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FBI Widens Use of National Security Letters
An anonymous reader writes "The Washington Post reports that the FBI has drastically increased its use of National Security Letters (NSL), which permit it to collect information without judicial oversight. According to the article, the use of NSLs is up by a factor of 100, and the records are kept forever (in the past they were thrown away if the subject was cleared). Deep in the article, the author reports that NSLs were used to collect records '[...] of every hotel guest, everyone who rented a car or truck, every lease on a storage space, and every airplane passenger who landed in [Las Vegas]' for a two week period, in response to a terrorism threat in 2003. Those records, apparently, will be kept forever by the federal government. There's an ombudsman, and a procedure to resolve complaints, but the mere existence of an NSL is secret, so it's not clear how anyone can complain!
OK, I'll bite. Why would any of this make any difference to you or, for that matter, an American? Contrary to the FUD found here, this is just the collection of information and in no way strips any rights from you (well, you're not American so that's a given) or any American. That information collection gives law enforcement the tools to fight that nasty thing you might have seen in the news: terrorism. By the way -- we do a better job of fighting it than anyone else.
And while we're at it, where is home for you? I suspect you are in better shape when you get off the plane here in the states than you are back in your Euro-hamlet. Do you even have a Bill of Rights? Perhaps you'd like to roast marshmellows in Paris?
Are you really serious? Now I must preface with this by saying that I don't necessarily support this kind of stuff, but honestly, it just isn't that big of a deal. I live in America and plan to for the rest of my life and I just don't see it affecting me in any serious way. I'm a more or less law-abiding citizen, and if my government wants to collect some information on me like whether I stayed at a hotel or not, I really just don't care that much. They don't personally know me and I will probably never come in contact with any of the people that know I stayed at that hotel. Even if I did, SO WHAT? I just don't buy all these conspiracy theories like what if the government thinks you're a terrorist and interrogates you and holds you without trial, etc, etc. Sure, there are a few horror stories (and I'm pretty sure most of them are embellished) but in reality that kind of stuff just doesn't happen.
Now I don't want to sound like a troll, but it seems like most of the privacy nazis posting on here are the type of people that just want to fight the system.
They are generally against government because of some kind of latent teenage rebellion or what have you. In general the government is not out to get you and does not need to be constantly treated by contempt.
Fight the fall of slashdot by supporting PlayfullyClever in your sig.
Yet you post on an American website that runs off and american developed internet forgeting WWII and your debt to america from real tyranny. You probably watch american TV and listen to american music too while eating a mcdonalds cheeseburger and a drinking a budwiser.
Whiners. Go have fun in your little EU. Don't like america? Don't live there, quit your bitching.