17 November 2006, The federal Ninth Circuit Court vacated the sentence of convicted child pornographer John Kuchinski when it found that his 70-month sentence was based on the number of images found on his computer, including more than 10,000 images found in his temporary Internet files and deleted Internet files.  Judge Fernandez explains, to hold otherwise "turns abysmal ignorance into knowledge and a less than valetudinarian [sic, nerdy] grasp into dominion and control."

13 October 2006, President signs H.R. 4954:  Security and Accountability For Every Port Act ("SAFE Port Act"), which SAFE Port Act incorporated Title VIII--Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 ("UIGEA").  Title VIII added in conference committee.  Earlier, the House passed the SAFE Port Act: ayes-421, nays-2 and not voting-9 and the Senate passed the SAFE Port Act: ayes-98, nays-0 and not voting-2.

Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Arizona)  The Senator has been one of leading architects of banning Internet poker.  After nine unsuccessful attempts with his "Unlawful Internet Gambling Act" he finally got his bill incorporated in the 2006 Act.

Rep Diana DeGette (D-Colorado)  This foe of Internet rights plans on introducing a bill calling for the mandatory data retention of Internet activity in the 110th Congress.  In the 109th she voted in favor of H.R. 4411, the early House version of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act.  She intends to introduce legislation in the 110th Congress mandating Internet service providers keep records of their users activities for a period of up to two years.  DeGette has succeeded ex-Rep Leach as the number one enemy of Internet rights in the House.

Pre-election fall 2006, the Mark Foley "House Page Scandal" adds saliva to the legislative palate for passage of a comprehensive Internet data retention act in the 110th Congress.

27 June 2006, five major online companies announced joint initiative with National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) to launch an aggressive new campaign against child exploitation on the Internet.

 

 

 

 

 

Return to Federal Actions

Title VIII was added in the wee hours of Saturday, October 2, 2006, as the final congressional act just moments prior to the pre-election break and would arguably never have passed the Senate in the 109th Congress.  e Republican leadership conspiratorially and callously poured their Internet banning Draino  ® down the gullets of Congress and the American people under the cloak of darkness. This caustic liquid now eats away the innards of personal liberty and Internet rights.  Return to Table of Contents.

The Act does not criminalize the player-gambler, but targets the operators of net casinos.  However, those operators are all unlikely to face prosecution in the US, except those subject to extradition treaties or those too dumb to avoid traveling to or through the U.S.

The Act exempts, in general: risk less gaming, intrastate State or tribal wagering with effective geolocation and age verification systems, activities related to horse racing under the Interstate Horseracing Act, interstate transmission of information relating to State-specific lottery between a State or foreign country and fantasy or simulation sports gaming. Return to Table of Contents.

Catch the Bootlegger:  The arrest, extradition, conviction and incarceration of foreign operators of net casinos are the only foreseeable punishments in the Act.  ISPs and financial companies are deputized to enforce many of the Act’s key provisions.

Close the Speakeasies:  Under the Act, the U.S. will go from “zero” blocked Internet sites to approximately 2000 sites initially, before tens of thousands of “hypertext link(s) to online site(s)” are required to be removed or disabled.  The Act deputizes “Interactive Computer Services,” which include:  ISPs, search engines, libraries and education institutions.  These cyber-deputies are required to SCREEN the surfing activities in real time of approximately 100 million US users in order to STOP at most eight million sporadic, recreational web-gamblers. Interactive Computer Services will each choose and contract with commercial Internet security systems companies to provide filter technologies.  These companies currently offer a menu of block able content categories from gambling to politics to their customers:  ISPs, businesses, government agencies, educational institutions, libraries and not-for-profits.  The Act suggests that the Justice Department will provide “notice” of additional censored sites on an ongoing basis.  

