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Obama Wants Broader Internet Wiretap Authority
An anonymous reader writes "The White House plans to deliver a bill to Congress next year that will require Internet-based communication services that use encryption to be capable of decrypting messages to comply with federal wiretap orders. The bill will go beyond CALEA to apply to services such as Blackberry email. Even though RIM has stated that it does not currently have an ability to decrypt messages via a master key or back door, the bill may require them to. Regarding this development, James Dempsey of the Center for Democracy and Technology commented on the proposal, saying, 'They basically want to turn back the clock and make Internet services function the way that the telephone system used to function.'"
Just a few days ago they raid the anti war movement and now right before the election they want to discuss this? This is a politically stupid time to talk about broader wiretap authority!
the more they stay the same (or get worse).
At least they are trying to make it legal. I'm sure the TURRISTS won't just use standalone encryption.
Now they want to direct all the spy agencies on the new "terrorist" the American citizen. They want to bug our houses, tap our phones, point satellites and drones at us, have informants stalk us, and feed the information back to the local police so that if we break even the slightest most esoteric arcane law we get raided, arrested etc.
Replace "Obama" with "Bush" and it's "Bush Wants Broader Internet Wiretap Authority." and the reason is to help law enforcement? Privacy and civil liberties should be given up to help the police put us in jail easier? They have to do a better job justifying the unlimited surveillance powers they claim to need. There aren't that many terrorists, unless they plan on going back to the 60s and raiding all the anti war movement hippy types and Alex Jones listeners who happen to know what encryption is.
There is an FBI already. There is an NSA already. If it's a national security concern the NSA already can crack the encryption so why do we have to make it so easy that any 2 bit local cop can do it? If it's about national security I'm sure they already can crack most of it if not all of it. If it's about law enforcement then it's not worth the sacrifice. There aren't enough criminals to justify it and most criminals aren't using encryption.
The only way they can justify this that I can see is with the "It's more efficient, it saves money", unfortunately even if it does save money it doesn't offer anything to the citizen. It doesn't make us feel safer and probably doesn't actually make us safer either. For a lot of us it will make us feel less safe because whenever a person feels under the microscope they usually feel less safe.
Federal law enforcement and national security officials are preparing to seek sweeping new regulations for the Internet, arguing that their ability to wiretap criminal and terrorism suspects is “going dark” as people increasingly communicate online instead of by telephone.
Of course, the New York Times article is way better than the Faux News article but my submission this morning turned into a paywall.
Bad, bad, very bad idea. Every academic says this is stupid, again from the original article:
Steven M. Bellovin, a Columbia University computer science professor, pointed to an episode in Greece: In 2005, it was discovered that hackers had taken advantage of a legally mandated wiretap function to spy on top officials’ phones, including the prime minister’s.
The government is trying to protect us by forcing us to be less secure and more vulnerable. That logic simply does not follow. I'm not against responsible internet wiretaps but this is the opposite of responsible.
My work here is dung.
The terrorists will develop their own encryption schemes so using wiretaps would be completely worthless anyway. The mafia is smart enough to outsmart this, street gangs are smart enough, terrorists are smart enough. This is to watch the civilian population like you and me.
Gee, where have we heard these arguments before?
Palm trees and 8
It is the natural tendency of political power to expand and consolidate over time. History has confirmed this over and over again. Like a mega-corporation hungry for more control over the market, government will keep pushing to expand their revenue and power over the people, like clockwork, year after year.
There's a reason why the elite at the top of the pyramid are swimming in wealth, and it's not because they're satisfied with the amount of control they have over the populace. Government is a business, and like any business, their primary objective is profit. The difference, of course, is that government holds the special right to generate market share through coercion, rather than persuasion.
Hope. Was not that the so called banner from 'Democrats' during their endless waa waa about Bush. Not much needs to be said. Gitmo? Ha. Iraq? Ha. Afganistan, Ha.
Obama is gone after 4 years, and will be hated by both sides.
We`re all equal
Hey America,
How is that Hope and Change working out for you?
Sincerely,
George Bush
I, like so many others, had the audacity of hope that Obama was a good man and interested in a better America... a second coming of JFK. (Yeah, I know there are people who will say JFK was the anti-christ.) But, instead of his promised removal of Bush administrations attacks on our freedoms and privacy, he persisted in it and defended it. Some people said "but this is normal! He is probably reviewing it before he makes changes!" How about now? No? Illegal wiretapping program is still running. And now he wants MORE.
So, Obama and other players in government HATE our freedom and HATE our privacy and will stop at nothing until both are gone. They make claims of defending and protecting our freedoms while they take them away. They make claims of "terrorists" hating our freedoms, yet the only ones who are attacking them are our own government. ... and still no one cares. We are all too busy trying to figure out how and why we are all getting obese and getting diabetes to concern ourselves with where the government and big business is taking our country.
When (if?) conservatives say "the government should not have that power", what they mean is "the liberals currently in government should not have that power, but it is okay for our side".
