Senate Rejects FBI Bid For Warrantless Access To Internet Browsing Histories (zdnet.com)

Zack Whittaker, reporting for ZDNet:An amendment designed to allow the government warrantless access to internet browsing histories has been narrowly defeated in the Senate. The amendment fell two votes short of the required 60 votes to advance. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) switched his vote at the last minute. He submitted a motion to reconsider the vote following the defeat. A new vote may be set for later on Wednesday. Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) introduced the amendment as an add-on to the commerce, justice, and science appropriations bill earlier this week. McCain said in a statement on Monday that the amendment would "track lone wolves" in the wake of the Orlando massacre, in which Omar Mateen, who authorities say radicalized himself online, killed 49 people at a gay nightclub in the Florida city. The amendment, which may be reconsidered in the near future, aims to broaden the rules governing national security letters, which don't require court approval. These letters allow the FBI to demand records associated with Americans' online communications -- so-called electronic communications transactional records.

Comments

Non Stop Orwell

[tomkost]

Don't think for a second that they're done. The all out assault on our liberties by statists is non stop. The FBI failed to stop Omar Mateen after meeting with him twice, but somehow that is justification for asking for MORE spy powers? Orwellian move by the Oligarchs.

Re:Non Stop Orwell

[TheGratefulNet]

as has been said many times, 'they' only need to win once and we need to win 100% of the time or we lose our liberties.

I really didn't ever think I'd see the US, my home country, turn into this kind of attack on freedom and privacy.

then again, I have to keep reminding myself, this is a human thing and we see this all over the world. I could list a dozen countries that are also attacking their citizens in this way.

I wonder how we solve a HUMAN problem? in fact, I have my doubts we can. this may well be the trigger that ends our world (yes, dramatic statement, but all signs are that the world is giving up on itself and doubling down on the derp, as the kids say, today). the disease of anti-liberty is infecting the whole world and the holdouts are losing. we are losing.

not pleasant thoughts, I know. but again, we have to win 100% of the attacks on our freedoms, and they only need to win once and once a law is enacted, its near impossible to fix it later. it can easily be too late by the time we realize what we have done to ourselves.

Re:sigh..

[tripleevenfall]

Is there anyone in Washington who has forwarded a sensible proposal in response to this tragedy?

All you hear from the left is "take away freedom A" and all you hear from the right is "take away freedom B".

All the while, the government had all the information they needed to act on this, they just governmented the whole thing up.

Wouldn't change anything. FBI is a failure.

[Nyder]

I find it funny how when the FBI and the other letters always think that our losing our rights will stop future crimes. It won't. Because when something happens under their watch, they will just say once again, well, if we can access X without a warrant, we can keep this stuff from happening. Yet bad shit still happens anyways.

You want to stop terrorists? How about we stop making them and stop supplying them with weapons, stop giving them money for oil. Stop killing their family and friends with drones. How about we, the USA be the bigger fucking person and apologize for how we have treated the Middle East for that last 70 years. How about we stop fucking giving Saudi Arabia weapons and money.

And seriously, I'm not against guns at all, but we need smarter laws on purchasing them.

Re:sigh..

[ganjadude]

the sensible proposal is to do nothing in the immediate, gather as much information as possible, and use it within the bounds of the constitution

so no... unfortunately no one in washington has made that proposal

Re:why qualify the nightclub as "gay"?

[Austerity Empowers]

How is "killed 49 people at a gay nightclub" any more informative than "killed 49 people at a nightclub".

It's informative about his motivations. It wasn't random, he was deliberately attacking gay people. That is useful to know to understand that particular crime.

The question you probably should have asked is what does it being a gay night club have to do with enhancing government spying privileges. Either enhancing spying to stop mass murders is OK or it is not. It doesn't matter what particular aspect of the victims set him off, some other nut job will have some other criteria for the same result. Throwing "gay" into the mix in this case may dampen the crime for the majority of people who are not gay, because they are now less afraid.

Regardless, this is just a power grab, and it is shut down however narrowly, yay.

A pox on rider bills

[magarity]

I hate rider bills totally unrelated to the primary bill just to get some nasty thing passed that can't get passed on its own.

Horrifying

[Jahoda]

What this actually means is that slightly under 3/5 of the senate is totally fine with this invasion of privacy clearly guaranteed by the fourth amendment, to say nothing of these "national security letters" which are a perversion of our justice system.

Re:sigh..

[david_thornley]

Police have been catching people for a long time, even while following the Fourth Amendment. It may make law enforcement less efficient, but that's a reasonable tradeoff.

Besides, what were the police and FBI going to do about the guy? Assuming they conclude he's likely to turn violent in the near future, what can they do? If it's due to mental illness they can request involuntary commitment, but the ability to hold someone indefinitely without a conviction is a civil rights nightmare.