When They Kick at Your Front Door, How You Gonna Come?

Jesse Walker | January 23, 2006

Google is saying no to the porn cops' fishing expedition. Yahoo has said yes. MSN is keeping quiet.

Update: Or rather, MSN kept quiet when the Associated Press inquired. They were somewhat more loquacious here.

Comments

|1.23.06 @ 5:58PM|#

...with your hands on your head or on the trigger of your gun? When the law break in How you gonna go?

Thanks, I won't get that out of my head for the rest of the day! ; )

..and I don't care if Google's motives aren't pure, go Google!

|1.23.06 @ 5:59PM|#

How is it that the government can issue supoeanas to find information to support their own propaganda?

|1.23.06 @ 6:04PM|#

#6:

"How is it that the government can issue supoeanas to find information to support their own propaganda?"

Uh, because...they got da guns, and we're just a bunch of sniveling twats who give up our rights at the drop of a hat---or at the mention of ye olde "it's for the children" line.

|1.23.06 @ 6:08PM|#

The best (oddest) part about this idiotic ordeal is that DOJ is trying to prove to the Supreme Court that it can uphold COPA without violating the 4th amendment. And they think the best way to prove this case is to...violate the 4th amendment?

Here's to hoping the federal judge in San Jose has some wits about him.

|1.23.06 @ 6:10PM|#

If you want to hear a really good cover of Guns of Brixton get the s/t album by Nouvelle Vague. They also do a terrific version of Too Drunk To Fuck.

|1.23.06 @ 6:10PM|#

apologies for the triplepost, but, do any of you computer nerds out there know of any way to maks your IP address to these stinkin' search engines?

CodeMonkeySteve|1.23.06 @ 6:19PM|#

Evan: Go to http://anonymouse.org/ , enter "google.com", and search for "anonymizing proxy". ;)

|1.23.06 @ 7:07PM|#

I've actually never used the search engines at MSN or Yahoo to search for anything. I do use MSN and Yahoo for free email, especially for obnoxious you-must-provide-an-email type of organizations, such as, er, um, H&R. I keep seperate my "real" email addresses. I still chuckle every now and then about the companies that address me as Jerry. The name I provided to MSN while registering my email in that instance was Jerry Garcia, although the body of my email stated my real name twice, once at the beginning and once at the end. Needless to say my name is not Jerry.

I guess I never will use MSN's or Yahoo's search engine now. Shame on those gutless organizations for rolling over on their 4th amendment rights.

Google rocks.

|1.23.06 @ 7:10PM|#

What I love is the nature of this fishing expedition. Ostensibly, what they want is to show that, yes Virgina, there is porn and swear-word laden content on the internet that a child could potentially obtain. Fuck duh, and if the kid happens to read Hit and Run then Reason.com would be just as liable as any titty site for not requesting age verification. Of course, if a concerned parent would watch over their children or at the least use the power of the markets (by installing NetNanny or somesuch) then the entire "for the children" premise would crumble.

Yea Google!!

|1.23.06 @ 7:15PM|#

Buy Yahoo and short Google. Being a government patsy is always rewarded financially.

|1.23.06 @ 7:50PM|#

Here's to hoping the federal judge in San Jose has some wits about him.

I'll drink to that. Hell, I'd drink every bottle in the house if it would do any good. Sadly, I have to hedge my bets and save most of it for after the bad decision.

|1.23.06 @ 7:59PM|#

"Buy Yahoo and short Google. Being a government patsy is always rewarded financially."

Hopefully educated consumers will flock to google and leave yahoo/msn to wither.

|1.23.06 @ 8:18PM|#

To avoid giving google identifying information, any proxy you use will do.

http://Scroogle.com claims that it is set up specifically for this purpose... but it might just be an FBI honeypot

|1.23.06 @ 8:42PM|#

"but it might just be an FBI honeypot"

Heh, I hope not. Being the libertarian crank that I am I've used that proxy for the past few years after reading about some of google's privacy concerns. But since I'm not a child pornographer, I guess I've got nothing to fear. Right?

|1.23.06 @ 9:01PM|#

The truly amusing thing, as perceived by moi, is that they're trying to prove a comforting lie. I've found porn on the internet, and oops, it was an accident. I'm very suspicious that the so called accidental exposure isn't accidental at all. It's a cheep excuse to tell mom.

I googled sweet peach, and clicked "I'm feeling lucky" all I got was a recipe. If I do this long enough I can plausibly claim that I stumbled on to the port honey.

|1.23.06 @ 10:07PM|#

Wait, there's porn on the internet?

