NSA Buys Americans' Internet Data Without Warrants, Letter Says (nytimes.com) 96
The National Security Agency buys certain logs related to Americans' domestic internet activities from commercial data brokers, according to an unclassified letter by the agency. The New York Times: The letter [PDF], addressed to a Democratic senator and obtained by The New York Times, offered few details about the nature of the data other than to stress that it did not include the content of internet communications. Still, the revelation is the latest disclosure to bring to the fore a legal gray zone: Intelligence and law enforcement agencies sometimes purchase potentially sensitive and revealing domestic data from brokers that would require a court order to acquire directly.
It comes as the Federal Trade Commission has started cracking down on companies that trade in personal location data that was gathered from smartphone apps and sold without people's knowledge and consent about where it would end up and for what purpose it would be used. In a letter to the director of national intelligence dated Thursday, the senator, Ron Wyden, Democrat of Oregon, argued that "internet metadata" -- logs showing when two computers have communicated, but not the content of any message -- "can be equally sensitive" as the location data the F.T.C. is targeting. He urged intelligence agencies to stop buying internet data about Americans if it was not collected under the standard the F.T.C. has laid out for location records. "The U.S. government should not be funding and legitimizing a shady industry whose flagrant violations of Americans' privacy are not just unethical, but illegal," Mr. Wyden wrote.
It comes as the Federal Trade Commission has started cracking down on companies that trade in personal location data that was gathered from smartphone apps and sold without people's knowledge and consent about where it would end up and for what purpose it would be used. In a letter to the director of national intelligence dated Thursday, the senator, Ron Wyden, Democrat of Oregon, argued that "internet metadata" -- logs showing when two computers have communicated, but not the content of any message -- "can be equally sensitive" as the location data the F.T.C. is targeting. He urged intelligence agencies to stop buying internet data about Americans if it was not collected under the standard the F.T.C. has laid out for location records. "The U.S. government should not be funding and legitimizing a shady industry whose flagrant violations of Americans' privacy are not just unethical, but illegal," Mr. Wyden wrote.
Just imagine... (Score:5, Insightful)
It's all perfectly legal, they don't really need your informed consent, & they can do whatever they like with it. Once they have the info, it's just one small step to scams, extortion, doxxing, character attacks, etc.. Nobody's safe from this.
Re:Just imagine... (Score:5, Interesting)
It's become commonplace for law enforcement to use public facing cameras, cellphone records, and license plate readers to solve crimes. So, who else is the information available too?
A lady friend worked in the office of a note lot used car sales outfit. She said they were able to purchase, for a monthly fee, information derived from cameras and license plate readers to track vehicle locations in case they needed to repossess one for nonpayment.
I asked her if this subscription information could be used to track/stalk the whereabouts of a significant other. She smiled and said, "Sure, but we're not supposed to do that."
Re:Just imagine... (Score:4, Interesting)
You should see what kind of data is in MERLIN. Any asshole with a business license can buy access to it and do all kinds of fabulous searches through your PII, and they only have to pinky swear that they are supposed to have it and won't do nefarious things to it.
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Well, just imagine what Tony Soprano & his crew could do with that info.
Can you pinky swear without a pinky?
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I didn't realize that!
I feel much better knowing they have to pinkie swear.
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Are you talking about the Merlin AI API?
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No. That's why I called it a database and put its name in all caps, which is how it is correctly given. I realize that the name Merlin is grossly overused, though, so I understand some confusion. MERLIN is a database I had access to for the brief moment I was looking into assisting my father with his debt collection job working for this total scum in Lakeport. Anywho it is a collection of other databases, mostly governmental ones, which contain a bunch of your PII. You get access to it through one of severa
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I guess I'm just puzzled why this is supposedly "news", I remember seeing stories on this same topic by around 2003 or so. Twenty years later Congress is just now noticing? Bullshit.
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Right? This is business as normal. This is the 'normalization' of it for the masses.
