US Spy Court Didn't Reject a Single Government Surveillance Request In 2015 (zdnet.com) 91
schwit1 shares news from ZDNet's security blog: In more than three decades years, the FISA Court has only rejected 12 requests. A secret court that oversees the US government's surveillance requests accepted every warrant that was submitted last year, according to new figures.The Washington DC.-based Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court received 1,457 requests from the National Security Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation to intercept phone calls and emails. In long-standing fashion, the court did not reject a single warrant, entirely or in part.
The FBI also issued 48,642 national security letters, a subpoena-like power that compels a company to turn over data on national security grounds without informing the subject of the letter. The memo said the majority of these demands sought data on foreigners, but almost one-in-five were requests for data on Americans.
It'll be interesting to see if the numbers go down any in 2016, since in November the court appointed five new lawyers to push back against government requests. Meanwhile, a new report shows an increase in the number of government requests to Facebook about their users, more than half of which contained a non-disclosure order prohibiting Facebook from notifying those users.
The FBI also issued 48,642 national security letters, a subpoena-like power that compels a company to turn over data on national security grounds without informing the subject of the letter. The memo said the majority of these demands sought data on foreigners, but almost one-in-five were requests for data on Americans.
It'll be interesting to see if the numbers go down any in 2016, since in November the court appointed five new lawyers to push back against government requests. Meanwhile, a new report shows an increase in the number of government requests to Facebook about their users, more than half of which contained a non-disclosure order prohibiting Facebook from notifying those users.
Surprise! (Score:5, Insightful)
US Spy Court Didn't Reject a Single Government Surveillance Request In 2015
Of course they didn't, why would they? This "court" is well known to be a Kangaroo Court [wikipedia.org] with a specific purpose of rubber-stamping [wikipedia.org] all that is put before it. This, and the continued existence of the so-called "Patriot Act" are why I, a life-long liberal who made the mistake of voting for Mr. Obama twice, will not be voting for his almost certain successor, the slimy Hilary Clinton. What a corrupt political landscape where a man like Donald Trump is truly the lessor of two evils...
Odds (Score:1)
I agree that it's not a given, but at least with Trump there is a chance something is done to benefit the public. Not a high chance sure, but with Clinton we are guaranteed to get 4 more years of the same ole shit, and probably worse. She's a vindictive and spiteful old twat.
Re:Odds (Score:4, Interesting)
I agree that it's not a given, but at least with Trump there is a chance something is done to benefit the public.
There's a 100% chance that his actions would be primarily motivated by what most benefits Donald Trump. Any benefit to the public would be entirely incidental. Fortunately, I'm not the least concerned that he has a chance of becoming president.
She's a vindictive and spiteful old twat.
Hillary is not my first choice - I I'd like to see Bernie Sanders in the White House - but if it's a choice between her and any Republican, I'm going to vote for her. I really do feel badly for the people who harbor such vitriol for her as she's likely going to be our president for the next 8 years. Gives 'em something to complain about, though, so there's that.
As to the article, you know things are bad when even the checks and balances aren't checking nor balancing the persistently abusive and unconstitutional government surveillance of American citizens. This upcoming election is the first time since the Snowden revelations that the majority of the American people have the opportunity to voice opposition to these practices. I sincerely hope (though secretly doubt) they don't fuck it up.
Re: (Score:2)
Making the public happy would benefit Trump, as he well knows that there's a lot of money and power in being well-liked. As he won't have much traditional political power he will rely on the perceived ability to turn that public against his enemies.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Odds (Score:4, Insightful)
Or about Clinton...
Re: Odds (Score:1)
It tells you everything you need to know about Hilary
Re: (Score:1)
How naive or stupid do you have to be to believe trump is lesser of two evils? You honestly think he wouldnt do the same things Obama did or Clinton would do?
If you vote Clinton it's a certainty that she'll end up doing the exact same things as Bush and Obama. Trump is a wild card I agree, but at least he can do something different. Wether he will end up doing something different only God knows. But between certainty and possibility I'll choose possibility.
Re: (Score:1)
If you vote Clinton it's a certainty that she'll end up doing the exact same things as Bush and Obama. Trump is a wild card I agree, but at least he can do something different.
different != better
Re: (Score:3)
different != better
True but when someone tells you that you get the choice of having another shit sandwiched forced down your gullet or you can have what is in the mystery box at some point it make sense to take a chance on the box.
Re:Surprise! (Score:4, Insightful)
Thank goodness there's more than two evils!
Re:Surprise! (Score:5, Interesting)
US Spy Court Didn't Reject a Single Government Surveillance Request In 2015
Of course they didn't, why would they? This "court" is well known to be a Kangaroo Court [wikipedia.org] with a specific purpose of rubber-stamping [wikipedia.org] all that is put before it. This, and the continued existence of the so-called "Patriot Act" are why I, a life-long liberal who made the mistake of voting for Mr. Obama twice, will not be voting for his almost certain successor, the slimy Hilary Clinton. What a corrupt political landscape where a man like Donald Trump is truly the lessor of two evils...
