Slashdot Mirror
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.
If they walk up to my house and look in a window from the street and see something fine. If the blinds are drawn and they want to see what is behind that window, they need to convince a judge (either before the fact via a warrant, or after the fact with probably cause). Why is it that so many people, especially in government, lose their minds when computers are involved? If I can visit engadget.com and see who is on the site and from where, then fine. If I want them to open up their access logs, I ought to need a judge's approval. Seriously, in this day and age a Judge's approval is never more than 15 or 20 minutes away. It's not like two centuries ago where judges rode circuit and you might have to wait a month until the next time you saw one. Aside from that, if the matters are sensitive, there is an entire court of judges (FISA) with top secret clearances and plenty of federal and even state court judges who have litigated or presided over sensitive cases and also have security clearances. If law enforcement complains that "it's hard" then that is how it should be. Infringing on someone's rights (and that's exactly what a search by the government is) shouldn't be easy.
FBI are getting too big for their britches, between lobbying efforts for more power, and pressure tactics on both commercial and other government agencies.
Table-ized A.I.
I can see where this is going.
You might hate terrorism and be looking at isis.com or whataver for legitmate academinc or other reasons, yet the FBI will now just put you on the no fly list anyway.
It's apparently not difficult to get an essentially rubber stamp warrant from a judge. At least that has a modicum of accountability in the process. Why the hell don't they simply get a warrant?!?!
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.
"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.
Personally, I find http://backslashdot.org/ rather boring. This site is more fun.
Agreed. There is no information available to tell how long someone spent browsing a page. Sure, if there is a record of a page retrieved, and then a record of another page retrieved that was linked on the initial page, and the time between those two retrievals was relatively short you can probably infer that the time on the first page was probably the time spent looking at the page. But in general people have a variety of browsing methods, may have taken a break to do something else (or their web browsing is the "break" while do some other task), etc. Any long time between page retrievals does not allow a conclusion that the time between those two retrievals indicates that the entire time was spent on that page.
This will be a great troll tactic. Way better than rick rolling.
Trick people into visiting terrorist websites and they'll be on the no fly list forever.
trolololo
Why the fuck does the FBI have a problem with getting a warrant? This isn't Apple's ridiculous refusal to decrypt data when the owner of the phone had consented. This is actually private data and should be protected accordingly. If there's a legitimate reason to access the data, then there shouldn't be any difficulty in obtaining a warrant to obtain access.
They don't have a problem getting warrants.
They want to not be observed to, or have any trace of, who and what they watch.
The goal is "Watching with NO RECORDS OF IT."
You should not be recording the browsing history of your users. Don't log the shit out of everything. Carry the data, don't keep it. WHY IS THAT SO HARD TO UNDERSTAND?
FBI are getting too big for their britches
Who's going to rein them in? Donald? Hillary? I don't think so. The only candidates that want to fix this are Gary Johnson and Jill Stein. Combined, they are polling at about 1%. Americans don't care about privacy, at least not when it matters.
We as a society want crime off our streets. So, we want officers to do their job as effectively and efficiently as possible. If someone's in the process of committing a crime, we want it stopped. Waiting for a warrant to get processed is time the perps have to get away and for the crime to go unpunished, and nobody wants that except the criminal.
As I've said repeatedly before, Law Comic is your friend. Borrowing from this page: "Rules are respectable. They're how things are supposed to work. But police officers sometimes see the rules as obstacles that get in the way of justice. And some criminals see the rules as handicaps they can take advantage of, to get away with it. And so, in real life, the rules are often ignored in favor of a kind of rough "street justice"." Besides, as this comic notes in a later section, most arrests get plea bargained anyways, making illegally obtained evidence a moot point.
To put it another way, ask yourself this question: What would upset you more, allowing a criminal to go free because evidence cannot be obtained legally, or arresting a criminal using evidence that was obtained illegally? (For the purpose of the question, assume the person has indeed committed a crime.)
Just how is this different — in principle — from the normal and old-fashioned investigation, where the investigator would talk to the suspect's friends, business-partners, grocery-suppliers, neighbors, and landlords? And, if the folks had any relevant records, ask to see them?
Sherlock Holmes would do that, Perry Mason would do that, Hercule Poirot would do that, Miss Marple would do that. Why can't the FBI — which law are they violating by the mere asking? There is no allegation in TFA of any illegal threats the agents have made against the companies for non-compliance or for demanding a warrant or some other approval from the Judiciary... What is the there there?
I'll bite - because this is compelled, not asked. An NSL *compels* information, and it also comes with a gag order. Neither of that is true of a cop asking. Now, in the case of a standard investigation, if they wanted to compel testimony or info they could get a warrant or a subpoena, as they can now for these records, but that requires a judge, not just a senior FBI agent, and typically never came with gag orders.
"goodbye and hello, as always" ~Prince Corwin, from Zelazny's Amber series