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EFF Wins Release of Secret Court Opinion: NSA Surveillance Unconstitutional
mspohr writes "For over a year, EFF has been fighting the government in federal court to force the public release of an 86-page opinion of the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC). Issued in October 2011, the secret court's opinion found that surveillance conducted by the NSA under the FISA Amendments Act was unconstitutional and violated 'the spirit of' federal law."
Shut it down......Shut it all down NOW!!!
Surprise, surprise. Obummer lies.
Organize your tits! Sniff your crotch mustard! ;)
You at the other side of the pond have generated a farce beyond fantasy. Create secret court, abuse powers, secret court says "non", ignore, expand and repeat.
As a tech I'd say your system has found a resonance point where the loop-gain is so much greater than one that it might cause the earth's rotation to change....
The documents showed that the problems were relatively small when compared with the vast scale of N.S.A. surveillance conducted from the United States on noncitizens abroad. The ruling estimated that the agency intercepts more than 250 million communications that way each year. And the N.S.A. fixed the problems to the courtâ(TM)s satisfaction, the documents showed.
Interesting...
Free Martian Whores!
So they got a court opinion that said it was unconstitutional, yet they just ignored it. Someone must be accountable for that! Aren't all US federal officers sworn to uphold the constitution of the United States of America - all the way up to the president? At the very least, someone should be tried for contempt of court. No matter the justification and possible reasons for the NSA program, they can't just ignore the highest law of the land. Or can they? It is a very slippery slope.
Meus subcriptio est nocens Latin quoniam bardus populus reputo is sanus callidus
Comment removed based on user account deletion
But the documents also revealed further problems. In particular, Judge Bates portrayed the issue, which the N.S.A. had brought to the secret surveillance courtâ(TM)s attention after discovering that it had been happening for several years, as part of a broader pattern of misleading the oversight court about its domestic spying activities.
âoeThe Court is troubled that the governmentâ(TM)s revelations regarding N.S.A.â(TM)s acquisition of Internet transactions mark the third instance in less than three years in which the government has disclosed a substantial misrepresentation regarding the scope of a major collection program,â he wrote.
There need to be penalties. Someone should be brought up on charges.
Free Martian Whores!
They'll be put on Double Secret Probation.
So now what?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
How exactly does it get out of the FISA court into the Supreme Court and would Roberts have to recuse himself because he appointed most of the FISA judges?
Time for more popcorn.
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
The same way he "hasn't" been all along. When the lies are coming from the highest levels of the government, they can brand anybody they want as anything they like. One can only hope that the EFF is large and influential enough to cope with any fallout from this.
Looks like it might be time to donate again. There's something ridiculous about the need to buy decent government by donating to a charitable organization, but hey, they're doing better than most, and most of "us" (Slashdot readers) can probably afford it. Normally I'd suggest the option of doing it by way of the Humble Bundle, but currently they don't include that option...
There's no place I could be, since I've found Serenity...
The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes a little longer.
Qu'on me donne six lignes écrites de la main du plus honnête homme, j'y trouverai de quoi le faire pendre.
This is legitimate prejudice for starting a revolution.
Your government and leading class has to learn how democracy gets done.
Everyone shall have this very definition of democracy hardwired in their brains for the centuries to come.
The evil doers will have to admit it painfully for best results, fear has to change sides.
The world is watching you USA.
Whenever these stories come out, I am uncomfortably reminded of conservative constitution-worship. "As the nation teeters at the edge of fiscal chaos, observers are reaching the conclusion that the American system of government is broken. But almost no one blames the culprit: our insistence on obedience to the Constitution, with all its archaic, idiosyncratic and downright evil provisions."
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
There appears to be no accountability is the US Government any more.
Laws are only for the “little people” Taxes are only for the “little people”. Profits are only for the “real people”
Private profit, public bailouts. Money is free speech.
The question is, “What can we do?” Gerrymandering has made even our votes almost useless.
Any ideas?
and since when does a court rule on the "spirit" of the law.
what a lame ass story.
