Snitch of the Week: 1/15 - 1/21 (This one's bad)

Despite all the paranoia about the scope and amount of information Google collects about its users, it turns out they were the only search engine that didn't rat out their users to the Bush administration's vague request for porn search records.

The government recently subpoenaed Yahoo!, (who has a long record of selling out to governments) AOL, MSN and Google for its porn related search records in order to see what access children have to pornography in accordance with the Child Online Protection Act.

Too many people assume that the Internet is anonymous and have no idea how traceable they are and what an IP address is. Any site you visit is recorded by your Internet service Provider and anything you search is recorded by whatever search engine you use.

If you're not convinced, go ahead and freak yourself out by clicking on this.


This isn't really about children looking at pornography. It's an attempt to garner support around seemingly noble causes.
Today Johnny Q. Redstate says, "Yes. Why shouldn't we help the government stop my little Timmy from looking at porn on ye old interwebs?" and tomorrow it's "Well I guess anyone who does a web search on terrorism should be tortured..."

Maybe I skipped a few steps of logic in between, but you get the general idea.
Between the NSA email taps and phone surveillance, it's clear that the government wants to know what you're doing.

The search records battle isn't over yet and it's possible that Google could lose in court but at least it was nice knowing that in principle Google tried to delay 1984 just a little bit.

Maybe more people will think twice before they hit enter on that "midget monkey bondage porn" search they were curious about.

MSN, Yahoo! and AOL, for your bitch-ass collapsing in the face of some government pressure, you are the Snitch of the Week.