College Student Finds GPS On Car, FBI Retrieves It 851
mngdih writes with this excerpt from Wired:
"A California student got a visit from the FBI this week after he found a secret GPS tracking device on his car, and a friend posted photos of it online. The post prompted wide speculation about whether the device was real, whether the young Arab-American was being targeted in a terrorism investigation and what the authorities would do. It took just 48 hours to find out: The device was real, the student was being secretly tracked and the FBI wanted their expensive device back ... His discovery comes in the wake of a recent ruling by the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals saying it's legal for law enforcement to secretly place a tracking device on a suspect's car without getting a warrant, even if the car is parked in a private driveway. ... 'We have all the information we needed,' they told him. 'You don't need to call your lawyer. Don't worry, you're boring.'"
Dont' call your lawyer? (Score:5, Insightful)
Hint: It's not your mom.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
How about the FBI throws you in jail for destruction of government property, obstruction, and any other charges they decide to toss your way (rightfully or not)? Is the amount of time spent sitting in a cell, the money lost in lawyers fees, and the hassle of going to court really worth it?
Replant the device (Score:5, Insightful)
Now that we have pictures we can identify future devices.
When you find one, wander over to a freeway gas station and replant it on an interstate truck. At least make them work to recover it.
Re:What happens if you destroy it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Take a wild guess.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
... and how about they kiss his ass, seeing as they left their property inside his for surveillance?
He's got every right (IMO) to do what he damn well pleased with it.
so what.... (Score:0, Insightful)
what's that? u want it back? sorry Mr FBI. I already disassembled it and destroyed it. what? u want to charge me with destruction of federal property? was there a tag on it that said it belonged to the FBI? it was in my car, it's my property. suck it!
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, but how does he know that it is actually theirs?
Perhaps they are just trying to get their hands on other people's property.
Are they prepared to provide a receipt for returning the item, or some proof of ownership that he can retain a copy of to protect himself from liability.
-- Menachem
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
So what you're saying is that we've gone from "give me liberty or give me death" to "don't throw me in jail because it will make me uncomfortable".
As to your last question. YES IT IS WORTH IT. Liberty is always worth the penalty for it, the other option is to acquiesce to slavery. This is no different. Tyranny must be fought with everything we have, because the other options aren't pretty.
Re:What happens if you destroy it? (Score:5, Insightful)
The article is a good read and a little creepy. We're here to recover the device you found on your vehicle. It's federal property. It's an expensive piece, and we need it right now...We.re going to make this much more difficult for you if you don't cooperate"
Summary: not illegal/unconstitutional for the government to track your car, probably a crime if you find tracker and do anything with it.
Re:OUCH (Score:5, Insightful)
Also: Don't believe it. Call the fucking lawyer.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:3, Insightful)
What's interesting is that they said newer models are placed in the engine compartment. It would seem wise to bug your own engine compartment so you know when the hood has been raised.
Re:Not hard to guess why he was being looked at (Score:5, Insightful)
And? I travel often for business, have family in Indonesia (in-laws), and often send large sums abroad (which is where I live). Does that warrant people investigating me? No. Not everyone with money who travels is suspect.
Re:Friend "wrote something stupid" (Score:5, Insightful)
I have no problem with the FBI putting tracking devices on people on whom they are conducting a legitimate investigation. I have a huge problem with the fact that they can do it now on minimum suspicion and without a warrant.
Re:Retribution? (Score:5, Insightful)
Imagine further if you as a citizen had planted the device on the car of a US Senator. Imagine the trouble you'd be in.
This kind of invasive aggressive action against citizens who have done nothing (no court order) should not be tolerated.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Not that I disagree with you, but there is a pretty wide gap between saying something like this on the Internet and actually following through with it in the real world.
There's obviously no way for me to know your level of life-experience but if a person is not normally subjected to direct pain and suffering or is blissfully unaware of it the amount of effort required to force them into acquiescence is minimal. Withstanding that kind of pressure isn't as simple as you make it sound.
Re:What if he had simply thrown it in the trash? (Score:5, Insightful)
Imagine if an FBI agent shows up to your house and hold you responsible for a missing tracking device you didn't know was on your car.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:2, Insightful)
"trying to piss them off might not be such a great idea."
You Sir/Madam is living in a police state. That sort of logic does not belong in a free society.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
actually, I would define subversive activities such as putting a GPS device in someone's car to track them without their consent as terrorism.
Re:Friend "wrote something stupid" (Score:4, Insightful)
First, given all the trouble [washingtonpost.com] the FBI has had issuing legal National Security Letters, I wouldn't assume that there's a valid warrant until I read it.
Second, if stalking immigrant kids is the FBI "doing their job", they should find a different job. Getting a warrant requires "probable cause". Probable refers to probability. How many of these fishing expeditions has the FBI gone on? If less than 50% of them lead to arrests, they are getting warrants for improbable causes. That's unconstitutional.
