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FBI Says Paper Trails Are Optional
WerewolfOfVulcan writes "According to this Washington Post article, the FBI says that it doesn't have to comply with even the unconstitutional provisions of the Patriot Act when asking for phone records. Apparently that whole due process thing doesn't include them. Funny thing is, they've apparently already been doing it for years." Quoting: "Under past procedures, agents sent 'exigent circumstances letters' to phone companies, seeking toll records by asserting there was an emergency. Then they were expected to issue a grand jury subpoena or a 'national security letter,' which legally authorized the collection after the fact. Agents often did not follow up with that paperwork, the inspector general's investigation found. The new instructions tell agents there is no need to follow up with national security letters or subpoenas. The agents are also told that... they may make requests orally, with no paperwork sent to phone companies. Such oral requests have been made over the years in terrorism and kidnapping cases, officials said."
Funny thing is, they've apparently already been doing it for years.
Oh yeah, that's funny. it's almost a real riot.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
Well the committee for State Security, (Russian translation KGB) is alive and well in the USA. It now comes out what I have been posting for some time that this was an effort to trounce the constitution.
Never Politically Correct ~ I prefer the facts If you don't like what I say, get a life, or comment yourself.
I'd make a funny about "In Soviet Amerika", but it just ain't funny anymore.
We need to step on these bastards necks NOW.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Well, phone companies have never had the greatest track record on upholding the rights of their customers, so it's no wonder the FBI tells its agents they don't have to fill out any paperwork. The companies just bend right over.
Some attitudes replaced or by cgi optimizes
I pick and choose the laws I obey as well, and after reading this, I feel even more vindicated when I do so.
Blar.
The Constitution is the ultimate "law of the land". So change "probably" to "definitely" :(
... bitch at your phone companies.
This isn't wire taps, this is getting your phone records. This is social engineering.
You could do this too, you don't have to be a federal agent.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Well, of course it doesn't. What are you gonna do, call the cops? Oh, wait, the FBI are the cops!
Silly citizens.
Well yeah. If you were going to use the powers of the USAPATRIOT act inappropriately, why would you keep a paper trail? That way the worst you can be accused of is not keeping the record, not whatever it is you actually did.
Insufficient accountability morphs directly into a complete lack of accountability. Who is surprised by this? Who did not anticipate this over five years ago? Those who were blinded by fear. Everyone else was either outraged by the potential -- and thus innevitable -- abuse, or lying and appealing to the fearful. Don't worry, there doesn't need to be any safeguards because we promise to use our powers wisely and justly, and besides, don't you hate Terrorists?!
The enemies of Democracy are
Hmm. That law they cite provides a justification for a telephone provider to turn over records; it does not provide a justification for law enforcement to request the records. Semantics, but important.
That the law clarifies under what kind of emergency such requests can be made is good-with-a-capital-G. What remains to be seen is if the old definition of emergency ("I can't be bothered with paperwork") will continue to be the de facto reason for a subpoena-less request.
IMO, any federal agent who acts outside the law wrt information requests should be prosecuted. They've broken the law no less than someone who smoked a joint -- and the cumulative negative effects on society are probably far worse for those who act outside the law in the name of the law.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
No, this is abuse of authority.
This is about removing accountability.
We don't need a paper trail just for a paper trail. We need one to make sure that the requests are legitimate and fair.
All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.
eleven plus two / twelve plus one
the submitter seems to have his pants in a knot over the FBI's misconduct, but he fails to realize that all police in all countries try to pull dirty tricks like that, and have done so for many decades. The difference between a free society governed by the rule of law and a dictatorship is that, in a free society, telcos have the liberty and *duty* to tell the police to sod off and come back with a proper warrant.
That US telcos comply to such oral requests alone should tell you something of the state of this country, which is the merging of the corporate world and the state. As in country that have this other form of government...
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
That summary is completetly out of touch with the actual article. If you RTFA there is no mention of the Patriot Act, equally the /.summary doesn't even bother to mention the unconstitutional provisions of the Patriot Act in question.
Thanks for that completely useless and misleading article summary.
