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This is a good point, although as we saw most recently with Petraeus, sometimes an expansive surveillance state can't help but ensnare its own leaders, and this
by joshuahedlund 14y ago
This is a good point, although as we saw most recently with Petraeus, sometimes an expansive surveillance state can't help but ensnare its own leaders, and this often accidentally leads to its limitations (as a bill requiring warrants for emails is now making its way through the Senate)
- tsotha 14y agoThe Petraeus affair didn't come to light because of surveillance. That was a garden variety love triangle that blew up. The FBI wouldn't have known if they hadn't been told.
- pyre 14y agoTheir investigation is what is being referred to here. Their ability to dig into the email accounts without any oversight.
- tsotha 14y agoThey have always had the ability to do that if you work in any job that requires a security clearance. Sexual orientation, affairs, drugs, politics... they have the right to look at anything that points to behavior which could make you a target for blackmail.
- pyre 14y agoThey (the FBI) didn't know that this was connected to the director of the CIA when they started the investigation. They only made the connection to him after getting information from Google without judicial oversight.
- Vivtek 14y agoNo, the biographer also had a clearance. They were actually within their rights. Whether it was a gainful use of resources given the origin of the tip is dubious, but they weren't actually violating the judicial oversight requirement, as far as I understand it.
- pyre 14y agoThey didn't know who it was connected to at all before getting information from Google. Claiming that they both had clearances, and gave up a right to private email is trying to forgive these things after the fact. Unknown individuals should be assumed to have privacy rights. You can't break into someone random person's house, then find out that they committed a crime, and say that the warrant-less search was now a-ok.
- Vivtek 14y agoI'm pretty sure (but I don't know absolutely) that the fact that she had clearance means, effectively, that the breach of privacy was her transgression, not the government's. It's effectively as though the police have a warrant to search your house - any conversation with a person with clearance is subject to surveillance, and if they screw it up, that's no protection of your privacy.