The Obama administration, already bogged down by a series of scandals at the periphery, and sometime directly inside the administration, has now to contend with the revelation that it has ordered the records for all Verizon customers for a period of three months.
The administration is quick to defend the actions, saying that such data mining has successfully helped in curtailing terrorism in the past.
However, the administration has taken pains to neither confirm nor deny the data collection, a move that sounds disingenuous considering its defense of data collection.
The aim, they contend, is to discover who terrorists abroad are contacting stateside. This, they assert, has been very useful in identifying terrorist activity in the past.
Case in point: a known, documented, interrogated, and pointed out by a foreign country, wannabe terrorist by the last name of Tsarnaev, was able to not only connect but interact with known cells abroad, and was furthermore connected to said cells and their activity by a foreign government and warned us about, but it did not result in a positive outcome for this nation. So has this then prompted the action we are seeing now? If so, why would they cite past successes as motivation for further data mining?
More importantly, if the Boston bombing is an example, what do they do with all that information? And how do they prevent miscarriage of justice such as third party innocent involvement? As in a friend of a friend of a suspect? How many people could be snared in this net and be totally innocent? What if some of these people become enemy combatants and are stripped of all rights under the US citizenship? What if a naturalized citizen is innocently embroiled in a friendship that has third party connections to a terrorist cell, then what happens? Does that person stand to lose his/her citizenship?
These question should be foremost in people's minds. But they are not. We are quietly abiding with some misplaced sense of hope that all this prevarication of privacy rights is indeed going to be used in the most righteous of ways. But the secrecy involved in these kind of operations also means that if there are scrutinies, arrests and other similar actions, that they would be, under the same umbrella, be kept equally private, thereby erasing any possibility for outsiders to aid or intervene if there is a miscarriage of justice. Secret is secret, from beginning to end. All other laws could be very simply set aside, by replacing them with 'secret' proceedings away from media and public scrutiny, and using 'secret courts' and laws tailor made to circumvent citizen's civil rights.
Just today, a law was passed by New York state legislature that makes it a felony to harass or molest or threaten a police officer. This is a perfect example of a law created in anticipation of future events, to dissuade citizens from certain actions. The broad definitions of this law are tailor made for future unrest or dissent in the streets. They alone could put a damper on any demonstration where the police could feel 'threatened' or harassed. Everyone involved in street demonstrations could be facing four years in jail just through broad or fanciful interpretation of the law.
It beggars belief then, that citizens might not express any dismay or concern at the revelation of such order, and it alone shows how unprepared people are to the advantages that techonologies offer governments. If people do not protect their rights now, it will become increasingly difficult in the future when technology will encompass almost every step we take and some we are not even aware of.
Another case in point: the US condemnation of Google's acquiescence of China's restrictions that allow censorship and scrutiny of internet users. When we condemn other countries, we cannot then turn around and do much of the same.
...
A whistleblower is responsible for the revelation of the data mining from Verizon. Someone released the record of the 'secret court order' and passed it on to the Guardian, a renown British newspapers organization.
Just today, a law was passed by New York state legislature that makes it a felony to harass or molest or threaten a police officer. This is a perfect example of a law created in anticipation of future events, to dissuade citizens from certain actions. The broad definitions of this law are tailor made for future unrest or dissent in the streets. They alone could put a damper on any demonstration where the police could feel 'threatened' or harassed. Everyone involved in street demonstrations could be facing four years in jail just through broad or fanciful interpretation of the law.
It beggars belief then, that citizens might not express any dismay or concern at the revelation of such order, and it alone shows how unprepared people are to the advantages that techonologies offer governments. If people do not protect their rights now, it will become increasingly difficult in the future when technology will encompass almost every step we take and some we are not even aware of.
Another case in point: the US condemnation of Google's acquiescence of China's restrictions that allow censorship and scrutiny of internet users. When we condemn other countries, we cannot then turn around and do much of the same.
...
A whistleblower is responsible for the revelation of the data mining from Verizon. Someone released the record of the 'secret court order' and passed it on to the Guardian, a renown British newspapers organization.
The order was signed by Judge Roger Vinson, of the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court back during the month of April. The order expires on July 19th, although there is no telling whether the application for an extension will be made or granted.
At least one Senator, Jeff Merkley, has described the order as "an outrageous breach of American's privacy". He also added that "This bulk data collection is being done under interpretations of the law that have been kept secret from the public. Significant FISA [Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act] court opinions that determine the scope of our laws should be declassified.”
What is at stake, according to the ACLU, is that the courts are stretching the law under the Patriot Act by fanciful interpretation that widens its range and scope immensely, and therefore constitute a prevarication of the limits imposed by the Act itself and the protections, if any, that were built in it for the private citizen.
Op-Ed
Source : The Atlantic/NBC news/BBC news 6.6.13
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