Slashdot Mirror
Buggy Bugging Backfires On German Police
Alethes writes "The BBC is reporting that German police have been caught bugging cellphones at the expense of criminal suspects who found a unknown and inaccessible voicemail number listed on their bills that was being used to record calls. Telecommunications authorities said that nearly 20,000 lines were currently being tapped."
what's the German translation for "Do'h!"
that they got caught. German laws allow for this, Sloppy work on the part of either the telecom company or the police (or both). If its one thing American Inteligence ( homebound anyway) is good at is keeping the public unaware of these types of things. Is that a good thing? Thats an agrument for another post.
Now they've given Ashcroft an idea to both monitor possible terrorists AND increase revenue for the US govertment...
:)
Record all of their conversations in voicemails, then charge them for the priviledge. Go Patriot Act!
Hacking most voicemail boxes is so simple because of the simple password.
Not to mention war-dialing the number trying all possible passwords from a land line.
Here's a something related to chew on . . . especially after last nights election results.
"A little-known amendment in the Senate version of the bill makes it much easier for ISPs to disclose e-mail communications without being served with a warrant, which had been prohibited before the Patriot Act of 2001." - wired
Check it here
If it had happened in England the subject could have been, "Buggy Bugging Backfires On British Bobbies."
Slashdotter are stupid and biased.
Most of the paswords are simple, such as "1-2-3-4-5"
That's the same combination I have on my luggage!
"You get what you pay for after all." --
Evil will always triumph, because good is dumb! - Dark Helmet
TODO: Something witty here...
Read the rest here. Now, I consider this worse - you can expect policy to breach privacy - but you are not supposed to expect that from a major telco....or...actually...are you?
The German police believe that over 20,000 people need to have active wiretaps on their phones?
German authorities can only use wiretapping in serious cases such as murder, money laundering, kidnapping or treason.
I think that when there are this many people who are being monitored, there's a problem. Just take a moment and think about the number of people it takes to monitor and administrate that level of surveillance!
Why should I argue rationally with someone being irrational? I'll just mock them instead.
Unfortunately, no
It is illegal for the UK media to report on incidents that involve national security.
Yeah, yeah, laugh as you want, you can even claim that it's rediculeus to claim it has anything to do with national security, laugh while you still have the right..
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
The police ARE trying to listen in on private phone calls, in the hopes of finding something there. Would you say police seaching private homes was OK simply because they're only looking for criminals? Not if you believe in any form of privacy.
"Al-Qaeda cells coordinating international terrorism is an everyday occurence in many German cities" -- you have direct knowledge of this? I haven't seen it reported anywhere. Maybe we suspect it is "an everyday occurrence" but suspicion without evidence is nothing, and acting on that to monitor 20,000 numbers would be harassment. Police doing "everything they can" would logically include what besides phone taps? Fighting terrorism is a worthy cause, but trashing everything we believe in to do it is not.
Give blame where blame is due, but nothing is gained by mindlessly rounding up the usual suspects. Al Queda is evil, and so is an authoritarian police state.
Now here's something to think about: These German police who conducted this were up so sloppy that the bugging information showed up on phone bills. So: how many governments are doing this the right way (i.e. without the public's knowledge?)
Err No.
A software glitch displayed information that was supposed to be private. I want to see posts on where the responsibility lies for 'software glitches'. Not "My privacy was invaded illegally". So far I can only see that there were 20k taps total, dozens in Germany. Home, Work, Cell. 3 per person. That gives you approx 6 thousand people total, say 'Telecommunications authorities".
But that's not the issue, I don't care about the legality of the taps, I want to know what the company has to give up because of their 'glitch'.
"I can't give you a brain, so I'll give you a diploma" - The Great Oz (blatently stolen sig)
Perhaps this can be employed by your local librarian as well:
"Oh, that's a not a late fee, that's the 'records retrieval' charge... Gee, I'm sorry, that should have been billed to the FBI, let me take that off of your account. Now, do you still want me to fetch that Civil Engineering book on demolition explosives?"
The New York office of the FBI was wiretapping various Mafia types (with some success; they eventually broke the New York Mafia). The taps were done by New York Telephone, and were implemented by ordering a remote extension from the circuit to be tapped to an FBI office. This was a billable service, and it wasn't cheap; the total costs of all those circuits were a strain on the FBI budget.
One month, the FBI didn't pay the bill for one of their "extensions". The billing software then started billing the other party on the line, the person being wiretapped. Big embarassment.
This was part of the motivation behind CALEA. Not only did it hurt the investigation, but it embarassed the FBI. (The FBI is very thin-skinned. "Don't embarass the Bureau" started with Hoover and lives on.)
All this is in one of the books about how the FBI took down the New York Mafia, but I don't have the cite.
Its funny how in Germany they seem to want to charge the customer were in the UK all the mobile teco's got pissed off with requests for duplicate bill's from the police (which have all call's made and when) that they started charging them.
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
Maybe the German police would say something like:
"Das cellphones ist nicht usen fur trakken das badfolken. Das policen ist nicht snoopen das folken a la 3rd Reich. Relaxen und watchen das bills increasen. And Kwitchurbelliaken."
Funny Germans.
Indeed. My wife is half German and half Mexican. It seemed like a good idea at the time. I never realized how quickly I'd get tired of sauerkraut tacos.
The US government/law enforcement/intelligence agencies would never use their powers to spy on people. Aren't you a PATRIOT?
-Puk
Sounds to me like the Germans just sent the bill a bit early; they should have sent it after the investigation was complete.
1984 came late it seems...
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"Ummm how hypocritical is that?
Why should they have rights?
Everyone should have rights.
Why should people who want to destroy us, and take away our livihood, and remove our liberties have any right?
What the hell is wrong with you. You're like every other idiot in this country that thinks "Well G Dubbaya is taking away rights of certain people so that I can keep mine and live a happy life." It reminds me of something I read a while ago -
In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and still I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up.
If you change communists to terrorists, jews to muslims, trade unionists to hackers, you basically have the situation of today.