All Zilla

The iPatriot Act?

Published on August 6, 2008 by admin

After 9-11 we know how quickly our government came up with ‘The Patriot Act.’ This was the opportunity our administration needed to establish power and control. This control has even extended to the internet with limited success. Free speach is still “bloggily” abundant, so far. The future is not so certain. Just as the ‘Patriot Act’ headed the hysterical, questionable responses affecting our constitutional rights, the ‘iPatriot Act’ is going to change the internet. It is known that the government has wanted more control over internet content for a long time, and it seems a certainty that they will get it. Someday, some hackers, backed by a hostile government or extremists, are going to attack American interests with malicious programs launched on the internet. The ‘iPatriot Act’ is written and ready to become the law of the web. Richard Clark, the counter-terrorism czar of the Clinton and Bush Administrations confirmed this to Law Professor Lawrence Lessig from Stanford University. You can listen for yourself in this YouTube video from this year’s Fortune’s Brainstorm Tech Conference.

Professor Lessig: “I had dinner once with Richard Clark at the table and I said ‘is there an equivalent to the Patriot Act, an iPatriot Act, just sitting waiting for some substantial event just waiting for them to come have the excuse for radically changing the way the Internet works?’ And he said, ‘Of course there is’ and I swear this is what he said, and quote, ‘and Vint Cerf is not going to like it very much.’”

In case your wondering, Vint Cerf is known as “The Father of the Internet.”