Who would you have picked in Obama's place? Mitt Romney? Obama's hardly the best president we've ever had, but he's hardly the worst either. If you want to vote for Trump, then alright, but [time.com]. Trump either has absolutely no idea what he's talking about (most likely), or he's seriously talking about shutting down Twitter and Facebook, which I highly doubt. Hillary Clinton will further push spy programs down our throat, but Donald Trump would undoubtly rubberstamp any bill on it because he can't oppose everything other people do. Hillary Clinton might at least backdown if the response is strong enough because her whole campaign for 12+ years has been changing direction as soon as any hint of controversy appears. What I'm trying to say is that she might realize that most people are strongly opposed to it and stop such a program because she fears for her already battered public perception, whereas Trump has no qualms about holding a stupid view.
Quite honestly, no major candidate has a good policy towards internet privacy, there is no choice we can make this election cycle. Our best bet is to hope someone comes around in 2020 with a better view, and to continue to create a mess for the government until such a person arrives. If we're going to lose this fight, I'd at least want to win our other battles, and I think a president who has absolutely no clue how to do his job and thinks closing our borders and sticking our heads in the sand is how we improve our society is a fool.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Who would you have picked in Obama's place?
Gary Johnson. By a mile.
And even in this next go around, Sanders.
Now you explain why supposedly freedom-loving liberals are supporting Hilary.
Re: (Score:1)
talking about shutting down Twitter and Facebook
well he's got my vote right there.
Re: (Score:1)
You really haven't been watching the news, have you? Trump is more of a hawk than any Democrat. He will spend even more on the military, dragging the USA into yet more conflicts. He has displayed enough contempt for anyone who doesn't agree with him that it should be clear to you that he will drive the USA even further along the road to fascism with more spying on citizens, more secret courts, etc..
Re:Surprise! (Score:5, Interesting)
How do you distinguish between:
a) a totally corrupt bench that will rubber-stamp any request put before the court,
b) a clueless bench that doesn't know when it is being lied to,
b) a good-faith effort by law-enforcement to err on the side of protecting civil rights by not presenting any requests that are even slightly questionable,
c) risk-adverse law-enforcement that is motivated more by avoiding the hassle of any challenged request than by defending rights or investigating crimes, or
d) over-worked law-enforcement that has more cases than they can investigate, so they triage based on ability to proceed?
Re: (Score:1)
You don't.
You assume that they're not doing their damn job until it is *proven* otherwise.
A lack of transparency means an inability to trust...
Re: (Score:1)
A 100% approval rate is generally a good indicator that someone is not doing the job they claim to do. Even b) and d) would lead to at least lead to some rejections and your second b) and c) would imply that the requests are not even necessary, since using them can apparently be avoided on the slightest chance of rejection without fear of negative effects on any investigation.
You cannot without public oversight (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
You can't which is why our system was designed with sunshine in the fist place. The government simply should not utilize so much secrecy.
I get that it might be necessary to keep the warrant application process secret so that the evidence can't be destroyed but the court documents related to the warrant application should be entirely public the moment the warrant is served.
The investigated parties should have the right to know they have had a lawful warrant executed against them.
We are becoming more and more like North Korea (Score:4, Insightful)
US Spy Court Didn't Reject a Single Government Surveillance Request In 2015
Of course they didn't, why would they? This "court" is well known to be a Kangaroo Court with a specific purpose of rubber-stamping all that is put before it
In North Korea as well as in China their so-called 'parliament / congress' and their so-called 'court system' are nothing but made up of living rubber stamps
Anything and everything the Great Leader wants, no matter how ridiculous the goal is, no matter how heinous the motive, and no matter how nefarious the objectives are, get approved, without any objection
We are the United States of America, we are supposed to be different, but are we?
Our congress critters, no matter if they are Republicans or Democrats, are not doing their job
Our court systems too --- from the prosecutors to the judges, are basically singing the same tune as that from the White House
When 'Toeing The Line" becomes the norm, then we might as well stop fooling ourselves
Our nation is no longer the 'Land of the brave' nor the 'Home of the Free'
We are becoming a new member of the fascist group of nation. I am sure North Korea and China wouldn't mind having us as their 'junior member'
Re: (Score:3)
My friend, shit always floats to the top, no matter how elegant the bathroom is.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Of course they didn't, why would they? This "court" is well known to be a Kangaroo Court [wikipedia.org]
What has it got to do with Austria? ;)
Re: (Score:2)
Seriously? You blame Obama for a court that was created in 1987 and legislation that was enacted during the Bush (the younger) administration.