If the feds look really, really hard, they might even find evidence that spammers exist!

|1.23.06 @ 10:09PM|#

Wait until they check out www.whitehouse.com.

|1.23.06 @ 10:26PM|#

The information the government is seeking contains no information that could identify me or anyone else . Therefore I don't actually have a problem if Google decided to give them the information. But Google doesn't want to do that. What I can't understand is how the government can subpoena information from a company when no crime is being alleged?

I'm not looking for a flippant response, I'm actually hoping some one can tell me how this works.

Neb Okla|1.23.06 @ 10:31PM|#

Nice version of "Guns of Brixton" here:
http://mp3.insound.com/download.cfm?mp3id=2470

|1.23.06 @ 10:40PM|#

MSN hasn't been keeping quiet. They've been making excuses on their blog.

http://tinyurl.com/cps28

|1.23.06 @ 10:44PM|#

Google stands on principle! If the $427 per share price was reflective of this, the price of a share of Pres. Bush stock would be about $6 and for Hillary stock, it would be about $4 a share.

The really troubling thing about this is that the administration even wants to conduct such a fishing expedition.

Among; "It's for the children", "It's to protect the children", and "It's to fight terror", there is no limit to the harm that government is willing to do and the individual rights that it is willing to violate.

amazingdrx|1.23.06 @ 11:06PM|#

Everyone needs a steel reinforced concrete safe room from which to call your lawyer, when (not if) the police state comes a knock, no knockin' on your door.

Let 'em cut through with concrete saws if they can. (Hint...embed old diamond saw blades in the concrete to slow them down even further.)

In a bushwacked world, the bush bunker is a necessity. My invention Jan 2001.

amazingdrx|1.23.06 @ 11:13PM|#

Be afriad rick, president hillary will inherit the warrantless search powers that duuhbya has wrought. And the secret prisons to torture and murder suspected wing nut terrorists.

I'm gonna be laffin' really hard at you all, when you realize you were duped into
giving up your rights.

Remember ruby ridge and the branch davidians? Hehehehey.

You all will dream of it every night under the hill an bill regime.

amazingdrx|1.23.06 @ 11:21PM|#

It's all basically punishment for lip service about being libertarians, but really supporting and voting for bush. Suffer fools.

Corporatism has it's downside, it's name is bonnie prince duuuhbya.

When you abandoned the fight for civil liberty you doomed yourselves. You all bought into the fear of terror, condi's mushroom cloud. You would rather live on your knees than fight for freedom.

So be it. Kneel wing nuts, and obey your king.

|1.23.06 @ 11:44PM|#

(Hint...embed old diamond saw blades in the concrete to slow them down even further.)

A matrix of sand and loose rebar will work better. If anyone cares.

|1.23.06 @ 11:49PM|#

I tried to think of words that might accidently connect to a porn site while googling. It took me a while but I finally thought of one. Rita sucks. I gave up on "Rita blows" and "bush blows" and "bush sucks on sex". It is not easy finding "accidental" links to porn.

I had to scroll through to number 30 though to find it (after "rita sucks"). Most of the rest of the links were for Hurricane Rita.

This was on no blocked images or words. If you have google's most strict filter on it skips several sites that seem innocuous, assuming four letter words don't bother you. :)

And of course parents can easily buy a "family control filter" of some sort. I think my Norton anti-virus and firewall package comes with one, but I have it disabled. :o

|1.24.06 @ 12:31AM|#

amazingdrx,

Your point on civil liberties is well taken.

"President Hillary"-God that sounds terrible! She's a big spending, big regulating liberal and she's a war hawk. Course so does "President Rudy"-sounds like a Bush administration reprise. I sure hope that the GOP nominates a good fiscal conservative who won't be the neocon's faithful servant and invade any nation at their behest for the sake of the Israeli government. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska would be very good. He questioned the WMD lies from the start and he's a good strong fiscal conservative.

On the other side, Russ Feingold seems like the best of the prominent Democrats. Not saying mush there, and he's terrible on domestic spending but he's the only prominent Dem who's not a war hawk. He wants our troops brought home now. Also, he's very anti the Patriot Act. If he was the Dem nominee, we'd have a good challenge to the war and on certain civil liberties issues.

|1.24.06 @ 1:23AM|#

that song hasn't been out of my head for 26 years. i ditched my yahoo accounts recently and am glad i did in light of this nonsense. i won't use their products again. it's google from here on out. glad to hear your customers' privacy means so much to you, jerry and dave. i hope others are walking from yahoo too. thank god, librarians have stood up to this kind of crap.

|1.24.06 @ 2:28AM|#

I read "porn cops" as "corn pops".

