| Art Alexion on 21 Mar 2007 13:26:37 -0000 |
|
On Tuesday 20 March 2007 19:58, jeff wrote:
> Never has it been more out in the open.
Yeah, this was actually an early '90s thing, having nothing to do with
terror-phobia, 9/11-phobia, the PATRIOT Act, etc. It was originally
triggered by the advent of digital cell phones which were much harder to
intercept and eavesdrop than the old analog ones. There was concern that
organized crime and others would move all of there telecommunications to
digital cellular to avoid court ordered wiretaps.
Unlike the PATRIOT Act, CALEA does not extend the authority of the government
and law enforcement in conducting specific instances of surveillance, but
rather imposes requirements on carriers to open, and if necessary, modify,
their systems to provide law enforcement -- with a warrant -- technological
access to the carrier's systems.
What is new is that the FCC, under the direction ("at the request"?) of the
Bush Justice Department, has extended CALEA requirements to ISPs.
Unlike warrantless wiretaps and other NSA programs that comb a broad array of
communications -- without a showing of probable cause that a crime has been
or is being committed -- which should concern you greatly -- this legislation
only effects the customers of ISPs if the customer would be subject to a
phone tap by pre-9/11 standards. Of course, it affects all of us in the
sense that it drives up the cost of doing business for the ISP, and that cost
is passed on to the customer.
Those of us involved in the FOSS community should be particularly concerned
with the aforementioned warrantless wiretaps and the other broad sweep
surveillance programs because we tend to have a lot of international internet
communication with people we have never met and know nothing about other than
their technical concerns and talents. If you happen to answer a technical
question for someone overseas who the government suspects has terrorist ties
(not "of being a terrorist" but "having terrorist ties"), you could come
under suspicion of having terrorist ties yourself, possibly resulting in
warrant-based surveillance, etc.
Think of the chilling effect this can have on FOSS development and relatively
anonymous help on lists such as this one...
--
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