[governance] USPTO blocks web access to "Political/Activist Groups" including KEI, ACLU, EFF, Public Citizen, Redstate, DailyKos

Thu Sep 20 12:34:19 EDT 2012

Alejandro,

It isnt really that simple at all.  Before I begin, however, let me state two things.
First, I do not question that PTO turned the thing off shortly after becoming aware of it.
Second, I assume that youre not aware of some of the relevant facts and law, rather than
that youre ignoring them.

PTO is a US government agency.  A government agency as employer is not held to the same
First Amendment restrictions as a government agency as government, but, unlike private
sector employers, the government as employer is subject to some First Amendment
restrictions.

This particular filter was not in any way supposed to be similar to what is seen in
corporate IT.  Its specific purpose, its only purpose,  was to block access to terrorist
sites and similar.  (Some of that is required by US law, whether thats a good or bad law
is not something I plan on discussing here.)  How any of the blacklisted sites could be
found to be terrorist sites is incomprehensible.  This was never supposed to be a pretty
standard filter.

Incidentally, the filter is the handiwork of Blue Coat, which did such a marvelous job of
promoting free expression on the Internet in Syria, among other places, see, e.g.,
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/10/blue-coat-acknowledges-syrian-government-use-its-pro
ducts

--

James S. Tyre

Law Offices of James S. Tyre

10736 Jefferson Blvd., #512

Culver City, CA 90230-4969

310-839-4114/310-839-4602(fax)

jstyre at jstyre.com

Policy Fellow, Electronic Frontier Foundation

https://www.eff.org

From: governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org [mailto:governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org]
On Behalf Of Dr. Alejandro Pisanty Baruch
Sent: Thursday, September 20, 2012 7:09 AM
To: governance at lists.igcaucus.org; Salanieta T. Tamanikaiwaimaro; Riaz K Tayob
Subject: RE: [governance] USPTO blocks web access to "Political/Activist Groups" including
KEI, ACLU, EFF, Public Citizen, Redstate, DailyKos

Sala, 

any knowledge of corporate IT will tell you that this is a pretty standard filter used in
private as well as public offices. Usually installed by third parties who set up the
networks or even run them, or accessed by IT at third-party sites. As Jamie Love writes as
well, the filter was removed upon request. It is the same type of filter that would have
caused some hotel reservation sites to be blocked "for sexual content."

Clues... they used to be more widely available.

Alejandro Pisanty

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NEW PHONE NUMBER - NUEVO NÚMERO DE TELÉFONO

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+525541444475 DESDE MÉXICO 

SMS +525541444475 
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UNAM, Av. Universidad 3000, 04510 Mexico DF Mexico

Blog: http://pisanty.blogspot.com
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Desde: governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org [governance-request at lists.igcaucus.org] en
nombre de Salanieta T. Tamanikaiwaimaro [salanieta.tamanikaiwaimaro at gmail.com]
Enviado el: jueves, 20 de septiembre de 2012 05:02
Hasta: governance at lists.igcaucus.org; Riaz K Tayob
Asunto: Re: [governance] USPTO blocks web access to "Political/Activist Groups" including
KEI, ACLU, EFF, Public Citizen, Redstate, DailyKos

If what is reported is legitimate, we are in for some troubling times ahead of us. :( :(:(

Sala

On Thu, Sep 20, 2012 at 8:21 PM, Riaz K Tayob <riaz.tayob at gmail.com> wrote:

USPTO blocks web access to  <http://keionline.org/node/1548> "Political/Activist Groups"
including KEI, ACLU, EFF, Public Citizen, Redstate, DailyKos

*	View <http://keionline.org/node/1548>  
*	What links here <http://keionline.org/node/1548/backlinks>  

Submitted by James Love on 18. September 2012 - 12:32 

Update: At 5 pm the USPTO called and said that the public access wifi network was using a
filter, provided by a contractor, to block "political activist" sites. This filter was not
used by the network providing Internet access for the USPTO staff. After our meeting, the
USPTO reviewed its policies, and has removed the filter. USPTO says the filter was
implemented by a contractor, and no one we talked to at USPTO was aware of who was being
blocked. In any event, the filter has been removed. 

Today I was visiting the USPTO, for a high level meeting on global negotiations on
intellectual property and access to medicine. The meeting was held in the Stockholm Room,
on the 2nd floor of the USPTO library, at the main USPTO building at 600 Dulany Street,
Alexandria, VA. The USPTO also uses these meeting rooms for its Global Intellectual
Property Academy (GIPA). The USPTO offers free Wifi for the visitors. But when I tried to
login to http://keionline.org, I received this message:

Access Denied (content_filter_denied) 

Your request was denied because this URL contains content that is categorized as:
"Political/Activist Groups" which is blocked by USPTO policy. If you believe the
categorization is inaccurate, please contact the USPTO Service Desk and request a manual
review of the URL.

For assistance, contact USPTO OCIO IT Service Desk. (io-proxy4)

We checked and found that the USPTO blocks access to a number of groups that have followed
SOPA and the TPP intellectual property negotiations, particularly those critical of the
USPTO positions on intellectual property issues. Among the NGOs that were blocked were
aclu.org, cdt.org, citizen.org, eff.org, healthgap.org, keionline.org and
publicknowledge.org. Among the sites NOT BLOCKED were the industry lobby groups BSA, MPPA,
RIIA, and PhRMA. 

The USPTO also selectively blocks certain blogs and new sites, including, for example,
dailykos.coms, firedoglake.com, redstate.org, rushlimbaugh.com and talkingpointsmemo.com.,

Here are examples of what the USPTO blocks, and does not block. 

Blocked NGOs

aclu.org
cdt.org
citizen.org
eff.org
healthgap.org
keionline.org
publicknowledge.org 

NGOs that are NOT blocked

bsa.org
creativecommons.org
iipa.com
iipi.org
ipi.org
mpaa.org
PhRMA.org
pubpat.org
RIIA.Org
stockholm-network.org 

Blocked Blogs and news outlets

dailykos.coms
firedoglake.com
redstate.org
rushlimbaugh.com
talkingpointsmemo.com 

Blogs and new outlets that are NOT blocked 

71patent.blogspot.com
aljazeera.com
boingboing.net
dailycaller.com
democracynow.org
drudgereport.com
groklaw.net
huffingtonpost.com
ip-watch.org
itcblog.com
lessig.org
michaelgeist.ca
nationalreview.com
spicyipindia.blogspot.com
techdirt.com
washingtonmonthly.com 

*	James Love's blog <http://keionline.org/blog/jamie>  
*	Add new comment <http://keionline.org/comment/reply/1548#comment-form>  
*	Printer-friendly version <http://keionline.org/print/1548>  
*	Send by email <http://keionline.org/printmail/1548>  

Cause of foul up <http://keionline.org/node/1548#comment-7970> 

Submitted by Anonymous dude or dudess on 19. September 2012 - 12:02. 

'Ex-Patent Examiner here. If this was anything other than a contractor foul-up, I'll eat
my hat. There were a dozen instances where I'd need to call the help desk to access a
website that would enable me to do my job.' If true, this means no one at USPTO tried to
access those sites and asked for the filter to be removed since it was implemented.

*	reply <http://keionline.org/comment/reply/1548/7970>  

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