Court Backs Broadband Wiretap Access

bitkid writes "Reuters reports that the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit rejected a petition aimed at overturning a FCC decision requiring broadband providers and others that offer Internet telephone service to comply with wiretap laws. According to the court, private networks would not be subject to the wiretap requirements. Just the same, networks connected with a public network would have to comply with the law." From the article: "The court concluded that the FCC requirement was a 'reasonable policy choice' even though information services are exempted from the government's wiretapping authority."

Comments

Join Tor Today!!!

[ferrellcat]

Enough is Enough! http://tor.eff.org/

Re:Join Tor Today!!!

[Dunbal]

Won't work, they'll tap you at the first hop (the cable company's router) if they have to.

      Nahh they'll just throw you in jail on suspicion of being a terrorist, and a judge will claim contempt until you give them the encryption keys.

Encryption

[Harmonious Botch]

What's the point of a wiretap if we can encrypt? Or will encryption become illegal?

Re:Encryption

[Poppler]

What's the point of a wiretap if we can encrypt?

To spy on regular citizens. Real terrorists and criminals will use encryption, but the average person will not.

Re:Encryption

[kfg]

Real terrorists and criminals will use encryption, but the average person will not.

Therefore using encryption will be probable cause. Have nice day.

KFG

Re:Encryption

[Poppler]

To any rational person, it doesn't follow that if terrorists use encryption, then everyone who uses encryption is a terrorist. Of coarse, that won't stop the government from making that logical leap...

All that needs to be said...

[Anonymous Coward]

The court concluded that the FCC requirement was a 'reasonable policy choice' even though information services are exempted from the government's wiretapping authority.

Someone is overstepping their bounds, and needs to get slapped.

Re:All that needs to be said...

[HiThere]

Legalistically, he gave reasonable arguments.

Of course, accepting those arguments rather destroys the idea of thinking of the courts as either the guardians of justice or the guardians or our rights, or anything else that is traditionally used to justify their existence. It instead turns them into the guardians of the status quo, provided it's supported by those in power. (I.e., not EVEN just the guardians of the status quo, but only a restricted subset of that which doesn't much need guarding.)

But he quoted various laws (that I never agreed to or authorized any of my "representatives" to agree do [Here representatives refers to "representational democracy" and refers to not only members of the House, but also to Senators and elected members of both the judiciary and the executive branch]). There is a totally insane number of laws, so I accept that he quoted the laws accurately. That has nothing to do with justice, but only with legalism.

If I accept that he ruled as the laws and procedures require, then I am simultaneously accepting that the court system is intrinsically void of justice. That though justice may occasionally be found there, it is purely by happenstance. His ruling made NO appeal to justice. ALL that was mentioned was laws and precedents. Now there are enough varied precedents that generally lawyers on both sides of any case can quote precedents to support their point of view, so any appeal to precedent without a simultaneous demonstration of how this precedent yield justice in this situation is immediately suspect. When the decision itself appears to be without justice, then it is imperative that the court demonstrate how it actually *is* just. I did not find that in the file.

Obviously, IANAL. I *am* a citizen. And decisions like this one have left me two steps short of voting the straight anarchist ticket. (A useless gesture, admittedly, and that's good, since any avowed anarchist who is a party member is an obvious hipocrite...well, unless they are syndicalist or some such. They make me want to agree with the Nihilists, but I remember how that led to Stalin.)

Given judgements like this, I can understand why the feds are so anxious to render jury trials impotent. Corrupt to the core.

I'm fine with this...

[HotBlackDessiato]

...and would like to take this opportunity to freely voice my ardent support for the current administration, congress, judiciary and the brave men and women at homeland security. You make it possible for me to have no alternative but to state my views thusly from now on when in public. Thanks a bunch.

e are going to hell in a handbasket

[Anonymous Coward]

That goddamn neocon has taken more liberties from us in the past 6 years then the combined total of all presidents. All in the name of fighting Global terrorism. Fucking please.....

Congress(House) votes down Net neutrality in the name of better service to consumers (fucking corporate profit!!!!!!) and more censorship than China I'll bet....
Republicans are facists
Democrats are Socialists.
Liberatarians(sp?) are nutbags...
Green Party is for saving pigeons...

Damn isn't there a party left for the common man......

The only people who have it good in this country or lying politicians, corporate whores, scumbag lawyers, and slimy lobbyists...