This will not end well.
Re:Just imagine... (Score:5, Insightful)
Indeed: the NSA is not the bad guy here. If people are pissed that the NSA buys this information from data brokers, look to the supply side of this equation, rather than the demand.
Re:Just imagine... (Score:4, Insightful)
Indeed: the NSA is not the bad guy here. If people are pissed that the NSA buys this information from data brokers, look to the supply side of this equation, rather than the demand.
Not exactly a valid argument when you consider the standard end-around to exercise unconstitutional overreach by the Federal Government, is to outsource it to a data broker.
Citizens should still be pissed both supply and demand, have been made legal through buying loopholes and lawmakers.
Re:Just imagine... (Score:5, Insightful)
Unconstitutional activity is still unconstitutional even if the government pays a third party to do it. The problem here is that it's currently perfectly legal for the data brokers to hoover up and resell this data. The only real difference between the NSA and any other customer of these brokers is that the NSA has a secret, but presumably much bigger, budget.
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A game of words. This whole argument of "perfectly legal" is based on how you interpret the details. The interpretation is manipulated by the power one holds or the money they posses. At the time of the constitution it was unimaginable that a private entity could harvest this information. The constitution was written in consequence that the people in power would not abuse this power and use their power to collect the information unless the had just cause. To say today that it is perfectly legal is to comple
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This sums it up well. For years I've pointed out the sophistry of warrantless phone "metadata", who you call and when. They even say what it's good for: fleshing out networks.
Yet that's exactly what good old King George III would have done, and therefore the Founding Fathers, had they still managed to succeed anyway, would have put it behind warrant requirements.
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The concept of "private detective [wikipedia.org]" existed for centuries.
If Sherlock Holmes (fictional) and Pinkerton (very real) could sniff out information, why couldn't the government then obtain it from them? Perry Mason wouldn't get anywhere without his trusty private detective agency — with office on the same floor as his own. Hired by the clients — who'd inevitably be falsely accused of murder —
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The concept of "private detective [wikipedia.org]" existed for centuries.
Exactly, as he said it was unimaginable that a private entity could harvest this information. Yes at great cost for one person, completely unimaginable to do it for the entire population, even the paper to write it down would have bankrupted them.
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It was just as unimaginable for a government — any government — to amass it too.
Yet, the concept of using paid informants was known for millennia [wikipedia.org] — and none of the Founders thought about forbidding their use.
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It was just as unimaginable for a government — any government — to amass it too.
Yet, the concept of using paid informants was known for millennia [wikipedia.org] — and none of the Founders thought about forbidding their use.
You missed my point completely and linked to life experience. The government isn't paying a witness. It's buying information to find a crime.
The link isn't an example that's even comparable. You are comparing an elephant to the moon and claiming that due to the elephants round head it's identical to the moon. Read the article that your link points too.
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Nonsense. Paid informants would often alert police to crimes, that cops didn't know about either.
I'm not that old :-)
My link points to the story of one (in)famous paid informant. Christians — and all of the Founders were such — universally disapproved of the man, but the practice of paying such people for their aid to law-enforcement was not banned by
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The subject of this discussion is not about paying an informant for some perceived illegal activity. It's about the collection of ALL activity. The constitution deals with your example very clearly a precisely. You should read it one day.
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Nonsense. Paid informants would often alert police to crimes, that cops didn't know about either.
So there is no material difference between receiving a piece of information and receiving ALL information to be stored in perpetuity? Nothing is different at all?
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I don't see any such difference. Do you? If so, can you describe it — well enough to make it possible to outlaw one without outlawing the other?
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Could you cite the part of the Constitution being violated here?
You cannot. The whole problem is that there is nothing illegal — much less unconstitutional — about it all.
It makes sense logically too — if a private dick can know it, why can't the government buy it from him?
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Unconstitutional activity is still unconstitutional even if the government pays a third party to do it.