Nobody has ruled on if he is a whisleblower or not. The executive branch does not have the authority to determine that. Snowden undeniably released classified information. That makes it the Executive Branch's job to change him with releasing classified information, which they have done. The next step in the process is for Snowden to present his case to the Judicial Branch that the protections reserved for whistleblowers apply to him. We will see if that ever happens.
Don't worry, they didn't actually violate a law. It was the 'spirit' of the law that was violated.
Move along people, nothing to see here.
...probably because it would conflict with the interests of EA (see the Bundle's current front page).
Speaking of EA...WTF, Humble?
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
EFF Wins Release of Secret Court Opinion: NSA Surveillance Unconstitutional
Maybe my pessimism / cynicism have gone haywired, but I do not think this court ruling going to affect Obama administration's determination in construct the United Socialist Soviet States of America
NSA would not only still do whatever they do, in fact, I suspect that they would carry out EVEN MORE dastard projects to subvert (and also pervert ) the Constitutions in order to change the U.S. of A. into something akin to a dictatorial wolf which wears a layer of democratic skin
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
So the question is around the notion of "spirit" vs "letter"
The only thing related to privacy and the constitution is the 4th amendment. Now we can talk about all of the exceptions to this that the Supreme Court has allowed but the only interesting one is the notion of "in plain view"
Can this be taken to mean that if it use HTTP vs HTTPS it is in plain view and anyone can have a field day.
Can this be taken that if if route my traffic across any network that people can see it is in plain view and they can do with it what they want?
At the end of the day the current state of my country makes me sad but but another thing that has always made me sad is the limited privacy protections put forward by the constitution and bill or rights. The to have them even more limited by the courts is just one blow after another.
at the end of the day the lawyers are going to have fun
Honestly, because the law gives explicit exemption to whistleblower protections when the topic is national security.
If the Supreme Court ruled that some Government activity was unconstitutional, and the Government (including executive and legislative branches) just shrugged and continued said activity, what then? Or what if Congress voted to impeach the President, but he ignored this action, what then? Who enforces on the enforcers? Would this be the tipping point to civil war?
They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
So, they found out that the system they set up didn't work like it should. But instead of covering it up, they took the data to the FISA court, who agreed (vociferously) that they screwed up and they couldn't just forget about it - they had to expunge the data and change how they collected the data in the first place (you know, the stuff they do as part of national defense). And they did.
Holy shit, this is about as close to a non-story as you can get. But hey, go crazy. I'm buying stock in tin foil.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
To quote one of my favorite movie characters, "The shit is about to hit the fan and I want to be here to see it." (Dr. Lazarus in "Outland" in case you're curious.)
The publication of this court ruling is going to make it much easier for a federal judge and subsequent appellate judges to slam the NSA down hard. I'm not certain about the law on this but it might also make it possible to send certain NSA officials to prison. My prediction: Heads at the NSA are about to roll and I will not be surprised if one of them is Gen. Alexander. Because he is a serving general and this shit happened on active duty, he could be courtmartialed, be stripped of rank, and lose his pension, a just punishment I believe for such a grave violation of the people's civil rights.
Unfortunately, the heads will not be literally be rolling on the floor, and perhaps that's a good thing. It's nice to contemplate, however. It would have made one hell of a great game of pool on a diabolical billiard table. General Alexander's head would be the cue ball. Some people more evil than myself might possess the belief that a certain other person's head should be the 8-ball but I'm not one of them. But it's hilarious to visualize!
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.
Welp, looks like I'm done ever supporting Humble again.
Donate to the EFF right now. Do not wait. Donate this very minute.
In this case, its the type of pie you have to eat to buy it.
You're point is that Obama isn't the only one on the list of "five worst presidents in US history"?
Bush sucked in his second term. For example, he ran a huge budget deficit, over-spending by billions. Obama then over-spent by trillions. That makes Obama somehow okay, because he only sucks twice as bad as some other guy? (By most objective measures, Bush is in the worst 25%, his second term is in the worst 15%, and Obama's "bad" numbers are double Bush's. Obama's debt is roughly equal to ALL OTHER PRESIDENTS COMBINED.
