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.'"

Comments

Until the government says "National Security"

[Chas]

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*

An intelligent judge

[mikesd81]

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.

Re:An intelligent judge

[suv4x4]

I don't deny that we're in a time where we need some kind of safety net

Shit, the propaganda is working eh...

The very fact you consent we're in a "time where we need some kind of safety net" means brainwashing worked. We're not in any kind of time. I'd say that the amount of terror US gets is disproportionally small to the amount of terror US applies to some countries in the rest of the world.

What we need really is to stop brainwashing, stop propaganda, stop the war and civil right erosion engine, stop snooping and concentrate on far less self-destructing activities.

But I'm a dreamer.

Re:Why fret over privacy loss?

[laughingcoyote]

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.

Re:Buckle Up

[DrunkenTerror]

Surely you're not implying the administration uses the Problem-Reaction-Solution tactic to influence public opinion?

Re:Why fret over privacy loss?

[Zweideutig]

Name: Sheyenne York Age: 18 Home address: 46 Bradford Lane South China, ME 04358 School: Erskine Academy 309 Windsor Road, South China, ME 04358 (207) 445 - 2962 Vehicles: I do not currently own an automobile. Telephone: I use e-mail. My e-mail address is zweideutig@gmail.com

Here's what I did...

[Anonymous Coward]

First after a call to AT&T, where I had a nice 15 minute talk with the customer service representative (she was aware there was something going on and had some canned response for reporters, but didn't understand what the "big deal" (her words) was, until I explained it to her. By the end of the conversation, she agreed that this was pretty scary... or at least pretended to, but she sounded sincere.) who told me that only one other customer had called her to complain (about 2pm).

Second, I'm cancelling my phone service w/AT&T and I will let them know exactly why. I'm switching to an Internet phone. Now, I know that this may not be much safer, especially considering any call INTO a bad phone company would be logged and reported to the NSA. (This is why Qwest customers aren't safe if they call anyone who uses AT&T, for example)... but if enough people cancel in disgust, who knows, maybe they'll get the message.

Third, I'm donating to the EFF. They need our help more than ever. And vice-versa.

Fourth, I'm ready, willing, and able to join any class action lawsuits against these companies. Even if they get thrown out.

Fifth, not an email. Not a letter. But a phone call to my state Senators and Representative.

Also #1: Has anyone put together a unified wiki/forum trying to "reverse-engineer" the NSA's data mining program from published reports + what IT folks & mathematicians think is possible? I bet with enough collaboration and discussion, the net can figure out pretty close to what they're doing with this massive database/total information awareness program (sounds a bit like they're creating associations between clusters of people, much like Amazon does when they profile you to recommend new products... The more info they have, the more they can cross-reference, looking for patterns and comparing with patterns of known profiles (criminals, political enemies, etc.).. I'd be really interested in learning more about what people think this program is and how it might work, from a technological point of view.

Also #2: Merry Fitzmas

Re:Here's what I did...

[lawpoop]

It's fairly easy to figure out what they are doing with the data. With a log of who called whom, when, and for how long, you can build a social network diagram like this. These diagrams tell you at a glance who are the most influential people. In this diagram, 'Ron' and 'Patti' are highly connected people. It's likely they are in a close relationship with each other.

If you wanted to destroy a terrorist network as quickly and cheaply as possible, you simply need to figure out the people at the nexuses of these social networks, and take them out. (In our example above, you would take out Ron and Patti -- they connect the green and red groups) The problem is, this also works for any other type of organizations -- ones that imposed martial law, for example.

Now, for most of the time, these social networks are almost entirely informal, based only on socializing. The thing of it is, they can quickly become the basis for any opposition or resistance movements ( think Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement ). If you wanted to go beyond fighting terrorism and, say, impose martial law and rule as a dictator, taking out rebellious, influential people ahead of time, or even afterwards, would make your life easier.

P.S. There is some kind of calculus that volunteers for congressional reps use for various types of communication. For instance, an email is assumed to represent the thoughts of 5 other constiuents, a phone call, 20, and a paper letter, 50. My numbers are a guess, but IIRC the paper letter carries the most weight as far as representatives surmising constiuent opinion based on feedback. So it would behoove your cause if you also sent a paper letter.

Re:Why fret over privacy loss?

[Jafafa Hots]

if this information is correct, it explains a lot.

I was kinda stupid when I was 18 too.

Re:Why fret over privacy loss?

[timmyf2371]

And therein lies the problem; I don't trust the Government - not the US Government, not the UK Government, and not the European Parliment. I'm sure others feel the same way. Furthermore, trust is earned, not deserved. And with the various lies and actions carried out by western Governments in recent times, they have a long way to go before they'll even have a chance of convincing me that they're trustworthy.

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.

Re:Buckle Up

[moorewr]

>"You're deluded, dude. 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 are referring to the Washington Posts slanted "snap poll" of only 500 respondents.
Newseeek has conducted a larger poll since with proper methodology and has found:

41% say necessary tool, 53% say goes too far.

Atrios link

In any case, the extent of the violation of my privacy and my rights guaranteed by the constitution are not measured by counting snouts.

Imagine what it saved the telecoms

[Esion Modnar]

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.

Thank you, Sheyenne.

[MattC413]

If you did reply seriously, great. I now know that you are 22 years old, not 18.

A search with this info using Peoplefinders.com yields a YORK, SHEYENNE, 22 years of age, with a relative (possibly mother) named YORK, MICHELE, age 53. For only $9.95, anyone here can find out more information about this person or their relatives, including more past addresses (and more specific addresses to confirm the poster's information).

See how privacy works? Once a leak occurs, it quickly becomes a flood.