When (if?) liberals say "the government should not have that power", what they mean is "the conservatives currently in government should not have that power, but it is okay for our side".
Both conveniently forget the problem of not whether YOU will not abuse the power when asking for it, but once granted whether or not those elected AFTER you are gone will abuse the power. For those playing at home, the answer is invariably "YES".
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
What does the DNC-NBC say about it?
Nothing.
I'm guessing that's some regurgitated joke about MSNBC. If it is, you didn't even bother to check their front page. They seem to be running the regular AP story about it. Look, when the New York Times are the only ones willing to get off their asses and actually do some work in order to garner eyeballs, it's hard to find other sources. Even the Fox News article appears to be entirely based off the New York Times article. Even the MSNBC article (and I'm guessing AP at large) cites them:
The Times said the Obama proposal would ... The Times said that some privacy and technology advocates say the regulations would create weaknesses in the technology that hackers could more easily exploit.
My work here is dung.
If the white house and the rest of the government want to continue to litigate our freedoms away, the least they could do is show how these programs actually have caught real terrorists. Because, quite frankly if they can't even show that, they are eroding our rights away for nothing other than more control. There are several reasons why we haven't had a terrorist attack since 9/11 and none of those are thanks to the government.
A) Natural stupidity. Terrorists aren't exactly smart, remember the "times square bomber" who used as his detonation device.... firecrackers? Yeah, it takes planning to pull off an attack and quite honestly the terrorists don't have that ability.
B) Passengers in public transit. If you look like you are going to blow up or hijack a plane, the passengers will take you down. Ever since 9/11 people associate hijacking = run into a building rather than the pre-9/11 mindset of "do nothing, wind up in Cuba, get on a plane back home".
C) Terrorists aren't common. This idea that there are millions of terrorists trying to kill you all the time is laughable and has no basis in fact.
Granted, these laws are pure BS no matter how many "terrorists" they've caught, but if the government can't even show a single terrorist caught using these, and a real terrorist that could actually cause serious harm, the citizens should strike these laws down even faster.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
Hey Obama, spare any change?
Oh, right, America's attention span is so low that they forgot that they were holding hands in a circle chanting all the slogans and catch-phrases spewed by his campaigners.
Meet the new boss
Same as the old boss
America, you'll get fooled again
As long as they have their Sunday Night Football, we won't have anything to worry about.
The list can go on. Thinking that the Democrats are for personal freedom is outdated thinking. Both major parties are led by totalitarian control freaks.
I want to be very clear on this statement, on behalf of GNU Telephony. It is not simply that we will choose to openly and publicly defy the imposition of such an illegitimate law, but we will explicitly continue to publicly develop and distribute free software (that is software that offers the freedom to use, inspect, and modify) enabling secure peer-to-peer communication privacy through encryption directly to the public worldwide as it is needed especially in nations, such as the United States, where basic human freedoms seem most threatened.
To fully understand the nature of such surveillance and societies, imagine being among several hundred million people who each wake up each day having to prove they are not a "terrorist" by whatever arbitrary means the government has decided to both define the terms of such a crime and whatever arbitrary means they might choose to define you as such. It is a society who's very foundation is built on the idea of everyone being guilty until proven innocent. It is the imposition of an illegitimate society, and one that probably will ultimately require a revolutionary response.
David Alexander Sugar
Chief Facilitator
GNU Telephony
The United Arab Emirates, followed by their huge cousin Saudi Arabia, are shutting down Blackberry until RIM lets them spy on its data in realtime. RIM has been able to argue it doesn't have such a backdoor feature. Obama has the clout to force this Canadian company to create one. And then the Saudis and the rest of their medieval tyranny neighbors will spy on us. They don't need no steenkin' warrants. And neither does Obama, if he personally decides it's a "state secret".
--
make install -not war
Are you sure? Seems like a continuation of the old.
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
I love how the OP gave this article a title of "Obama Wants . . ." (well, the submission used "US President wants. . ."). Not the FBI or the DOJ or the NSA, or even "Feds Want . . ." in order to be comprehensive; but Obama. As if this was some devious idea Obama had while dining on babies, rather than something the law enforcement and national security comunities have been working up for more than a half-decade. Of course he's responsible for the actions of the administration while he's president; but that's a long way from this being part of his nefarious plan for fascism. I looked for the quote from Obama or a spokesperson of his in TFA -- something, *anything* indicating this was an initiative specifically coming from him -- but couldn't find it. Nonetheless, just as the OP intended, 90% of the replies have been about Obama, rather than about the actual regulations. Way to be manipulated, folks. Given this, how unsurprising that the story link accompanying the submission was to Fox News, even though that Fox News story does absolutely nothing more than quote a story in the NYT.
And to head it off at the pass -- it shouldn't be necessary, but someone here will try it anyway -- I can't stand Obama. I think he's been terrible in a variety of ways. I just also can't stand people who are intellectually dishonest in an effort to score political points.