eBuzz - FBI Withdraws Digital Library's National Security Letter

FBI Withdraws Digital Library's National Security Letter

Sometimes, just sometimes, the good guys win.

That's the story coming out of San Francisco, where a nonprofit digital library, the Internet Archive, has successfully fought an FBI attempt to seize information about one of its users—and is calling on other groups to challenge government agencies attempting to obtain online customer information without a judge's order.

Wendy Davis writes in MediaPost:

As it turned out, Internet Archive founder Brewster Kahle knew some lawyers: He is also on the board of the digital rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation.

That group and the ACLU sued, arguing that Congress in 2006 amended the Patriot Act to restrict the FBI's ability to order libraries to disclose information about users. Faced with this court challenge, the FBI backed down from the request at the end of last month, and also agreed to unseal the documents in the case. Those were made public for the first time Wednesday.

Paul Elias, writing for the Associated Press, adds:

National security letters are used to compel businesses to turn over customer information without a judge's order or grand jury subpoena. They are most typically served on Internet service providers and telephone companies demanding billing records, subscriber information and other electronic communication transactional records.

The companies receiving the letters are barred from telling customers who are the targets of the FBI demands.

It's obviously a victory for online privacy, essential for both free speech and ongoing emarketing endeavors. This case makes three for three in terms of court challenges to National Security Letters. We can only applaud the court decision and urge other challenges to be issued. No one will trust the storage of digital information anywhere—including on ecommerce sites—if personal information is available without court order to government agencies.

And that's our take on the news today!

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