Wikimedia Is Clear To Sue the NSA Over Its Use of Warrantless Surveillance Tools (engadget.com) 60
The Wikimedia Foundation has the right to sue the National Security Agency over its use of warrantless surveillance tools, a federal appeals court ruled. "A district judge shot down Wikimedia's case in 2015, saying the group hadn't proved the NSA was actually illegally spying on its communications," reports Engadget. "In this case, proof was a tall order, considering information about the targeted surveillance system, Upstream, remains classified." From the report: The appeals court today ruled Wikimedia presented sufficient evidence that the NSA was in fact monitoring its communications, even if inadvertently. The Upstream system regularly tracks the physical backbone of the internet -- the cables and routers that actually transmit our emoji. With the help of telecom providers, the NSA then intercepts specific messages that contain "selectors," email addresses or other contact information for international targets under U.S. surveillance. "To put it simply, Wikimedia has plausibly alleged that its communications travel all of the roads that a communication can take, and that the NSA seizes all of the communications along at least one of those roads," the appeals court writes. "Thus, at least at this stage of the litigation, Wikimedia has standing to sue for a violation of the Fourth Amendment. And, because Wikimedia has self-censored its speech and sometimes forgone electronic communications in response to Upstream surveillance, it also has standing to sue for a violation of the First Amendment."
Re:Sue the government? (Score:5, Informative)
Yes. The government is not above its own law. It MUST be held accountable. If the government cannot be restrained by the courts, any semblance of democracy is gone.
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If? Lol. NOTHING will come of this but promises that will be immediately broken.
The courts cannot restrain a government that has no qualms about concealing its activities and misdirecting the public. There is no democracy here, but that was obvious from the voting system on up. An unranked vote for 300 million people? ROTFL Democracy indeed!
Not a failure of democracy-- it is democracy (Score:4, Informative)
The fact that the system of checks and balances sometimes works ineffectively doesn't mean that the system of checks and balances doesn't work at all.
In fact, the courts do present a barrier to abuse of power on the part of executive agencies. Not a perfect system-- and the ability of agencies to withhold information what they are doing, for security reasons, is indeed a serious barrier to court oversight-- but nevertheless, it is not completely broken.
You would be better to direct your cynicism toward the people. A large portion of the population (very likely the majority of the population) wants greater surveillance of communications, and wants the agencies hunting terrorists to do so secretly: they want to catch and shut down the terrorists whatever it takes. This isn't a "failure" of democracy-- this is democracy. IF it's a failure, it's a failure of the restraints on democracy.
If you want to change that: figure out how to make people less scared. (Good luck with that.)
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No. Have you not been paying attention? Citizens United is just a stupid description, it is more corporations united, and money has a louder voice in our oligarchy, that is by no means a democracy. Technically we would not be a democracy, anyways. We are supposed to be a republic. Insofar as terrorism goes, this is more manufactured consent from fear mongering. We create terrorists. Unless you think that our military just can not spot some shit rag tag army going across an open desert.
"democracy" just means voting (Score:2)
No. Have you not been paying attention? Citizens United is just a stupid description, it is more corporations united, and money has a louder voice in our oligarchy, that is by no means a democracy.
Although I'm not a great fan of the Citizens United ruling, that decision doesn't mean we're "not a democracy". It means that corporations (and more generally, people controlling money) are not restricted from using that money to promulgate their views, and hence direct public opinion.
But "democracy" doesn't mean "citizens voting intelligently." It merely means "citizens voting."
Technically we would not be a democracy, anyways. We are supposed to be a republic.
There are many varieties of democracy. The two are not exclusive; that's why it would be called a "democratic republic".
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And there we have it - the TRUTH of the MATTER - TOO many people are willing - even eager - to sacrifice their rights in order to obtain 'protection' from the savages at the gate (actually, the savages that have already broken down the gate) who are dead-set on destroying our domestic freedoms.
Had a few, and don't remember the exact quote - but - - - those that are willing to give up their liberties for the sake of 'safety' / 'security', will have, and deserve, neither ! ! !
God Bless America - since apparen
Liberty versus safety (Score:2)
And there we have it - the TRUTH of the MATTER - TOO many people are willing - even eager - to sacrifice their rights in order to obtain 'protection' from the savages at the gate (actually, the savages that have already broken down the gate) who are dead-set on destroying our domestic freedoms.
Yep. However, like everything else, it's a trade off. Patrick Henry was very noble saying "give me liberty or give me death," but, in fact, if you're dead you don't have any liberty.
Had a few, and don't remember the exact quote - but - - - those that are willing to give up their liberties for the sake of 'safety' / 'security', will have, and deserve, neither ! ! !
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
--Ben Franklin.
(often misquoted. Reference: https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/... [wikiquote.org] )
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Crap! Did I wave the flag too hard ? Or did I just make a point that didn't resonate with any of the /. readers?
I can live with being 'dinged' as a patriot, but to be down-graded from my basic +1 by someone as 'over-rated' is just about the limit.
Apparently there are no readers that lived through the Viet Nam debacle - hence I didn't even get a single response except from someone that believes that my basic +1 is OVER-RATED, even though I had the balls to include my real name and my military service histo
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And yet winning lawsuits against the government has happened in the past. The US government is not unified, the courts, legislature, and executive do not agree with each other. We have had overreaching intelligence activities slapped down before by congress and the courts.
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Perhaps I'm more cynical than most but I'm still looking for evidence that any semblance of democracy still exists.
Re:Sue the government? (Score:5, Insightful)
Technically, the US is a Democratic Republic. Tyranny of the majority (Democracy) is still tyranny.
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A democratic republic is both a republic and a democracy. A republic is: a sovereign state. whose ultimate power rests in its citizens entitled to vote. who (directly or indirectly) elect representatives to wield that power.
