The FBI has been using a “full-pipe” technique to monitor the internet, according to ZDNet, meaning that, instead of picking up just what is on the warrant and examining it, they pick up that and whatever else happens to get in with it, then sort it out later. If they find that, for one reason or another, they can’t monitor a single IP address, they monitor everything. It is sometimes described as a “vacuum-cleaner” approach.
Paul Ohm, former trial attorney at the Justice Department’s Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section, says that this has become the default method. “What they’re doing is even worse than Carnivore,” said Kevin Bankston of the Electronic Frontier Foundation “What they’re doing is intercepting everyone and then choosing their targets.”
Federal law says that agents must “minimize the interception of communications not otherwise subject to interception” and keep judges informed of what is happening. Apparently though how exactly this works is a somewhat unclear issue.
Technorati Tags: Politics, Current Events, Bush, Current Affairs, Civil Liberties, Civil Rights, Electronic Rights, Executive Power, Right to Privacy, FBI, Wiretaps, Fourth Amendment, Internet
