[Discussion] Surveillance and the Police State

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General observations on surveillance and accrual of police powers.

New edition of the Police State thread; creating it because nobody else seems to have done so.

Leading off: Police routinely misuse state and federal databases to stalk romantic interests, business partners, family, and even each other.

Can you call another police department to report a theft?

Another take on that first story:

AP: Across US, police officers abuse confidential databases

Criminal-history and driver databases give officers critical information about people they encounter on the job. But the AP's review shows how those systems also can be exploited by officers who, motivated by romantic quarrels, personal conflicts or voyeuristic curiosity, sidestep policies and sometimes the law by snooping. In the most egregious cases, officers have used information to stalk or harass, or have tampered with or sold records they obtained.
 
[long snip]
 
Officers are instructed that those systems, which together contain data far more substantial than an internet search would yield, may be used only for legitimate law enforcement purposes. They're warned that their searches are subject to being audited and that unauthorized access could cost them their jobs or result in criminal charges. Yet misuse persists.

And note that this information is very possibly less personally sensitive than things like the NSA's 'grab all your Internet use forever' databases. These are mostly semi-public records being abused.

LeapingGnome wrote:

Can you call another police department to report a theft?

State troopers?

Wait, nope. State troopers get a cut.

And who would prosecute, when the prosecutor's office also gets a cut?

sometimesdee wrote:
LeapingGnome wrote:

Can you call another police department to report a theft?

State troopers?

Wait, nope. State troopers get a cut.

And who would prosecute, when the prosecutor's office also gets a cut?

Federales (but only since they recently backed away from seizures).

So the FBI? Once again, who will prosecute?

Yahoo secretly scanned customer emails for U.S. intelligence - sources

Yahoo Inc last year secretly built a custom software program to search all of its customers' incoming emails for specific information provided by U.S. intelligence officials, according to people familiar with the matter.

The company complied with a classified U.S. government directive, scanning hundreds of millions of Yahoo Mail accounts at the behest of the National Security Agency or FBI, said two former employees and a third person apprised of the events.

Some surveillance experts said this represents the first case to surface of a U.S. Internet company agreeing to a spy agency's demand by searching all arriving messages, as opposed to examining stored messages or scanning a small number of accounts in real time.

It is not known what information intelligence officials were looking for, only that they wanted Yahoo to search for a set of characters. That could mean a phrase in an email or an attachment, said the sources, who did not want to be identified.

Reuters was unable to determine what data Yahoo may have handed over, if any, and if intelligence officials had approached other email providers besides Yahoo with this kind of request

CNN seems to be claiming that reading Wikileaks is illegal:

https://streamable.com/6g5v

Malor wrote:

CNN seems to be claiming that reading Wikileaks is illegal:

https://streamable.com/6g5v

That's actually an interesting point. And I'm not sure if the point has been settle legally in the electronic information age.

Possessing stolen documents is illegal, yes? For mass leaks on this level it sounds like we're discussing Napster. Technically illegal behavior but nearly or completely unenforceable. And isn't the speaker in that clip correct that it's different for the media? There's a pretty clear delineation between corporate espionage, treason, and whistleblowing, but I'm not how that applies to semi-private entities like the DNC or campaign staff.

Jolly Bill wrote:
Malor wrote:

CNN seems to be claiming that reading Wikileaks is illegal:

https://streamable.com/6g5v

That's actually an interesting point. And I'm not sure if the point has been settle legally in the electronic information age.

Possessing stolen documents is illegal, yes? For mass leaks on this level it sounds like we're discussing Napster. Technically illegal behavior but nearly or completely unenforceable. And isn't the speaker in that clip correct that it's different for the media? There's a pretty clear delineation between corporate espionage, treason, and whistleblowing, but I'm not how that applies to semi-private entities like the DNC or campaign staff.

I think either when Snowden or Manning had their leaks, I was explicitly told by work that viewing the leaked material could have consequences including termination or other legal issues. I do forget if this applied to work computers or in general. However, this was at an Aero and Defense company, so a little different than other companies or your personal equipment.

IIRC, that applied to any and all military personnel and government workers too.

Yes. Those restrictions are voluntarily entered into, of course.

Feds enter a residence and demand everyone's fingerprints to open phones on premises

A memorandum from DoJ described the warrant as having:

“authorization to depress the fingerprints and thumbprints of every person who is located at the SUBJECT PREMISES during the execution of the search and who is reasonably believed by law enforcement to be the user of a fingerprint sensor-enabled device that is located at the SUBJECT PREMISES and falls within the scope of the warrant.” The warrant was not available to the public, nor were other documents related to the case.

Government claims they have probable cause to go fishing through all data on all devices they find, and that people in the building have to unlock them.

