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BS: Who Is Watching YOU?
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Subject: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: JohnInKansas Date: 14 Jul 12 - 02:09 PM Different people in different places accept being "watched" in various circumstances, but it must be assumed that everyone has their limits. A recent report on one particular kind of "watching" claims that even the ones who have been watching the watchers were "startled" by the results of a US Congressional study: Wireless firms flooded by requests to aid surveillance Law enforcement agencies seek text messages, caller locations and other information By ERIC LICHTBLAU New York Times 7/9/2012 WASHINGTON — In the first public accounting of its kind, cellphone carriers reported that they responded to a startling 1.3 million demands for subscriber information last year from law enforcement agencies seeking text messages, caller locations and other information in the course of investigations. The cellphone carriers' reports, which come in response to a Congressional inquiry, document an explosion in cellphone surveillance in the last five years, with the companies turning over records thousands of times a day in response to police emergencies, court orders, law enforcement subpoenas and other requests. The reports also reveal a sometimes uneasy partnership with law enforcement agencies, with the carriers frequently rejecting demands that they considered legally questionable or unjustified. At least one carrier even referred some inappropriate requests to the F.B.I. The information represents the first time data have been collected nationally on the frequency of cell surveillance by law enforcement. The volume of the requests reported by the carriers — which most likely involve several million subscribers — surprised even some officials who have closely followed the growth of cell surveillance. [More details at the link] The article points out the conflict resulting from the SCOTUS ruling that placing a GPS tracking device on a suspects car was illegal without a warrant, but it's unclear whether using the GPS in a phone, or the cell tower locations the phone "pings," also requires a warrant or other legal permission. Most police agencies now act as if they don't think any legal justification is needed. The 1.3 million requests is a very big jump from (what is known about) previous years, but isn't particularly astonishing relative to the population; but many of the requests have been for "tower dumps" that may include information on hundreds, or in some cases, thousands of individuals. And there is no regulation of how long informated reported to police may be retained or what security is required for police records. London was reported a few years ago as having "more surveillance cameras than any other city in the world" and there have been several reports of significant additions to the system, all of which are monitored at a central location at London police HQ. Recent reports of a UK plan to "track all phones" also have been seen. This surveillance hasn't been obviously objectionable to Brits, but small towns here raise a fuss when they put up a camera to watch for someone running a stop light/sign. We also seem to have a few here who are Specific comments on police use of cell phone user information, as reported at the link, is the main subject here, but there is the additional curiosity about: WHAT REALLY SHOULD BOTHER US? John |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Jack the Sailor Date: 14 Jul 12 - 03:16 PM I avoid surveillance by being uninteresting and my avoiding unlawful behavior. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Joe Offer Date: 14 Jul 12 - 03:32 PM Who is watching ME? Well, my dog, for one. He thinks I have something he can eat.... But in general, I agree with Jack. I can't imagine anybody wanting to bother watching me, so why should I worry? And if they were watching, what would they learn and how could it harm me? But yes, of course law enforcement investigators would want to check phone records of people involved in certain sorts of crimes. It might be a good source of evidence. It might not, but it's worth checking. There's something wrong with laws that require investigators to know the information they're looking for, before they find it. -Joe- |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Jim Dixon Date: 14 Jul 12 - 03:49 PM I think the problem is that the Department of Homeland Security (or whoever is generating these requests for information) simply has too big a budget and too many employees. When an organization like this has too many employees, and too little important work to do, they will make work for themselves by watching things that don't need to be watched. Say they get hold of copies of all your emails. They will scan them for suspicious keywords, compile a profile of you assessing your risk level (which may be zero), compile a list of all the people you are linked to, and all the people linked to them, and so on, until they know how many steps you are from Kevin Bacon, and anyone else on the Group W Bench. They will index, cross-correlate, and regress to the mean, and print out all kinds of reports with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back explaining what each one is, all of which may be perfectly useless, but it will give their programmers, file clerks, and analysts something to do. The good news is, they probably will NOT knock on your door late at night. That could lead to bad publicity for them. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Jim Dixon Date: 14 Jul 12 - 03:52 PM ...so if you're going to be mad about something, be mad that they're wasting money that could go toward improving education, or health care, or rebuilding our infrastructure. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Little Hawk Date: 14 Jul 12 - 04:56 PM My solution is the same as yours, Jack. I avoid surveillance by being uninteresting and by avoiding unlawful behavior. I also don't own a cellphone...yet (I still might get one someday, just for possible road emergencies). And my emails to people are quite uncontroversial. So who is watching me? Four budgies are watching me. They depend on me for their food and water, and I think they're also starting to like me fairly well. At any rate, I have their undivided attention whenever I approach the cage. **** I do think, though, that the increasing levels of surveillance of the general public in the UK and the USA and elsewhere are worrisome. In the event of a war or some other national emergency, that surveillance could theoretically be used in all kinds of ways that violate people's traditional civil liberties...and there is no guarantee that our governments would not do that in what they regarded as an emergency. The recent Patriot Act and the NDAA legislation in the USA have already put the legal mechanisms in place which could be used to establish what would amount to an authoritarian system of the worst kind. **** My budgies don't worry about stuff like that. I don't worry about it much either, because worrying won't help me, it'll only stress me out. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Jack the Sailor Date: 14 Jul 12 - 05:08 PM From the link. >>>With the rising prevalence of cellphones, officials at all levels of law enforcement say cell tracking represents a powerful tool to find suspects, follow leads, identify associates and cull information on a wide range of crimes. "At every crime scene, there's some type of mobile device," said Peter Modafferi, chief of detectives for the Rockland County district attorney's office in New York, who also works on investigative policies and operations with the International Association of Chiefs of Police. The need for the police to exploit that technology "has grown tremendously, and it's absolutely vital," he said in an interview. <<< I would think that with hundreds of millions of digital devices in the country 1.3 million requests for taps and data do not seem like much at all. Say the DEA has a witness to a drug buy. Two people are identified. There would be a "demand" for recording of the calls on each phone, a request to track the two phones' GPS history, possibly a request for phones within a hundred yards of the buy. taps on the phones these phones talked to etc etc. One investigation could spark dozens of requests. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: GUEST,olddude Date: 14 Jul 12 - 05:12 PM I dunno but I hope it is Christie Brinkley |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Greg F. Date: 14 Jul 12 - 05:39 PM The Department Of Hopeless Stupidity is an unnecessary and redundant agency created out of paranoia and Yanke Doodle Dandy patriotism. It has an obscene budget, ditto number of employees. Since there aren't enough real "terrorosts" or other undesirables out there, they have to occupy their time with other busy work. Like spying on innocent citizens. But they got a lot of forks 'n' knives And they gotta cut somethin' |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Jack the Sailor Date: 14 Jul 12 - 05:39 PM Yes Olddude, the good news is that you are being watched by Christie Brinkley. The bad news is that Chuck Norris, Wesley Snipes and that crazy little woman from "Northern Exposure" can see you too. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Jack the Sailor Date: 14 Jul 12 - 05:41 PM I guess that it is pointless to point out that the article is not about DHS. It is about requests "from all levels of law enfocement." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Greg F. Date: 14 Jul 12 - 05:55 PM It is reasonable to conclude, Jack, that "all Levels" includes the DHS, is it not? Christie Brinkley is another issue.... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Jack the Sailor Date: 14 Jul 12 - 06:26 PM Yes that's true Greg F. but SCOTUS is actually mentioned in the article. Wouldn't a rant about Clarence Thomas be more on topic? Come on! Do it! we KNOW you want to! Look at that "smile" Janine Turner brrrrrr |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: ChanteyLass Date: 14 Jul 12 - 08:29 PM I'm sure JtS didn't know this would happen, and maybe I'm the only one who had this problem, but when I clicked on the link for the Northern Exposure woman (because I was a fan of that show), I got a request to stay on the page and "chat" with a salesperson from Total Gym who would offer me a discount. I did not consent to chat, but then I couldn't quit the page and get back to Mudcat. Nor could I quit the Safari. I had to Force Quit, shutting down my computer. Now I'm hoping a virus or some kind of malware has not been installed on my computer. Other folks, if you haven't already clicked on that link, be wary. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Jack the Sailor Date: 14 Jul 12 - 08:51 PM I got the link from an image search. Didn't happen to me sorry. I liked Northern exposure. I liked her in it. I am not impressed with her new career selling home gyms and complaining about Hollywood. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: olddude Date: 14 Jul 12 - 09:48 PM I bet they love me and Rap talking about C4, ma duces, and fully auto AR's :-) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Janie Date: 14 Jul 12 - 10:13 PM I actually think this is a real cause for concern, especially combined with the large amount of information about our personal preferences and habits that are being gathered from our activities on the internet for marketing purposes and that could also be demanded by government agencies. Neither freedom or democracy are possible without a significant guarantee of personal privacy. Constitutional guarantees of privacy were as much safe-guarded by the labor intensiveness of gathering private information about private individuals in the pre-internet age. These days, one does not have to be a "person of interest" to government for the government to still have the capacity to easily garner significant information about us. I think about that more and more as I browse on-line and watch ads pop up on Mudcat and other sites clearly related to data collected about sites I have visited or topics I have searched. I think about that when the grocery receipt at the stores where I have "rewards" cards that give me "discounts" are printed on the back with coupons that reflect the store's tracking of my shopping habits. Relatively benign now? Yes. Will it be for future generations? Big Brother is a reality in many totalitarian countries. It is foolish to think Big Brother is not a very real possibility, or even a probability in current democracies. J. Edgar Hoover and Joe McCarthy would have loved the internet and cell phone towers. Me paranoid? Maybe. But I don't think so. