Senator calls for the public release of AT&T 'Hemisphere' surveillance records
engadget.comIt's always the same senator. It should be very concerning that you have only one person in Congress who has fought against mass surveillance over the years.
See also Senator Paul going after the PATRIOT act in particular.
https://www.paul.senate.gov/issues/protecting-privacy-civil-...
Even a stopped clock is right twice a day. (not referring to Wyden)
Really, the best reason (from the security org point of view) not to collect so much surveillance on your home population, is because it creates a single point of failure for foreign adversaries to gain access. Most of the interesting data is already commercially available for advertising.
Excellent and very WISE observation. Why, oh why, do people in charge never consider the Law of Unintended Consequences?
Because to keep their jobs they have to be seen as doing something and the old 'this is something therefore it must be done.' truism still hold. They never look farther ahead than the next election, were lucky if the look farther than the next nights news most of the time
The people who make these laws are not affected, and the people who execute these actions are not the people that make these laws.
They will be. And they will be surprised.
Oh, I never said they weren't due for an ass whipping, I'm just describing how it happens.
We learned this lesson the hard way when China stole a ton of military members' personal info.
I don't think they learned anything.
Don't forget then house representative and now senator, Bernie Sanders.
Unfortunately, Bernie talks the talk, but has failed to walk the walk in recent years. For example, congress was within one vote from passing a law that would require warrants for surveillance and missed it because Sanders wasn't there to vote.
The Senate on Thursday took up a key bill to reauthorize domestic surveillance programs while making changes to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, with several substantial amendments on the line. One of the amendments, introduced by Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden and Republican Sen. Steve Daines, would have required authorities to obtain a warrant to access internet users’ search histories and browsing information. Uh, yes, pass that??
The amendment, however, met an extremely Senate grave: It “failed” with 59 yeas to 37 nays, one short of the 60-vote threshold it needed to overcome the streamlined vestigial filibuster. The splits didn’t fall neatly along partisan lines: 24 Republicans voted for it, while 10 Democrats voted against it. (Would you like to see the names of the Democrats who voted against it? Their names are: Tom Carper, Bob Casey, Dianne Feinstein, Maggie Hassan, Doug Jones, Tim Kaine, Joe Manchin, Jeanne Shaheen, Mark Warner, and Sheldon Whitehouse.)
Source: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/05/bernie-sanders-a...
Senator Paul, God bless him, is seemingly the only patriot in Washington. I always know the exact position he will take on any issue, and it's identical to me. A true, small government conservative, no lobbyist bullshit.
I'll take Ron over Rand any day, but beggars can't be choosers.
Against all abortion, against the Paris Agreement, and pro Tea Party.
What’s the term (may be colloquial) when law enforcement obtains information illegally but figure out how to fake or back fill the reason they know it so it becomes plausible in court they obtained the information legally?
It would be a more certain bet that they’ve done this with the AT&T surveillance than putting money in any cryptocurrency.
That would be Parallel Construction, or Evidence Laundering.
Evidence Laundering is a more fitting term. I'll use that going forward.
Ah! Thank you! Internet high five!
It's called Parallel Construction or evidence laundering.
The term you're looking for is parallel construction.
Yeah, I agree.
Even knowing that parallel construction exists, it's still pretty shocking to see it used in practice.
eg I'm aware of a case here in Seattle where the Seattle PD coordinated with the feds to use a Stingray in the arrest of a fugitive. They thought they knew exactly where he was, and just used the Stingray to confirm his location before using a cooperating informant to lure him out of the building.
The police report of the incident has all of the officers creatively neglecting to write the full truth of how the arrest occurred, not a peep about the Stingray at all.
How does the public ever "find out" if its not in Court documents, does the Court make it a habit to call out misrepresentation or discipline the prosecution in any meaningful sense? How doesn't any of this come up during cross?
If it does, prosecution has a few tools at their disposal. They can seal the records, justified as protecting "ways and means", they can also just decide ahead of time not to bring charges until such time as there is a successful route through which to execute a parallel construction.
The biggest issue, in a sense, isn't that defense attorneys aren't able to challenge these devices use, but that prosecutors are not slamming law enforcement for unlawful use. They aren't incentivized to in any way except by meing a radical proponent for judicial as systemic integrity. Such a personality characteristiv is not going to endear one sufficiently to law enforcement enough to likely even be informed that a case may have had less-than-legal investigatory methods employed.
Literally the only realistic way to catch these types of abuses is to essentially assume they happen, and dedicate adversarial resources with relative-to-Law-Enforcement level privileged access to the means to investigate law enforcers.
I.e. Internal Affairs/an Inspector General like construct.
In practice, however, any system that implements such a thing still has levers that can be applied to sufficiently frustrate the efforts of said groups to render it of questionable efficacy.
The term you're likely looking for is 'parallel construction'.
AT&T use to publish bits about the data management technology for their call data records, called Daytona: https://web.archive.org/web/20140610135457/http://www.resear...
What's are the names of Verizon, Dish, US Cellular and T-Mobile's equivalent projects?
For folks interested in this topic, Stewart Hicks just released "The Windowless Skyscraper Conspiracy:"
Join me, an architecture professor from Chicago, as we uncover the secrets behind windowless skyscrapers. These structures, often overlooked and misunderstood, play a mysterious role in our urban landscape. In this video we explore the hidden purposes and intriguing stories of these architectural anomalies.
From Wyden's letter:
"The Houston HIDTA officials told my staff that all Hemisphere requests are sent to a single AT&T analyst located in Atlanta, Georgia, and that any law enforcement officer working for one of the federal, state, local and Tribal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. can contact the AT&T Hemisphere analyst directly to request they run a query, with varying authorization requirements. The Houston HIDTA officials confirmed that Federal and state law enforcement agencies can request a Hemisphere search with a subpoena, which is a directive that many law enforcement agencies can issue themselves (except in California and Texas, where a court order is required by state law). They also explained that Hemisphere searches are not required to be in support of drug-related investigations."
> requests are sent to a single AT&T analyst located in Atlanta, Georgia
Just one poor sap with an ODBC to a DB2 database and a panache for Excel stands between law enforcement and state mass surveillance...
They also explained that Hemisphere searches are not required to be in support of drug-related investigations.
Why would they be?
If I had such a system, why would I waist it chasing pot dealers?
To complain about the system on that basis not only makes no sense at all, but totally misses the point of being against mass surveillance. It makes me wonder if these people are actually against mass surveillance at all?