How Militarized Cops Are Zapping Rights With Stingray (alternet.org) 105
"Police nationwide are secretly exploiting intrusive technologies with the feds' complicity," argues a new article on Alternet -- calling out Stingray, which mimics a cellphone tower to identify every cellphone nearby. "It gathers information not only about a specific suspect, but any bystanders in the area as well... Some Stingrays are capable of collecting not only cell phone ID numbers but also numbers those phones have dialed and even phone conversations."
The ACLU says requests for more information have been meeting heavy resistance from police departments since 2011, with many departments citing nondisclosure agreements with Stingray's manufacturer and with the FBI, and "often, the police get a judge's sign-off for surveillance without even bothering to mention that they will be using a Stingray...claiming that they simply can't violate those FBI nondisclosure agreements.
"More often than not, police use Stingrays without bothering to get a warrant, instead seeking a court order on a more permissive legal standard. This is part of the charm of a new technology for the authorities: nothing is settled on how to use it." Stingray is more than a 1960s TV series with puppets. Several state judges estimate there have been hundreds of instances where police have used the Stingray tool without a warrant or telling a judge.
Slashdot reader Presto Vivace writes:
This is why it matters who wins the mayor and city council races. Localities do not have to accept this technology.
"More often than not, police use Stingrays without bothering to get a warrant, instead seeking a court order on a more permissive legal standard. This is part of the charm of a new technology for the authorities: nothing is settled on how to use it." Stingray is more than a 1960s TV series with puppets. Several state judges estimate there have been hundreds of instances where police have used the Stingray tool without a warrant or telling a judge.
Slashdot reader Presto Vivace writes:
This is why it matters who wins the mayor and city council races. Localities do not have to accept this technology.
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Why not just keep your phone in a Faraday Cage at all times?
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Why not just keep your phone in a Faraday Cage at all times?
Wouldn't that drain the battery?
Re:airplane mode (Score:4, Funny)
Correct phrasing. (Score:5, Insightful)
nothing is settled on how to use it
This isn't a problem with new technology. This is a problem with powertripping fuckheads.
The Fourth Amendment, in very simple and explicit language, settled the use of Stingray long before it was even imagined.
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The Constitution explicitly applies to things that didn't exist at the time of its writing, and the language was expressly crafted to include future changes in society, technology, etc.
Re:Correct phrasing. (Score:5, Informative)
The Constitution was deliberately crafted to limit what the government may do to the people without due process. Your argument here, is that because those in government who have power think its ok to weild that power against the people, then it is inherently ok for those with power to weild it against the people. That is precisely the thing that the Constitution was built to protect against, and anyone unwilling to see that or to do the mental gymnastics necessary to dismiss it is intellectually lazy, intellectually dishonest or morally corrupt.
The opinions of any individual bureaucrat isnt even relevant. What is relevant is the opinion of the judges in the courts. These days I dont have a hell of a lot of faith in them either, since so many are activist judges. However, they do get it right on occasion, and more than a couple have found Stingray to be a violation of the Fourth Amendment. (http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/crime/bs-md-ci-stingray-court-decision-20160331-story.html)
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The opinions of any individual bureaucrat isnt even relevant. What is relevant is the opinion of the judges in the courts.
Not quite. In US law, we require all law enforcement officers, and all lawyers, so swear oaths upholding the law. The highest law in the land is the Bill of Rights, an open-ended document with unspecified rights "retained by the people" (9th Amendment) and "reserved to the people" (10th Amendment).
The open-ended nature of the Bill of Rights was so extremely important, it actually ended up in two different amendments!
As such, we ARE expecting police officers (and all government bureaucrats) to make their o
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It's all well and good that the Obama administration's lawyers and appointed officials, and law enforcement at a more local level (guided by the FBI) believe that they have the authority to do a thing to the people without due process. It's another for the courts to uphold it.
While I understand what you'
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Your argument is about as valid as if you were to say that none of the protections for freedom of movement across the US apply because you're using a car instead of a horse.
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Except the only thing which should be visible in transit is the IP address, size, and time.
Law enforcement and various other agencies preferred the previous situation where everybody thought the law and Constitution were being followed; it allowe
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Except the only thing which should be visible in transit is the IP address, size, and time.
How is that unlike what is written on an envelope and dropped in a mailbox? Why would the Constitution be upheld in the use of one but not the other? Aside from the obvious answer that it's because government wants to take advantage of the laziness and ignorance of the citizens, that is.
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It is exactly like the protections afford to post office mail and completely unlike the protections offered to data. The Constitution is *not* upheld for data by any branch of government leaving only technological methods.
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I actually agree with you but not for the typical reason.
Since none of the three branches of government can protect and enforce the 4th amendment as far as communications, it might as well be treated null and void. Technological measures can protect it at the cost to law enforcement and the courts of
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parallel evidence (Score:5, Funny)
Hard to see what the problem. The police gather information illegally with a stingray. Then they know who/what/where to look for. Then they create a secondary story to explain how they made the bust. In the drive through a McDonald's noticed suspect leave motel and get in his car. Suspect stumbled and appeared to be inebriated. When suspect was pulled over, suspect seemed nervous which justified the search which lead to the happy fortuitous discovery of drugs...
