It always amazes me how many U.S. businesses wantonly break the law—often doing so without compunction and, worse, without consequences. It further amazes me how, even when a crime is obvious, our government agencies often fail to stop it.

Here in my current home town of Herndon, Virginia, as in many other places around the country, illegal immigrants gather in large numbers on a particular street to await work every morning. Do the local police, state authorities, or federal immigration agencies ever stop by to arrest these illegal immigrants and the people who illegally hire them? No.

I discovered from Brian Krebs’s blog at the Washington Post that this pattern extends to the Internet, at least with respect to terrorism. Also here in Herndon, our neighborhood domain registrar Network Solutions has illegally accepted money from Hezbollah, Hamas, and other terrorist organizations that U.S companies are prohibited from doing business with. Endurance International, the parent company of my own web hosting provider (that I am soon to abandon for other reasons), also hosts a web site for the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade.

Do these companies care? Apparently not. Will the various U.S. government agencies with responsibility for enforcing our anti-terror laws fine these businesses? Unlikely. I just don’t get it!