[IP] more on Who they're spying on
Begin forwarded message:
From: "Steven M. Bellovin" <smb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: June 7, 2006 12:20:42 PM EDT
To: dave@xxxxxxxxxx
Cc: h_bray@xxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [IP] Who they're spying on
On Wed, 7 Jun 2006 11:53:48 -0400, David Farber <dave@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
In all the fuss about the NSA spying issue, it's sometimes forgotten
that there are real bad guys out there, who badly need to be spied on.
Here's a story that makes the point, from today's London Times.
The issue has never been whether or not there are bad guys or even
whether
or not there should be spying. The issue is the authorization to do so,
and the checks and balances on surveillance requests.
The Fourth Amendment recognized this, more than 200 years ago. It
doesn't
outlaw searches; it does, however, require an outside check on what
is to
be searched and why. Without such checks, we're open to arbitrary
abuses
of executive power. We've already seen the claim that the government is
using the phone call databases to track down leakers. Is this
legal? I'm
hard-put to think that it is, since they're using the very sort of broad
spectrum fishing that is specifically barred by the Fourth
Amendment. (By
the way, don't make the mistake of thinking that traffic analysis is
new,
and hence unanticipatable by the framers of the Bill of Rights. I
recently stumbled on a report of a spy, noting who was meeting, how
frequently, and how many messages were sent out following such meetings.
This was in 1603.)
--Steven M. Bellovin, http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb
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