EFF Case Against AT&T To Go Forward

Tyler Too writes "The NSA wiretap lawsuit filed by the EFF will apparently be moving forward. A federal judge has denied the government's request that the EFF's lawsuit against AT&T be dismissed. Among other things, the judge ruled that 'if the government has been truthful in its disclosures, divulging information on AT&T's role in the scandal should not cause any harm to national security.' The case will now move forward, pending a government appeal."

Either the EFF is fast or /. is slow

[Skyshadow]

I just got the EFF's "we're winning, now please donate more cash" spam and surfed over here to see if there were details. Scary how the two lined up so perfectly.

So yeah, if you have a few bucks, they could probably use it. I realize it's only our basic liberties, but let's be honest -- if you don't donate your spare cash to the EFF, you're just going to waste it on booze.

How Far Into the Rabbit Hole Are We?

[kravlor]

I certainly look forward to seeing just how much the phone companies have been aiding the NSA. With the abuses leaked regarding the "terrorist surveillence program" related to international phone calls, the warrantless surveilance of American citizens certainly needs to be dragged, kicking and screaming, into the light of day.

Re:Either the EFF is fast or /. is slow

[Hoho19]

if by "waste" you mean consume until I stumble around so blindly drunk that I cannot reason then yes. :-D

Quite a Surprise

[BigCheese]

I expected the yes men to have buried this long ago.

Is the US justice system working? We'll have to wait and see...

Re:Hmm...

[Soko]

Is that like "if you have nothing to hide, you won't object to surveillance"? Seriously, poor government!

No, it's not like that. It's more like this:

"If you have been truthful to previous investigaters about your involvement in this, you won't mind us investigating your pal over here for any wrong-doing on his part."

The US Govt. tried to have the case against AT&T thrown out - not a case against itself. It's quite a diffrent matter.

Soko

Re:Hmm...

[theCat]

That would imply that judges have a sense of humor. And perhaps that they are not above cruel irony. Which, if true, speaks highly of the judiciary, in my opinion.

I'm stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess I'm stupid.

I don't understand how invading a country protects my freedom. Or how, terrorists threaten my freedom. They can blow shit up all they want, but I still have freedom of speech and religion. Or how by violating our civil rights, our Government protects our freedom. How is this true??

The only threat to my freedom has been my own Government. They are the ones (and unfortunately, the majority is letting them) who are trying to restrict the freedom of the press with their lawsuits over leaks. They are the ones who are violating citizens rights by spying on them.

This case is protecting our rights and fredoms that, let's see, were violated by our Government.

I'd rather live free and live with the vry remote possiblity of dying in a terrorist attach than having my Government take my rights away to protect my Freedom!

I've been voting and writing letters, but, unfortunately, the cowards run the show.

More like...

[jd]

"If you've not commited any crimes with your friend, you won't have anything to worry about if I ask your friend if he's commited any crimes with you", which does reduce to the grandparent post's phrasing. Basically, the judge is daring the Government to either let the case through (and risk disclosure) -or- be found guilty of lying.

Since the Government isn't a defendent, and as the US has no meaningful concept of "contempt of court" or perjury, the court can't do anything about it if the Government is found guilty of lying. On the other hand, this is election year, which is not a good year to be found guilty of anything, even if there is nothing the courts can do.

My guess is that the Government will do anything and everything to stall proceedings, such that if there is a trial, there's absolutely no risk of anything embarassing being said before polling day. If they're in power, they can clean things up afterwards. If they're not, it's no longer their problem.

Re:How Far Into the Rabbit Hole Are We?

[Tx]

Unless you consider the actaul act of surveillence an abuse, there have been no "abuses".

Most epople consider improperly authorized surveillance an abuse, I think you'll find.

No one has been blackmailed or otherwise had any information misused.

I think you meant to say "No one has been blackmailed or otherwise had any information misused as far as I know." Big difference, and they might well not be in a position to be shouting about it.

Re:Hmm...

[GigsVT]

Is that like "if you have nothing to hide, you won't object to surveillance"? Seriously, poor government!

Absolutely.

The government is supposed to be "surveilled" by the public. It is our responsibility to watch the government as closely as we can. It's not hypocritical to object to cameras on street corners but to lobby for cameras in police cars. They work for us, not the other way around.

Re:How Far Into the Rabbit Hole Are We?

[drinkypoo]

You want to execute those responsible for initiating a program intended to protect American citizens. And you call it "treason," how ironic

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

By this definition, it is those giving the enemies of the U.S. "aid and comfort" that begin to meet that standard.

The enemies of the constitution are enemies of the U.S. The constitution protects us from unlawful search and seizure. QED.

