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Petraeus Case Illustrates FBI Authority To Read Email
An anonymous reader writes "Back in April, we discussed how the 1986 Electronic Communications Privacy Act says email that has resided on a server for more than six months can be considered abandoned. The recent investigation of General Petraeus brings this issue to light again, and perhaps to a broader audience. Under current U.S. law, federal authorities need only a subpoena approved by a federal prosecutor — not a judge — to obtain electronic messages that are six months old or older. Do you know anyone these days who doesn't have IMAP accounts with 6+-month-old mail on them?"
I don't have a useless IMAP account - I keep all my valuable messages on Hotmail
Petraeus was the head of our CIA and couldn't keep his own affair secret? If he can't camp a little action off on the side without getting caught, I sure don't want him in charge of our country's Department of Spies.
You could have a long track record of photos of you snorting blow off a shaved donkeys ass while giving it a reach around, and the CIA won't care as long as you're not embarrassed about it.
Wait, how did you get a hold of my family Christmas photos?
Patraeus is a public servant. The military and public servants agree to adhere to a higher standard of ethics when they take their jobs.
Making them easier to blackmail. I'd rather have a public servant agree to adhere to the letter of the law (as applicable to the rest of us) and not be put in a position where his/her behavior, acceptable for the general public, would put his/her job in jeopardy.
Patraeus is said to have sent 20 to 30,000 pages of emails to this lady.. What on earth was he sending her?
Probably a lot of copies of his military and CIA correspondence and reports (sanitized of course) for her use in his biography.
What others have said about the head of the CIA not being able to conceal an affair: This guy is an idiot for not knowing that his life is under scrutiny as a condition of having a secret clearance. Heck, here in Boeing territory, we all know that the DIA contacts our neighbors periodically to see if we (those of us with secret clearances) have 'unusual' lifestyle patterns that might signal possible compromise by foreign intelligence.
Funny anecdote: When conducting interviews, they ask my friends and neighbors not to discuss it with me. But their kids come over and say, "Hey mister! The FBI was asking my dad about you. Are you some sort of criminal or something?" [Yeah, I bury pesky kids in my back yard. So stay off my lawn!] So its pretty easy to find out when they do their rounds.
Have gnu, will travel.