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Pentagon surveilling Americans without a warrant, Senator Wyden reveals

699 points by jbegley 5y ago

billytetrud 5y ago
Unsurprising, but still disappointing. Actually I'm glad someone is trying to hold them accountable. It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution. It highlights that the constitution only has teeth in some legal contexts, primarily where a court case is being heard on a citizen being prosecuted. Conditionality seems to not have any bearing on preventing agencies from violating the constitution or stopping them when they're found out, nor punishing those responsible for the violation.
- mc32 5y ago
  We gotta thank the Bush admin for this. Obama had the opp to make things right, but passed and instead gave them a wink. Trump was never going to act against these interests even if he’d wanted to given all the other aspects he was embroiled in. And now Biden. No way is he going to buck the establishment. Unfortunately Ron Paul nor anyone like him will make it into office to dismantle this surveillance-industrial complex.
  - HumblyTossed 5y ago
    Don't you mean Ron Wyden and not Ron Paul? Otherwise you're pretty much spot on.
    - adventured 5y ago
      They mean making it into the White House I believe. Ron Paul would certainly attempt to dismantle it, and he'd fail miserably (he'd never win election to begin with though). The larger confusion on the part of the parent is thinking the President is in charge of much of anything or has the power to dismantle any of these deep state perma structures that have been built up in the post WW2 era; these are structures that survive any given administration, regardless of political agenda, and which nobody really dares to challenge. That includes the always expanding spying systems and military industrial complex. Any President that tries it will be burned out of DC every which way possible. Instant lame duck, crippled by their own party, on the outs with the news media (which is entirely a pet of the deep state), lambasted coming and going, tripped up in staged scandals set up by deep state opponents in the FBI or CIA, probably get impeached a few times for relatively trivial things (vs, say, starting wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya that got a million plus people killed; you know, things you should actually get impeached for). The President is more of a token figurehead today than not.
      - atatatat 5y ago
        > he'd never win election to begin with though How do you persevere in the face of this type of media blacklisting? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMdrwhDoZjQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMdrwhDoZjQ
        adventured 5y ago
        I didn't watch your link (I rarely follow stray YouTube links). However regarding Ron Paul, I don't envy what he has endured in his lifetime from moronic opponents on both sides of the political aisle. The YouTube video of him being harangued & attacked by zombie anti-drug zealots on the Morton Downey Jr show is enough to feel sorry for him for a lifetime. Persevere, though? Anyone that dares to tell the truth today is begging for a blacklisting. That's what building the big tech censorship systems is all about (which will be America's version of the great firewall), being able to dictate what the supposed truth is for any given topic at any given moment in time. It's a martyrs game, telling the truth, I assume Ron Paul has known that for a long time.
        nobody9999 5y ago
        >Persevere, though? Anyone that dares to tell the truth today is begging for a blacklisting. Indeed. Liz Cheney's fate[0] is a great example of that. [0] https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/05/12/liz-cheney-live-vote-updates-gop-house-leadership/5031048001/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/05/12/liz-...
        vlan0 5y ago
        Yep. We saw it with Andrew Yang as well. Either being left out completely, or media outlets taking about 'him' without actually saying his name.
        NotSammyHagar 5y ago
        I'm skeptical of this media blackout. I heard lots of people talking about this, he was on podcasts, I saw him interviewed. Look at how much discussion there is about him running in NYC. I think it was much more that there were a whole lot of credible people running and there wasn't enough air in the room for him to get much. I saw every losing group complain of the election being stolen from them in some way, Warren, Sanders, Yang.
  - CWuestefeld 5y ago
    Yes, blame GWB. But I'm not sure why you're giving a pass to Obama, Trump, and Biden. Their failure to address it is every bit as bad as anything that was (presumably) set up under Bush.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
  - jtdev 5y ago
    Uhhhh... Obama doubled down on this bullshit.
  - HideousKojima 5y ago
    >Trump was never going to act against these interests even if he’d wanted to given all the other aspects he was embroiled in. Yet another person completely unaware that Trump let the Patriot Act expire: https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/27/politics/house-vote-fisa/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/27/politics/house-vote-fisa/inde... Can't say I'm surprised, the left didn't want to make huge news about it because it made Trump look good (and the establishment left supports the Patriot Act), and the right establishment/military supports the Patriot Act as well so they didn't want to raise a hubbub about it.
    - howenterprisey 5y ago
      Just in case anyone sees that and thinks it was due to any sort of principles or concerns about mass surveillance, a quote from the article: "Thank you to our GREAT Republican Congressmen & Congresswomen on your incredibly important blockage last night of a FISA Bill that would just perpetuate the abuse that produced the Greatest Political Crime In the History of the U.S., the Russian Witch-Hunt. Fantastic Job!"
      - koolba 5y ago
        Who would have a better understanding of the issue at hand than someone who’s campaign was spied on by political operatives leveraging FISA powers?
        throwaway8581 5y ago
        Umm, orange man bad.
        howenterprisey 5y ago
        The campaign was certainly surveilled. Have you seen any indication it was unwarranted? I found https://www.politico.com/news/2020/08/03/doj-fbi-review-of-surveillance-applications-finds-almost-all-errors-are-minor-391101 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/08/03/doj-fbi-review-of-s..., which suggests nothing untoward was going on. As I said, I don't think Trump was approaching this in a particularly well-considered way.
- clairity 5y ago
  i'd go one step further and prohibit our government from surveilling any non-governmental foreigner without an auditable warrant, and strictly prohibit corporations with heavy sanctions from sharing any non-governmental surveillance with the government whatsoever (on top of existing privacy laws of course). the government should be in service, not in command, of the people.
  - c3534l 5y ago
    The government only has the powers granted to it by the constitution. If the power for the executive to unilaterally conduct searches was not given to it, then it doesn't have it. Just because it doesn't say the government can't surveil foreigners doesn't mean they can - it has to specifically say the government is granted the right to surveil foreigners. And there's really very little reason to think that a power never granted to the government in the first place in the case of Americans was actually, somehow in secret, granted in the cases of non-Americans.
    - andred14 5y ago
      The 2020 election is proof that currently what is written in the constitution does not matter
    - salawat 5y ago
      Note: military surveillance should notcross with Law Enforcement surveillance. They are two different things in the eyes of the judiciary. The military can get away with surveillance under the mandate of defending the United States from all threats, foreign and domestic. The product of that surveillance, however, is not permissible as far as I know in a court of law unless it's specifically UCMJ. Not a lawyer though. If one is around willing to enlighten us on this odd question, it'd be much obliged.
    - clairity 5y ago
      i'd also generally agree with this, but not everyone does, so let's spell it out more clearly, even if somewhat redundantly.
    - 5y ago
- babesh 5y ago
  Surveillance is a form of power. Power does not give up power. Law is enforced via power. When it meets a greater power then the law is contravened. Look at the US and how it broke international law to force a plane down that it thought had Snowden.
  - edoceo 5y ago
    Huh, TIL.. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evo_Morales_grounding_incident https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evo_Morales_grounding_incide...
    - fanatic2pope 5y ago
      Assange deliberately leaking false information is a very interesting admission.
      - tpmx 5y ago
        Given the extreme asshattery history of Assange, it seems just as probable that he was mostly trying to get some attention with guesses and then later claimed that it was a deliberate disinformation campaign.
