If/When the ISP's start filtering traffic, some enterprising programmer will create a robust proxy service to circumvent government spying (hushmail is an example) - and likely offer it to the masses for free.

VERY well pointed out, NET neutrality is the only way we can keep 1st Amendment speech from being selectively blocked!! Bravo InfoWorld / Robert X. Cringely for posting on this topic!!! Phil G

This story, coulpled with the news of the Senate granting retroactive immunity to the telcos for serving us up the Bush administration are almost too much to bear. We're allowing this to happen. Who have we become?

All this talk about sniffing internet traffic will be short lived.

2008 will be the year of encryption. We will see browsers start encrypting, we will see hard drive encryption and we will see the increased use of SSL to transmit data.

It is apparent from your comments that you are acting on Wikileaks statements and not the actual court proceedings. The judge did not decide anything. He simply signed off on an agreement between Dynadot (Wikileaks DNS provider) and BJB. Yes, Dynadot folded instead of fighting for their client. That's an issue with Dynadot, not a friendly or activist judge. Also, Wikileaks claimed lack of legal representation is a quite dubious -- documents on Wikileaks own site show that they had been in touch with BJB's lawyers for a month. You would know that if you did any research at all. But, I guess it's more fun to rant than to be responsible. I'm ashamed for you. The misrepresentations you are engaging in are irresponsible journalism.

Whether sf_curmudgeon's comments about this case are true or not, is unimportant compared to the more important issue that Cringe addressed.

It's about government and corporate control over us - in other words - freedom.

I am not ashamed of Bob Cringely, I am proud of him, and anyone who exposes those who would deprive us of freedom - regardless of the excuses they use for justification.

sf curmudgeon is only partially correct. yes, julius baer's attorneys were in touch with wikileaks for weeks before the hearing, as evidenced by the confidential letters sent to them by said lawyers, which wikileaks promptly put up on its site.

however, in the report I reference above (from Wired News), wikileaks apparently was not made aware of the hearing until a few hours before it happened. I can't vouch for the accuracy of that statement, hence my qualification "according to wired news." but nobody's said otherwise yet as far as I know.

as for the judge "signing off on an agreement" between baer and dynadot.... that's absurd. it was a court order. if dynadot had wanted to do as baer requested, they wouldn't have needed a judge to intercede.

as for research, those boldfaced words in my entry are hyperlinks to some of the sources I consulted (probably less than half the total). and that was before the story got picked up by AP, the wall street journal, and other mainstream outlets. I suppose it could all be just a mass conspiracy, concocted by wikileaks against a totally innocent swiss/caymans bank. what do you think?

rxc

'Tis a tightrope we walk between individual liberty and national security. It is only through vibrant discourse and active debate that the two sides can remain in balance. Keep up the discourse!

This causes me to dream of a future where the 'Net is all/mostly wireless and there exists pirate web sites such as there are now pirate radio stations.

What's the line from the 1st Jurassic Park? "Nature finds a way."?

This matter makes the Three Stooges look like James Bond, or whatever avatar of hyper-competence pleases you. As Mr. Tynan has stated, the bank's leaders are "mind-bogglingly stupid," in that their action had, predictably, an effect in opposition to their (presumed) desires. The judge has made a laughingstock of the federal judiciary, and perhaps by association, federal law enforcement in general. Give a loud horselaugh and a rude raspberry to both clowns--hmmm--perhaps a bad choice of words. Clowns are skilled entertainers; bank and judge both outshine the village idiot in... idiocy.
But rxc is misleading in granting absolution to Dynadot. They filed a stipulation with the court, in essence agreeing with BJB's shysters( http://www.citmedialaw.org/threats/julius-baer-bank-and-trust-v-wikileaks ). On the surface, this is craven at best, and possibly tortious collusion with a criminal enterprise, namely money-laundering. Ummm--is the judge liable? Seems like three parties got together to deprive a fourth (wikileaks) of services, presumably prepaid (my DNS provider demands prepayment). If I had been a Dynadot customer, I no longer would be.
Got to run. I have to compose a letter asking my DNS provider if they are cowards, sneaks and possibly thieves, like Dynadot. And for a new clause in my contract.

Whether the judge ordered Wikileaks.org's DNS service turned off, or merely consented to an agreement between BJB and Dynadot to do so, is beside the point, which is that it was ASTOUNDINGLY naive for anyone involved to have believed this would "shut down" the entire site. Of course it did not; of course DNS is merely a pointer to a server which is otherwise still available on the 'net, by other means.

I'm sure the Dynadot folks knew this, and they may have gone along with it knowing it would not torpedo the site, in an effort to spare themselves further litigation. But it boggles the mind that BJB's lawyers and the judge could have been this stupid. Granted they aren't techies (in my experience many lawyers are actually tech-adverse), but they could easily have consulted some to see what the results of their action would be. That they chose not to, shows more than a small amount of arrogance.

That this judge would consent to this agreement, as opposed to having explicitly ordered it of his own accord, is not significanly better. He STILL went beyond what was legally appropriate, and did so very stupidly. His judgement (pun intended) is questionable at best.

As a twice over government whistle blower I can tell you they will burn your ass one way or another and I don't mean just blackball you or destroy your career but if you cause them to much pain in what you reveal or what you could reveal they will try to have you killed or have a very bad accident. Only having some info stashed away keeps some still kicking so yea, Big Brother wants complete control of everything and even though they are not that bright, they soon will have National I.D. and they own the system and they hire govt' schooled nurds with tax money to do the dirty web work for them.
Truth I found out (the hard way) really is so-much, much stranger than fiction.

1984 was 20+yrs to early is all.

So when's the next article that shares that list of the alleged money-laundering clientele?

Cringe called my statement that the decree in question was a settlement agreement "absurd". This quote from an EFF indicates the Cringe's interpretation was more absurd than mine. :o

"DynaDot's private agreement to disable access to its customer's domain name and the court's endorsement of that agreement raise (sic) serious First Amendment concerns," said EFF Senior Attorney Matt Zimmerman. [Appeared here: http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=10908

Incredibly underscores the point that I was making -- too many people:
- swallowed Wikileaks propaganda hook, line, and sinker;
- did incomplete (or no) research before spouting off;
- were/are wrongfully inferring what legal procedures took place;
- were/are willing to malign the judge based on limited/wrong data.

sf_curmudgeon:

looks like the judge himself doesn't agree with you (or his earlier ruling) anymore. but you should feel free to sue wikileaks yourself, if they tick you off so much.

the issue was never about buying wikileaks propaganda, it was about shutting down an entire website and squelching the ability for whistleblowers to operate anonymously. a far more important issue than whether the bank was doing the nasty things the wikileaks docs claimed.

cheers,

rxc