‘Obstruction of justice’ is also refusing to enforce privacy law when there is a clear and present danger to the public
My 2020 weapon of choice is honesty. To be blunt, this will be, at least, the second Washington State session I witnessed an open secret. Microsoft, a corporation underneath a 20 year consent decree for privacy violations and unfair practice, sent in Brad Smith and his public policy team to write up the privacy law it can live with for the State of Washington. Of course, the legislation, faithfully chanelled by Senator Carlyle, is a milquetoast privacy placcard to soothe global regulators in Europe and prevent scare of Chinese/Canadian investors away with any kind of law enforcement.
The chair of the Consumer Protection Committee won’t take up privacy as a consumer protection matter. The Chair of the House Public Safety Committee indicates corruption by way of corporatism for lack of law enforcement means with toothsome privacy laws like: HIPPA, COPPA, the Drivers License Protection Act and of course, my pet favorite to reign in federally funded mass surveillance, the Privacy Act of 1974.
“That’s only applies to federal matters, right?”
Yes, Representative, that’s right. If the State of Washington accepts federal funding for their police work, mass spectrum wireless/ IOT/smartphone surveillance, biometric capture and analysis systems at U.S. borders and anything else usually rubber stamped for appropriations in a CROmnibus package headed for WA State, including traffic cameras, geolocation devices and ALPR … a United States Citizen may write their Microsoft Federal first party data controller and tell them to stop collection and schedule destruction of their data. Then Microsoft has to do it. Kind of takes the air out of those Q2 projections based on trade transfer mandates and DOD “research” bids.
In a quantum reality where I actually have a reasonable expectation of privacy, Microsoft, and other serial privacy violators underneath FTC conformance orders, would get chased out of Consumer Protection and appropriations offices by capitol security for fear of guilt associations. Government workers would sit around and talk about how the FBI’s malfeasance division actually busted someone they knew, who went to jail for licensing access to siloed public data to third party political actors. The scandal would have displaced several Senators and key members of the US Congress for accepting bribes, gifts and any other kind of persuasion to obstruct justice or enforcement of privacy laws.
The current lawmaking class behaves as if there were no recollection of life before 2007, FISA or the Bush regime’s suppression of US 4th Amendment rights and freedoms. They act as if privacy law was never enforceable. Formerly, so many businesses were utterly terrified of running afoul of privacy law because it was so strong and punitive, with both stiff civil and criminal penalties.
Now, of course, all we have is non-law enforcement-enforcement from the FTC, who will whine after protection orders gavell down that, “It wasn’t strong enough!!” In the meantime, Salim, Salabim the CFO for CRIME CORPORATION whips out a magic checkbook and pays The Man. NEXT!!
No. Clearly, there is a breakdown in law enforcement of privacy law. It’s time for jail. It ain’t consumer protection until the CFAA violators who poached the Children’s Hospital credentials from Estonia or Kabul goes to jail and the obese infosec lead, whose keyboard is covered in Doritos powdered cheese and apathy, also serves some time … for not giving a damn.
Did I get it wrong perhaps? Let’s try another scenario then. In this scenario, the risk-analysis team who greenlit COPPA violations for smartphones would get perp walked on the 7 PM news. TMZ PM edition sports the mugshots of marketing leads who used to work at AT&T and Disney now in jail for not allowing perfectly enforceable law to be their North Star, opposed to licensing the information of 7 year olds to anyone who would pay.
My law enforcement and white collar crackdown fantasy continues as a massive public-private sting soon demonstrates several K Street fixer firms implicated, along with at least 40% of seated US Congress in publican data price fixing, profiteering, extortion, larceny, menacing and obstruction of justice busts. The scope goes global as Interpol reaches deep into UK leadership, Italy, Israel and China with extradition orders to stand witness and submit records at the Hague for global privacy violation, human rights violations and kleptocratic enrichment.
Then people howling from all violations fill the streets to celebrate the takedown of the Panopticon’s machines. Ribbons and tickertape fill the streets as people manufacture some new Free People’s festival on the spot. Busking DJs and musicians magically show up. Hackey sack and street food vendors flock to the occasion. Local business regulators fold their arms and say, “Meh. We will get them at tax time.” Police and Fire volunteer for overtime pay and point citizens to Waste Management areas where post-surveillance State scrap merchants fight over the City waste, while others take selfies and pose over the junk heap for the Kiss cam on Instagram. Old radio production engineers show up with tape recording magnets and drills to charge for erasure, so they can retire. Amen.
Who knows? Maybe it can all happen.
However, today I will ask the God of Personal Justice to please ban companies, still underneath the FTC for privacy violation, from writing law and to withdraw their legislative proposals for “privacy reforms” and then usher in a law era with such enforceable ferocity in both civil and criminal court, no company will be dumb enough to violate it.