Wiretap Requests From Federal and State Authorities Fell 14% In 2011 64
coondoggie writes "Federal and state court orders approving the interception of wire, oral or electronic communications dropped 14% in 2011, compared to the number reported in 2010. According to a report issued by the Administrative Office of the United States Courts a total of 2,732 wiretap applications were authorized in 2011 by federal and state courts, with 792 applications by federal authorities and 1,940 applications by 25 states that provide reports. The reduction in wiretaps resulted primarily from a drop in applications for intercepts in narcotics offenses, the report noted."
Thank you, Internet (Score:5, Interesting)
The cynical side in me says: Thanks to the Internet, everyone (not just law enforcement) now has wiretap capabilities far far beyond what they could do just 10-20 years ago. ANYONE can now track anything beyond their wildest dreams. Wiretaps are going the way of brick-and-mortar store, print shops, and rotary dial telephones.
So... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Except you can't do that (Score:5, Interesting)
If you think the government will just ignore the law and do whatever it wants anyway, then any discussion of the law is moot.
Actually, that is when it is most important to discuss the law; to document the non-compliance as a part of the cultural record and to bring it to raise it as an issue to those in government who are supposed to act as the correcting force.
It is the natural course of governments to seek to do what they think is in the best interests of the citizenry. It is also the nature of the people who embody government to realize that they could do more good for the people if they were uninhibited by law. Finally, it is the nature of government on our scale to have some secrets in order to operate effectively.
Given that humans are fallible and subject to distorted perception, it is the nature of such a system for abuses to occur. Each time such an abuse occurs, it either leads to correction or reinforcement of the behavior. Correction if they are punished, reinforcement if they are not.
In the United States, The People are the ultimate sovereigns. We are the ones who have to ensure that the government acts in the interest of the nation. We do that by correcting the government when its internal mechanisms fail to do the job. When the government ignores the law and its internal mechanisms fail to correct it, it is our most important patriotic duty to discuss it, to vote them out if they do not listen, to formally demand redress if we elect those who promise correction and they fail to do so, and to remove them by force if they deny the authority of petition for redress. Each subsequent step is significantly more costly than the one before. The least costly one is discussion.
Discussing lawlessness in government is not frivolous. On the contrary, discussion is the first and least costly means to avoiding the bloody mess of revolution. Denial of such lawlessness or inhibiting the discussion thereof is a path to escalation.
Shouldn't it be the other kinds going down? (Score:4, Interesting)
I thought the whole point of wiretapping was to catch dangerous criminals like drug lords. With this 14% reduction, does that mean they are abandoning crime as an excuse and just wiretapping run-of-the-mill citizens now?
85% drugs, 15% everything else (Score:3, Interesting)
"Wiretap requests" (Score:5, Interesting)