Standard Mischief

OK. I’ll admit it, I got terribly upset by the recent disclosures that my government has been collecting the details of nearly everyone’s phone calls (who called whom, time, date, duration), and have used that data to create a gigantic database that they have been mining for data.

Hopefully this is a more levelheaded rant.

Acidus quotes the phone companies

I have Acidus to thank for pointing me to this USA-Today article that has the statements from the phone companies. Brownshirts AT&T, Bellsouth, and Verizon:

AT&T: “We do not comment on matters of national security, except to say that we only assist law enforcement and government agencies charged with protecting national security in strict accordance with the law.”

BellSouth: “BellSouth does not provide any confidential customer information to the NSA or any governmental agency without proper legal authority.”

Verizon: “We do not comment on national security matters, we act in full compliance with the law and we are committed to safeguarding our customers’ privacy.”

Qwest was a different case. Before they were going to spill their guts, they wanted an opinion from the FISA court. (FISA stands for “Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act”, it was a law passed to keep a realistic limit of the powers of the spooks to spy on citizens. EFF has more details on FISA. )

According to sources familiar with the events, Qwest’s CEO at the time, Joe Nacchio, was deeply troubled by the NSA’s assertion that Qwest didn’t need a court order - or approval under FISA - to proceed. Adding to the tension, Qwest was unclear about who, exactly, would have access to its customers’ information and how that information might be used.

…

Qwest’s lawyers asked NSA to take its proposal to the FISA court. According to the sources, the agency refused.
The NSA’s explanation did little to satisfy Qwest’s lawyers. “They told (Qwest) they didn’t want to do that because FISA might not agree with them,”

So, those of you who are saying, “hey, you may not like it, but it’s legal”, please note this: When the Secret Police aren’t 100% sure that they can get a warrant from the Secret (unaccountable to anyone) Court, odds are there’s something shady going on.

For similar reasons, this person said, NSA rejected Qwest’s suggestion of getting a letter of authorization from the U.S. attorney general’s office. A second person confirmed this version of events.

Yup, according to USA-Today, Quest would have even been happy with a letter from the AG, but the NSA folks said “nope”.

The Anarchangel weighs in

I was still seeing through that Red Curtain of Blood when I responded to Chris. I though he was another GOP apologist. He starts off saying that the “brouhaha” is “patently silly”, and goes on to explain how this is not wiretapping (Duh).

I must have skimmed over this part:

Again, I’m a Libertarian, these issues get kind of thorny with me. Do I WANT the government to do this? No I don’t; however we have constructed a government that CAN do this, both legally, and technically. I disagree with it, I’d like the laws changed; I’d even like to see a constitutional guarantee to certain privacy beyond that which I outline here; but it simply doesn’t exist now (nor likely ever will).

Anyway, he does bring up several good points. He notes a number of laws and court cases, but does not clearly document them so I can reference them properly. He also explains a bit about 3rd party information and how it has always been resold. I’ve never been comfortable with this myself, in fact I do have a prepaid cellphone, and I do subscribe to magazines under an assumed name, just to see who they sell my information to.

(more below the fold)

Salty Pig calls up Verizon to vent.

Salty Pig calls up Verizon to get the straight poop on his private records. While waiting on hold, and being told how valuable his call was to them, he also got the standard story on how Verizon respects his privacy:

just got off the phone with those loser bastards at verizon. while waiting for transfer to somebody, i was fed some bullshit recorded boilerplate about how verizon values my privacy, and needs my permission even for a company rep to review my account. what a show! then a woman picked up, identified herself, and asked for verification of my account. i provided that and said that i was calling to hear verizon’s story on these news reports that they gave my private information to government (along with AT&T and BellSouth)…

Furthermore, in another post he suggests that we “kill NSA collaborators, market style”

That’s great in theory, but remember, this isn’t just some greasy spoon with bad service. Going back to the USA-Today article, it seems that after NSA was rebuffed after offering to pay for the data, they twisted the thumbscrews a bit.

In addition, the agency suggested that Qwest’s foot-dragging might affect its ability to get future classified work with the government. Like other big telecommunications companies, Qwest already had classified contracts and hoped to get more. [emphasis mine]

It makes it tough to starve those companies that already suckle so much from the government teat.

Pawpaw says it’s no big deal

Pawpaw reminds us that they’re not confessing to wiretapping, and that we’re at war. Furthermore, he draws an analogy between the Government snooping on everybody, and your wife or GF looking at your phone bill.

He goes in the GOP apologist category.

Feministe is worth reading

I don’t have any comments on their telephone records post, because I mostly agree with them. What drives me bonkers over there (and probably what keeps me reading) is one moment they are all “keep your laws off my tanning beds” and the next moment it’s “universal state-controlled health care like Canada has is a great idea, I can’t see any privacy problems“.

Anyway, from zuzu:

Oh, yawn. “Clinton did it too.” Except he didn’t. Echelon involved calls made to or received by people outside the US and complied with FISA. Remember FISA? That nice little rubber-stamp court that gives out the wiretapping warrant? The one that never turned down a request by anyone until Bush came along, and then he just decided to do an end run around it?

And then we have Carnivore, which was an internet surveillance program developed by the FBI who - hey! how novel! - got court warrants prior to using the program!

They do have a pointer to this post by Think Progress. It explains how perhaps the telcos have violated the Stored Communications Act, Section 2703(c).

Say Uncle is busy having a kid

In comments, _Jon claims that this all came out in December, and is being recycled now as an effort to block Michael Hayden’s confirmation as CIA director. He offers no linky though.

Update 16may06: He provides a link, (but not here, over at SayUncle’s) and it seems to be good:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/24/politics/24spy.html?ex=1293080400&en=016edb46b79bde83&ei=5090

SayUncle:

It’s another step toward the nanny state and I don’t like it. May not be that big of a deal in terms of violations of privacy but it is significant. Another canary just died.

Marko weighs in

Damn, I’m suprised that you read this far, he’s worth reading too.