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“do not track” should be called “do not surveil” and called for comprehensive national privacy legislation.

“How much surveillance is socially tolerable?” he asked. “How much are we prepared to abandon our traditional understanding that what we do in our daily life is nobody’s business except those with whom we choose to share?”

Often, investigators can intercept communications at a switch operated by the network company. But sometimes — like when the target uses a service that encrypts messages between his computer and its servers — they must instead serve the order on a service provider to get unscrambled versions.

 Like phone companies, communication service providers are subject to wiretap orders. But the 1994 law does not apply to them. While some maintain interception capacities, others wait until they are served with orders to try to develop them.

Mrs Romano “consented to the fact that her personal information would be shared with others, notwithstanding her privacy settings”.

I think that’s flawed in several respects. First, based on the parts of Facebook’s privacy policy which Justice Spinner quotes in his ruling, Facebook’s position is clearly that, while they try to keep your data secure, no security system is foolproof and therefore you should be aware that it might be inadvertently disclosed because of a security breach, whatever privacy settings you choose. However, that is not at all the same thing as saying “we will share your data with third parties of our choosing, regardless of your privacy settings”. It is not credible to suggest that, in restricting access to parts of her Facebook profile, Mrs Romano was consenting that her personal information would be shared without restriction.

James X. Dempsey, vice president of the Center for Democracy and Technology, an Internet policy group, said the proposal had “huge implications” and challenged “fundamental elements of the Internet revolution” — including its decentralized design.

 “They are really asking for the authority to redesign services that take advantage of the unique, and now pervasive, architecture of the Internet,” he said. “They basically want to turn back the clock and make Internet services function the way that the telephone system used to function.”