P2P On the Hill - Clark Wants Gov. Regulation

Filed in archive Companies , Government on August 14, 2007

This post is part of a series on the us house of representatives hearing on P2P.

1. U.S. Witch Hunt

2. Who Stole My P2P Cheese

3. What the Feds Say

4. The Industry Talks

5. Clark Wants Gov. Regulation


The star power for the hearing was retired General Wesley Clark. Clark is an advisor to Tiversa, a security company focused on protecting businesses and consumer from disclosing confidential data.

Clark testified "If you saw the scope of the risk, I think you'd agree that it's just totally unacceptable. The American people would be outraged if they were aware of what's inadvertently shared by government agencies on P2P networks. They would demand solutions."

Clark and Tiversa's solution? He said that industry self-regulation would not be effective and called on the House to regulate P2P and distributed computing.

I am outraged too. At the suggested solution of a heavy-handed Draconian approach to regulate an entire industry because of isolated negligence. Clearly the blame and responsibility for inadvertent disclosure falls to government agencies and companies that don't fully secure their data and individuals that use computers for unauthorized purposes.

Such regulation doesn't happen with other Internet technologies like web sites, email, and instant messaging. And it shouldn't with P2P. Unless you happen to be an entertainment executive or Tiversa stockholder.