NSA has massive database of Americans' phone calls

[jillian]

Really? Whoever gets the most phone numbers wins?

 

[dilloduck]

Seriously--America doesn't have the guts to fight a war. We get blown up and we worry if its ok to keep a raghead in prison. We're screwed if this mentality continues.

 

[insein]

What people don't understand here is that whether you believe Bush has the people's best interests in mind is irrellevant. Sure Bush may be doing this to stop terrorists but the precedent is set and the next president might take it a step further.

"We need to start analyzing all words on phone calls to look for key words like 'bomb', 'terrorist', etc."

Then from there another president might start just recording the conversations of political enemies and piecing together pieces from 100's of conversations to make it sound like they are doing something illegal. Then another president might want to arrest all people who speak about criminal activity over the phone such as smoking marijuana, drinking alcohol underage, driving over the speed limit, etc, etc. The door will be open and there's not a judge in the country that will shut it with the precedent set.

Once you hand over something like this on a silver platter to the government, they are going to devour it and take seconds, thirds and desert without you ever asking if they wanted more. NEVER give up your rights to privacy people. There are ways to track terrorists within the laws we have that are effective. Don't let them scare you into believing you need to give up more freedoms to stop terrorists.

 

[dilloduck]

What people don't understand here is that whether you believe Bush has the people's best interests in mind is irrellevant. Sure Bush may be doing this to stop terrorists but the precedent is set and the next president might take it a step further.

"We need to start analyzing all words on phone calls to look for key words like 'bomb', 'terrorist', etc."

Then from there another president might start just recording the conversations of political enemies and piecing together pieces from 100's of conversations to make it sound like they are doing something illegal. Then another president might want to arrest all people who speak about criminal activity over the phone such as smoking marijuana, drinking alcohol underage, driving over the speed limit, etc, etc. The door will be open and there's not a judge in the country that will shut it with the precedent set.

Once you hand over something like this on a silver platter to the government, they are going to devour it and take seconds, thirds and desert without you ever asking if they wanted more. NEVER give up your rights to privacy people. There are ways to track terrorists within the laws we have that are effective. Don't let them scare you into believing you need to give up more freedoms to stop terrorists.

Slippery slope psychosis. We have had severe limitations placed on our civil rights in the past and survived to so called "crisis". The argument that this data mining WILL lead to tryanny is pure speculation. The first poor drug user who gets nailed by this "intel" will have the support of a nation and walk.

 

[insein]

Slippery slope psychosis. We have had severe limitations placed on our civil rights in the past and survived to so called "crisis". The argument that this data mining WILL lead to tryanny is pure speculation. The first poor drug user who gets nailed by this "intel" will have the support of a nation and walk.

Slippery slope is real. Look at where we are now in terms of government involvement in our lives compared to 1900. Income tax was deemed "necessary" to help fund WW1 and WW2. So why werent they repealed after the wars ended? Government just kept their mouths shut and when not many people complained they kept it permanent. When we had the worst recession in our nation's history during the 30's, what was the governments response? Programs that to this day still cost us money. Why are we still paying for the programs that were meant to revive the economy of the 1930's when our economy is booming? The complaints were too few and far between to make any headway. Government simply kept the money they had no right to and after a few decades, those that opposed it were dead and people just considered it a part of life.

If we allow government to intrude into our lives and take away another freedom in the name of temporary security then we will lose it FOREVER. Then another few decades go by (or since everyone has a miniscule attention span maybe a few years) and another freedom is taking in the name of something else. How long before they start censoring and monitoring everyone's emails and internet activity to stop child predators? Why do you think they are pushing that issue so hard? To make everyone so afraid of a child molestor snatching their kid that they need Big government to swoop in and protect you from yourselves. Its happening right in front of our eyes and few even care.

 

[jillian]

Slippery slope psychosis. We have had severe limitations placed on our civil rights in the past and survived to so called "crisis". The argument that this data mining WILL lead to tryanny is pure speculation. The first poor drug user who gets nailed by this "intel" will have the support of a nation and walk.

