Critics are right to be concerned about the FBI’s expanded power, especially when it comes to recruiting and deploying informants. That’s true regardless of why FBI Director James Comey acted as he did toward Hillary Clinton.
Source: Amid Clinton Controversy, FBI Documents Show Why Americans Should Worry About Intelligence Gathering
Each new investigation and judicial inquiry proves Snowden’s core warnings were correct.
In one month, an obscure procedural rule tweak will come into effect allowing US cops and federal agents to hack any computer in the world using a single warrant issued anywhere in America.No one in Congress has voted on this legal update. It means a warrant granted somewhere within the US can be executed on the other side of the country – or the other side of the planet.
The change, approved by the Supreme Court, is in Rule 41 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. Right now, if law enforcement wants to hack a PC, they have to ask a judge for a warrant in the jurisdiction where it is located. With the rule change, they could do this to any computer anywhere in the US or the world.
As a bonus, the change would also allow law enforcement – without a warrant – free rein to hack into computers that have already been hacked. So, for example, if you have a virus infection then law enforcement can go through your files at will.
Source: America has one month to stop the FBI getting its global license to hack • The Register
‘It is out of control,’ think tank thinks
Source: Meanwhile, in America: Half of adults’ faces are in police databases • The Register
I don’t believe it! The mad lads have only gone and won a legal case against the spooks!
Source: Court finds GCHQ and MI5 engaged in illegal bulk data collection • The Register
No access to world’s servers thwarts “criminal and national security investigations.”
Source: US renews fight for the right to seize content from the world’s servers | Ars Technica
Reuters: Yahoo “complied with a classified US government directive.”
Presuming that the report is correct, it would represent essentially the digital equivalent of a general warrant—which is forbidden by the Fourth Amendment
Source: Yahoo’s CISO resigned in 2015 over secret e-mail search tool ordered by feds | Ars Technica
It’s not uncommon for Zellerbach to go missing when people need him. When Zellerbach ran the DA’s office, he was rarely there. The DEA found his office to be just as accommodating, with or without him, though. Although the DEA was supposed to run its wiretap warrant requests through federal judges and have them signed by the district attorney himself, it often found it easier to obtain a signature from whoever happened to be at the office and run them by Riverside County judge Helios Hernandez, who approved five times as many wiretap applications as any other judge in the US.The wiretap applications’ reach frequently exceeded their jurisdictional grasp, traveling far outside of Riverside County, California, to be deployed against suspects as far away as North Carolina. But that was only one issue with the warrants applications approved by Zellerbach’s office.
The NSA spies on NGOs to help the U.S. dig up information on how targets respond to disease and weapons of mass destruction.
Source: How the U.S. Spies on Medical Nonprofits and Health Defenses Worldwide
Outlook.com e-mail on Irish servers not covered by Stored Communications Act.
Source: Microsoft wins: Court rules feds can’t use SCA to nab overseas data | Ars Technica
