7 ms·

Help MuckRock crowd-FOIA Stingray usage around the country

85 points by morisy 12y ago

fks 12y ago
...huh?
- morisy 12y ago
  If you fill out the form on the page, we'll submit a request to your local police department, asking for policies, invoices, etc. that will detail if and how they're using cell phone scanning technology (including Stingrays), and even what vendors have unsuccessfully pitched them on the technology.
  - leorocky 12y ago
    Reading this post made it seem like muckrock is more of a ideologically driven site than a neutral data dump. Which is totally OK, but I was thinking maybe it be nice to just to have a place to get data regardless of the topic or how it fits in with a particular set of opinions. So I'm all for using FOIA to make public data accessible for the greater good, but I'm not sure if what you're doing is the right approach.
    - morisy 12y ago
      Anyone can sign up for and file any request through the site, and the request pages are about as neutral as can be (http://j.mp/UG3TMB http://j.mp/UG3TMB). We also publish news, analysis and commentary on select documents, but that's handled fairly separately, so if you just want the raw docs, that's very easy; if you want to better understand why they're important, we try to make that easy, too. We don't typically take too many ideological stances except that agencies should probably follow the public records laws that they're subject to, which generally isn't too controversial an opinion. We're looking for other ways to allow more analysis and context, but keeping the data clean and easily accessible will always be a part of what we do.
      - schoen 12y ago
        You might say that there is an implicit ideology in what kinds of government activities people find interesting or concerning. For example, the Sacramento Bee has made great use of CPRA to find out about things that went wrong in the construction of the new Bay Bridge. Other people are concerned about government surveillance and send a lot of requests to try to expose information about it. Not everyone finds it intuitive that the ability of police to know your cell phone's location is a concern on par with the quality of the welding in the Bay Bridge.
        nknighthb 12y ago
        I don't drive over the bay bridge. Nobody I know regularly drives over the bay bridge. Nothing I buy is likely to be transported over the bay bridge. I don't even live in the same state as the bay bridge anymore. By and large, the bay bridge just doesn't have any significance to me. I, like every other person in America, do live within the jurisdiction of a law enforcement agency that may be buying/using this technology. It seems strange to suggest that an entity must be ideologically driven because it's focusing on something that affects an entire country instead of a distinctly local issue.
        schoen 12y ago
        I guess I meant to compare concerns about the Bay Bridge with concerns over whether SFPD or OPD has IMSI catchers (or drones), rather than over whether any law enforcement agency anywhere has them. A very significant fraction of public records requests relate to something that the requester is concerned about or objects to or fears is being mishandled in some way. Deciding where to focus one's concerns and questions could be viewed as ideological, or at least ideological concerns help make particular topics more salient and interesting to people. By way of analogy, take a look at the series of questions that these journalists decide to pose to Victoria Nuland, then spokeswoman for the U.S. Department of State, about the activities of European election observers in Texas during the 2012 elections there: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2012/10/199824.htm http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2012/10/199824.htm Obviously journalists have the right to ask Ms. Nuland about anything that interests them, and supporting that right isn't (very) ideological (within the U.S. political context). But it seems pretty clear that the line of questioning that they were pursuing was inspired by a concern or belief that Ms. Nuland herself didn't share: that there was something improper or disturbing about European international institutions observing an election in Texas. If you share that belief, you might find the questioning pretty natural and obvious and even wish that it had been pursued a bit further and uncovered more information about the relationship between the U.S. and OSCE. If you don't share that belief, you might find the questioning perplexing or annoying, and be bewildered that the journalists didn't accept Ms. Nuland's perfectly reasonable replies.
dmix 12y ago
I was planning to donate but it requires subscribing to Beacon with monthly recurring donations and you get a CD/thumbdrive? I just wanted to throw some one-time cash their way ala kickstarter. I don't really care about subscriptions/CDs.
- morisy 12y ago
  Thanks for the feedback! That was the template Beacon Reader gave us and how they're set up. We're looking at building out our own donation tools to enable one-time, zero-signup donations, but not quite there yet (we do take PayPal at info@muckrock.com though).
  - ChrisAntaki 12y ago
    Nice. Making that PayPal email more prominent might result in higher donations. Also, have you considered accepting Bitcoin, through Coinbase or something similar?
    - morisy 12y ago
      Yup, making those options more visible is a priority, just a very small, very part time team running it all. We'll get there!
