Feds Ordered Google To Unmask Certain YouTube Users. Critics Say It’s ‘Terrifying.’
www.forbes.com
The federal government asked Google to turn over information on anyone who viewed multiple YouTube videos. Privacy experts say the orders are unconstitutional.

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The court orders show the government telling Google to provide the names, addresses, telephone numbers and user activity for all Google account users who accessed the YouTube videos between January 1 and January 8, 2023. The government also wanted the IP addresses of non-Google account owners who viewed the videos.

“This is the latest chapter in a disturbing trend where we see government agencies increasingly transforming search warrants into digital dragnets. It’s unconstitutional, it’s terrifying and it’s happening every day,” said Albert Fox-Cahn, executive director at the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project. “No one should fear a knock at the door from police simply because of what the YouTube algorithm serves up. I’m horrified that the courts are allowing this.” He said the orders were “just as chilling” as geofence warrants, where Google has been ordered to provide data on all users in the vicinity of a crime.

    • DragonTypeWyvern@literature.cafeEnglish
      518·
      9 months ago

      Someone with enough reading comprehension to take that tone would have understood it was criticism of the federal government’s hypocrisy and that critics complaining is not the same thing as a law or the courts agreeing.

      • pl_woah@lemmy.mlEnglish
        520·
        9 months ago

        You did not provide enough context in your original statement to distinguish between sarcasm and sincerity. Any sufficiently good old stupid statement is unrecognizable from parody.