How did they find out about this? Interviews?
on CSPAN radio. (What a life, eh?) Long story short - one rep said in response to the FBI saying "they'll do their best" to clean up the situation, was "If you don't clean it up, you won't have these NSO/NSL letters to worry about any more." (Taking them away).
The FBI counsel came back to that whole "in an emergency" thing, but they cannot gaurantee that it's an emergency. They couldn't even gaurantee it was part of an investigation (a requirement). What a mess we've created these last six years.
Leave the gun, take the cannoli -- Clemenza, The Godfather
This is a story about the FBI calling up and making a request that doesn't have the force of law. If you want to do something about this call up your phone company and ask what the policy is regarding oral requests from the FBI. If you don't like it, use a different one.
And we're not talking about wiretaps, here. We're talking about records of who you call. The courts have ruled, over the years, that this data is not yours. It belongs to the phone company. In fact, those court rulings are probably what prompted the change in policy.
There, fixed that for you.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Short answer to your last question: No.
"I, a concerned citizen of this country, was left feeling unsatisfied and betrayed by the very government I am forced to pay to support."
Welcome to - the nature of the state. You have just learned what every OTHER citizen of every OTHER country in the entire history of the world has learned at some point.
"I'm growing tired of hearing about how the democratic process will repair these evils. How? When?"
Never. No democracy ever has and no democracy ever will. Because democracies that reach this point are no longer democracies - if they ever were.
When you reach this point, revolution or destruction by outside attack are the only solutions left.
It's a tossup which one - or both - will occur to the US and when, but it is inevitable.
And you haven't seen anything yet. Wait until the war on Iran starts, and car bombs start going off all over the place here as the US economy sinks into the sunset due to quadruple oil prices and the Chinese dumping the US dollar. The Constitution is history. Fergeddaboutit.
The only thing you need to understand is: the people really running this country WANT THIS TO HAPPEN. To paraphrase the "feel good" movement, everything that happens happens for a reason - and it serves them (not us.)
But if you're smart enough (which I apparently am not), you can make it serve you, too...
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
Much wiretapping in the US is actually outsourced to Verisign. Verisign's NetDiscovery center provides a full-service wiretapping service, with hooks into telcos, cellular networks, VoIP providers, cable TV systems, wireless data networks, and ISPs. Verisign's proprietary back door into the SS7 telephone signaling control network makes this not only possible, but allows Verisign to offer wiretapping services at a lower cost.
Verisign is extending their wiretapping network internationally. Italy is already hooked up.
So if Congress or the press wants to look into this matter, the place to go is Verisign's Network Security Office. Also, attending Intelligence Support Systems for Lawful Interception, Cybercrime Investigations and Intelligence Gathering Conference and Expo in May, in Washington, DC. "Now that most nations of the world require lawful interception support of VoIP and other IP-based services, ISS World Spring 2007 is a must attend event." Talks include "Best Practices for Successful Deployments of Word Spotting Technology" and "Content and P2P Monitoring and Filtering". Major topics for this year include inteconnecting multiple intercept systems to allow easier remote access.
Even if wiretapping is a teensy bit OT from TFA, the Verisign stuff is still very interesting and consistent with the drift of this thread.
I share many of your fears but not your complete lack of hope. You are right on about the terrible consequences of a possible war with Iran. Such would most definitely result in the collapse of US global hegemony and domestic security.
These problems both domestic and foreign, stem from our current neo-conservative, ultra-nationalist world view (at least among our elected representatives, both Dem. and Rep., legislative and executive). I would point out that we put too much emphasis on the platitude "democracy" and not on freedoms (speech/expression, religion, from want) and rule of law. Autocracies and constitutional monarchies can sometimes provide these freedoms better than democracies (e.g. Wiemar Germany, the French Revolution, the current Iraqi "democracy"). Viewed in these terms, the global condition is nowhere nearly as dire as we now all think: the massive increase in quality of life in China, Russia, and many parts of the Middle East, though their regimes are not as "democratic" as the West.
