Digital rights

[Guest Scathane]

European ministers have decided on a law that forces isp's to store all email and telephone traffic for a maximum of two years. In Rotterdam and other Dutch cities the police have voiced the desire to dig a mobile phone moat - a so-called digital moat - around each city so that they can keep track of which mobile phones enter and leave the city.

 

Most of these suggestions stem from the fear of terrorism and crime. Now I read that the US Government would like to be able to track cell phones without probable cause of crime.

 

How do you feel about this as the subject of this type of legislation?

[Darth_Rob]

It's ludicrious! The government doesn't need to know where I am at all times!

[Mad78]

Just ridiculous! I agree that for people who are suspected of crime or terrorism it would maybe allow easy following but seriously do they really need to know where the local newspaper boy is at all times!?!

[DarthTofu]

I would say that this is necesarry in these times when we must defend against terrorist attacks, but this a Ted Stevens level stupid move (Ted Stevens. Tried to build our increadible bridge to an Alaskan village with a population of less than fifty? Put the bill for drilling in Alaska in with a national bill? John Stewart was making fun of him for wearing an "Increadible Hulk" tie at the senate meeting last night on the daily show. Come on!) You can't keep track of everyone with a mobile phone at all times. Maybe in locations where security is necessary, such as a presidential speach, but not at all times. There's no way that we can effectively use this. Its ridiculous!

[DarthTex]

You guys surprise me Here's our chance to start our own little "Empire", and you're complaining?! You sound like a bunch of whining rebels. As long as the the government (Empire) practices its dictates on someone else it's OK, but on me? Nooooo way. Order must be maintained!

 

 

Gotcha!

 

A question: if you're not doing anything illegal (not ill - eagle, Tofu), what do you care if the gov't tracks what cell phones enter/leave cities? The same applies to phone conversations. Deep down inside, are you afraid that someONE would abuse their job and "fix" information against you? Or that some political hack would twist things around to burn anyone possible to move up the political ladder? It almost sounds like a SW movie theme/plot. And who says they're not doing it now anyway? Their (the gov'ts) problem is presenting the evidence without showing they got it illegally. Illegal evidence doesn't work in court.

 

Absolute power, corrupts absolutely. So, don't give them absolute power.

[Mitth_raw_nuruodo]

Abe Lincoln once said something on the lines of 'Democracy will work until politicians figure out how to make democracy work for them.' I know I most likely mis-quoted that, so don't anyone get all bent out of shape if you know the actual wording. Guess what my friends, that day has arrived. Think back to the end of June when the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that a local gov't could kick someone out off their land and then give said land to a developer, just because they think a retail outlet would do the community more good financially. You all know what that means don't you? It means that if Walmart or some other business decides they could make buku bucks if they just had a store where your house is at, they can legally take it from you. http://www.620wtmj.com/_content/talk/charliesykes/index.asp?id=8&entry=8519 (Here's a link if you want some more info on that. I don't know all the particulars, I assume they have to buy the land for market value, but I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't have to, but just the fact that you can't keep your house anymore just plain pisses me off.) We're getting close to the Empire that so many of you love. "So this is how Democracy ends, with thunderous applause." (Again I apologize if I missed a word here and/or there.)

 

I'm willing to debate anyone who wants to.

[AdmiralToguroAni]

I know I sound kind of paranoid, but I don't want anyone who isn't meant to hear my conversations to hear said conversations. If they hear it, it won't damage me in any way, probably, but private conversations are meant to be shared in private. If I'm in a particularly naughty phone conversation with my girlfriend, I would appreciate it if some government employees weren't keeping a record of it. I doubt they pay people to listen to every conversation or to read every record, but I don't want to give some guy his kicks during a random screening.

 

While thats an extreme example, the above situation shows that just because you're not doing anything wrong, it doesn't mean that you would just want to have the government (or anyone!) listening to you. Its the same reason you don't carry private conversations when your mom/sister/brother is listening on another end of the phone.

