5 ms·

This article quite wrongly assumes that the government is always justified in issuing warrants, not to mention the current excesses in the form of rubber stamp,

This article quite wrongly assumes that the government is always justified in issuing warrants, not to mention the current excesses in the form of rubber stamp, overbroad, secret warrants that you can't even be informed of. This alarming attitude seems to be taking hold more and more, which is even more distressing considering that this is the country founded on distrust of the government. Add to this that many people now treat their digital devices as extensions of their mind which leads in to fifth amendment territory, and there is absolutely no reason anyone but the person to whom the data is most dangerous should be allowed access. The government, like IT departments, should not exist to serve itself: it is there to serve others, and so called "thinking of the children" or any other reason cannot excuse the invasions of privacy that occur on a regular basis. I'm no fan of Apple, but if they've made it so that even they can't unlock an iPhone due to court order, they are doing something right. The government also gets many advantages from technology, and still has the advantages of extremely powerful and time tested techniques that have not become outdated merely due to advances in technology. Just because some LEO agents want to take shortcuts to be "tough on crime" doesn't justify harming innocent bystanders in the process, otherwise we'd allow them to shoot first and ask questions later.

IBM 12y ago
What percent of warrants do you believe are issued without justification? I keep reading this comment here but no one has shown that most (or even a large amount of warrants) are unjustified.
- hawleyal 12y ago
  Does it matter? If it's possible to abuse, it's a problem. In a security-centric view, if the door is unlocked, you are inviting people in. Or at least should not be suprised by it.
  - modfodder 12y ago
    I would say it does matter. If its 1%, that seems well in the realm of natural error and probably impossible (or too expensive) to solve. If its 99%, then that is a problem with the enforcement or interpretation of that law that point directly to abues and seems very fixable.
    - hawleyal 12y ago
      What I mean is, it doesn't matter if a warrant is justified or not. If the device is less secure to allow warrants to be carried out, it's less secure in general.
- x0x0 12y ago
  I don't have the resources to go looking, which is part of the problem. On one side you have multiple publicly funded organizations attempting to get warrants (police, local da, federal da, fbi, etc) and on the other side you have individual defense attorneys plus generally woefully underfunded public defenders. You can get some notion of what one side would do without oversight -- ie the fisa court, which essentially never turns down a warrant. Relying on individual attorneys, who are after all advocating for their clients, not for what is best for the legal system or people as a whole, to set case law opposing warrants means they will basically be outmatched. We can also get some sense, again, of how little you can trust any of these people by remembering that the fbi is supposed to be tracking officer involved shootings. In 1994, Congress passed the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act. Among its provisions was the order that “the Attorney General shall, through appropriate means, acquire data about the use of excessive force by law enforcement officers.” The Justice Department was also required to publish an annual report on the data collected. And…that’s pretty much the last anyone heard of that. The work of collecting the data was shuffled off to the International Association for Chiefs of Police, which made a few efforts at collecting data and put together a report in 2001, but has produced nothing since. [1:2] I'm sure it's just an accident :rolleyes:. Meanwhile, the police fight every inch of the way even the attempt to collect statistics on how many people they killed. And for more news in the quality of self-regulation, after the fbi decided to murder someone connected to the boston bombing under very suspicion circumstances, they discovered that shooting -- like all 150-odd fbi shootings -- was justified [3]! A stunning turn of affairs. [1] http://www.popehat.com/2014/08/25/government-priorities-compare-and-contrast/ http://www.popehat.com/2014/08/25/government-priorities-comp... [2] https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140822/07034228290/federal-law-ordering-us-attorney-general-to-gather-data-police-excessive-force-has-been-ignored-20-years.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140822/07034228290/feder... [3] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/19/us/in-150-shootings-the-fbi-deemed-agents-faultless.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/19/us/in-150-shootings-the-fb...
bcohen5055 12y ago
If anyone has any statistics on this I'd like to see them. Obviously there are cases when warrants are misused but I am still of the belief that overall the government does not act with malice and overall does its work for legitimate reasons. I'd image that thousands of warrants are issued daily but do we know how many end up in gathering enough evidence for formal charges? I'd assume it's a fairly large percentage but I could be wrong.

IBM 12y ago

What percent of warrants do you believe are issued without justification? I keep reading this comment here but no one has shown that most (or even a large amount of warrants) are unjustified.

hawleyal 12y ago
Does it matter? If it's possible to abuse, it's a problem. In a security-centric view, if the door is unlocked, you are inviting people in. Or at least should not be suprised by it.
- modfodder 12y ago
  I would say it does matter. If its 1%, that seems well in the realm of natural error and probably impossible (or too expensive) to solve. If its 99%, then that is a problem with the enforcement or interpretation of that law that point directly to abues and seems very fixable.
  - hawleyal 12y ago
    What I mean is, it doesn't matter if a warrant is justified or not. If the device is less secure to allow warrants to be carried out, it's less secure in general.
x0x0 12y ago
I don't have the resources to go looking, which is part of the problem. On one side you have multiple publicly funded organizations attempting to get warrants (police, local da, federal da, fbi, etc) and on the other side you have individual defense attorneys plus generally woefully underfunded public defenders. You can get some notion of what one side would do without oversight -- ie the fisa court, which essentially never turns down a warrant. Relying on individual attorneys, who are after all advocating for their clients, not for what is best for the legal system or people as a whole, to set case law opposing warrants means they will basically be outmatched. We can also get some sense, again, of how little you can trust any of these people by remembering that the fbi is supposed to be tracking officer involved shootings. In 1994, Congress passed the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act. Among its provisions was the order that “the Attorney General shall, through appropriate means, acquire data about the use of excessive force by law enforcement officers.” The Justice Department was also required to publish an annual report on the data collected. And…that’s pretty much the last anyone heard of that. The work of collecting the data was shuffled off to the International Association for Chiefs of Police, which made a few efforts at collecting data and put together a report in 2001, but has produced nothing since. [1:2] I'm sure it's just an accident :rolleyes:. Meanwhile, the police fight every inch of the way even the attempt to collect statistics on how many people they killed. And for more news in the quality of self-regulation, after the fbi decided to murder someone connected to the boston bombing under very suspicion circumstances, they discovered that shooting -- like all 150-odd fbi shootings -- was justified [3]! A stunning turn of affairs. [1] http://www.popehat.com/2014/08/25/government-priorities-compare-and-contrast/ http://www.popehat.com/2014/08/25/government-priorities-comp... [2] https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140822/07034228290/federal-law-ordering-us-attorney-general-to-gather-data-police-excessive-force-has-been-ignored-20-years.shtml https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140822/07034228290/feder... [3] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/19/us/in-150-shootings-the-fbi-deemed-agents-faultless.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/19/us/in-150-shootings-the-fb...

bcohen5055 12y ago

If anyone has any statistics on this I'd like to see them. Obviously there are cases when warrants are misused but I am still of the belief that overall the government does not act with malice and overall does its work for legitimate reasons. I'd image that thousands of warrants are issued daily but do we know how many end up in gathering enough evidence for formal charges? I'd assume it's a fairly large percentage but I could be wrong.