Christopher Leger

International trade agreements rarely make front page news, and even then only when the agreements are signed, binding the signatory countries to them. Because of this, the standard practice for negotiating these trade agreements is extraordinarily opaque due to press disinterest and the lack of the same open-government laws that many nations have regulating how [...]

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Time Warner Cable, the geniuses who can’t help but rip off their customers, is at it again. Several small towns across the country are taking matters into their own hands and creating a utility broadband system for their residents. This, being a community-owned utility, offers high capacity for low price – who could have a [...]

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The fight for a voice at the table by anyone not already an IP rights-holder is heating up. Already, the Obama administration is filled with RIAA and BSA industry oriented officials, and few if any from consumer, education, or hardware oriented backgrounds. An April 2nd letter sent to the President requests a more diverse group [...]

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Just like the debacle with the Scorpion’s album cover on Wikipedia, a controversial image has made the entire Internet archive unavailable to the UK. The heavy handed approach that the UK appears to be becoming more and more comfortable using is looking more and more like the great Chinese firewall, with zero regard for personal [...]

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The telcos would be laughed out of the room if they didn’t have so much lobbying power. They are deadly serious in fighting any regulation, and proponents of a fair and free Internet should redouble their efforts to enact net neutrality regulation before the situation becomes worse.

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Will a President Obama be good for Federal technology policy? Only time can tell, but his campaign’s use of technology gives me hope that he understands the opportunity that technology offers the country. As I have argued many times, an understanding of technology is missing from far too many legislators and regulators, so, hopefully, this [...]

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If data mining like this doesn’t even work, what possible excuse could be used to infringe individual privacy rights? Thanks to Buzz Out Loud for the link to the article!

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This article by Ellen Nakashima in The Washington Post (8/12/08 pg D1) about the House Committee on Energy and Commerce inquiry into ISP customer monitoring is very revealing. The article links to the actual letters sent to the Committee by many ISPs detailing their customer tracking techniques. Please find your ISP and find out what [...]

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Recently, the news had been abuzz with stories about international travelers having their laptops and other digital devices searched and detained at many international borders, including the US borders, without individualized suspicion or probable cause. Until the governments of the world come to grips with the concept of privacy rights and technology, it is up [...]

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After hearing the story about the loss/misplacement/theft/ballyhoo of a TSA laptop containing over 30,000 travelers personal information, as well as the recent news in the Royal Bank of Scotland case, the TJX case, etc. I propose a simple piece of legislation: Any personally identifying information stored digitally must be encrypted using a NIST standards compliant [...]

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