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April 26, 2006BELTWAY BLOGROLL
House Passes Bill To Protect Phone Numbers
The House yesterday passed a bill designed to protect the privacy of telephone numbers -- legislation that was introduced early this year after publicity generated in part by a blogger.
The measure, H.R. 4709, would make it illegal for online brokers to buy and sell individuals' monthly phone records. It would empower both the FCC and FTC to enforce new rules banning "pretexting," the practice of obtaining customers' personal information under false pretenses.
The House passed the legislation on a 409-0 vote. Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., said on the floor that the bill "provides consumers with important new protections for the confidentiality of their calling records without compromising the legitimate lawful interests of law enforcement, emergency services and cellular telephone service providers" who might need access to the records.
As reported in my Feb. 14 column, the push to protect phone records had languished until early this year. After John Aravosis of Americablog read an article about the issue, he decided to make cell-phone privacy a pet cause.
Aravosis first bought his own records to prove a point, then he bought the records of someone who mattered: 2004 Democratic presidential candidate Wesley Clark. That ploy generated lots of publicity and jumpstarted the issue in Congress.
Three House bills and two Senate measures were introduced within days. House Judiciary approved H.R. 4709 by voice vote on March 2, and Senate Judiciary approved a similar measure, S. 2178, by voice vote the same day.
Posted by | 12:47 PM
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When any of us in the blogosphere succeed, we all benefit, and I would like to offer congratulations to two bloggers from the port side of the 'sphere. Glenn Greenwald recently released a new book, How Would A Patriot Act?>,... [Read More]
Tracked on April 26, 2006 07:00 PM
Comments
Hopefully, as more people migrate to cellphone use, this kills of those stupid coldcalls altogether.
The blogosphere has won again! This will inspire others to think up good legislation. One mere reason why these are the best of times.
Twok | 04.26.06 01:59 PM
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