        TheTester 5y ago
        Unless you are quite rich and powerful, saying that what Assange has done is mostly "asshattery" is dishonest, yes he has had flukes but consider the mental state of someone being prosecuted and hunted by the most powerful and corrupt people in our planet, mostly what Assange has done s good and denying and calling him an asshat is dishonest and shows a clear bias on your part
        tpmx 5y ago
        Unless you are quite rich and powerful, saying that what Assange has done is mostly "asshattery" is dishonest Why do you think it wouldn't be dishonest if I were quite "rich and powerful"?
- mywittyname 5y ago
  > It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution. The constitution only grants or limits power of various branches of government, it doesn't prescribe punishments for breaking the rules. That's a job of Congress (or courts, for civil cases).
  - 0xbadcafebee 5y ago
    Even if the Constitution did prescribe punishments (what's a law without enforcement? wishful thinking.), everyone seems to think that just because there's some lines in the constitution that the matter is settled. We've been debating the constitution since it was written. We need laws to be tested in order to find out if they can or should be changed, or if we need to do something else.
  - billytetrud 5y ago
    Yes, but it could have defined punishments for violating it. IMO it should have.
- WalterBright 5y ago
  The Constitution is just a piece of paper. It is powerless if people ignore it. It's the same with presidents, kings, and dictators. If people just stopped doing what they said, they become nothing. There's an incident in Soviet history where Stalin was sure they were coming to arrest and execute him. He was shaking and completely powerless. But they were just coming to affirm his power. The Arab Spring came about because people stopped following orders. When Nixon was on his way out, the military decided to not follow his orders (so I've read). The US will end when people just decide Constitution Shmonstitution. Gun control is neither here nor there for me personally, but what greatly concerns me is if the Bill of Rights is ignored wrt the 2nd Amendment, then what about the rest of the Bill of Rights? Is that next?
  - rootusrootus 5y ago
    > It is powerless if people ignore it. Indeed we just had a bit of a lesson in the recent past which showed exactly how dependent our country is (and probably most other countries as well) on shared values and tradition. The Constitution isn't all-powerful as a piece of paper, its real power is as an idea.
    - Frost1x 5y ago
      The real power is consensus in an idea. Hopefully that idea is good but ultimately, you need critical mass to accept an idea or reject it. If people in the US really want to grab back power to the citizens of this country it can be done (peacefully even). All it really takes is a large enough consensus of voters to upend all the garbage we're being subjected to. The issue is that the consensus is more difficult to reach due to the scale of the US voter population combined with tactics like gerrymandering and overall difficulty of orchestrating movements to support ideals most people seem to support (which isn't oppressing a minority unless we classify power and wealth hungry individuals as a protected minority which we currently seem to do). Reaching consensus amongst citizens is far far more difficult these days, giving an edge to those already sitting in positions of concentrated power with fewer players, lending itself more likely to reach a consensus. It doesn't help that those in power actively try and divide the general voter population and set us against one another making it even more difficult to reach a consensus.
- phkahler 5y ago
  >> It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution. The argument is probably pretty simple. These companies will sell your data to anyone for the right price, why would a government agency be any different. It's probably not a search or seizure, just a purchase between parties that don't even include any specific member of the public. First congress needs to make all this data selling and trading illegal, then we'll see how the government goes about obtaining it and weather that's legal or not. But too many lobbyists represent companies that make a ton of money on it, and of course these agencies would prefer to just purchase the data "legally", so I'm not terribly optimistic.
- baybal2 5y ago
  In other news: - More than 120 retired generals and admirals wrote to Biden appearing to back a false election conspiracy and questioning his mental health - https://www.businessinsider.com/former-generals-admirals-letter-question-election-biden-health-2021-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/former-generals-admirals-let... - An open letter by former officers calling the president a “Marxist” dictator is a greater threat to U.S. democracy than the ouster of Liz Cheney. - https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/05/12/joe-biden-military-revolt-liz-cheney/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/05/12/joe-biden-military-revo... - Over 120 retired generals and admirals signed on to a letter falsely claiming the 2020 election was stolen in a move other veterans say erodes democratic norms. - https://sofrep.com/news/retired-officers-question-2020-election-and-bidens-health-in-an-open-letter/ https://sofrep.com/news/retired-officers-question-2020-elect... 30 Brigadiers, 16 Lietenant Generals, 42 Major Generals. In any other normal country, at this stage people will call a military putsch brewing an inevitability.
  - xvector 5y ago
    There are over a million service members in our armed forces. A couple of retired, senile crazies does not indicate a “military putsch brewing.”
    - baybal2 5y ago
      The number is significant. The statutory limit on US army general staff is 241, and most of those guys are quite recent retirees. Countries had putsches with much lesser portion of generals mutinying, and some times made without general staff involvement as such. In fact there are almost as much succesful putches on record by majors, and colonels, than generals.
- fredgrott 5y ago
  it is often stated that locks are not for honest people, but to keep dishonest people out. can be applied to US constitution as additional laws needed not for those who WANT to uphold the US constitution but those who want to violate it. Most of you probably already saw a Michigan-congress rep submit a bill to violate the US constitution by trying to force twitter posters to register with Michigan to post facts because he wanted to prevent others from outing him in the form of fact checking.
  - vernie 5y ago
    Isn't it the other way around?
  - danans 5y ago
    > it is often stated that locks are not for honest people, but to keep dishonest people out. The saying goes the other way: "Locks are for honest people", implying that criminals aren't deterred by locks, and will just break a window if they want to get in.
- seaourfreed 5y ago
  Congress is corrupt (via lobbyist money) which causes this problem. The DoD tracks large scale threats to our nation. When the economy is rigged, then the establishment worries about the citizen base turning on the establishment. Congress corruption (via lobbyiests) happens by: a) Wall Street rigged economy HF front-running trades, b) Wall Street is rigged c) 2008 Mortgage crisis theft d) Pharma is rigged e) Medical costs are out of control. Every price fixes are killed by lobbyists): Hillary, Obama cost controls, etc.
  - parineum 5y ago
    What lobby is lobbying for warrantless surveillance?
    - seaourfreed 5y ago
      DAVOS had the economic elites paranoid about a citizen uprising due to a rigged economy. The rigged economy would be fixed by congress (if they didn't sell out to lobbyists, to not fix it). DoD doesn't do surveillance due to lobbying. They do it because they view a potential risk in citizen uprising due to the rigged economy. DoD and Davos attendees share a worry about a risk from the citizen base.
- Black101 5y ago
  > It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution. What makes you think that they will respect new laws?
  - billytetrud 5y ago
    Great question. Unless there are consequences, some will simply ignore it and do what they want.
- 1cvmask 5y ago
  The Supreme Court and constitution have always been irrelevant. Ask any former black slave or many laws etc that were trampled on by Presidents: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worcester_v._Georgia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worcester_v._Georgia The constitution and Supreme Court do not consider Blacks humans or citizens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sandford https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sandford
  - billytetrud 5y ago
    I very much disagree. Yes the constitution has been violated many times. But without the constitution, its tenants would be violated constantly everywhere in the country. Nothing is perfect, and the outcomes brought the constitution being imperfect is no indictment of the document.
java-man 5y ago
