Peer-To-Peer Networks Face Scrutiny
House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Edolphus Towns on Wednesday was expected to blame the Bush administration for having a laissez-faire attitude that has allowed privacy and security problems posed by peer-to-peer networks to persist online. At a hearing on the topic, he is likely to call for legislation to guard against inadvertent file-sharing, heightened FCC and FTC involvement and the creation of a public awareness campaign to inform people about the dangers of P2P software. The panel held similar hearings in 2007 and four years earlier. In response, the P2P industry adopted a voluntary code of conduct to prevent unintentional data disclosures, but a new committee investigation showed popular platforms like LimeWire are not living up to their promises.
In his opening remarks, Towns pointed to an analysis by security experts at Tiversa and said specific examples of recent LimeWire leaks "range from appalling to shocking."
• The Social Security numbers and family information for every master sergeant in the Army had been found on LimeWire.
• The medical records of some 24,000 patients of a Texas hospital were inadvertently released and most of the files are still available on LimeWire.
• FBI files, including surveillance photos of an alleged Mafia hit man, were leaked while he was on trial and before he was convicted.
• A security breach involving the Secret Service resulted in the leak of a file on LimeWire containing a safe house location for the First Family.
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