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Telecoms Facing $50 Billion Lawsuit for Wiretaps
hdtv writes "According to a MarketWatch article, BellSouth Corp and Verizon Telecommunications are facing lawsuits seeking billions of dollars in damages for the decision to turn over calling records to the government. The damages amount to $1,000 per person, whose records were turned over to Feds. According to the article, 'consumers could sue the phone service providers under communications privacy legislation that dates back to the 1930s. Relevant laws include the Communications Act, first passed in 1934, and a variety of provisions of the Electronic Communications and Privacy Act, including the Stored Communications Act, passed in 1986.'"
I expect the lawsuits to collapse, or at least gimp along on two broken legs at that point.
"National Security" has become the new "We Do This For Our Children".
*Stomps away in disgust*
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
What we need is an itelligent judge that isn't afraid to intepret the law and who will stand up for the American citizens of this country. I don't deny that we're in a time where we need some kind of safety net, but we don't need to give our liberties. If this all keeps going on the way it has been, the terrorists the gov't is seeking so hard to stop will win by splitting America apart.
That which does not kill me only postpones the inevitable.
Why fret over privacy loss if you aren't doing anything illegal/covert?
Very well, let's see if you'll answer that. Presumably you're not doing anything illegal or covert?
Alright. Please post right here: Your real name, your age, your home address, your work or school address, your home phone number, your cell phone number, your work phone number, a description and the license plate numbers of any vehicles you own, and a link to a recent photo of yourself.
If you're not comfortable with that information being in the hands of strangers...then you're concerned about privacy.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
Surely you're not implying the administration uses the Problem-Reaction-Solution tactic to influence public opinion?
I was kinda stupid when I was 18 too.
This space available.
As much as it pains me to say this, I'd rather have Google store all my personal data than any Government have access to it; hypothetically assuming for a moment that the data could only be subpeoned via a "normal" warrant - like in the olden days before all these new Patriot Act type laws.
Now don't get me wrong, I've nothing against the authorities applying for a warrant to listen into my telephone calls/emails etc if they have reasonable suspicion that I am going to commit a crime, or that I have committed a crime. Blanket monitoring with no consideration of presumed innocence is most definitely a big no-no though.
Backup not found: (A)bort (R)etry (P)anic
On a side note, where I live, we had no terrorist attacks since decades. And that's in a country with a -- from your point of view -- extremely leftist government (and yes, we're a true democracy).
Windows is like decaf - it tastes like the real thing, but it won't get you through the day.
Probably at least $10 or $20 million in "campaign contributions". Yeah, let us help you out with these phone records, gubmint. And be sure to remember us next time we need something nudge nudge wink wink say no more say no more.
They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
"In the book 1984, the government maintained a perpetual state of phoney war to distract the population. Today, the opposite is happening. We are in a real war with terrorist networks groups that swear they will kill us any way they can, yet the myopic deny reality and imagine that the war is phoney."
Isn't a "perpetual state of phony war" what this so-called "war on terror" is? I don't see the government doing the logical things to make us safer such as securing our borders, scanning the cargo containers coming into our ports, and adequately funding first responders. The disaster in New Orleans only proves how unprepared we are. And that was a diaster we could see coming, unlike an actual terrorist attack, considering how pathetic the state our intelligence services are.
And what has the government done with is so-called "war on terror?" Aside from Afghanistan, which I believe was more of less justified, it has invaded a sovereign nation that had nothing to do with the 9/11 terrorist attacks and was actually an enemy of Al-Quaeda, engaged in the supression of human rights in places like Guantanamo Bay, and erode the freedoms and privacy of regular Americans. Oh yeah, and they created the department of homeland security. Because more buerocracy means we're safer.
If you believe that the terrorists are out to destroy our way of life, I'd say the terrorists are winning at this rate. Certainly some sacrifices must be made, but this is going too far.
Yes the threat of terrorism is real, but I'm think we have a lot more to fear from our own government than from terrorists.
You must have missed the slashdot article a few days ago about the polling results that show 63% of Americans support the NSA operations.
Oh, I didn't miss it...in fact, I posted in it. Here are a few more posts which do an excellent job of pointing up just why that 'poll' was bogus:
And you're paranoid too. Are you actually suggesting that the gov't is orchestrating terrorist attacks to consolidate its power?
Take a good hard look at the A HREF="http://www.physics911.net/faketerror.htm">a
And now, after you're done crowing about what a 'moonbat' site I've just linked to, take a deep breath, try to be objective, and actually look this time. All of your denunciations of 'ridiculous conspiracy theories' won't change the characteristics of ASTM E119 cettified steel, or alter the building specifications of the WTC towers, or somehow account for approximately 60 tons of missing aircraft debris at the Pentagon.