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 14 Jul 12 - 10:41 PM If bombers and other criminals can use the internet to plan and conduct their crimes, why is it wrong to waylay them or convict them using the same Internet? I was dismayed by Facebook's invasion of my privacy. I signed up, and up popped pictures of my friends. "Look at the people you know who are already on Facebook!" they crowed. I can only assume that Facebook somehow got around my password and read the Address Book on my e-mail program. I sent a message to an author and closed my FB account ten minutes later. For one thing, my financial advisor's name is in my e-mail program. I certainly don't want FB employees finding out where I have my accounts. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: GUEST,999 Date: 15 Jul 12 - 09:21 AM I'm with Janie. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: GUEST,CS Date: 15 Jul 12 - 09:36 AM Ditto 999 - Janie spot on. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: GUEST,marks Date: 15 Jul 12 - 09:38 AM God. Nothing else counts. Mark |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: GUEST,999 Date: 15 Jul 12 - 09:45 AM And who's watching him? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Greg F. Date: 15 Jul 12 - 09:45 AM Wouldn't a rant about Clarence Thomas be more on topic? No rant required - he's not worth it. Thomas is perhaps the least qualified justice in the history of the institution. Period. The end. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Little Hawk Date: 15 Jul 12 - 02:12 PM Bruce, in regards to "who's watching him (God)".... How does one watch that which one cannot get outside of or become separate from? You have to establish a physical separation from something before you can watch it. You have to be "here" and it has to be "there" (outside of you). See my point? Now...you may think of "God" as an old patriarch with a beard who is sitting on a heavenly throne somewhere the other side of the Andromeda Nebula.... ;-) But I don't. That would make for a very small God. Remember: When people say "God", they all have some sort of unique notion in their heads of what the heck it is they mean by that word. They got that notion from their parents, their culture, books they read, things people told them, their own inner questioning about the matter, etc. This makes communication about "God" particularly difficult, because no one knows for sure what the other person is thinking when the word comes up. Can one, for instance, watch destiny? Or watch consciousness? Many things exist (not physically, but in some other sense) and cannot be watched, because they aren't observable in an outward fashion, though they are experiential in an inward fashion... I experience things that can't be watched. So does everyone else. I'm experiencing things no one can watch right now, and so is everyone else. All the time. That's the inner experience of life. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: GUEST,999 Date: 15 Jul 12 - 03:22 PM LH, fer krissake. Do you really think you have said something I'm not already aware of? My post was a remark to Mark because when people tell me about god I get wise-ass because no one knows about god, and that means you, too. Don't teach your grandmother how to suck eggs. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Jeri Date: 15 Jul 12 - 07:40 PM Part of me is a little bit paranoid, and part of me doesn't give a flyin' whatsit. I think a healthy outlook is probably a combination of the two. There are some who live mysterious lives and seem to leave no footprints. There are others who are generous with sharing and will answer anyone's questions about themselves. The former can inspire people to go dig up as much stuff on them as can be dug. The latter type of folks don't inspire much curiosity, and can make people wish for a little less sharing. I like the whole idea of hiding in plain sight, but there isn't anything I do that makes me think I should be hiding. Whatever path we choose, it's the path we commit ourselves to maintaining. As Frankie once said "Don't dream it; BE it!" Now, it's raining, so I'm off to frolic in the non-steam bath of the outside world. If you're watching, I'm a chubby woman in sports top and shorts, possibly dancing strangely. (It's just a jump to the left.) But nobody wants to watch that. I'm guessing that nobody gives much of a shit about any other aspect of my life either. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Little Hawk Date: 15 Jul 12 - 11:59 PM No, no, Bruce....it's just a subject I enjoy talking about on almost any excuse, even though I would never imagine that I know much about God. ;-) Don't take it personally. Regarding the eggsucking thing, though....as a matter of fact I DID teach my grandmother how to suck eggs one time back in 1981. I was quite surprised that she, at such an advanced age, had never mastered eggsucking. I was astounded. "How did you manage to avoid it all these years?" I asked her. "In Vienna," she said icily, "young women of a good class didn't do such things." "Okay....so...why do you want to learn about it now?" "The Canadian women in my bridge club were discussing it last week. It seems to be all the rage now, so I thought it best that I should learn about it, even though I find the thought of it disgusting!" "I see. Okay, well...will it be white eggs then or brown?" "White, of course!" she exclaimed, looking aghast. "What do you take me for?" |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Greg F. Date: 16 Jul 12 - 09:37 AM More like you just enjoy talking, period. Or perhaps hearing yourself talk, LH? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: GUEST,olddude Date: 16 Jul 12 - 10:17 AM Me I am of the school, I don't give a crap like Jeri said ... I hurt nobody and just live my crazy messed up life one day at a time ... besides I am still waiting for Christie Brinkley to post back. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: GUEST,Crusty Binkley Date: 16 Jul 12 - 01:10 PM Hugs and kisses to you, Dan. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Who Is Watching YOU? From: Jack the Sailor Date: 16 Jul 12 - 01:58 PM Dan, you gotta be more fun to watch than this guy. |
