A new report from the Electronic Frontier Foundation analyzes more than 2,500 pages' worth of FBI documents extracted using Freedom of Information Act litigation and finds disturbing, system-wide violations of civil liberties on a scale that is far beyond anything reported to date:
Using documents obtained through EFF's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) litigation, the report finds:
• Evidence of delays of 2.5 years, on average, between the occurrence of a violation and its eventual reporting to the Intelligence Oversight Board
• Reports of serious misconduct by FBI agents including lying in declarations to courts, using improper evidence to obtain grand jury subpoenas, and accessing password-protected files without a warrant
• Indications that the FBI may have committed upwards of 40,000 possible intelligence violations in the 9 years since 9/11
Release: EFF Uncovers Widespread FBI Intelligence Violations
Report: Patterns of Misconduct: FBI Intelligence Violations from 2001 - 2008
(Image: FBI, a Creative Commons Attribution (2.0) image from groovysoup's photostream)
report this ad
Facebook is at war with users who block ads, and battle proceeds apace. Just two days after boasting that it could serve ads that were undetectable by adblockers, Facebook got a rude awakening in the form of updates to AdBlock that detected them just fine. But it isn’t giving up, and has already adjusted its […]
Maker Evan Booth transformed a Keurig K350 coffeemaker into a “bionic” hand. As William Gibson once wrote, “the street finds its own uses for things.”
Most phones already come equipped with an Airplane Mode for flights, a Do Not Disturb mode for watching movies or ignoring people, and a Low Power mode for when your battery is about to die. But what happens when you’re in an emergency?
If you’ve ever tried to quickly share a file with someone, you know there’s nothing actually quick about it. Between permissions, log-in credentials, size limitations, and download issues, it’s a miracle if you’re ever able to share the document at all. That’s why we think Droplr Pro is so essential.Droplr Pro lets you quickly, easily, and […]
You won’t want to hit another music festival without these essentials. Read on to find out what we’re packing for the final festivals of the year.This Smart Charger Always Knows Where The Car Is ParkedIn addition to charging your phone, the Zus Smart Car Charger and Locator ($29.99) helps you locate your car no matter […]
When the mood strikes you and you’re looking to light up, you shouldn’t have to hunt around for all the things you need: your pipe, your grinder, your favorite munchies, and so on. And with the Happy Kit, you won’t have to.This compact black case houses everything you need, including a grinder, a glass pipe, […]
report this ad
Nobody will stand up until like Egypt they are a few paychecks behind on their food bill, angry and hungry, when they have nothing to loose. In the US a pacified generation is still desperately trying to make house and car payments and can’t be bothered by silly concepts like freedom or privacy that brave people once fought and died for.
In the wake of 9/11, many of us – and important groups like the ACLU, EFF, etc. – warned that giving too much ground on privacy and civil liberties would inevitably lead to abuses.
We were told that we were unpatriotic, paranoid, pinkos/atheists/liberals/assholes/whatever.
In the years since, we’ve seen abuse after abuse, piling upon one another so quickly that we scarcely get a chance to digest one before another two are piled on. As a result, people either don’t know about these events or believe that they’re minor, irregular, or intermittent. The evidence shows that they’re systemic and common.
Imagine my (complete lack of) surprise!
Fortunately Games Workshop recently released a FAQ that corrected a lot of problems with the offshoot Space Marine chapters, so its ok now.
The system has always been broken on both ends and in the middle. Now it’s simply obvious.
Very thankful to the good folks at the EFF for uncovering the truth. Mulder would be so proud.
So, it was really Fraud, Bullying, Intimidation all the time huh. I thought that era ended with Hoover. Stupid of me. The general integrity of politicians has steadily declined since the sixties, so logically their selected operators should follow.
I think the only thing that would trigger more general pushback against the surveillance state would be a sense of personal violation… what if a wikileaks-style release of information just assembled a DB where we could all look up our names and find out how many phone calls, emails, and pages of data has been collected in our profile? Not the content, for privacy’s sake, just the volume. OI guess it would really take release of the content for serious pushback.
Only 40K ?
The question remains, the big fat elephant staring at us: What are we going to do about it?
We will feel mildly to moderately irate for a few minutes, then after a bit more browsing, we’ll forget all about it and do something else until the next story about abuse of our civil liberties and privacy rights. Rinse. Lather. Repeat.
These sound more like civil liberties violations to me. An intelligence violation is when someone does something stupid. :D
Ya authorize sloppy shortcuts, ya get sloppy shortcuts.
I say again: The terrorists made us stupid. By doing so, they _won_.
Ladies and gentleman, further evidence that you’re living in a police state. Get out now!
“(Y)ou’ve got extraordinarily talented people who are working very hard to keep Americans safe. I don’t want them to suddenly feel like they’ve got to spend all their time looking over their shoulders and lawyering up.”
“My general belief is that when it comes to national security, what we have to focus on is getting things right in the future as opposed to looking at what we got wrong in the past.”
Bush or Obama?
Politician lacking morals. No need to specify at this point.
egoVirus – where you do recommend for people to get out to? Don’t most places have problems similar, but not the same as the US?
Who will prosecute the F.B.I?
They are a bunch of scumbags with badges. ABOVE THE LAW!
This sort of story would read very differently if the headline was, “EFF: FBI agents may have committed more than 40K intelligence violations since 9/11. The FBI may be above the law, but FBI agents aren’t, formally. An FBI agent (or police officer, or TSA drone) acting beyond his or her lawful authority is no different from any other criminal. By my lights their punishment should be more swift and sure than anybody’s.