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The Executive Order That Redefines Data Collection
sandbagger writes: " ...it is often the case that one can be led astray by relying on the generic or commonly understood definition of a particular word." That quote apparently applies to words offering constitutional protections against unreasonable search and seizure. TechDirt looks at the redefinition of the term "collection" as redefined by Executive Order 12333 to allow basically every information dragnet, provided no-one looks at it. "Collection" is now defined as "collection plus action." According to this document, it still isn't collected, even if it has been gathered, packaged and sent to a "supervisory authority." No collection happens until examination. It's Schrodinger's data, neither collected nor uncollected until the "box" has been opened. This leads to the question of aging off collected data/communications: if certain (non) collections haven't been examined at the end of the 5-year storage limit, are they allowed to be retained simply because they haven't officially been collected yet? Does the timer start when the "box" is opened or when the "box" is filled?
So if I download lots of copyrighted music and films, but never listen to them -- then I'm apparently okay right?
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The recursive expansion will keep it tied up in court forever.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
>This leads to the question of aging off collected data/communications: if certain (non) collections haven't been examined at the end of the 5-year storage limit, are they allowed to be retained simply because they haven't officially been collected yet? Does the timer start when the "box" is opened or when the "box" is filled?
Doesn't matter, US Govt. will do as it pleases regardless of perceived or actual legality.
This is doubleplusgood.
I really feel for the poor Americans. What a totalitarian nightmare America has become, with its clapped out economy, militaristic police, authoritarian military/commercial state with effective single party governance, its huge prison population, its high murder rate, and the presence of personal armaments everywhere, simmering racial tensions, lack of personal rights and freedoms, a state that kidnaps and tortures people.
Couple that with extreme military spending, severe paranoia, and a 'national security' doctrine that comes straight from the nazi playbook, making explicit that America will bomb and murder whoever it wants, as long as it is in 'American national interests', and you have the worst kind of rogue state of all.
The conditions look ripe for instability, and chaos.
Sure i shot all those people. But i kept my eyes closed the whole time.
It seems like this new definition of what "collecting" data means is carefully crafted to insure that while unnecessary to collect at the time, the capability exists so the government can have access to data it didn't know it wanted. They're basically saying that it's not illegal because no one is looking at the data without a proper Fourth Amendment rationale.
If you ask anyone outside the intelligence establishment what "collecting data" means, they'll readily tell you it means that data is being stored. This is bullshit of the highest order.
It's amazing the kind of silly alchemy you can pull off after managing to keep your population ignorant.
We are happy to announce that we were able to stamp out the nefarious philatelists. No longer are they able to collect stamps as they are unwilling to use the stamps they own.
Convenient, isn't it?
Well this is moot since they ARE examined. They are run against a query for a subset of data which excludes that data from the subset. Sure the result of the query doesn't return your data, but it returns the fact that your data didn't match the query!
e.g. Terrorist is defined someone who reads 4chan AND sites ending .PK. Your data is searched, you don't match, so you don't come up in the results set, but nevertheless your data was searched for the negative.
The data clearly *is* collected, an executive order from 1981 when the data could *not* be collected in a searchable form back in 1981 clearly does not apply to data collected in searchable form today!
Lawyers pretending words mean other things, is a lawyers trick that has to be constantly pushed back against.
Also like Google's AI that doesn't technically give Google employees access to read emails unless they snoop but is still read by AI and ads served based on content, government automates with advanced AI scanning through audio, images, text, location data, and not all surveillance is done through collection such as satellites which analyze and watch and track each human from space. They therefore know where each person is at all times. Vital signs are monitored, as are brainwave emissions observing thoughts, passcodes, and intentions.
12333 was put into effect by Ronald Reagan and enabled the government to warrantlessly spy on Americans during black world and other operations.
There is another Executive Order myself and Russell Tice have gone on about. The system enables agents inside government to construct Special Access Programs (and ECIs and VRKs), programs that are completely black and secret and only parties authorized are allowed to know about or brought in on. SAPs enable any type of program to be created, including weapons system, surveillance, and torture and programs of targeting Americans.
Furthermore exists criminal surveillance and criminal targeting, which goes on even if laws criminalize or otherwise make the programs or actions illegal. They can do this because the actions are kept secret and normally hard proof kept from the public.
SAPs are set up under Executive Order 13526.
Executive Order 13526
Sec. 4.3. Special Access Programs.
