Official US spynet ‘Immune from judicial review’
p2pnet news view Freedom | P2P:- Because almost everyone in the United States has a phone and is online, it’s OK for the US government to spy on them, says US District Court Chief Judge Vaughn Walker (right).
Dismissing EFF case Jewel v NSA, yesterday, brought on behalf of AT&T customers challenging the National Security Agency’s “mass surveillance of millions of ordinary Americans’ phone calls and emails”, “the illegal spying dragnet was not a ‘particularized injury’ but instead a ‘generalized grievance’ because almost everyone in the United States has a phone and Internet service,” it says.
The “alarming upshot of the court’s decision is that so long as the government spies on all Americans, the courts have no power to review or halt such mass surveillance even when it is flatly illegal and unconstitutional,” says Electronic Frontier Foundation lawyer Kevin Bankston.
“With new revelations of illegal spying being reported practically every other week — just this week, we learned that the FBI has been unlawfully obtaining Americans’ phone records using Post-It notes rather than proper legal process — the need for judicial oversight when it comes to government surveillance has never been clearer.”
The foundation says it’ll appeal Jewel v NSA, a case brought to end “the NSA’s dragnet surveillance of millions of ordinary Americans and holding accountable the government officials who illegally authorized it”.
“Evidence in the case includes undisputed documents provided by former AT&T telecommunications technician Mark Klein showing AT&T has routed copies of Internet traffic to a secret room in San Francisco controlled by the NSA,” it states, adding:
“That same evidence is central to Hepting v. AT&T, a class-action lawsuit that’s currently under appeal in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit.”
..… and identi.ca
p2pnet music downloads – and stuff
EFF – EFF Plans Appeal of Jewel v. NSA Warrantless Wiretapping Case, January 21, 2010
Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. Subscribe to p2pnet.net | | rss feed: http://p2pnet.net/feed
Net access blocked by government restrictions? Use Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. Go here for details.
January 22nd, 2010 at 8:39 pm
yeha we pay our gov officals to spy our ourselves, that does not include theft and property loss incured by their blundering. That does not include taking of properity/rights unlawfully and the information says unlawfully and someone wants what? responceability,,,for who?