 

That said, I have to say that I dislike the trend we're seeing in America. I dont know enough to comment about laws passed in other countries, but it seems that we're not really fighting terrorism anymore. We've killed Osama Bin Laden and I THINK we killed that other guy, too. We're doing a decent job stomping out terrorism overseas, so there's no reason to pick on Americans living their lives on American soil. Its been four years now since terrorists attacked America, and I think we can start thinking rationally again.

[DarthTex]

AdmiralToguroAni wrote:

 

... Its been four years now since terrorists attacked America, ...

 

Have you thought that maybe because of the government's "enhanced" scrutiny, that's why there hasn't been another attack? The media likes to dwell on the negative and the government doesn't want their "bad guys" to know the methods, but maybe there have been several more attempts? What to do think would better serve the public good: keeping quiet that other terrorists have captured/foiled, or to come out publicly telling everyone that several attempts have been stopped so the public feels good or worried (and the terrorists now change their plans to something else)?

 

As much as I want to know, I don't want to know. Just keep up the good work government employees.

[Mitth_raw_nuruodo]

I support the Patriot Act, I don't think we should lower our defenses. In no way shape or form does that mean I think gov't should b allowed to listen in on private citizens conversations.

[AdmiralToguroAni]

I don't support the Patriot Act at all. Its like the Sedition Act in its purpose of trampling civil liberties in order to preserve order. Darth Tex brings a good point, but we don't have evidence to believe that enhanced scrutiny in the states has done much to stop terrorism (although it has stopped drug crimes somewhat). Its equally likely that our activities oversees, fighting terrorism, is whats causing the lack of attacks. Unless we can get some hard evidence to justify the Patriot Act's existance, I think we should start trying people for crimes rather than just holding them. Actually I'm for that in ALL situations.

[Mitth_raw_nuruodo]

Unless we can get some hard evidence to justify the Patriot Act's existance....

 

Would you be willing to clarify that a little bit?

[DarthTofu]

The main issue that I have with the patriot act is that I don't feel it is effective at anything short of raising taxes to pay for it. This is like a lot of Ted Stevens' propositions (At least I think it was Ted Stevens) who proposed the huge stinkin' bridge to a city in Alaska with a population of less than fifty. Sure, it accomplishes something, but the money could be put to better use accomplishing other things better. When you think about it, someone must be paid to monitor conversations, who has to be trained by people for a fee, and they have to use expensive, specialized equipment. I see no reason to pay them to effectively violate the constitution at all times.

 

My proposal is that maybe we do it only in certain areas where it would be necessary to maintain security, such as a presidential speech or debate, or an ENRON meeting or something. (Okay, yeah, I know ENRON made no sense in there, but they have the whole illegal things going on so... Never mind, disregard that whole thing in the parenthesise and the stuff before it about ENRON. Deleting it would be easier, but I'm too lazy.) So, yeah, I guess I just feel that we are starting to edge closer and closer to what we set out to oppose and stuff.

 

If one of these monitors becomes corrupt they could easily accomplish both getting their payroll and helping someone else commit a crime. Say that someone approaches them with someone they want to kill's phone number. In tracing the location of this phone, the monitor has helped to make the nation less safe rather than more so. They could even do this inadvertantly, mentioning something odd someone did when they go out and have one too many beers, perhaps.

 

I feel this would be more of a danger than a helper to our nation.

I'm DarthTofu, and I approve of this post. heheh, that's going to be my new SN, I think.

[Mitth_raw_nuruodo]

So when an al-Qida (I know spelling is wrong, I'm just not interested in looking up the proper spelling) agent is in the US talking to bin Laden about blowing up the...Sears Tower lets say (first building to come to mind)...you don't think SOMEONE in law enforcement should know about that and know in time to take out said terrorist?

 

On a similar note, where do you stand on taking down the wall that existed between CIA and FBI? (They now get to share info so FBI knows when/where a suspected terrorist that CIA's been tracking enters the US.)

[DarthTofu]

Woah, did you miss the "In certain areas" bit there, Mith? And I honestly don't think that terrorists would be stupid enough to discuss destroying any building over a non-secure line. More likely in a hidden location face to face. I'm not sure who said it, but it was a good quote: "Remember, the bad guys watch movies, too."

 

As for CIA and FBI walls coming down, I have no issues with that. I mean, we can glean intelligence from tracking a suspected terrorist in the U.S. or other countries.

