4 ms·

Not technically, as they only get to search collected data with a warrant from the FISC. Now we're getting into the territory of strict vs. liberal interpretati

Not technically, as they only get to search collected data with a warrant from the FISC. Now we're getting into the territory of strict vs. liberal interpretations of the Bill of Rights. In a world that could not have foreseen the ability of the US government to quite literally record everything, and thusly didn't include in the 4th amendment a protection against ex post facto search and seizure, something beyond even sci-fi at that point.

ChikkaChiChi 13y ago
The process and procedure of an FISC warrant is one of the things that is being called into question. Not to mention the fact that there are challenges to the true accessibility of this data or if it can be mined without metadata information being attached to it.
MichaelSalib 13y ago
Putting aside Prism, I don't see how the cell phone metadata is compatible with the fourth amendment at all. The 4A exists specifically to ban general warrants that allow the government to seize whatever they want without any specificity. That's exactly what the FISC order authorizing metadata collection is. There really isn't any strict vs. liberal interpretation here that I can see.
- dclowd9901 13y ago
  The interpretation is in the word "seizing." Nothing is taken. It's copied and collected. So does "seizing" mean to collect benignly, or to take possession from another?
- mpyne 13y ago
  Except this very issue about metadata was already deliberated in the courts decades ago when it first came up that phone companies maintained these metadata records, with the conclusion that they are phone company records, not your records, and that therefore the government could subpoena them if they wished, as long as they didn't individually identify people (which would require something more substantive).
  - LoganCale 13y ago
    Phone numbers individually identify people.
    - mpyne 13y ago
      Strictly speaking, phone numbers identify phones. I mean, that's what we would say when the RIAA comes at us saying that IP address umpty-squat was used to download a movie, right? "Must have been my neighbor on my Wifi". "My friend was browsing my laptop". But either way, that's why the NSA must get a separate subpoena to get the subscriber information for a given phone number, if they don't already have it from earlier. And only after that can they get a warrant to allow for grabbing the data itself.
      - LoganCale 13y ago
        It's generally fairly easy for an ordinary person to find someone's identity with just their number, completely bypassing any sort of warrant/subpoena system. If I can do it, I'm sure the NSA does as well.
      - MichaelSalib 13y ago
        First of all, I don't find the IP address argument persuasive and I don't think most courts have either. Secondly, given that it is quite common for DHCP to give a single computer different addresses and nothing like that happens to phone numbers (which are intended to be persistent and not transient identifiers), I don't think your analogy works.

ChikkaChiChi 13y ago

The process and procedure of an FISC warrant is one of the things that is being called into question. Not to mention the fact that there are challenges to the true accessibility of this data or if it can be mined without metadata information being attached to it.

MichaelSalib 13y ago

Putting aside Prism, I don't see how the cell phone metadata is compatible with the fourth amendment at all. The 4A exists specifically to ban general warrants that allow the government to seize whatever they want without any specificity. That's exactly what the FISC order authorizing metadata collection is. There really isn't any strict vs. liberal interpretation here that I can see.

dclowd9901 13y ago
The interpretation is in the word "seizing." Nothing is taken. It's copied and collected. So does "seizing" mean to collect benignly, or to take possession from another?
mpyne 13y ago
Except this very issue about metadata was already deliberated in the courts decades ago when it first came up that phone companies maintained these metadata records, with the conclusion that they are phone company records, not your records, and that therefore the government could subpoena them if they wished, as long as they didn't individually identify people (which would require something more substantive).
- LoganCale 13y ago
  Phone numbers individually identify people.
  - mpyne 13y ago
    Strictly speaking, phone numbers identify phones. I mean, that's what we would say when the RIAA comes at us saying that IP address umpty-squat was used to download a movie, right? "Must have been my neighbor on my Wifi". "My friend was browsing my laptop". But either way, that's why the NSA must get a separate subpoena to get the subscriber information for a given phone number, if they don't already have it from earlier. And only after that can they get a warrant to allow for grabbing the data itself.
    - LoganCale 13y ago
      It's generally fairly easy for an ordinary person to find someone's identity with just their number, completely bypassing any sort of warrant/subpoena system. If I can do it, I'm sure the NSA does as well.
    - MichaelSalib 13y ago
      First of all, I don't find the IP address argument persuasive and I don't think most courts have either. Secondly, given that it is quite common for DHCP to give a single computer different addresses and nothing like that happens to phone numbers (which are intended to be persistent and not transient identifiers), I don't think your analogy works.