Re: OT - Kuwait

What Scott is trying to say democrat administrations dont eavesdrop.

what a crock!!!


sjp wrote:

> Making the case for encryption standards that would allow the Feds to
> conduct wiretaps on cellphones is not the same thing as conducting
> wiretaps without a court order.
>
> Since such taps are possible without decryption on landlines, Clinton was
> basically arguing for the same ability for the Feds to "listen in" on
> cellphones that they already have with landlines.
>
> One place where I agree with you is that the scope of government intrusion
> into the private matters of Americans is much greater than most Americans
> realize:
>
> http://www.progressivetrail.org/node/112
>
>
>
> On Sun, 15 Jan 2006 20:25:21 +0000, stananger wrote:
>
>> Scott Vita wrote:
>>
>>
>>> "stananger" <stananger@********.***> wrote in message
>>> news:Eewyf.9407$Di.5124@xxxxxxxxxxx
>>>
>>>> try this one
>>>>
>>>> http://www.austinlinks.com/Crypto/non-tech.html
>>>
>>> Looks like another dud.
>>>
>>>
>>> "The Attorney General shall make all arrangements with appropriate
>>> entities to hold the keys for the key-escrow microcircuits installed in
>>> communications equipment. In each case, the key holder must agree to
>>> strict security procedures to prevent unauthorized release of the keys.
>>> The keys shall be released only to government agencies that have
>>> established their authority to acquire the content of those
>>> communications that have been encrypted by devices containing the
>>> microcircuits. The Attorney General shall review for legal sufficiency
>>> the procedures by which an agency establishes its authority to acquire
>>> the content of such communications."
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Scott Vita
>>
>>
>>
>> Every one but you knows the government has been evesdropping on email &
>> phone calls for years.
>>
>> They dont need a warrant, they just do it.
>>
>> If you dont have anything to hide why worry!!
>>
>>
>>
>> Feds Want to Control Encryption
>>
>> Do you worry that Big Brother (a.k.a. the Federal Government) wants to
>> monitor your phone calls, your e-mail, your computer files, your health
>> and financial records, and your business -- and even build government
>> databases containing personal information about you, your activities,
>> your medical treatment, and your finances? You should.
>>
>> The Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, "The right of the people to be
>> secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against
>> unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated," was written
>> at time when unreasonable searches and seizures were carried out
>> principally by armed troops. This language is just as applicable and
>> vital today to protect us against unreasonable searches carried out by
>> modern mechanisms.
>>
>> Encryption is the marvelous technology that can enable us to have
>> private phone conversations and send e-mail messages that are secure
>> from prying eyes -- just like sealing the envelope of a letter.
>> Encryption is a code that makes your phone conversations and e-mail
>> sound or look like gibberish to everyone except those to whom you give
>> the key to decode them.
>>
>> Encryption can enable American citizens to protect both our Fourth
>> Amendment rights and our First Amendment right to speak or write in any
>> language, whether English, Spanish, Greek, or code. Surely, American
>> freedom should include the right to have private conversations, to send
>> private messages, and to keep private files -- and we do have that right
>> today.
>>
>> Encryption is not yet in widespread popular use, but it should be soon.
>> Telephone users are becoming increasingly annoyed with the fact that
>> nosy people can easily listen in on our wireless (cellular and cordless
>> phone) conversations. As more and more people use e-mail for their
>> correspondence, they realize that sending e-mail without encryption is
>> like mailing a postcard -- everyone can read it along the way to its
>> destination.
>>
>> But the Clinton Administration opposes our right of encryption. Vice
>> President Al Gore, Attorney General Janet Reno, and FBI Director Louis
>> Freeh, are all demanding the authority to read our encrypted messages.
>> They believe that, to be sure you are not breaking the law, the Federal
>> Government should have access to all your private files and messages at
>> any time and without your knowledge.