Sure. But just because it *feels* like it should be unconstitutional doesn't make it so -- in particular by "originalist" constitutional thinking. What would the *framers* have thought about the government purchasing data from corporate data brokers? They'd have thought you were talking gibberish.
There has been a strong line of constitutional arguments and rulings that recognize that the Bill of Rights presumes certain unenmerated individual rights, and reason that it would logically inconsistent to allo
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Unconstitutional activity is still unconstitutional even if the government pays a third party to do it.
Sure. But just because it *feels* like it should be unconstitutional doesn't make it so -- in particular by "originalist" constitutional thinking. What would the *framers* have thought about the government purchasing data from corporate data brokers? They'd have thought you were talking gibberish.
Greed and corruption has not changed since the Constitution was created, and the reasons certainly haven't.
The Federal Government bypassing Rights bestowed by the 4th and 5th Amendments doesn't just "feel" unconstitutional. It IS unconstitutional. And PRISM proved long ago this abuse certainly isn't "new" behavior.
...They get the benefit of privacy intrusion without having their fingerprints on it.
At least we both agree what they're doing is fucking wrong. Not sure why you're implying otherwise with fine-print arguments that hardly define the limits of unconstitutional abuses.
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The Federal Government bypassing Rights bestowed by the 4th and 5th Amendments doesn't just "feel" unconstitutional. It IS unconstitutional.
That's nonsensical.
They're not bypassing them. You have surrendered them when you surrendered your data.
There is no constitutional remedy for this, it must be fixed via statute. For that, you must get Congress on your side. For that, you have to stop voting for corporate fucks.
The State has always been able to use informants. Paid, and otherwise.
You have no protection from information that you volunteer, even if it makes it past the circle of individuals you thought would be privy to it.
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The Federal Government bypassing Rights bestowed by the 4th and 5th Amendments doesn't just "feel" unconstitutional. It IS unconstitutional.
That's nonsensical.
They're not bypassing them. You have surrendered them when you surrendered your data.
That is not even a possibility.
"They" have broken a law that applies to them. "Your" involvement is only as a the subject of the crime.
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This is fucking absurd.
This is why informants are a thing.
The State is free to pay someone or ask someone, to which you have told privileged information, to snitch on you.
Nothing protects you from the government asking someone to give them information.
You're starting to sound like a sovereign citizen- a wonk. You're asserting laws and rights that don't exist, and that you don't have.
You have no right that prevents the State from knowing information about you. You have a right for the State to
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the NSA is not the bad guy here
No, they are a bad guy here. There are no good guys in this story.
If people are pissed that the NSA buys this information from data brokers, look to the supply side of this equation, rather than the demand.
Consumers create a market.
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Consumers create a market.
Yes, for narcotics, kiddie porn, military-grade weapons, trafficking humans, etc.. What exactly is your point?
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Embarrassing. Right wingers.
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And in this example the NSA is the customer. Not you, not me. We are the product.
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We're just now concerned while something much larger than us grins while holding a fork and a knife.
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Indeed. However, we volunteered to be.
Whatever you volunteered for is insufficient justification for the law being broken. You are not the one violating the law so it does matter what you volunteered for.
If you volunteered to have someone kill you and parade your body around, do you think that society would let the person who killed you continue living a normal life?
So why do you think the NSA gets to keep buying your data? Feel free to write them a note giving them your permission to keep buying your data (with your money!) but you can't give
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Whatever you volunteered for is insufficient justification for the law being broken.
There is no law being broken.
You are not the one violating the law so it does matter what you volunteered for.
Huh?
What law is being broken?
If you volunteered to have someone kill you and parade your body around, do you think that society would let the person who killed you continue living a normal life?
hahaha- I'll take wrong analogies for $100, Alex.
So why do you think the NSA gets to keep buying your data? Feel free to write them a note giving them your permission to keep buying your data (with your money!) but you can't give them permission to keep buying mine. But you kind of already did.
