Privacy Source

George Washington University Law Professor and Concurring Opinions creator Dan Solove has published an article about the Fourth Amendment in the Boston College Law Review. The abstract of “Fourth Amendment Pragmatism“:
In this essay, Professor Solove argues that the Fourth Amendment reasonable expectation of privacy test should be abandoned. Instead of engaging in a fruitless game [...]

The British Tabloid Phone-Hacking Scandal: Via NYTimes.com Magazine.

IN NOVEMBER 2005, three senior aides to Britain’s royal family noticed odd things happening on their mobile phones. Messages they had never listened to were somehow appearing in their mailboxes as if heard and saved. Equally peculiar were stories that began appearing about Prince William in one of the country’s biggest tabloids, News of the World.

The stories were banal enough (Prince William pulled a tendon in his knee, one revealed). But the royal aides were puzzled as to how News of the World had gotten the information, which was known among only a small, discreet circle. They began to suspect that someone was eavesdropping on their private conversations.

By early January 2006, Scotland Yard had confirmed their suspicions. An unambiguous trail led to Clive Goodman, the News of the World reporter who covered the royal family, and to a private investigator, Glenn Mulcaire, who also worked for the paper. The two men had somehow obtained the PIN codes needed to access the voice mail of the royal aides.

Scotland Yard told the aides to continue operating as usual while it pursued the investigation, which included surveillance of the suspects’ phones.

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Murdoch Reporters’ Phone-Hacking Was Endemic, Victimized Hundreds: Via Threat Level.

A phone-hacking scheme involving British royals and reporters working for one of Rupert Murdoch’s tabloid newspapers went far beyond what was previously disclosed and prosecuted, according toThe New York Times.

Andy Coulson, currently media advisor to British Prime Minister David Cameron, is accused of having encouraged the hacking during his tenure as editor of Murdoch’s News of the World paper.

According to the N.Y. Times, reporters working under Coulson targeted hundreds of victims — from Princes Harry and William to government and police officials and numerous celebrities, including soccer star David Beckham and his wife.

Most of the victims are only now learning that their phone voicemail accounts may have been accessed by reporters, four years after the investigation first launched. One young woman, who had previously been the victim in a high-profile sexual-assault case when she was 19, only recently received a letter confirming that her phone number was on a list of potential hack targets kept by News of the World employees.

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‘Evil’ Eric Schmidt Debuts in Video Targeting Google Privacy: Via Threat Level.

A creepy caricature of Google CEO Eric Schmidt drives an ice cream truck in this video produced by a consumer group targeting the search giant for its data collection practices.

The video is part of a lobbying effort by Consumer Watchdog to get the government to create a so-called “Do Not Track Me” list “to prevent online companies from gathering our personal information, just as Congress had the Federal Trade Commission create a Do Not Call list to prevent intrusive telemarketers.” The group says they’ve paid to have a version of the video shown 36 times per day on a jumbotron in Times Square.

It’s not the first anti-Google antic from the group, which is largely funded by legal fees, the Rose Foundation, Streisand Foundation, Tides Foundation and others. Last month the group announced it had parked outside lawmakers’ Washington-area residences to determine whether they had unsecured Wi-Fi networks that might have been sniffed by Google as part of the internet giant’s Street View and Google Maps program.

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Righthaven's Brand of Copyright Trolling: Via EFF.org Updates.

Copyright trolls are nothing new, and Righthaven is just the latest group of lawyers to try to turn copyright litigation into a business model. What these lawyers have in common is that they seek to take advantage of copyright's draconian damages in order to bully Internet users into forking over money. To anyone who has watched the file-sharing lawsuits of the last few years or the current BitTorrent cases brought by a DC law firm, the Righthaven saga is developing into a familiar, unfortunate story. It also has some especially troubling twists.

The basic pattern: Righthaven has brought over a hundred lawsuits in Nevada federal court claiming copyright infringement. They find cases by (a) scouring the Internet for parts of newspaper stories posted online by individuals, nonprofits, and others, (b) buying the copyright to that particular newspaper story, and then (c) proceeding to sue the poster for copyright infringement. Like the RIAA and USCG before them, Righthaven is relying on the fact that their victims may face huge legal bills through crippling statutory damages and the prospect of paying Righthaven's legal fees if they lose the case. Consequently, many victims will settle with Righthaven for a few thousand dollars regardless of their innocence, their right to fair use, or other potential legal defenses.

However, Righthaven is unlike other copyright trolls in some key ways:

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