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Sorry, Wrong Wiretap

Rick Zeman writes "CNN is covering a little-mentioned Inspector General's report which mentions that the FBI 'sometimes gets the wrong number when it intercepts conversations in terrorism investigations' due to various reasons, and that 'The FBI could not say Friday whether people are notified that their conversations were mistakenly intercepted or whether wrongly tapped telephone numbers were deleted from bureau records.'"

5 of 166 comments (clear)

  1. Sorry, Wrong Wiretap by falconwolf · · Score: 4, Informative

    The FBI could not say Friday whether people are notified that their conversations were mistakenly intercepted or whether wrongly tapped telephone numbers were deleted from bureau records.

    Why should they tell people their phones were tapped and conversations recorded? I'd bet that the people involved would get vocal about wiretaps.

    use of warrants issued by a court that operates in secret under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

    They use secret courts so they aren't accountable to the people who pay their salary, the taxpayers.

    Falcon
  2. Re:Shocking!! The Government Ain't Perfect by larry+bagina · · Score: 3, Informative
    Police sometimes arrest the wrong people who haven't committed any crime. Juries someimte convict the wrong person. The FBI isn't perfect.

    No! Next you'll be telling me that moderators sometimes label "informative" posts "insightful"

    --
    Do you even lift?

    These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.

  3. Re:Shocking!! The Government Ain't Perfect by bigtrike · · Score: 2, Informative

    Police sometimes arrest the wrong people who haven't committed any crime.

    Yes, but they need either a warrant or a very good reason such as witnessing you committing the crime, finding you covered in blood near a murder scene, etc.. That's the way it used to be with wiretaps. Thanks to the inappropriately named patriot act, they can do it to anyone at any time, without notification.

  4. What about the Constitution? by cnerd2025 · · Score: 3, Informative

    I thought that these were rights that were protected by the Constitution in the 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th Amendments of the US Constitution? One is supposed to be informed of his crime before investigation can begin. The Writ of Habeas Corpus also applies here; since a crime hasn't been committed, there is no way that they can just listen because someone might commit a crime. Someone might talk about committing murder and how they plan to do it, but no one has the right to listen in on the conversation because one of the parties might conspire to commit murder. The Constitution protects rights of "criminals" by saying that a) to run an investigation a crime must be committed (habeas corupus) b) the accused must be told what his or her crime is (5th amendment) c) the person must be informed by the government with a cause and substantiation for search and seizure (4th amendment) d) the person is free from penalty of self-incrimination (5th amendment) e) the person is entitled to trial by jury (7th amendment and article 3) f) the person is granted the right to a fair punishment that fits his or her crime (8th amendment) g) the person has a right to a trial that quickly follows his or her endictment for the crime, as well as reasonable bail (6th amendment). So, wiretapping and using it in court would violate ALL of these. Since there is no proof of a crime that has been committed, the rest of the claims that would even validate a wiretap are false. If people knew that their phones were being tapped, they would clearly invoke the fifth amendment. This is a clear violation of authority and needs to be stopped. I'm sure a good corporate interest group would actually agree with us on this one.

  5. Re:sounds like... by toleraen · · Score: 3, Informative

    Analysis of the USA PATRIOT act

    Section I, subsection A. Paragraph 5.

    Second, FISA allows a secret court to authorize U.S. intelligence agencies to conduct surveillance using each of the four basic mechanisms listed above....The secret court's role here, however, is quite limited: it is not supposed to "second-guess" the government's certifications or representations. (Unsurprisingly, the secret FISA court has only denied one application in its over twenty-year existence.)

    Third party information, but the EFF is pretty much the ACLU for digital information. I've seen it other places, but don't have the links anymore.