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FBI Carnivore Screwup Destroys E-Mail Evidence
An Anonymous Coward writes: "The FBI apparently used Carivore in an attempt to collect information on Osama bin Laden't network. Unfortunately they screwed up and collected information on "non-covered targets" (*ahem*, isn't this the sort of thing we weren't supposed to worry about...). Then the FBI tech was "so upset" that he destroyed ALL of the collected email, not only the information that was not covered by the warrant. Here is the SF Gate Story and EPIC's press release."
They didn't do a backup of the evidence before somebody could destroy it?
it was just osama's pr0n password. he isn't gonna use email anyway, CNN told everyone the government would read osama's mail. come on
Here's the original FBI memo: http://www.epic.org/privacy/carnivore/fisa.html
Now we will here that their own forensic data recovery types will suceed -- but only the /bin/laden data, of course.
All my previous sigs now look like this one, I wish they were permanetly recorded when used.
"Oh, those privacy minded techs who read our email, they destroy it if its not covered by a warrant, we can trust the FBI"
Yea right.
What is a geek to do when he can't rely on his own government to keep secret, accurate, and complete backups of his email!?
Gotta be more careful with those rm -rf 's
Is Carnivore still around? I heard they were tracking gaming websites, particularly those that involve terrorists and counter-terrorists. Counterstrike is not only the number one online game right now, but there are many websites revolving around it. For example, NerdTreeHouse is a huge haven for Counterstrike fans and I heard the FBI requested information from them. I'm not sure what happened.
I hope they have all the backups of the porn spam that I've been receiving lately. I'm sure I'm missing out on some good deals. Oh, and those "fake" paypal and icq activation emails too!
why can't they track crap like that down too?
www.time.com/time/covers/1101020603/memo.html
you've got to read it to believe it.
Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller were expected to outline high-profile changes Wednesday at the FBI's headquarters, including closer ties to the CIA and an overhaul of the FBI's outdated computer systems.
Does anyone believe for a second that the FBI's computer systems are outdated? Sounds like a spin job to me....
Later watch the FBI try to attribute their missed tip-offs prior to 9/11 to slow computers. They'll have all kinds of "contributing" factors that'll spread the blame out thin enough so no one loses their job.
Samsung took back my unlocked bootloader because Google wants me to rent movies. They're both evil.
FBI Agent 1: We have a problem... Carnivore was doing its thing, but we got caught grabbing stuff we shouldn't!
FBI Agent 2: Hmmm. I know! We claim that some lowly tech in a spat of moral outrage deletes ALL the material as he is so offended that it captured the, uhh, "non-target" mail, but we actually keep all the files and use them as we see fit.
FBI Agent 1: Perfect!
FBI Agent 2: (Takes long drag off cigarette)
"They do not preach that their god will rouse them, a little before the Nuts work loose." Kipling, 'The Sons of Martha'
Hopefully this sort of thing will get more press attention, that way more people see how evil Carnivore really is.
Good lord, haven't they ever heard of procmail:
:0:
* ^From:.+al-quaida.org
terrorist
Perhaps that's what all the open source debate at
the Pentagon was really about.
Wouldn't this be something if the deleted email also just happened to contain additional FBI memos and/or information related to the pre-9/11 memo that has been circulating around the news.
"Whoops. Sorry boss, but I destroyed that damning piece of evidence that links our field office to the overlooked memos regarding the WTC tragedy. I hope this doesn't get me in too much trouble...."
Rule #1 -- Politics always trumps technology.
The guy goofed. What's nice to read is that he was upset about collecting information on innocent Americans, and that he deleted it. I would have been more upset if he did something with the information. Could you imagine the slashdot headline for *that*?
So Carnivore ate its own data? Maybe they should give it a new name. I think Cannibal would work pretty well.
For every post, there is an equal and opposite re-post.
Perhaps this can be a fighting point for us against the carnavore. This proves that they are collecting the wrong stuff. I would have liked for them to find Bin Laden, and the FBI can go through my Akai mailing list and Spam that I recieve if that will catch him, because I don't really do anything personal that isn't encrypted heavily.
I wonder if this will be the evidence that they need to make them stop using it.
Tibbon
tibbon.com
The article actually says that the collected information was not destroyed -- citing an unnamed source. One would wonder with the backups a system like that would (should) have that destroying the evidence would be a lengthy job and may not have been done completely.
The article also notes people who have had their e-mail unintentionally collected are entitled to be informed. Can't wait to see if that happens...
