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Police Are Seeking More Digital Evidence From Tech Companies (bloomberg.com)

Posted by msmash on from the growing-tension dept.

U.S. law enforcement agencies are increasingly asking technology companies for access to digital evidence on mobile phones and apps, with about 80 percent of the requests granted, a new study found. From a report: The report released Wednesday by the Center for Strategic and International Studies found local, state and federal law enforcement made more than 130,000 requests last year for digital evidence from six top technology companies -- Alphabet's Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter, Verizon' media unit Oath and Apple. If results from telecom and cable providers Verizon, AT&T, and Comcast are added in, the number jumps to more than 660,000. The requests covered everything from the content of communications to location data and names of particular users. "The number of law enforcement requests, at least as directed at the major U.S.-based tech and telecom companies, has significantly increased over time," the Washington-based think tank found. "Yet, the response rates have been remarkably consistent."

23 comments

  1. "Evidence" -- Idiocracy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Is anyone else reminded of that Idiocracy scene?

    So basically a tech firm can just send them some files with text and numbers, and it will be considered "evidence"?

    Like thaat won't be abused every time a dime or voter is to be made...

    Then again, this is a country where "lie detectors" are taken *seriously*, or at the very least used to create false "evidence" and torture people mentally. Yeah, like in 1984.

  2. Policework by DickBreath · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How did police work ever get done before the digital age?


    Police work is easy in a police state.

    --

    I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
    1. Re:Policework by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 2

      How did police work ever get done before the digital age?

      Before the digital age they could get wiretaps (hello encrypted messaging/calling), warrants for papers like bookie ledgers (hello digital encrypted files), or find boxes of copied/burned music/movies.

      While the "solution" of backdoors to encryption is a non-started, it's wrong to claim there is no problem.

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      Your ad here. Ask me how!
    2. Re:Policework by WolfgangVL · · Score: 1

      No sympathy.

      Wiat, whats the problem? 80% of requests are granted....

      --
      You are being ripped off every second of every day, so that advertisers can help rip you off even more tomorrow.
    3. Re:Policework by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 1
      I don't think anyone is claiming encryption is not a problem.

      But it's not more of a problem than it was before.

      Encryption has been around for just about as long as recorded history. And criminals have used it for just as long.

      Before the digital age they could get wiretaps (hello encrypted messaging/calling), warrants for papers like bookie ledgers (hello digital encrypted files), or find boxes of copied/burned music/movies.

      And they still can. But they couldn't generally break encryption then, either.

      In any case, let's keep in mind that a Federal appeals court has declared that police need a warrant to get your phone location information. Unless that is appealed to the Supreme Court, that is current law.

      Which isn't perfect, maybe, but it's a bit of relief. And it represents a serious weakening of the Third Party Doctrine. So now is probably the time to kill it altogether.

    4. Re:Policework by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Encryption has been around for just about as long as recorded history. And criminals have used it for just as long.

      Before turnkey encryption, they usually got it wrong, and a smarter person could defeat it. Now any bozo can download crypto the government can't crack. That's still not a reason to give up privacy. It's a reason to build a better society which doesn't create criminals.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    5. Re: Policework by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If someone has been arrested, an enforcement agency should be allowed to search for evidential material - that's their job. If you have committed murder why on earth do you deserve privacy?

      The issue is surveillance without grounds. This impacts on your privacy. This impacts on democracy. This is because many things that aren't illegal affect your reputation. They can be embarrassing. You intend to share different things with different people. It's a basic part of freedom.

      The traditional way to handle this problem was that when an enforcement agency wanted to search to gain enough evidence to get an arrest, or prevent it being destroyed before they were ready to finish an ongoing investigation, they would apply to the judiciary for a warrant.

      The theory here that a neutral party, expert in the law , would test the validity of the case provided and determine if there were sufficient grounds to give up privacy to maintain justice. This is fair. It works.

      Now we have a situation where certain technologies are complicating the status quo. It comes from two sides, those that what increased surveillance without warrant, catch all searching without probable cause, and encryption and the complications it presents to the standard procedure.

      The solution is not backdoors to encryption. It's rather simple.

      Firstly we need to reduce the consequences of minor offending in a digital age where all evidence can be stored permanently. (One trade off to the citizenry for the benefits to the state that mass surveillance gives)

      Secondly drug offending needs to become a medical issue and only a factor for criminal courts when it is aggravating to other charges (violence, theft)

      Thirdly, failure to provide access to an encrypted system needs to be a reverse onus situation where failure to provide evidence against yourself is deemed an admission of guilt. This is pretty major as it effects the right to remain silent to some degree. But when viewed from how the status quo worked before encryption, it's pretty much necessary and balanced by the prior two concessions to the public. This improvement is not perfect as it could result in flawed evidence - why would you reveal the key if you know there is evidence or more serious offending than accused? And some may still refuse out of embarrassment when innocent. At least they have the choice. Requests for the encryption key should be appealable.

      Finally all data analysis of data obtained through mass surveillance should be protected and banned for use in politics. This is a digusting stain on democracy and creates an unequal balance of power between the public and the protections against the forces of tyranny in rule.