>>
>> That would be tantamount to giving the government the power to steam
>> open all the letters we send through the mail. That's only done in
>> totalitarian countries. No free nation has ever tried to snoop on the
>> content of private messages -- until the Clinton Administration.
>>
>> When you put messages in code, whether it's an old-fashioned code
>> written on paper or a newfangled code concocted on a computer, there
>> must be a "key" to enable you and the recipients of your communications
>> to read them. The Clinton Administration is demanding access to all
>> encryption keys through a system called "key recovery" or "key escrow."
>> Under one scheme, all Americans would be required to deposit the keys to
>> their software files and communications with a "third party" who would
>> rapidly comply with government agency requests without telling us. As an
>> alternate, the Clinton Administration is pressuring industry to make it
>> impossible for Americans to buy any encryption system that doesn't have
>> key recovery built into it.
>>
>> Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) says that "encryption is to digital
>> communications what deadbolt locks are to doors." Giving the FBI access
>> to our encryption keys would be like giving our door keys to the local
>> police, leaving our doors unlocked, and relying on the police to catch
>> burglars after they break and enter.
>>
>> Everyone will eventually want encryption in the computer age. There are
>> all kinds of reasons why we will want to encrypt our own computer files
>> and e-mail and telephone calls, and also want the people with whom we do
>> business to use strong encryption so that the personal records they have
>> on us will not fall into unauthorized hands.
>>
>> Whether you use a computer or not, enormous amounts of your personal
>> information are already collected and stored "on line" on somebody
>> else's computer. Doctors and hospitals store and transfer sensitive
>> medical records. Your bank and credit card companies hold and transfer
>> information about your finances. Your employer, and the stores where you
>> shop, collect and transfer information about your income and purchases.
>> The telephone company has a complete listing of every phone call you
>> make or receive, including the phone numbers, the time, and how long you
>> talked. The government requires cell phone companies to track the
>> location of your cell phone.
>>
>> The Department of Health and Human Services wants to build a national
>> computerized registry of everyone's health record and at least half the
>> states have already built a database of medical records. HHS is also
>> building the National Directory of New Hires with data forwarded by the
>> states on every new worker. Of course, the Internal Revenue Service and
>> the Social Security Administration have computer files on nearly all
>> Americans.
>>
>> The public schools are starting to participate in a national data
>> collection system that will collect and transfer private information
>> about all students, not only their academic records, but also medical,
>> attitudinal, behavioral, and family information that is none of the
>> schools' business. The plan is to have these electronic portfolios
>> available to the government and to the students' future employers.
>>
>> FBI Director Louis Freeh doesn't like Americans having private
>> conversations. He told the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and
>> Transportation on July 25, 1996 that encryption poses a "threat to
>> public safety." He wants to forbid the use of encryption products unless
>> they are "socially-responsible," i.e., have "key recovery" built into
>> them so he can read them. He speaks ominously about what he calls "the
>> looming specter of encryption" that he can't crack. This is the same
>> Louis Freeh who in 1996 proposed that one percent of the telephone
>> capacity in urban areas be reserved for wiretaps (that's 10,000 phones
>> in a city of one million). Even the KGB and the Gestapo didn't reach
>> that level of surveillance.
>>
>> The FBI argues that it needs "key recovery" power to crack down on drug
>> lords and terrorists, but the bad guys can buy top-quality encryption
>> from dozens of other countries. The danger from these criminals should
>> not require Americans to submit to police-state surveillance of our
>> daily lives and activities.
>>
>> The FBI cannot be trusted with the awesome power of key recovery. The
>> FBI has already betrayed our trust in so many areas, including turning
>> over 900 "raw" personnel files to political operatives at the Clinton
>> White House, the multiple outrages at Waco and Ruby Ridge, and the abuse
>> of Richard Jewell, the falsely accused Atlanta security guard.
