Halfway to Sunset

I didn't expect to be blogging about the USA Patriot Act again this year. I assumed the extensions to the Bush-era anti-terrorist surveillance bill would pass without fuss, and the sun would fail to set yet again. But something happened.

The House didn't pass the USA Patriot Act extension. Apparently they considered it so uncontroversial that they moved it to the floor under a provision that requires a two-thirds majority to pass. One-hundred-twenty-two Democrats voted against it, and they were joined by 26 Republicans, including eight freshman "tea party" candidates. Of course, the headlines will read that it was some kind of "tea party rebellion" that thwarted the extension, ignoring the 122 nays from the Democrats, and ignoring that most of the tea party caucus voted to pass the extension.

Seeing this new Congress in action leads me to a few questions: are the TP candidates posing as libertarians or authoritarians? What happened to the "small government" rhetoric? They certainly have a strange understanding of freedom as Rachel Maddow pointed out last night. Just look at their policies:

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And yet Congress went through all that trouble to read the Constitution on the House floor just to cast votes against the Fourth Amendment a month later.

The bright side is that the issue of civil liberties can be common ground for the right and the left, but Glenn Greenwald has these sobering thoughts:

Last night's unexpected Patriot Act vote illustrates the tantalizing promise of such an alliance. Things would be vastly improved on the civil liberties front if the American Right was even minimally faithful to the political principles they claim to support. But the nature of that movement means that last night's vote is far more of an isolated aberration than anything likely to change the bipartisan dynamic in a positive way. Indeed, the very weak status of civil liberties in the U.S. is compellingly illustrated by the fact that an alliance with this deeply unprincipled and authoritarian movement is one of the few viable means for stemming the tide of the erosion.

Greenwald also believes that the Patriot Act extensions will indeed pass when they are voted on again in a few weeks under standard procedures that require a majority for approval.

But with more attention on the issue now and the votes of some unallied Freshman, maybe they will surprise us again? They do seem kind of fickle.

When the Sun Never Sets

The USA Patriot Act was signed into law by President George W. Bush in 2001. A big opportunistic anti-terrorist bill, it was proposed after the attacks on September 11, 2001, and of course, we were told the legislation would keep us safe.

Russ Feingold was the only Senator to vote against the bill. The rest of them, well, I doubt they even read it. It was called "The Patriot Act" after all. But here is what they were approving:

The Act dramatically reduced restrictions on law enforcement agencies' ability to search telephone, e-mail communications, medical, financial, and other records; eased restrictions on foreign intelligence gathering within the United States; expanded the Secretary of the Treasury’s authority to regulate financial transactions, particularly those involving foreign individuals and entities; and broadened the discretion of law enforcement and immigration authorities in detaining and deporting immigrants suspected of terrorism-related acts. The act also expanded the definition of terrorism to include domestic terrorism, thus enlarging the number of activities to which the USA PATRIOT Act’s expanded law enforcement powers can be applied.
...
Opponents of the law have criticized its authorization of indefinite detentions of immigrants; searches through which law enforcement officers search a home or business without the owner’s or the occupant’s permission or knowledge; the expanded use of National Security Letters, which allows the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to search telephone, e-mail, and financial records without a court order; and the expanded access of law enforcement agencies to business records, including library and financial records. Since its passage, several legal challenges have been brought against the act, and Federal courts have ruled that a number of provisions are unconstitutional.

The concerns were well founded. It has since been revealed that the NSA, under the direction of George W. Bush, spied on everyone, specifically targeting journalists. Under President Obama, there hasn't been any change. Now we know that the FBI has even circumvented the minimal checks on their power when demanding telephone records.

Of course, we weren't to worry. The surveillance state was only temporary. There were "sunset provisions" in the Patriot Act. Many of the provisions were set to expire in 2005. The war on terror would be over by then, right? LOL.

The USA Patriot and Terrorism Prevention Reauthorization Act of 2005 was passed in July of that year. It was reauthorized again in 2006, and then, well, quite a history of reauthorizations follows, sometimes adding new measures for fighting terrorism or new powers for the Secret Service.

For some reason I was lead to believe that there would be no torture and no warrantless wiretapping under President Obama. But apparently executives rarely give up executive power.

In 2010 (you may have missed this), the Patriot Act with no reforms was extended again. You can find the final vote on the Office of the Clerk of the U.S. House of Representatives site. Yes, that is the correct link to the vote. It was weaseled into a bill titled "Medicare Physician Payment Reform Act." I'm not shitting you. The bill passed by Unanimous Consent.

The extension was only for a year though. Just one more year, yeah, right. Anyway, as you would guess, though hardly notice, the Patriot Act is up for renewal again. I don't expect anybody to make a fuss. Most people probably feel it doesn't apply to them. You don't need civil liberties until -- you know -- you actually have something unpopular to say.

The Patriot Act is anything but patriotic. Let the sun set.

Peek-a-Boo High

Here's a little update on those infamous Pennsylvania school officials who really should have known better.

As you might recall, earlier this year, students at Pennsylvania's Harriton High filed a class action complaint alleging that Lower Merion School District administrators were spying on students in their homes by activating the webcams on school-issued laptops. Stryde Hax's blog has thorough technical details on the software, hardware, tools and tricks used in this digital panopticon.