"not wittingly" [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEh-l_G1Gcs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEh-l_G1Gcs
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 5y ago
  Can't watch because I am at work but the NSA conducts foreign surveillance. If a foreign target talks to a US citizen that's "unwittingly" surveiling a US citizen. Do you believe that it's alright for the NSA to conduct surveillance on foreign threats?
  - etrabroline 5y ago
    Under the 4th amendment NSA is forbidden from collecting the communications of US citizens without a warrant. Do you disagree or think the constitution should be amended to authorize that?
    - dragonwriter 5y ago
      > Under the 4th amendment NSA is forbidden from collecting the communications of US citizens without a warrant. Strictly by the text this is false in a couple respects: (1) the text does not refer to or limit its provisions to citizens at all. (2) the text prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures, not those without warrants (it also sets standards for warrants, when they are issued.) The Supreme Court has inferred from the juxtaposition of the reasonableness requirement and warrant standards that warrants are presumptively but not universally required for reasonableness.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
  - Mediterraneo10 5y ago
    > Do you believe that it's alright for the NSA to conduct surveillance on foreign threats? It is one thing for the NSA to conduct surveillance on foreign threats, but I have always been uncomfortable with the suggestion that the NSA is perfectly entitled to vacuum up the communications of ordinary, perfectly harmless foreign individuals because "the protections of the American Constitution don’t apply to foreigners". The American Constitution is largely a product of 18th-century natural-law arguments, and so you would think that case can be made that all human beings are endowed by their Creator with a right to privacy regardless of their citizenship.
ssklash 5y ago
I knew before even reading that the senator would be Ron Wyden. He's a treasure and the most tech-literate politician I know of. Oregon is lucky to have him, and we could use a lot more like him.
- nickysielicki 5y ago
  Respectfully, the most tech-literate politician is without a doubt Thomas Massie, who went to MIT for both his undergrad in electrical engineering and his masters in mechanical engineering, who formed a decently successful startup working on novel computer input mechanisms. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Massie#Early_life,_education,_and_business_career https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Massie#Early_life,_educ...
  - totalZero 5y ago
    Thomas Massie is an example of what I like to call the "tetazoo paradox": As a person gets more adept regarding technology, their capacity to communicate with laypeople about technology diminishes. The best advocates for tech literacy are not the most tech-literate, but rather the ones in the middle ground who are smart enough to understand the technology and patient enough to communicate about it with laypeople who are a few eureka moments behind. We occasionally find wonderful people like Richard Feynman who can sidestep this inverse relationship, but not frequently.
  - ssklash 5y ago
    Fair enough. I think it would be more accurate to say that Wyden is the most vocal and effective when it comes to tech-related issues.
  - verall 5y ago
    And yet he is publicly against Net Neutrality and doesn't believe in climate change. Tribal affiliation takes priority over technical ability I guess.
    - adventured 5y ago
2OEH8eoCRo0 5y ago
This is about the DoD purchasing data from 3rd parties.
- swiley 5y ago
  I wonder if this is why the anti trust action against Apple/Google/Qualcomm has taken so long.
  - Nasrudith 5y ago
    Antitrust suits are slow and hard even when they are legitimate and not publicity stunts or attempts to punish enemies.
    - babypuncher 5y ago
      The lawsuits are usually against incredibly wealthy corporations. It's best to make sure your case is air tight before going up against the best lawyers money can buy.
freshair 5y ago
Until high ranking government officials start getting very length prison sentences for this sort of shit, I doubt it will ever get better.
- giantg2 5y ago
  Why would they get a prison sentence for legally buying information that the private sector can also buy?
  - topkai22 5y ago
    Also with the legal precedent from the Supreme Court that telecom metadata IS not protected by the 4th amendment? It is NOT clear from the article that what is doing is legally unconstitutional, as much as I might personally disagree with the Judicial branch's current view.
  - Nasrudith 5y ago
    You can hire a PI legally. A police chief hiring a PI to bypass warrant restrictions would rightfully be in deep shit for it.
    - giantg2 5y ago
      You seem to be implying that the PI has additional powers. It's quite the opposite. Any search that a PI can legally do can also be done by legally by the police. Police have access to government sources of data that PIs do not, can collaborate with other departments, and can detain people (under the right circumstances). The chief might get in trouble, but usually that has to do with policies against using external resources or for budget constraints.
  - kwere 5y ago
    they will get senteces due data collected so to not get caugth they will ride privacy bandwagon
sprkwd 5y ago
This is my surprised face.
HDMI_Cable 5y ago
The Third Party Doctrine is one of the things that is so obviously out of date, and needs to be changed. When so much of our lives (to the point where it is our lives) are online, why is there no expectation of privacy? --- [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-party_doctrine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-party_doctrine
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- Nasrudith 5y ago
  Because they wanted to take as much as they could without any pesky constitutional rights getting in the way.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- webXL 5y ago
  Apple sells privacy, so there's a market for it and it's expanding into the public conscience. Apple isn't a bank though, and they aren't beholden to the same paternalistic/sinister interests. So what's really needed is reducing the size and scope of what paternalistic/sinister interests manage. Design principles such as separation of concerns come to mind.
anonymousisme 5y ago
What about the practice of letting our five eyes partners collect on Americans, and then obtaining the laundered intel products?
maybelsyrup 5y ago
The thing I still can't fathom, all these years after Bush II and then Snowden, is just how little human beings really care about mass surveillance. Yeah, the Snowden leaks made a splash, but the media cycle turned over a couple weeks later and everyone moved onto other things. It's like, if you're of a certain age, you had to read 1984 or whatever in school. You'd think "well, no one would stand for that sort of thing in real life!" Okay, so we don't live in that society, exactly, but time after time, we're shown the breadth of government surveillance and the reaction from the broader public isn't to call for anyone's head on a pike -- it's not even to vote anyone out! Outside of little communities like this one, people don't give much of a fuck. I guess that was Orwell's real point.
- derg 5y ago
  Honestly it could also be it's just hard to fathom the breadth and scale. Easier to imagine someone opening your mail or tapping your phone or otherwise physically interacting with things you own over the government intercepting a request to post a picture to facebook, for instance. I think a fair number of people intuitively understand just how massive the internet is and it's hard to conceptualize someone or something sifting through the sand to find your few little grains.
- thanatos519 5y ago
  Maybe 'Amusing Ourselves to Death' by Neil Postman will help you fathom it; here's the forward: https://www.tau.ac.il/education/muse/maslool/boidem/170foreword.html https://www.tau.ac.il/education/muse/maslool/boidem/170forew...
- tsimionescu 5y ago
  I think most people would oppose it if the media were really presenting it as an issue to keep in mind. However, most of the people in the media are very much supporters of such powers, as they are deep believers in the rightness of US institutions and their 'fundamentally benign' nature. If you look at the media, most are still in support of every single war America has ever been in, with the only opposition being on matters of strategy (e.g. "The US should have retreated from Vietnam earlier", not "there was no defensible reason for the war in Vietnam, it was just a blatant display of imperialism"). And I'm not talking about Fox (who pride themselves on such views), but even the most liberal papers or news channels. Of course, they are very much opposed to such measures in other countries, especially their enemies.
boomboomsubban 5y ago