I wonder just how much data they captured.
Of course, if they *really* wanted to, they could do forensics on the drives and reclaim the data. I bet my Amazon order for "Learn Arabic in 48hours" is probably one of the captured transactions:
Lesson 1:
Translate:
"The tightness of the restraints will negate the need for you to slit my throat"
No, I don't trust in god. He'll have to pay up front, like everybody else.
how they keep screwing up trying to get this guy.
its almost like they need him to be a mystery and be alive so they can blame him for things...
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Possible Headline:
Kathleen Fent, do NOT read this story
from the oh-no-our-porn-tapes-are-public-domain dept.
Posted by CmdrTaco
WHY AM I NOT SURPRISED!!!!
An Anonymous Coward writes: "The FBI apparently used Carivore in an attempt to collect information on Osama bin Laden't network.
Gee, I didn't know Osama was dutch.
To-do List: Receive telemarketing call during a tornado warning. Check.
We only have a surveillance device known as DCS-1000. You civil libertarians are so paranoid. Sheesh.
I'll bet I know how they figured out there was a problem:
[modal window]
Drive C:/ is Full.
[/modal window]
followed quickly with a blue screen of death.
#hmmm.. wots up with these warnings?
/etc/munch.etc /mnt/munchData/*
df -k
/dev/hde2 10 000 000 9 900 000 99% \
/mnt/Carnavor data
#Oh crap! All those emails! This is TOTALLY\
illegal!! I'd better restart that piece of crap..
/etc/rc.d/init.d/munch stop
vi
rm -Rf
/etc/rc.d/init.d/munch start
#whew. Legit again. I'm TOTALLY awsome!
You got the point!
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
Assuming that the emails really were deleted and all the backups were also cleared out, what is to stop them from recovering the data using their forensic data recovery techniques. Comerical teams are amazing at this and I would have to assume the FBI is at least as good. How lost is this data really?
As much as I've been following the War on Terrorism, I'm not sure how high this registers on the Need-To-Coverup basis. I suppose we'll find out if/when the Pentagon issues another Emergency Alert to distract the public from how bad an issue it is...
Seriously, it's a pattern. The U.S. just took out a village by accident? Probably didn't hear much about it because everybody's talking about Tora Bora (ever wonder how everybody knows about that location and yet nobody knows what's been accomplished there?) The U.S. bombs 4 Canadians into smithereens? Two days later, a 13-state warning is issued saying that banking outlets are targetted. (Of course, Ashcroft denies that people should avoid banking that day...) Bush actually had information on the attacks before Sept 11th? Whoops, can't talk about that now, because the BIGGEST TERRORIST WARNING EVER where this time they're targeting the STATUE OF LIBERTY!!!!!
Last time I saw, Statue of Liberty's still standing. But that's okay. It makes me feel better knowing that whenever we start thinking for ourselves, the Pentagon's there to put everything back into perspective...
Got war?
Unless you honestly believe that being made fun of on some website reduces peoples' ability to do work, that *is* a troll.
Consider: If being made fun of online made folks unable to get stuff done, Microsoft's release schedules would slip by years!
Oh, wait...
You shouldn't have to su for deleting some stuff inside your own home directory.
(Unless the files weren't yours, of course.)
I suffer from attention surplus disorder.
I'm certain that "destroyed" in this case means they threw it in the "nuker" (big magnetic device) and therefore data recovery is impossible.
I'm confused. Your point is that /. users would add 'terrorist-like' tags to the end of thier emails to over fill a parser device that saved all suspect email. Your trying to say that because some people might have done this it's the faults of lamers who trade p0rn?
/. readers do *not* trade files, or engage in warez activity. IRC is the forum for those clowns, slashdot has a fairly high level of 19-28yr. old people in the IT/tech industry, with another segment of 'nerdy' teenagers who are fairly clean. I'm not going to deny that there are some lamers here, but the general populus they are not.
I don't think this argument can hold any weight. I honestly think that the majority of
Before 9/11 carnivore was such an absurd system that it was absurdity. I do not agree to any form of blanket-wiretap, if such a tap existed, I would have my telephone lines encrypted. I do not have anything to hide, BUT they do not have any reason to know that. I severly doubt that anyone who has any respect in this world would dare to put terrorist-like messages in thier emails post 9/11, it's simply not kosher in this era of post-crisis nationalism.