Further establishing "democracies" or other governments that provide the freedoms and rule of law does not ensure that either the government or the people governed will agree with all US policy, contrary to the neo-conservative understanding that all "democracies" toe the US policy line. US citizens and their elected representatives are no exception with respect to the policy of the executive branch. And understanding that this disagreement is natural and may be completely innocent (i.e. one need not be an Islamic Fundamentalist to disagree with the government but could have a conflict of interest that is economic or social) will lead to less hard-line, no-holds-barred domestic and foreign policy.
When we think of things practically and take into account the other side's point of view, we begin to realize the benefit of more restrained policy both to ourselves and others. The more we can get others to think rationally, the more who will buy into it, including our own government and those of the Arab nations we are currently needlessly threatening (i.e. not all Arab nations hated the US before the Iraq, and still many depend on us to maintain a world order that makes them wealthy). We need fear mongering among neither the conservatives (i.e. "The whole united Muslim world wants to destroy the West") nor the liberals (i.e. "Put on your tin foil hat"), because both are equally hyperbolic and lead to dangerously extreme, reactionary behavior. I shared both your fear of Muslim reprisal and of Right Wing conspiracy. However, a careful, rational examination shows that the Muslim world is as fragmented and complex as the West, it has age old feuds and religious scisms as does the West (e.g. Al Qaeda/the Taliban and Iran almost went to war in the late 90s!). Further, right wing neo-conservative philosophy is less about conspiracy and more about a knee-jerk mass hysteria, ultra-nationalism, and near infinite greed. Simple, deliberate changes could begin to heal the rifts that we currently think are beyond repair. Just look at examples in history: France and England, the US and China.
I just recently read Ethical Realism: A Vision for America's Role in the World by John Hulsman and Anatlo Lieven (ISBN: 0375424458), and most of my opinions above are influenced by an Ethical Realist worldview. Though the book is more focused on foreign policy, its tenets of Ethical Realism could easily be applied to domestic policy as well. It was a fascinating read, and it illustrates the dangers of our current ultra-nationalist/fascist neo-conservative course, but also outlines some relatively sensible changes we could make to salvage both our foreign relations and our affairs at home.
Then they were expected to issue a grand jury subpoena or a 'national security letter,' which legally authorized the collection after the fact. Agents often did not follow up with that paperwork, the inspector general's investigation found. The new instructions tell agents there is no need to follow up with national security letters or subpoenas. The agents are also told that... they may make requests orally, with no paperwork sent to phone companies.
If the feds didn't follow up with the required paperwork, then does this even qualify as a patriot-act request? Seems like the companies could follow up in next month's phone bill:
Dear Customer,
On Jan 1, 2007 the FBI invoked the patriot act to ask for the records of John Q Smith, saying they would provide us with a subpoena in a timely fashion to keep this request confidential.
The subpoena was never brought to us. We thought you might like to know.
Sincerely,
Phone Company
I am not a sig.
"Why shouldn't he be on my phone - he's on everybody else's!"
These days, our government seems to be doing everything they can to realize the wettest of the wet dreams of our enemies. Want a way to recruit Muslim extremists? Here you go! Want a way to solidify flagging support for your nutty-extremist presidency? Pick a fight with the US and get Bush & Company to saber rattle and rally your base behind you! Want a way to stimulate your softening oil driven economy? Act the ass, get the US to threaten you, and cause oil prices to increase due to uncertainty without cutting back supply and get a shot in the arm! Want somebody to take out the dangerous neighbor who kept you from being a dominant power in your region? Taken care of! The list of things that nobody (until now) was stupid enough to do goes on and on.
This whole administration has been dream after dream come true for Iran because they seem to have no problem taking their eyes off the strategic ball in favor of short-term blunt-instrument ideology-driven fireworks. I used to think that they were too smart to make idiotic decisions like invading Iran, but I've learned to set aside my doubts and just wait and see. Either way it's a win-win situation for Ahmadinejad and the powers that be, all thanks to years of complete mismanagement of our foreign policy and military resources.
An interesting anagram of "BANACH TARSKI" is "BANACH TARSKI BANACH TARSKI"
Unfortunately, the bootup process is powered by blood.
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