FedGovs want another data grab


Do you want Amazon and eBay reporting your info to the IRS?
Yesterday I talked about the government loves to use private companies and individuals as unpaid informants.

Well, it's going to get worse.

The Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) is sounding an early warning on a proposal in the president's 2008 budget that would require Internet businesses like eBay Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. to collect personal data on their customers and share it with the Internal Revenue Service.

The move is part of an effort by the U.S. Treasury Department to track down unreported small business income generated by the sale of personal property on such sites. Under the proposal, online "brokers" would be required to file income statements for all customers who use their sites to conduct 100 or more separate transactions that generate $5,000 or more per year.

Among the information the brokers would be required to collect would be customers' names, addresses and taxpayer identification numbers or Social Security numbers. The proposal would be effective for sales of property on or after Jan 1, 2008.

"While no lawmaker has yet come out in support of it, the measure could easily find its way into a larger legislative package," the CDT, a Washington-based think-tank, warned in a statement on its Web site.

The biggest concern with the proposed legislation is that it could lead to a vast collection of Social Security numbers and other personal data by a lot of different commercial entities on the Web, said Ari Schwartz, deputy director of the CDT. "The IRS is going after smaller businesses that cheat on their taxes," Schwartz said. In the process, though, millions of other Internet users who use such sites to sell personal property could also be affected.

The more places that are required to collect personal information, the greater chance that information will be lost, scrambled, stolen, or misused.

For far too long, the income tax has been used to justify massive invasions of privacy.

Here's my solution. Shut down the IRS. Abolish the income tax. Move it all to a sales tax. And watch the fur fly as people realize just how much money the government is taking.

But without an income tax, there is no reason for any financial institution to report your transactions. That means that you are not required to affirm under penalty of law. That means that your money is yours to do with as you wish.

— NeoWayland

Posted: Tue - May 8, 2007 at 07:41 AM  Tag


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