Justice

The 404 948: Where we're in some deep dish (podcast)

Leaked from today's 404 Podcast episode:

Congress is proposing a school lunchroom bill that would allow as little as two tablespoons of tomato paste on a frozen pizza to be classified as a proper weekly serving of vegetables for students. Fries and tater tots also count as vegetables. The U.S. Department of Justice wants to make it a crime to lie on social networks like Match.com, Facebook, and OKCupid--if the fib in question violates other laws outside of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. This holiday season, the Salvation Army send its volunteers into the streets with a new way to accept donations using credit card-reading hardware provided by Sprint/Nextel and Square. The program will join Girl Scout troops and The U.S. Army in pushing the next generation of mobile payments. A digital experiment from the artists at Wemakecoolsh.it enables subway denizens on the L-Train to access Wi-Fi and communicate with one another secretly using their self-powered "NOTwork." The enclosed system will run the week of November 14th on L-Trains going in and out of the Brooklyn and Manhattan boroughs. AOL resurrects its Instant Messaging service AIM with new features that even the score with sites like Meebo and Adium, and Jabber that already let you log chat histories, sign into multiple social networking accounts, and view multimedia like video and Twitter messages directly in the message window. An attack on online copyright infringements is in in progress, spearheaded by an initiative called the Stop Online Privacy Act, or SOPA that aims to blacklist sites that allegedly violate existing copyright laws. As of last night, however, the opposition is gaining powerful allies across the Web, including big names like Google, Facebook, Twitter, and Zynga. Bathroom break video 1: Star Wars Rogue Squadron - Cheers Bathroom break video 2: Turkish Ice Cream Follow Jeff, Wilson, Justin, and The 404 Twitter pages for a chance to win Battlefield 3, Batman: Arkham City, and Uncharted 3. Check out this post for how to enter.

Click through to stream or download today's 404 podcast episode!… Read more

AT&T: Sprint's public, private claims are two-faced

AT&T's fight with Sprint Nextel over its right to buy T-Mobile USA keeps getting uglier.

The latest move by AT&T: claiming Sprint is two-faced, pointing out contradictions between its publicly made arguments and its confidential responses to the Federal Communications Commission. AT&T won the right to access Sprint's confidential documents because it needs to prepare for its defense against the Department of Justice. AT&T filed a document pointing out the difference in opinion to the FCC.

The war of words has gotten increasingly bitter, as AT&T scrambles to … Read more

Should lying online be a crime?

Google lets you remove your Wi-Fi info from its location database, iTunes Match goes live, and the Department of Justice pushes Congress to make it a felony to use a fake name on a social network or lie on a dating-site profile.

Links from Tuesday's episode of Loaded:

DOJ: Lying on Match.com needs to be a crime

The U.S. Department of Justice is defending computer hacking laws that make it a crime to use a fake name on Facebook or lie about your weight in an online dating profile at a site like Match.com.

In a statement obtained by CNET that's scheduled to be delivered tomorrow, the Justice Department argues that it must be able to prosecute violations of Web sites' often-ignored, always-unintelligible "terms of service" policies.

The law must allow "prosecutions based upon a violation of terms of service or similar contractual agreement with an employer or provider," Richard … Read more

U.S. attorney general: DOJ 'ready and eager' for AT&T trial

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder told lawmakers today that the Justice Department's antitrust division is "ready and eager" to pursue its lawsuit and stop AT&T's acquisition of T-Mobile USA.

Holder said the division is "committed to seeing this through," Reuters reported today. Holder was speaking at an oversight meeting with the Judiciary Committee's antitrust panel.

In August, the Justice Department sued to block the proposed $39 billion merger, putting the brakes on what many in the industry assumed to be a done deal. The Justice Department cited concern over competition … Read more

Union: AT&T's T-Mobile buy would create 100,000 jobs

The merger between AT&T and T-Mobile USA would create more than 100,000 jobs in the United States, a major telecommunications union said today, again putting its weight behind the deal.

The Communications Workers of America said a new analysis has found that the deal, which would combine the second- and fourth-largest U.S. wireless carriers, would create an additional 96,000 jobs, alongside the 5,000 outsourced jobs AT&T has pledged to bring back.

The CWA also lashed out at opponents of the deal, noting that their concerns over lost jobs stemmed from "sloppy … Read more

AT&T pushes back target date for T-Mobile buy

The regulatory scrutiny is starting to get to AT&T and its bid to acquire T-Mobile USA.

AT&T disclosed in its quarterly regulatory filing that it now expects the deal to close in the first half of 2012, compared with its previous target of the first quarter. The Dow Jones Newswires was the first to report the change.

The regulatory scrutiny has also caused it to push back the target date for its acquisition of spectrum from Qualcomm. AT&T now expects that deal to close in the first quarter of 2012, rather than the end … Read more

Judge lets Sprint, C Spire pursue suit against AT&T

A federal judge today allowed Sprint Nextel and C Spire to continue with its lawsuit to block the merger between AT&T and T-Mobile USA.

AT&T and T-Mobile had attempted to dismiss the lawsuit. But Judge Ellen Huvelle allowed both companies to persist with their lawsuits, which claim they would be squeezed by market pressures if the consolidation were to be allowed, according to Reuters. Part of the lawsuits, however, were dismissed. The lawsuits could further complicate the deal, which already faces opposition in the form of a lawsuit from the Justice Department.

"Both Sprint and … Read more

Justice Department ramps up WikiLeaks e-mail probe

The U.S. Department of Justice has expanded its investigation of WikiLeaks-related accounts to encompass Google and Internet provider Sonic.net.

Both companies received secret court orders directing them to turn over information from the e-mail account of Jacob Appelbaum, a hacker and human rights activist who has been affiliated with WikiLeaks, The Wall Street Journal reported today.

CNET has learned that the secret court order is what's called a 2703(d) order. It's not as privacy-protective as a traditional search warrant, and some courts have ruled that such orders are unconstitutional when used to read a suspect'… Read more

Privacy cases slated for U.S. Supreme Court's new term

When police in the District of Columbia decided to use an automobile GPS bug to surreptitiously track the movements of Antoine Jones, a suspected cocaine dealer, they set in motion a legal challenge that will end before the U.S. Supreme Court.

The court's fall term, which begins today, includes a review of Jones' attempt to overturn his conviction. His attorneys argue that such precise turn-by-turn tracking requires a search warrant signed by a judge--a step that D.C. police chose not to take.

It's one of a handful of technology cases that, in addition to a high-profile … Read more