Re:Buckle Up

[midimastah]

"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.

Re:Buckle Up

[TripMaster Monkey]

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:

• yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=185583&cid=153171 88
  
• yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=185583&cid=153177 59
  
• yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=185583&cid=153178 06
  
• yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=185583&cid=153178 68
  
• etc., etc., etc.
  

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">av ailable evidence.

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.

Damned If You Do

[rumblin'rabbit]

The U.S. legal system is so screwed up that it's now got me feeling sorry for big, evil corporations, no small feat that. I suspect that soon there will be no course of action that any corporation can take without getting sued for large amounts. In this case we have companies caught between the government and the consumer. Not nice.

60 Minutes had a story about Amgen a few months ago. Amgen were carrying out tests for a treatment for a serious disease. They had to halt the tests when side effects starting showing up - drug companies can not afford to take risks these days once they suspect there are problems.

So the patients sued Amgen - for halting the trials! They said the treatments were working.

60 Minutes thought the story was about how greedy and uncaring drug companies are. I thought the real story was about how it's fast becoming impossible to do business in the United States, even with the best of intentions.

Re:Read This.

[TripMaster Monkey]

How does this document fit in with your philosophy, then?

And what about this document?

Yes, there is a big difference, isn't there?

some hope?

[e**(i pi)-1]

• Domestic spying is costly for telecoms
  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.
• Domestic spying could reveal trading secrets
  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.
• Domestic spying accelerates standard encryption
  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.

An other reason for hope is the existence of organizations like EFF or ACLU.

"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

AT&T Privacy Policy

[midimastah]

After reading over my phone company's privacy policy, http://att.sbc.com/gen/privacy-policy?pid=2506#4 it seems that they have violated said policy. According to AT&T, "We must disclose information, when requested, to comply with court orders or subpoenas," but there clearly weren't any court orders involved with them turning the information over to the NSA, according to this article: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/business/38 59829.html.

AT&T says that the data is "Customer Proprietary Network Information (CPNI), http://att.sbc.com/gen/privacy-policy?pid=2566, and that "Protecting the privacy of your service and usage records is your right and our duty under federal law," although "our local SBC telephone company may also be required to disclose CPNI for legal and regulatory reasons such as a court order," but again there was clearly no court orders involved according to the article about Qwest's refusal to cooperate.

If they didn't break any laws (which I doubt, but is a possibility) they certainly have broken their promise to their customers. That might be grounds for legal action, false advertising perhaps?

Re:Buckle Up

[rossifer]

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

Re:Here's a scenario for you

[radtea]

You have a very active imagination there... You know what would really happen? The guys would show up, interview you and maybe ask if you could help them catch the guy.

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:

The case of Maher Arar suggests no such restrictions encumber U.S. efforts. In September 2002, Arar was returning to Canada from Tunisia when he was detained by U.S. immigration authorities while in transit at JFK. He was held in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn for 12 days and interrogated, he said, by FBI and immigration officials. Then he was put on a small plane, and after a stopover in Washington, flown to Amman, Jordan, where Arar was handed over to Jordanian authorities. He said the Jordanians beat him for hours, and then took him to Syria. His Syrian captors tortured him, beating him on the palms, hips, and lower back with electric cables.

After Arar's release, which caused a storm in Canada but barely raised a whisper in the U.S., Syrian authorities said they had no interest in him, and had interrogated him in a show of goodwill towards the U.S. Arar believed his interrogation was largely related to a casual acquaintance, a terrorism suspect who has also been released from jail in Syria.

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...

Re:Buckle Up

[TripMaster Monkey]

The reason I "bragged" about my math score on the GRE exam is that a) someone explicitly questioned my math ability in a insulting way, and b) it is an objective measure.

As has been said before, your alleged results of the GRE mean little, although you seem to use this argument on a regular basis. From the linked article:

I don't usually brag about myself, but when I am insulted like that I feel that I have the right to brag to some extent. I scored in the top 1% of the Graduate Records Exam (GRE), which is taken by engineering graduates to get into graduate school.

"Don't usually brag", huh? On the contrary, it looks like 'bragging' is your standard M.O..

I have published many papers since then, but they would be more or less meaningless to someone not in my field.

This claim intrigued me, so I decided to do some research. What I found was intriguing. While the majority of search results seeem to be posts by Russ on various bulletin boards touting his bona fides, very few seemed to be in regards to actual work done by him in his ostensible field of expertise. Several results, however, stood out:

• A vapid cheerleading of Case Closed by Gerald Posner, proponent of the lone-assassin theory of the JFK assassination.
  
• An argument disputing the validity of poll results especilly amusing given his reliance on the Washington Post poll maintaining that 63% of the populace is in favor of government surveillance without a court order.
  
• A post in which he derides a former colleague for 'conspiracy theories', and denies accusations by said colleague of gerrymandering content submitted by said colleague, attributing the changes as editing for 'readability' purposes (although he expressly admits 'inadvertently' changing the meaning of the text on occasion, as well as publishing said changes without the original submitter's approval.
  

And just in case you're not convinced by now that Russ is a right-wing shill, here's his defenses of Intelligent Design:

• The Myth of the Blind Watchmaker
  
• Is Intelligent Design Theory Scientific?
  
  Russ Paielli stands exposed as a right-wing astroturfer, and his posts should be weighed accordingly.
  
  And if you are so smart, I recommend you grow up sometime soon.
  
  Excellent parting shot, Russ. Worthy of Brit Hume.
  

The Founders would be ashamed

[mclaincausey]

The message of current US policy is that freedom is weak. Freedom cannot withstand a single terrrorist attack.

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.