Doesn't matter. IT'S ILLEGAL.

 

[Bullypulpit]

Seriously--America doesn't have the guts to fight a war. We get blown up and we worry if its ok to keep a raghead in prison. We're screwed if this mentality continues.

If our government is unwilling to engage in a war in line with the principles laid down in the Constitution as well as federal and international law, it has become that which it seeks to defeat.

If your mentality prevails, then we are well and truly screwed.

 

[Bullypulpit]

Slippery slope psychosis. We have had severe limitations placed on our civil rights in the past and survived to so called "crisis". The argument that this data mining WILL lead to tryanny is pure speculation. The first poor drug user who gets nailed by this "intel" will have the support of a nation and walk.

If the President doesn't like the laws, he should have gone to Congress to have the laws changed. It is not his place to decide which laws he will. or will not obey. America, supposedly, is a nation of laws not men and Dubbyuh, whether he likes it or not, is bound by the same laws as everyone else.

And any "poor drug user" who is arressted as a result of this "intel" deserves to walk...Just like Rush Limbaugh.

 

[dilloduck]

If the President doesn't like the laws, he should have gone to Congress to have the laws changed. It is not his place to decide which laws he will. or will not obey. America, supposedly, is a nation of laws not men and Dubbyuh, whether he likes it or not, is bound by the same laws as everyone else.

And any "poor drug user" who is arressted as a result of this "intel" deserves to walk...Just like Rush Limbaugh.

How about someone take it to SCOTUS ? Saying something is illegal doesn't make it so. He's not walking around flagrantly stomping over a law--it's his contention that what he is doing is LEGAL.

 

[Diuretic]

How about someone take it to SCOTUS ? Saying something is illegal doesn't make it so. He's not walking around flagrantly stomping over a law--it's his contention that what he is doing is LEGAL.

And that's a fair point. Non-partisan question coming up here - how would any president's actions be referred to the Supreme Court for examination? Is there a particular process?

 

[jillian]

How about someone take it to SCOTUS ? Saying something is illegal doesn't make it so. He's not walking around flagrantly stomping over a law--it's his contention that what he is doing is LEGAL.

No. When first asked about FISA, he lied and said that any surveillance would be done using the FISA Courts. He KNOWS this isn't legal. And if you recall, they're trying to prosecute the reporter who broke the story about the surveillance. Now...how are we supposed to challenge the legality of something if the President doesn't even want us to know about it?

As for the phone records, they know this is illegal, too. You think they didn't discuss it with the DOJ? Come on...

 

[5stringJeff]

Need parameters? They are out there.

1. It violates the Stored Communications Act. The Stored Communications Act, Section 2703(c), provides exactly five exceptions that would permit a phone company to disclose to the government the list of calls to or from a subscriber: (i) a warrant; (ii) a court order; (iii) the customer’s consent; (iv) for telemarketing enforcement; or (v) by “administrative subpoena.” The first four clearly don’t apply. As for administrative subpoenas, where a government agency asks for records without court approval, there is a simple answer – the NSA has no administrative subpoena authority, and it is the NSA that reportedly got the phone records.

2. The penalty for violating the Stored Communications Act is $1000 per individual violation. Section 2707 of the Stored Communications Act gives a private right of action to any telephone customer “aggrieved by any violation.” If the phone company acted with a “knowing or intentional state
of mind,” then the customer wins actual harm, attorney’s fees, and “in no case shall a person entitled to recover receive less than the sum of $1,000.”

(The phone companies might say they didn’t “know” they were violating the law. But USA Today reports that Qwest’s lawyers knew about the legal risks, which are bright and clear in the statute book.)

3. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act doesn’t get the telcos off the hook. According to USA Today, the NSA did not go to the FISA court to get a court order. And Qwest is quoted as saying that the Attorney General would not certify that the request was lawful under FISA. So FISA provides no defense for the phone companies, either.