 

And by the way:How do you pick out which one, out of over 50,000 phone calls in a given city is a terrorist's phone call? You could try going with only those phones which are a year or two old, but if a terrorist simply stays in one area for enough time they can evade that. Ultimately I think that keeping an area from being blown up belongs to security.

[Mitth_raw_nuruodo]

I caught 'in certain areas' and it sounded like a geographical reference to me so that's how i treated it. (In DC we monitor cell phones, but not in [middle of nowhere], Alaska.)

 

As far as knowing which phones to monitor all I can tell you is that mine needn't be.

[DarthTofu]

Alright, let's go with a 'does your phone need to be monitored' survey to find out who we should use our methods on; that'll work! Excuse, Mr. Bin Laden, do we need to monitor your phone calls? No? Okay, then. Wow, lots of people claiming we don't need to monitor their calls!

 

And in light of what you mentioned, I did sort of mean certain geographical areas, though not as broad as you were thinking; areas such as New York and DC, IE areas with very high populations or very important people.

[General_Crespin]

Even if you were to not mind that the current administration could tap your connections- what happens when an administration you don't like comes to power?

 

"Hey, he did it, why can't I?"

[Guest Scathane]

Well, as I said, legislation in the EU if running in the same direction. Personally, I am against any legislation that enables the government to delve into peoples personal stuff just because it ups their level of control in battling those 'few' who have doubtful purposes. I mean, the advantages for a government are clear but what about the disadvantages for the average human being as well as isps? They're numerous!

 

First of all, I feel that the government has no business keeping track of where I am or what kind of messages I email. Most of it is gibberish anyway.

 

Secondly, the legislation is flawed. Why store all email traffic for two years but completely ignore all snail mail? I bet that, before the invention of email, governments around the world dealt with terrorism and criminality as well. Then why wasn't it decided after the umpteenth ransom note for a kidnapping, that all snail mail should be stored to a maximum of 2 years (as they're doing now with email in the EU)? The answer is simple: it wasn't possible. As a snail mail sender, you don't have and isp or an ip-address. And, now that electronic mail makes it possible to keep track of people's messages, it all of a sudden is okay for a government to say We want to be able to keep track of every message you sent?! I agree with Mitth_raw_nuruodo (we have to find an abbreviation for your name, dude! ): that's making democracy for the government.

 

Thirdly, the legislations lack probable cause. In the EU, the police may not tap your phone, search your house, car or body without probable cause. This means they have to go through a judge to ask permission and get a warrant. When the police register my phone coming into a certain area, they monitor me without my -or a judge's - permission.

 

Fourthly, it not feasible. In the Netherlands alone, the two largest isps - Planet and XS4All - have a throughput on their servers of several terabytes a day! I realize that this also comprises all download and surf traffic, not just email but, then again, I'm only talking about two providers in a relatively small country. If you take all isps in the EU, you'd probably be talking about a skyscraper full of hard disks to make for the storage duty.

 

Amplifying on feasibility... How wil governments search email for illegal activity? I mean, we're talking about terabytes a day for the entire European Union; words like bomb, terrorist, Al-Qaeda, The Director (one of Osama's aliases, according to the FBI), White House or Bush creep up quite a lot, I would say. And even when you do find someone, I'd say you need the entire email thread to adequately attest that something wasn't emailed in jest. For the same reason most netnanny's don't work.

 

Lastly, who's to say that I'm not scrutinized for other reasons (i.e., the government doesn't like my ideas)? I don't know about you guys but I'm getting 1984 visions these days...

 

EDIT: Another police commisioner has now launched the idea to automatically take some DNA from ALL suicide victims in the Netherlands. He hopes that this DNA will serve a lot of murder cases, since - he figures - behind a lot of suicides are veiled dramas that are connected to other murder cases. Puhleaze!

[Mitth_raw_nuruodo]

Even if you were to not mind that the current administration could tap your connections- what happens when an administration you don't like comes to power?

 

"Hey, he did it, why can't I?"

