7 ms·
That's not an honest representation of the argument given there is no parallel you can make between today's world of electronic communication passing over centr
by chillwaves 9y ago
That's not an honest representation of the argument given there is no parallel you can make between today's world of electronic communication passing over centralized infrastructure to however people communicated before.
There was no ability for the government to read everyone's (or anyone's) mail at once in the past.
- threeseed 9y agoIntelligence services absolutely had the ability to read people's postal mail and intercept their phone calls. For example, the CIA in a declassified report from 1976 opened over 215,000 physical letters: https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/document/0001420864 https://www.cia.gov/library/readingroom/document/0001420864
- andy_ppp 9y agoI guess that's a very small sample. We are talking about them making copies of every letter ever sent...
- shusson 9y agoWhat about telephone wire tapping? e.g https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Assistance_for_Law_Enforcement_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communications_Assistance_for_...
- izacus 9y agoThere is a huge difference in scale. Phone wiretapping required explicit targeting and was not possible at scale modern measures allow.