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FBI May Get Easier Access To Internet Activity
olsmeister writes "It appears the White House would like to make it easier for the FBI to obtain records of a person's internet activities without a court order to do so, via the use of an NSL. While they have been able to do this for a long time, it may expand the type of information able to be gathered without a court order to include things like web browsing histories."
It seems like on civil liberties issues Obama is being almost as bad as Bush. There's something deeply wrong with my country when I read a headline and my first thought is "Well, at least this President isn't having people tortured."
The usual solutions . . . unless they're planning to outlaw those too?
Mod Me Up. You'll make a grown man cry.
Always treat every single thing you do online as if anyone could see what you are doing. If you don't want people to know you are visiting certain sites, then don't visit them. If you don't want people to know your opinion about something, don't write it on Facebook.
Treat everything you do online as if you have zero privacy. That way, in case something goes screwy, you have no surprises waiting for you.
Living With a Nerd
I'm sorry but I have a sense of Privacy in my life and the thought of some bureaucrat being able to snoop on my traffic or anything they want without a warrant is to damn Orwellian for my taste.
We have laws to protect our rights, among those are the rights to Privacy. Why the hell then do we allow the Executive Branch of government trounce on those rights because of National Security? Just because
I use technology to communicate doesn't mean I subrogate my rights to keeping those communications confidential unless I decide to make them public. Yes, the Internet is public but what I have on my computer
is private. If they have a suspicion of illegal activity, get a warrant, make the case in front of a judge and then and only then can they do these things.
Frankly, I think I'll be like Johnny Depp and get my own Fuck Off Island if these damn so-called security experts keep pushing our Privacy into the trash.
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
Power cannot and will not be compartmentalized. A government that has the ability to give you everything you ever wanted also, by the simple reality of power, has the ability to take everything you ever had.
Do not ignore the big picture. A government should not only be measured by individual laws and mandates, but as a single entity in reference to its power over the people. In other words, the reason the FBI is able to enact this form of oppression is because government is big enough.
Things that can be abused, will be abused.
This is especially true when people working for law enforcement agencies have a sense of entitlement and no real accountability for their actions. There's a reason for warrants.
.... but this, along with a lot of changes made with the last few adminstrations is getting ridiculous. Why must those of us who are law abiding put up with our civil liberties being stripped away piece by layered piece until we are truly in Orwell's "1984". I know that the reason that is being touted is to help the FBI and other agencies catch those would mean to cause harm upon us, but this is not the right way to go about this.
To counter the arguement "If you've done nothing wrong, you've got nothing to hide", I have done nothing wrong and I simply would like to continue to have my privacy that is part of my civil liberties. Just because someone does no wrong doesn't mean they wish to be an open book.
I prefer my habits via driving, phoning, texting, or web surfing to be my business, not yours or anyone else's.
Life takes interesting turns, but the most interest is when you're off the beaten path.
...not vile corporations. They have your best interests at heart. The infallible, incorruptible regulators must have information to do their job of protecting you from the evil businessmen (and, of course, from yourself). Just cooperate and no one will get hurt.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Here are some awkward related questions:
1. What do you think the US government's encryption-breaking capability REALLY is these days? e.g. for example,
are common encryption protocols and key-lengths used in, say, online banking and e-commerce readily crackable by the Feds?
2. Do security agencies of the federal government automatically flag for further investigation all people who use "an excess
amount of encrypted traffic"?
3. Does the FBI, a "domestic" intelligence agency, have the right to spy on foreign residents whose net transactions
traverse the US border? If they don't have the right, are they doing it anyway, or is that some other agency?
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
Politicians say whatever it takes to get into power, then they do what they wanted to do all along - until 6 months before the next election when they change tune just long enough to get a forgetful electorate to vote them in for another four years. And you fall for it every time. Sucker.
It doesn't matter whether you vote Republican, Democrat, Labour or Conservative (in the UK), you will get much the same thing.
If you want change, vote for another party or become a politician yourself. Failing that, you are wasting your time.
EVERYTHING is intercepted.
Yours In Akademgorodok,
Kilgore Trout
In the post 9/11 world, the National Security Letter is an indispensable tool and building block of an investigation that contributes significantly to the FBI’s ability to carry out its national security responsibilities by directly supporting the furtherance of the counterterrorism, counterintelligence and intelligence missions.
Don't you just love that "In the post 9/11 world" bit? They use that qualifier for everything that infringes on privacy. Its the "Think of the children" of the Military Industrial Complex. Yes there are bad people. Yes there are folks that want to do bad things. But again, trading privacy, and hence freedom, for security, well you know the rest.
'We are trying to prove ourselves wrong as quickly as possible, because only in that way can we find progress.' RPF
I believe Obama when he said there'll be no more torture in the U.S. I took that as an indicator that all torture will be carried out offshore from now on.
It seems to me that this is just moving further in the FBI's renewed interest under Obama to go after file-sharers without the need of the courts prove their need. Everybody knows file-sharers are terrorists in disguise, anyway.
ACTA is failing on a worldwide scale, so why not make sure they can move forward in other - easier - ways?
Stuff like this is why I joined the Electronic Frontier Foundation: https://www.eff.org/
"I'm not a quack, I'm a mad scientist! There's a difference." - Dr. Cockroach
Treat everything you do online as if you have zero privacy.
If I can't have privacy, I'd at least like anonymity. That's what we are really after anyhow. Privacy relies on your identity being known, but your activities remaining unknown.
Reply to That ||
false, the reason we don't torture has absolutely nothing to do with non-expectation of reciprocity. we should not torture because it is evil.
besides, who is the real "cultural enemy", who has mass-murdered the most innocents in this fake "war on terror". It isn't any muslim nation, and the "Taliban" being fought now is not the one that hosted bin Laden. We of the U.S. are creating more "Taliban" (disgruntled Afghans who resent foreign occupier and who are thus taking up arms). This "War on Terror" is about money and and having a rallying point for an ideology and an excuse to remove our liberties. It is not in any way about fighting those who attacked us nor is it making us more secure. It is a lie, a treason committed against We the People.
they wouldn't get much from my isp. i run linux from scratch on a vm with darknet because i don't like how my isp tries to dictate the dns server i use. a clear and obvious sign they glean info from user habits to sell to marketing firms. as far as data security goes the file system is loop-aes. i guess if i wanted to be paranoid i could point my cache to /dev/null. there is a howto for a tor based vm on encrypted file system that is a lot like my environment here: https://svn.torproject.org/svn/torvm/trunk/doc/design.html
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.