How the U.S. forces Net firms to cooperate on surveillance
How the U.S. forces Net firms to cooperate on surveillance U.S. forces Net firms to cooperate on surveillance
Officially, Uncle Sam says it doesn't interfere. But behind the scenes, the feds have been trying to browbeat Internet firms into helping with surveillance demands.
Declan McCullagh
by Declan McCullagh
July 12, 2013 12:30 PM PDT
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FISA gives the government a powerful club to wield against Internet companies. The law requires the firms to "furnish all information, facilities, or technical assistance necessary to accomplish the electronic surveillance" as long as it can be done with a "minimum of interference" with other users.
In another case that was closely watched within the industry, the FBI invoked similar language to force EarthLink to install a Carnivore network monitoring device, over the company's strenuous objections. EarthLink challenged the surveillance order in court because it was concerned that Carnivore would vacuum up more user metadata than the court order authorized.
It lost. A federal magistrate judge sided with the government, despite the fact that "Carnivore would enable remote access to the ISP's network and would be under the exclusive control of government agents," Robert Corn-Revere, an attorney for EarthLink, told Congress at the time.
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In 1994, then-President Bill Clinton signed into law the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, or CALEA, which required telephone companies to configure their systems to perform court-authorized lawful intercepts in a standard way. In 2004, that requirement was extended to cover broadband providers, but not Web companies.
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http://news.cnet.com/8301-13578_3-57593538-38/how-the-u.s-forces-net-firms-to-cooperate-on-surveillance/
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