I don't like how this article buries the important parts of this story. There is good reason to think that this surveillance by public info is legal currently, there was a court ruling stating that's the case. A law is necessary to codify that this practice is a violation Fourth Amendment, and Wyden is currently one of a handful of senators trying to get it passed. The story eventually mentions this, but the beginning focus on confidentiality makes it seem like they're hiding evidence of their crime.
- kemitchell 5y ago
  I'm not familiar with any such ruling. Which do you have in mind?
  - boomboomsubban 5y ago
    Sorry, I'm basing this off other articles on this subject I've read recently but my 30 second search didn't locate them. The DoD has some reason to believe their interpretation is correct though, a law clarifying it's not would still be a good idea.
    - 1MachineElf 5y ago
      The pessimist in me wonders if Senator Wyden is being funded by a company who stands to gain when their competitor can no longer supply the Pentagon with surveillance data according to the letter of the law.
      - boomboomsubban 5y ago
        Three things on that. First, the law would just require a warrant before they get that data, there isn't really some other source that would benefit from it. Second, Wyden has been supportive of similar issues for years, not beyond suspicion but there should be some substance to any suspicion cast on him. And finally, I wouldn't care if Wyden was being paid to ensure that law enforcement needs a warrant. My cynical take is that Wyden is only allowed to make these press releases because both parties know that they are unlikely to become law. People get less upset knowing someone is pushing for the issues they care about even though the effort is futile.
GartzenDeHaes 5y ago
A warrant is not required for the government to purchase commercial data products and there are plenty of legitimate uses for this kind of data. Security analytics would seem to be an obvious use case for netflow data, for example. Commercial datasets are also used for address correction and standardization and most government agencies routinely do.
- jtdev 5y ago
  This sounds like the definition of flimflam with a splash of gaslighting... flimflam: deceptive nonsense
- tclancy 5y ago
  >there are plenty of legitimate uses for this kind of data Who defines "legitimate" and why should that be an argument for doing something that seems blatantly unconstitutional?
sjaak 5y ago
Land of the free, home of the surveilled.
forgithubs 5y ago
I don't support that kind of surveillance. That said, are they really in illegality ? Can I buy this type of localization data as a private individual ? If so, then they don't need a warrant, am I right ?
- tclancy 5y ago
  There are plenty of things a private citizen can do that a government entity cannot.
  - forgithubs 5y ago
    Do you have an example ?
    - tialaramex 5y ago
      In the United States the government is not allowed to get religion. Private Citizens can worship whoever or whatever they want, but the Government isn't supposed to. Now, you might observe that the country's money says "In God We Trust" on it, its legislature openly prays to the Christian God, its Head of State goes to a Christian church, and its Supreme Court sure seems like they have some very peculiar ideas about how exactly such freedom for "private citizens" manifests... But in principle the United States does not have an Established Church and is not permitted to establish one. This may be cold comfort de facto if you see Organised Religion with its tendrils deep in the heart of government, but there you are.
croes 5y ago
That's why all this data collection in the web is a bad idea. Not only by FAANG but any developer who helps in creating this data.
- jtdev 5y ago
  I think U.S. based developers need to create something akin to the CCC in Germany to combat the clear abuse of privacy that many developers are now engaging in on a daily basis. https://www.ccc.de/en/club https://www.ccc.de/en/club I know... the CCC has been the target of infiltration and compromise in various ways throughout history, but that's a reality of standing up to abusive power.
  - croes 5y ago
    I would have thought something like that already existed in the USA. So there is one point where Germany has a head start in IT.
SquibblesRedux 5y ago
Regarding the DoD purchasing data from data brokers, I would much rather first focus on laws or regulations that set legal standards for the collection, sale, and other distribution of personal information. For example, make the sale of personal information to a government agency an act that requires posting notice on a public register. Also, a hefty tax on the sale of personal information would be nice to see. I would focus on the collection and sale of personal information first because it is often done without the informed consent of the person to whom the information is associated.
- grayfaced 5y ago
  If these data brokers are already selling this data, I'm not going to get upset at the govt for buying it. I want restrictions on EVERYONE buying my data. Not just one entity.
  - nobody9999 5y ago
    >I want restrictions on EVERYONE buying my data. Not just one entity. That's a start, but I'd prefer restrictions on EVERYONE collecting my data too.
bsd44 5y ago
This is brand new information.
sneak 5y ago
"We can't tell you if we are violating your constitutional rights or not, because that's classified on the basis of national security." When the preservation of the formerly supreme law of the land is made subordinate to the interests of the ruling military, I think it is safe to say the american experiment is over. I have long maintained that the US is basically a military dictatorship. There are many examples, like the CIA hacking congressional computers to cover up the fact that the CIA lied under oath to congress. Snowden telling us that all of the large US internet and web service providers have to spy on everyone, citizens and not, without a warrant. And now this. The US is not a free country today, if indeed it ever was.
- rpdillon 5y ago
  I fear that arguments like this lead to people devaluing what freedoms they have, since hey, we're already in a military dictatorship, so there's nothing left to lose. I understand why you're saying this, but I think it's profoundly dismissive of those who have fought for what we have.
auiya 5y ago
So Wyden's issue is the DoD is buying access to these data sets from private industry? I'm not sure there has been a court ruling declaring this practice to be illegal, and it might very well be legal depending on the dataset's coverage and what it's intended use would be. The DoD's OGC are not stupid when it comes to these sorts of matters, and surely they've had to weigh in on this collection point already. I guess this is why Wyden is trying to pass legislation for this practice to be illegal unless explicitly directed by court order to do so? I'm betting the DoD has already anticipated this and filters out the domestic traffic they don't care about prior to ingest - I think they have to do so by law anyway. So Congress can pass a law saying a court order is needed first to buy these communications datasets, but the FISC will continue to be a rubber stamp for the IC, and not at all the friction barrier the legislators are hoping for. This strikes me as posturing and nothing more.
- spydum 5y ago
  Agree, buying sampled Netflow data would technically hit this bar. Hard to know if it is troublesome without knowing the purpose. Are we using this for analyzing citizens traffic and correlating with other identifiers... Or are we analyzing traffic patterns to critical infrastructure and/or foreign nations?
epberry 5y ago
We should all be grateful that Senator Wyden has been a champion for these issues. I like to watch him in hearings and it's clear he's one of the most well prepared questioners on issues of privacy and liberty. To the staff of his office, if you're seeing this comment section - thank you!
jnwatson 5y ago
The US Intelligence Agencies have been using this trick for a long time. They ask the Brits for intel on US persons and they trade for intel on Brits. The only difference is they go through a commercial entity now. If it is legal to trade with the Brits, it is legal to go through a private entity. Data is big business.
kingkawn 5y ago
if its possible, theyll do it
fukmbas 5y ago
If you want to see something scarier just check the social media forums that trigger to people born after 2001. Typical response is So?
1MachineElf 5y ago
Some of the answers the DoD provided were given in a form that means Wyden's office cannot legally publish specifics on the surveillance; one answer in particular was classified. In the letter Wyden is pushing the DoD to release the information to the public. A Wyden aide told Motherboard that the Senator is unable to make the information public at this time... It seems strange and troubling to me that a senator would be restricted from making public any government information.
samuelizdat 5y ago
Jeremy Bentham and his consequences have been a disaster for the human race.
anm89 5y ago
I would be more surprised at this point to find out that the American three letter agencies bothered to get a warrant for anything. My base case is that they are constantly warrantlessly surveilling everyone.
Juntu 5y ago
Data transx :::3(( pentagon secret Alice