We are democratic republic. Representation is, by definition, part of the "republic" part. We elect our representatives directly, democratically. Hence, democratic republic.
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If a government cannot be restrained by the courts, then it should escalate to a tight rope around the neck.
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If the government cannot be restrained by the courts, any semblance of democracy is gone.
Not like that hasn't happened before [pbs.org]...
And please, the NSA? Good luck trying to collect, much less actually stopping them.
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Trade Federation: "is it legal"
Palpatine: "I will make it legal"
Government is above the law, because it makes the law. We don't elect people to write laws and execute them, we elect people to monitor the legislative and executive actions of the shadow state.
Far too many people are enjoying the fruits of this illicit governance, and therefore don't care how bad our liberties are being raped.
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In the US this is not exactly true, the government is not above the law. The executive does not make the laws, it only enforces them. Even though congress makes the laws it changes its mind very often. The courts can also step in and declare the a law conflicts with other laws. Presidents often discover that things aren't so easy to implement as they think they are before coming to office.
Re:Completely Frivolous Claim (Score:4, Insightful)
Furthermore, monitoring itself does not interfere with speech in any way.
Excuse me?
I'll tell you what, create an account here on Slashdot using your real name - DOX yourself so we can be sure you who you say you are - and post what you honestly think of our government.
Re:Completely Frivolous Claim (Score:4, Informative)
On the Fourth Amendment claim, the search must be unreasonable in order to be a violation. An unreasonable search is one that is not supported by a warrant. Contrary to the claim, the NSA has always had a warrant to conduct mass surveillance issued by the FISA court.
Did you miss the phrase "warrantless surveillance" in the summary?
The actual court ruling is here: https://www.aclu.org/legal-doc... [aclu.org]
Re:Completely Frivolous Claim (Score:4, Interesting)
Being paranoid about government surveillance does not mean your rights are violated.
With Snowden's and Shadow Brokers' revelations, being paranoid about government surveillance means you underestimate the extent of 4th Amendment violations less than the general population.
Re:Completely Frivolous Claim (Score:5, Insightful)
"An unreasonable search is one that is not supported by a warrant."
A warrant "...particularly describing the place to be searched..."
The Fourth Amendment is written in such a way as to preclude a court from issuing any sort of "general" warrant. Searching the records of millions of people or collecting vast amounts of internet traffic is not a "particular" place to be searched.
"It does not matter whether that warrant is valid, only that it exists."
You could argue that an invalid warrant means the NSA personnel were acting in good faith and should thus not be subject to disciplinary action or criminal charge, but it doesn't make their activity legal. Yes, any warrant allegedly permitting this sweeping surveillance activity would be central to the case.
We need to bring these important claims to court because the courts have never issued a ruling on the Constitutionality of the NSA surveillance programs. Thus far, the government has successfully argued that the programs cannot be challenged in court because the plaintiffs don't have legal standing. Sounds like that argument didn't work this time.
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Does that mean this shit is ok? Hell no. However, it isn't as cut and dry as people want it to be.
The main issue isn't the lack
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Searching the records of millions of people or collecting vast amounts of internet traffic is not a "particular" place to be searched.
And if the warrant says "All interesting pieces of data crossing this particular fibre optic at the far end, and
then containing a long list of entries that look like: #XX-1234-(CIRCUIT ID) At facility (Street Address of Telecom facility), Cabinet number, Rack 4, Port XX,YY" ?
Everything passing through a specific piece of fibre optic cable is a particular place t
I remember the constitution (Score:5, Insightful)
maybe someday we can bring it back again.
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We won't be able to bring it back until "We the people" learn all over again that the Constitution is there to tell the government the bounds in which it can operate, not to tell us what "rights we have".
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We won't be able to bring it back until "We the people" learn all over again that the Constitution is there to tell the government the bounds in which it can operate, not to tell us what "rights we have".
It won't be coming back unless we are willing to take up arms and start shooting and hanging the bastards. Anything short of that level of commitment will fail because *they* are willing to kill everyone like the dog in the manger to protect their power and positions.
You have two choices America: Throw the bastards out or get used to being a serf with no rights. There's no middle ground here.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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Nobody forced an Uber driver to start driving for Uber.
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Thanks to Edward Snowden, we know that the NSA employs people to commit billions of felonies every day.
And police officers drive faster than the speed limit. The reality is that the decisions are usually more complicated than "would this be a crime if a civilian did it?" If an agent of law enforcement or life preservation (EMT, fire fighter, etc.) violates a law that was impeding their ability to do their stated and accepted purpose, then the law is typically found to be at fault in that situation.
For some of the NSA activities, we know that the organization structurally violated the US Constitution, which
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You have described case law. We have at least two branches of government. One who writes the law (contract law as you put it) and one who upholds the law (precedent law as you put it). When a law has never been challenged then you are fighting to have a judge interpret the law the way you see it should be interpreted. When a judge interprets a law a specific way and creates a ruling it is up to either the third branch to validate or invalidate the law. Otherwise future judges can accept or deny the int
amendments (Score:1)
Too bad NSA don't actually answer to the american justice.
I'm sorry for you if it's only now that you realize that the amendments is just a piece of paper if people in power chose to ignore it.
emoji? (Score:1)
"the cables and routers that actually transmit our emoji"
wtf
Warrants are apparently meaningless (Score:2)
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demanding privacy as a right for themselves and customers isn't a political position. That is a personal opinion and a right to avoid unreasonable govt intrusion into our lives.
Only a simpleton would believe this is a partisan issue.
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Wikimedia shouldn't be involved in any US political affairs.
Choosing to adhere to the constitution and the supreme law of the land or not is NOT a political affair.
All governmental organizations MUST adhere to the constitution.