Court Troubled By Surveillance Excesses At FBI, NSA (politico.com) 81
schwit1 quotes a report from Politico: In a just-released court opinion, a federal court judge overseeing government surveillance programs said he was "extremely concerned" about a series of incidents in which the Federal Bureau of Investigation and National Security Agency deviated from court-approved limits on their snooping activities. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court Judge Thomas Hogan sharply criticized the two agencies over the episodes, referred to by intelligence gatherers as "compliance incidents." He also raised concerns that the government had taken years to bring the NSA-related issues to the court's attention and he said that delay might have run afoul of the government's duty of candor to the court. Yesterday, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has filed a lawsuit against the Department of Justice to reveal whether or not they ever forced a company to provide technical surveillance assistance in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
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Troubled? Concerned? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Troubled? Concerned? (Score:5, Insightful)
When it reaches the point where you are forced to cooperate and keep quiet about it at basically gunpoint, it's too damn late for being "concerned". What's next, "strong condemnation"? NSA, FBI and CIA (and others) are criminal organizations, and should be disbanded, stripped of all resources, and those responsible should be tried for running an organized crime syndicate, simply enough. What the hell does your "troubled" accomplish? Zip. It's to keep you idiots in the illusion that they are doing something about it.
JFK vowed to "shatter the CIA into a million pieces", and look where it got HIM...
Re: Troubled? Concerned? (Score:4, Insightful)
End run around obtaining them barely even covers it when things are so bad the DOJ openly admits it things "Paralell Construction" is legal.
Sure, its perfectly legal to hide the real source of information and invent a fake evidence trail to present to the court in order to hider surveillance and ensure poisoned fruit can be used in court?
Afterall, when you know someone is guilty, what are civil rights and a fair trial anyway but minor procedural hurdles to be circumvented? All these checks and balances are just a show for the plebs anyway.
Re: Troubled? Concerned? (Score:3)
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What's next, "strong condemnation"?
You're jumping the gun. First you have to go through "annoyed", "exasperated" and "appalled." Then you can move on to "strongly condemning" and "deploring".
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What's next, "strong condemnation"?
You're jumping the gun. First you have to go through "annoyed", "exasperated" and "appalled." Then you can move on to "strongly condemning" and "deploring".
I'm sure that "strongly worded letter" and "stern warning" fit in there somewhere as well.
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Good point. I also forgot to mention "indignant".
Too big, not accountable (Score:5, Insightful)
When the FISA court starts questioning how the FBI and the NSA are doing their job you know there's a problem. I think this is the first time I've ever heard a FISA judge question the governments credibility albeit indirectly describing it as a lack of candor. The surveillance programs need to be brought out into the light and the FISA court need to be abolished, it's a dark government corner that needs to see the light of day.
"The court was extremely concerned about NSA's failure to comply with its minimization procedures—and potentially" a provision in federal law
So, the FBI and NSA both went beyond the scope of the court's instructions and may have violated the law. "Extremely concerned?" yeah there's nothing wrong here.
Re:Too big, not accountable (Score:5, Insightful)
So, the FBI and NSA both went beyond the scope of the court's instructions and may have violated the law. "Extremely concerned?" yeah there's nothing wrong here.
And yet I am sure that the court will continue to rubber stamp 99.9% of all the monitoring requests it gets.
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So, the FBI and NSA both went beyond the scope of the court's instructions and may have violated the law. "Extremely concerned?" yeah there's nothing wrong here.
Just wait until the court discovers how far back this monitoring goes, and how deep it extended. They'll be suitably upset with the govs lack of candor, I'm sure, and then just maybe they'll discover how deep the corruption goes only to sweep it under the rug and continue business as usual.
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Re:Too big, not accountable (Score:4, Insightful)
They did when I went to school. It's probably been abolished like cursive writing.
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Yes - as "Current Events"
Re:The ends, in this case, justify the means. (Score:4, Insightful)
If you like authoritarianism and hate freedom so much, then go somewhere else and stop ruining my country.
Re:The ends, in this case, justify the means. (Score:5, Interesting)
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The ends don't justify the means if the end result of those ends means that in the end you become the very thing you were fighting against. THE END.
Exactly!
It's called "Blackstone's Formulation" [wikipedia.org].
Re:The ends, in this case, justify the means. (Score:5, Insightful)
But for some reasons, people don't like this method of rooting out terrorism -- at least if it is happening at their own country. (In other countries, apparently, this method is often applied, and it is hailed to be a Good Thing[tm]).
So no, for some reasons we like to withheld some tools from people tasked with a job, though the tools seem to be very effective. They have some very problematic side effects.
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When it comes to rooting out terrorist cells and keeping our citizens safe, I don't understand why we are trying to handcuff the people we've tasked with doing this. We've given them a job to do and withheld the tools they need to do it effectively.