  - latj 12y ago
    I'm under the impression that FOIA does not apply to records at state or local level. Am I wrong?
    - bdisraeli 12y ago
      Most states have their own FOIA laws. [1] [1] http://www.nfoic.org/state-freedom-of-information-laws http://www.nfoic.org/state-freedom-of-information-laws
      - latj 12y ago
        Yes, I understand. But sounds of goofy to refer to them as FOIA. If you say "FOIA" people assume you are referring specifically to the federal law called Freedom of Information Act and that you are probably trying to request a record from a federal agency. My state also has laws to help the public access public records. We just dont call them FOIA because they have a different name as they do in other states. I understand its probably nitpicking. :>
AznHisoka 12y ago
Your name sounds an awful lot like MuckRack.
tesq 12y ago
Very surprised that a search for my local police department and a few terms like 'stingray' or 'cell phone tracking/privacy/tapping/gps' yielded more results than expected along with a state SC case initiated because of the actions taken by our department. Not specific to Stingray usage, but I still filed a request. I hope this campaign successfully increases the awareness and insight into the fact that this is happening everywhere and has been for close to a decade.
- morisy 12y ago
  Thanks tesq!
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
mpyne 12y ago
I wish you guys the best. But it does make the whole "USA IS A POLICE STATE!!!1" claims a bit harder to take seriously. I keep trying to imagine East German civil libertarians publically crowd-sourcing requests to the Stasi to divulge the particulars of their surveillance appartus, in ways that don't result in the murder of themselves or their families. I don't mean this to be snide though, this kind of civil action and distrust of authority is precisely what it means to be an American, and precisely what is needed to ensure that our various police forces don't actually become a modern day Stasi, so keep it up! :)
- maxerickson 12y ago
  What's a true police state? Something like a sobriety checkpoint, where a technical measure of blood alcohol level is used to assess guilt, at least gives wink and a nod to social control. (I don't really mean to speak against the checkpoints, I just wonder if "police state" has a clear enough definition to provide an interesting framework for discussion of modern governments)
  - mpyne 12y ago
    > I don't really mean to speak against the checkpoints, I just wonder if "police state" has a clear enough definition to provide an interesting framework for discussion of modern governments That's a really good point, but I suspect that those for whom 'police state' has the most meaning would also have the most incentive to keep the definition from ever getting too specific. That's not counting the idea that one person's "police state" is another person's "safe spot to raise my kids". But even non "police states" involve social control (e.g. against serial killing), there's no getting around that. Even anarchies involve social control—the members of each commune are expected to abide by the democratically-reached decisions. If I had to start on a definition I'd probably key off the difference between "social control for the benefit of the people/society" and "social control for the sole benefit of the government in power". There are implementations of sobriety checkpoints are not too hard to classify in the former.
    - maxerickson 12y ago
ianpenney 12y ago
Pretty neat, and somewhat relevant: https://github.com/SecUpwN/Android-IMSI-Catcher-Detector https://github.com/SecUpwN/Android-IMSI-Catcher-Detector
maxoptical 12y ago
The manufacture and use of Stingray type equipment is clearly in violation of Federal law and is punishable by up to ten years in prison. Two parties conspiring to infringe on a citizens civil rights. Read for yourself. http://www.justice.gov/crt/abo.. http://www.justice.gov/crt/abo... It is also agains FCC rules with 2 years in prison on $50,000 fine. Section 705 of the Communications Act Section 705 of the Communications Act adds to the Federal Wiretap Act additional restrictions on the unauthorized interception of communication "by wire or radio." Specifically, the Act provides No person not being authorized by the sender shall intercept any radio communication and divulge or publish the existence, contents, substance, purport, effect, or meaning of such intercepted communication to any person. No person not being entitled thereto shall receive or assist in receiving any interstate or foreign communication by radio and use such communication (or any information therein contained) for his own benefit or for the benefit of another not entitled thereto. No person having received any intercepted radio communication or having become acquainted with the contents, substance, purport, effect, or meaning of such communication (or any part thereof) knowing that such communication was intercepted, shall divulge or publish the existence, contents, substance, purport, effect, or meaning of such communication (or any part thereof) or use such communication (or any information therein contained) for his own benefit or for the benefit of another not entitled thereto.Violations of Section 705 carry strict penalties, with willful violations "for purposes of direct or indirect commercial advantage or private financial gain" meriting fines of up to $50,000 and prison for up to two years for the first offense.

