Intellectual Property Law

U.S. Intelligence Eyes Second Life

By Tim Armstrong, Derek Bambauer, and William McGeveran.

Robert O’Harrow, a Washington Post reporter who is very insightful and current in his coverage of data privacy (and author of a good book on it too), today chronicles the inevitable first stirrings of government fear about virtual worlds such as Second Life:

Intelligence officials who have examined these systems say they’re convinced that the qualities that many computer users find so attractive about virtual worlds — including anonymity, global access and the expanded ability to make financial transfers outside normal channels — have turned them into seedbeds for transnational threats.
[snip]
The government’s growing concern seems likely to make virtual worlds the next battlefield in the struggle over the proper limits on the government’s quest to improve security through data collection and analysis and the surveillance of commercial computer systems.

O’Harrow quotes from a U.S. intelligence study that says something like: “All the kids today are dancing and ‘jiving’ to this new rock-and-roll music on their jukeboxes, leading to increased lascivious behavior and moral decay.”

Full post as published by Info/Law on February 07, 2008 (boomark / email).