02/03/12: The New York Times reports that the international hackers group known as Anonymous turned the tables on the FBI by listening in on a conference call last month between the bureau, Scotland Yard and other foreign police agencies about their joint investigation of the group and its allies. An FBI official said Anonymous had not in fact hacked into the conference call or any other bureau facilities. Instead, the official said, the group had obtained an e-mail giving the time, telephone number and access code for the call. The e-mail had been sent on January 13 to more than three dozen people at the bureau, Scotland Yard, and agencies in France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands and Sweden.
Continue reading "FBI admits hacker group’s eavesdropping" »
02/02/12: The Washington Times reports that a secret police document shows that the New York Police Department recommended increasing surveillance of thousands of Muslims and their mosques based solely on their religion. The Associated Press obtained a copy of a May 2006 NYPD intelligence report on Iran. It says police should expand clandestine operations at Shiite mosques and then lists mosques around the Northeast. Mayor Michael Bloomberg has said the NYPD never considers religion in its policing.
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01/29/12: The New York Times reports that tens of thousands of Americans are tracking cars with little oversight, for purposes as seemingly benign as tracking an elderly parent with dementia or a risky teenage driver, or as legally and ethically charged as spying on a spouse or an employee — or for outright criminal stalking. Last Monday’s Supreme Court decision held that law enforcement placement of a GPS tracker on a vehicle constitutes a search under the Fourth Amendment. But sales of GPS trackers to employers and individuals, for a multitude of largely unregulated uses, are growing fast, raising new questions about privacy and a legal system that has not kept pace with technology.
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12/30/11: Bloomberg News reports that the US government’s decision to shield telecommunications companies from lawsuits alleging an anti-terrorism surveillance program violated consumers’ privacy rights was upheld by a federal appeals court. The US Court of Appeals in San Francisco ruled that an amendment to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, granting immunity from lawsuits to AT&T Inc. and other companies doesn’t violate constitutional due process rights of citizens who sued carriers whom they alleged assisted the government in illegal wiretapping.
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11/17/11: The Wall Street Journal reports that Barbara Handschu had tried to remove her name from the agreement that is her legacy. More than a quarter century ago, after New York's police were caught spying on Americans who were exercising their right to free speech, she and others filed suit to stop it. The outcome was an agreement to place limits on surveillance — the Handschu rules.
Continue reading "In NYPD spying, a Yippie legal battle echoes again " »
10/18/11: The Washington Post reports that federal prosecutors have released a photograph that they say proves Mohamad Anas Haitham Soueid met this summer with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad — just a few months before the US citizen was arrested on charges of gathering information about anti-Assad protesters and providing it to Syrian intelligence. The photo’s release came days after the Syrian Embassy in Washington said it was “ludicrous” for prosecutors to claim that Soueid met privately with Assad.
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09/27/11: Defense Media Network reports that when the Transportation Security Administration began using full-body scanners in airports, the now-iconic “naked” images spurred a public debate over privacy and security. As a result, TSA has started implementing new software in its Advanced Imaging Technology (AIT) machines, removing all anatomical detail and automatically targeting concealed objects on a generic outline. “We believe it addresses the privacy issues that have been raised,” TSA Administrator John Pistole said.
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09/27/11: The Washington Post reports that China’s massive market beckons to American businesses — the nation is the United States’ second-largest trading partner — but many are increasingly concerned about working amid electronic surveillance that is sophisticated and pervasive. In China, the use of cyber-espionage is often corporate, part of a broader government strategy to help develop the country’s economy.
Continue reading "In China, business travelers take extreme precautions to avoid cyber-espionage" »
09/22/11: The New York Times reports that two United States senators on the Senate Intelligence Committee have accused the Justice Department of making misleading statements about the legal justification of secret domestic surveillance activities that the government is apparently carrying out under the Patriot Act. The lawmakers — Ron Wyden of Oregon and Mark Udall of Colorado — sent a letter to Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. calling for him to “correct the public record” and to ensure that future department statements about the authority the government believes is conveyed by the surveillance law would not be misleading.
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09/21/11: The Washington Post reports that the Second Circuit Court of Appeals reached a 6-6 decision Wednesday, upholding the standing of a group of American lawyers, human rights activists and journalists to challenge the constitutionality of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act as amended by Congress in 2008. The revision expanded the government’s surveillance authority, permitting intelligence agencies to collect information on US soil without a warrant identifying a particular individual.
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Opinion: Privacy, technology and law
01/29/12: The New York Times features an opinion piece by Barry Friedman. Everyday, Friedman contends, those of us who live in the digital world give little bits of ourselves away. On Facebook and LinkedIn. To servers that store our e-mail, Google searches, online banking and shopping records. Does the fact that so many of us live our lives online mean we have given the government wide-open access to all that information? Friedman argues that the Supreme Court’s decision last week in United States v. Jones presents the disturbing possibility that the answer is yes.
January 29, 2012 at 10:06 AM in Judiciary / Cases, Surveillance / Privacy, Commentary / Opinion | Permalink