>>
>> A neutral panel of the National Research Council was set up to make
>> policy recommendations about encryption. The panel called on the
>> government to abandon its efforts to restrict encryption. The panel
>> concluded that increased use of encryption would enhance our national
>> security, not diminish it. Thirteen of its 16 members had security
>> clearances with access to secret information, and they said there are no
>> classified national security reasons that are relevant to the encryption
>> debate. The Clinton Administration bases its campaign to control private
>> encryption on the alleged need to fight crime through wiretapping, but
>> the panel concluded that the ability of the private sector to transfer
>> confidential financial and other data over the information highway
>> without interception is far more important. Strong encryption for
>> individual use is the number-one privacy issue in the information age.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> FBI's Wiretaps To Scan E-Mail Spark Concern
>>
>> By NEIL KING JR. And TED BRIDIS
>>
>> WASHINGTON -- The Federal Bureau of Investigation is using a superfast
>> system called Carnivore to covertly search e-mails for messages from
>> criminal suspects.
>>
>> Essentially a personal computer stuffed with specialized software,
>> Carnivore represents a new twist in the federal government's fight to
>> sustain its snooping powers in the Internet age. But in employing the
>> system, which can scan millions of e-mails a second, the FBI has upset
>> privacy advocates and some in the computer industry. Experts say the
>> system opens a thicket of unresolved legal issues and privacy concerns.
>>
>> The FBI developed the Internet wiretapping system at a special agency
>> lab at Quantico, Va., and dubbed it Carnivore for its ability to get to
>> "the meat" of what would otherwise be an enormous quantity of data. FBI
>> technicians unveiled the system to a roomful of astonished industry
>> specialists here two weeks ago in order to steer efforts to develop
>> standardized ways of complying with federal wiretaps. Federal
>> investigators say they have used Carnivore in fewer than 100 criminal
>> cases since its launch early last year.
>>
>> Word of the Carnivore system has disturbed many in the Internet industry
>> because, when deployed, it must be hooked directly into Internet service
>> providers' computer networks. That would give the government, at least
>> theoretically, the ability to eavesdrop on all customers' digital
>> communications, from e-mail to online banking and Web surfing.
>>
>> The system also troubles some Internet service providers, who are loath
>> to see outside software plugged into their systems. In many cases, the
>> FBI keeps the secret Carnivore computer system in a locked cage on the
>> provider's premises, with agents making daily visits to retrieve the
>> data captured from the provider's network. But legal challenges to the
>> use to Carnivore are few, and judges' rulings remain sealed because of
>> the secretive nature of the investigations.
>>
>> Internet wiretaps are conducted only under state or federal judicial
>> order, and occur relatively infrequently. The huge majority of wiretaps
>> continue to be the traditional telephone variety, though U.S. officials
>> say the use of Internet eavesdropping is growing as everyone from drug
>> dealers to potential terrorists begins to conduct business over the Web.
>>
>> The FBI defends Carnivore as more precise than Internet wiretap methods
>> used in the past. The bureau says the system allows investigators to
>> tailor an intercept operation so they can pluck only the digital traffic
>> of one person from among the stream of millions of other messages. An
>> earlier version, aptly code-named Omnivore, could suck in as much as to
>> six gigabytes of data every hour, but in a less discriminating fashion.
>>
>> Still, critics contend that Carnivore is open to abuse. Mark Rasch, a
>> former federal computer-crimes prosecutor, said the nature of the
>> surveillance by Carnivore raises important privacy questions, since it
>> analyzes part of every snippet of data traffic that flows past, if only
>> to determine whether to record it for police.
>>
>> "It's the electronic equivalent of listening to everybody's phone calls
>> to see if it's the phone call you should be monitoring," Mr. Rasch said.
>> "You develop a tremendous amount of information."
>>
>> Others say the technology dramatizes how far the nation's laws are
>> lagging behind the technological revolution. "This is a clever way to
>> use old telephone-era statutes to meet new challenges, but clearly there
>> is too much latitude in the current law," said Stewart Baker, a lawyer
>> specializing in telecommunications and Internet regulatory matters.
