IP Democracy: Issues of Trust

It wasn’t a good day for the Bush Administration or for the nation’s three largest telcos. After reading and watching the torrent of news coverage of the NSA phone-call database triggered by a USA Today story by Leslie Cauley, I found myself wondering if this latest development might have some effect on the network neutrality debate.

What struck me was that this time, it wasn’t just the President and his former NSA chief and current CIA director nominee Michael Hayden telling the American people “we can’t really tell you what we’re doing (and if we did we’d all be in grave danger from terrorists) but, trust us, its not illegal and its good for you.” But this time, joining the Administration in this trust-straining mantra, which has helped push the President’s approval rating to new lows, were three of the four RBOCs—Verizon, AT&T and BellSouth. Now, there may be good legal reasons for the RBOCs’ stonewallish response to reporters’ inquiries, but my point here is not so much about the substance, but more about appearances and perceptions.

As I said in a recent post entitled “We Really Do Want Our Internet”, I’m getting the sense that more and more American citizens and businesses value the principle of network neutrality and are growing increasingly skeptical of telco assurances regarding the benign implications of their two-tiered Internet plans.

Watching three of the four RBOCs lumped together with the NSA in today’s news coverage, I couldn’t help but think that this can only increase public skepticism of their basic message on the net neutrality issue: “trust us, our tiering plans don’t threaten the Internet you know and love and have come to depend on.” It sounds an awful lot like the Administration’s message on preserving civil liberties in the war on terror: “trust us, our secret NSA operations don’t threaten the freedoms you know and love and have come to depend on.”

I’m not equating the substance of the two issues here, only speculating about how today’s events might impact public perceptions of them and the players involved.

Senate Judiciary Committee chair Arlen Specter (R-PA) reportedly intends to haul RBOC executives before his committee to answer questions about the NSA database. That could give them a chance to better explain their actions—or, alternatively, to sink deeper into the quagmire of distrust.

It’s worth noting that, according to Cauley’s story, Qwest executives refused to provide data to the NSA, based on doubts about its legality and concerns that the company might be subject to heavy fines for illegally divulging calling information. According to Cauley, the NSA “pushed back hard” when Qwest refused to cooperate.

Trying to put pressure on Qwest, NSA representatives pointedly told Qwest that it was the lone holdout among the big telecommunications companies. It also tried appealing to Qwest’s patriotic side: In one meeting, an NSA representative suggested that Qwest’s refusal to contribute to the database could compromise national security, one person recalled.

In addition, the agency suggested that Qwest’s foot-dragging might affect its ability to get future classified work with the government. Like other big telecommunications companies, Qwest already had classified contracts and hoped to get more.

Unable to get comfortable with what NSA was proposing, Qwest’s lawyers asked NSA to take its proposal to the FISA court. According to the sources, the agency refused. The NSA’s explanation did little to satisfy Qwest’s lawyers. “They told (Qwest) they didn’t want to do that because FISA might not agree with them,” one person recalled.

In June 2002, Nacchio resigned amid allegations that he had misled investors about Qwest’s financial health. But Qwest’s legal questions about the NSA request remained. Unable to reach agreement, Nacchio’s successor, Richard Notebaert, finally pulled the plug on the NSA talks in late 2004, the sources said.

Posted by Mitch Shapiro on May 12, 2006 1:43 AM to IP Democracy