The Meat of the Matter

The Global Internet Freedom Act

In my spare time, I always love to read upcoming legislation. On Feb. 14, the Global Internet Freedom Act was submitted to the House. Here's a particularly interesting section: (6) Intergovernmental, nongovernmental, and media organizations have reported the widespread and increasing pattern by repressive foreign governments of Internet jamming, including jamming, censoring, blocking, monitoring, and restricting Internet access and content by using technologies such as firewalls, filters, and `black boxes'. Such interference with individual activity on the Internet includes surveillance of e-mail messages, message boards, and the use of particular words, `stealth blocking' individuals from visiting particular websites, the development of `black lists' of users who seek to visit these websites, and the complete denial of access to the Internet. While this law is intended to apply to other countries, this will make President Bush's warrantless e-mail reading illegal. Oh wait a minute. It already was illegal.