>>
>> Robert Corn-Revere, of the Hogan & Hartson law firm here, represented an
>> unidentified Internet service provider in one of the few legal fights
>> against Carnivore. He said his client worried that the FBI would have
>> access to all the e-mail traffic on its system, raising dire privacy and
>> security concerns. A federal magistrate ruled against the company early
>> this year, leaving it no option but to allow the FBI access to its
>> system.
>>
>> "This is an area in desperate need of clarification from Congress," said
>> Mr. Corn-Revere.
>>
>> "Once the software is applied to the ISP, there's no check on the
>> system," said Rep. Bob Barr, R-Ga., who sits on a House judiciary
>> subcommittee for constitutional affairs. "If there's one word I would
>> use to describe this, it would be 'frightening.' "
>>
>> Marcus Thomas, chief of the FBI's Cyber Technology Section at Quantico,
>> said Carnivore represents the bureau's effort to keep abreast of rapid
>> changes in Internet communications while still meeting the rigid demands
>> of federal wiretapping statutes. "This is just a very specialized
>> sniffer," he said.
>>
>> He also noted that criminal and civil penalties prohibit the bureau from
>> placing unauthorized wiretaps, and any information gleaned in those
>> types of criminal cases would be thrown out of court. Typical Internet
>> wiretaps last around 45 days, after which the FBI removes the equipment.
>> Mr. Thomas said the bureau usually has as many as 20 Carnivore systems
>> on hand, "just in case."
>>
>> FBI experts acknowledge that Carnivore's monitoring can be stymied with
>> computer data such as e-mail that is scrambled using powerful encryption
>> technology. Those messages still can be captured, but law officers
>> trying to read the contents are "at the mercy of how well It was
>> encrypted," Mr. Thomas said.
>>
>> Most of the criminal cases where the FBI used Carnivore in the past 18
>> months focused on what the bureau calls ' infrastructure protection," or
>> the hunt for hackers though it also was used in counterterrorism and
>> some drug-trafficking cases.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Liberty vs. Totalitarianism, Clinton-Style
>>
>> Monitoring by I.D. and Database
>>
>> Two of the principal mechanisms by which the rulers of 20th century
>> police states maintained their control over their people were the file
>> and the internal passport. These governments kept a cumulative file
>> (called the dangan in Communist China) on every individual's performance
>> and attitudes from school years through adult employment. Citizens
>> carried an internal passport or "papers" that had to be presented to the
>> authorities for permission to travel within the country, to take up
>> residence in another city, or to apply for a new job.
>>
>> These two methods of personal surveillance -- efficient watchdogs that
>> prevented any emergence of freedom -- required an army of bureaucrats
>> fortified by a Gestapo, a Stasi or a KGB, plus the ability to commandeer
>> an unlimited supply of paper and file folders. Technology has now made
>> the task of building personal files on every citizen, and tracking our
>> actions and movements, just as easy as logging onto the Internet.
>>
>> Unknown to most Americans, coordinated plans are well underway to give
>> the Federal Government the power to input personal information on all
>> Americans onto a government database. The computer will record our
>> school, business, medical, financial, and personal activities, and track
>> our movements as we travel about the United States.
>>
>> These plans were authorized by the so-called conservative Congress and
>> are eagerly implemented and expanded by the Clinton Administration
>> liberals. They plan to force all Americans to carry an I.D. card linked
>> to a federal database, without which we will not be able to drive a car,
>> get a job, board a plane, enter a hospital emergency room or school,
>> have a bank account, cash a check, buy a gun, or have access to
>> government benefits such as Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid.
>>
>> Putting all that information on a government database means the end of
>> privacy as we know it. Daily actions we all take for granted will
>> henceforth be recorded, monitored, tracked, and contingent on showing
>> The Card.
>>
>> Legislative authority for these dramatic changes in what we endearingly
>> call the American way of life was buried in two bills passed by
>> Republicans and signed by Bill Clinton in 1996: the Illegal Immigration
>> Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act, and the Personal Responsibility
>> and Work Opportunity Reform Act (known as welfare reform).