Legal expert says they got a warrant to go looking for enough evidence to get a warrant. “They want the ability to get a warrant on the assumption that they will learn more after they have a warrant,” said Marina Medvin of Medvin Law. “Essentially, they are seeking to have the ability to convince people to comply by providing their fingerprints to law enforcement under the color of law – because of the fact that they already have a warrant. They want to leverage this warrant to induce compliance by people they decide are suspects later on. This would be an unbelievably audacious abuse of power if it were permitted.”

IIRC, you're not required to give passwords/pass codes, though, do try to shut down your iPhone when the cops come?

Edit: never mind. That particular warrant includes passwords!

sometimesdee wrote:

IIRC, you're not required to give passwords/pass codes, though, do try to shut down your iPhone when the cops come?

Edit: never mind. That particular warrant includes passwords!

"I'm sorry officer, I've forgotten my password", doesn't quite work with thumbprints, does it?

However, as the article says, a few cases where they got the fingerprints backfired because fingerprints don't work on iPhones after 48 hours of inactivity... so I guess you could try to stall and fight it for two days...

Amy Goodman Is Facing Jail Time for Reporting on the Dakota Access Pipeline. That Should Scare Us All.

The Nation wrote:

When asked to explain the grounds for arresting a working journalist, Erickson told the Grand Forks Herald that he did not, in fact, consider Goodman a journalist. “She’s a protester, basically,” Erickson told the newspaper. “Everything she reported on was from the position of justifying the protest actions.” And in The Bismarck Tribune he later added, “I think she put together a piece to influence the world on her agenda, basically. That’s fine, but it doesn’t immunize her from the laws of her state.”

It’s worth pausing here for a moment to contemplate the full and chilling absurdity of this statement: According to Erickson, a woman who appeared at a protest carrying a microphone emblazoned with the name Democracy Now! and trailing a video crew; who can be heard in the resulting video report identifying herself to a security guard as a reporter; and who then broadcast the video on the daily news program she has hosted for 20 years is not actually a journalist. She is not a journalist, because she harbors a strong perspective, and that perspective clashes with his own. By the same distorted logic, every muckraking news gatherer from Ida Tarbell and Upton Sinclair on through I.F. Stone, and, yes, today’s Matt Taibbi (whose work Erickson apparently admires) was not a journalist but an activist flirting with arrest.

sometimesdee wrote:

IIRC, you're not required to give passwords/pass codes, though, do try to shut down your iPhone when the cops come?

Edit: never mind. That particular warrant includes passwords!

It didn't include passwords, just fingerprints and thumbprints. Passwords are something you know, which is protected by the 5th amendment, whereas fingerprints and other biometric data are who you are, which isn't.

Stengah wrote:
sometimesdee wrote:

IIRC, you're not required to give passwords/pass codes, though, do try to shut down your iPhone when the cops come?

Edit: never mind. That particular warrant includes passwords!

It didn't include passwords, just fingerprints and thumbprints. Passwords are something you know, which is protected by the 5th amendment, whereas fingerprints and other biometric data are who you are, which isn't.

Quick reminder for the more paranoid among you. Set up your iPhone to wipe itself after 10 consecutive incorrect password entries. Then get awfully clumsy when the police ask you to unlock your phone. You know, because you're nervous, right?

"whoops"

Stengah wrote:
sometimesdee wrote:

IIRC, you're not required to give passwords/pass codes, though, do try to shut down your iPhone when the cops come?

Edit: never mind. That particular warrant includes passwords!

It didn't include passwords, just fingerprints and thumbprints. Passwords are something you know, which is protected by the 5th amendment, whereas fingerprints and other biometric data are who you are, which isn't.

Forbes article wrote:

For that reason, the warrant authorizes the seizure of ‘passwords, encryption keys, and other access devices that may be necessary to access the device,’” the document read.

It's also stated in said document, posted at the bottom of the article.

Jonman wrote:

Quick reminder for the more paranoid among you. Set up your iPhone to wipe itself after 10 consecutive incorrect password entries. Then get awfully clumsy when the police ask you to unlock your phone. You know, because you're nervous, right?

Don't use biometrics either, because they are basically garbage.

1. The tools to fake the signatures are getting better all the time and are in a constant arms race with the manufacturers of the devices for fidelity.
2. You can't change your thumbprint, if a copy of it is made.
3. Bio metrics use probability algorithms to determine if the input is "close enough" to the information it has on file, which means that it will sometimes give false positives and negatives near the threshhold. Imagine if your computer said your input "OHISEEYOU812" is close enough to "OH1SEEYOU812", I'll just let you in.
4. You can't change your thumbprint, if a copy of it is made.
5. The databases containing the signatures of the biometrics can be stolen off of a network they're attached to and used to create forgeries.
6. YOU CAN'T CHANGE YOUR THUMBPRINT, IF A COPY OF IT IS MADE.