Because it is not against the law to buy someone's data.
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People loved it when a successful TV show did exactly the same, they loved it because the target were "pedos". No one blinked as actors baited private citizens in ways law enforcement definitely could not, then keep the police around the corner when the entrapment worked. The only difference here is who is paying, advertisers or the cops themselves.
There is a whole market to collect data such that government can skirt accountability. Government agencies are, without a doubt, the bad guys and they definit
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It's only entrapment if they themselves suggest the crime.
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So it's the bank's fault for having money in the vault. Or the farmer's fault for having crops in the field, so available...
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Indeed: the NSA is not the bad guy here. If people are pissed that the NSA buys this information from data brokers, look to the supply side of this equation, rather than the demand.
I completely agree with you about dealing with the supply side of this issue; however, I vociferously disagree with the idea that the NSA is not the 'bad guy' here. They most definitely are the Bad Guy here. They are collecting information in direct opposition to the Constitution. A very grave betrayal for a government agency.
Yes, I know that if you magnify your microscope enough, you can see that this is information that the government is not specificly prohibited from gathering; however, when you look at
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...how many other 3rd parties can buy very revealing personal information about you ...
The question for 500 is "Can anyone, literally anyone buy personal information about anyone including the instant location?"
One of the John Olivier's episodes of "Last Week Tonight" covered the issue of selling personal information including location to bounty-hunters, however due to sloppy regulation practically anyone was able to buy this information about anyone. It might be covered in this episode (not sure though): https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
No duh (Score:1)
Its the same thing as the data siphoned from phone calls made.
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\s in case it's not obvious
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Its all your fault for living there instead of on the street.
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Rather, you consented to another person living in that house with you recording your comings and goings, because you like the way they made you smile.
They then sold it to the homeowner to get your ass kicked out.
And you think that's a violation of your rights.
In fact, it's called being a fool. And it's unfortunate that our entire fucking society has succumbed to it.
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Rather, you consented to another person living in that house with you recording your comings and goings, because you like the way they made you smile.
Why do you assume consent? I didn't consent to ANY of this shit.
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If you have consented to nothing, then they don't have any data from you.
Otherwise you have consented. Now, we can argue how informed that consent was, and my opinion would fall on your side, but I'm no judge.
If it is up for sale (Score:5, Insightful)
Perhaps the problem is not the gov purchasing data, but the data being sold to begin with - to whoever pays for it: a gov agency, a foreign company, a state sponsored actor.
Data brokers will always exist while social media continues to amass data, happily given by users themselves. Which amendment protects you from yourself and your very poor life choices again?
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Perhaps the problem is not the gov purchasing data, but the data being sold to begin with - to whoever pays for it: a gov agency, a foreign company, a state sponsored actor.
Data brokers will always exist while social media continues to amass data, happily given by users themselves. Which amendment protects you from yourself and your very poor life choices again?
If your own government can buy this data... Imagine what other entities can also buy it, foreign states, paramilitary organisations... your corporate overlords.
There's a reason they want to make you so scared of the GDPR with their popups and cookie warnings.
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"Imagine what other entities can also buy it'
Your auto loan lender, your home mortgage lender, all sorts of retailers, hospitals, insurance companies...
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The better question is can you have a modern economy without this.
You used to get a loan from the guy at the local "building and loan" who knew you family and went to high school with you. Now you get it from Mega-bank. However Mega-bank needs data to make a sound lending decision, the building and loan had data too it was just less formalized and less portable. If were a new face in town you might not be able to get a loan. Now you can because because credit reports exist.
Slashdot is a such an interest
Re:If it is up for sale (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd argue it should go the other way around.
If you want to keep weed criminalized, you need this data to prove there is an actual harm. They haven't proved it yet.
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So your thesis is that in order for society to work effectively, all of this data must be captured to ensure it works efficiently.
That is all well and good; however, did you think about the way this data set can be abused?