So yeah, politicians suck. By the numbers, the current president does as much suckage as the sum total of every other president's suckage combined.
goddamn... how can we have a ruling that basically evaluates activity as unconstitutional and not only does word of that not get out but also nothing is done about said unconstitutional activity???!?! and we have to get the EFF to fight tooth and nail just to GET THAT DECISION OUT? like, "you're guilty of murder.... have a nice day. see ya around. don't worry, we won't tell anyone." system has rotted out. we're fucking doomed.
Stop voting for Democrats and Republicans. Pick a random 3rd party out of a hat if you have too, but please stop voting in elderly/senile authoritarian fucks.
You are mistaken. For example, I very publicly called out my Congressman for failing to support the amendment to end this shit. That's a Republican congressman whom I voted for. Then, I made sure that for two weeks his Facebook page featured me blasting his excuses for not doing something about this.
On this very page, I've called Bush, who I voted for based on his success as governor, "one of the worst presidents in history".
There are two ways you can support your "team". You can either support them in becoming the best, doing the best, or you can mindlessly pretend whatever they do is best. If my football team has a crappy quarterback, I say it. I say "let's figure out what we need in a replacement QB". Pretending that your QB is awesome as he fumbles every snap doesn't get you anywhere. All it does is make youlook stupid and your team continue to lose. The Democrats made a bad draft pick. The sooner they admit that the sooner they can improve.
In the meantime, the EFF's success in court goes a long way to undermine the claims of Snowden and his supporters that breaking the law was the only way to make this information public.
As a disillusioned Obama voter, I agree he deserves criticism but not for all of the debt problems. It's more nuanced than you make it out to be:
Bush snuck through a $1T Medicare Part D giveaway bill in the middle of the night to buy senior votes. Initial and ongoing costs went straight onto the public debt ledger. There's no realistic way to take it back.
Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, $3T, same as above, continuing costs stacked right onto the public debt for many years to come.
Destroyed economy because of deregulation and lack of oversight on his watch, many $Trillion, and the cost of required $700B stimulus and bailout bills were stacked onto the public debt. The Fed's balance sheet was turned upside down to avoid depression, who knows how much that cost the economy in real dollars because of lost jobs and confidence.
My point is that it's disingenuous to put all debt onto Obama's watch. Bush doubled the debt from $5T to $10T directly on his watch but the effects caused a lot of that Obama debt to be racked up. There isn't a clear way to separate it.
Now, complain about how it's criminal that Obama let the bankers go scot free, and how much debt we'll need to incur from future bailouts...you'll get no argument from me.
You are mistaken.
So it's not true that "Had Mitt won the presidency, ... a lot of these guys bitching about Obama would be standing right in line behind Mitt,"? One counter-example does not a disproof make; even lot of counter-examples would only be sufficient if it meant that the people complaining about the surveillance who were and would be OK with it under a Republican president a minority. They may well be (I certainly hope they are!), but I've not seen anything yet to indicate that they are.
And, yes, people who complained about what Bush did and would have complained about it under Mitt but who defend it under Obama are, indeed, just as hypocritical.
Because there are two completely separate issues, in both fact and law, which have nothing to do with each other.
1. Snowden had a clearance, and violated it. He signed contracts, and broke them. The facts are clear on this side.
2. Snowden was disclosing illegal acts, which would *seem* to come under whistleblower protection . . . if maybe he were disclosing a company dumping toxic waste . . . but if the legal system itself is doing something, how can it be illegal? (My answer is "of course it can", but I don't work in the legal system.)
Read the New Yorker article on civil forfeiture and see how police departments all over the country are stealing people's property. Oh, sorry, I mean "remanding as evidence". We should all be more vigilant about ALL levels of government. http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/08/12/130812fa_fact_stillman
At best they'll say something along the lines of "Sorry we violated your constitutional rights. Our bad." No one will go to jail. No one will be fired. No one will even be spoken to sharply or slapped on the wrist. Actually I'd be surprised if they even acknowledge it.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
From the very beginning of this fiasco, as soon as the publicity hit the fan, the NSA should have been out front saying: "Of course we listen to signal intelligence, that's what the NSA was founded for back in the 1950s, and we're doing our best to implement the will of Congress as expressed in multiple laws. We're going to make sure that we never again miss signs of plots against the safety of American citizens."
