Date: Sat, 07 Aug 93 16:43:35 EST
Errors-To: Comp-privacy Error Handler <comp-privacy-request@PICA.ARMY.MIL>
From: Computer Privacy Digest Moderator <comp-privacy@PICA.ARMY.MIL>
To: Comp-privacy@PICA.ARMY.MIL
Subject: Computer Privacy Digest V3#011
Computer Privacy Digest Sat, 07 Aug 93 Volume 3 : Issue: 011
Today's Topics: Moderator: Dennis G. Rears
Email Policy
Limits on advocation (Was: America Online censor)
Re: First Person broadcast on privacy
First Person broadcast on privacy
Re: Beepers restrict or give freedom
The Computer Privacy Digest is a forum for discussion on the
effect of technology on privacy. The digest is moderated and
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(Moderated). Submissions should be sent to
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Back issues are available via anonymous ftp on ftp.pica.army.mil
[129.139.160.133].
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Thu, 5 Aug 1993 15:00:04 -0800
From: "Glenn S. Tenney" <tenney@netcom.com>
Subject: Email Policy
On 03 Aug 93 17:57:14 EDT William Hugh Murray <75126.1722@compuserve.com> said:
> 7. Policy should always reserve some right for management to
> look at the contents of the communications in order to
> preserve necessary options and to protect management when
> some manager or management surrogate acts at or beyond the
> limits of his authority.
and many other things relating to consistent rules for all forms of
communications...
The last time I spoke with the USPS about mail addressed to people at a
business address I was told that the rules were very clear: If a letter is
addressed to someone at a company, it belongs to the receiving company.
However, if a letter indicates that it is 'personal', then it belongs to
the person to whom it is addressed rather than to to the company.
In other words, if I send you a letter (via the US Post Office) addressed
to you at work and indicate that it is 'personal', your employer would be
violating Federal law to "look at the contents of the communications"
regardless of your suggestion above.
I should think that a similar exception must apply for other forms of
communications. If the subject line of an email message says 'personal',
then the company is on notice that it is NOT work related and they should
not be looking at it. The company might wish to have a policy against
non-business communications, but that is impossible to enforce for the
receipt of unsolicited communications.
---
Glenn Tenney
tenney@netcom.com Amateur radio: AA6ER
Voice: (415) 574-3420 Fax: (415) 574-0546
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 5 Aug 93 23:07:05 GMT
From: Bear Giles <bear@eagle.fsl.noaa.gov>
Subject: Limits on advocation (Was: America Online censor)
Organization: Forecast Systems Labs, NOAA, Boulder, CO USA
In article <comp-privacy3.5.2@pica.army.mil> you write:
>
>Here are a couple of excerpts, cut and pasted, from AOL's Terms of Service.
>
>Member specifically agrees not to ...
>submit, publish, or display on America Online any ...
>illegal material; nor shall Member encourage the use of
>controlled substances.
Is it just me, or are people rolling over and playing dead simply
because someone says Drugs Are Bad?
First, what do they mean by "illegal material"? If they wish to
prohibit posting obscene material, they should say so directly.
I can't think of anything else that is itself considered illegal,
although there are certain things which the _act_ of printing/disclosing
is illegal. (e.g., disclosing classified material is illegal).
However, if Congress passed a law making it unlawful to criticize
any member of Congress I would certainly have no qualms about
breaking that law. In fact, I would consider it a badge of honor. :-)
It seems that AOL is confusing "legal" (actually "lawful") with "just".
Printing the "Pentagon Papers" may have been unlawful, but it was
probably just and arguably legal.
[BTW, "lawful" refers to the actual laws, "legal" refers to the
overall legal gestalt, for lack of a better term. For instance, it
is _unlawful_ to travel 80 mph on a road with a 55 mph speed limit, but
not _illegal_ if you are transporting a critically injured person to a
hospital and not endangering other people (e.g., you're driving down an
empty rural road). Saving a life is considered more important than
simply obeying the speed limit].
Secondly, that second statement is absurd. "[No] Member [shall]
encourage the use of controlled substances"...
Literally read, that means that you can't encourage someone to take
prescribed medicines! Having participated in support groups, this
isn't as bizarre as it seems -- many medicines have gruesome side effects
and some people may consider the cure worse than the disease.
Regarding only illegal drugs, this seems a pretty serious abridgement
of constitutional rights (which, of course, AOL can try since it is
not a governmental body). Consider an analogous situation from 100-odd
years ago: how would you feel if the AOL regulations required that
no member encourage the transportation or support of runaway slaves?
While such actions might have been _unlawful_, would any of us consider
them _illegal_? Today, it's hard to argue for the right to get stoned,
but at the same time it seems some parts of the government are far
too concerned with what citizens ingest (e.g., the suggestion to
regulate (i.e, require a doctor's prescription) OTC vitamins and
nutritional supplements).
This would seem a reach, if TCI in Indiana had not refused to air
_political_ ads for a pro-hemp organization, citing their corporate
support for a "drug-free company". Imagine a TV/cable company refusing
to run ads for a candidate since he was an atheist and therefore did not
meet the standards of the Church-attending General Manager?!
BTW, the ads simply questioned the studies the government quoted to
"prove" the hazards of marijuana. Anyone who has seen the spokesman
for the Tobacco Institute claim there is no "clear evidence that
tobacco is harmful" while citing TI-funded studies would have to
be at least a bit concerned.
In summary, AOL certainly has the right to insist that subscribers
not conduct actual illegal activities via AOL (e.g., conspiracy or
wire fraud). However, insisting that subscribers not discuss _unlawful_
activities except to condemn them seems excessive.
