Nerd News: Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) wants answers from DHS about seizure of Music site

This is a followup to earlier post http://cliffsesportcorner.blogspot.com/2011/12/ice-admits-year-long-seizure-of-music.html , ICE is Immigration and Customs Enforcement [US], from this new report I believe they were acting at the request of DHS [Department of Homeland Security in US], but I am not sure on the details of that yet.

Also looks like they may have seized the music site with no intent to prosecute, see quote below or full story at ars.

Senator Wyden seems to be active in internet and ecommerce issues, if you wish to contact Sen. Ron Wyden click here.  Note: from what the site says, he is only allowed to respond by email to Constituents from his state of Oregon, but my understanding is that he may respond by snail mail or other wise to others, though he encourages people to contact their Senator.  But his website would be a good source for information on internet and related issues, politicans work hard to keep their Sponsors (ie Voters and people that contribute money to their campaigns) informed on what they are doing.

As I have stated before, I cover these issues because I feel they are relevant to Esports, and I hope to encourage people in the entire Esports Community to make their voice heard, in a respectful & mannered fashion, to the Politicians that make & enforce the laws that affect us.

If you want to find your Senator click here, for your US Representative (Congressman/Congresswoman) click here.

~Cliff

Source & full story at ars:

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) said Friday he would demand answers from the Department of Homeland Security about its domain seizure program known as Operation in Our Sites after it was revealed that the government kept a hip-hop music review site’s name for a year without affording the owner a chance to challenge the seizure.
 Wyden also wants to know why there was no court record of the case, other than the initial seizure filing a year ago.
"I expect the administration will be receiving a series of FOIA [Freedom of Information Act] requests from our office and that the senator will have very pointed questions with regard to how the administration chooses to target the sites that it does," said Jennifer Hoelzer, a Wyden spokeswoman. She said the senator was "particularly interested in learning how many secret dockets exist for copyright cases. There doesn’t seem to be an obvious precedent or explanation for that."