Re:Not hard to guess why he was being looked at (Score:2, Insightful)
You'd think there would be a huge gap in between someone having raised a red flag ("looking suspicious" in street cop talk), and there being enough probable cause to suspect someone of a crime, enough to get a warrant. That suggests the warrant issue process is extremely liberal and lax. And if things are like that, then maybe you are going to have such a tracker, some day.
A couple of pieces of commonsense advice. (Score:3, Insightful)
(1) When a cop investigating you acts friendly toward you, don't assume that means he's your friend.
(2) [corollary] When a cop who's been investigating you tells you that you don't need to talk to your lawyer, *talk to your lawyer*.
Re:Not hard to guess why he was being looked at (Score:3, Insightful)
I used to be thankful I don't live their, but that was until the G20 in Toronto. Looks like your country's government's attitude towards citizen's rights its (respective) constitution has started infecting ours as well.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
1776: "We lack representation in government and have no other recourse."
2010: "We are the government and have recourse to change laws."
After reading TFA... (Score:4, Insightful)
After reading the TFA (yeah, I know) the FBI actions seem warranted, even though they didn't have a warrant.
Score 1 for the FBI. Epic fail for the 9th circuit. Even though they were right, they still should have gone through the proper procedure.
I don't know about you, but I'm willing to pay an extra $1/year in taxes so the FBI follows proper procedure and gets a warrant. If everybody pays that, it's about $300 million. I doubt it would even cost that much to actually do what the Constitution requires. You know, that document that you SWORE TO UPHOLD AND DEFEND?
Re:What happens if you destroy it? (Score:3, Insightful)
As a (former) cop .... Anybody in law enforcement, at every level, is an infantile egomaniac.
If there's one thing I've learned from being a part of large government organizations, it's that any individual can only really speak about himself. Any time you hear a soldier, cop, or politician speak about their field of work, they tell you more about themselves than they do about the organization.
Re:What happens if you destroy it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Hysterical. You even started with: “If there's one thing I've learned from being a part of large government organizations”.
By your own logic, you told me more about yourself than you did about anyone else working for the government.
Re:Not hard to guess why he was being looked at (Score:4, Insightful)
So get a warrant.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:3, Insightful)
Forming the red-neck militia and stocking up on canned bacon isn't the way to go about changing it. We have laws. We have law makers. Getting one to change the other is the way. Oh, you can't get rid of your local politician because everyone else votes for him? Well, that doesn't give you the right skip the democratic process just because you don't like the results. "It's not tyranny when I do it" just doesn't cut it.
Um, you do know how the United States became an independent country, no? I suppose it's a matter of opinion whether the founding fathers should have fought it out in Parliament instead of on the battlefield the Revolutionary War, but their choice WAS the foundation of the country.
An excerpt from the Declaration of Independence:
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:1, Insightful)
See - that's the problem in 2010. People think the government has power. The truth is that people have power which they permit the government to use:
Re:From the article (Score:5, Insightful)
Fits the profile of someone you want to keep an eye on pretty well, actually.
In which case, getting a warrant should be a piece of cake.
Re:Friend "wrote something stupid" (Score:5, Insightful)
He saw through the security theater and openly questioned it. Pretty dangerous, huh?
And so, the war against common sense and intelligence dutifully continues.
Re:What happens if you destroy it? (Score:4, Insightful)
Now, if he had an attitude or a temper or a point to prove, and had lots of free lawyer service saved up, he definitely could have played with the fbi guys.
With his background, obviously he fits a "profile" and is one of many many people being tracked.
I remember hearing about East Germany during the heyday. I heard that about 50% of the people were in some way affiliated with the government, so basically each person had another person watching them. Everyone was under surveillance by everyone else. Not sure how true that was, but it can't be too far from the truth, lol.
My point is, the FBI must have an enormous amount of people being watched. How many agents are there who watch all those people? Amazing. And how boring that must be, doing surveillance all day every day. And paperwork after that.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:2, Insightful)
I think you meant
1776: "We lack representation in government and have no other recourse."
2010: "We lack representation in government and have no other recourse."
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
2010: "The government habitually plays big brother (and just did)."
Re:Retribution? (Score:2, Insightful)
When I first read about this court ruling I was left wondering how this applies to citizens using these devices on police, government officials, candidates, etc. I had just read a different article about iPhone apps that let people know where speed traps and DUI checkpoints are set up. The cynic in me thought this ruling must mean that citizens can now GPS bug police cars and the whole process of collecting data for speed traps and stuff would be automated instead of world-of-mouth. Is that a logical conclusion? Or are police and government officials somehow different from citizens in this regard?
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Friend "wrote something stupid" (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Not hard to guess why he was being looked at (Score:2, Insightful)
Maybe - I do not necessarily disagree with that either. There may be a large number of other reasons we aren't told, we are only hearing his side of the story too. My bet is that the vast vast majority of people who were *actually* doing something got caught before doing it they would raise a fuss about being watched and would take advantage of the current political climate in certain groups to have knee jerk reactions to anything the govt does. I seriously doubt most would admit to being a subversive. The same would be true if we only talked to the law enforcement side - I'm betting they have have some good logical reasoning to do this that ignores the other sides view of the matter too.
