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'It's Time To End the NSA's Metadata Collection Program' (wired.com)
Jake Laperruque, Senior Counsel at The Constitution Project, where he is working on issues of government surveillance, national security and defending privacy rights in the digital age, argues via Wired that it's time to end the National Security Agency's metadata collection program, known as CDR. An anonymous reader shares an excerpt: In 2015, Congress passed the USA Freedom Act to reform Section 215 and prohibit the nationwide bulk collection of communications metadata, like who we make calls to and receive them from, when, and the call duration. The provision was replaced with a significantly slimmed-down call detail record program, known as CDR. Rather than collecting information in bulk, CDR collects communications metadata of surveillance targets as well as those of individuals up to two degrees of separation (commonly called "two hops") from the surveillance target. But this newer system appears to be no more effective than its predecessor and is highly damaging to constitutional rights. Given this combination, it's time for Congress to pull the plug and end the authority for the CDR program.
It's unsurprising that just last week a bipartisan group in Congress introduced a bill to do so. Last month, the New York Times reported that a highly placed congressional staffer had stated that the CDR program has been out of operation for months, and several days later, NSA Director Paul Nakasone issued comments responding to questions about the Times story by saying the NSA was deliberating the future of the program. If accurate, this news is major but not shocking; this large-scale-collection program has been fraught with problems. Last year, the NSA announced that technical problems had caused it to collect information it wasn't legally authorized to, and that in response, the agency had voluntarily deleted all the call detail records it had previously acquired through the CDR program -- without even waiting for a court order or trying to save some of the data -- indicating that the system was unwieldy and the data being collected was not important to the agency.
It's unsurprising that just last week a bipartisan group in Congress introduced a bill to do so. Last month, the New York Times reported that a highly placed congressional staffer had stated that the CDR program has been out of operation for months, and several days later, NSA Director Paul Nakasone issued comments responding to questions about the Times story by saying the NSA was deliberating the future of the program. If accurate, this news is major but not shocking; this large-scale-collection program has been fraught with problems. Last year, the NSA announced that technical problems had caused it to collect information it wasn't legally authorized to, and that in response, the agency had voluntarily deleted all the call detail records it had previously acquired through the CDR program -- without even waiting for a court order or trying to save some of the data -- indicating that the system was unwieldy and the data being collected was not important to the agency.
Why do people even bother with this? What are you actually going to do about it if they don't stop and keep breaking the law? The government has been breaking the law for a long time regardless of party in power and nothing gets done about it either way. At best when a citizen is wronged they sue the government and the citizens pay for that lawsuit along with paying the payout the wronged citizen receives. Not only that most people do not even challenge the charges the government brings against people they charge? The court treats government employees as people that have no reason to lie. The only thing keeping "some" innocents out of jail is because every once in a while a Judge makes the state prove it's case when a citizen manages to overcome the onslaught of charges the DA is going to throw at them if they don't take a plea deal and goes to trial. The presence of a jury changes little, most jurors are pissed off they got stuck in jury duty, don't give a shit about their fellow citizens and many believe in passing a guilty verdict because the defendant is guilty of something so they might as well fuck them over whatever that may be.
Carlin said it best... you have no rights.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
"The government does not give a fuck about you, it is interested in its own power, keeping it, and expanding it where ever possible."
Option A) Use products and services compromised by the NSA
Option B) Use competing products and services that are...also compromised by the NSA
Option C) Become a luddite and avoid electronics whenever possible
Occupy Wall Street was a mass protest. It was systematically crushed at the local, state and federal level.