(a) Establishment of special access programs. Unless otherwise authorized by the President, only the Secretaries of State, Defense, Energy, and Homeland Security, the Attorney General, and the Director of National Intelligence, or the principal deputy of each, may create a special access program. For special access programs pertaining to intelligence sources, methods, and activities (but not including military operational, strategic, and tactical programs), this function shall be exercised by the Director of National Intelligence. These officials shall keep the number of these programs at an absolute minimum, and shall establish them only when the program is required by statute or upon a specific finding that:
(1) the vulnerability of, or threat to, specific information is exceptional; and
(2) the normal criteria for determining eligibility for access applicable to information classified at the same level are not deemed sufficient to protect the information from unauthorized disclosure.
(b) Requirements and limitations.
(1) Special access programs shall be limited to programs in which the number of persons who ordinarily will have access will be reasonably small and commensurate with the objective of providing enhanced protection for the information involved.
(2) Each agency head shall establish and maintain a system of accounting for special access programs consistent with directives issued pursuant to this order.
(3) Special access programs shall be subject to the oversight program established under section 5.4(d) of this order. In addition, the Director of the Information Security Oversight Office shall be afforded access to these programs, in accordance with the security requirements of each program, in order to perform the functions assigned to the Information Security Oversight Office under this order. An agency head may limit access to a special access program to the Director of the Information Security Oversight Office and no more than one other employee of the Information Security Oversight Office or, for special access programs that are extraordinarily sensitive and vulnerable, to the Director only.
(4) The agency head or principal deputy shall review annually each special access program to determine whether it continues to meet the requirements of this order.
(5) Upon request, an agency head shall brief the National Security Advisor, or a designee, on any or all of the agency's special access programs.
(6) For the purp
Can't change the law, or don't want to? Just redefine the words.
In the introductory class on law I took ages ago, they already told us that "one can be led astray by relying on the generic or commonly understood definition of a particular word.", and advised to always examine the meaning of words like "accused", "summons", etc, as they have a specific legal definition that often differs from the commonly understood meaning. Now I know why...
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
The voters don't give a damn. The TV still works, what's the big deal?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
unconstitutional.
forsworn.
impeachment.
succession.
No election has happened until the president has acted like a statesman. Obama's terms have not yet started.
It is funny to call it "redefining Data Collection" but it actually is fucking the constitution up the ass.
So will it hold up in court ? Looks like a nice EFF project.
"But, for the purposes of DoD 5240.1-R, information is "collected" -... only when it has been received for use by an employee of a DoD intelligence component in the course of his official duties ... (and) an employee takes some affirmative action that demonstrates an intent to use or retain the information."
This is grade A bullshit. Although automated analysis of the acquired data leaves a layer of separation between employees and the data, that doesn't mean the DoD as an entity isn't interacting with it. Hope this shit sees its day in a proper court.
I really feel for the poor Americans.
So do I, they seem to have completely forgotten their old drive for capitalism. Here they are storing everyone's personal phone calls, electronic documents, photos etc. and nobody in the US government has thought of marketing this as the ultimate solution to everyone's backup problem.
"Does the timer start when the "box" is opened or when the "box" is filled?"
Neither. The timer simply determines how long the government has to ship the data off to a non-US jurisdiction then deny that they ever collected it.
Never in my life have I read a "collection" of words that more succinctly summarized the level of corruption within our government than in the summary we've read here.
I don't even know why it ended in a question when the answer will be whatever the fuck they want it will be. They've mad that abundantly clear with the manipulation of wordplay to dismantle every Right you read about in the "collection" of books we use to educate our youth.
Want to ban more books in school? Might as well start with the US Constitution. You'll find it accurately filed under fictional humor because it's a joke.
On December 4, 1981 President Ronald Reagan signed Executive Order 12333, an Executive Order intended to extend powers and responsibilities of US intelligence agencies and direct the leaders of U.S. federal agencies to co-operate fully with CIA requests for information.[1] This executive order was entitled United States Intelligence Activities. It was amended by Executive Order 13355: Strengthened Management of the Intelligence Community, on August 27, 2004. On July 30, 2008, President George W. Bush issued Executive Order 13470[2] amending Executive Order 12333 to strengthen the role of the DNI.[3][4]
- From WIkipedia
Thanks Obama
Silence is a state of mime.
... The 4th amendment prohibits unreasonable searches AND SEIZURES. Regardless of the attempt to redefine "collection", the gathering remains a seizure of the data and is just as legally invalid.
I can't help but to hear Inigo Montoya's voice saying "You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means".
George Orwell got it right. When you're free to redifine what words mean, you can justify and get away with anything.
"But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother."
the term "collection" as redefined by Executive Order 12333 to allow basically every information dragnet, provided no-one looks at it. "Collection" is now defined as "collection plus action." ... This leads to the question of aging off collected data/communications:
No it does not. Do not go gentle into that good night. There is no reason whatsoever for us to accept the giant leap into unconstitutional territory and debate the fine points left to us, settling for scraps of liberty from dictators who have derived no just power from the consent of the governed. Rage against this machine until you die or it does.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
Joe Biden is a square shooter. Joe Biden for 2016.
