Remember last year, when several U.S. phone companies -- but not Qwest Communications -- willingly and voluntarily surrendered phone records to the U.S. government? The Electronic Frontier Foundation and the ACLU filed suit against the phone companies, most notably AT&T, which "built a secret room in its San Francisco switching station that funnels internet traffic data from AT&T Worldnet dialup customers and traffic from AT&T's massive internet backbone to the NSA," according to a former AT&T technician.

Things looked bad for the phone companies. They were probably in violation of 18 U.S.C. 2511 et seq., which prohibits phone companies from disclosing subscriber information unless compelled to do so by a court order (which, as far as we know, none of them had been given). Public opinion was against the phone companies and the Bush administration, the latter of which had assured us that he was only looking for terrorists.

Well, Verizon has gotten itself some smart lawyers. Or something. Last week, Verizon filed a motion to have the case thrown out on free speech grounds.

Yes, you heard that right. Free speech grounds. Verizon alleges that sending confidential subscriber information to the government in violation of 18 U.S.C. 2511 "is protected petitioning activity." They must have hired the RIAA's lawyers for this one.