Is the proposed increased efficiency of society worth the abuses that the data could invite?
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Which amendment protects you from yourself and your very poor life choices again?
The one that allows you to vote for legislators. Then instead of lamenting your poor life choice of living next to a river that companies have been dumping so much junk into that it caught fire several times, you can have your legislator make that sort of pollution illegal. Instead of carefully monitoring the reputation of a company to make sure they're not using lead acetate as a sweetener, you can have your legislator ban them from using it. Likewise you can have your legislator make rules against "toxic"
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Frankly, I don't see, how these nefarious "data-brokers" are different — in principle — from paid informants, whom law-enforcement has used, for better or worse, for millennia [wikipedia.org].
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It's a bizarre information and money circle. People using social media hand their data over to corporations, who sell it to 3rd party brokers, who sell it to the NSA, which is paid for by the some of the taxpayers its spying on, with the data they gave the corporations for free.
Hang on, this is just another windmill to shift public money into private hands. Shoot, we've been duped again!
But wait, there's more - the NSA is (ostensibly) using this data to keep Americans (and allied countries and interests) sa
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Perhaps the problem is not the gov purchasing data, ...
Perhaps you are a moron? The problem under discussion is about the government purchasing data and you start off with "Perhaps it isn't a problem"? WTF dude.
Of COURSE it is a huge problem. Regardless of anything else, that data being purchased is not legal for the government to do. Full stop.
And some people think the deep state's not real! (Score:2, Interesting)
There is clearly a problem with the self justifying and self perpetuating intelligence complex. OTOH there's the fact that there are some VERY nasty people out there.
The reality of their ability is further hinted at by this story:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/wor... [bbc.co.uk]
An 18yo's private joke on allegedly fully encrypted Snapchat generated a full scale alert including a fighter escort and his being held in a Spanish lockup for 2 days. How did the intelligence community get hold of this?
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As the linked Snapchat help page clearly says, Snap itself scans for threats and passes them on to the authorities: "We also work to proactively escalate to law enforcement any content appearing to involve imminent threats to life, such asâ¦bomb threats."
(AC because mod points.)
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Yes, this is exactly what happened. It's not some magical super-deep-state technology*. It's just Snapchat themselves monitoring everything. Snapchat is NOT a private communication system.
* If that super-deep-state technology exists they certainly wouldn't reveal it this way. That type of information is highly guarded and its worth is above even human life.
BTW, your moderation is still removed even if posting as AC.
Edward Snowden Tried to Warn Us (Score:1, Redundant)
Julian Assange is in Belmarsh Prison, where he awaits his final appeal against extradition to the US.
There's a pattern here...
Re: Edward Snowden Tried to Warn Us (Score:3)
And the government successfully painted them as the bad guys. In the eyes of the average citizen, they've all been discredited by their unrelated actions. Lesson is, don't fight the machine if you have skeletons in the closet. And even if you don't, realize convincing skeletons can be manufactured.
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Russia being a dictatorship shithole doesn't make the USA the knight in shining armor.
Sometimes it's crook vs. crook and you're fucked either way.
What you can argue is that you can root for the lesser evil. Right now, that sure isn't Russia. But then again, to make Russia the lesser evil, I think the alternative would have to be something worse than North Korea, so don't feel vindicated...
Re: Edward Snowden Tried to Warn Us (Score:4, Informative)
Sorry to break this to you - maybe these details for some reason didn't make it to your local TV station: Snowden's passport was revoked by the US when he was in transit, so he got stuck in Moskow.
I'll repeat myself:
Snowden's passport was revoked while in transit to Latin America. It's the US who grounded Snowden in Moskow. The US even made EU complicit by making it ground and search a presidential plane: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
So no, Snowden didn't choose for Russia. The US put him there, convently changing perception and telling from your naive comment, that worked.
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This isn't an either-or thing. The US government and Putin's empire can both be nasty in different ways and to different degrees. Xi ain't such a great guy either.
