Unsurprising, but still disappointing. Actually I'm glad someone is trying to hold them accountable. It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution. It highlights that the constitution only has teeth in some legal contexts, primarily where a court case is being heard on a citizen being prosecuted. Conditionality seems to not have any bearing on preventing agencies from violating the constitution or stopping them when they're found out, nor punishing those responsible for the violation.
The Constitution is just a piece of paper. It is powerless if people ignore it.
It's the same with presidents, kings, and dictators. If people just stopped doing what they said, they become nothing.
There's an incident in Soviet history where Stalin was sure they were coming to arrest and execute him. He was shaking and completely powerless. But they were just coming to affirm his power.
The Arab Spring came about because people stopped following orders.
When Nixon was on his way out, the military decided to not follow his orders (so I've read).
The US will end when people just decide Constitution Shmonstitution.
Gun control is neither here nor there for me personally, but what greatly concerns me is if the Bill of Rights is ignored wrt the 2nd Amendment, then what about the rest of the Bill of Rights? Is that next?
i'd go one step further and prohibit our government from surveilling any non-governmental foreigner without an auditable warrant, and strictly prohibit corporations with heavy sanctions from sharing any non-governmental surveillance with the government whatsoever (on top of existing privacy laws of course). the government should be in service, not in command, of the people.
Congress is corrupt (via lobbyist money) which causes this problem.
The DoD tracks large scale threats to our nation. When the economy is rigged, then the establishment worries about the citizen base turning on the establishment.
Congress corruption (via lobbyiests) happens by:
a) Wall Street rigged economy HF front-running trades,
b) Wall Street is rigged
c) 2008 Mortgage crisis theft
d) Pharma is rigged
e) Medical costs are out of control. Every price fixes are killed by lobbyists): Hillary, Obama cost controls, etc.
> It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution.
The constitution only grants or limits power of various branches of government, it doesn't prescribe punishments for breaking the rules. That's a job of Congress (or courts, for civil cases).
>> It seems silly tho that we need to pass a law to uphold what's already written into the constitution.
The argument is probably pretty simple. These companies will sell your data to anyone for the right price, why would a government agency be any different. It's probably not a search or seizure, just a purchase between parties that don't even include any specific member of the public.
First congress needs to make all this data selling and trading illegal, then we'll see how the government goes about obtaining it and weather that's legal or not. But too many lobbyists represent companies that make a ton of money on it, and of course these agencies would prefer to just purchase the data "legally", so I'm not terribly optimistic.
it is often stated that locks are not for honest people, but to keep dishonest people out.
can be applied to US constitution as additional laws needed not for those who WANT to uphold the US constitution but those who want to violate it.
Most of you probably already saw a Michigan-congress rep submit a bill to violate the US constitution by trying to force twitter posters to register with Michigan to post facts because he wanted to prevent others from outing him in the form of fact checking.
The thing I still can't fathom, all these years after Bush II and then Snowden, is just how little human beings really care about mass surveillance. Yeah, the Snowden leaks made a splash, but the media cycle turned over a couple weeks later and everyone moved onto other things.
It's like, if you're of a certain age, you had to read 1984 or whatever in school. You'd think "well, no one would stand for that sort of thing in real life!" Okay, so we don't live in that society, exactly, but time after time, we're shown the breadth of government surveillance and the reaction from the broader public isn't to call for anyone's head on a pike -- it's not even to vote anyone out!
Outside of little communities like this one, people don't give much of a fuck. I guess that was Orwell's real point.
I think most people would oppose it if the media were really presenting it as an issue to keep in mind. However, most of the people in the media are very much supporters of such powers, as they are deep believers in the rightness of US institutions and their 'fundamentally benign' nature. If you look at the media, most are still in support of every single war America has ever been in, with the only opposition being on matters of strategy (e.g. "The US should have retreated from Vietnam earlier", not "there was no defensible reason for the war in Vietnam, it was just a blatant display of imperialism"). And I'm not talking about Fox (who pride themselves on such views), but even the most liberal papers or news channels.