/biometricsaredumbrant

sometimesdee wrote:
Stengah wrote:
sometimesdee wrote:

IIRC, you're not required to give passwords/pass codes, though, do try to shut down your iPhone when the cops come?

Edit: never mind. That particular warrant includes passwords!

It didn't include passwords, just fingerprints and thumbprints. Passwords are something you know, which is protected by the 5th amendment, whereas fingerprints and other biometric data are who you are, which isn't.

Forbes article wrote:

For that reason, the warrant authorizes the seizure of ‘passwords, encryption keys, and other access devices that may be necessary to access the device,’” the document read.

It's also stated in said document, posted at the bottom of the article.

The government submits this supplemental authority in support of its application for a search warrant which seeks authorization to depress the fingerprints and thumbprints of every person who is located at the SUBJECT PREMISES during the execution of the search and who is reasonably believed by law enforcement to be a user of a fingerprint sensor-enabled device that is located at the SUBJECT PREMISES and falls within the scope of the warrant. The government seeks this authority because those fingerprints, when authorized by the user of the device, can unlock the device.
In order to attempt to gain access to the devices found at the SUBJECT PREMISES, the search warrant seeks the authority to use the fingerprints and thumbprints of any person who is located at the SUBJECT PREMISES during the execution of the search and who is reasonably believed by law enforcement to be a user of a fingerprint sensor-enabled device that is located at the SUBJECT PREMISES and falls within the scope of the warrant. Without the numerical or alpha-numerical passcode, the government may not be able to obtain the contents of the devices if those prints are not used.
Because there is probable cause sufficient to seize the digital device, there is probable cause sufficient to seize the key to that device in the form of a person's fingerprint similar to the provisions in the warrant to seize other keys.
Finally, as law enforcement will only be seeking to depress the fingerprints of those persons present at the search location for whom law enforcement has cause to believe may be a user of a device, neither the Fifth nor Fourth Amendment is violated.
The government respectfully requests that the search warrant be issued with the procedures permitting the law enforcement personnel to depress the fingers of every person who is located at the SUBJECT PREMISES during the execution of the search and who is reasonably believed by law enforcement to be a user of a fingerprint sensor-enabled device that is located at the SUBJECT PREMISES and falls within the scope of the warrant.

Passwords are mentioned once, but only in the Legal Discussion section:

While the government does not know ahead of time the identity of every digital device or fingerprint (or indeed, every other piece of evidence) that it will find in the search, it has demonstrated probable cause that evidence may exist at the search location, and needs the ability to gain access to those devices and maintain that access to search them. For that reason the warrant authorizes the seizure of passwords, keys, and other access devices that may be necessary to access the device. A password, key, or use of a fingerprint are all means of gaining access to other spaces or devices, and are seizable both to gain and maintain access. See, United States V. Shi, 525 F.3d 709, 731 (9th Cir. 2008)

That case only concerned physical keys and a physical location, and several judges have already ruled that you cannot be forced to give the police your smartphone password. If it were written down and they found it during their search they could use it to unlock the phones without your cooperation.

Judge Rejects "Riot" Charges Against Amy Goodman in North Dakota

Democracy Now wrote:

District Judge John Grinsteiner did not find probable cause to justify the charges filed on Friday October 14 by State’s Attorney Ladd R. Erickson. Those charges were presented after Erickson had withdrawn an earlier charge against Goodman of criminal trespass. Goodman had returned to North Dakota to turn herself in to the trespassing charge.

Good.

Jonman wrote:
Stengah wrote:
sometimesdee wrote:

IIRC, you're not required to give passwords/pass codes, though, do try to shut down your iPhone when the cops come?

Edit: never mind. That particular warrant includes passwords!

It didn't include passwords, just fingerprints and thumbprints. Passwords are something you know, which is protected by the 5th amendment, whereas fingerprints and other biometric data are who you are, which isn't.

Quick reminder for the more paranoid among you. Set up your iPhone to wipe itself after 10 consecutive incorrect password entries. Then get awfully clumsy when the police ask you to unlock your phone. You know, because you're nervous, right?

"whoops"

Or just hard restart your phone. It takes 2 seconds and fingerprints won't work till you put in your password.

It's unlikely that A) you'll think of doing that when being arrested, and that B) they would allow you to, either at the time or later.

NSA Inspector Who Criticized Snowden for Not Using 'Official' Channels Found Guilty of Retaliating Against Whistleblower Who Did Just That

"More generally," observes Zagorin, "there are few if any incentives for intelligence whistleblowers to report problems through designated authorities when the IG of [the] NSA is found to have retaliated against such an individual."

No surprise there. Recent news reports indicate a huge, ongoing morale problem at the agency, with lots of resignations and difficulty filling some billets.

So you're saying my undergrad math degree and a couple Coursera courses under my belt makes might finally pay off?

You're clearly Cabinet material, muraii.

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