By SAUL HANSELL and ERIC LICHTBLAU
Published: June 2, 2006
NY TIMES
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/02/washington/02recor
ds.html?
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"The Justice Department is asking Internet companies
to keep
records on the Web-surfing activities of their customers to
aid
law enforcement, and may propose legislation to force them
to do
so."
...
"The department proposed that the records be retained
for as long
as two years. Most Internet companies discard such records
after
a few weeks or months.In its current proposal, the
department
appears to be trying to determine whether Internet companies
will
voluntarily agree to keep certain information or if it will
need
to seek legislation to require them to do so."
...
"An executive of one Internet provider that was
represented at
the first meeting said Mr. Gonzales began the discussion by
showing slides of child pornography from the Internet. But
later,
one participant asked Mr. Mueller why he was interested in
the
Internet records. The executive said Mr. Mueller's reply
was, "We
want this for terrorism."
At the meeting with privacy experts yesterday, Justice
Department
officials focused on wanting to retain the records for use
in
child pornography and terrorism investigations. But they
also
talked of their value in investigating other crimes like
intellectual property theft and fraud, said Marc Rotenberg,
executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information
Center
in Washington, who attended the session.
"It was clear that they would go beyond kiddie porn
and terrorism
and use it for general law enforcement," Mr. Rotenberg
said."
Chuck Hamaker
Associate University Librarian Collections and Technical
Services
Atkins Library
University of North Carolina Charlotte
Charlotte, NC 28223
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