I would guess that carnivore instead accidently collected *all* emails/communications that passed through it, weither they were the target or not. This was not the intended behavor, so they made a big deal about it and tried to cover it up. Typical behavior (I'm not for/against it, I'm just stating this is likley what happeend).
I have no objection to the type of wiretap they imposed against mafiaboy (he could only get one of a set of ip's, they tapped his phone line, very specific packet sniffing), I am against this sort of blanket 'big brother is watching' actions.
Before you reply, I'd like to make it very clear, I am 100% for selective wiretaps with a judges approval. I am not for the ability to bypass the judge, and I am not in any way supportive of the police acting in thier own authority when it comes to extended spying.
I live in a giant bucket.
One would think that they'd have tested the software BEFORE it was installed. That is how it's supposed be done, right?
It looks like Carnivore has finally proven to be worth it.
Don't get me wrong, I was right there with every other slashbot. "Abridgement of libery!" I cried, and more besides.
But that freedom isn't worth a dime in today's world without the security to keep it.
Something to consider.
Karma: Good (despite my invention of the Karma: sig)
I wonder why the person that submitted this chose to do this as "Anonymous Coward"
;-)
Help fight continental drift.
I was forced to work for this pervert for a few months . Everyone knew he was bad news, even before he entered a guilty plea for possession of child pornography including photos of infants.
Why are we letting pedophiles write software to catch criminals?
This guy is NO GENIUS! After all, he thought there really were young girls in an IRC chat room called "Dads & Daughters Sex" and he got caught!
Patrick was supposed to be an Internet Expert, yet he didn't even PGP his kiddie porn!
The Walt Disney Company lost $1Billion dollars investing in Patrick Naughton's company (his college roommate and best friend still works for Disney!). Now the FBI lost hard-earned evidence investing in Naughton's technology.
-Disney paid the price for Naughton's stupidity.
The FBI paid the price for Naughton's stupidity.
And THE AMERICAN PUBLIC did, too! By standing still while "pretty boy" Patrick was able to plea bargain by writing crappy software for the FBI, he got out of jail sooner and he's free to endanger more young girls, maybe even your son or daughter!
--
Ask the Ya-Hoot Oracle Anything!
Well, we Jeffersonians are not suprized a bit. Nor are we suprized that the Hamiltonians are suprized either LOL!
Wooly Mammoths and Sally Hemmings indeed!
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
thehungersite is back up? Cool! I hit that site every day for the longest time before it died. Thanks for posting that :)
-----
Apple hardware still too expensive for you? How about a raffle ticket?
Come to the University of Mars! Classes starting soon!
You can't handle the TRUTH!
They were using the GXP series harddisks for more than 8 hours at a time!
Peace. Love. Linux. Head Crash.
Have you read the moderator guidelines? Well, have you, PUNK? (and I want a Karma: Gnarly option)
Yeah, it's a chain reaction, because every time you make fun of them on a website, they have to stop fighting terrorism for long enough to get a Carnivore warrant to investigate you, right? Fortunately, they'll probably lose the evidence anyway.
At least, I hope so, now...
-- 'intellectual property' is oxymoronic
If you actually read the article. :) You will learn that contrary to the /. header, the tech was a "she".
someone with that sort of spirit should be promoted!
Not to bash law enforcement, but those among them who aren't completely ignorant of technology often know just enough to be dangerous.
CEE5210S The signal SIGHUP was received.
We gave these guys ~$122B to fight cyberterrorism and what do we get? Pure and utter incompetence.
Oh, I see... they just need more money. When the fuck did this country become so unwilling to take responsibility for our fuckups? I forgot, no one can be responsible because that means our government can't and won't protect us. But we should still give them gobs of money so that they can inform us how we might possibly die instead of doing anything to prevent it.
/angry libertarian rant
Hammer of Truth
The best part of this article is the fact that an FBI agent was upset at collecting email that wasn't supposed to be collected.
Whether they have backups, whether they collected the information or not, it points out the fact that individuals in the FBI are concerned about privacy issues as much as many of us are.
"The FBI technical person was apparently so upset
that he destroyed all the e-mail take, including the take on" the suspect, the memo said.
temper temper FBI Guy.
The Justice Department's Office of Intelligence and Policy Review was furious after learning the evidence captured by the e-mail wiretap system was destroyed because of the glitch, the memo states.
temper temper Justice Dept.
Henry Perritt, who led a team authorized by the FBI to review the surveillance system, said he was surprised the technician deleted the e-mails.
Wha? something wrong in the "system"?!