Here's what's so ironic about the whole issue. The Bush administration has successfully kept the US free of terrorist attacks since 9/11/01. But his very success had lead to a sense of complacency, particularly among ultra-myopic Bush-haters.
For the last three years, I've been snapping my fingers to keep the tigers away. I'm proud to announce that since enacting the practice, I've gone three solid years without a tiger attack.
In the book 1984, the government maintained a perpetual state of phoney war to distract the population. Today, the opposite is happening. We are in a real war with terrorist networks groups that swear they will kill us any way they can, yet the myopic deny reality and imagine that the war is phoney.
And that's exactly what the majority of the brainwashed populace in 1984 were led to believe. Well done.
I wonder if a nuclear attack will wake them out of their stupor? Alas, probably not. They'll just blame it on Bush.
Of course I'll blame it on Bush, since he'll be the one to instigate the attack. Question is, when that happens, will it be enough to wake you out of your stupor?
I watch Brit Hume on Fox News
Odds are it won't.
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~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
- Domestic spying is costly for telecoms
- Domestic spying could reveal trading secrets
- Domestic spying accelerates standard encryption
An other reason for hope is the existence of organizations like EFF or ACLU.Snooping and tapping activities at the boundary of legality have made me worried, but costly legal lawsuits could be a good medicine. Like chemotherapy against cancer. Better would be strict laws which prevent such abuse. Lets see how the law dragons fight the snooping hydra.
There is an other issue which could prevent that we slip into a totalitarian state: telephone calling records of industry decision makers are valuable information. The database can give hints about mergers, stock market developments (company X has suddenly a lot of phone-calls with company Y. Do they merge? Do they launch a new product, lets buy or sell stocks accordingly). In a government, for which business is so closely linked to politics, domestic spying could be seen a free ticket for obtaining insider information. That could become a problem, once it is realized that it exists.
A third remedy about the domestic spying issue could be technology: not only standard encryption of telephone calls, but also standard masquerading about who calls whom. Such technology will first be used by people who need protection, not criminals, but CEOs or engineers working on new technology, which the competition should not know about. Of course, the people who are the primary targets of those stupid spying activities have long gone to other communication channels.
"The Eye: that horrible growing sense of a hostile will that strove with great power to pierce all shadows of cloud, and earth, and flesh, and to see you: to pin you under its deadly gaze, naked, immovable."
LOR, Chapter 2, The Passage of the Marshes
The Bush administration has successfully kept the US free of terrorist attacks since 9/11/01.
Yeah. They were perfect at preventing domestic terrorist attacks from 04/20/1995 through 9/10/01, too. With that kind of a record, you'd have to trust that their efforts are the reason no attack has happened.
What kind of asinine logic are you using?
We are in a real war with terrorist networks groups that swear they will kill us any way they can, yet the myopic deny reality and imagine that the war is phoney.
You mean Iraq? The country that was the source of none of the 9/11 bombers? The country where none of the 9/11 bombers trained? The country where terrorists from other places (Saudi Arabia) go to seek out a fight with the US military?
Clue-bat for you: Saddam Hussein was literally created by US foreign policy via the CIA. The misery of his people (and many other groups in that region) was created by US foreign policy over many years. The fact that they hate us is simply chickens coming home to roost. Kill enough fathers and husbands and the kids are going to grow up pissed off. If you don't understand why, then you're stupider than your posting lets on.
You must have missed the slashdot article a few days ago about the polling results that show 63% of Americans support the NSA operations.
You're actually claiming membership with the sheeple? Wow.
Right and wrong don't arise from "majority rules" or "might makes right". Even if I was the only person saying that what our government is doing is flat out wrong while everyone else disagreed, I'd still be right and every single other person would be wrong. Including you.
I wonder if a nuclear attack will wake them out of their stupor?
So, based on the fact that if someone really wants to detonate a nuclear weapon on US soil they will, you're also willing to give up all of your freedoms to slow them down a bit?
Doesn't seem like a smart trade to me. I'd rather live in a country where "home of the free" meant something important. Who knows, maybe if we didn't go around killing off democratically elected leaders and replacing them with US-owned despots who destroy the lives of their people, those people wouldn't hate us so much... Nah.
Alas, probably not. They'll just blame it on Bush.
