WASHINGTON -- The last thing that an ailing U.S. technology sector needs is intrusive new regulations that raise the cost of doing business, some 40 firms will tell legislators next week.
On Tuesday, the companies, including eBay and Motley Fool, plan to lobby Congress in opposition to sweeping privacy bills that both the House and Senate are considering this year.
The visits to key politicos are designed "to educate members that the new privacy regulations being discussed will be too expensive for them to implement," says a spokesman for the Association for Competitive Technology, which is coordinating the event. If regulations are sufficiently costly, they could put struggling firms out of business.
Scheduled events include a Monday evening reception with Senators George Allen (R-Virginia) and John Kerry (D-Massachusetts), and a Tuesday presentation of a study that promises to slap a price tag on how much it will cost the private sector to comply with new privacy laws.
Rules aimed at corporate data collection are backed by many liberal groups, including Ralph Nader's Consumer Project on Technology, the U.S. Public Interest Research Group and the Electronic Privacy Information Center. Other companies participating in what's become an annual "Let's Talk Privacy" event include eAdSpec.com, Ensuredmail, Orbitz and Progressive Systems.
Monica watch: Bill Clinton may have left town, but Monicagate isn't over.
Last year, House Republicans were investigating whether the ex-pres illegally hid from investigators thousands of e-mail messages related to Monica Lewinsky and campaign finance scandals.
Now the results are in, and they're, well, inconclusive.
Investigators at the General Accounting Office, an arm of Congress, released the results of their research this week, saying that the White House "did not effectively monitor management of e-mail records."
Neither, apparently, did Vice President Al Gore's staff: "The (Office of the Vice President) did not implement adequate records management practices to ensure that all e-mail records generated or received were preserved in accordance with applicable law and best practices."
But the investigation found no smoking gun, and Gore's lawyers pointed to that fact as partial vindication. The big reason why over two years of e-mail was lost was, apparently, that the "Mail2" server was misspelled "MAIL2."
Censor-happy police: If you live in the Seattle area, be warned: Your city may sue if you post court records about police officers on the Net.
A judge in King County heard arguments this week by the city of Kirkland, Washington, which hopes to remove public records from justicefiles.org, run by Bill Sheehan.
City officials said they wanted to see police officers' unlisted home addresses, phone numbers and Social Security numbers removed for the safety of officers who fear the information could be used by anyone seeking revenge, according to a Seattle Times report.
A recent brief filed by Sheehan's lawyer says: "The law, for better or for worse, protects the defendants against the order proposed by the plaintiffs. The plaintiffs must seek their remedy elsewhere, perhaps by exercising their free speech rights to petition the government for strengthened privacy rights."