85 points by morisy 12y ago

fks 12y ago

...huh?

morisy 12y ago
If you fill out the form on the page, we'll submit a request to your local police department, asking for policies, invoices, etc. that will detail if and how they're using cell phone scanning technology (including Stingrays), and even what vendors have unsuccessfully pitched them on the technology.
- leorocky 12y ago
  Reading this post made it seem like muckrock is more of a ideologically driven site than a neutral data dump. Which is totally OK, but I was thinking maybe it be nice to just to have a place to get data regardless of the topic or how it fits in with a particular set of opinions. So I'm all for using FOIA to make public data accessible for the greater good, but I'm not sure if what you're doing is the right approach.
  - morisy 12y ago
    Anyone can sign up for and file any request through the site, and the request pages are about as neutral as can be (http://j.mp/UG3TMB http://j.mp/UG3TMB). We also publish news, analysis and commentary on select documents, but that's handled fairly separately, so if you just want the raw docs, that's very easy; if you want to better understand why they're important, we try to make that easy, too. We don't typically take too many ideological stances except that agencies should probably follow the public records laws that they're subject to, which generally isn't too controversial an opinion. We're looking for other ways to allow more analysis and context, but keeping the data clean and easily accessible will always be a part of what we do.
    - schoen 12y ago
      You might say that there is an implicit ideology in what kinds of government activities people find interesting or concerning. For example, the Sacramento Bee has made great use of CPRA to find out about things that went wrong in the construction of the new Bay Bridge. Other people are concerned about government surveillance and send a lot of requests to try to expose information about it. Not everyone finds it intuitive that the ability of police to know your cell phone's location is a concern on par with the quality of the welding in the Bay Bridge.
      - nknighthb 12y ago
        I don't drive over the bay bridge. Nobody I know regularly drives over the bay bridge. Nothing I buy is likely to be transported over the bay bridge. I don't even live in the same state as the bay bridge anymore. By and large, the bay bridge just doesn't have any significance to me. I, like every other person in America, do live within the jurisdiction of a law enforcement agency that may be buying/using this technology. It seems strange to suggest that an entity must be ideologically driven because it's focusing on something that affects an entire country instead of a distinctly local issue.
        schoen 12y ago
        I guess I meant to compare concerns about the Bay Bridge with concerns over whether SFPD or OPD has IMSI catchers (or drones), rather than over whether any law enforcement agency anywhere has them. A very significant fraction of public records requests relate to something that the requester is concerned about or objects to or fears is being mishandled in some way. Deciding where to focus one's concerns and questions could be viewed as ideological, or at least ideological concerns help make particular topics more salient and interesting to people. By way of analogy, take a look at the series of questions that these journalists decide to pose to Victoria Nuland, then spokeswoman for the U.S. Department of State, about the activities of European election observers in Texas during the 2012 elections there: http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2012/10/199824.htm http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2012/10/199824.htm Obviously journalists have the right to ask Ms. Nuland about anything that interests them, and supporting that right isn't (very) ideological (within the U.S. political context). But it seems pretty clear that the line of questioning that they were pursuing was inspired by a concern or belief that Ms. Nuland herself didn't share: that there was something improper or disturbing about European international institutions observing an election in Texas. If you share that belief, you might find the questioning pretty natural and obvious and even wish that it had been pursued a bit further and uncovered more information about the relationship between the U.S. and OSCE. If you don't share that belief, you might find the questioning perplexing or annoying, and be bewildered that the journalists didn't accept Ms. Nuland's perfectly reasonable replies.

dmix 12y ago

I was planning to donate but it requires subscribing to Beacon with monthly recurring donations and you get a CD/thumbdrive? I just wanted to throw some one-time cash their way ala kickstarter. I don't really care about subscriptions/CDs.