"The collection is supposed to be retained for judicial review," Perritt said. "If an agent simply deleted a whole bunch of files without the court instructing, that's not the way it's supposed to work."
Really? didn't these guys assure us that everything works fine with carnivore? And that we could trust them not to use it improperly?
Now we have hothead FBI techies misdeploying a software package that has the potential to break the laws they are trying to enforce with the help of the "furious" Dept. of Justice to oversee their work?
Somehow I get the feeling I'm gonna be watched by mad men.
) Human Kind Vs Human Creation
) It'd be interesting to see how many humans would survive to serve us.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
The Washington Post's got a story up too: Article
So close and yet so far from the world's perfect ID number
Amendment IV of the U.S. Constitution: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Notice that the Constitution does not say that illegal searches may be performed as long as any resulting evidence is not used against the persons being illegally searched. It says that it shall not happen. This interception of mail was not just a violation of federal wiretap law, it was a violation of the Bill of Rights. We are supposedly fighting a "war on terrorism" to protect our way of life, but that way of life is rooted in our Constitution. The only way to win the hearts and minds of the rest of the world is to stick to our principles and abide by the highest law of the land which is the U.S. Constitution.
-
Why You Should Use Encryption
You would be suprised how easy it is to get access to the data you transmit over the Internet, and how many people are in a position to easily access it.When you're done with that, consider also reading Is This the America I Love?
Thank you for your attention.
-- Could you use my software consulting serv
there was a giant carnivore, named Carni, which could eat tons and tons of terrorist email. The FBI promised the American citizens that they would be safe from the beast because terrorist email is like meat, and carnivores eat meat.
But, one day, the hideous creature was very, very hungry and ate some green leafy stuff. This made Carni very happy, for in reality he wasn't merely a carnivore, he was an omnivore. "It's all good" he thought as he merrily munched away, one megabite after another.
After the creature had gorged himself on the newly discovered delicacy, a cagesweeper (fbi agent) noticed that Carny looked bloated. The concerned agent looked into the throat of the monster and saw what had happened. "Spit it out", he screamed. "rm this", "rm that", "rm some more". "It's no use, there's too much in there". "rm -rf * #take that you bastard".
The final incantation did the trick, now Carni had plenty of room for more meat. Unfortunately, the poor cagesweeper found himself buried in a mountain of shit.
The moral of the story? There are no morals. This is the FBI.
It's not easy to speak out about what you believe in, but if more people did, the world would be a better place.
-- Could you use my software consulting serv
I worked with a guy who was "let go" from the company, and the boss wanted to give his computer to somebody else. However, being a smart PHB-type boss he also wanted a copy of some relatively important code and docs that were kept on the computer.
So the boss asked a jr. lan admin to "ghost" the computer -- but of course the lan admin ghosted a fresh build over top of the existing one... The admin got the beats for it, even though it was an honest mistake. I can easily see how someone could delete something important by accident.
Anyway, can't the gubment guys just use their special sticky tape to pull out all the deleted 0s and 1s? I thought you had to really work at it to fully and completely delete data.
I don't want to be here.
or slashdot? I know, I'm killing karma here, but nothing new here. Big brother is watching, maybe... possibly. If they are that agent's career is fucked. New sig: so it goes
Gotta make sure they can claim copyright. AOL/Time-Warner wouldn't want someone else to benefit from their expensive writing talent.
i would think that if the files were that important they could be retrieved, if it was ever written to disk. maybe even reconstruct the link light activity... :P
And that's why nobody knows what happened to Elvis... Who killed Marylin Monroe or how many Gunmen it took to kill JFK... Damn accidental Carnivore email dumps! We can blame everything on it now!
You need a FREE iPod Nano
There, OsamaBin Ladoni wields the Death Jet, a Jet with the power to destroy an entire building.
Will OsamaBin be able to rescue the FBI from the clutches of those Terrorist Privacy Advocate Infidels?!?!? Will Saddam learn that yuppie ex-president Ronald Reagan is his father? Will Arafat appear on the show Friends as rumored? Stay tuned.
/^[A-Z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}$/i
I know for certain FBI works harder than most think. In fact I have two relatives, one Special Agent and another a programmer, who retired after many years of service only a couple years ago.
What would their reaction be to the funny post?
They'd probably both have a good laugh at it even if they were still in the FBI.
Believe it if you want to.
db
Cig:
ôô
I ran it through the W3C HTML validator and found quite a few problems with the HTML, and have fixed them. The page now validates as HTML 4.01 transitional.
