WASHINGTON -- John Ashcroft, President Bush's pick for attorney general, says he'll take a long, hard look at Carnivore if he gets the job.
In response to a written question from Sen. Herb Kohl (D-Wisc.), Ashcroft wrote back: "If confirmed, I will conduct a thorough review of Carnivore and its technical capabilities, and work closely with law enforcement to ensure that adequate measures are taken to secure personal privacy before the program is deployed."
The only problem with that response, which the ACLU circulated, is that Carnivore, the FBI's favorite way of doing Internet surveillance, has already been deployed. It's already been used dozens of times as of last fall, according to the FBI's congressional testimony.
Ashcroft's nomination has become one of the first pitched battles of Bush's presidency, pitting Republicans against Democrats in a fight over whether the former Missouri senator, an unabashed conservative, is qualified for the job.
As of Friday, according to the Washington Post's head count, nine Democratic senators have said they'll vote against Ashcroft.
Babbitt backs out: Any TV interview that irks a Cabinet secretary so much that he tears off his microphone and stomps out of the room has got to be worth watching.
This one sure is. You won't want to miss an in-depth ABC News report airing Saturday at 10 p.m. (EST), in which reporter John Stossel asks tough questions about government -- and concludes that nearly everything the feds do can be handled more efficiently and more cheaply by the private sector.
One scene features then-Interior Secretary Babbitt preparing for an interview. But even before Stossel asks the first question, Babbitt gets cold feet.
"I'm not sure why I'm here ... I'm going to fire whoever scheduled this interview," Babbitt said, and left in a huff.
When it comes to the feds' slothfulness, Stossel seems to have a point. Instead of saying "nomination pending" or anything useful, the department's current website about the secretary of the interior returns an unhelpful blank page.
No cookie: DoubleClick may not be all that evil after all.
The online-ad company -- the perennial winner of Big Brother awards from highly agitated, left-leaning privacy groups -- seems to have done nothing wrong, the Federal Trade Commission concluded this week.
In a two-page letter sent to the company, the FTC said "it appears to staff that DoubleClick never used or disclosed consumers' (personally identifiable information) for purposes other than those disclosed in its privacy policy."
Fans of data collection regulation had pressed for the investigation, which began in February 2000, after DoubleClick bought direct marking company Abacus Direct.
Saying little: Secretary of State Colin Powell may be new to his job, but he's already mastered the ability to say nothing while talking a lot.
When the newly elected Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fl.) asked about Powell's views on export restrictions on "satellites, encryption materials, conventional weapons, computers," during a confirmation hearing last week, the former general demurred.
Powell said he wanted to guard "the nation's interests, protecting our secrets, but at the same time, not putting our nation at a competitive disadvantage."
D.C. Notebook (continued)
He did, however, say that when it came to computer exports, "We have now discovered that they are fungible items -- they're all over the world, and if we don't sell them, somebody else will."
Reno's swan song: Speaking of encryption, the topic came up during ex-Attorney General Janet Reno's farewell press conference last week.
A reporter noted that some conservatives are "very concerned about the power of the government, particularly the FBI, worried about roving wire taps, worried about encryption, worried about snooping of people on the Internet."
Reno, with only one full day left on the job, wasn't about to talk turkey.
"To put it bluntly," Reno replied, "I think those people would rather be reassured by Louis Freeh than by Janet Reno, and have more confidence in what Louis Freeh tells them. So I understand he's going to be staying on for a little bit, and I hope that he might be able to reassure them."
Then she turned to more pressing business: Goodbyes.
Reno told the score of beat reporters who show up every week that she has "never seen the media set such an example as I have for the people who are regularly around this table and in this room.... I'm going to miss you."
Don't cry: We don't mean to upset you, but the frowny-face has been trademarked.
Yes, it's true. The Patent and Trademark Office has granted rights to everyone's favorite emoticon :-( to a private firm, despair.com.
Fortunately, the owners seem to be doing more smiling than frowning.
The company's recent tongue-in-cheek press release jests that Despair has filed a federal suit against 7 million Internet users.
"The company has, through the use of the FBI's controversial new 'Carnivore' Internet wiretapping system, surreptitiously monitored unencrypted Internet e-mail and compiled a list of over 7,000,000 individuals who have used the ':-(' emoticon in email," it says.
E.U. sites lose: A new report from Consumers International, an association of over 260 consumer groups and agencies from many countries, says that both U.S. and European websites don't provide enough privacy protections.
So what else is new, right?
Well, here's the twist: Even though neither may be perfect, U.S. sites reportedly outperform their cross-Atlantic counterparts.
A Consumers International press release this week says: "The most popular U.S. sites were more likely than the EU ones to give users a choice about being on the company's mailing list or having their name passed on, despite the existence of legislation which obliges EU-based sites to provide users with a choice."
It says: "Despite tight EU regulation, sites within the EU are no better at telling users how they use their data than sites based in the U.S. Indeed, some of the best privacy policies were found on U.S. sites."
Translation: Market pressure is more effective at protecting privacy than even the best efforts of bureaucrats.