No cops where jailed during the crime, so all good.
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Irony! Oh, no, no, we don't get that here. We haven't had any irony here since about, uh, '83, when I was the only practitioner of it. And I stopped because I was tired of being stared at.
- C.D.
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Law enforcement is very careful not to record the number of drug searches which turn up nothing just like they are very careful not to record the number of false drug dog indications. If they did that, it would reveal the magnitude of their deceit.
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A simple solution to part of the problem (Score:5, Interesting)
FTS: "often, the police get a judge's sign-off for surveillance without even bothering to mention that they will be using a Stingray...claiming that they simply can't violate those FBI nondisclosure agreements"
So judges should just get into the habit of asking specific questions about Stingray, and anything similarly illegal, EVERY TIME law enforcement asks for a warrant. Force the cops to make a choice between lying to a judge and violating an NDA with the FBI. It would be entertaining to be a fly on the wall and watch the FBI get thrown under the bus a few (dozen) times in front of a variety of judges.
Re:A simple solution to part of the problem (Score:5, Informative)
In general, the practice in america is to throw the accused in jail for a few months until they confess, citing high (99.9+%) conviction rates and the fact that the judge WILL throw the book at anyone who dares to take a case to a trial in the first place, in order to set an example. By the time a new inmate has sampled the delights of sleeping on a concrete floor with three square feet of personal space, and sharing a toilet with twelve other men for a month or two, most of them will admit to almost anything if it means they get time served.
Particularly in california, the legal system is very predatory.
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Re:A simple solution to part of the problem (Score:4, Interesting)
This. I'm a relatively well off white male, and I have encountered exactly this happening. Twice...
The first time, I was riding in my car with friends. Had we been drinking? Absolutely. But the driver didn't. He was a heart surgeon at OSU Hospital who was on call. He offered to drive the group because of the fact that he could not possibly drink anything. This was back in 2002. Why is that important? Oh, I don't know. Maybe because a few people crashed some planes in a some buildings, and the entire US turned against anyone who wasn't white. See, my friend, who was a well known heart surgeon, happened to look middle eastern. He was sober. Hadn't drank so much as a drop of alcohol... and he was forced to pull over to a parking lot.
In said parking lot, we were surrounded by 6 police cars and 3 paddy wagons. I was in the back seat, behind a window tinted so you couldn't see me. I had 5 other friends with me. An asian, the middle eastern who drove, an african american, and two other white friends. Every... single... minority was put in handcuffs in the backs of the cop cars. Not one of the whites were. I was mildly drunk, which means I was stupid enough to have no fear of what was happening. I yelled at the cops because of how they treated my friends. I scolded them for how my minority friends were treated differently than we were. I was given "fantastic" answers like, "would you like us to handcuff you too?!?!" to which I "smartly" replied, "yes, and lets explain to the courts why."
It turns out an asshole neighbor of mine saw a bunch of minorities getting into a car (my car!!!!), and reported it being stolen. Having nothing better to do, the entire Columbus, OH police department responded to the theft of a 1984 Chevy Suburban that had more rust than metal. They pulled my friends out, at gunpoint, by their necks and handcuffed them in the back of police cars.
Had things gone slightly different, I might be attending a friend's funeral. It frightens me both in how close I was to having a friend murdered by the police, and looking back and seeing how easily they would have justified it. Only because my friends did not assert their rights are they alive, and ironically, only because as a white male who did assert my rights were they freed.
There are bad people out there. There are great cops out there. The problem is, the police unions are so "pro cop" that any / all attempts to remove the bad cops from the force is null and void. They will protect a "bad cop" at the expense of 1,000,000 "good citizens" and won't think twice about it. I did file a report about what happened to my friends and I, and received a response that the police pulling my friends out at gunpoint was 100% justified because random citizen X reported my car as being stolen.
That was the first time... The second time... was even more "unfortunate". I'll simply say, I understand why poor people do not trust the police. I'm fairly well off, and have personally seen the abuses they are willing to do. The only difference is that I'm well off enough to be able to retaliate via the courts, and my friends often are not.
Everytime they've been faces with violating an NDA (Score:2)
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So judges should just get into the habit of asking specific questions about Stingray, and anything similarly illegal, EVERY TIME law enforcement asks for a warrant. Force the cops to make a choice between lying to a judge and violating an NDA with the FBI.
Remind me again, why would any judge want to make cops' life difficult?
If a judge signed a warrant which subsequently led to the illegal use of Stingray, would there be any penalty for the judge? The answer is most likely no, and therein lies the root of the problem.
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If they didn't, then why wouldn't the warrants be trivial to get? Why would the improperly collected evidence be inadmissable? Why would the appeals court not allow it the admissability to stand?