Follow the Money: The following quotes are from Samuel Vallandingham, on behalf of the Independent Community Bankers of America, during the “Legislative Hearing on H.R. 4777 [merged with H.R. 4411], before the Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security on 5 April 2006.  The Act will “criminalize the knowing acceptance of credit, credit proceeds, electronic fund transfers or such monetary payments by anyone in the gambling business.”  The Act barely recognizes “that the check clearing system and the Automated Clearing House (ACH) [electronic funds transfer] network does not have the same capabilities as the credit card association networks to identify different types of transactions.”  The ACT, if passed, “would not only necessitate a massive overhaul of our nation’s check clearing and ACH systems, but also create enormous regulatory burden requiring the deputization of tens of thousands of financial institutions to identity and block illegal transactions.”  While the Bank Secrecy Act of 1970 requires reports for amounts from $10,000 for bank, casino and business currency transactions—smaller (to $2,000) for suspicious transactions, this Act, requires financial institutions to block or to refuse honoring restricted transactions as small as $1.00.  The Act does give the Secretary of the Treasury and the Federal Reserve Board a 270-day period from the Act’s date of enactment to devise an enforcement plan or “find that it is not reasonably practical to identify and block, or otherwise prevent or prohibit the acceptance of, such transactions.” Return to Table of Contents.

All Internet Activity Filtered:  The Act will significantly alter the implicit privacy of all Americans by setting up an entirely new system to scrutinize through filters all Internet visits.  While only foreign gambling sites and U.S. hot links to them are expected to be blocked, the system is capable with a key stroke of expanding into other content categories.  Well-intended, future laws could easily further narrow the range of Internet content to US citizens. 

All Financial Transactions Codified:  The Act requires the codification of all banking transactions for the sake of stopping less than 1/1000 of 1% of on-line gambling exchanges raises serious issues of governmental intent. 

All Email, IM, Chat Room and Web Surfing Cached for Two Years:  A separate initiative with respect to child endangerment will add a tile to the mosaic of authoritarianism.  While unrelated to the Act, the likelihood of enactment in the 110th Congress is enhanced following the ex-Congressman Mark Foley congressional page fiasco.  Because of the general failure of local law enforcement agencies to promptly follow up on child endangerment leads from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (the “NCMEC”), the Justice Department is pressuring and Congress is threatening legislation to cause ISPs to cache senders and receivers of emails, chat room and IM participants and extensive Internet histories for all 100 million US users for a evergreen two-year period.  While identifying and prosecuting exploiters of children is a noble initiative, NetRightsAdvocates strongly believes that this initiative raises severe privacy issues and is misguided and dangerous.  A better approach is to make additional resources available to local law enforcement agencies to follow-up promptly to the NCMEC’s specific leads so that court orders can be requested and issued and each pervert’s Internet records obtained on a timely basis.  Caching 120 billion unique page views for 100 million Americans to provide possible prosecutorial evidence on a thousand perverts is misguided and dangerous. 

All International Transactions Monitored:  Concerns have been raised about the Executive’s Branch’s monitoring over the Swift (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication) international financial system.  

All Americans International Calls and Emails Subject to Monitoring:  Additional concerns continue over Bush’s 2001 directive which authorized the National Security Agency to monitor, without court warrants, American’s international calls and emails when terrorism is suspected.

The Mosaic of Authoritarianism:  Each tile above is supported by arguably valid public policy concerns, but the mosaic of authoritarianism is clearly pictured when all the tiles are assembled. Return to Table of Contents.

We believe that Internet gambling should be legalized, regulated and taxed.  Such an approach would ensure age and identity verification, the integrity and fairness of the games and that responsible gaming features are prominently featured.  Congress fails to appreciate the creative ability of Internet users to avoid their collective nonsense.

A short-sighted Congress has cost tens of thousands of American jobs in an industry, Internet gaming, which the US could have easily dominated with it well-established, well-respected international gaming concerns and gambling commissions.  US software programmers and computer, router, server manufacturers should have designed the next generation of Internet gambling sites and installations.  American state governments should be receiving tax revenues, not Antigua and the other 84 foreign jurisdictions. Return to Table of Contents.