Monitoring access is focus of Obama web policy

At first, the Obama internet policy for the nation appeared to be a call for broadband accessibility befitting a first world nation. However, the White House has something else it wants done online. Currently, the Obama administration and law enforcement and security agencies are pushing for new regulations of the Internet and the telecommunications industry. Should the bill, which isn’t slated to go before Congress until 2011, pass into regulation, increased accessibility can be granted by mandate to regulation enforcement and intelligence officials. You will find few methods of electronic communication that aren’t already under surveillance. This will shorten that list even further.

The Obama web strategy

There is a bill that is prepared for next year, according to the New York Times, that will expand wiretap and surveillance powers for regulation enforcement and intelligence agencies. The bill is due sometime next year. The Obama administration backs the idea. The amount of communications that the government already has accessibility to is ample, which will expand if the bill passes. The reason is that some communications, especially those on the Internet, are encrypted and private.

Small business will suffer

Though this law would certainly favor large corporations that have the engineering staff to manage new specifications, startup tech companies can be at a disadvantage. Research In Motion doesn’t even have access to the private and encrypted transmissions from the Blackberry, which led to bans of the phone in some countries. RIM is in the process of complying with monitoring needs of several governments, and corporations such as Skype and other VOIP, or voice over web protocol, businesses could have to re-engineer their products to regulatory standards. Regulation enforcement and intelligence services do rely on monitored communication to catch criminals, and as a result of the decreased access, have seen their capabilities “going dark” to do their jobs.

Electric ear

There have been many laws passed giving government the ability to look or listen in. Few methods of communication, except maybe sign language, are exempt. Obama has been mum about repealing some of the almost Orwellian laws which were part of Bush domestic spying controversies. The government maintains that its requests for access are not unreasonable, nor unprecedented. A greater degree of surveillance may seem a great tool for catching criminals in the act, however can very easily be misused.

Articles cited

NY Times

nytimes.com/2010/09/27/us/27wiretap.html?pagewanted=1