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."
Re:Implying.. (Score:4, Informative)
The CIA is for international (or at least not on US soil) work.
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since when have that stopped them?
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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 p
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> The CIA is for international (or at least not on US soil) work.
Yes, that's the original charter. Who enforces that now?
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Perhaps you believe that the USG operates or owns the internet... they don't.
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No, AT&T does.. same difference
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Thing is, if the Gov haters ever succeed in getting rid of Government, the Corporations are likely to become the defacto Government (who else otherwise?) but not be restrained by the Constitution and pesky laws like this and the FOIA.
Re:Already Have It (Score:4, Insightful)
You have evidence that the government is restrained by the Constitution and the FOIA?
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You have evidence that the government is restrained by the Constitution and the FOIA?
They're definitely more restrained than corporations are, otherwise you wouldn't have this story. Quote:
The judge declared the clause in the Stored Communications Act that allows this unconstitutional. Though it was a 6th Circuit decision, and thus technically only meant to apply to the four states in that higher courtâ(TM)s jurisdiction, the IRS plans to comply with it nationally.
The US Gov has to at least pretend to respect the constitution as long as the voters and Judges consider it important enough. And they still do or pretend to in many cases.
In contrast, from what I understand of US laws, if the corporations ever own everything you'd all be screwed.
If people think that voters can't vote "properly" for the few options every few years, what makes them think that people can v
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And if the corporation lovers succeed in giving unlimited power to the business because of some misguided belief that the market self-regulates, who wins then? Corporations have already demonstrated that they care not one whit about the Constitution, and less about their workers. I'm not sure how making them even more powerful is going to change that for the better, although I'm sure in your beneficent wisdom you know exactly how perfect everything can be if only we all do it your way. You and Ron Paul.
Ther
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Redundancy (Score:2)
The government seeing the email is one thing; using it in court as admissible evidence is another
And they would bother doing this "court" thing ... why?
a little nudge (Score:1)
Good to hear (Score:3, Insightful)
It's good to hear the US government isn't fighting the courts tooth and nail whenever there's a judgement against them. I with the same were true in Canada. The Harper government is hell bent on getting around a number of court orders on a variety of policies. They have their vision, and nothing will stop them -- not the will of the people, not the recommendations of scientists and experts, not statistics, and certainly not the objections of people in foreign nations (including the US. Thanks to the Texas conservatives for supporting the Canadian public's view that a prison state is not the way to go.)
The Harper government thinks a majority is a dictatorship.
I refuse to call it the Canadian government because there is nothing Canadian about the way it's treating the farmers, the stewardesses, the postal union, the medical cannabis patients, ...
Re:Good to hear (Score:4, Insightful)
Put the offending government employee in prison and defund/disband the agency. Then you will see them behave. With no accountability, nothing will change.
In the end it is our fault. We get the government that we tolerate.
There are four boxes to be used in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury and ammo. Please use in that order.
I agree with your points and would add one (Score:2)
Off topic? Not to Canadians (Score:2)
I fail to see how contrasting the Canadian governments reaction to court rulings with US reactions is off topic. SlashDot is international. Of course I'm going to put a Canadian spin on things.
Let Mark do it. (Score:4, Insightful)
The FBI will have to get the goods on people from Mark Zuckerberg, he's got the dirt on everyone.
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Wasn't there a Law & Order episode about that?
Heisenberg is off the hook for now (Score:1)
Walter White can live in peace until the Season 5 starts.
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?
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The contents aren't encrypted at each node, just in between. So you have to trust your email provider and every node on the chain.
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But what do you mean by "every node"? If you mean every router , then you are wrong, Email is encrypted on the paths between email servers. You have to trust the email servers. Later, users may then download the email over a non-encrypted session, which destroys the point of using SSL when the email is transmitted between mail servers.
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Because none of these are easy and free. Even really easy and cheep would be good, but really easy would require something like storing your private key on a server so it can be replaced when you delete it.
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Even really easy and cheep would be good
Twitter is good now?
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Because the encryption technology currently available to the average user is pretty much useless if the NSA or other government agency takes an interest in your e-mail..
THIS is misleading. Maximum strength PGP encryption is virtually uncrackable, first of all. Second, the laws concerning cracking encrypted files are different from the authority necessary to get emails without a court order. I fault the courts here - make the court order process easier, but never, ever let anything be done without the approval of the justice system.
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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!
