Getting Some Rays: Z-Backscatter Technology in Action

[CuttingEdge100]

Getting Some Rays: Forget Radar, Now the Government is X-Raying You as You Drive
by Dave Lindoff
URL: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/10/04-1

This strikes me as a serious 4th Amendment violation. The Supreme Court already ruled sometime back that you cannot use infrared scanners without warrant to look into people's houses as it constituted an unwarranted search and seizure. Yet this technology can do at the very least, the same, and it's being done without warrant.

It is clear that the government is using them, and unlike with the X-ray backscatter devices used in airports, where you can opt-out and get a pat-down instead, there is no opt-out here. It's also clear that there is a radiation exposure risk if used liberally and/or in the even that some of the moving parts in the scanner break down or fail to function correctly.

In addition to the fact that these devices violate the 4th Amendment, and could potentially pose a health-risk, they are not particularly suitable for detecting liquid explosives.

Another disturbing detail mentioned in the article is that the US Military was testing these devices in the streets of New York City. So much for Posse Comitatus...

I don't know about every member here, but I for one am sick and tired of the government using the threat of terrorism as an excuse to monitor every aspect of our existence. I am even more sick of the fact that despite their desire to know everything knowable about us; whenever we wish to know what they are doing, they invoke the State's Secrets privilege (I'm not saying that the government should not keep any secrets -- I'm saying that they should only keep secrets that are necessary to protect the country; not to protect themselves)

What are your opinions?

 

[RobertVA]

What's the point of spending billions of our tax dollars and getting thousands of solder's killed when the very government that's allegedly "protecting our rights" is violating the Bill of Rights on such a regular basis?

At the rate they are going they should be replacing their uniforms with red coats.

 

[Amaris]

Just to add another source to this issue: Christian Science Monitor Article

Yes, I am very concerned about this. I was even more appalled to learn that Obama wants to expand wiretapping to Skype and Google phones. I voted the GOP out of the White House to stop this, not increase it. Our privacy is at serious risk, and people need to take notice. This should be something that angers the nation, but I doubt most people will listen or care. They'll just acquiesce in the name of "safety" and "the War on Terror". Disgusting.

 

[Lindley]

I was even more appalled to learn that Obama wants to expand wiretapping to Skype and Google phones. I voted the GOP out of the White House to stop this, not increase it.

It's not really a matter of increasing interception capability, but merely maintaining it. Those services are designed in such a way that at present they would be technically unable to comply with a court-ordered wiretap request; so law enforcement is losing its ability to apply that method of investigation as those services gain ground.

The proposed legislation would require such services to come up with a design change enabling their compliance with such court-ordered intercepts.

 

[Amaris]

I was even more appalled to learn that Obama wants to expand wiretapping to Skype and Google phones. I voted the GOP out of the White House to stop this, not increase it.

It's not really a matter of increasing interception capability, but merely maintaining it. Those services are designed in such a way that at present they would be technically unable to comply with a court-ordered wiretap request; so law enforcement is losing its ability to apply that method of investigation as those services gain ground.

The proposed legislation would require such services to come up with a design change enabling their compliance with such court-ordered intercepts.

Well, I don't want them to maintain it either.

 

[CuttingEdge100]

J. Allen,

Agreed

 

[Lindley]

Well, I don't want them to maintain it either.

Why not? Certainly, such interceptions must be carefully controlled by the courts to avoid abuse, but in some cases the capability provides vital information to stop killers, kidnappers, drug dealers, and---yes---terrorists.

I'd agree that the "terrorism" scare has led to some unwarranted laxity in the legal oversight of such things, but that's a matter of regulation, not capability. As usual.

 

[Amaris]

J. Allen,

Agreed

I thought you might.

Well, I don't want them to maintain it either.

Why not? Certainly, such interceptions must be carefully controlled by the courts to avoid abuse, but in some cases the capability provides vital information to stop killers, kidnappers, drug dealers, and---yes---terrorists.

I'd agree that the "terrorism" scare has led to some unwarranted laxity in the legal oversight of such things, but that's a matter of regulation, not capability. As usual.

Because it's too easy to simply walk all over civil rights in the name of security. This latest revelation is utterly atrocious. People should be angry. They should be demanding this be shut down now. When warrantless wiretaps were initiated and expanded upon by the Bush Administration, people should have been clamoring for the system to right itself, and now that Obama wants to maintain that very same system, people should be furious that he would want to continue such a breach of our rights, but they're not. All through this, most of the people have just taken it lying down, and it looks like that will continue.

The ends rarely, if ever, justify the means.

 

[Jetfire]

You have people who seemingly give up their privacy freely now splashing every detail about their lives on the internet...I don't think the most people care if this is going on and if they do care...they are too lazy to do anything about it. It doesn't matter who you vote for the person only cares about themselves and having power...this won't change.

 

[Lindley]

When warrantless wiretaps were initiated and expanded upon by the Bush Administration, people should have been clamoring for the system to right itself, and now that Obama wants to maintain that very same system

Link? The only thing I've been able to find with regards to Obama and Skype/Google Talk is that he wants regulations in place requiring them to be capable of complying with court-ordered wiretapping.