In other words, for every 1 million Americans whose records were turned over to NSA, the telcos could be liable for $1 billion in penalties, plus attorneys fees. You do the math.

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/05/11/telcos-liable

Closed case. It's illegal. It needs to stop. Excellent find - to both RWA and Mr. P!

 

[GotZoom]

I'm sorry you went through that. It must have been horrible. And if our government has any information that gives it probable cause to believe someone is a terrorist, then they'll get a warrant. Let them do covert operations, get people inside believed hot spots. I don't think for a second that data mining does anything more than give people who can't be trusted virtually unlimited access to our private lives for reasons which even if you believe are noble ones, may not always be used for noble purpose. And you can't put the genii back in the bottle once it's out.

Israel is much more targeted in its anti-terrorism efforts. The Mossad gathers information about people who are risks...not the general populace.

Do you think that the WOT nullifies the 4th Amendment?

Data mining is an incredible tool when it comes to establishing communication history between people, groups, and countries. Do a search on NSA and Data-Mining and you will find many articles that go into detail about how this help the intelligence community.

The Mossad does much more than any of us realize. They only let you know what they want you to know. I think if it became public what kind of things the Mossad is involved in, and what they have done, people would be absolutely stunned.

If the U.S. government or military did half the things the Mossad did, data-mining would be small beans.

 

[jillian]

Data mining is an incredible tool when it comes to establishing communication history between people, groups, and countries. Do a search on NSA and Data-Mining and you will find many articles that go into detail about how this help the intelligence community.

The Mossad does much more than any of us realize. They only let you know what they want you to know. I think if it became public what kind of things the Mossad is involved in, and what they have done, people would be absolutely stunned.

If the U.S. government or military did half the things the Mossad did, data-mining would be small beans.

See Jeff's last post.

 

[Annie]

Closed case. It's illegal. It needs to stop. Excellent find - to both RWA and Mr. P!

Again, the jury's out:

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MDZjMDllOTRlYmFlMmQ3ZGEzNDJjNzExYjZiNGMxZWM

May 12, 2006, 8:15 a.m.

NSA Nonsense
The legal issues.

By Daveed Gartenstein-Ross

All hopes that the debate over National Security Agency surveillance would quietly subside were shattered on Thursday morning by an explosive USA Today report that the NSA has secretly collected a massive database containing the phone-call records of tens of millions of Americans. Anonymous sources said to have “direct knowledge of the arrangement” explained to the newspaper that the agency was able to persuade three major telecommunications companies to provide these records:

The NSA’s domestic program began soon after the Sept. 11 attacks, according to the sources. Right around that time, they said, NSA representatives approached the nation’s biggest telecommunications companies. The agency made an urgent pitch: National security is at risk, and we need your help to protect the country from attacks.

The agency told the companies that it wanted them to turn over their “call-detail records,” a complete listing of the calling histories of their millions of customers. In addition, the NSA wanted the carriers to provide updates, which would enable the agency to keep tabs on the nation’s calling habits.

In short, this data-mining operation allegedly involved collection of records regarding calls that were made—but did not, apparently, include the content of those communications.

As could be expected, the story’s publication was accompanied by a torrent of criticism directed at the Bush administration. A quick scan of liberal blogs shows that the program is being attacked as not only unwise, but also illegal. Yet for this to be true, an actual law must have been broken. Yet the two most likely legal authorities—the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (“FISA”) and the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution—do not prohibit the alleged government activity.

FISA distinguishes between “electronic surveillance,” which collects the substantive content of electronic communications, and “pen registers,” which collect only the addressing information of electronic communications. Although the language of FISA is somewhat convoluted, information about what calls were being made that doesn’t involve listening in on the discussions themselves should be classified as a pen register rather than electronic surveillance under the statute.