Of course, they are very much opposed to such measures in other countries, especially their enemies.
I think most people don't care much about privacy for themselves ("I have nothing to hide") and are happy to let military intelligence daddy read their emails, as long as it doesn't affect their life.
They remain ignorant of the fact that this means that people who actually do need privacy for purposes of organization against the harmful elements of the status quo (civil rights leaders, labor leaders, political party upstarts, et c) will be kneecapped by this for the remainder of the time the USA exists.
Brave New World becomes ever more prescient. Fahrenheit 451, too:
We're Mildreds too busy being consumed by the stories of our parlour walls (social media?). Or Fabers too cowardly to really speak up and stand up to it when we had the chance. Or Montags working in the system that slowly eats away at us until we wake up one day to what has been lost.
I think the "average" person is fine because they never have the pressing need to exercise a freedom, and when one comes to the occasion and finds that the freedom is gone, it might be too late to regain.
> Bush II and then Snowden, is just how little human beings really care about mass surveillance.
I'm struggling to think of a single negative thing that I can directly associate with mass surveillance in the US. Certainly nothing bad has happened to me personally or anyone that I know because of it. So no one cares because it doesn't impact anyone's lives.
Yeah, this is fucked up. How can people not care about this stuff?
It's not like this is a fringe subject, we have mainstream media exposing people to these ideas. There are so many movies and series where global surveillance is part of the plot. Every 21st century police procedural episode begins with the authorities briefing themselves on the situation and they always have access to ridiculous amounts of information. I can't possibly be the only one who gets uncomfortable watching these scenes.
Honestly it could also be it's just hard to fathom the breadth and scale. Easier to imagine someone opening your mail or tapping your phone or otherwise physically interacting with things you own over the government intercepting a request to post a picture to facebook, for instance.
I think a fair number of people intuitively understand just how massive the internet is and it's hard to conceptualize someone or something sifting through the sand to find your few little grains.
Here's a good behavioral experiment that shows surveillance can reduce people's comfort speaking online. Likewise, if people are afraid to speak up, you aren't hearing it.
That is why I find most interesting about social media generally. Many people seem to care about government mass data collection all the while voluntarily and intentionally providing to private companies from which the government purchases it. Having your cake and eating it too.
I’m of the age where I had a Kinect in my bedroom when I read 1984, and it was interesting to reflect on how basically everything was already happening IRL and it wasn’t that big a deal.
Do you remember when people freaked because the new Kinect would be on _all the time_ and (gasp) _always listening_? Obviously no parallels to future technologies.
I think part of the reason, maybe by design, is it took 7 years to be ruled illegal. I'm actually surprised it didn't take longer. A lot happens in 7 years.
People will always perfer the guided cage of illusory safety constructed by government over the messy unpredictable chaos of freedom....
how little human beings really care about mass surveillance is just one in the long line of truths that prove that most of the population prefer perceived safety over liberty
I think what confuses me most is that one side of the political isle says their major concern is big government and them taking away rights. Yet these people are the hardest to convince to use services like Signal, VPNs, or even basic privacy things like ad blockers (or pick your poison of basic privacy tools). Like if you don't want them to take your guns you should also be concerned about them spying on you. It has utterly surprised me how little they are. If we're going with the super inaccurate political compass I'd say it tends to be lower center and lower left that tend to care more about surveillance. I'm not sure why it isn't everyone that is afraid of the government. I just don't get it. Maybe someone can actually explain it to me, because my friends and family just say "what can I do" and "well I have nothing to hide."
I reread 1984 several months back, my first time reading it since 8th grade, I believe.
It was scary as all hell, given the Trump presidency. But it's not just the surveillance that is frightening. Eg, the rewriting of history, and the Two Minutes Hate which seem characteristic of the Trump rallies
I don't like how this article buries the important parts of this story. There is good reason to think that this surveillance by public info is legal currently, there was a court ruling stating that's the case.
A law is necessary to codify that this practice is a violation Fourth Amendment, and Wyden is currently one of a handful of senators trying to get it passed.
