White House To Propose Ending NSA Phone Records Collection 208
The New York Times reported last night that the White House is planning to introduce a legislative package that would mostly end the NSA's bulk collection of phone records. Instead, phone companies would be required to hand over records up to "two hops" from a target number. Phone companies would be required to retain records for 18 months (already legally mandated) instead of the NSA storing records for five years. It does not appear that secret courts and secret orders from the court would be abolished, however. From the article: "The new type of surveillance court orders envisioned by the administration would require phone companies to swiftly provide records in a technologically compatible data format, including making available, on a continuing basis, data about any new calls placed or received after the order is received, the officials said ... The administration’s proposal would also include a provision clarifying whether Section 215 of the Patriot Act, due to expire next year unless Congress reauthorizes it, may in the future be legitimately interpreted as allowing bulk data collection of telephone data. ... The proposal would not, however, affect other forms of bulk collection under the same provision."
Sure (Score:5, Insightful)
Still properly tantamount to investigation without (Score:4, Insightful)
I was in the US embassy a while ago to pick up a work visa.
There was a quote from one of the founding fathers, John Adams;
"There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty."
There is nothing safe about the Government having this power *because* it is the Government.
Bull fucking shit (Score:5, Insightful)
Snowden (Score:5, Insightful)
This begs the quesion......if Snowden hadn't released this info, would this "change" be taking place? I wish I could say that this was an admission from the White House that what he did was right, but we know that's not the truth.
PLANNING to introduce a LEGISLATIVE PACKAGE (Score:2, Insightful)
>> planning to introduce a legislative package
Since when did Obama think a lawful path through Congress was a good option? Wasn't he the guy who said he'd work around our elected representatives to mandate the important things on his agenda?
Oh...I see. This is just a "planning to" press release. In other words, this is a BS trial balloon designed to get people off his back about the NSA without actually changing anything.
Re:Bull fucking shit (Score:5, Insightful)
Welcome to the latest and most provactive episode of: government v.s. the people.
Who does the government work for these days?
It's the beginning of the end.
Re:Sure (Score:5, Insightful)
Or, more appropriately, the NSA is part of the executive branch.
Obama is the Chief Executive.
If he really wanted to stop this shit, he could issue an executive order stopping this shit. Congress never passed a law requiring the NSA to collect this data; Obama could stop this shit RIGHT NOW if he wanted to.
But he doesn't want to. He wants to pass the buck, and blame a gridlocked Congress when the House does what the House does - shitcan any proposed legislation coming from this White House.
This is just a cheap and cynical play to score some points before a midterm election. Obama has exactly zero intentions of actually shutting this down.
Re:They aren't ending anything (Score:4, Insightful)
Just because they privatize the burden of data collection doesn't mean they are ending anything.
No, I think that depending on the implementation, it's a huge difference. I honestly don't have a problem with law enforcement collecting phone records, so long as they are able to get a warrant that is in keeping with the 4th amendment. I also don't have a problem with them saying to phone providers, "You must keep the phone records we might solicit for a period of X months, in case we do solicit them, and you must have the infrastructure to provide that information in a timely manner." Assuming it's easy, reasonable, and effective for phone carriers to do that, I don't really have a problem with the idea.
And I do think there's a huge difference between that and the NSA collecting the data themselves. The problem I have with the NSA spying is specifically that they collect and store this information on their own servers. The metaphor I've used to describe my problem with the NSA wiretapping is that the physical equivalent would be as though they regularly rifled through your belongings and recorded potential evidence, and then say, "But that's not a 4th amendment violation because we promise not to look at or think about this evidence unless we think you've done something wrong!" To that I say, no, you need to get the warrant first, and then you can collect evidence. You can't collect evidence first and then later get a warrant to use that evidence, since that system is too easy to abuse.
Of course, they should still have to get a real warrant, and not through some secret court where the charges and proceedings are all hidden from the public.
Re:Sure (Score:4, Insightful)
How about we start with just not renewing the PATRIOT act. That would probably still leave plenty of room for way over line surveillance but it would be a good start.
911 was a decade and a half ago, we don't need it anymore; because the only reason we ever needed it was a purely psychological one where people had to feel the government was "doing something".