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I'm really disappointed that even in CA (which is pushing for better privacy rights with CCPA), one of our senators voted for this.
by hellcow 2y ago
I'm really disappointed that even in CA (which is pushing for better privacy rights with CCPA), one of our senators voted for this.
- verdverm 2y agoAre you aware the alternative is less oversight? FISA protects Americans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Act https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveilla...
- geuis 2y agoI obviously can't guess your age, but I'm gonna wager you weren't around much prior to 9/11. The world was getting on quite well without massive surveillance creep, and none of the stuff FISA has done in the last 23 years would have stopped it. The authorities already had all the info they needed back then and just didn't act on it.
- borkt 2y agoFISA has been in existence since 1978. It did not prevent 9/11, so honestly your comment undersells how worthless the program has been in light of the constitutional freedoms we willingly cede in reauthorizing it. The fact is though it remains law and the officials we elected feel the value is worth it. I hope its being done solely based on the benefits it provides us as a whole and is not being used for self-serving purposes
- tastyfreeze 2y ago> used for self-serving purposes That is inevitable. If there is an easier path to a goal some human will use it. It doesn't matter if the goal is against the people.
- unethical_ban 2y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Act_of_1978_Amendments_Act_of_2008 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveilla... 2008.
- Retric 2y agoForeign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA) https://bja.ojp.gov/program/it/privacy-civil-liberties/authorities/statutes/1286 https://bja.ojp.gov/program/it/privacy-civil-liberties/autho...
- unethical_ban 2y agoAnd the components of the program being discussed are from the 2008 amendment.
- Retric 2y agoPeople dislike parts of the original 1978 bill that contunued. I take issue with this bit: FISA also established the United States Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), a special U.S. Federal court that holds nonpublic sessions to consider issuing search warrants under FISA. Proceedings before the FISC are ex parte, meaning the government is the only party present. When combined by foreign agents including US citizens, it’s troubling.
- soraminazuki 2y agoEven humanitarian groups such as the UNICEF were targets, there's no doubt now what the program is about
- AmVess 2y agoThese laws aren't about protecting America and its citizens, but rather as means to control them.
- mdhb 2y agoPeople just toss comments like this around as though they were facts when in fact it’s completely paranoid made up q-anon level nonsense. These laws work a very specific way and have very specific controls in place to prevent shit like you describe from happening which you could go and read up on if you wanted to but it’s much easier to fear monger amongst one another because it plays to your ego that somebody who is important enough to be under surveillance by an intelligence agency.
- soraminazuki 2y ago"Completely paranoid made up q-anon level nonsense" from the New York Times, The Guardian, Washington Post, Associated Press, and many others? I think not. https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/13/world/middleeast/book-reveals-wider-net-of-us-spying-on-envoys.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/13/world/middleeast/book-rev... https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/dec/20/gchq-targeted-aid-agencies-german-government-eu-commissioner https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/dec/20/gchq-targete... https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/08/24/loveint-when-nsa-officers-use-their-spying-power-on-love-interests/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2013/08/24... https://apnews.com/article/b25197d5b11740b2b29681bbc521a45f https://apnews.com/article/b25197d5b11740b2b29681bbc521a45f https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/05/fbi-misused-foreign-surveillance-law-280k-times-to-snoop-on-people-in-the-us/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/05/fbi-misused-fore...
- xanthor 2y agohttps://apnews.com/article/fisa-foreign-surveillance-fbi-3f7d4cc0ef413cdf20bc0b70548cde84 https://apnews.com/article/fisa-foreign-surveillance-fbi-3f7... One does not have to be “important enough” if they are conducting mass surveillance and storing it in a database indefinitely.
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- soraminazuki 2y agoAgree with the sentiment, but spying capabilities have been abused before FISA, just ask Martin Luther King Jr. So I don't think things were particularly fine before 9/11 either. It's just that technological advancements have made abuse on a mass scale possible for the first time in human history. AFAICT surveillance used to be much more targeted and labor intensive. That all changed after 9/11.
- e40 2y agoI didn't downvote you, btw (I upvoted you). I think MLK Jr's problems with the government weren't traditional spying, they were more harassment of government employees acting on their own because they were bigots. The organized government actions that did happen, IIRC, were in places were the local government was highly corrupt and infiltrated by the KKK.
- jiggawatts 2y ago“Apart from the widespread abuse of government power, there was no abuse.”
- int_19h 2y agoCOINTELPRO?
- verdverm 2y agoI watched 9/11 live from my dorm Maybe don't jump to biases so fast, people within all age groups have different opinions about the same topics. HN is very opinionated on surveillance, as the comments on this story reinforce
- chiefalchemist 2y agoWhat do you mean by opinionated on surveillance? When did the Constitution become an opinion?
- geuis 2y agoDoesn't really matter, but I was 21 when it happened. I suspect we're basically the same age.
- mise_en_place 2y agoThe alternative is requiring a warrant, which means following the Constitution. Due process doesn’t disappear because you want it to. Even if someone is supposedly a terrorist or criminal.