Spoken like a true anonymous coward.
Re:The ends, in this case, justify the means. (Score:5, Insightful)
When it comes to rooting out terrorist cells and keeping our citizens safe, I don't understand why we are trying to handcuff the people we've tasked with doing this. We've given them a job to do and withheld the tools they need to do it effectively.
The reason is that if they are not regulated and monitored (what you call handcuffing) they will exceed the scope of their mandate. They will spy for political, personal, and criminal reasons. They will do things with their powers other than rooting out terrorists and keeping people safe. Those with power are prone to abuse it. We cannot assume they are all benevolent or wise. So there must be limits on their power, and this is one of them.
I would also point out that the ends never justify the means; the ends are the means. The way in which you go about something determines the outcome. If I told you I wanted to build a functioning car engine out of cheese, would you say the ends justify the means? No, because the means I am using will not bring about the desired end. Likewise if I say I want to bring peace to a region by killing most of the people there, we cannot say the ends justify the means because killing people does not bring peace; only the choice not to kill brings peace. So there should be no question as to whether the ends justify the means. The question should be whether a given course of action will bring about the desired result and what the side effects will be. In the case of surveillance stopping terrorism, I don't think that question has been adequately answered.
Re:The ends, in this case, justify the means. (Score:5, Insightful)
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The reason is that if they are not regulated and monitored (what you call handcuffing) they will exceed the scope of their mandate. They will spy for political, personal, and criminal reasons. They will do things with their powers other than rooting out terrorists and keeping people safe.
The only problem with your statements are that they are written in the future-tense.
Re:The ends, in this case, justify the means. (Score:5, Insightful)
About 220 years ago, the people of the USA revolted against their God-appointed ruler precisely because they objected to His Majesty's representatives doing "whatever it took" with "whatever tools they needed" to root out treasonable offences. And the term "treason" back then could be applied to just about anything at the time up to and probably including spitting on the pavement.
They wrote very explicit restrictions on what was and wasn't acceptable behavior in the investigation of and prosecution of crimes and wrote them with the mindset that it was better that 1000 criminals should go free tather than one innocent person be punished.
And they earned the name of the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave.
Somewhere along the line, however, the streak of courage that led a small group of colonies to revolt against an empire drained out. Now the USA is the land of the Cowards and on track to become Home of the Slaves.
And the irony of it is, since their forebears made it possible to own guns, they'll think that they're still free because they're slaves with guns. Never realizing that it isn't the gun that makes you free.
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The reason is that if they are not regulated and monitored (what you call handcuffing) they will exceed the scope of their mandate. They will spy for political, personal, and criminal reasons. They will do things with their powers other than rooting out terrorists and keeping people safe.
But they told us that they wouldn't do that stuff. There's even a part of the federal court overseeing them to make sure they don't do thing they aren't supposed to do. Surely if the NSA did something they aren't supposed to do, this court would remind them of the scope of their operations and tell them not to go outside that scope again.
Re:The ends, in this case, justify the means. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:The ends, in this case, justify the means. (Score:5, Informative)
QFT.
The chance of dying by terrorism does NOT justify 10 trillion in spending, all this spying on the population and being sexually molested every time you want to travel more than a few miles.
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less likely than being struck by lighting, twice, on the same day.
Have you ever had a lamp fall over and hit you in the head? It hurts like hell.
The Drumhead (Score:5, Insightful)
One of the best episodes of Star Trek TNG was The Drumhead. An explosion in the Enterprise's dilithium chamber leads to an investigation by Admiral Satie. At first, the investigation uncovers an actual Romulan spy named J'Dan, though he denies causing the explosion. That leads Picard and Satie to question the crew members who associated with the J'Dan. That leads them to suspect another crewman named Simon Tarses, whom Satie believes is concealing information. Meanwhile, evidence is found showing that the explosion was caused by wear and tear rather than sabotage. Instead of closing the matter, Satie interrogates Tarses in public and forces him to admit concealing that his grandfather was Romulan, ruining Tarses' career. Satie uses that admission as a pretext to expand interrogations, eventually interrogating Picard publicly and accusing him of being a traitor. Finally, another Admiral sees that the investigation has become a disgrace and puts an end to the interrogations.
It can be seen as a remarkably accurate allegory for surveillance in the western world. It's completely reasonable to carry out investigations of terrrorists and those who are reasonably suspected of terrorism. Investigating actual terrorist plots and stopping them clearly does help keep us safe. But we've long since moved on from that to suspecting everyone of terrorism. That's why most of us are subjected to the post-9/11 enhanced screening at airports. That's why the NSA collected and demanded access to metadata on everyone's communications. That's why the government wants backdoors in everyone's encryption so they can access private communications and data. At what point do we say that the surveillance and treating everyone as a terror suspect is a disgrace and demand that this stop?
