It’s a dark day for Internet privacy, and this is a battle we lost. It’s all over except for the President signing it. Brian Fung reports:
House Republicans voted overwhelmingly Tuesday, by a margin of 215-205, to repeal a set of landmark privacy protections for Web users, issuing a sweeping rebuke of Internet policies enacted under the Obama administration. It also marks a sharp, partisan pivot toward letting Internet providers collect and sell their customers’ Web browsing history, location information, health data and other personal details.
The measure, which was approved by a 50-48 margin in the Senate last week, now heads to the White House, where President Trump is expected to sign it.
Read more on the Washington Post.
You can see how your Representative voted here. If you never checked on how your Senator voted, you can find that roll call here. Not happy with how the folks you elected voted? Start working for those who will run against them the next time they’re up for re-election.
WTF???
Is it really possible that every Republican (except 15) in the U.S. House of Representatives truly believes that the company that sees ALL of your internet communications should be treated like each individual company that you decide to communicate with? That your phone company be able to use the content of your phone calls in exactly the same way as the companies that you call?? And every Democrat understands how ridiculous that is?
I don’t think so. I think our representatives are so caught up in their partisan warfare that they no longer care about the effects of their decisions on the country.
The Federal COMMUNICATIONS Commission has correctly concluded that the internet is a two way COMMUNICATIONS service and that communications providers have a duty to provide private, unfiltered communications to their PAYING CUSTOMERS. That’s why the developed the common carrier concept. They understood (before regime change) that private communications are the lifeblood of democracies.
I can only hope that our populist president will realize that for every cable company shareholder who loves the idea of increased profits, there are a million internet users who hate this blatant power grab by these greedy, monopolistic companies.