Also I have long had a bad link to a page called "Email Encryption Made Simple", and several people have written in over the last couple years to give me an updated URL, but I never got around to fixing it. Now the link works.
Finally, I urge the use of PGP on the page. But Network Associates no longer supports PGP. I thought it would be helpful to mention GNU Privacy Guard, which is actually what I use these days. I added links to it and will try to elaborate on it in the discussion sometime in the next week or so.
-- Could you use my software consulting serv
All the issues about privacy with the FBI and the likes aside. I'm pretty worried about the fact that someone, even an FBI tech can delete the contents of a sniff.
Sure, there are -probably- back-ups. But then if the tech makes those backups, whats to say he didnt delete them as well?
Personally, it sounds more like a case of someone trying to abuse a tool they have access to (Tech sneeks a look at other peoples emails) and then messing up covering their tracks.
Then he avoids getting attacked by putting a moral spin on it, and comming out a hero. (maybe)
I saw the light at the end of the tunnel... But it was just someone with a flashlight bringing more work.
Hmm... I read this story and thought...
Is this the first time that a piece of software was defended when it did its' job-- but not what they told people-- by claiming "That's a bug, not a feature"?
Then I noticed my tinfoil hat was maladjusted. So I guess they really did goof, Carnivore is just a powerful (if maladjusted) tool for law enforcement, and my fears to the contrary are just their attempts to discredit my typical insights into their foul ways with an insidiously sublte use of their orbital mind control rays.
Do you like Japanese imports?
Read an article in the last month or so about the extremely sad state of IT affairs in the FBI. Generally they receive other government agency PC throw aways as their UPGRADE machines. What, are they using 386 processors now? Also, they raid their IT budget for other uses -- the last $90 million raid went to their travel budget. Knowing this, the incompetence they exhibit with Carnivore should not be surprising.
He did what he was supposed to do. He inadvertantly collected information on innocent people and then destroyed it upon recognition. That's what is supposed to happen to protect our rights. Morever, all this talk about backups or method of deletion doesn't matter. Even if that data is still somewhere, it can't be used (legally, that is). It was collected in an illegal manner and the innocent people are not under investigation. You don't go out of your way to resurrect data that you can't do anything with.
Why does this sig rock so hard?
What is the jargon in PR circles when an interesting story like this one breaks, and you announce an even bigger story to hope that the more interesting one goes unnoticed?
The "cue the foo posts in 3, 2, 1..." posts will commence with no subsequent foo posts in 3, 2, 1...
FBI? Someone during the Warren Commission investigation suggested that the acronym stood for Federal Bungled Investigations. And it always was, and it always will be, as long as law enforcement agencies sacrifice intelligence in the name of hiring folks who can be expected to follow orders without thinking.
Hic iacet Arthurus, rex quondam rexque futurus.
When privacy stories come up involving the government's right to peek into citizens' lives, there are always some people who state, "If you're not doing anything wrong, then what do you have to worry about?"
Well, this is clearly one thing we should worry about. What happens when the government, which is composed of fallible humans, goofs in its actions and accidentally destroys the citizens' property? Now no one could say that "that wouldn't happen."
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
As a member of the IITRI team that evaluated the Carnivore system, I'd like to point out that the dates of these memos indicate that the mistakes happened while using an earlier version of Carnivore than the one that we evaluated. I'm not trying to downplay the dangers of a device like Carnivore, but simply to point out that the FBI was aware of problems with their device, and was making modifications to it. One of the caveats of the independent review was that our review would only apply to a specific version of Carnivore, as we could not possibly know how changes made after we reviewed it would fix problems, or possibly introduce new ones. The version of the system we reviewed was not baselined until just before the review began.
As a recap of our report, we pointed out that the accuracy of Carnivore collection was highly dependent on the correct setup of the filtering rules. We also pointed out that it was quite easy to make a mistake setting up those rules which would cause an over collection. The memos which were released do not indicate whether the overcollection was due to a filter setup mistake or some other bug that may have existed in a version prior to the one that we tested.
As stated earlier, I am not trying to defend Carnivore, but you must put these documents into context with the time period in which they were produced.
The scary thing is I can see the statements being fashioned in the halls of justice right now:
"You know, we would have intercepted this communication and 9/11 could have been averted, if only we hadn't had our hands tied by these ranting leftist civil liberterians. Thousands died because we were afraid of what would have happened if we accidently picked up on innocent emails making plans for the holiday, or exchanging recipes. Now that we know what the cost of those silly liberties are, I think we all realize that 9/11 was too high a price to pay."
