Politicians in Westchester County began talking last year about passing a law requiring businesses that offer WiFi access to secure their network in various ways. The law passed last week, but it’s typically misguided, written with little understanding of network security and doing nothing that would actually pose a problem for a hacker. But county politicos see themselves as trailblazers, and they’ve now set their sights on the safety of kids on the internet. They’re hosting an “adults-only” meeting about it, and aren’t ruling out drafting some sort of legislation dealing with the issue. If nothing else, it would be entertaining to see what kind of law they’d come up with, given the matter of some small things like the First Amendment, or a lack of local jurisdiction over the internet. It’s also slightly amusing that the article emphasizes the meeting is adults-only, after all, it’s probably far better just to listen to all the hype about the dangers of online services, rather than actually, you know, talk to kids about them.

Filed under: Geek