Warrantless wiretapping is an orthogonal issue, unrelated to this proposed technical requirement.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

When warrantless wiretaps were initiated and expanded upon by the Bush Administration, people should have been clamoring for the system to right itself, and now that Obama wants to maintain that very same system

Link? The only thing I've been able to find with regards to Obama and Skype/Google Talk is that he wants regulations in place requiring them to be capable of complying with court-ordered wiretapping.

Warrantless wiretapping is an orthogonal issue, unrelated to this proposed technical requirement.

I think J's perspective goes back to the perceived anonymity of the Internet, which is a temporary situation and is only going to erode further. Skype is a communications service and as such may be tapped by court order. I don't like it but there is ample precedent for it. It makes very little sense that it's OK to tap phones but not OK to tap other communication services.

 

[farmkid]

I think J's perspective goes back to the perceived anonymity of the Internet, which is a temporary situation and is only going to erode further. Skype is a communications service and as such may be tapped by court order. I don't like it but there is ample precedent for it. It makes very little sense that it's OK to tap phones but not OK to tap other communication services.

Assuming the purpose of this law is to bring other telephone-like communication services in line with the regular telephone, I don't have a problem with it. It seems stupid not to update the laws to keep up with technology, and it seems that's all this is.

The problem I have with it, however, is the effect it may have on innovation. Skype wouldn't exist right now if this law were in place earlier. Imagine, if you will, that you have a great new idea for some kind of communication service. You have the technical expertise to develop it and make it work. But then, you find out that you also have to build in the capability for law enforcement to be able to execute a court-ordered wiretap on the system. You don't know how to do that, and you don't have the resources to do so, so the system never happens.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

I think J's perspective goes back to the perceived anonymity of the Internet, which is a temporary situation and is only going to erode further. Skype is a communications service and as such may be tapped by court order. I don't like it but there is ample precedent for it. It makes very little sense that it's OK to tap phones but not OK to tap other communication services.

Assuming the purpose of this law is to bring other telephone-like communication services in line with the regular telephone, I don't have a problem with it. It seems stupid not to update the laws to keep up with technology, and it seems that's all this is.

The problem I have with it, however, is the effect it may have on innovation. Skype wouldn't exist right now if this law were in place earlier. Imagine, if you will, that you have a great new idea for some kind of communication service. You have the technical expertise to develop it and make it work. But then, you find out that you also have to build in the capability for law enforcement to be able to execute a court-ordered wiretap on the system. You don't know how to do that, and you don't have the resources to do so, so the system never happens.

Solution: make your system decentralized. Then it is impossible to effectively tap it.

If your communication system relies on central servers then it is always technically possible to intercept all traffic that comes through it. I have no doubt AOL, Yahoo, and the like keep records of all instant messages passing through their networks.

Skype uses VOIP and it is possible to tap a VOIP call as long as you have access to the network that call uses (and the call itself is not encrypted.) To what extent a company like Skype should assist in the tapping is up for debate.

In theory, it is possible to tap a VOIP conversation, but in practice such tapping can be thwarted by technology and I don't think we should go about outlawing such technology or prevent companies from using it just to make law enforcement's job easier. There has to be a balance between the rights of the public, the need to innovate, and law enforcement requirements.

I do think it's very difficult--perhaps impossible--to make money off a completely decentralized network, but that's what a business would have to do in order to avoid having to comply with wiretap regulations. If you are capturing or at least forwarding all comm traffic through your network, you are by definition capable of tapping those communications. The only way to get out of that is to never have the communications go through your hardware at all.

 

[farmkid]

Solution: make your system decentralized. Then it is impossible to effectively tap it.

If your communication system relies on central servers then it is always technically possible to intercept all traffic that comes through it. I have no doubt AOL, Yahoo, and the like keep records of all instant messages passing through their networks.

Skype uses VOIP and it is possible to tap a VOIP call as long as you have access to the network that call uses (and the call itself is not encrypted.) To what extent a company like Skype should assist in the tapping is up for debate.

In theory, it is possible to tap a VOIP conversation, but in practice such tapping can be thwarted by technology and I don't think we should go about outlawing such technology or prevent companies from using it just to make law enforcement's job easier. There has to be a balance between the rights of the public, the need to innovate, and law enforcement requirements.

I do think it's very difficult--perhaps impossible--to make money off a completely decentralized network, but that's what a business would have to do in order to avoid having to comply with wiretap regulations. If you are capturing or at least forwarding all comm traffic through your network, you are by definition capable of tapping those communications. The only way to get out of that is to never have the communications go through your hardware at all.

If a decentralized system would be impossible to tap, then this law would make a decentralized system illegal. That's what concerns me about this law. If you were to come up with a communication system that was generations ahead of anything else out there, but it had to be decentralized in order to work, this law would prevent it from ever existing. From what I understand about the proposed law, it would require Skype and other similar services to make changes to their system so that law enforcement officials could tap a call if a court gave the okay to do so. While it would bring these services in line with regular telephone service, I fear that it would significantly hamper further innovation and development.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Solution: make your system decentralized. Then it is impossible to effectively tap it.