Re:Plead the 5th or ignorance

[vertinox]

Nahh they'll just throw you in jail on suspicion of being a terrorist, and a judge will claim contempt until you give them the encryption keys.

IANAL but I've been told by one that it is often to your benefit in certain situations to plead the 5th, refuse to testify, or if they won't allow for that claim ignorance that you have fogotten even though you will end up with some type of punishment or contempt in court.

But only if the punishment of what the crime is if it outweighs the charge of contempt.

The truth of the conversation was whether or not it was ok to refuse to take a breathalyzer test. If you refuse to take it, you can get your license supsended up to 12 months, but if you take it and were convicted of drunk driving you could face jail time plus 5 years suspension...

Now don't everyone go refusing breath tests now because these laws vary state to state, but the lawyer also told me without hard evidence it is easier to me off (errr don't ask) with a judge or jury because beyond reasonable doubt means there is real evidence that you commited a crime... Not hearsay that since you refused the test that you must be drunk.

However... Like I said before talk to your lawyer if you really want to know about the rules of this in your state (some states have refusal means a lot more)

So to apply to this situation and the moral of this situation... If you ever find yourself in a room full of FBI agents demanding your encryption keys... Explain to them it is your constitutional right (the 5th) to remain silent and you wish to speak to your lawyer so he can advise you how to proceed.

If a judge is ordering your encryption keys to be released, then have a frank discussion with your lawyer over whether or not the information that is contained on those drives will get you more jailtime if convicted than jailtime for refusing to comply.

Although... If you find yourself strapped on a table with a room full of NSA or CIA agenents with one of them weilding a cattle prod and other asking for those keys in a stern german accent... Well... Best of luck then.

Re:Wiretapping is actually a legitimate power

[Bob_Robertson]

Wiretapping is a legitimate power with a court order, as per the 4th Amendment. It was the 4th Amendment which granted the power to search in the first place.

And the problem with "a fascist ass like Bush" is that any power granted to any level of government will be abused. No matter how noble the present office holder is, there will be a fascist little twit there at some point.

That is why granting power to government doesn't work. It has never worked. Leviathan always grows, always gains more power to itself. Any "emergency" power today will be tomorrows "Legitimate Power". That's why the American Constitution has no provision for suspension of said Constitution. If it did, an "emergency" would be quickly manufactured and those Constitutional limitations on government power forsaken.

There are those who see "illegal combatant" as just another excuse for an abuse of power they want to do anyway.

Bob-

A fake 'I've been caught' decrypt key

[HotBlackDessiato]

I'm repeating what someone else remarked here when I say there is a solution. Given the privacy climate, it might also become the standard encryption strategy. Follow this: You have a regular private key which does decrypt, and a fake 'I've been caught' key which decrypts into something innocuous.

Add features to make it indistinguishable(can this be done??) from the regular decryption, and I think what you end up with is actual privacy. Although with one very upset government on our hands, but that's another day.

IMHO the government has severely shot itself, and by extension, us in the footal region by overreaching and prompting this flavour of technical reaction. This is an irreversible response...when lowly citizens taste their first control over their personal data, there's no reason, from their perspective to go back. Is there?

"Well since I know I'm doing nothing wrong, there's no reason for my info to be examined. Since it's now my choice, I'll keep encypting"

See, now the argument goes both ways.

Re:A fake 'I've been caught' decrypt key

[EndlessNameless]

What you describe with a fake key is not possible. I would suggest reading up on symmetric key cryptography.

While I suppose it is possible to use a crypto PROGRAM that spews out innocuous text in response to your fake key, the government investigators will most certainly be decrypting the cyphertext with their own application. The crypto algorithms just perform a series of mathematical operations on either a block of data or a stream of data. There is no known way to make one instance of cyphertext decrypt into two different sensible plaintext outputs depending on which of two keys are used. I suppose someone could design an algorithm to do this, but it sure as hell won't be easy.

No existing crypto algorithm in wide use has the ability to do what you describe (not Rijndael, not DES, nothing). Using your fake key on the real cyphertext will return a bunch of gibberish, which will make it very obvious that you gave them a fake key.

You might want to look into something else. There is a related field, stenography, which deals with hiding the existence of your data. Combining good encryption with good stenography can make it very difficult to discover you data, as an attacker would have to find it first, then attempt to decrypt it. Handing over your crypto keys doesn't do anyone any good if they cannot find coherent cyphertext to decrypt.