Wave Systems Corp. (fka WAVXQ)

[aleajactaest]

Hi Dreamer,

If you are curious about the FBI's role in promoting the surveillance culture, then you need to know about SOD. The FBI is only one member of the group which demands access to device information.

"A secretive U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration unit is funneling information from intelligence intercepts, wiretaps, informants and a massive database of telephone records to authorities across the nation to help them launch criminal investigations of Americans.

Although these cases rarely involve national security issues, documents reviewed by Reuters show that law enforcement agents have been directed to conceal how such investigations truly begin - not only from defense lawyers but also sometimes from prosecutors and judges.....

The unit of the DEA that distributes the information is called the Special Operations Division, or SOD. Two dozen partner agencies comprise the unit, including the FBI, CIA, NSA, Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Homeland Security."

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/08/05/us-dea-sod-idUSBRE97409R20130805

I see the point of law enforcement having access to a really bad actor's information. But the IRS? A dozen years ago I talked about how easy access to information would lead to law enforcement using a system of the type they have now to spy on folks for not paying parking fines.

This is the difficulty.

There isn't merely an issue of privacy. There's also law and order. And then there's where you draw the line between them.

We are trying to emerge from a model of maximised surveillance and a tiny zone of privacy.

I want to see minimized/targeted surveillance by individual court warrant and a large zone of privacy.

Others want to see no surveillance and nothing but privacy.