Bush has signed a law that makes "annoying someone on the internet anonymously" a federal crime. No, I am not joking. No, I do not know how they will enforce this. No, I'm sure this won't get abused at all.
AFAICT, Declan McCullagh's article is factually correct but somewhat slanted. You can read the old law here (http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode47/usc_sec_47_00000223----000-.html) and the amendment to it here (http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:H.R.3402:) (click on the last version. Relevant portion of old law, in brief:
[whoever] makes a telephone call or utilizes a telecommunications device, whether or not conversation or communication ensues, without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any person at the called number or who receives the communications; [is guilty of an offence]
Relevant portion of the amendment: [the abovequoted law] includes any device or software that can be used to originate telecommunications or other types of communications that are transmitted, in whole or in part, by the Internet (as such term is defined in section 1104 of the Internet Tax Freedom Act (47 U.S.C. 151 note)).'
So it was already illegal to anonymously use a 'telecommunications device' to 'annoy' somebody with 'obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, or indecent' material. I'm not a lawyer, but I'd be surprised if a good prosecutor couldn't already have made a strong argument that a Net-enabled computer counts, in which case the amendment has little effect. (It does delete an 'and' earlier in the law, which might change the situation re. sending, say, an image you didn't yourself create, but that's not very objectionable.)
But if a Net-enabled computer is not a 'telecommunications device', then a stalker who makes harassing phone calls via a landline is treated differently to one who makes the same calls via Skype, and that's just absurd. AFAICT, the intent of this new legislation is to ensure the old law is consistent from one means of communication to another. Yes, there *are* free-speech concerns - but I think blame for those is better directed at the pre-existing law than at this amendment to it.
Also, although I'm still not a lawyer, I'm pretty sure the legal usage of 'annoy' is rather more stringent than general conversational usage (see second definition here (http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=annoy)).
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branchandroot
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Date: 2006-01-10 02:01 am (UTC)AFAICT, Declan McCullagh's article is factually correct but somewhat slanted. You can read the old law here (http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode47/usc_sec_47_00000223----000-.html) and the amendment to it here (http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c109:H.R.3402:) (click on the last version. Relevant portion of old law, in brief:
[whoever] makes a telephone call or utilizes a telecommunications device, whether or not conversation or communication ensues, without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any person at the called number or who receives the communications; [is guilty of an offence]
Relevant portion of the amendment: [the abovequoted law] includes any device or software that can be used to originate telecommunications or other types of communications that are transmitted, in whole or in part, by the Internet (as such term is defined in section 1104 of the Internet Tax Freedom Act (47 U.S.C. 151 note)).'
So it was already illegal to anonymously use a 'telecommunications device' to 'annoy' somebody with 'obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy, or indecent' material. I'm not a lawyer, but I'd be surprised if a good prosecutor couldn't already have made a strong argument that a Net-enabled computer counts, in which case the amendment has little effect. (It does delete an 'and' earlier in the law, which might change the situation re. sending, say, an image you didn't yourself create, but that's not very objectionable.)
But if a Net-enabled computer is not a 'telecommunications device', then a stalker who makes harassing phone calls via a landline is treated differently to one who makes the same calls via Skype, and that's just absurd. AFAICT, the intent of this new legislation is to ensure the old law is consistent from one means of communication to another. Yes, there *are* free-speech concerns - but I think blame for those is better directed at the pre-existing law than at this amendment to it.
Also, although I'm still not a lawyer, I'm pretty sure the legal usage of 'annoy' is rather more stringent than general conversational usage (see second definition here (http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=annoy)).