Feds Shy Away From Raiding Email Without Warrant 71
nonprofiteer writes "In December, a federal judge ruled that the 4th amendment applies to email and that the feds cannot go after it without a warrant. (We have Smilin' Bob to thank for that.) Though the federal judge's decision only applies to the four states in his jurisdiction, it looks like federal agencies are applying it nationally. An internal email written by the IRS general counsel cites the law and says that its collectors can no longer get the contents of suspected tax cheats' email by sending letters to their ISPs, though it can get non-content information, like who they email and how they pay for their accounts."
Already Have It (Score:0, Interesting)
They already have the email traffic, so why bother getting permission to look at them again?
PGP, GPG, etc. (Score:3, Interesting)
We've had a technical solution to this for over a decade which, for some reason, has never become a standard. It's kind of sad when a legal solution beats a technical one.
Why do we still allow our correspondence to be transmitted in plain text?
Contradicting laws (Score:5, Interesting)
If they want access to somebody's email without getting a warrant, all they need to do is pull the person over and search their smart phone for some bogus reason. Cause apparently that's still perfectly legal!
Re:Implying.. (Score:3, Interesting)
That was the big changes which took place post-9/11 and the reason for the creation of homeland security. The creation of homeland security allows for these agencies to violate their charters; which includes spying and violating protections afforded under the US Constitutions. Factually, creation of homeland security is a massive step toward totalitarianism. And while frequently cited for reasons of hyperbole, in this case, none applies; take a hard look at the history of Nazi Germany. Post-9/11 literally put all of the pieces in place which exactly mirrored pre-Nazi Germany. The final piece which makes it complete was Obama's federal violation of law selling guns to criminals and then passing legislation which saves us from Obama but requires all firearm transforms to be documented. And as we know from Katrina, exactly as was done in Germany, they now have a list of exactly who they should steal (I say steal because it aptly describes; as a large portion of these stolen weapons, stolen by state and FEDERAL troops, were never returned) weapons from before they declare martial law.
Obama hates guns and had made his administration violate federal law to begin stealing them. If you believe in the US Constitution, and are of good faith, it is literally impossible to support Obama.
And if you have no idea what I'm talking about, shame on you. Go read about Gun Walker and Fast and Furious. Both of which are federal crimes acted by federal employees whereby no one has been punished (except literally, the whistle blowers) and several have been promoted. Immediately after, new anti-gun laws were passed by Obama, specifically citing these horrible crimes; as at the time Obama's violation of federal law wasn't yet public.
Honestly, the closest comparison in US history is Nixon and Water gate. Its shameful and most media is not covering it.