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Assange is a Russian op. And Snowden became one.
Fuck off with that stupid shit.
Snowden reported what he reported because of his conscience.
I don't give a fuck about Assange other than watching my government work itself up over him. If he is a Russian OP, it is paying for itself very nicely.
Snowden was not a Russian OP. What he reported was genuine and Russia had nothing to do with his reveal. Our incompetent and evil government employees had everything to do with the reveal.
thats not "buying it" (Score:2)
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You should have added this to your comment:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Your tax dollars at work (Score:2)
Your data is like the trash (Score:4, Insightful)
If you put the trash out to the curb the NSA doesn't need a warrant either. Stop leaving your data in the hands of corporations.
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How will you ever do business (or even exist) in today's economy without entrusting some of your personal data with a corporation? Do you expect me to string my own Ethernet drop back to Slashdot's server?
The answer probably lies with legislation that clearly defines data ownership. And creates a category of data associated with commercial relationships where ownership interest is not relinquished by entering into one. And demanding that all parties to that relationship protect it.
Re: Your data is like the trash (Score:2)
Not long ago I tried to get an account on some streaming service. So, I read the TOS/EULA before ticking "I agree." Upon reading a small bit of it, I decided that no, I wasn't going to agree to them selling my streaming habits and what not to any of the 137 partners they listed, so I didn't get an account with them. It's not that hard.
If you do not agree, do not tick "I agree". Cos if you did, you dun goofed. Don't cry now. You knew all along.
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I decided that no, I wasn't going to agree to them selling my streaming habits and what not to any of the 137 partners they listed, so I didn't get an account with them.
So never buy a home. Got it. You can't take out a mortgage without agreeing to let a business sell your data.
I suspect you are insane. You cling to the little bit of normalcy that you can (I didn't get an account) when you realize the full scale of what is going on.
Your little "I don't agree" action, while VERY important, is utterly meaningless to the rest of us, many who also "didn't agree". The data is still being collected and 'they' know all of the details that you work so hard to lie about to the rest
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Corporations ask for data because; they can, the government demands they do, the government can't demand data but goverment wants it anyway.
The government is looking for inconsistent data: Amazon locks an inconsistent account and demands a photo of everything the customer owns, before unlocking the account.
People don't want to punish data collection. People don't want to reward the corporations spending 2 seconds to protect their privacy. People touch their toes and buy the latest iShiny as compensat
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Stop leaving your data in the hands of corporations.
Other than not doing business with them and avoiding society entirely, how do you suggest to do that?
Walk into a business and don't buy anything? Too bad, they know who you are by your phone. Data just transferred into their computers and they will not let it go.
Ok, ok, fine, we won't do it anymore (Score:2)
Instead we'll create a shell company, the shell company buys the data and we subpoena it from the shell company with the reason ... umm... it's Tuesday and cold outside, and the shell company doesn't resist the order.
You happy now?
Simple solution (Score:2)
A law that states that no government or law enforcement agency can compel me to maintain the secrecy of communications between them and myself. So you bought someone's location data? Allow me to notify them of that fact. By contacting me with such a data request, you have released that fact "to the public". I'm a member of that public. Stopping me from sharing that with whomever I choose harms my right to freedom of association.
I'm not a cop. I didn't apply for the job. You certainly aren't paying me a sal
If you find yourself nodding along (Score:2)
Tough On Crime and broken windows policing are a package deal with giving up your civil rights. Attacking crime head on instead of at it's root doesn't work, and like a lot of things that don't work when you double down and do more of it instead of stepping back and thinking things through you're gonna en
The NSA Doesn't Need a Warrant to Buy Stuff (Score:2)
You don't need a search warrant to buy stuff that's up for legal sale. If you can buy it legally, they can buy it legally.
The problem is that your data's for sale.
And no doubt China does also (Score:2)
One Country (Score:1)
And is behind a lot that is going wrong in the world today.