Then, when the backlash started, they could have apologized for taking those laws so literally and doing their job too well.
Instead, because of their core mission and training, the first reaction was to lie. And the more that comes out, the more obvious and blatant the lies are.
File this one under "No...DUHHHHH"
Obama's debt is roughly equal to all other President's combined?
Since when in 11 roughly equal to 6?
Or how about Mr. Reagan who's debt was TWICE all of his predecessor's combined?
And then there is the inconvenient fact that Mr. Bush's tax cut, two wars, and devastation of the econimy is the primary reason the debt under Obama has ballooned so much.
Of course that's true. My post (GP) didn't come out right.
When was the last time a president followed through on his campaign promises?
Point 1. You do realise of course, contracts which are illegal or provide for illegal activities are void in most jurisdictions and cannot be enforced. For example, if A contracts with B to kill someone for money, A cannot sue B to force him to carry out the murder, nor can B sue A to pay up once the murder is committed. So saying 'Snowden had a contract and he broke it' means nothing.
Point 2. Your argument is specious. People who work in the courts, the Justice department, the AG's chambers etc can and often do make mistakes. Sometimes, they carry out acts which are against the law i.e. illegal which is why so many cases go before the Supreme Court on appeal. Some laws even when passed may violate for example the Constitution which is the supreme law of the land and are struck down by the courts.
My point is, saying "if the legal system itself is doing something, how can it be illegal" does not make any sense.
It is impossible to separate completely. One thing is clear though. To "blame it all on Bush", you have to claim that so many mistakes were made in Bush's final six months that Obama, in five years, can't improve anything. They then have to explain how those policies could be THAT bad when they worked fine for seven years.
The numbers were okay (not awesome) for 80% of Bush's presidency and started to fall in his final year. Therefore his policies clearly weren't that bad, not in the measurable ways at least. Obama said that if things weren't a lot better by the end of 2010, American's should think twice about re-electing him. He was right.
In 232 years, the US racked up $10 trillion in debt. (balance as of September 2008).
In his first four years, Obama put us another $6 trillion in the hole. By the time he leaves office, his debt is expected to be $9T-$10T, roughly equal to ALL other presidents COMBINED. That's not okay. It wasn't okay when Bush overspent by $xxx billion, and it's damn sure not okay for Obama to bury us by trillions.
ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION, Plaintiff.
versus
NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY, Defendant.
[Redacted] [redacted] of the [redacted]. [Redacted] [redacted] and [100 pages of completely blacked out text].
We rule, therefore that [redacted] [redacted] [redacted].
Ooh, moderator points! Five more idjits go to Minus One Hell!
Delendae sunt RIAA, MPAA et Windoze
From the same link you posted:-
No, Justice Ginsburg simply stated that there were more modern sources of legislation you can use as a sample when you want to draft a constitution today. Note the context. Her comment was not directed at the values embodied in the US Constitution. She most certainly did not say the US Constitution was bad.
The Constitution was adopted on September 17, 1787, using the language of that time. Are you saying that constitutions drafted today should use the same language?
Your innuendo is misleading and deceptive.
I don't think Romney would have worried too much about his promises. His personality strikes me as very much like Clinton. Then again, Romney gave away 30% of his income, which is very UNLIKE Clinton and suggests he may be a man of character.
Bush II said what he meant even when it was stupid, though. I don't remember his campaign promises well enough to say whether he stood by them. Bush I was boring enough that I don't remember much of him.
How was GP "factually incorrect"? It was his *opinion* that "a lot of" (not "all", not even "majority/most") Obama critics would be defending these actions had Romney won instead.
You counter with a single example: yourself. It's commendable that you did what you've done, and as GP said, "bravo" for being consistent. It in no way invalidates what GP wrote.
GP here. Yeah I guess you didn't see my reply. The first little bit of my post doesn't belong in this sub-thread.
What he said is NOT factually incorrect. It's true, people pretend their guy can do no wrong.
GP here. A few minutes before you posted , I posted that "factually incorrect" didn't belong in that part post. He is correct, some people do act like their guy can do no wrong.