morisy 12y ago
Thanks for the feedback! That was the template Beacon Reader gave us and how they're set up. We're looking at building out our own donation tools to enable one-time, zero-signup donations, but not quite there yet (we do take PayPal at info@muckrock.com though).
- ChrisAntaki 12y ago
  Nice. Making that PayPal email more prominent might result in higher donations. Also, have you considered accepting Bitcoin, through Coinbase or something similar?
  - morisy 12y ago
    Yup, making those options more visible is a priority, just a very small, very part time team running it all. We'll get there!
- latj 12y ago
  I'm under the impression that FOIA does not apply to records at state or local level. Am I wrong?
  - bdisraeli 12y ago
    Most states have their own FOIA laws. [1] [1] http://www.nfoic.org/state-freedom-of-information-laws http://www.nfoic.org/state-freedom-of-information-laws
    - latj 12y ago
      Yes, I understand. But sounds of goofy to refer to them as FOIA. If you say "FOIA" people assume you are referring specifically to the federal law called Freedom of Information Act and that you are probably trying to request a record from a federal agency. My state also has laws to help the public access public records. We just dont call them FOIA because they have a different name as they do in other states. I understand its probably nitpicking. :>

AznHisoka 12y ago

Your name sounds an awful lot like MuckRack.

tesq 12y ago

Very surprised that a search for my local police department and a few terms like 'stingray' or 'cell phone tracking/privacy/tapping/gps' yielded more results than expected along with a state SC case initiated because of the actions taken by our department. Not specific to Stingray usage, but I still filed a request. I hope this campaign successfully increases the awareness and insight into the fact that this is happening everywhere and has been for close to a decade.

morisy 12y ago
Thanks tesq!

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

mpyne 12y ago

I wish you guys the best. But it does make the whole "USA IS A POLICE STATE!!!1" claims a bit harder to take seriously. I keep trying to imagine East German civil libertarians publically crowd-sourcing requests to the Stasi to divulge the particulars of their surveillance appartus, in ways that don't result in the murder of themselves or their families. I don't mean this to be snide though, this kind of civil action and distrust of authority is precisely what it means to be an American, and precisely what is needed to ensure that our various police forces don't actually become a modern day Stasi, so keep it up! :)

maxerickson 12y ago
What's a true police state? Something like a sobriety checkpoint, where a technical measure of blood alcohol level is used to assess guilt, at least gives wink and a nod to social control. (I don't really mean to speak against the checkpoints, I just wonder if "police state" has a clear enough definition to provide an interesting framework for discussion of modern governments)
- mpyne 12y ago
  > I don't really mean to speak against the checkpoints, I just wonder if "police state" has a clear enough definition to provide an interesting framework for discussion of modern governments That's a really good point, but I suspect that those for whom 'police state' has the most meaning would also have the most incentive to keep the definition from ever getting too specific. That's not counting the idea that one person's "police state" is another person's "safe spot to raise my kids". But even non "police states" involve social control (e.g. against serial killing), there's no getting around that. Even anarchies involve social control—the members of each commune are expected to abide by the democratically-reached decisions. If I had to start on a definition I'd probably key off the difference between "social control for the benefit of the people/society" and "social control for the sole benefit of the government in power". There are implementations of sobriety checkpoints are not too hard to classify in the former.
  - maxerickson 12y ago

ianpenney 12y ago

Pretty neat, and somewhat relevant: https://github.com/SecUpwN/Android-IMSI-Catcher-Detector https://github.com/SecUpwN/Android-IMSI-Catcher-Detector

maxoptical 12y ago

The manufacture and use of Stingray type equipment is clearly in violation of Federal law and is punishable by up to ten years in prison. Two parties conspiring to infringe on a citizens civil rights. Read for yourself. http://www.justice.gov/crt/abo.. http://www.justice.gov/crt/abo... It is also agains FCC rules with 2 years in prison on $50,000 fine. Section 705 of the Communications Act Section 705 of the Communications Act adds to the Federal Wiretap Act additional restrictions on the unauthorized interception of communication "by wire or radio." Specifically, the Act provides No person not being authorized by the sender shall intercept any radio communication and divulge or publish the existence, contents, substance, purport, effect, or meaning of such intercepted communication to any person. No person not being entitled thereto shall receive or assist in receiving any interstate or foreign communication by radio and use such communication (or any information therein contained) for his own benefit or for the benefit of another not entitled thereto. No person having received any intercepted radio communication or having become acquainted with the contents, substance, purport, effect, or meaning of such communication (or any part thereof) knowing that such communication was intercepted, shall divulge or publish the existence, contents, substance, purport, effect, or meaning of such communication (or any part thereof) or use such communication (or any information therein contained) for his own benefit or for the benefit of another not entitled thereto.Violations of Section 705 carry strict penalties, with willful violations "for purposes of direct or indirect commercial advantage or private financial gain" meriting fines of up to $50,000 and prison for up to two years for the first offense.