699 points by jbegley 5y ago

Unsurprising, but still disappointing. Actually I'm glad someone is trying to hold them accountable. It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution. It highlights that the constitution only has teeth in some legal contexts, primarily where a court case is being heard on a citizen being prosecuted. Conditionality seems to not have any bearing on preventing agencies from violating the constitution or stopping them when they're found out, nor punishing those responsible for the violation.

mc32 5y ago
We gotta thank the Bush admin for this. Obama had the opp to make things right, but passed and instead gave them a wink. Trump was never going to act against these interests even if he’d wanted to given all the other aspects he was embroiled in. And now Biden. No way is he going to buck the establishment. Unfortunately Ron Paul nor anyone like him will make it into office to dismantle this surveillance-industrial complex.
- HumblyTossed 5y ago
  Don't you mean Ron Wyden and not Ron Paul? Otherwise you're pretty much spot on.
  - adventured 5y ago
    They mean making it into the White House I believe. Ron Paul would certainly attempt to dismantle it, and he'd fail miserably (he'd never win election to begin with though). The larger confusion on the part of the parent is thinking the President is in charge of much of anything or has the power to dismantle any of these deep state perma structures that have been built up in the post WW2 era; these are structures that survive any given administration, regardless of political agenda, and which nobody really dares to challenge. That includes the always expanding spying systems and military industrial complex. Any President that tries it will be burned out of DC every which way possible. Instant lame duck, crippled by their own party, on the outs with the news media (which is entirely a pet of the deep state), lambasted coming and going, tripped up in staged scandals set up by deep state opponents in the FBI or CIA, probably get impeached a few times for relatively trivial things (vs, say, starting wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya that got a million plus people killed; you know, things you should actually get impeached for). The President is more of a token figurehead today than not.
    - atatatat 5y ago
      > he'd never win election to begin with though How do you persevere in the face of this type of media blacklisting? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMdrwhDoZjQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMdrwhDoZjQ
      - adventured 5y ago
        I didn't watch your link (I rarely follow stray YouTube links). However regarding Ron Paul, I don't envy what he has endured in his lifetime from moronic opponents on both sides of the political aisle. The YouTube video of him being harangued & attacked by zombie anti-drug zealots on the Morton Downey Jr show is enough to feel sorry for him for a lifetime. Persevere, though? Anyone that dares to tell the truth today is begging for a blacklisting. That's what building the big tech censorship systems is all about (which will be America's version of the great firewall), being able to dictate what the supposed truth is for any given topic at any given moment in time. It's a martyrs game, telling the truth, I assume Ron Paul has known that for a long time.
        nobody9999 5y ago
        >Persevere, though? Anyone that dares to tell the truth today is begging for a blacklisting. Indeed. Liz Cheney's fate[0] is a great example of that. [0] https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/05/12/liz-cheney-live-vote-updates-gop-house-leadership/5031048001/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/05/12/liz-...
      - vlan0 5y ago
        Yep. We saw it with Andrew Yang as well. Either being left out completely, or media outlets taking about 'him' without actually saying his name.
        NotSammyHagar 5y ago
        I'm skeptical of this media blackout. I heard lots of people talking about this, he was on podcasts, I saw him interviewed. Look at how much discussion there is about him running in NYC. I think it was much more that there were a whole lot of credible people running and there wasn't enough air in the room for him to get much. I saw every losing group complain of the election being stolen from them in some way, Warren, Sanders, Yang.
- CWuestefeld 5y ago
  Yes, blame GWB. But I'm not sure why you're giving a pass to Obama, Trump, and Biden. Their failure to address it is every bit as bad as anything that was (presumably) set up under Bush.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- jtdev 5y ago
  Uhhhh... Obama doubled down on this bullshit.
- HideousKojima 5y ago
  >Trump was never going to act against these interests even if he’d wanted to given all the other aspects he was embroiled in. Yet another person completely unaware that Trump let the Patriot Act expire: https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/27/politics/house-vote-fisa/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/27/politics/house-vote-fisa/inde... Can't say I'm surprised, the left didn't want to make huge news about it because it made Trump look good (and the establishment left supports the Patriot Act), and the right establishment/military supports the Patriot Act as well so they didn't want to raise a hubbub about it.
  - howenterprisey 5y ago
    Just in case anyone sees that and thinks it was due to any sort of principles or concerns about mass surveillance, a quote from the article: "Thank you to our GREAT Republican Congressmen & Congresswomen on your incredibly important blockage last night of a FISA Bill that would just perpetuate the abuse that produced the Greatest Political Crime In the History of the U.S., the Russian Witch-Hunt. Fantastic Job!"
    - koolba 5y ago
      Who would have a better understanding of the issue at hand than someone who’s campaign was spied on by political operatives leveraging FISA powers?
      - throwaway8581 5y ago
        Umm, orange man bad.
      - howenterprisey 5y ago
        The campaign was certainly surveilled. Have you seen any indication it was unwarranted? I found https://www.politico.com/news/2020/08/03/doj-fbi-review-of-surveillance-applications-finds-almost-all-errors-are-minor-391101 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/08/03/doj-fbi-review-of-s..., which suggests nothing untoward was going on. As I said, I don't think Trump was approaching this in a particularly well-considered way.
clairity 5y ago
i'd go one step further and prohibit our government from surveilling any non-governmental foreigner without an auditable warrant, and strictly prohibit corporations with heavy sanctions from sharing any non-governmental surveillance with the government whatsoever (on top of existing privacy laws of course). the government should be in service, not in command, of the people.
- c3534l 5y ago
  The government only has the powers granted to it by the constitution. If the power for the executive to unilaterally conduct searches was not given to it, then it doesn't have it. Just because it doesn't say the government can't surveil foreigners doesn't mean they can - it has to specifically say the government is granted the right to surveil foreigners. And there's really very little reason to think that a power never granted to the government in the first place in the case of Americans was actually, somehow in secret, granted in the cases of non-Americans.
  - andred14 5y ago
    The 2020 election is proof that currently what is written in the constitution does not matter
  - salawat 5y ago
    Note: military surveillance should notcross with Law Enforcement surveillance. They are two different things in the eyes of the judiciary. The military can get away with surveillance under the mandate of defending the United States from all threats, foreign and domestic. The product of that surveillance, however, is not permissible as far as I know in a court of law unless it's specifically UCMJ. Not a lawyer though. If one is around willing to enlighten us on this odd question, it'd be much obliged.
  - clairity 5y ago
    i'd also generally agree with this, but not everyone does, so let's spell it out more clearly, even if somewhat redundantly.
  - 5y ago
babesh 5y ago
Surveillance is a form of power. Power does not give up power. Law is enforced via power. When it meets a greater power then the law is contravened. Look at the US and how it broke international law to force a plane down that it thought had Snowden.
- edoceo 5y ago
  Huh, TIL.. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evo_Morales_grounding_incident https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evo_Morales_grounding_incide...
  - fanatic2pope 5y ago
    Assange deliberately leaking false information is a very interesting admission.
    - tpmx 5y ago
      Given the extreme asshattery history of Assange, it seems just as probable that he was mostly trying to get some attention with guesses and then later claimed that it was a deliberate disinformation campaign.