But more details are emerging as key players are brought in for deposition in the federal invasion-of-privacy lawsuit brought by Blake Robbins, a Harriton High School sophomore.

The school had originally stated that they only used the built-in webcams to secretly photograph students 42 times. Yeah, only 42 times! But if that wasn't enough to make you scream, try this: there were actually 42 instances where the school remotely enabled intense surveillance which activated tracking software which would snap a new picture every 15 minutes until the laptop was turned off.

As any intelligent person would guess, this surveillance resulted in thousands of pictures of students at home -- sometimes catching the teens partially undressed. Did these district employees think? Did they realize this was wrong? Did they realize this was an invasion of privacy? Did they realize that photographing minors in various states of undress was likely illegal? Well, apparently they thought their new super-powers were pretty cool:

Back at district offices, the Robbins motion says, employees with access to the images marveled at the tracking software. It was like a window into "a little LMSD soap opera," a staffer is quoted as saying in an e-mail to Carol Cafiero, the administrator running the program.

"I know, I love it," she is quoted as having replied.

If Carol Cafiero wasn't constitutionally savvy back then, she certainly is now. She's invoking her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in response to every question at the deposition. Of course, in her unfortunate position, as one of only two school district officials authorized to remotely activate the cameras, this is probably the smart thing to do. Too bad she became smart too late.

I hope LMSD officials eventually face a judge and jury with zero tolerance for wiretapping.

Petty Tyrants

"I was spied on by the Lower Merion School District, and all I got was this lousy t-shirt."

That's what students at Pennsylvania's Harriton High School should be saying after news that webcams on their assigned laptops were covertly activated by school administrators to spy on students.

Spying on students at school is bad enough, but intentionally installing webcam software that can be activated while the student is at home takes the arrogance of a petty tyrant.

You can read the class action complaint here. It alleges that the district was able "to view and capture whatever images were in front of the webcam, all without the knowledge, permission or authorization of any persons then and there using the laptop computer."

The district says they only installed the software to track stolen laptops. But I'm skeptical of their intentions and their intelligence. Why did they turn around and stupidly use the captured images to discipline a student for improper behavior in his home? Did anybody in the school district look into wiretapping laws? And did anybody in the school district raise concerns about possible accusations of trafficking in child pornography?

I also wonder what the students are learning from this. Are they growing to accept a surveillance state like the Chinese? Or maybe they're becoming more subversive? Hey kids, a low-tech solution like a scrap of tape or a band-aid is all you need to block the camera.

Or maybe they'll become Luddites? Old-fashioned books never spied on anybody.

I always thought there was something creepy about my own webcam sitting on top of my stack of desk junk. I was so disturbed by that dark glassy lens staring back at me that I put a little Post-It note over the thing until one day the round little eyeball rolled off my desk like the meatball in that old song, and I've left it face-down on the floor to gather dust.

Subversion is a Crime Against The State

Isn't that one cute and non-threatening avatar? In China, he pops up every thirty minutes on web surfers' screens to cheerfully remind them that subversion is a crime against the state.

Beijing has declared war on cybercafes, the Internet, and bloggers. The government has frequently raided cybercafes claiming that pornography and violent, addictive video games are cultural pollution and threaten their youth and their future.

But the control-freak government doesn't stop there (they never do). Project "Golden Shield" is the name of the Chinese high-tech surveillance and censorship program. The program involves some 300,000 surveillance cameras, often disguised as lampposts, connected to a single, nationwide network. This network involves a massive, searchable database of names, photos, residency information, work history, credit records, Internet usage and biometric data.

When I read about these tools of oppression, somehow I don't shout "wow, great opportunity to make money!" Maybe that's why I'm not rich like those people at Cisco who are helping to build the Great Firewall of China (while possibly violating U.S. sanctions). Western companies -- even those that proudly attach themselves to the Internet’s reputation for anarchy -- peddle their wares to China’s Ministry of Public Security. Shanghai Business Magazine recently estimated that the Chinese security industry is enjoying 15% annual growth.

Undermining privacy is a profitable business. And privacy is the rock that dignity, freedom of association and freedom of speech are built on.

China, hosting the summer Olympics, is trying to awe us with their technology, planning, efficiency and social order, but this is not progress.

Naomi Klein describes the new police state:

The goal of all this central planning and spying is not to celebrate the glories of Communism, regardless of what China's governing party calls itself. It is to create the ultimate consumer cocoon for Visa cards, Adidas sneakers, China Mobile cell phones, McDonald's happy meals, Tsingtao beer, and UPS delivery -- to name just a few of the official Olympic sponsors. But the hottest new market of all is the surveillance itself. Unlike the police states of Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, China has built a Police State 2.0, an entirely for-profit affair that is the latest frontier for the global Disaster Capitalism Complex.

I used to believe that free people and free markets were a package deal. It's not true, unless you only value your freedom to buy stuff.

BBC News has an online video exploring China's cyberspace. I had to pause at the point where Sherang Chen, editor for BBC China, says that the Chinese "do feel they are enjoying quite a degree of freedom..." When Police State 2.0 arrives in the U.S., "quite a degree of freedom" won't be enough for me.