However, the definition of “pen register” in FISA shows that the statute doesn’t regulate the government with respect to the technology at issue here. FISA states that the regulations governing pen registers do not “include any device or process used by a provider or customer of a wire or electronic communication service for billing, or recording as an incident to billing, for communications services provided by such provider.” That is precisely what was alleged in this case: The sources who spoke to USA Today said that the three participating telecommunications companies handed over information that was collected pursuant to their regular billing procedures. FISA does not implicate such action.

Nor would the Fourth Amendment, which protects Americans from unreasonable searches and seizures, make the conduct in question illegal. The Supreme Court held in Smith v. Maryland (1978) that government collection of phone numbers called does not violate the Fourth Amendment. The Court reasoned that callers cannot have a “reasonable expectation of privacy” in the numbers they dial:

[W]e doubt that people in general entertain any actual expectation of privacy in the numbers they dial. All telephone users realize that they must “convey” phone numbers to the telephone company, since it is through telephone company switching equipment that their calls are completed. All subscribers realize, moreover, that the phone company has facilities for making permanent records of the numbers they dial, for they see a list of their long-distance (toll) calls on their monthly bills. . . .

[E]ven if [a caller] did harbor some subjective expectation that the phone numbers he dialed would remain private, this expectation is not “one that society is prepared to recognize as ‘reasonable.’” . . . This Court consistently has held that a person has no legitimate expectation of privacy in information he voluntarily turns over to third parties. . . . [W]hen [a caller] used his phone, [he] voluntarily conveyed numerical information to the telephone company and “exposed” that information to its equipment in the ordinary course of business. In so doing, [the caller] assumed the risk that the company would reveal to police the numbers he dialed.

In sum, the alleged government data collection described by USA Today does not, on its face, violate the Fourth Amendment or FISA. Of course, the fact that a government action is legal doesn’t settle the case: There may still be ample room to oppose it. But there is a rush among broad sections of the Left to declare illegal any Bush-administration policies with which they disagree without being troubled by such trivialities as what the actual, settled law says. Here, this reflexive reaction appears dead wrong.

Daveed Gartenstein-Ross is an attorney and counterterrorism consultant. His first book, My Year Inside Radical Islam, will be published in winter 2007 by Tarcher/Penguin.

 

[dilloduck]

No. When first asked about FISA, he lied and said that any surveillance would be done using the FISA Courts. He KNOWS this isn't legal. And if you recall, they're trying to prosecute the reporter who broke the story about the surveillance. Now...how are we supposed to challenge the legality of something if the President doesn't even want us to know about it?

As for the phone records, they know this is illegal, too. You think they didn't discuss it with the DOJ? Come on...

Well charge his ass with a crime! Amazing how doing the right thing is less important than doing the "legal" thing!

 

[jillian]

Well charge his ass with a crime! Amazing how doing the right thing is less important than doing the "legal" thing!

If it were the right thing, they'd amend the laws to reflect it. He knows what he's doing is unacceptable.

And going through millions of Americans' phone records isn't the right thing or they'd have asked for our consent.

And I'm sure if there were any checks and balances coming out of this Congress, they would at least investigate it.

The civil suits should be interesting though. Can't wait to be part of a class action suit against Verizon.

 

[dilloduck]

If it were the right thing, they'd amend the laws to reflect it. He knows what he's doing is unacceptable.

And going through millions of Americans' phone records isn't the right thing or they'd have asked for our consent.

And I'm sure if there were any checks and balances coming out of this Congress, they would at least investigate it.

The civil suits should be interesting though. Can't wait to be part of a class action suit against Verizon.

The law is not always the right thing---you know better than that.

 

[insein]

The law is not always the right thing---you know better than that.

This from mr. "the law is the law no matter how ridiculous" when discussing traffic violations?

 

[dilloduck]

This from mr. "the law is the law no matter how ridiculous" when discussing traffic violations?

yup" it's me it's, me it's Ernest T "