THE FEDS have swooped on Silicon Valley in the hope that it might be able to provide some expertise when it comes to Internet surveillance.

      Google got in a lot of hot water this year when its Street View cars were caught snuffling private wireless data. It was not arrested in the US, but clearly the US Federal  Bureau of Investigation (FBI) thought "we should be having some of that".

      According to the New York Times, Robert Mueller, the director of the FBI, travelled to Silicon Valley on Tuesday to meet with top executives of several technology firms to talk about ways to make it easier to conduct surveillance on Internet users.

      Mueller and the FBI's top lawyer, Valerie Caproni, were scheduled to meet with senior managers of several major companies, including Google and Facebook, both of which have fallen afoul of privacy laws recently.

      Mueller wants to expand a 1994 law, the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA), to impose more regulations on Internet companies. The current law requires phone companies and Internet service providers (ISPs) to immediately comply when presented with a court wiretapping order.

      Now the federal coppers want the 1994 law extended to also cover Internet companies because people increasingly communicate online.

      In opposition to extending the law, the US Commerce Department and State Department are worried that it will inhibit innovation. That is probably the reason why Mueller popped into Google.

      In other words, "We want to monitor everyone in the US all the time to make sure that they are all decent Americans. Do you think this will stuff up your bottom line?"

Source from The Inquirer

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