In a surprising vote, French legislators have defeated a bill that would monitor Internet communications and cut off from the Internet people accused of illegal downloading by the music and movie industries. The defeat resulted in cries of anguish from the industry spokespeople, and a promise from Sarkozy to bring it back after Easter, when more than a handful of legislators will actually be present to vote.

It’s surveillance, guys. If it’s legal to inspect everybody’s data packets because you are pretty sure somebody is sharing songs illegally, surely it should be legal to open everyone’s mail because we know that there are illegal acts carried out through the postal service. And to listen to everyone’s telephone calls because we know some people are doing bad things over the phone.

The French see these things differently, and the big fear is that ubiquitous Internet surveillance will establish a beachhead in Europe and then be transported stateside through international treaties. Watch this one closely.

Sarkozy, by the way, is fuming.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 9th, 2009 at 9:46 pm and is filed under Surveillance, The role of government—laws and regulations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.