Hate on Obama, that's fine (lots of people will join you) but please knock him for things he has some minimal responsibility for.
Editors, Please (Score:3, Insightful)
Not even trying
Re: (Score:1)
WTF is "decades years"?
I have no idea, but the Millenium Falcon can make the Kessel run in less than three decade years.
30 years^2 (Score:2)
Easy to understand, it's 30 square years, of course.
Re: (Score:2)
Which is the equivalent of 3996750 square days.
Traitors! (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
It would be interesting to know two things.
1. How much are the judges paid?
2. If someone didn't agree with the government every time, how fast would they lose their job?
Supporting the Constitution isn't very interesting when you are paid well to do otherwise.
Re:Traitors! (Score:4, Insightful)
2. If someone didn't agree with the government every time, how fast would they lose their job?
This trick here is that you simply review a few hundred potential judges before selecting 'the right one'. Consider that for lawsuits 'judge shopping' is already a thing. It's not hard to pick a judge with a well known history of rubber-stamping such requests.
Re:Traitors! (Score:5, Informative)
The FISA Court judges are Federal District judges and make the same salary as any district judge, they serve on the FISA Court in addition their normal duties. Every few months some of the 11 judges go to Washington to serve FISA, on what I believe is a semi-informal rotating basis.
They serve seven year terms, and are appointed (without review) by the Chief Justice -- which means for as long as there's been a FISA Court, its been conservative Chief Justices appointing its membership.
Its notable they've picked one and only one Democrat in the entire history of the Court.
That said, they are appointed only for seven years and can't be appointed a second time. There is no mechanism for removal (short of impeaching their judgeship entirely), but there's really is no financial incentive to them support the government.
Re: (Score:3)
> but there's really is no financial incentive to them support the government.
The base salary is roughly $200,000/year. The benefits are very nice for a judge at this level, and it also means that they can do literally no work for these approvals, since they've apparently never bothered to reject a single one. The role also bolsters their resume for work in other government offices or the right private sector roles after their term. Those are _large_ financial incentives to make the plaintiffs with mone
Re: (Score:3)
They get that salary no matter what: they get that salary if they never serve on FISA at all. They get that salary if they reject every request. They have a lifetime appointment at that salary. Their benefits are exactly the same as every other judge at their level: FISA membership or payment doesn't offer extra benefits as far as I can tell.
Since their rulings are classified, if they rule all for or against the government, they get the same spot on their resume, I see no incentive. There's no way to remove
Re: (Score:2)
Not having to do any work is a strong fiscal incentive to simply rubber stamp these requests. The judge's time, and possible earning power from books or consultations on cases not in their direct purview, are at risk if they make a fuss about these "routine" matters. Their staff can be cut, their offices can be switched to less luxurious quarters, and they're much less likely to get fiscal support for political office they may seek during or after their term. Favors to family members, access to the alls of
Re: (Score:1)
but there's really is no financial incentive to them support the government.
They are bought out long before their appointment. They are paid $200k per year to rubber-stamp the requests. It's a fancy bribe. Most of the US is based on bribes and corruption. It's just so institutionalized that it's all 100% legal.
Re: (Score:2)
Nonsense. Federal judges refuse government requests all the time. Not all the time, no, but that's because warrants just require probable cause, not conclusive proof.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
There's only three levels (at least in Article III judges; magistrate judges and administrative judges are different, but since FISA uses district judges those aren't relevant): District Court judges, Appellate Circuit judges, and the Supremes.There isn't really a migration path between these. The vast majority of people who are appointed to a judgeship have it for life and never advance up a tier.
And there's no evidence at all that those that do advance up a tier do so because they "play ball". There's lot
Re: (Score:2)
There isn't really a migration path between these. The vast majority of people who are appointed to a judgeship have it for life and never advance up a tier.
Go look up the career paths of the sitting Supreme Court Justices. The ones I recall from confirmation hearings, and my memory may be faulty, did move in the tiers. Most privates don't make first sergeant, but all first sergeants were privates, so arguing that there's no mobility in rank because most privates don't make first sergeant isn't true, at all.
Re: (Score:2)
Derp. That second "all the time" was supposed to be "Not every single time".
Re: (Score:2)
They're all federal district court judges.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Court#Composition [wikipedia.org]
Pay for all such judges is fixed at $174,000/year as of 2009.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_judge_salaries_in_the_United_States#District_Court [wikipedia.org]
They know this data gets released? (Score:3, Interesting)
You think they'd submit some totally bogus/badly written requests just for the court to reject to make the optics on the numbers look better. It's not like the actual details get released on any of this. This is how little the gov't gives a shit (and how little the people give a shit either, since this is barely 'news' outside Techdirt and the like).... they can't even be bothered to do the small amount of work to FAKE oversight...
Re:They know this data gets released? (Score:4, Interesting)
Scarier thought: What if they already did?
