White House Wants To Make It Easier For The FBI To See Your Internet Contacts
So an anonymous "senior administration official" says that "most" internet and email providers already turn over this information. (Gee, I wonder why he didn't want to go on the record. And I wonder why the Post allowed it.)
See, here's the problem with these relentless expansions of executive power: I don't actually believe that the Obama administration is interested in putting me under surveillance for criticizing their policies. But they're sure as hell making it a lot easier for a paranoid Republican administration to do it -- not to mention loose cannon FBI agents who simply want to ignore the rules. In a democracy, the way it's supposed to work is, we have laws that will protect us even when the bad guys are in charge:
The Obama administration is seeking to make it easier for the FBI to compel companies to turn over records of an individual's Internet activity without a court order if agents deem the information relevant to a terrorism or intelligence investigation.
The administration wants to add just four words -- "electronic communication transactional records" -- to a list of items that the law says the FBI may demand without a judge's approval. Government lawyers say this category of information includes the addresses to which an Internet user sends e-mail; the times and dates e-mail was sent and received; and possibly a user's browser history. It does not include, the lawyers hasten to point out, the "content" of e-mail or other Internet communication.
But what officials portray as a technical clarification designed to remedy a legal ambiguity strikes industry lawyers and privacy advocates as an expansion of the power the government wields through so-called national security letters. These missives, which can be issued by an FBI field office on its own authority, require the recipient to provide the requested information and to keep the request secret. They are the mechanism the government would use to obtain the electronic records.
[...] Many Internet service providers have resisted the government's demands to turn over electronic records, arguing that surveillance law as written does not allow them to do so, industry lawyers say. One senior administration government official, who would discuss the proposed change only on condition of anonymity, countered that "most" Internet or e-mail providers do turn over such data.
To critics, the move is another example of an administration retreating from campaign pledges to enhance civil liberties in relation to national security. The proposal is "incredibly bold, given the amount of electronic data the government is already getting," said Michelle Richardson, American Civil Liberties Union legislative counsel.
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
Could you see it if crazy Sarah Palin somehow got the Republican nomination for President? (Ain't gonna happen, but just supposin').
If Mooseyak was given some kind of security clearance and was able to get her hands on Internet contacts of her enemies, of folks who blogged or commented about her and the Palin Family Circus, and of those who even just rolled their eyes in her presence, she'd find some way to punish them.
Even my buds at www.perverts@porn.com?
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
the times and dates e-mail was sent and received; and possibly a user's browser history. It does not include, the lawyers hasten to point out, the "content" of e-mail or other Internet communication.
Ok I guess I'm dumb, but what's the point of not including the content of the e-mail?
I would have thought that knowing the "content" was the point.
We could certainly slow the aging process down if it had to work its way through Congress.
- Will Rogers
they just want to open all your mail.
they promise not to read it.
really.
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
guilty, guilty, guilty by association. If you visited PETA's site, well then, you must be an animal rights terrorist.
Long and short, the government sucks, and the Obomba Admin is the government right now.
It is time to look forward to the future!
*gag*
has all your email, in real time, along with your voice telephone service. If everyone were to switch over to 2048-bit RSA encrypted email overnight, they would still archive all of it while waiting for more mainframes to decrypt the messages. Any small number of users encrypting their emails would look like the protruding "nails" awaiting the police state "hammer". Taxpayers would be "on the hook" to pay for those additional mainframes to decrypt all those encrypted emails. The NSA currently has over 18 acres of mainframes in their underground bunkers near BWI airport in Maryland. Plus, we are all paying the telecom companies a monthly fee, buried in our phone bills, that covers their expenses in complying with the government's "Big Brother" data collection and monitoring.