The story eventually mentions this, but the beginning focus on confidentiality makes it seem like they're hiding evidence of their crime.
The Third Party Doctrine is one of the things that is so obviously out of date, and needs to be changed. When so much of our lives (to the point where it is our lives) are online, why is there no expectation of privacy?
Apple sells privacy, so there's a market for it and it's expanding into the public conscience. Apple isn't a bank though, and they aren't beholden to the same paternalistic/sinister interests. So what's really needed is reducing the size and scope of what paternalistic/sinister interests manage. Design principles such as separation of concerns come to mind.
So Wyden's issue is the DoD is buying access to these data sets from private industry? I'm not sure there has been a court ruling declaring this practice to be illegal, and it might very well be legal depending on the dataset's coverage and what it's intended use would be. The DoD's OGC are not stupid when it comes to these sorts of matters, and surely they've had to weigh in on this collection point already. I guess this is why Wyden is trying to pass legislation for this practice to be illegal unless explicitly directed by court order to do so? I'm betting the DoD has already anticipated this and filters out the domestic traffic they don't care about prior to ingest - I think they have to do so by law anyway. So Congress can pass a law saying a court order is needed first to buy these communications datasets, but the FISC will continue to be a rubber stamp for the IC, and not at all the friction barrier the legislators are hoping for. This strikes me as posturing and nothing more.
Regarding the DoD purchasing data from data brokers, I would much rather first focus on laws or regulations that set legal standards for the collection, sale, and other distribution of personal information. For example, make the sale of personal information to a government agency an act that requires posting notice on a public register. Also, a hefty tax on the sale of personal information would be nice to see.
I would focus on the collection and sale of personal information first because it is often done without the informed consent of the person to whom the information is associated.
We should all be grateful that Senator Wyden has been a champion for these issues. I like to watch him in hearings and it's clear he's one of the most well prepared questioners on issues of privacy and liberty. To the staff of his office, if you're seeing this comment section - thank you!
A warrant is not required for the government to purchase commercial data products and there are plenty of legitimate uses for this kind of data. Security analytics would seem to be an obvious use case for netflow data, for example. Commercial datasets are also used for address correction and standardization and most government agencies routinely do.
Some of the answers the DoD provided were given in a form that means Wyden's office cannot legally publish specifics on the surveillance; one answer in particular was classified. In the letter Wyden is pushing the DoD to release the information to the public. A Wyden aide told Motherboard that the Senator is unable to make the information public at this time...
It seems strange and troubling to me that a senator would be restricted from making public any government information.
"We can't tell you if we are violating your constitutional rights or not, because that's classified on the basis of national security."
When the preservation of the formerly supreme law of the land is made subordinate to the interests of the ruling military, I think it is safe to say the american experiment is over.
I have long maintained that the US is basically a military dictatorship. There are many examples, like the CIA hacking congressional computers to cover up the fact that the CIA lied under oath to congress. Snowden telling us that all of the large US internet and web service providers have to spy on everyone, citizens and not, without a warrant. And now this.
The US is not a free country today, if indeed it ever was.
I knew before even reading that the senator would be Ron Wyden. He's a treasure and the most tech-literate politician I know of. Oregon is lucky to have him, and we could use a lot more like him.
The US Intelligence Agencies have been using this trick for a long time. They ask the Brits for intel on US persons and they trade for intel on Brits.
The only difference is they go through a commercial entity now. If it is legal to trade with the Brits, it is legal to go through a private entity. Data is big business.
I would be more surprised at this point to find out that the American three letter agencies bothered to get a warrant for anything. My base case is that they are constantly warrantlessly surveilling everyone.
[+] [-] billytetrud|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] babesh|4 years ago|reply
Law is enforced via power. When it meets a greater power then the law is contravened.
Look at the US and how it broke international law to force a plane down that it thought had Snowden.
[+] [-] WalterBright|4 years ago|reply
It's the same with presidents, kings, and dictators. If people just stopped doing what they said, they become nothing.
