Telecommunications carriers and service providers now play an essential role in facilitating modern surveillance by law enforcement agencies. The police merely select the individuals to be monitored, while the actual surveillance is performed by third parties: often the same email providers, search engines and telephone companies to whom consumers have entrusted their private data. Assisting Big Brother has become a routine part of business
5 comments:
Perfect timing, Mike. From the dissertation:
"Without their assistance (the third party service providers), the government would be wholly unable to get the depth of data it desires, at the scale it now demands."
Within hours of Drudge leading with this story:
'Obama Collecting Personal Data for a Secret Race Database'- New York Post
Remember when Maxine Waters said "The President has put in place an organization with the kind of database that no one has ever seen before in life."?
Yep, and just look at how short the time period has been since legislation was moved to limit NSA's data collection and the Feeds are jumping all over every electronic device the Tenn. shooter had and had access to.
In looking at and considering time periods, how much time elapsed since all of the hype and raised 'alerts' for 'possible terrorist threats' (with no definite info)
around July 4th, and the Tenn. shooter ? And conveniently, he was killed without saying anything too. Seems like that happens to a number of them.
Folks need to understand the "other" third party factor too - and obamas Interpol EO.
OTHER COUNTRIES are no longer bound by our fourth amendment protections INSIDE this country OR outside it. THEY spy on us - at will- and then give and/or trade the information they garner with the U.S. Government. Anyone who thinks they have fourth amendment protection in any form is a fool.
We have NO rights left untouched by gubmint. There is only an illusion of rights, a pretense. And STILL Americans refuse to fight back - or even listen to the current state of things. I live amongst a nation of abject idiots! Places like Sipsey Street are a refreshing and nourishing respite - affording the tiniest of reminders that at least I'm not yet totally alone - there are indeed SOME of us remaining. But I grow less confident that we even make up three percent....I starting to feel like we are the .03%!
"The Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) is a United States wiretapping law passed in 1994, during the presidency of Bill Clinton (Pub. L. No. 103-414, 108 Stat. 4279, codified at 47 USC 1001-1010)."
Forget movie scenes with "Black Bag" teams creeping about in basements with alligator clips and tape recorders. By law all major telecom companies in he USA were forced by CALEA to add software to their switching systems whereby "law enforcement" has 24/7 access to those switches and can add a "tap" to any line merely by typing in a command on a dedicated circuit. No, this is not collection of "metadata". This is the capability to monitor and capture the actual voice/data moving across the line in real time.
I don't know if anyone else noticed, but this dissertation was dated 2012..a full year before Snowden's surveillance revelations, of which, like Jesselyn Radack(whistleblower attorney) says.,,. "an outraged America should be surrounding WDC." Instead, it yawns, and still believes the Congress fixed it with the absurd "USA Freedom Act", which in reality, actually codified certain aspects while mocking the 4th Amendment. And given the FISC has now virtually declared itself beyond the jurisdiction of other court's rulings, while raising it's middle finger to Senator's Frank Church and Ron Wyden, by virtue of it's recent approval for the IC to restart the collection of every phone call in America program, regardless that the Second Circuit has ruled it illegal. And, they are fast tracking it...
https://www.emptywheel.net/2015/07/14/beware-fiscr-fast-track/
What most people don't understand is rulings in one Circuit, are not binding on the rest. Which tells me something. That the "rule of law" is a myth.
Meanwhile, notwithstanding the Second Circuit, as far as this Orwellian surveillance is concerned, at least some other countries courts are still sane...http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jul/17/data-retention-and-surveillance-legislation-ruled-unlawful
Now if they would only prosecute the war criminals who are still walking around free, while whistleblowers are prosecuted with impunity. Unfortunately, sanity isn't America's strong suit.
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