However, in this particular case what we *have* heard from the Law Enforcement side is that there was no court ordered placement of the device. *That* is truly wrong. A large part of why we are supposed to tolerate this type of intrusion into our privacy is that it went through many checks and balances to happen and for many many decades it certainly has done so. One entity, carrying the full weight of the Federal govt, did this with *no* oversight whatsoever. *That* is why many groups (and while it changes some based on who is President, it is slowly becoming a universal idea) have afore mentioned knee jerk reaction.
There was a time when, for the most part, we believed the authorities because of what they had to go through to do this type of thing. We knew that enough different types of people had signed off on it that saying "There is a reason" was *mostly* good enough. There has never been a perfect system and sometimes it didn't work - but over all those things were rare. However for quite a while (well before 9/11 - ask the Ruby Ridge and Waco Texas families that the ATF/FBI went after) there has been a sever erosion of those checks and balances with the power inevitably going towards the govt - and specifically the executive branch. I can't really say when it started either, I can say that it became blatant enough during Bush Jr's tenure that it was obvious and all but the most partisan deny that. Further all but the most partisan find it obvious that Obama has not only failed to reverse or halt that course but has done everything he can to further making Bush Jr's term look good. Unless *both* parties go through a major internal change I suspect that the next couple of Presidents will do the same thing too, it's just a question of if they will have an "R" or "D" after their name and which parts of our lives they will enact draconian one sided controls on.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Not hard to guess why he was being looked at (Score:3, Insightful)
Entirely normal
Normal depends on the level of detail you apply. If you report it as "sending money to family" maybe. If you report it as "sending money to Egypt" well how many Americans regularly send money to Egypt? Not many as a percentage.
The fact that he's a college student himself probably makes it very unusual. How many students send money to their families rather than vice versa? Could definitely be accepting money from one group and forwarding it on himself.
Re:Top Ten Things to do with FBI Tracking Devices (Score:2, Insightful)
0. Plot a circuit of roads that spells out "FU" and then drive it over and over again until they get the message.
Simple solution (Score:4, Insightful)
"Hello, Police? Yes, my mechanic has found what appears to be a pipe bomb attached to the underside of my car. Could you please send some units, and bomb disposal, here immediately, I am concerned for my life."
It's a long black pipe, sealed at both ends, with an antenna wire hanging out of it, and magnets to secure it in place. While it may be a GPS tracker, it could just as likely been a pipe bomb with a remote trigger. Best let the authorities blow that sucker up. And if the FBI come by asking for their tracker back, you can have them arrested for instigating an act of terror on American soil by planting their "pipe-bomb" on your car.
And then the legal system disappears up it's own fundamental orifice.
Re:Friend "wrote something stupid" (Score:3, Insightful)
If you're up for an experiment, why not go a bit further. You're assuming he was targeted because he's brown, but you have to do everything he did except be brown to really test that. So change your name to an ethnic Muslim name. Start sending money and traveling to the Middle East. Leave similar comments. Have someone report you as a possible threat. If nothing happens to you then you've got a pretty good case.
Re:Finders Keepers? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Dont' call your lawyer? (Score:1, Insightful)
Because he's planning a trip overseas. While he's outside the US he could end up assassinated by the US military or its civilian intelligence agencies. Or they could have their allies (or even their enemies if they pay a bounty) round him up for interrogation by torture, possibly unto death. Or just turn him back over to the US to be held in a military prison (once again suffering torture and/or humiliation) for an indefinite period of time with no legal recourse.
The truly, truly sad thing is that this isn't some kind of paranoid tin-foil hat delusion. It's a real possibility. It's not that likely, but it's certainly more likely than, for example, an average US citizen being killed in a terrorist attack on US soil.
Re:What happens if you destroy it? (Score:3, Insightful)
2) no one has ever defined what a minimum standard for reasonable suspicion is for such a thing, and having an accent is most assuredly on the list of things leading to reasonable suspicion.
The effect is that if you do ask the cop for, say, directions, he can, just from your accent, from the fact you don't know where you are going, and that you exhibit a number of subjective other attributes he makes up later (you looked nervous, you looked confused, etc.) hold you for nothing other than asking for directions.
Additionally, the law was simply enforcement of the existing federal law, so if the AZ law was truly "profiling", then the federal law is, as well.
That's a flat out lie. It's not the law that's profiling, but the implementation. The federal law, as applied, is to determine the nationality of someone already in custody when something specific triggers a question (addresses not adding up, problem with ID, no SSN) , and is never used as a primary law at all. The Arizona implementation leaves open the possibility of driving into a lot at Wal-Mart and checking green cards of the dark-skinned people the cops suspect of being illegal migrant workers. And, based on some of the popular police figures, that doesn't sound like an unreasonable expectation.
The law should have simply indicated that all people convicted of an offense leading to jail time shall have their nationality verified. That's closer to how the feds enforce theirs, and would eliminate profiling. Instead, it will likely be used to harass brown people, and can be used to do so.