There's an incident in Soviet history where Stalin was sure they were coming to arrest and execute him. He was shaking and completely powerless. But they were just coming to affirm his power.
The Arab Spring came about because people stopped following orders.
When Nixon was on his way out, the military decided to not follow his orders (so I've read).
The US will end when people just decide Constitution Shmonstitution.
Gun control is neither here nor there for me personally, but what greatly concerns me is if the Bill of Rights is ignored wrt the 2nd Amendment, then what about the rest of the Bill of Rights? Is that next?
[+] [-] clairity|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] seaourfreed|4 years ago|reply
The DoD tracks large scale threats to our nation. When the economy is rigged, then the establishment worries about the citizen base turning on the establishment.
Congress corruption (via lobbyiests) happens by:
a) Wall Street rigged economy HF front-running trades,
b) Wall Street is rigged
c) 2008 Mortgage crisis theft
d) Pharma is rigged
e) Medical costs are out of control. Every price fixes are killed by lobbyists): Hillary, Obama cost controls, etc.
[+] [-] mywittyname|4 years ago|reply
The constitution only grants or limits power of various branches of government, it doesn't prescribe punishments for breaking the rules. That's a job of Congress (or courts, for civil cases).
[+] [-] phkahler|4 years ago|reply
The argument is probably pretty simple. These companies will sell your data to anyone for the right price, why would a government agency be any different. It's probably not a search or seizure, just a purchase between parties that don't even include any specific member of the public.
First congress needs to make all this data selling and trading illegal, then we'll see how the government goes about obtaining it and weather that's legal or not. But too many lobbyists represent companies that make a ton of money on it, and of course these agencies would prefer to just purchase the data "legally", so I'm not terribly optimistic.
[+] [-] 1cvmask|4 years ago|reply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Worcester_v._Georgia
The constitution and Supreme Court do not consider Blacks humans or citizens:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sandford
[+] [-] fredgrott|4 years ago|reply
can be applied to US constitution as additional laws needed not for those who WANT to uphold the US constitution but those who want to violate it.
Most of you probably already saw a Michigan-congress rep submit a bill to violate the US constitution by trying to force twitter posters to register with Michigan to post facts because he wanted to prevent others from outing him in the form of fact checking.
[+] [-] Black101|4 years ago|reply
What makes you think that they will respect new laws?
[+] [-] baybal2|4 years ago|reply
- More than 120 retired generals and admirals wrote to Biden appearing to back a false election conspiracy and questioning his mental health - https://www.businessinsider.com/former-generals-admirals-let...
- An open letter by former officers calling the president a “Marxist” dictator is a greater threat to U.S. democracy than the ouster of Liz Cheney. - https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/05/12/joe-biden-military-revo...
- Over 120 retired generals and admirals signed on to a letter falsely claiming the 2020 election was stolen in a move other veterans say erodes democratic norms. - https://sofrep.com/news/retired-officers-question-2020-elect...
30 Brigadiers, 16 Lietenant Generals, 42 Major Generals.
In any other normal country, at this stage people will call a military putsch brewing an inevitability.
[+] [-] mc32|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] maybelsyrup|4 years ago|reply
It's like, if you're of a certain age, you had to read 1984 or whatever in school. You'd think "well, no one would stand for that sort of thing in real life!" Okay, so we don't live in that society, exactly, but time after time, we're shown the breadth of government surveillance and the reaction from the broader public isn't to call for anyone's head on a pike -- it's not even to vote anyone out!
Outside of little communities like this one, people don't give much of a fuck. I guess that was Orwell's real point.
[+] [-] tsimionescu|4 years ago|reply
Of course, they are very much opposed to such measures in other countries, especially their enemies.
[+] [-] sneak|4 years ago|reply
They remain ignorant of the fact that this means that people who actually do need privacy for purposes of organization against the harmful elements of the status quo (civil rights leaders, labor leaders, political party upstarts, et c) will be kneecapped by this for the remainder of the time the USA exists.