Ever wonder why the USA is so far behind other industrialized nations in regard to their internet access speeds ?? The telecom companies in the USA will never give Americans more bandwidth than that which the national intelligence infrastructure can handle in real time. Anyone here remember President Clinton's "Clipper Chip" fiasco ?? Every President, Democratic or Republican, since Truman has been engaged in enhancing the capabilities of our intel services, to the detriment of civil rights, civil liberties, and privacy. "1984" wasn't so much a work of fiction as it was a blueprint for action, not unlike the NeoCon PNAC document.
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
-- John F. Kennedy
Obama voted for the re-authorization of the patriot act, ...and voted for FISA immunity years ago when he was a senator.
(let none of us) "pretend to be surprised"
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
you happy now?
:)
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
They are just ignoring it. Head in the sand time. Emerging only to berate those who do actually criticise the Obama administration, and call them "concern trolls" "secret republicans" "dino's" and racists.
God Good Almighty ..
What has this nation come to?
A Democratic president makes this request ..
I thought J. Edgar Hoover was dead and buried.
Apparently he's sitting in the White House now.
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
I told you not to be surprised...
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
Just really really really irritated ..
This reeks of Richard Nixon or, like I said, J. Edgar Hoover.
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
This is not change I can believe in!
Susie, ya talking about this?
http://www.eff.org/nsa/hepting
"No man is so foolish but he may sometimes give another good counsel, and no man so wise that he may not easily err if he takes no other counsel than his own. He that is taught only by himself has a fool for a master." - Hunter S. Thompson
Go back and read what Republicans were advocating two years ago.
Richard Nixon could only have imagined in his wildest dreams the surveillance power the NSA holds today.
But J Edgar Hoover would have been the one really to appreciate what we are headed for.
***
Addendum:
Glenn Greenwald notes another week of Change here
Since the FISA treachery I have been saying:
status quObama, change you can pretend in,
just to repeat…
statusquObama, change you can only pretend in
It would appear to me that the most radical fringes of both the left and right are (mostly) correct about the Obama administration. The Reich-wingers feel a little bit uncomfortable with the notion that a black NeoLiberal (Reagan) Democratic President might actually support some of the most egregious Big Brother measures reminiscent of 1930's and 1940's National Socialism (Fascism) -- a bit too close to their overall solution to gays, minorities, leftists, labor unions, etcetera. The Leftists see Obama as a fascist turncoat "wolf-in-sheep's-clothing" Crony Corporatist.
Consider that every administration from Truman onward has increasingly cow-towed to the national security infrastructure enabled and created by the National Security Act of 1947, the inception of both the CIA and the NSA. Every new executive branch power of the police state seized by the GW Bush regime has been retained by the Obama regime, along with new police state powers like extrajudicial assassination of USA citizens anywhere in the world, and extrajudicial revocation of USA citizenship.
At each and every step of the way, the leadership and much of the rank-and-file politicians of both mainstream political parties have supported this creeping fascism. The only major difference between today's Republican and Democratic Parties is the rate of change into that "perfect" police state -- faster or slower, but with the same ultimate destination. The fascist police state has become so overbearing, both fiscally and in regards to the loss of civil rights and liberties that the only solution may very well be the Anarchist/Libertarian solution -- totally dismantling the entire current government infrastructure at the Federal level, as well as most of that at the State level.
This new police-state power will be further emphasized, in short order, by the total elimination of internet neutrality -- the last bastion of populist dialog not already thoroughly under the control of the Crony Capitalist Oligarchy and their bought-and-paid-for government. Okay, the last bit is pure speculation on my part, but it certainly would fit the emerging profile of American-style National Socialism, and predictable.
eom
David
"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable."
-- John F. Kennedy
JFK is the only President who presumed the CIA answered to him.
Rather than the other way around.
And we all know how that worked out.
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
Susie said, "I don't actually believe that the Obama administration is interested in putting me under surveillance for criticizing their policies. But they're sure as hell making it a lot easier for a paranoid Republican administration to do it -- not to mention loose cannon FBI agents who simply want to ignore the rules."