      - TheTester 5y ago
        Unless you are quite rich and powerful, saying that what Assange has done is mostly "asshattery" is dishonest, yes he has had flukes but consider the mental state of someone being prosecuted and hunted by the most powerful and corrupt people in our planet, mostly what Assange has done s good and denying and calling him an asshat is dishonest and shows a clear bias on your part
        tpmx 5y ago
        Unless you are quite rich and powerful, saying that what Assange has done is mostly "asshattery" is dishonest Why do you think it wouldn't be dishonest if I were quite "rich and powerful"?
mywittyname 5y ago
> It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution. The constitution only grants or limits power of various branches of government, it doesn't prescribe punishments for breaking the rules. That's a job of Congress (or courts, for civil cases).
- 0xbadcafebee 5y ago
  Even if the Constitution did prescribe punishments (what's a law without enforcement? wishful thinking.), everyone seems to think that just because there's some lines in the constitution that the matter is settled. We've been debating the constitution since it was written. We need laws to be tested in order to find out if they can or should be changed, or if we need to do something else.
- billytetrud 5y ago
  Yes, but it could have defined punishments for violating it. IMO it should have.
WalterBright 5y ago
The Constitution is just a piece of paper. It is powerless if people ignore it. It's the same with presidents, kings, and dictators. If people just stopped doing what they said, they become nothing. There's an incident in Soviet history where Stalin was sure they were coming to arrest and execute him. He was shaking and completely powerless. But they were just coming to affirm his power. The Arab Spring came about because people stopped following orders. When Nixon was on his way out, the military decided to not follow his orders (so I've read). The US will end when people just decide Constitution Shmonstitution. Gun control is neither here nor there for me personally, but what greatly concerns me is if the Bill of Rights is ignored wrt the 2nd Amendment, then what about the rest of the Bill of Rights? Is that next?
- rootusrootus 5y ago
  > It is powerless if people ignore it. Indeed we just had a bit of a lesson in the recent past which showed exactly how dependent our country is (and probably most other countries as well) on shared values and tradition. The Constitution isn't all-powerful as a piece of paper, its real power is as an idea.
  - Frost1x 5y ago
    The real power is consensus in an idea. Hopefully that idea is good but ultimately, you need critical mass to accept an idea or reject it. If people in the US really want to grab back power to the citizens of this country it can be done (peacefully even). All it really takes is a large enough consensus of voters to upend all the garbage we're being subjected to. The issue is that the consensus is more difficult to reach due to the scale of the US voter population combined with tactics like gerrymandering and overall difficulty of orchestrating movements to support ideals most people seem to support (which isn't oppressing a minority unless we classify power and wealth hungry individuals as a protected minority which we currently seem to do). Reaching consensus amongst citizens is far far more difficult these days, giving an edge to those already sitting in positions of concentrated power with fewer players, lending itself more likely to reach a consensus. It doesn't help that those in power actively try and divide the general voter population and set us against one another making it even more difficult to reach a consensus.
phkahler 5y ago
>> It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution. The argument is probably pretty simple. These companies will sell your data to anyone for the right price, why would a government agency be any different. It's probably not a search or seizure, just a purchase between parties that don't even include any specific member of the public. First congress needs to make all this data selling and trading illegal, then we'll see how the government goes about obtaining it and weather that's legal or not. But too many lobbyists represent companies that make a ton of money on it, and of course these agencies would prefer to just purchase the data "legally", so I'm not terribly optimistic.
baybal2 5y ago
In other news: - More than 120 retired generals and admirals wrote to Biden appearing to back a false election conspiracy and questioning his mental health - https://www.businessinsider.com/former-generals-admirals-letter-question-election-biden-health-2021-5 https://www.businessinsider.com/former-generals-admirals-let... - An open letter by former officers calling the president a “Marxist” dictator is a greater threat to U.S. democracy than the ouster of Liz Cheney. - https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/05/12/joe-biden-military-revolt-liz-cheney/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/05/12/joe-biden-military-revo... - Over 120 retired generals and admirals signed on to a letter falsely claiming the 2020 election was stolen in a move other veterans say erodes democratic norms. - https://sofrep.com/news/retired-officers-question-2020-election-and-bidens-health-in-an-open-letter/ https://sofrep.com/news/retired-officers-question-2020-elect... 30 Brigadiers, 16 Lietenant Generals, 42 Major Generals. In any other normal country, at this stage people will call a military putsch brewing an inevitability.
- xvector 5y ago
  There are over a million service members in our armed forces. A couple of retired, senile crazies does not indicate a “military putsch brewing.”
  - baybal2 5y ago
    The number is significant. The statutory limit on US army general staff is 241, and most of those guys are quite recent retirees. Countries had putsches with much lesser portion of generals mutinying, and some times made without general staff involvement as such. In fact there are almost as much succesful putches on record by majors, and colonels, than generals.
fredgrott 5y ago
it is often stated that locks are not for honest people, but to keep dishonest people out. can be applied to US constitution as additional laws needed not for those who WANT to uphold the US constitution but those who want to violate it. Most of you probably already saw a Michigan-congress rep submit a bill to violate the US constitution by trying to force twitter posters to register with Michigan to post facts because he wanted to prevent others from outing him in the form of fact checking.
- vernie 5y ago
  Isn't it the other way around?
- danans 5y ago
  > it is often stated that locks are not for honest people, but to keep dishonest people out. The saying goes the other way: "Locks are for honest people", implying that criminals aren't deterred by locks, and will just break a window if they want to get in.
seaourfreed 5y ago
Congress is corrupt (via lobbyist money) which causes this problem. The DoD tracks large scale threats to our nation. When the economy is rigged, then the establishment worries about the citizen base turning on the establishment. Congress corruption (via lobbyiests) happens by: a) Wall Street rigged economy HF front-running trades, b) Wall Street is rigged c) 2008 Mortgage crisis theft d) Pharma is rigged e) Medical costs are out of control. Every price fixes are killed by lobbyists): Hillary, Obama cost controls, etc.
- parineum 5y ago
  What lobby is lobbying for warrantless surveillance?
  - seaourfreed 5y ago
    DAVOS had the economic elites paranoid about a citizen uprising due to a rigged economy. The rigged economy would be fixed by congress (if they didn't sell out to lobbyists, to not fix it). DoD doesn't do surveillance due to lobbying. They do it because they view a potential risk in citizen uprising due to the rigged economy. DoD and Davos attendees share a worry about a risk from the citizen base.
Black101 5y ago
> It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution. What makes you think that they will respect new laws?
- billytetrud 5y ago
  Great question. Unless there are consequences, some will simply ignore it and do what they want.
1cvmask 5y ago
The Supreme Court and constitution have always been irrelevant. Ask any former black slave or many laws etc that were trampled on by Presidents: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worcester_v._Georgia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worcester_v._Georgia The constitution and Supreme Court do not consider Blacks humans or citizens: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sandford https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sandford
- billytetrud 5y ago
  I very much disagree. Yes the constitution has been violated many times. But without the constitution, its tenants would be violated constantly everywhere in the country. Nothing is perfect, and the outcomes brought the constitution being imperfect is no indictment of the document.

