Senate Readies Bill to Allow Agencies Access to Email Without Warrants

Tue Nov 20, 2012 2:29pm

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Senate Democrats are getting ready to completely destroy whatever privacy you thought you had on the Internet with one grand Constitutional burning stroke. Holy shit, they are about to allow over 22 government agencies unfettered access to your email, Facebook, Twitter DMs and more. Would love for the ACLU to step up but my guess is they are only outraged when it’s the right doing these egregious things to the freedoms and liberties the citizens of this country used to hold dear. NO warrants needed. Need a look into someone’s email account? Sure go right ahead.

Best be finding yourself a secure overseas encrypted email account for online communications you don’t care for assholes in the federal government reading.

You know the Reid-led Senate can’t be bothered to come up with a budget in the last 4 years but they can propose bullshit like this? America, you are fucked.

Gateway Pundit via CNET reported:

A Senate proposal touted as protecting Americans’ e-mail privacy has been quietly rewritten, giving government agencies more surveillance power than they possess under current law.

CNET has learned that Patrick Leahy, the influential Democratic chairman of the Senate Judiciary committee, has dramatically reshaped his legislation in response to law enforcement concerns. A vote on his bill, which now authorizes warrantless access to Americans’ e-mail, is scheduled for next week.

Leahy’s rewritten bill would allow more than 22 agencies — including the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Federal Communications Commission — to access Americans’ e-mail, Google Docs files, Facebook wall posts, and Twitter direct messages without a search warrant. It also would give the FBI and Homeland Security more authority, in some circumstances, to gain full access to Internet accounts without notifying either the owner or a judge.

It’s an abrupt departure from Leahy’s earlier approach, which required police to obtain a search warrant backed by probable cause before they could read the contents of e-mail or other communications.

FBI Wants Mandatory Surveillance Backdoor on Web Communication Sites

Mon May 7, 2012 9:48am

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FBI seeks to expand their power and ability to perform surveillance on all Web communications.

CNET is reporting that the FBI is quietly pushing a plan to require surveillance backdoors on social networks, VoIP, and Web e-mail providers. They also do not want Internet companies to oppose a law making those backdoors mandatory, natch.

The FBI is asking Internet companies not to oppose a controversial proposal that would require firms, including Microsoft, Facebook, Yahoo, and Google, to build in backdoors for government surveillance.

In meetings with industry representatives, the White House, and U.S. senators, senior FBI officials argue the dramatic shift in communication from the telephone system to the Internet has made it far more difficult for agents to wiretap Americans suspected of illegal activities, CNET has learned.

The FBI general counsel’s office has drafted a proposed law that the bureau claims is the best solution: requiring that social-networking Web sites and providers of VoIP, instant messaging, and Web e-mail alter their code to ensure their products are wiretap-friendly.

“If you create a service, product, or app that allows a user to communicate, you get the privilege of adding that extra coding,” an industry representative who has reviewed the FBI’s draft legislation told CNET…

…The FBI’s proposal would amend a 1994 law, called the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, or CALEA, that currently applies only to telecommunications providers, not Web companies.

Apparently the feds are worried that its ability to do surveillance diminishes as technology advances. They call it “Going Dark” so their answer is to simply allow the ability to monitor everything on the Web.

[The FBI] singled out “Web-based e-mail, social-networking sites, and peer-to-peer communications” as problems that have left the FBI “increasingly unable” to conduct the same kind of wiretapping it could in the past…

..In addition to the FBI’s legislative proposal, there are indications that the Federal Communications Commission is considering reinterpreting CALEA to demand that products that allow video or voice chat over the Internet — from Skype to Google Hangouts to Xbox Live — include surveillance backdoors to help the FBI with its “Going Dark” program. CALEA applies to technologies that are a “substantial replacement” for the telephone system.

Liberty and Internet freedom be damned.

I suppose the upside, if you believe the government cares about Constitutional rights, is that they would still need a court order to activate the tap. Our government just gets bigger and bigger.