Come to think of it, I used to be more like that myself.
I just want to make sure I have the right series of events here, from the public perspective:
1. A previous elected official and congress enact some overreaching laws in response to a terrorist attack
2. A politician who makes a bunch of promises against these programs is elected the new President
3. The now-elected politician strengthens and enforces those programs rather than shuttering them
4. There is some kind of a court decision but it is sealed/secret. FOIA requests are made by EFF.
5. A whistle blower comes forward and exposes the illegal activities to the public because his bosses and the elected official have continued said operations. Since his bosses are the Executive Branch and responsible for enforcing the law, he has nobody to report his findings to other than the public.
6. The elected official and members of congress declare said whistle blower a traitor for exposing their methods.
7. It is revealed that the court had previously, as in years ago, ruled that the activities reported on by the whistle blower are illegal. Meaning the whistle blower is not just reporting the activities, but he is reporting that the President of the United States, the heads of major departments, the Attorney General, and a bunch of other People In Power have been knowingly breaking the law to empower the government. Not only, in fact, are they doing something that the court already ruled is illegal, but they sealed the court's decision so that the public would not know about it.
Did I miss anything?
Oh yeah,
8. Snowden is probably still fucked.
Yep. It's *we*, at *both* sides of the pond. Complacency is our worst enemy, state surveillance and commercial greed for private data comes in as a second.
Am I missing something? What has the Humble Bundle done that makes you want to never support them again? Is it just that the EFF is not one of the charities listed there?
The suicide bomber believes in their faith so strongly they are willing to die to achieve its goals.
This doesn't get the same respect from the same "terrorists" as think the illegal war against the crown (treason) when its others doing it rather than themselves.
The will to die for your cause is NOT the requirement for honourability. Committment carries no weight in the correctness of the cause, you need to look elsewhere for that.
Revolution isn't the answer. The answer is to stop voting for candidates that are promising to destroy the government and fail to even pretend to have plans to improve the situation.
Here's news for you: administration has a lot of long-term employments. Those are mostly secure from whatever candidate or party is voted into "power".
You discover that your car runs propelled by tortured souls and you want to change that. Democracy tries to effect change by exchanging the driver.
But it's actually the engine that is the problem.
We should understand that the US nation has got a profound trauma in 2001 when its landmark symbolic buildings were barbarically destroyed.
This is the cause of all these draconian laws, acts, dragnet surveillance, etc.
Hannibal crossed Alps with a bunch of ragged militants. The senators of the Great Roman Empire were literally laughing when the news broke out in Rome.
Roman soldiers took wine, festive food with them as they thought that after checking out Hannibal's group they would have a picnic outdoors.
But Hannibal new cunning military tactics nearly destroyed the Roan Empire in the following 2nd Punic war.
My point is that if we want privacy and other freedoms we should learn to abstain from military conflicts, even from ones which seem to look easy and insignificant.
In general, there is always an economical interest behind a military conflict. But nowadays getting rich means, more often than not, getting isolated from normal healthy physical activity and consequently overweight. Being overweight outweighs any advantages.
Most of the US Founding Fathers despised the very idea of political parties, knowing what a corrupt morass they would become.
Once again, their insight has proved true. Then promptly ignored.
Amen! Slashdot must be punished for their shit text rendering.
Thanks for the info. I'm not sure that giving to universities etc. is self-interest, but thanks anyway.
Or he's been threatened from Day One by the three-letter guys that were already all-powerful. Look at all his decisions and the actions of his administration that are in total opposition to his campaign and that of his core supporters (weed, Wall Street, Gitmo, et al) and tell me I'm crazy.
Another lying summary on SlashDot. Imagine that? When are you fucks going to stop spinning shit? The court found an aspect of the data collection violated the law and the constitution AFTER the NSA told the court that it had accidentally collected more data than it intended. Then, the NSA changed it's collection techniques to come back in-line with what the court allowed.
Get it right or shut the fuck up, you lying assholes.
It does account for inflation to 2008 because I used the value in 2008 dollars.