Re:How Far Into the Rabbit Hole Are We?

[AuMatar]

Intended to protect American citizens? Bullshit. Its intended to increase the powers of the government, its precisely *against* the founding principles of the US.

Given that the wiretaps were specifically aimed at people who made calls to or received calls from known terrorist phone numbers

No, they weren't. If thats all they were aimed at, the government would get a *warrant* against them. You know, like they've done hundreds of times in the past. The government was data mining the phone records of the *entire nation* not of specific people.

On a side rant- known terrorists? Its been proven in a court of law? Or they confessed to it? No? Then they aren't known terrorist, they're *suspected* terrorists, and are innocent until proven guilty.

Shame on them for this.

Shame on them? No, shame on you. Shame on you for throwing away our freedoms, shame on you for pissing all over the Constitution. And shame on the rest of America for letting sheep like you throw away what generations have fought and died for.

Re:no career ambitions

[Maelwryth]

If you were pulling the strings, which would you want more?

A) The judge to quash the well publicised case, possibly causing an uproar.

B) The judge to allow the case. Drag the case out over a year or two. Make the EFF spend a shitload of money, and then have the defendant win.

Besides, the NSA are still sitting pretty. It's AT&T that's being sued, not them.

Re:How Far Into the Rabbit Hole Are We?

[Penguinshit]

Certain portions of the mis-named Patriot Act make it illegal to shout about it.

Re:How Far Into the Rabbit Hole Are We?

[gordo3000]

you're off. the nsa taps were not aimed at known terrorist phone numbers. They were aimed at phones that made frequent calls to countries with known terrorist ties(namely, anywhere in the middle east). The data as to who was being called and where the calls were coming from was being used in order to narrow down possible terrorists. If they were known terrorist phone numbers, the wiretaps could begin immediately and concurrently, the administration could request clearance through FISA and the special court set up to hear these things. The interesting thing is, all the government needs to do is give a very limited reason as to why the taps are needed.

If they knew the phone numbers belonged to terrorists, it wouldn't be a problem to get a warrant for a wire tap. So to say the warrantless wiretaps were required for security is only meaningful if the government was partaking in broad based surveilance of anyone who made any contact with person's from the middle east.

Re:I'm stupid

[mirio]

AC, you are right on the mark.

When people talk about freedom (real freedom, not the politician's word), what are they talking about? FREEDOM FROM GOVERNMENT.

Governments are to be feared. The natural tendency of any government to expand it's power over it's people must be continuously fought.

sad

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it so sad or what that it is in fact the two elected branches of government that are running the country into the ground while the other one with its appointments and life terms is the only thing standing in their way? I'm beginning to think people are really that stupid.

Re:Some degree of balance

[vertinox]

Funny... If you replaced your words with another famous "uhampered" security group we all know of we get something like this:

Personally I think we should let the Gestopo do its job. When Gestopo data starts being used to find Christian Democrats and Socialists we've got a problem, but as long as its used for national defense and national defense only I personally think its a good idea to let them do there job unhampered. Imagine if the Reichstag fire had been prevented by such a program? When I say national defense I mean attacks like Reichstag fire, Soviet invasions, etc. things killing hundreds or thousands of people.

Ironically, unhampered security groups do lead to invasions and killing of hundred of thousands of people. Personally I don't think that the NSA is even remotly comparable to the Gestopo, but what if in 20 years a power hungry psycho uses the massive amount of power we let the NSA have today to declare a defacto dictatorship?

If we make the Presidency so powerful and unhampered as well as its agencies then corrupt evil people desiring power will seek this position. We must keep the Presidents and security groups in check so that this never happens.

Re:How Far Into the Rabbit Hole Are We?

[shawb]

So to say the warrantless wiretaps were required for security is only meaningful if the government was partaking in broad based surveilance of anyone who made any contact with person's from the middle east.

And how do we know that wasn't what the NSA was doing? We may yet find out that is what happened, as the judge let the case go through. Remember government officials: if you have nothing to hide, then you won't mind the public oversight.

Re:I Like His Logic

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

My right to live my life without being molested on a constant basis by the government outweighs your right to not get blown up.

Re:I Like His Logic

[blincoln]

am not saying this to be mean or short-sighted but every time I see a very liberal person taklign about the wiretapping/phone records issue, they genuinely come across to me as someone who would rather see people DIE as in DEAD than have one single person's phone call monitored that shouldn't have been. Does it matter that they were talking about a recipe for fried chicken or a rendezvous at a restaurant? No.

That's funny. Every time I hear a very stereotypically "conservative" American talking about the wiretapping/phone records issue, they genuinely come across to me as someone who would rather see Americans live under constant surveillance with no actual freedom than have one single person stand a chance of being killed (or even injured) by some nebulous "terrorist" bogeyman-of-the-week.