Re: A simple solution to part of the problem (Score:2, Interesting)
What do you call people working for government who very obviously display criminal behavior in their everyday jobs, like the FBI? Not criminals, because they won't get arrested. What then? Is there a better word that still retains the contempt society should hold for these people?
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Why would the judges do that? It is in their interest not to know.
Is That Warm Feeling (Score:2)
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The Police State (Score:5, Insightful)
The Police State is progressing successfully, all while we continue to ensure that the masses believe they are free and have a full bill of rights that is followed legally.
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"requests for more information have been meeting heavy resistance from police departments since 2011"
What is it they tell us again about how okay it is to use the stingray?
"If you have nothing to hide..."?
Nah, it's:
"Pick up that can!"
Strat
Local elections do not matter (Score:1)
No. The reality is that there is a chain of command and that the most spineless lightweights occupy lower offices. They will do whatever they are pressured to do from the next level up, and so on.
Stop living under the delusion that there is democracy in the world.
The only way you could argue that there is democracy is if 95+% of humans don't count as people. Which is pretty much the argument th
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No. The reality is that your public officials are doing exactly what people demand from them: being tough on crime. Sure, they end up trampling all over everyone's rights, killing or jailing innocent people, and going way too far with the guilty, but that's what you keep voting for.
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I'm afraid your ideas of the proportions of the population in terms of various designations of fervor about crime are askew.
Voting does not matter. The system has been broken. It's been figured out. The only candidates supplied are those that will follow the chain of command, or the only people voting are those that will follow the chain of command.
The only people who vote in local elections are, honestly, complete freaks. The do not vote out of honest concern, they vote to fit in. They vote to brag about w
If you build it, they will come (Score:3)
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If the Feds gave local police military helicopters with Hellfire missiles they would routinely be used on jaywalkers and drivers who didn't use turn signals
They should be used on drivers that don't use their turn signals.
Civil Contracts vs. The Constitution (Score:3)
...with many departments citing nondisclosure agreements with Stingray's manufacturer and with the FBI, and "often, the police get a judge's sign-off for surveillance without even bothering to mention that they will be using a Stingray...claiming that they simply can't violate those FBI nondisclosure agreements.
So their position, then, is that they've contracted away our constitutional rights? Is that the long and the short of it?
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Yea, it is pretty much the same as the contract between the five eyes.
The CIA is not supposed to spy on US-nationals in the U.S.A, so they let MI5 spy inside the U.S.A. and share the information with the CIA. Not exactly in the spirit of the law, is it.
In other news... (Score:1)
mdsolar zapping my rights to cheap efficient electricity with his anti-nuclear agenda. For more information, go back 4 articles.
Mobile phones (Score:2)
New legal strategy? (Score:2)
Maybe all defence lawyers should ask the opening question whether any surveillance device was used without a court order, during the investigation? Get the illegal data tossed out frequently enough, that maybe the cops will consider use of a court order?
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So how do you detect this device. is it mounted on a dish???
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https://github.com/CellularPrivacy/Android-IMSI-Catcher-Detector/wiki
Moral of the story.... (Score:3)
never Ever trust the police. They are no different than the Crips or Bloods except they are better financed.
Cases dropped (Score:5, Insightful)
The 6th amendment right to confront your accuser has caused many cases brought about by so called stingray devices to be dropped for fear of violating the NDA's signed by the department utilizing the devices, FBI included. I'm not saying they aren't out there or that many departments aren't over-stepping their bounds but any decent lawyer will challenge the source of transcripts and many cases have magically faded away for the lack of evidence unless they are major cases that can invoke secret warrants or such as national security issues.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-po... [arstechnica.com]
http://forums.theregister.co.u... [theregister.co.uk]
https://www.techdirt.com/artic... [techdirt.com]
Determining if cell tower is a stingray (Score:2)
Get "Network Signal Info Pro [kaibits-software.com]", by kaibits software. Then use it.
Better Cannon meet improved Wall (Score:3)
I believe this whole outcry is quite stupid. It has quite a "simple" technical solution.
1. Crowdsource the position and coordinates of "legal" cell tower antennas. It's not hard, they are visible . If it is possible to have "OpenStreetMap" I do not see why it cannot have a layer called "OpenCellSites". Just like Waze
2. Write an App, or include it in the firmware that keeps the cellphone from answering siren calls from any antenna not in the list.
Stingray is not a problem if you simply do not answer its call.
I know #2 maybe difficult if it is in the firmware inside radio module. If that is the case then I foresee an industry of open source radio modules with a "veto" signal that tells the cellphone when it is hearing a "better" antenna and asks for permission to change. It it does not receive permission, it is forbidden to switch.
Just My Idea.
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This has already been done. [slashdot.org]
"Filter error: You can type more than that for your comment"
Slashcode error: makes people type in worthless padding. Good job. Not.
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Which will not be approved by the FCC.
How about Mystery Diner ? (Score:2)
They showed the messages as captured - so either this was faked or private citizens can purchase and use Stingray's for spying on people.
And you are worried about Law Enforcement using them ?
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