Post by chatter on Feb 13, 2006 11:32:32 GMT -5
internet data trails lead to court
a justice department request to four major internet companies for data about their users' search queries has cast new light on what privacy, if any, internet users can expect for the data trail they leave online.
when it comes to e-mail and internet service records, "the average citizen would be shocked to find out how adept your average law enforcement officer is at finding information," said paul ohm, who recently left the justice department's computer crime and intellectual property section.
even though isp companies promise to protect the privacy of their users, they routinely hand over the most intimate information in response to legal demands from criminal investigators and lawyers fighting civil cases.
such data led directly to a suspect in a school bombing threat; it has also been used by the authorities to track child pornographers and computer intruders, and has become a tool in civil cases on matters from trade secrets to music piracy. in st. louis, records of a suspect's online searches for maps proved his undoing in a serial-killing case that had gone unsolved for a decade.
just as technology is prompting internet companies to collect more information and keep it longer than before, prosecutors and civil lawyers are more readily using that information.
a justice department request to four major internet companies for data about their users' search queries has cast new light on what privacy, if any, internet users can expect for the data trail they leave online.
when it comes to e-mail and internet service records, "the average citizen would be shocked to find out how adept your average law enforcement officer is at finding information," said paul ohm, who recently left the justice department's computer crime and intellectual property section.
even though isp companies promise to protect the privacy of their users, they routinely hand over the most intimate information in response to legal demands from criminal investigators and lawyers fighting civil cases.
such data led directly to a suspect in a school bombing threat; it has also been used by the authorities to track child pornographers and computer intruders, and has become a tool in civil cases on matters from trade secrets to music piracy. in st. louis, records of a suspect's online searches for maps proved his undoing in a serial-killing case that had gone unsolved for a decade.
just as technology is prompting internet companies to collect more information and keep it longer than before, prosecutors and civil lawyers are more readily using that information.