- twoodfin 2y agoIf you’re hoping the Supreme Court, and in particular this Supreme Court, is going to agree that the Constitution requires the executive branch get a warrant before spying on cross-border communication with a non-citizen, you’re going to be disappointed. FISA is Congress exercising the only authority it has here, which is oversight & regulation. You could argue FISA should be stricter, but it can’t extend the Constitutional reach of the Fourth Amendment, nor can it contract it the way many in this thread believe it’s somehow doing.
- soraminazuki 2y agoIt's baffling to many people how FISA is even a thing. To a layperson, the Fourth Amendment leaves no room for a rubber stamp court authorizing mass surveillance. And no one except politicians and bureaucrats are buying the argument that this is somehow targeted surveillance. Also, free nations should have higher standards than "Not a citizen? Too bad, anything goes."
- twoodfin 2y agoThis is not complicated: If you run a telegraph wire between El Paso and Juárez, the executive has the Constitutional authority to tap it to intercept communication to or from a non-citizen not in the United States, warrant-free. Congress can regulate the process that must be followed, the documentation that must be made, even require judicial review at the program level to ensure it doesn’t also record traffic that is Constitutionally protected. That’s what FISA is. But it can’t ban that tapping, nor can it require the executive to get a warrant for a particular otherwise Constitutional intercept from an Article 3 court. Which part of this do you think is incorrect?
- bigstrat2003 2y ago> Are you aware the alternative is less oversight? Yes, I am. That is in fact what I want. > FISA protects Americans No, it does not. At this time, the greatest threat to me (and other Americans) is in fact the glowies who want to use this sort of law to violate our civil liberties.
- serf 2y agoI can't down vote you harder. FISA hurts Americans by short circuiting any kind of protections citizens once had for due process. We were fine before, and arguably it would've done little to change the events that caused the reaction that allowed it to be established in the first place.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- randcraw 2y agoI used to work for several of the US intel agencies. I can say with great confidence that we never have acted gainfully on preventing a major event using intel and we never will. The catalyst for acting boldly to prevent or defend a major event is much mor political than informational. No intel will ever play a big role in deciding whether a country lives or dies. But we most certainly WILL abuse individual civil rights my abusing that intel. THAT has been confirmed in history again and again.
- user_7832 2y ago> The catalyst for acting boldly to prevent or defend a major event is much mor political than informational. Could you explain what you mean by this? On a tangential note, have you considered talking/explaining this with politicians/academics studying this field? Or is it more of something that's already known to those familiar with the field?
- randcraw 2y agoThe most relevant example I know is the Zimmerman telegram in 1917 which British intelligence decrypted and passed along to Pres Wilson. It detailed plans Germany had made to invade the US with Mexico's help. Wilson released it to newspapers in March as support for his decision to declare war on Germany in April. However the primary justification for war wasn't the telegram, but the public decision by Bismark to fully resume uboat attacks on merchant ships in the Atlantic. So even as damning and revealing as the Zimmerman telegram was, ultimately it was Germany's bold resumption of the torpedoing of US oceangoing traffic that catalyzed US public opinion into ending 3 years of American neutrality and joining the fight in WWI. Thus even when intel is most damning, the role of intel will always be subservient to publicly motivating events like lost lives, as in the much ballyhooed sinking of the Lusitania 2 years before (1915). Wikipedia has a couple of outstanding articles on the topic: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimmermann_Telegram https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zimmermann_Telegram https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_entry_into_World_War_I https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_entry_into_World_Wa...
- reaperman 2y agoWe also had drug trafficking when the US constitution was originally written[0], and the founders of the US still gave us a constitutional right to warrants for searches relating to it. I don't understand why sealed warrants aren't "good enough" for this purpose, perhaps you could open my mind a bit. Why do we need "warrantless" surveillance for drug trafficking now? Specifically, what's wrong with getting a sealed (secret for a period of time) warrant for surveillance from a normal court? > In 1800, the British Levant Company purchases nearly half of all of the opium coming out of Smyrna, Turkey strictly for importation to Europe and the United States. 0: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/heroin/etc/history.html https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/heroin/etc/hi...
- bennyhill 2y agoI assume any congress person who voted for surveillance has a horrible kink and received photos of it shortly before the vote.
- kwhitefoot 2y agoThat reminds me of Wellington's response under similar circumstances. A former lover tried to blackmail Wellington. His response was 'Publish and be damned.' It was published to the delight of many. But he still went on to become Prime Minister. https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/rear-window-when-wellington-said-publish-and-be-damned-the-field-marshal-and-the-scarlet-woman-1430412.html https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/rear-window-when-wellin...
- Mountain_Skies 2y agoReminds me of when the KGB and the CIA tried to use knowledge of the sexual exploits of Indonesia's president Sukarno to blackmail him. Instead of falling in line, he told them to release what they had so his countrymen could be impressed by his sexual prowess. The KGB went as far as having a group of their agents pose as flight attendants to engage him in an orgy, which they secretly filmed. When confronted with the film, he asked if KGB for extra copies for him to take home.
- int_19h 2y agoLook up Dianne Feinstein's track record on these matters.