java-man 5y ago

"not wittingly" [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEh-l_G1Gcs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEh-l_G1Gcs

2OEH8eoCRo0 5y ago
Can't watch because I am at work but the NSA conducts foreign surveillance. If a foreign target talks to a US citizen that's "unwittingly" surveiling a US citizen. Do you believe that it's alright for the NSA to conduct surveillance on foreign threats?
- etrabroline 5y ago
  Under the 4th amendment NSA is forbidden from collecting the communications of US citizens without a warrant. Do you disagree or think the constitution should be amended to authorize that?
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > Under the 4th amendment NSA is forbidden from collecting the communications of US citizens without a warrant. Strictly by the text this is false in a couple respects: (1) the text does not refer to or limit its provisions to citizens at all. (2) the text prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures, not those without warrants (it also sets standards for warrants, when they are issued.) The Supreme Court has inferred from the juxtaposition of the reasonableness requirement and warrant standards that warrants are presumptively but not universally required for reasonableness.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- Mediterraneo10 5y ago
  > Do you believe that it's alright for the NSA to conduct surveillance on foreign threats? It is one thing for the NSA to conduct surveillance on foreign threats, but I have always been uncomfortable with the suggestion that the NSA is perfectly entitled to vacuum up the communications of ordinary, perfectly harmless foreign individuals because "the protections of the American Constitution don’t apply to foreigners". The American Constitution is largely a product of 18th-century natural-law arguments, and so you would think that case can be made that all human beings are endowed by their Creator with a right to privacy regardless of their citizenship.

ssklash 5y ago

I knew before even reading that the senator would be Ron Wyden. He's a treasure and the most tech-literate politician I know of. Oregon is lucky to have him, and we could use a lot more like him.

nickysielicki 5y ago
Respectfully, the most tech-literate politician is without a doubt Thomas Massie, who went to MIT for both his undergrad in electrical engineering and his masters in mechanical engineering, who formed a decently successful startup working on novel computer input mechanisms. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Massie#Early_life,_education,_and_business_career https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Massie#Early_life,_educ...
- totalZero 5y ago
  Thomas Massie is an example of what I like to call the "tetazoo paradox": As a person gets more adept regarding technology, their capacity to communicate with laypeople about technology diminishes. The best advocates for tech literacy are not the most tech-literate, but rather the ones in the middle ground who are smart enough to understand the technology and patient enough to communicate about it with laypeople who are a few eureka moments behind. We occasionally find wonderful people like Richard Feynman who can sidestep this inverse relationship, but not frequently.
- ssklash 5y ago
  Fair enough. I think it would be more accurate to say that Wyden is the most vocal and effective when it comes to tech-related issues.
- verall 5y ago
  And yet he is publicly against Net Neutrality and doesn't believe in climate change. Tribal affiliation takes priority over technical ability I guess.
  - adventured 5y ago

2OEH8eoCRo0 5y ago

This is about the DoD purchasing data from 3rd parties.

swiley 5y ago
I wonder if this is why the anti trust action against Apple/Google/Qualcomm has taken so long.
- Nasrudith 5y ago
  Antitrust suits are slow and hard even when they are legitimate and not publicity stunts or attempts to punish enemies.
  - babypuncher 5y ago
    The lawsuits are usually against incredibly wealthy corporations. It's best to make sure your case is air tight before going up against the best lawyers money can buy.

freshair 5y ago

Until high ranking government officials start getting very length prison sentences for this sort of shit, I doubt it will ever get better.

giantg2 5y ago
Why would they get a prison sentence for legally buying information that the private sector can also buy?
- topkai22 5y ago
  Also with the legal precedent from the Supreme Court that telecom metadata IS not protected by the 4th amendment? It is NOT clear from the article that what is doing is legally unconstitutional, as much as I might personally disagree with the Judicial branch's current view.
- Nasrudith 5y ago
  You can hire a PI legally. A police chief hiring a PI to bypass warrant restrictions would rightfully be in deep shit for it.
  - giantg2 5y ago
    You seem to be implying that the PI has additional powers. It's quite the opposite. Any search that a PI can legally do can also be done by legally by the police. Police have access to government sources of data that PIs do not, can collaborate with other departments, and can detain people (under the right circumstances). The chief might get in trouble, but usually that has to do with policies against using external resources or for budget constraints.
- kwere 5y ago
  they will get senteces due data collected so to not get caugth they will ride privacy bandwagon

sprkwd 5y ago

This is my surprised face.

HDMI_Cable 5y ago

The Third Party Doctrine is one of the things that is so obviously out of date, and needs to be changed. When so much of our lives (to the point where it is our lives) are online, why is there no expectation of privacy? --- [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-party_doctrine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-party_doctrine

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Nasrudith 5y ago
Because they wanted to take as much as they could without any pesky constitutional rights getting in the way.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
webXL 5y ago
Apple sells privacy, so there's a market for it and it's expanding into the public conscience. Apple isn't a bank though, and they aren't beholden to the same paternalistic/sinister interests. So what's really needed is reducing the size and scope of what paternalistic/sinister interests manage. Design principles such as separation of concerns come to mind.

anonymousisme 5y ago

What about the practice of letting our five eyes partners collect on Americans, and then obtaining the laundered intel products?

maybelsyrup 5y ago

The thing I still can't fathom, all these years after Bush II and then Snowden, is just how little human beings really care about mass surveillance. Yeah, the Snowden leaks made a splash, but the media cycle turned over a couple weeks later and everyone moved onto other things. It's like, if you're of a certain age, you had to read 1984 or whatever in school. You'd think "well, no one would stand for that sort of thing in real life!" Okay, so we don't live in that society, exactly, but time after time, we're shown the breadth of government surveillance and the reaction from the broader public isn't to call for anyone's head on a pike -- it's not even to vote anyone out! Outside of little communities like this one, people don't give much of a fuck. I guess that was Orwell's real point.

derg 5y ago
Honestly it could also be it's just hard to fathom the breadth and scale. Easier to imagine someone opening your mail or tapping your phone or otherwise physically interacting with things you own over the government intercepting a request to post a picture to facebook, for instance. I think a fair number of people intuitively understand just how massive the internet is and it's hard to conceptualize someone or something sifting through the sand to find your few little grains.
thanatos519 5y ago
Maybe 'Amusing Ourselves to Death' by Neil Postman will help you fathom it; here's the forward: https://www.tau.ac.il/education/muse/maslool/boidem/170foreword.html https://www.tau.ac.il/education/muse/maslool/boidem/170forew...
tsimionescu 5y ago
I think most people would oppose it if the media were really presenting it as an issue to keep in mind. However, most of the people in the media are very much supporters of such powers, as they are deep believers in the rightness of US institutions and their 'fundamentally benign' nature. If you look at the media, most are still in support of every single war America has ever been in, with the only opposition being on matters of strategy (e.g. "The US should have retreated from Vietnam earlier", not "there was no defensible reason for the war in Vietnam, it was just a blatant display of imperialism"). And I'm not talking about Fox (who pride themselves on such views), but even the most liberal papers or news channels. Of course, they are very much opposed to such measures in other countries, especially their enemies.

boomboomsubban 5y ago

I don't like how this article buries the important parts of this story. There is good reason to think that this surveillance by public info is legal currently, there was a court ruling stating that's the case. A law is necessary to codify that this practice is a violation Fourth Amendment, and Wyden is currently one of a handful of senators trying to get it passed. The story eventually mentions this, but the beginning focus on confidentiality makes it seem like they're hiding evidence of their crime.

