behaviour than in other countries.
Other Indian cities are watching the results closely."
The police want cafes to demand photo id, a home address and maintain records of access for at least a year. The Great Deamons of Justification have been invoked - Terrorism, Paedophillia, Hackers and in this case Users of Adult Sites. On the cafe owner's part - they are countering with questions of liability for verifying customer details and the issues of privacy.
India remains a country with a very low percentage of the population having their own internet connection. Bombay's 3000 cafes are used by approximately 1.5 million people so these new laws would give the police much larger scope to monitor people's online behaviour than in other countries.
Other Indian cities are watching the results closely."
Censorship (Score:1, Flamebait)
Re:Censorship (Score:2, Informative)
How private are cybercafes? (Score:2, Funny)
Broadband (Score:3, Informative)
How is this different from Howard Dean's proposal? (Score:5, Interesting)
Hell, I'm watching it closely. How is this too different from what presidential candidate Howard Dean proposed for this country? [metafilter.com]
Oh, right, Dean proposed that all computers, whether in an internet cafe or in your home, be equipped with a card reader to scan your national id card* prior to letting you access the internet.
* Ok, inter-operable state-issued id cards.
(Please note, up until hearing about this I was leaning Dean in my search for the right "Anybody But Bush" candidate. But since my major problem with Bush is his administration's willingness to abrogate our civil rights, I want to be sure that the Democrat I vote for will protect our traditional American rights. And Dean had already raised concerns with Vermont's ACLU when he announced that views about privacy would change post 9-11.)
Re:How is this different from Howard Dean's propos (Score:1)
STOP REWARDING COMPANIES THAT MOVE JOBS OVERSEAS AND START REWARDING COMPANIES THAT PRODUCE IN AMERICA
Require companies to disclose layoffs in America and job increases overseas. Consumer, investors, and workers all have the right to know which companies are moving which jobs overseas. As President, Wes Clark would work to develop a system of timely reporting to ensure that we have timely and accurate information on com
Re:How is this different from Howard Dean's propos (Score:2)
"Clark told a New Hampshire newspaper that "life begins with the mother's decision," adding that abortion should be allowed all the way up through the baby's head coming out of the womb."
Re:How is this different from Howard Dean's propos (Score:2)
Dean also suggested that computer makers such as Apple Computer, Dell, Gateway and Sony should be required to include an ID card reader in PCs--and Americans would have to insert their uniform IDs into the reader before they could log on. "One state's smart-card driver's license must be identifiable by another state's card reader," Dean sai
also in Audia/Video Stream via 'Go Digital' (Score:1)
btw... (Score:1)
kinda makes you wonder how they'll try to implement this with success.
PS - I DIDN'T READ THE ARTICLE *old news.. for $sme*
Mabye this is a good thing. (Score:4, Insightful)
It sounds crappy but this could lead, finally, to the understanding that anything plaintext can be tapped/subpoena'ed/copied and that the only true way to protect your identity and your communications is with encryption.
Police snooping will only further legitimize encryption in your day to day communications (for the average citizen).
Hmmm (Score:1, Flamebait)
Geez, didn't they read the last India article? (Score:2)
Police always think powers help! (Score:5, Insightful)
On individual cases, it might. Unfortunately, the cost to greater society in terms of intimidation and abuse are higher than the benefits of solving the crime.
Freedom isn't just philosophically attractive, it is also extremely pragmatic. It increases human happiness and productivity. Unfortunately. police are seldom happy people and cannot recognize this value.
I cannot think of any major criminal activity that can be done on the Internet, still less in the restricted environment of a cybercafe. Sure, threats and extortion can be communicated, but these are accessory to the crime contemplated/committed.
Re:Police always think powers help! (Score:3, Insightful)
Try Fraud and Identity Theft.
OK.... (Score:2)
I think you were trying to write daemon [google.com], but in this context, it's just demon [google.com].
Re:OK.... (Score:2)
Won't happen. (Score:3, Insightful)
Incidentally, if I recall correctly, the city police in Hyderabad did try to bring in a similar move some two years back or so; the cyber-cafe-owners association there apparently resisted the measure successfully. The police now only insist that the computers be placed in cubicles with clear windows, mainly to discourage folks from browsing porn.
Personally, I think stuff like this (much like that earlier banning of that insurgent group's YahooGroups thing) is indicative of two things urgently required in India:-
a) An EFF-like group to charter and fight for maintaining the constitution's libertarian values,
b) Greater awareness among the Indian public of the issues involved, particularly, the right to privacy and other cyber-legal issues.
(Or if there already is such a group, I'd be great if someone could, perhaps, point their URL out or something.)
Remember (Score:2)
Cencorship and monitoring are standard fare in India and the only reason it isn't much more widespread is that the population is huge and the government isn't tech savvy enough to do anything 1984-ish.
Re:Remember (Score:3, Interesting)
In any case, the YahooGroups incident, methinks, is actually shows that the situation isn't as dire as you might think; consider, for instance, the fact that CERT-India's discussion
Re:Remember (Score:2)
Re:Remember (Score:2)
Two points (Score:3, Informative)
one word: HTTPort (Score:1, Flamebait)
Not just Bombay,... (Score:2)