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It was a not-so-thinly veiled recreation of the McCarthy hearings and the HUAC.
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At what point do we say that the surveillance and treating everyone as a terror suspect is a disgrace and demand that this stop?
IMHO, about 10 years ago; but I must admit I am VERY surprised to hear a FISA-Court Judge dress-down the "intelligence" community. And publicly, to boot!!!
You KNOW it must be bad, when...
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Read the actual opinion instead of the news article. On the substantive issue of using intelligence data collected under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the FISC came out in favor of the FBI/NSA being able to use that data to investigate non national security ordinary crimes.
Sigh. Why am I not surprised. But I was SOOOO hoping for a Sudden Outbreak of Common Sense (or at least Constitutionality). And you're right. I was busy at work and just skimmed TFS. Thanks!
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Because this is America, not USSR. Freedom is more important than your agenda du jour, and that's even in spite of so many people voting Fear-Party.
There are plenty of other countries ruled with totally different priorities, to serve citizens who have a values than Americans. They can do their thing; we do ours.
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Wow, you are really short-sighted and gullible. Terrorists don't have to do anything more than make people like you feel scared and you'll destroy your own freedom for them. *You* are letting terrorists win and are in effect an accomplice to terrorism if you support the sacrifice of privacy and liberty.
"It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees"
-Emiliano Zapata Salazar
Extremely just means finally paying attention (Score:5, Funny)
Modestly Concerned: teenage daughter is indeed dating.
Extremely Concerned: teenage daughter is dating, and it occurs to you that you know exactly what that boy wants.
Re:Extremely just means finally paying attention (Score:5, Funny)
Extremely Concerned: teenage daughter is dating, and it occurs to you that you know exactly what that boy wants.
Brain Exploded: final realization that that is exactly what your teenager daughter wants too.
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Realization Concerns Sadly Misplaced: when your daughter comes out as a lesbian.
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Meh, just teach them well and let them fuck.
Hey, son or daughter, you know those 17 trivial tasks that, for your own health and well-being, you should really do daily, and that your other parent and I have been reminding you to do every day since you were five years old, only now you're sixteen and sexually active, and you still have to be reminded to do those same 17 trivial tasks or else you don't do them, possibly for weeks at a time?
Yeah, please remember to do those 17 trivial tasks again today. Oh, and also, to always use proper protection duri
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I think too many people forget what it's like to be young. Anyone here remember *just* wanting sex? Maybe a few, but considering that men rely on their partners either primarily or exclusively for emotional support, to a far larger degree than do women, I'd say there's more to it than sex. Teaching girls that boys only want "one thing," or that sex is "wrong" only leads to the neuroses we have as a culture when it comes to sex. It's a holdover from when sex was all but guaranteed to lead to childbirth a
Domestic Spying is a Crime With No Punishment (Score:4, Informative)
What are the ramifications if they get caught?
We are not going to see a change until officials go to jail for domestic spying.
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What are the ramifications if they get caught? We are not going to see a change until officials go to jail for domestic spying.
Then we're not going to see a change, sadly.
J Edgar (Score:2)
J Edgar Hoover was never charged for his crimes subverting the FBI to be his personal spy network*. US government officials were as terrified of him as their counterparts were of Stalin up to the moment they both died.
* - Some will allege the FBI has changed. Bullshit. Look who their HQ is STILL named after.
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The court will send them a strongly worded letter stating that they will be troubled next time they get caught also.
Criminal offences here? (Score:3)
Yeah - ok - we're talking the USA here, not some well regulated democracy with a rule of law...
"compliance incidents." (Score:2)
Such 'compliance incidents' are usually called 'crimes' when a civilian fails to comply with common laws and regulations and gets sent to jail.
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Completely agree.
In a police state, though, the police are not subject to the law and can ignore court orders and the law without ever suffering negative effects. They have devolved into a means of exercising power and keeping the general population in check. Which, to be fair, was probably the original role of armed thugs under government control anyways.
Why even bother? (Score:2)
"Compliance incidents"? Criminal action! (Score:2)
These people must be sanctioned personally when disregarding court orders, just the same as everybody else.
NSA Compliance has always been a problem (Score:1)
When the Snowden "papers" were leaked, I took the time to read through a very lengthy report by FISA on their court on their proceedings with the NSA which included a lot of transcriptions of the proceedings. There were multiple confrontations over the NSA's failure to comply with FISA mandated restrictions on the surveillance, including the overly broad reach of some of the programs. Some of these transcriptions included laughable excuses from the NSA: "x program is complicated, we haven't had time to figu