Clintonites don't trust us in Cyberspace [well said djf]

[David Farber <farber@central.cis.upenn.edu>]

Date: Fri, 28 Oct 1994 23:03:09 -0700
From: mykes@mail.best.com (Mike Schwartz)


I found this piece in the San Jose Mercury News, Sunday Oct. 23, 1994.
It was written by a professional and mature journalist.






CLINTONITES DON'T TRUST US IN CYBERSPACE
Dan Gillmor, Computing Editor


------


Rush Limbaugh may view the Clinton administration as a nest of left-wing,
permissive radicals, but you couldn't prove it by looking at some of the
federal government's cyberspace policies.


The Clintonites say they want to spur information technology - the so-called
information superhighway.  Last week, for example, they opened a White house
site on the Internet's World Wide Web.  At least they have a clue about this
stuff.


But they don't trust us.


When it comes to civil liberties on-line, the Clintonites haven't just been
indifferent.  They've been actively hostile.  In the name of public safety
and social justice, they are sending us a disturbing message: In cyberspace
you can forget your Constitutional rights.


Consider:


o       This administration persuaded Congress to pass a digital wiretap law.
        As we do more and more on-line, this noxious law will expand greatly
        government's ability to spy on us.  It forces telephone and other
        communications companies to build in doors allowing government
        surveilance of your calls and other electronic communications.
        Cybercrooks are bound to use the same doors.  And compliance will
        cost a fortune; we'll all pay via taxes and phone bills.


o       This administration launched the infamous Clipper chip plan.  The idea
        was to produce devices that could encrypt, or scramble, communications
        using a method that, in theory, only the government could crack from
        the outside.  Apart from the assault on civil liberties this would
        be, domestic makers of telecommunications equipment and software
        aren't likely to sell much overseas when buyers know the U.S.
        government has the keys to supposedly secure communications.  Clipper
        is in trouble, but the Clinton folks still like the concept.


o       This administration hauled the owners of a Milpitas computer bulletin
        board to the heart of the Bible Belt and prosecuted them on obscenity
        charges - an abuse of the criminal justice system and a direct attack
        on First Amendment rights.  If the couple's conviction stands,
        standards in the nation's most repressive communities could determine
        what you and I may read, hear or view.


o       This administration again tossed free speech overboard when the
        Education Department's Office of Civil Rights sided with three
        California college students who were offended by sexist remarks on
        a campus computer messaging system. The proper response to offensive
        speech is not censorship but more convincing speech, a concept that
        eludes more and more people these days, and not just in government.


The technology that is making it easier to spy on us also is giving us the
tools to keep the spies at bay - whether the spies are our government, big
business or the cybercrook down the street - and to send and receive materials
others deem offensive.  To stop this, you have to make criminals of people who
use these tools, no matter how pure their motives.  Administration denials
to the contrary, that's the clear direction in which we're heading.


I'm not indifferent to law and order or national security, nor to the reality
that bad folks are using cyberspace in damaging ways.  But I'm convinced
that government control of this new medium will do far more harm than
good: It will derail innovation, and it will erode people's faith in the
system's security from prying eyes, governmental or otherwise.


In the end, I guess, I trust us more than our government.


----------------


Write Dan Gillmor at the Mercury News,
750 Ridder Park Dr.
San Jose, CA 95190
call (408) 920-5016
fax (408) 920-5917
Mercury Center: dgillmor.
Internet: dgillmor@sjmercury.com