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Tech Firms Say FBI Wants Browsing History Without Warrant (engadget.com)
Aaron Souppouris, reporting for Engadget: Tech companies and privacy advocates are warning against new legislation that would give the FBI the ability to access "electronic communication transactional records" (ECTRs) without a warrant in spy and terrorism cases. ECTRs include high-level information on what sites a person visited, the time spent on those sites, email metadata, location information and IP addresses. To gain access to this data, a special agent in charge of a bureau field office need only write a "national security letter" (NSL) that doesn't require a judge's approval. It's worth noting that ECTRs don't amount to a full browsing history. If a suspected terrorist were reading this article, the FBI would only see they read "engadget.com" and how long for, rather than the specific page links. Additionally, the ECTRs won't include the content of emails, search queries, or form content, but will feature metadata, so the FBI would know who someone is messaging and when.
This is based on a ridiculous ruling that phone numbers dialed are not private information because they're voluntarily shared with a third party (the phone company) and therefore don't have am expectation of privacy. The case is Smith v. Maryland (1979). Basically they ruled that because phone companies keep records of the numbers dialed that users shouldn't expect any privacy and therefore no warrant is required. This ruling could easily be extended to content with that same logic. For example, Facebook has to keep a record of the messages you send in Messenger because they show your conversation history. You've voluntarily shared that content with them. Phone companies now back up SMS messages in the cloud that can be restored to a new phone or after a factory data reset. In either case, you've voluntarily shared the content with a third party and therefore the same logic could be used to argue no expectation of privacy exists there, either. It is, of course, an awful ruling with ludicrous logic applied. It is one of the most shameful rulings ever issued by SCOTUS.
ECTR's arent a formal technical definition, its a smoke-and-mirrors piece of jargon invented by the FBI to conceal the meaning and definition of what it really wants and to prevent overstepping the "metadata" line.
ECTRs are apache, postfix, nginx, and php logs from transactions. they are asking for your system logs.
Good people go to bed earlier.
If they walk up to my house and look in a window from the street and see something fine.
No, not fine. Not always anyway. IANAL, so I am overly simplifying here, but cops need a reason to be in the area. Which could be as simple as "I just so happened to be in the area, and just so happened to glance in the direction of the open window". If a cop is routinely going up and down a street, looking in every open window, and the best excuse they can come up with is "well, I might see something", that is illegal.
"I just came from a meeting, today, in the situation room, in which I’ve got people who we know have been on ISIL websites living here in the United States — US citizens. And we’re allowed to put them on the no fly list when it comes to airlines, ..."
Based on browser history - pardon? What the president just confirmed is that someone from the government is noting everyone's browsing history, determining which websites are not to be visited, and furthermore, if someone does visit the website for whatever reason they get put on a no fly list.
If they walk on to my property with the intent to look in my window, they better already have that warrant in hand otherwise none of what they see will be admissible in court.
Unless you don't know they were on your property, and they use parallel construction to fabricate a different chain of evidence.
DEA official: "Parallel construction is a law enforcement technique we use every day. It's decades old, a bedrock concept."