Well, why don't you believe the Obama administration is interested in putting you under surveillance? They're the ones trying to openly expand governmental power to spy on you without a warrant. They're the ones seeking to kill what shreds remain of the 4th Amendment. Why is it only a "paranoid Republican administration" you fear might so coarsely violate your (now) imaginary civil liberties?
It's time to grow up: Obama is as much a fascist swine, power monger and mass murderer as was Bush, and the Dems, with rare exception, are just as much corrupt, mendacious, craven prostitutes to the oligarchs as are the Republicans. The Republicans are, to their credit, simply more honest about their complete subservience to the moneymen who own the country.
... from the terrorists. I guess the issue of keeping you safe from the government, which is the purpose of the Bill of Rights, is "off the table".
While the Dems may be equally evil, (and I actually don't think that they are because of the presence of a progressive wing), they are certainly less loony.
But it does seem that in choosing between the Democrats and Republicans, we're only selecting which rate the deterioration of civil rights should proceed at.
Now, even as the Obama administration wants more warrantless disclosures, they are pushing for an Identity Ecosystem.
As the article says, “Perhaps ironically, the proposal expects that people will use the Identity Ecosystem to post to blogs anonymously; in this respect the draft's authors are clearly cognizant of the free speech implications of online anonymity. Such anonymous posting would work because there's a third party between the anonymous user and the blog provider who can vouch that the user is legit, and can perhaps even transmit payment for blog hosting and related services on behalf of the user.”
But, of course, this 3rd party scheme would seem to be subject to the relaxation of court issued warrants. Like the article says, “... every single US-based service provider, from telcos to wireless carriers to Google and Amazon, will give you up to the authorities when they come knocking”.
The only difference I can see anymore is in the quality of the rhetoric they deploy. The Democrats still have to pretend that they give a shit about this country, while the Republicans have stopped wasting their energy in maintaining dishonest public pretenses. Both parties are lost in their prostitution to the oligarchs and to totalitarian, neo-feudal plutotocracy.
it legal. No really believes the FBI isn't monitoring us already, do they?
with visions of jackboots and overwhelming power into everybodys lives.
Porn.
What are we going to do about it. This pisses me off.
"Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people." ~ Eleanor Roosevelt
mortica or mortisha?
AP Video:
FBI Scrutinized Over Test Cheating
.. just remembered I'd saved this ..
.. btw, this is AP, not known for making waves ..
Democracy is too important to be entrusted to politicians.
Rise Up!
Protest!
your IP and MAC address
Goodnight, Frau Blücher
They broke those laws. They just didn't care.
And now, your so-called "good" guys are in charge. And they don't care either.
Maybe one day, you'll realise there are no "good" guys. Only bad guys and worse guys.
but from what I can tell, The Obama administration is a Republican administration. It's pretty clear that Obama and crew don't give a shit about constitutional protections, civil liberties or Human Rights. This is just G.W.Bush, MkII.Between them, they have done a pretty good job of turning this country from a place to come to to a place to flee from.
And speaking of Bush's 3rd term, this headline from The Huffington Post:
"Obama Administration Pushing To Expand U.S. Arms Exports By Gutting Approval Process". Wonderful....
neverbeenfooled. Sorry, it was not my intent to vote for a Republican Administration.Hate to break it to you, the bad guys are in charge.
Hopefully humanity will one day learn to be humane.
Hooray - the Obama Administration is protecting our freedoms again.
Just like GWBush and all the oligarchists before him.
This is a link to a short video of the late Molly Ivins. It explains the whole story of this subject: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXToviObdoA
are only 18-20 points from catching George Bush at the end of his second term, and he has only been in office 18 months! Considering the computer literacy distribution among the general populous, 70-75% of PC savy folks probably voted for this man in 2008. That might drop to 20-25 % in 2012 if he gets the FBI the power to invade personal e-mail contacts without a warrant and probable cause....
Say good night Barry....we hardly knew ya and, every day, that seems to be more all right, man, ...that seems to be all right.
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