February 5, 2004

Internet Anonymity Threatened

Somewhat related to the anonymous blogging debate raging in some parts of the blogosphere (see the posts below) - there is a potentially dangerous piece of new legislation in Congress called the Fraudulent Online Identity Sanctions Act, or FOISA. Naturally, it's backed by the entertainment industry. Read this post at Free2Innovate.net, and then the next more recent post for comments from a law professor in why it is dangerous.

According to Free2Innovate.net, FOISA "would mandate stiffer sentences for anyone who commits a crime using a web site registered under a false name and allow copyright owners to seek larger monetary damages from people who falsify registration information for web sites where they distribute copyrighted material without permission." The blog cites a WaPo story from yesterday.

I haven't read the FOISA legislation yet, but it seems to be more of the same privacy-invading kinds of things pushed by Big Entertainment to the detriment of your digital freedoms. And, no, it is not inconsistent to be against a law cracking down on false domain name registration while also being against anonymous blogging. The former is a public policy issue involving proposed criminal penalties, the latter an ethical issue of credibility.