If your communication system relies on central servers then it is always technically possible to intercept all traffic that comes through it. I have no doubt AOL, Yahoo, and the like keep records of all instant messages passing through their networks.

Skype uses VOIP and it is possible to tap a VOIP call as long as you have access to the network that call uses (and the call itself is not encrypted.) To what extent a company like Skype should assist in the tapping is up for debate.

In theory, it is possible to tap a VOIP conversation, but in practice such tapping can be thwarted by technology and I don't think we should go about outlawing such technology or prevent companies from using it just to make law enforcement's job easier. There has to be a balance between the rights of the public, the need to innovate, and law enforcement requirements.

I do think it's very difficult--perhaps impossible--to make money off a completely decentralized network, but that's what a business would have to do in order to avoid having to comply with wiretap regulations. If you are capturing or at least forwarding all comm traffic through your network, you are by definition capable of tapping those communications. The only way to get out of that is to never have the communications go through your hardware at all.

If a decentralized system would be impossible to tap, then this law would make a decentralized system illegal. That's what concerns me about this law. If you were to come up with a communication system that was generations ahead of anything else out there, but it had to be decentralized in order to work, this law would prevent it from ever existing. From what I understand about the proposed law, it would require Skype and other similar services to make changes to their system so that law enforcement officials could tap a call if a court gave the okay to do so. While it would bring these services in line with regular telephone service, I fear that it would significantly hamper further innovation and development.

Given that we haven't outlawed things like strong encryption I find it difficult to believe the very concept of a decentralized communications network would be outlawed. I don't see the outlawing of specific technologies as something that would stand up to Constitutional scrutiny.

 

[Lindley]

There is certainly a question of whether it's reasonable to require a naturally decentralized service to be capable of invisibly redirecting or copying data through central servers in special cases. That seems to me to be a problem for the engineers to study first, though, before it gets to the lawmakers.

 

[farmkid]

Given that we haven't outlawed things like strong encryption I find it difficult to believe the very concept of a decentralized communications network would be outlawed. I don't see the outlawing of specific technologies as something that would stand up to Constitutional scrutiny.

I'm not saying that decentralized systems would be outlawed. Assuming what you said is true, that a decentralized system would be impossible to tap, then creating a decentralized communications system would not be possible under this law if passed, because this law would require that the system be tappable by LEOs. If it can't be tapped, then it would not be allowed to operate under the law. Decentralized systems wouldn't be outlawed, if they couldn't be made to conform with the law, then they couldn't be implemented. If, however, you could figure out a way to make your decentralized system tappable, they you could go ahead and build it.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

Given that we haven't outlawed things like strong encryption I find it difficult to believe the very concept of a decentralized communications network would be outlawed. I don't see the outlawing of specific technologies as something that would stand up to Constitutional scrutiny.

I'm not saying that decentralized systems would be outlawed. Assuming what you said is true, that a decentralized system would be impossible to tap, then creating a decentralized communications system would not be possible under this law if passed, because this law would require that the system be tappable by LEOs. If it can't be tapped, then it would not be allowed to operate under the law. Decentralized systems wouldn't be outlawed, if they couldn't be made to conform with the law, then they couldn't be implemented. If, however, you could figure out a way to make your decentralized system tappable, they you could go ahead and build it.

Short of going around and actually arresting people for creating such software there is no way you could prevent it from being implemented. And if the code got out into the wild there isn't a damn thing the government could realistically do to stop it.

I'm saying that by definition you cannot tap a truly decentralized system. The most you could do is identify which user on the network you want to monitor and have their ISP provide access and monitoring. But there would be no way to monitor a decentralized network completely.

In fact, I wonder why it is Skype that would have to provide this functionality rather than the feds going straight to the ISP. I thought ISPs had thus far bent over backwards to let the FBI into their networks for monitoring purposes.

 

[Amaris]

When warrantless wiretaps were initiated and expanded upon by the Bush Administration, people should have been clamoring for the system to right itself, and now that Obama wants to maintain that very same system

Link? The only thing I've been able to find with regards to Obama and Skype/Google Talk is that he wants regulations in place requiring them to be capable of complying with court-ordered wiretapping.

Warrantless wiretapping is an orthogonal issue, unrelated to this proposed technical requirement.

I think J's perspective goes back to the perceived anonymity of the Internet, which is a temporary situation and is only going to erode further. Skype is a communications service and as such may be tapped by court order. I don't like it but there is ample precedent for it. It makes very little sense that it's OK to tap phones but not OK to tap other communication services.

Yep. Sorry, my fault. I got some wires crossed (no pun intended) and switched them around, although you're right, there was a time when the internet was more anonymous, or at the very least, more difficult to parse unless you were very good at doing so. Now, everything is trackable and um, tappable.

 

[Jetfire]

^
And people are more than willing to put their lives on display.