Bush made the underlying problems worse and our country less safe (more terrorists), however, he didn't start the process. He's as much a pawn of the corporations as anyone else these days. Some would go back to MacNamara for the first systematic horrors of US foreign policy, some would go back much further than that (McKinley, Monroe, etc.)
But to understand these names, you'd have to know history, which would imply reading a book. Unlikely in your case. The stupidity of people who think like you make me furious. Every time an American soldier dies, I want to punch someone like you in the face and say, "IT'S YOUR FUCKING FAULT!" Because you let Bush and the people behind Bush get away with any action or lie they want.
It's not Bush's fault. It's your fault. You elected him, you total and complete fuckwit.
Ross
More attacks are being tried now, and not just in the US.
You need to back that one up. How many "attempted" attacks have there been in the USA before 9/11 and after 9/11?
I'm afraid you're the one with the active imagination, and your head firmly in teh sand.
I'm guessing you have never heard what your government did to Maher Arar, a Canadian citizen born in Syria, a software developer who consulted with Mathworks, who was arrested, illegally detained and shipped off to Syria for torture at the behest of the American Government:
I know, I know... why bother to stand up for this guy? After all, he's a friend of a criminal, right? Except that he was an acquaintance, not a friend, and the other guy wasn't a criminal. But then, he's a foreigner, and you're not a foreigner, so you have nothing to worry about.
Just don't wonder why there is no one left to stand up when they finally come for you...
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
like your ISP, your bank, your cell phone provider, etc. You give more personal data than this to rent a video or save $0.45 at Albertsons.
The difference is that you can choose to give up the information they request. I've made a decision to allow these organizations access to certain pieces of information about myself.
I did not elect to give my government my telephone records.
I really fail to see the harm.
There's no harm in not following the rules? Do you really want a government that doesn't feel that the laws put in place are important? That the rule of law isn't important?
Interestingly enough, when the AG of the US was asked why he didn't just work with Congress to change the law, his answer was "because we believe they will refuse to change the laws". There is actually a reason why government is required to abide by the law, and that's to protect the citizenry from government intrusion. Remember that thing called the "bill of rights"? It was intended that the people - not the government - ultimately decide what they want.
When the government refuses to follow its own rules and laws, everone is harmed.
Bill Maher joked on Real Time last night that "Osama Bin Laden needs to find a new reason to hate us - he used to hate us for our freedom." While Maher was joking, he was making a very poignant point: If we give up our freedoms, the terrorists win.
The complaint isn't that the government isn't doing enough; it's that the administration is breaking the laws that are in place. They can perfectly well do the exact same thing by following the rules - get a subpoena for the records; get a FISA court to approve the wiretaps. They refuse to do that, and then play the "if you don't let us do this, the terrorists win". NO! If we *DO* let the government do this, the terrorists win!
Insanity is a gradual process; don't rush it.
Here's one simple, easy to digest scenario in which it harmful to society. Understand that I'm not taking a position on it, merely posing a hypothetical situation.
The terrorist-graph program is successful. Law enforcement decides to tweak the algorithms and use it on organized crime. It meets success and becomes part of the standard set of tools. The individuals in charge of this program are dedicated and enlightened and have no desire to abuse the system.
Fast forward 10 years. Most of the people in charge, and all of the political leaders have changed. They've inherited these law enforcement programs. They use them to dig up political dirt or other mischievous, but relatively light weight abuses. It is deeply entrenched in the bureaucracy.
Another 10 years. Corruption is heavy in high level politics. All likely challengers are identified ahead of time and neutralized, either with planted evidence or coercion.
I'm not attempting to make a slippery slope arguement here. Two assertions I'm making are:
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Do you think that the fear we're living under now is anything compared to the fear of the founders as the much larger, better equipped and trained Royal armies attacked?
Yet they believed freedom was more important than life itself. That belief is the foundation of our way of life, and this foundation is under attack. Once we lose these freedoms, they will be almost impossible to recoup without force.
What unmitigated cowards are the people who are willing to cede freedoms to terrorism. And furthermore, there is no proof that ceding these freedoms enables us to better fight terror.
To the founding fathers, we would look like a bunch of cowards and ingrates. They would be horrified to see the legacy they struggled and died to create collapsing under the comparatively tame threat of terrorism.
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To catch terrorists this way. By now, everyone, including the terrorists, have figured out that the phone lines are insecure. Those who have something to hide are already using different forms of communication.
The only possible effective use of this system today is to stifle the political dissent of law abiding citizens.
It has never been about catching terrorists or protecting children. Yes, occasionally such eavesdropping has helped solve criminal cases; but the primary purpose has always been the suppression of political dissent.
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