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Data-Grabbing ‘Stingrays’ Are Attacking Our Civil Liberties

November 12, 2015

Data-Grabbing ‘Stingrays’ Are Attacking Our Civil Liberties 


Carolina K. Smith MD / Shutterstock

A recent report by the American Civil Liberties Union revealed that Michigan police have been using portable cellphone tracking devices—so-called Stingrays and Kingfish among them—to investigate crimes since 2006. These devices are designed to imitate cell phone towers in order to gather metadata from cellphones in their vicinity. Police departments claimed to have purchased the equipment as a counterterrorism measure, but in fact it has been used for 128 “run-of-the-mill” investigations in Michigan, including burglaries and robberies.

One reason this is concerning is that police agencies have been required to sign contracts with Harris Corp., the company that makes the devices, saying they will not reveal they are using them. The devices are being used by police departments across the country, as well as the IRS.

“We [now] have a much better handle on the incredible magnitude of use and proliferation of this technology,” Nathan Wessler, staff attorney with the ACLU’s Project on Speech, Privacy, and Technology, told Truthdig. “We now know of 57 state and local agencies and more than a dozen federal agencies that have bought these devices, and surely there are many more that have bought them or are borrowing them,” he said.

Wessler said police departments get the devices with grants from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for the ostensible purpose of fighting terrorism. However, he noted, the DHS doesn’t check on how they are used once police departments have purchased them.

Wessler was instrumental in establishing that officers in Michigan have been using these devices, and he has been tracking their use nationally. “Efforts are now turning from transparency—just figuring out what’s going on—to substantive oversight,” he said.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

NSA’s Bulk Collection of Phone Records is Illegal, Appeals Court Says

May 8, 2015

NSA’S BULK COLLECTION OF PHONE RECORDS IS ILLEGAL, APPEALS COURT SAYS

A federal appeals court panel ruled on Thursday that the NSA’s bulk collection of metadata of phone calls to and from Americans is not authorized by Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act, throwing out the government’s legal justification for the surveillance program exposed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden nearly two years ago.

Judge Gerard E. Lynch, writing the opinion for the unanimous three-judge panel of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York, described as “unprecedented and unwarranted” the government’s argument that the all-encompassing collection of phone records was allowed because it was “relevant” to an authorized investigation.

The case was brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, and ACLU attorney Alex Abdo told The Intercept, “This ruling should make clear, once and for all, that the NSA’s bulk collection of Americans’ phone records is unlawful. And it should cast into doubt the unknown number of other mass surveillance operations of the NSA that rely on a similarly flawed interpretation of the law.”

As Lynch wrote in the court’s opinion: “To obtain a § 215 order, the government must provide the FISC [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court] with ‘a statement of facts showing that there are reasonable grounds to believe that the tangible things sought are relevant to an authorized investigation (other than a threat assessment).’”

Lynch continued:

 

The government emphasizes that “relevance” is an extremely generous standard, particularly in the context of the grand jury investigations to which the statute analogizes orders under § 215. Appellants argue that relevance is not an unlimited concept, and that the government’s own use (or non-use) of the records obtained demonstrates that most of the records sought are not relevant to any particular investigation.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

 

 

NSA Fesses Up To Improper Surveillance Of U.S. Citizens

December 27, 2014

NSA Fesses Up To Improper Surveillance Of U.S. Citizens.

While you were drinking eggnog on Christmas Eve, the National Security Agency released hundreds of pages of heavily redacted documents detailing instances of improper surveillance on U.S. citizens in the last 12 years.

The batch of documents, stretching from the fourth quarter of 2001 to the second quarter of 2013, was released in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union. While some of the information was already publicly known, the reports shed more light on instances in which NSA employees either intentionally or unintentionally violated the law and collected the private data of American citizens.

“These materials show, over a sustained period of time, the depth and rigor of NSA’s commitment to compliance,” read a statement on the NSA’s website. “By emphasizing accountability across all levels of the enterprise, and transparently reporting errors and violations to outside oversight authorities, NSA protects privacy and civil liberties while safeguarding the nation and our allies.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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