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suddenoutbreakofcommonsense (Score:2)
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Glad to see the judge did his job, and glad to see that the fed at least appears to be following his ruling.
The IRS could still get transaction information from eBay or Amazon ...
"Mr. Cowznowfski, you earned a salary of $35,378.77 for the year 2010."
"Yes..."
"Perhaps you could explain your purchase of this 1930 Duesenberg on eBay..."
"Um.. it was used."
Where did the 6 month rule come from? (Score:1)
So if the email is older than 6 months they can request it w/o warrant? If my phone record is older than 6 months can they view that? Sounds like a step in the right direction, but a partial victory at best, i believe the feds can wait to charge somebody with a crime well past 6 months, whether the evidence is still there is another story.
Also, WHO you call isn't accessible without a warrant either, so I don't know, seems like a partial victory.
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When the law was written, people downloaded their email to their computers and it was deleted from the server
The case happened in 2006?
Cite your shit, or stfu.
Why is non-content above getting a warrant? (Score:2)
"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."
What if the ISP says 'not without a warrant' on this too?
I think you're being naive (Score:3)
I think you're being naive, if you're seriously hoping ISP would stand up and protect your rights. It's not a profitable thing to do and it is most certainly not in their interest (it cost money to fight this sort of things against the government.) With majority of the market being service by just a few major ISP, there's no incentive for them to go the extra mile to keep you as their customer.
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What if the ISP says 'not without a warrant' on this too?
Why would they do that? Seriously, what motivation do that have to do that? All it could possibly do is create headaches for the legal department. And if the ISP says 'not without a warrant' and wins, rest assured that somebody in law enforcement would start investigating them for something-or-other. While there's probably a market for an ISP that protects its customers legally, I doubt that the market is large enough to sustain a company that has a real chance of competing with the AT&Ts of the world.
It's considered equivalent to a pen trace (Score:2)
As in who you call and when with a telephone.
It's like them being able to stand at the post office and read the exposed front of the envelopes containing your mail. It doesn't require a search warrant.
Great! except... (Score:2)
The IRS has the necessary authority (Score:2)
The IRS has the statutory authority to ask a judge for a warrant if they start a criminal investigation. It's not clear why they didn't do that here. The problem may be that they want to find the money, not prosecute the guy, and that's not a valid use of search warrant authority.
An interesting point is that the consumer protection agencies, the Federal Trade Commission and the Securities and Exchange Commission, don't have statutory authority to even request a search warrant.
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A warrant is more paperwork and has a higher evidence requirement than a non-warrant request, so people generally don't get warrants unless they need them. (Plus, the IRS probably investigates a lot of tax cheats, so they want to save time on them. If you're investigating the only murder your town has seen in the past couple years, you cover your ass and get warrants for everything.)
Incidentally, with many organizations, the standard for being able to make non-warrant requests for information is that you ne
I confirmed with mine (Score:2)
They'll give nothing up without a warrant, and will notify me if not gagged.
The fourth amendment? (Score:2)
Why is the IRS reading my email? (Score:2)
IRS is only conerned with items of income, and there are forms for that. My email might have reciepts, but so would the site that I have the account with.
In December??? (Score:1)
"In December, a federal judge ruled"
Um... Is it me... or is December not here yet? So either this is a REALLY OLD article or they somehow invented a time machine, went about two months into the future and came back to give us this good news? I don't get it..... Maybe it has something to do with the 2013 Delorian??? [slashdot.org]
The ruling makes no difference. (Score:1)
Former Revenue Officer, here (Score:2)
Where to start?
The article says the R.O. in this case "asked" the ISP for the information. That can be done a number of ways. The most informal is to, you know, ask.
If an R.O. wants to find out about you and you live in an apartment complex, they'll ask the complex management for a look at your application. 20 years ago, the management would hand it over. Nowadays, in the aftermath of the Revenue Reconciliation Act of 1998 that, in many ways, neutered R.Os, nobody complies with simple requests.
If a reco
non-content information? (Score:2)
Yeah, like the Subject, To: and From: of all email, and every URL they load, including any GET form parms. This information is aggregated, burned to a CD, and handed to an FBI agent, so there is no electronic record of the transfer.
ObDisclaimer: AFAIK I am not being monitored by the FBI, but who knows? I'm an outspoken privacy and freedom advocate and I have had a job which required an FBI background check. I do, however, know someone who is responsible for handling the FBI-required monitoring of one or mor