--
Bear Giles
bear@fsl.noaa.gov
-<My views rarely reflect those of my employer or the Federal government>-
------------------------------
From: "Wm. L. Ranck" <ranck@joesbar.cc.vt.edu>
Subject: Re: First Person broadcast on privacy
Date: 6 Aug 1993 03:23:48 GMT
Organization: Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia
John Higdon (john@zygot.ati.com) wrote:
: "Wm. L. Ranck" <ranck@joesbar.cc.vt.edu> writes:
: > Anybody who feels seriously cut off because they don't have e-mail and
: > a pager is way too hooked on tech gadgets. I'll admit, I like having
<<<delete>>>
: > need for a pager. I can understand the need for those things in business,
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
: For me, a pager is freedom. The alternative would be to be constantly
: forwarding my phone to locations all over town or to my cellular phone.
: I could forget social activities that would take me out of the reach of
: telephones such as concerts and picnics. You see, I am on twenty-four
: hour call. If any one of number of radio stations were to go off the
Like I said, some people have a business use for pagers and faxes. But,
the original post was about someone who had been laid off from his job
and "had to scramble" to keep access to pager, fax, and e-mail. He
didn't need them for his job anymore he just thought he needed them for
his personal communications. And, I think that's absurd.
: waste of money. Your comment, "and I have *never* seen a need for a
: pager", speaks more about the nature of your responsibilities than it
: does about the necessity of pagers. I am curious: if you were on
: twenty-four hour call, how would you handle it without a pager?
I would probably have a pager. For my job I don't need it, but remember
the post I was responding to was talking about a person who had lost
his job. He wasn't on call, he just wanted to keep the pager for
personal use. That's fine, but he felt "cut off from communication"
because he didn't have a pager. If you didn't need your pager for
your on call status would you still feel a need to carry it around?
I have seen some folks who had a pager for personal use. A friend
of mine carried one for the last couple of months of his wife's pregnancy
because he wasn't always near his office phone. So, yes, I understand
there are some reasons for wanting to keep a pager for personal
communication.
: That having been said, some people (myself included) tend to utilize
: in-place facilities. Ease of communications can facilitate social
: activities as well as business matters. If you have to wear the pager
: twenty-four hours a day anyway...
True, but that presumes you've already got the gadget.
: Again, this is a personal preference. Do people use the telephone to
: contact you for personal reasons? Where in stone is it written that
: pagers and faxes are for business purposes only? I have no problem with
: your personal preferences, but the fact that you post about it
: indicates that you attach some universal significance to it.
: MY point in all of this is that is it perfectly understandable that
: employees of a firm might tend to use the company's facilities for
: private use. To expect otherwise is unrealistic. But it is also
I don't disagree with this. My wife and kids call me at work sometimes.
If I'm not at my desk they leave phonemail. Somebody might send me a
personal fax someday. No big deal. But I certainly wouldn't feel I had
to go out a replace those things if I left my job or got laid off and
lost access to them.
--
* Bill Ranck (703) 231-9503 Bill.Ranck@vt.edu *
* Computing Center, Virginia Polytchnic Inst. & State Univ., Blacksburg, Va. *
------------------------------
From: Bruce.Baugh@f40.n105.z1.fidonet.org (Bruce Baugh)
Subject: First Person broadcast on privacy
Organization: /etc/organization
Date: Sat, 7 Aug 1993 02:06:50 GMT
MSGID: 1:105/40.23 2c62e4bd
REPLY: <comp-privacy3.10.4@pica.army.mil>
jac> From: John Higdon <john@zygot.ati.com>
jac> "Wm. L. Ranck" <ranck@joesbar.cc.vt.edu> writes:
>> Anybody who feels seriously cut off because they don't have
>> e-mail and a pager is way too hooked on tech gadgets. I'll admit,
jac> Try not to be too provincial in your attitude concerning
jac> communications. I do not criticize people for not indulging in
jac> answering machines, pagers and the like. By the same token, I do not
jac> expect to receive flak maximizing their use. Just because you see no
jac> need for a pager does not invalidate its need for existence.
Just so. In the case of e-mail, there are lots of people out there who are
partially or completely confined to home. I'm one of them; when my immune
system craps out on me, as it does from time to time, I may not be able to set
foot out the door for days or weeks. Lots of people have those limitations
permanently.
E-mail is faster and cheaper than any other way I know to keep in touch with
many kinds of folks.
As for pagers, I've felt charitably toward them ever since hearing from a
friend about the months she spent with one while her husband was in the final
stages of dying from muscular dystrophy. Thanks to the pager, she could be
available to help at critical points.
jac> MY point in all of this is that is it perfectly understandable that
jac> employees of a firm might tend to use the company's facilities for
jac> private use. To expect otherwise is unrealistic. But it is also
jac> reasonable to expect that if a person finds these alternate forms of
jac> communication useful, he ought to look into establishing his own
jac> implementation of these tools--independently of those of his
jac> employer. Then he is free to use them at will--for business or
jac> pleasure--and expect to be free from casual snooping at the same
jac> time.
Exactly!
Bruce
* Origin: Kiksht Cyberspace (1:105/40.23)
------------------------------
From: dk010b@uhura.cc.rochester.edu
Subject: Re: Beepers restrict or give freedom
Organization: University of Rochester - Rochester, New York
Date: Fri, 6 Aug 93 18:32:41 GMT
Apparently-To: comp-society-privacy@uunet.uu.net
As a student who also works several jobs I don't think I could live
without my pager. From 7AM to 7PM there is no way to get in touch with
me other then through my pager as there is no way that I could
realistically predict where I am going to be when as my schedule
changes every day. This way people can get in touch with me when they
need to, but I have control over it as I can control who I give my
pager number to.
Dan
------------------------------
End of Computer Privacy Digest V3 #011
******************************