The comparison is actually slanted WAY in Obama's favor to say it's roughly equal because the numbers I gave show Obama's CURRENT deficits are about equal to all other deficits PLUS the accumulated interest. In other words, every million in overspending by Carter counts as two million because we're including the interest on the original million. If you simply add up other president's deficits, they sum is less than Obama's first term.
Most of them are just as guilty. We the people are F@#*&d!
The "Iron Mountain" document agenda http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=VAcNFQGKWPs
I agree, and reading your post resulted in me signing up to EFF for $25 a month.
after hearing about the staged 'I know not to use a bubble-sort' comment while doing a Q&A at google (I think this was at the campus in Washington, the person in question moved down to the bay after his contract with them ended, and had no interest in working for them again/full time.)
Obama always seemed too slick for his own good, and as the past 5 years have proven, just like the last president, it's likely because somebody else is calling the shots.
At some level it is irrelevant. In the real world doing the right thing does not protect you from the consequences of your actions. History is full of cases of people doing the right thing and being persecuted for it. Sometimes by evil immoral people and sometimes by those who themselves have the highest motives. Tough shit. Character means doing the right thing even when it is inconvenient or will result in negative consequences. You lose the moral high ground when you "do the right thing" but then do anything and everything to avoid the consequences of your actions. Snowden sitting in a jail in Virginia for blowing the whistle: Hero. Showden sitting in Russia after releasing info to a British newspaper so he can duck arrest: traitor.
The NSA has deleted all reference to FISA in its massive databases and now argues that FISA doesn't exist and never did.
The whole "red team" vs "blue team" thing is just an illusion to keep the sheep distracted.
Unix is user friendly, it's just selective about who its friends are.
Why do you people keep going on about "constitutional" or not, when a vast section of the US is not afforded constitutional protections as it no longer applies 100 miles from the border. Get it in your heads.
Forget it. The US constitution, for all intents and purposes, is an interesting piece of history now.
"Unconstitutional"? So fucking what? Doesn't mean shit anymore.
Yeah, I know AC and all that...
I'm not sure that giving to universities etc. is self-interest
LIke the AC said, it is quid pro quo. When you get something back in exchange for your donations it isn't really charity. But as long as it isn't directly tangible the IRS can't really tax it so people tend to ignore it.
It's like donating to NPR. When they give you a tote bag the IRS requires that the value of the tote bag be counted against the amount of the donation because it is easy to quantify. While the value you get from be able to listen to NPR isn't easy to measure so it gets a free pass by the IRS, but it is still morally self interest.
Donating to BYU specifically (versus an unaffiliated university) gets him standing in the mormon church. Donating to his kids' private high-school makes sure that his grand-kids are at the front of the line even if they don't necessarily measure up to the school's normal admission standards.
Even if his grand-kids don't end up attending, donating money to a hoity-toity private high-school isn't really about helping the needy - only a small fraction of such donations go to needs-based scholarships, the rest go to school infrastructure that benefits wealthy kids. Is it really charity if it pays for 20 kids to go sailing on the lake for phys-ed and 19 of those kids drive to school in BMWs while 1 can only afford to ride the bus? That's an example from my personal experience at a similar school, with a sailboat donated to the school.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
It is GOVERNMENT that is at fault here.
This is technically correct, but most people will mis-interpret it.
In Soviet Russia, Stalin was the government. He had the power.
In the United States of America, the citizens are the only government, the only source of power.
Officials are hired hands in the USA - they are not the government. "Of the People, By the People, For the People"... and we chose hired hands to exercise some of our power as a convenience. But it's not their power, it never is - it's ours.
Two problems:
1) It's (roughly) a democracy, so the citizens must go along with being out-voted by their fellows. Many won't, and therefore accept law-breaking when they think it suits their personal cause.
2) It's on the citizens to monitor, and correct, hired hands that get out of line. It's called "the Rule of Law". If you tolerate a violation because it supports your personal cause you've abandoned the United States of America.
The citizens are responsible. The citizens are the government. Everyone else is quite right to blame them for what they allow their hired hands to do.
It's constant hard work being an American citizen. That's not an excuse, though. We're still un-excuseably responsible for what is done in our name.