Re: They know this data gets released? (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Why waste "their" time?
The "they" to which you refer are investigators who have better things to do with their time than make numbers look worse. Remember, the investigators' job is to build a case that the court won't reject. A rejection means the investigators are actually trying to violate someone's legal rights. Thus far, no court has actually found these requests unconstitutional, so there's no reason for rejection.
FUCK the (Score:3)
FBI & NSA!
Keep in mind who approves the judges/lawyers (Score:5, Insightful)
Even for those defendants who want to hire a lawyer has to get that lawyer and their firm approved. Again an actual lawyer who believes in things such as the constitution or knows who side they are on are going to survive the testing. If your lawyer is rejected from the process you can still have them but they don't get to see your case.
Also a critical factor in winning cases that are already stacked against you is to hire a lawyer who then puts 10 interns onto the case along with a handful of investigators, none of whom are either going to be allowed to see anything or do an investigation. Thus these are nearly unwinnable cases.
Then the entire US justice system is adversarial. So any group of prosecutors and judges who don't have an opposing side are going to easily run circles around defendants who don't even know they are on trial (being investigated).
The key to all this is that there are already plenty of laws that deal with nearly every form of crime that a terrorist might do or plan. If you plan on murdering people then oddly enough that is a crime and can be investigated including wire taps. Murdering people is probably against the law. Hiring murders is, funding criminals is, hiding criminals, all existing crimes. There are all kinds of interesting things such as probable cause, RICO, etc that give police everything they need. Not everything they want, just everything they need.
The crazy thing is that this continues at pretty much full speed. It is almost like the constitution is some kind of measuring stick where they get to measure the size of their dicks by how many part of the constitution are ignored or suspended on their behalf. Like the stupid war on drugs, their efforts are going to only have overall negative returns. Maybe once in a blue moon they catch an actual bad guy as opposed to a straw bad guy they pretty much had to build from scratch. But for every bad guy they catch they will spread untold misery, economic problems, and potentially an increased death toll by slightly increasing the overall stress and unhappiness of the entire population. I will be discussing this sort of thing over the phone and sometimes the other person will say that they aren't comfortable talking about this on a phone. Crazy.
I would say that the only way that this madness ends is if crystal clear laws are put into place that wholesale ban this sort of behaviour. Potentially all the way to a constitutional amendment. Otherwise it will simply be a ratchet type approach. Every time there is a scare they will get a few more regulations or laws that favour the ending of this right or that privacy. These laws are typically one way. Very rarely are they repealed. Also there don't seem to be any willing investigators actively prosecuting those who have already violated existing laws.
I wonder what any of the space of likely presidential winners will do? Will they curtail these abuses and the entire abusive direction. Or will they realize that it just makes them more powerful?
Re: (Score:2)
The problem is to get them declared unconstitutional, most likely by the SCOTUS, you have to get the case about the non-disclosure orders to court. So far, almost all of them have been thrown out due to lack of ability to prove standing, ie: since you can't prove that one of these orders were applied to you, as they're secret, you can't test your case in court. That is most likely why they do not terminate the non-disclosure when an actual case is brought against you is so the NSL itself cannot be contest
majority? (Score:3)
The memo said the majority of these demands sought data on foreigners, but almost one-in-five were requests for data on Americans.
But, what? 80% does seem to meet and exceed the definition of "majority." Is that good? Obviously not. Does it meet their weasaly legalese? Yup.
You have to give them some credit (Score:2)
This is either very good, very bad, or both (Score:2)
In a perfect world, the prosecutor or police would know the law so well that he wouldn't ever submit a warrant that wouldn't be approved if the judges knew the law, took the time to learn the particulars of the case, and followed it to the letter of the law as it applies to that case. If that's the case, then WOO-HOO, "no rejections" is a good thing.
I'm not that naive. In a "good" world, this would account for 90-99.9% of "non-rejections."
I'm not even that naive, especially when it comes to secret courts
Re: (Score:1)
In a good world, people wouldn't be so afraid of terrorists that they race to throw their liberties under the bus.
But this is the real world.
And in the real world, the FBI and CIA have responsibilities to stop terrorist attacks. To perform their duties correctly, they need information. Ideally as much as possible. On everyone. Sure, some of that information is not relevant, but collecting it causes no harm to the investigative process. What it does cause
UnAmerican - Anti-American (Score:2)
UnAmerican - Anti-American, that's where the government is now.
Am I the only one... (Score:2)
...who has reached the decision that I'd just prefer a life without government? I honestly believe that outside of some immediate local coordination needs, there's not much that would be worse if government was removed from existence. Modern communications should have eliminated the need for it at least 2 decades ago. Anyone who has not spent time living with different cultures may believe the lie that there is real threat that "others" are out to get us. The only group on the planet actively pursuing domin
So what!?! (Score:1)