kemitchell 5y ago
I'm not familiar with any such ruling. Which do you have in mind?
- boomboomsubban 5y ago
  Sorry, I'm basing this off other articles on this subject I've read recently but my 30 second search didn't locate them. The DoD has some reason to believe their interpretation is correct though, a law clarifying it's not would still be a good idea.
  - 1MachineElf 5y ago
    The pessimist in me wonders if Senator Wyden is being funded by a company who stands to gain when their competitor can no longer supply the Pentagon with surveillance data according to the letter of the law.
    - boomboomsubban 5y ago
      Three things on that. First, the law would just require a warrant before they get that data, there isn't really some other source that would benefit from it. Second, Wyden has been supportive of similar issues for years, not beyond suspicion but there should be some substance to any suspicion cast on him. And finally, I wouldn't care if Wyden was being paid to ensure that law enforcement needs a warrant. My cynical take is that Wyden is only allowed to make these press releases because both parties know that they are unlikely to become law. People get less upset knowing someone is pushing for the issues they care about even though the effort is futile.

GartzenDeHaes 5y ago

A warrant is not required for the government to purchase commercial data products and there are plenty of legitimate uses for this kind of data. Security analytics would seem to be an obvious use case for netflow data, for example. Commercial datasets are also used for address correction and standardization and most government agencies routinely do.

jtdev 5y ago
This sounds like the definition of flimflam with a splash of gaslighting... flimflam: deceptive nonsense
tclancy 5y ago
>there are plenty of legitimate uses for this kind of data Who defines "legitimate" and why should that be an argument for doing something that seems blatantly unconstitutional?

sjaak 5y ago

Land of the free, home of the surveilled.

forgithubs 5y ago

I don't support that kind of surveillance. That said, are they really in illegality ? Can I buy this type of localization data as a private individual ? If so, then they don't need a warrant, am I right ?

tclancy 5y ago
There are plenty of things a private citizen can do that a government entity cannot.
- forgithubs 5y ago
  Do you have an example ?
  - tialaramex 5y ago
    In the United States the government is not allowed to get religion. Private Citizens can worship whoever or whatever they want, but the Government isn't supposed to. Now, you might observe that the country's money says "In God We Trust" on it, its legislature openly prays to the Christian God, its Head of State goes to a Christian church, and its Supreme Court sure seems like they have some very peculiar ideas about how exactly such freedom for "private citizens" manifests... But in principle the United States does not have an Established Church and is not permitted to establish one. This may be cold comfort de facto if you see Organised Religion with its tendrils deep in the heart of government, but there you are.

croes 5y ago

That's why all this data collection in the web is a bad idea. Not only by FAANG but any developer who helps in creating this data.

jtdev 5y ago
I think U.S. based developers need to create something akin to the CCC in Germany to combat the clear abuse of privacy that many developers are now engaging in on a daily basis. https://www.ccc.de/en/club https://www.ccc.de/en/club I know... the CCC has been the target of infiltration and compromise in various ways throughout history, but that's a reality of standing up to abusive power.
- croes 5y ago
  I would have thought something like that already existed in the USA. So there is one point where Germany has a head start in IT.

SquibblesRedux 5y ago

Regarding the DoD purchasing data from data brokers, I would much rather first focus on laws or regulations that set legal standards for the collection, sale, and other distribution of personal information. For example, make the sale of personal information to a government agency an act that requires posting notice on a public register. Also, a hefty tax on the sale of personal information would be nice to see. I would focus on the collection and sale of personal information first because it is often done without the informed consent of the person to whom the information is associated.

grayfaced 5y ago
If these data brokers are already selling this data, I'm not going to get upset at the govt for buying it. I want restrictions on EVERYONE buying my data. Not just one entity.
- nobody9999 5y ago
  >I want restrictions on EVERYONE buying my data. Not just one entity. That's a start, but I'd prefer restrictions on EVERYONE collecting my data too.

bsd44 5y ago

This is brand new information.

sneak 5y ago

"We can't tell you if we are violating your constitutional rights or not, because that's classified on the basis of national security." When the preservation of the formerly supreme law of the land is made subordinate to the interests of the ruling military, I think it is safe to say the american experiment is over. I have long maintained that the US is basically a military dictatorship. There are many examples, like the CIA hacking congressional computers to cover up the fact that the CIA lied under oath to congress. Snowden telling us that all of the large US internet and web service providers have to spy on everyone, citizens and not, without a warrant. And now this. The US is not a free country today, if indeed it ever was.

rpdillon 5y ago
I fear that arguments like this lead to people devaluing what freedoms they have, since hey, we're already in a military dictatorship, so there's nothing left to lose. I understand why you're saying this, but I think it's profoundly dismissive of those who have fought for what we have.

auiya 5y ago

So Wyden's issue is the DoD is buying access to these data sets from private industry? I'm not sure there has been a court ruling declaring this practice to be illegal, and it might very well be legal depending on the dataset's coverage and what it's intended use would be. The DoD's OGC are not stupid when it comes to these sorts of matters, and surely they've had to weigh in on this collection point already. I guess this is why Wyden is trying to pass legislation for this practice to be illegal unless explicitly directed by court order to do so? I'm betting the DoD has already anticipated this and filters out the domestic traffic they don't care about prior to ingest - I think they have to do so by law anyway. So Congress can pass a law saying a court order is needed first to buy these communications datasets, but the FISC will continue to be a rubber stamp for the IC, and not at all the friction barrier the legislators are hoping for. This strikes me as posturing and nothing more.

spydum 5y ago
Agree, buying sampled Netflow data would technically hit this bar. Hard to know if it is troublesome without knowing the purpose. Are we using this for analyzing citizens traffic and correlating with other identifiers... Or are we analyzing traffic patterns to critical infrastructure and/or foreign nations?

epberry 5y ago

We should all be grateful that Senator Wyden has been a champion for these issues. I like to watch him in hearings and it's clear he's one of the most well prepared questioners on issues of privacy and liberty. To the staff of his office, if you're seeing this comment section - thank you!

jnwatson 5y ago

The US Intelligence Agencies have been using this trick for a long time. They ask the Brits for intel on US persons and they trade for intel on Brits. The only difference is they go through a commercial entity now. If it is legal to trade with the Brits, it is legal to go through a private entity. Data is big business.

kingkawn 5y ago

if its possible, theyll do it

fukmbas 5y ago

If you want to see something scarier just check the social media forums that trigger to people born after 2001. Typical response is So?

1MachineElf 5y ago

Some of the answers the DoD provided were given in a form that means Wyden's office cannot legally publish specifics on the surveillance; one answer in particular was classified. In the letter Wyden is pushing the DoD to release the information to the public. A Wyden aide told Motherboard that the Senator is unable to make the information public at this time... It seems strange and troubling to me that a senator would be restricted from making public any government information.

samuelizdat 5y ago

Jeremy Bentham and his consequences have been a disaster for the human race.

anm89 5y ago

I would be more surprised at this point to find out that the American three letter agencies bothered to get a warrant for anything. My base case is that they are constantly warrantlessly surveilling everyone.

Juntu 5y ago

Data transx :::3(( pentagon secret Alice