It's a lack of imagination, really. The Long Now.
[+] [-] decasteve|4 years ago|reply
We're Mildreds too busy being consumed by the stories of our parlour walls (social media?). Or Fabers too cowardly to really speak up and stand up to it when we had the chance. Or Montags working in the system that slowly eats away at us until we wake up one day to what has been lost.
I think the "average" person is fine because they never have the pressing need to exercise a freedom, and when one comes to the occasion and finds that the freedom is gone, it might be too late to regain.
[+] [-] treis|4 years ago|reply
I'm struggling to think of a single negative thing that I can directly associate with mass surveillance in the US. Certainly nothing bad has happened to me personally or anyone that I know because of it. So no one cares because it doesn't impact anyone's lives.
[+] [-] thanatos519|4 years ago|reply
https://www.tau.ac.il/education/muse/maslool/boidem/170forew...
[+] [-] matheusmoreira|4 years ago|reply
It's not like this is a fringe subject, we have mainstream media exposing people to these ideas. There are so many movies and series where global surveillance is part of the plot. Every 21st century police procedural episode begins with the authorities briefing themselves on the situation and they always have access to ridiculous amounts of information. I can't possibly be the only one who gets uncomfortable watching these scenes.
[+] [-] derg|4 years ago|reply
I think a fair number of people intuitively understand just how massive the internet is and it's hard to conceptualize someone or something sifting through the sand to find your few little grains.
[+] [-] nr2x|4 years ago|reply
http://scratchbook.ch/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Journalism-...
[+] [-] austincheney|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nxc18|4 years ago|reply
Do you remember when people freaked because the new Kinect would be on _all the time_ and (gasp) _always listening_? Obviously no parallels to future technologies.
Alexa, play Despacito.
[+] [-] 2OEH8eoCRo0|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cronix|4 years ago|reply
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/sep/03/edward-snowd...
[+] [-] syshum|4 years ago|reply
how little human beings really care about mass surveillance is just one in the long line of truths that prove that most of the population prefer perceived safety over liberty
[+] [-] godelski|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jeffwass|4 years ago|reply
It was scary as all hell, given the Trump presidency. But it's not just the surveillance that is frightening. Eg, the rewriting of history, and the Two Minutes Hate which seem characteristic of the Trump rallies
[+] [-] boomboomsubban|4 years ago|reply
A law is necessary to codify that this practice is a violation Fourth Amendment, and Wyden is currently one of a handful of senators trying to get it passed.
The story eventually mentions this, but the beginning focus on confidentiality makes it seem like they're hiding evidence of their crime.
[+] [-] kemitchell|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] HDMI_Cable|4 years ago|reply
--- [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-party_doctrine
[+] [-] webXL|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] Nasrudith|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] auiya|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] SquibblesRedux|4 years ago|reply
I would focus on the collection and sale of personal information first because it is often done without the informed consent of the person to whom the information is associated.
[+] [-] epberry|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] GartzenDeHaes|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 1MachineElf|4 years ago|reply
It seems strange and troubling to me that a senator would be restricted from making public any government information.
[+] [-] sneak|4 years ago|reply
When the preservation of the formerly supreme law of the land is made subordinate to the interests of the ruling military, I think it is safe to say the american experiment is over.
I have long maintained that the US is basically a military dictatorship. There are many examples, like the CIA hacking congressional computers to cover up the fact that the CIA lied under oath to congress. Snowden telling us that all of the large US internet and web service providers have to spy on everyone, citizens and not, without a warrant. And now this.
The US is not a free country today, if indeed it ever was.
[+] [-] freshair|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] croes|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] anonymousisme|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 2OEH8eoCRo0|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] java-man|4 years ago|reply
[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEh-l_G1Gcs
[+] [-] ssklash|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jnwatson|4 years ago|reply
The only difference is they go through a commercial entity now. If it is legal to trade with the Brits, it is legal to go through a private entity. Data is big business.
[+] [-] anm89|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sjaak|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] samuelizdat|4 years ago|reply