Do no evil
As readers of this blog probably are already aware, Google has been subpoenaed. The United States government is demanding, in part, that they provide a list of all URLs they index. This is something I’d expect them, or any other search firm, to want to keep secret.
Imagine my surprise when I read this in their response to the subpoena:
Defendant has already received URLs from at least one other major search engine. It is unclear why Defendant believes it needs URLs from Google.
Google goes on to state that they object to providing the information. Inquiring minds, however, want to know which search engine(s) did provide it. If they were forthcoming with that information, perhaps they also provided the other item which the government demanded: every search query from a one-month period.
Update five minutes later: AOL, Yahoo, and MSN did comply, sayeth BoingBoing.
I’m very happy that Google resisted on principle, and wish the other firms had joined them. It’s important to note, however, that the other players have a primary business in content provision. Since this investigation has something to do with COPA (The Bush DoJ having run out of toking cancer victims to lock up), I can see why they might want to cooperate a little in early phases.
Anyone want to poke around and see who negotiated the “narrowing”?
COPA requires that all commerical distributors meet a “community standards” standard or else block minors. Enforcement was blocked 2 years ago in a somewhat messy decision based on filtering, changing technology and the Reno v ACLU CDA decision.
If you are trying to get age verification on all indecent material online, how does the data collected above help you?
I suspect the government is looking for raw data they can massage to prove the need for such a law. Something like, “X% of all online searches result in pornographic material.”