Please exchange your constitutional rights for security. Before it is too late!!!
Personally, I think we won't solve anything as long as we focus on the symptoms rather than the cause of these problems.
Cheers
i dotn get it.. are you trying to say.. well carnivore is bad.. but to complain about the agent throwing away the emails would mean that you think we need to stuff..
without carnivore.. there wouldnt be any emails..
The war with islam is a war on the beast
The war on terror is a war for peace
http://www.cnn.com/2002/US/05/28/attack.carnivore. reut/
good, bad, i'm the guy with the gun
and of course the FBI has no access to the enormous data-recovery technologies of the NSA ..
... whereever
right...
dont they know how hard it is to delete data so its not recoverable??
or are their heads still up their
"There are 11 kinds of people: those who know binary, those who don't, and those who could not care less!"
And no lower court can remand our rights.
No Congress can abridge our rights.
As with Korea, as with WW II and internment, illegal unconstitutional acts shall never stand, they only exist and are struck down in time.
We, who realize the implications of such unconstitutional actions taken under the guise of hunting down the terrorists (a good thing), must safeguard our rights - for few others realize what is at stake.
-
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
Mike
-- Could you use my software consulting serv
Personally I'd prefer the caps lock key to be illegal rather then the delete key.
And don't do a "Tab"!
The only logical american response is to say "Really guys, we don't care that much about our privacy. If you mess up and snag my email now and then, don't freak. It's okay, you don't have to go delete everything.
I would never say such a thing in this lifetime.
That's equivalent to saying, "Oh, it's alright guys, go ahead and database every gun purchase, and serial number. I have nothing to hide, i won't kill anyone!"
-- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
It's very hard to argue that a software bug causing unintended data collection results in an 'unreasonable' search. Especially if the data was never accessed. There's no such thing as constitutionslaughter.
Jack Valenti and the MPAA are to technology as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone
No, what was supposed to happen, as pointed out in the SF Gate article, was that the data should have been retained for judicial review, as part of normal oversight procedures:
Morever, all this talk about backups or method of deletion doesn't matter. Even if that data is still somewhere, it can't be used (legally, that is). It was collected in an illegal manner and the innocent people are not under investigation. You don't go out of your way to resurrect data that you can't do anything with
You're right, you don't. Instead, you go out of your way to delete data that would point to criminal activity on your own point - such as violating the terms of a search warrant.
I can see from your comment and others that many people are reading "unreasonable" as something which is debatable. It is important that people understand the the terms "reason" and "cause" have specific legal meanings and they are synonyms in this context. Saying that NO searches will take place WITHOUT reason is the same as saying that searches will ONLY take place WITH reason, which is exactly what they say in the following clause when they specify that a narrowly defined warrant MUST be issued first and a warrant can ONLY be issued when the evidence shows that a crime has PROBABLY been committed.
I know you weren't trolling. I wish I had replied sooner so that more people might have seen this because it seems that quite a few people are misinterpreting based on "conversational" English. And this is an incredibly important point today judging by the way things have been headed lately.
"Accidental FBI screwup destroys evidence proving JFK was murdered by the CIA."
- painfully politically correct,
- anal-retentitive,
- will hang yer ass out if you try to exercise your own good judgment instead of following my paranoid (after all, you are out to get everyone) rules designed to keep you from EVER using any form of common sense because you are, after all, a fekkin tool of an oppressive regime.
I refer, of course, to the common taxpayer as presented to the FBI by the press.People, people, people. If you crucify and excoriate anyone in public service who uses the least bit of common sense, then do not come crying to me when all you get in government service are a bunch of timid drones who follow the rules flying in the face of what you think a reasonable person should do. You reap what you sew. Since the 60's we have sewn timid book following drones more than visionary risk takers. Of course, too many risk takers and you get too many Ruby Ridges, Waco's and Philadelphia's, the trick (which we have not learned) is to walk the line between the two. Unfortunately, there are institutions (like the ACLU) who dedicate themselves to preventing the risky behaviors, but none who are successful in de-neutering the resulting drones.
if the police break into my house randomly w/o my consent to enter and see the materials for me to murder my neighbor, they can't arrest me.
If the police wiretap me randomly w/o my permission to be doing so, they can't arrest me.
If they have a warrant to do either, they can.
See how it didn't cost anyone any lives?
I live in a giant bucket.