 

I NEVER said I liked the current administration, I DON'T. I didnt like the LAST administration. I WON'T like the NEXT administration. To explain that quite simply let me just say I HATE ALL politicians. I wouldn't cry if they were all shot. Now, does that make me a terrorist? I don't think so. I don't think it makes me anything but a guy with some ideas. Will I ever go out and start killing political targets? No. Will I ever support the ppl who might kill said politicians? Absolutely not! I think Clancy made a good point in one of his books, The Bear and the Dragon I think. He said that the senatorial and congressional STAFFERS, the people that work for every Congress(wo)man and/or Senator, were the real corrupt ones. At the end of one of his previous books Clancy drops a 747 on the ceremony where Jack Ryan is supposed to be sworn in as the Vice-President of the US. The explosion takes out the Pres. and most of both the congress and the senate. Ryan then becomes the President. He decides to allow the staffers to retain their posts, and w/in a few years all the corruption is back. I think EVERY politician and ALL of their staffers around the ENTIRE world should be fired.

 

Thirdly, the legislations lack probable cause. In the EU, the police may not tap your phone, search your house, car or body without probable cause. This means they have to go through a judge to ask permission and get a warrant. When the police register my phone coming into a certain area, they monitor me without my -or a judge's - permission.

 

Scath, IDEALLY, this whole thread is solved by following the idea of probable cause. HOWEVER, and this goes back to my theory which i posted in another thread (http://www.swrebellion.com/forums/posts3030-15.html), that would require intelligence, something which the human race as a whole severely lacks.

 

I agree with Mitth_raw_nuruodo (we have to find an abbreviation for your name, dude! )

 

Tofu calls me 'Mith', which is fine so long as it's spelled correctly. 'M-I-T-T-H'.

[DarthTofu]

Spellig corectlI is Hiley uper rated

[Guest Scathane]

Scath, IDEALLY, this whole thread is solved by following the idea of probable cause. HOWEVER, and this goes back to my theory which i posted in another thread (http://www.swrebellion.com/forums/posts3030-15.html), that would require intelligence, something which the human race as a whole severely lacks.

You could argue that, in a sense, the human race lacks any intelligence to speak of... Anyway, I realize that probable cause would only ideally solve this problem to the extent that a real bonafide solution may never be found. However, I feel it's erratic to start screaming about big-brotherish solutions that only might be acceptable, feasible or sustainable but are downright totalitarian.

 

What's next? A new law that says the police can search my house without a warrant or probable cause?!

[Mitth_raw_nuruodo]

No, what's next is that the ACLU, the humanitarians, the conservationists and the anti-gun nuts in the country are all going to team up and this nation founded on Christian principles and protected by a God that everyone seems to be trying to piss off is gonna end up goin down the s@#*ter (I think it's spelled w/ 2 'T's...).

 

While this is going on the Chinese are going to take advantage of controlling 1/6th of the worlds population and their going to try to take Siberia, and, after that, the middle east. This results in WW3, which the cinese win through numerical advantage and the willingness to start a nuclear war. Then we use up all the oil in Texas (the Chinese aren't selling to us) and can't open the Alaskan fields (because of the conservationists). As a result of these things the US looses its status as a superpower.

 

Where do we go from there? I don't know. (To be honest I'm not entirely sure how I got so far off topic.)

[General_Crespin]

I don't think I was talking to only you, Mitth_raw_nuruodo.

 

I've read the Jack Ryan series several times. Awesome books.

[Mitth_raw_nuruodo]

I don't think I was talking to only you, Mitth_raw_nuruodo.

Is this what you were refering to?

Even if you were to not mind that the current administration could tap your connections- what happens when an administration you don't like comes to power?

 

"Hey' date=' he did it, why can't I?"[/quote']

If so I think that between me and Scath it got burried. Sorry. Also, to rephrase what I said earlier, you're more than welcome to drop the '_raw_nuruodo' when talking to me.

[BadSamaritan]

It means that if Walmart or some other business decides they could make buku bucks if they just had a store where your house is at, they can legally take it from you.

 

Right. As soon as the local SWAT team gets past me, my arsenal of shotguns and homemade explosives, and my semi-legal .50 cal rifle, they can have my house.

 

I would say a high body count is really what Wal*Mart wants all over the news.