Dave W.|1.24.06 @ 6:11AM|#

btw, T., this is (or at least is closely akin to) an abuse of the discovery process. Even I, admit that there are relevance limits on discovery and this is out of line. I hope that GOOGLE's resistance is results in a quash of the subpoena, which is how the process is supposed to work. We'll have to see.

|1.24.06 @ 9:04AM|#

Rick-

On the bright side, President Hillary would mean First Husband Bill Clinton.

Which would be the most hilarious thing to ever happen in Washington.

|1.24.06 @ 9:51AM|#

"President Hillary"-God that sounds terrible!

Would a President Hillary from a policy perspective really be all that different from a President Bill Clinton?

Was all that peace and prosperity really that terrible? Would you prefer a more masculine name follow "President"?

|1.24.06 @ 10:13AM|#

Presidents have something to do with the economy? Gosh, I thought it was all of us out here producing and consuming. We're in quite an upswing in a number of areas now, and we'll probably be in a fairly strong boom (barring any surprises) in the next year or so. Will that mean Bush is some economic genius? Government can certainly be a drag on the economy (I, for one, think that the Microsoft witch hunt by DOJ had some effect on the IT sector), but it's rarely very helpful.

Although I think another Clinton or Bush in the Whitehouse would be a tragedy, I have to agree with thoreau that it would amuse me mightily to see WJC handling all of the "First Lady" duties. Reminds me of a reverse-gender Macbeth I saw once, with a Mr. Lady Macbeth. Weird.

|1.24.06 @ 10:20AM|#

I really thought this headline was gonna be saved until we had a post-Kelo shootout someplace.

|1.24.06 @ 10:24AM|#

If they catch him with an intern this time around will he be charged with treason?

Is that still a hanging offense?

|1.24.06 @ 10:28AM|#

"Was all that peace and prosperity really that terrible?"

That rules! Are you sure it wasn't 'cause of the pope? Wait, wait, maybe it was because of the stars! Ya know, I was younger and better looking during the Clinton years, too.

"president hillary will inherit the warrantless search powers that duuhbya has wrought."

I hear ya. I tried to tell this to my dad when he was all gung-ho anti-terror legislation. Oh well, how much does that bunker cost?

Jesse Walker|1.24.06 @ 10:29AM|#

I really thought this headline was gonna be saved until we had a post-Kelo shootout someplace.

You expect more maturity from me than I have to offer. I was just saving it for the right pun on "come."

|1.24.06 @ 12:41PM|#

"President Hillary"-God that sounds terrible! ... Would you prefer a more masculine name follow "President"?

Yeah. How about "Condoleeza"?

(One man's love song to Condi Rice available as a Flash movie here.)

|1.24.06 @ 1:09PM|#

Here's a funny one from the MSN blog:


# Not their fault
Poor MSN, they were taken in by a phishing email:
-----
Dear [e-mail],

Due to a computer problem at the National Security Agency, we have been unable to record the last six months of search results for MSN in our master tracking database. As specified in the Patriot Act (John Ashcroft interpretation), MSN must send us those results to ensure the terrorists do not win. Please email the information to [e-mail] before January 15, 2006. Failure to comply will result in double-super-secret probation.
Saturday, January 21, 2006 11:08 AM by Dave

|1.24.06 @ 1:17PM|#

BTW, just a question - when I use google on my home computer it remembers every search I've done and tries to guess the search based on the letters I type in. I delete all my cookies, history, have anti adware programs etc. yet it always does it. Any idea on how to get rid of that??

|1.24.06 @ 1:52PM|#

Jim:

Turn off auto-complete in your browser.

|1.24.06 @ 2:12PM|#

jf -

Doh! Here I was thinking google has some foolproof cookie that I couldn't eradicate. Thanks for your superior computer literacy.

|1.24.06 @ 2:33PM|#

Um...yeah. That's your browser, not Google.

|1.24.06 @ 2:36PM|#

You're not the first guy to trip on that, Jim.

|1.25.06 @ 1:16PM|#

Offtopic: anyone know how to turn autocomplete back on in Gmail (not GOOGLE, Gmail)?

I did notice that they made prominent the delete button this week! Yeah!