      The real privacy offenders in this day and age are not the state and enforcement agencies but the tech companies themselves who are employing every technique they can with data analysis to coerce you and fleece you of money. The government can not be trusted until it protects the people from this threat.

      Once these points are achieved, we are ready to proceed into the digital age. Murderers and child pornographers do not deserve privacy. Most of the rest of the population does.

    6. Re: Policework by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A ban on misuse of info will not prevent it's misuse. Mass surveillance can never be made good.

    7. Re: Policework by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Likewise a ban on murder won't prevent it. Might as well just allow it then.

    8. Re:Policework by AHuxley · · Score: 1

      People did not move around as much as they had to have jobs. Move into an area and the city police would know if that new person was a criminal.
      That worked until the 1960's. The police solution rates for crime all other the USA was great.
      The 1960's saw the rise of drug culture and the need to ensure police did not investigate.
      That saw a massive amount of new and very different crime over the decades.
      The FBI also started to really create lists of interesting ways to track crime. That almost became predictive in a small wealthy community.
      Find the person who does to fit and who is planning for a bank robbery. Reports of parking near a bank and watching for hours.
      Entering a bank not as part of a local community as a stranger to that community.
      Police and FBI could quickly move in on such patterns and movements of money at set days to a bank.
      Crime was easy to work on when no issues of police corruption had to be considered. The community in great towns and cities would report as they saw things too.

      --
      Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
    9. Re:Policework by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      mod parent up

    10. Re:Policework by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They had to apply for interception warrants, which were different from warrants and harder to get. Anti-terrorism laws abolished the interception warrant.

    11. Re: Policework by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Thirdly, failure to provide access to an encrypted system needs to be a reverse onus situation where failure to provide evidence against yourself is deemed an admission of guilt."

      Wow, just wow!

      What if that evidence doesn't exist? What if there is no meaning in the pile of noise I'm told to decrypt?

      What you propose, is that anything random is resistance. I can carry around random noise and expect to be fine when told by some cop that it's really an encrypted locker full of incriminating evidence. Not under your system though. Anything the authorities *think* is encryption can now land me in jail.

      "Sir explain these stacks of quarters on your counter, it looks like binary digits comprising an illegal encryption scheme!"

    12. Re: Policework by Actually,+I+do+RTFA · · Score: 1

      If you have committed murder why on earth do you deserve privacy?

      Well, for one, we allow criminals to have some, but not all, rights that people have. For instance, the right to medical autonomy, etc.

      But more importantly, if you're accused of murder, you haven't necessarily committed murder. We allow some violations of your rights in the accused state (warrants, pretrial detention) because they are necessary. But they also certainly are violations.

      Firstly we need to reduce the consequences of minor offending in a digital age where all evidence can be stored permanently... Secondly drug offending needs to become a medical issue

      These are probably good policies. However, the purpose of constitutional rights isn't to enforce good policies, it's to prevent dictators (who will knowingly use bad policies)

      ailure to provide access to an encrypted system needs to be a reverse onus situation where failure to provide evidence against yourself is deemed an admission of guilt.

      Why stop there? Why not say their refusal to confess is an admission of guilt?

      --
      Your ad here. Ask me how!
    13. Re:Policework by AutodidactLabrat · · Score: 1

      In any case, let's keep in mind that a Federal appeals court has declared that police need a warrant to get your phone location information. Unless that is appealed to the Supreme Court, that is current law

      No. It's only law in the jurisdiction of that one court

  3. Need of an audit trail by Alain+Williams · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Every request should have to be approved by a judge. The papers presented by the police should be kept by the courts and made public after a defined time. This would keep the police honest, stop abuse of the system. This will not be perfect, corrupt individuals in tech companies will always be willing to help, either for a fee or some other favour from the police.

    How long: 5 years maybe. In long running cases it would be open for the police to petition the court to have them kept secret for another 5 years - 3 judges would be needed to make the order for extension of time.

    1. Re:Need of an audit trail by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Every request should have to be approved by a judge.

      This is how it used to work. Interception warrants were required before the anti-terrorism acts were passed in the 2000s.

    2. Re:Need of an audit trail by swillden · · Score: 1

      Every request should have to be approved by a judge.

      This is how it used to work. Interception warrants were required before the anti-terrorism acts were passed in the 2000s.

      You mean before 1978.

      However, FISA requests are only a miniscule fraction of the numbers the article talks about, so the vast majority of these requests must be traditional warrants and subpoenas.

      --
      Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
    3. Re:Need of an audit trail by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Every request should have to be approved by a judge."

      That's how it works when the police apply for a wiretap warrant. They just can't rock up and do it. No telco is going to let them do that.

  4. Easier than the 2 old tried and true methods... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Such as 1) following the trail of donuts to the perpetrator, and 2) the perpetrator turning themselves in and confessing.

  5. Evidence vs Confession by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Evidence, "proof" of a sign.

    Confession, your mobile phone rating on you, telling on you... there is a difference there.

  6. Digital witness by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ...could also call that a mobile phone... or vice versa ;)

  7. Communism by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Is starting look less invasive. In fact with the new star on your driver license Communism is less invasive.
    I am starting to think I dont need to fly or go anywhere I am not wanted.