The thing is, I can't figure out if it's blind stupidity alone, or stupidity mixed with blind hatred of the Bush administration, and by extension, the military and intelligence communities.

The thing is, I can't figure out if it's blind stupidity alone, or stupidity mixed with a blind hatred of anything they perceive as "liberal."

The issue here is not the NSA listening in on one particular person giving a recipe to a friend. It is the mentality that a surveillance society is a good thing. The NSA wiretaps are a product of that mentality, with the logical conclusion of it being totalitarianism. That is why people like me want to see programs like this smashed *now*, before they get even more out of hand.

Re:How Far Into the Rabbit Hole Are We?

[Anthony Boyd]

Shame on them? No, shame on you. Shame on you for throwing away our freedoms, shame on you for pissing all over the Constitution. And shame on the rest of America for letting sheep like you throw away what generations have fought and died for.

My God. Your post makes me want to weep. Partly because I'm just so thrilled to see someone stand up for the Constitution is such stark terms. But partly because it's completely sad to think that a post like yours is rare enough to evoke such a reaction. :(

Re:Either the EFF is fast or /. is slow

[Anonymous Coward]

Freedom isn't free. If you're lucky, freedom will only cost you money.

The way we protect liberty will have to change

[CurtMonash]

A lot of people seem to be overlooking two basic facts:

1. The amount of information government truly needs to gather to protect us is also sufficient to greatly threaten our liberty.
2. Governments will inevitably gather much more information than they really need.

As a result, it is necessary to design legal systems (and where possible to restrain the design of technical systems) so that even though government has the information, it doesn't commonly use it in nefarious ways. I've written a series of articles about that. Most of them can be found starting from the link http://www.monashreport.com/2006/06/06/freedom-eve n-without-data-privacy/ [monashreport.com], or more generally from http://www.monashreport.com/category/public-policy -and-privacy/privacy/ [monashreport.com]

Examples of why we should expect government to gather huge amounts of information include, in no particular order:

A. All the call/e-mail/whatever connection information they're already getting, as documented in the news around NSA surveillance, AT&T's involvement, and so on.
B. Laws to require ISPs or information service providers to keep records of which IP addresses connect to which sites (so as to fight child porn, piracy, whatever).
C. Britain's moves towards complete video tracking of car movements (I get my reporting on this from The Register).
D. Credit card transaction records.
E. Forthcoming integrated electronic health records. (Those will have huge benefits to the saving of lives, quality of life, cost and efficiency of health care, etc. Whatever the privacy risks, they need to be managed so that health care is allowed to improve.)

And that's even without mentioning RFID.

What's slowing all this down is some political opposition, plus the huge technical difficulty of the required system integration projects. But in a small number of decades, it will all have happened. Our laws and oversight systems need to have evolved drastically by then. We have to start now.

I'm definitely not saying that we should cripple government in gathering and using information. Indeed, I'm an advisor to Cogito, a company with some of the most powerful relationship analysis software out there. http://www.dbms2.com/category/object-oriented-and- xml-technology/cogito/ [dbms2.com] But I think we need to radically upgrade our legal structures in response to these technological trends.

Re:I Like His Logic

[mrchaotica]

Hell, I'd die if I knew that would be what I were doing.

Yeah, but I wouldn't if I knew we were going to just go and screw it up like we're doing now!

Re:I Like His Logic

[mrchaotica]

The difference is who it's being applied to. Private citizens have a right to privacy (that's why they're called "private!"); the government does not.

Re:I Like His Logic

[ghc71]

"Give me liberty or give me death!" is a rallying cry for American patriots. 'Nuff said.

Re:I Like His Logic

[uvayankee1]

Essentially, you can't have freedom and security at the same time. If a government protects my rights and freedoms, then it should protect yours as well, and also those of anyone else who lives here. So if the government is protecting my rights, which I sincerely hope they are, then they are also protecting the rights of someone who wants to read up on how to make bombs or who wants to plot a bank robbery. That's not to say that if authorities get wind of such actions they shouldn't try to tap in and find out about what's going on, but first and foremost, my rights should be protected.

It's also worth noting that the Government can't keep you safe. Never has been able to, never will be able to. It's a frightening thought at first, but if you think about it, there is little that can guarantee safety in this world. So given the choice between our rights and freedoms, which we can protect, and a nebulous illusion of safety, which cannot actually exist, then I would choose freedom.

Finally, the opposite of wiretapping is not people dying, the opposite of wiretapping is freedom from government survelliance and the protect of my right to free speech, and governmental respect of my privacy.