>>
>> The illegal immigration law prohibits the use of state driver's licenses
>> after Oct. 1, 2000 unless they contain Social Security numbers as the
>> unique numeric identifier "that can be read visually or by electronic
>> means." (Section 656(b)) The act requires all driver's licenses to
>> conform to regulations promulgated by the Department of Transportation,
>> which published its proposed regulations on June 17. (Federal Register,
>> vol. 63, no. 116, pp. 33219-33225)
>>
>> The illegal immigration law orders the Attorney General to conduct pilot
>> programs in at least 5 states where the state driver's license includes
>> a "machine-readable" Social Security number. (Section 403(c)) The law
>> also orders the development of a Social Security card that "shall employ
>> technologies that provide security features, such as magnetic stripes,
>> holograms, and integrated circuits." (Section 657(a)) A "smart card"
>> with these technologies can contain a digitized fingerprint, retina
>> scan, voice print, DNA print, or other biometric identifier, and will
>> leave an electronic trail every time it is used.
>>
>> The law orders "consultation" with the American Association of Motor
>> Vehicle Administrators. AAMVA, a pseudo-private, quasi-government
>> organization, has long urged using driver's licenses, with Social
>> Security numbers and digital fingerprinting, as a de facto national I.D.
>> card that would enable the government to track everyone's movements
>> throughout North America.
>>
>> The welfare reform law requires that, in order to receive federal
>> welfare funds, states must collect Social Security numbers from
>> applicants for any professional license, occupational license, or
>> "commercial driver's license." (Section 317) The Balanced Budget Act of
>> 1997, in the guise of making "technical corrections" to welfare reform,
>> deleted the word "commercial," thereby applying the requirement to all
>> driver's license applicants, and even added "recreational" (hunting and
>> fishing) licenses.
>>
>> Another provision of welfare reform requires employers, since Oct. 1,
>> 1997, to transmit the name, address, and Social Security number of every
>> new worker to a Directory of New Hires. This is supposed to help track
>> deadbeat dads, but the information is collected from all new workers
>> (regardless of whether they are deadbeats or even dads) and maintained
>> for 24 months.
>>
>> The "instant background check" established by the 1993 Brady Act takes
>> effect nationwide on Dec. 1. Under this system, prospective handgun
>> buyers must be screened against a database of convicted criminals. But
>> the new national I.D. card will make it easy to keep a database of gun
>> buyers, too, which some states reportedly are doing already. Although
>> the Brady Act forbids federal agencies from using the instant check
>> system to register firearms, the FBI says it plans to keep records of
>> prospective handgun buyers for 18 months.
>>
>> A few states have already quietly legislated acquiescence in the new
>> federal requirements, but fingerprinting and smart cards have stirred an
>> uproar in others. Most Americans have never been fingerprinted and look
>> upon it as something that happens only to criminal suspects.
>>
>> The New Jersey Legislature recently abandoned efforts to pass Governor
>> Christine Whitman's high-tech driver's license called "Access New
>> Jersey." It was designed to contain a computer chip with 100 electronic
>> keys capable of storing large amounts of personal data. It would leave
>> an electronic trail each time the card was used to cash a check, make a
>> purchase, pay a toll, check out a book, get insurance authorization to
>> see a doctor, or used for identification, all identified by Social
>> Security number. These new federal laws effectively overturn the 1974
>> Privacy Act, which declared that "It shall be unlawful for any Federal,
>> State or local government agency to deny to any individual any right,
>> benefit, or privilege provided by law because of such individual's
>> refusal to disclose his Social Security account number." On the pretext
>> of catching illegal aliens, welfare cheats, deadbeat dads, and
>> criminals, these laws will subject law-abiding Americans to the
>> police-state apparatus of national I.D. cards linked to coordinated
>> government databases.
>

.

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