So stop fighting collection, and start fighting "data capture" and "data retention"
Isn't there a concept of the "half-life" of data? So, every so often, half of all uncollected data older than a certain age will be deleted from the database.
Abuse of words has been the great instrument of sophistry and chicanery, of party, faction, and division of society.
- John Adams
In reality the Feds have overwhelmed every constitutional principle that they've found irritating, and the armed uprising has never happened. But it's a nice fantasy that keeps a few people quiet - because they KNOW they can do something about it when... at which point they will just be mown down in a hail of bullets.
Que the "See Reagan did this, so Obama is still my hope and change." BS.
...and "Bush was so much worse."
While we're bickering about "my team" vs "your team", the constitution erodes further....
www.facebook.com/DareDefendOurRights
www.fairtax.org
What that means is there is absolutely no oversight. When the government looks at a box of someone's private info and gives any information about downloaded MP3 copyright violations to their corporate masters they can bypass any Constitutional protections just by using parallel reconstructive perjury.
Que the "See Reagan did this, so Obama is still my hope and change." BS.
While we're bickering about "my team" vs "your team", the constitution erodes further....
Don't you remember George Walker Bush declared the Constitution of the United States of America be to "a worthless piece of paper?" The constitution eroded in full on that day.
Americans accept this when it comes to terms like "speech" or "arms" all the time. Rather than change a law or amend the constitution, we just accept subtle redefinitions of terms. We don't want people to own own nuclear weapons, even though we have the right to bear arms. So we redefined "arms" to not include certain kinds of bombs. Similarly, the first amendment protects speech, so we redefined "speech" so it does not include shouting "fire" in a crowded theater.
Unfortunately, this is a dangerous solution because it delegates the power to change the constitution to the very institution who is bound by it.
... For the Executive order redefining PI as 3.2.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Do I need to say any more? Who do you think runs your Congress?
The banks, energy companies and weapons makers. But most of them are not Jewish, sorry.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Obama has turned into such a vile sack of shit. I may never vote Dumbocrat again.
Executive orders are issued by the president; our current "constitutional expert" in the White House could change this any time he wants to with the stroke of a pen, like he promised during his campaign. The fact that these policies remain in place is solely the responsibility of the president.
A similar situation happens with software and EULAs. There is the claim that you need a license to use software. Yet the software that came in a box on a disc that was bought at a store obviously is a genuine copy created by the copyright holder. So, it logically follows one can use the software without a license just as much as one can use a book without a license.
No amount of slapping a license over the pages that read "by removing this license you agree to these listed terms, but you can return the book for a full refund if you disagree" somehow mitigates this. The courts have accepted these sort of shrink-wrap licenses not only on software but on other things because there's always the option to back out of accepting the terms. Yet clearly until the point you actually accept or reject the license, there's a clear Schrodinger paradox of the legality of buying, distributing, or possessing the thing if you follow the court's logic.
So, it's little surprise that this--as just another repeat of history--would happen in an Executive Order. I can only hope that there will finally come a point that Fair Use, the common sense and inherent, will be spelled out in law to override this clear bullshit. But just as how new technology gives officials and greedy capitalists new excuses to ignore the clear spirit of the law, it'll only be a brief respite until another excuse can be given to ignore the clear intent. To search, regardless of whether there's any net collection, requires a warrant.
Some lawyers should to to jail for such a interpretation, on other hand, somebody allowed on such retarded interpretation of word.
This newspeak is doubleplusungood.
"No collection happens until examination"
Our reasonable way to do most search and seizure gives the target the chance to protest the process and maybe stop it.
(As in no sir, I do not consent to that search, or calling the judge that issued the warrant.)
The argument supporting bulk collection it is really useful and permits things that would not otherwise be possible.
But his plan eliminates the possibility of the target protesting or questioning pretty much any examination.
There may be a few cases where this is the right thing to do, but this policy makes it the general case.
That seems less than unreasonable.
So how do we get the usefulness when necessary for the dire situation without loosing the traditional, reasonable safeguards for 99.999% of the cases?
Isn't that how Picard was going to take down the borg in the Hugh episode?
Storage is now cheaper than sorting. Thats why the "all the phone records into a lockbox" over the life of a user is now the storage baseline. From that a gov can build hops as communication adds up over a life time.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
The Fourth Amendment is clear on traditional, reasonable safeguards for 100% of the cases.
Bulk collection is not legal and permits things that would not be legal.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"