EFF’s Warrantless Wiretap Lawsuits Begin August 1st: Spread Awareness of Civil Liberties Violations
The Electronic Frontier Foundation’s (EFF) cases against the government’s warrantless wiretaps begin August 1st under Jewel v. NSA and Hepting v. AT&T. The hearings are open to the public.
[Photo courtesy of Jacob Appelbaum. Billboard defacement by The Billboard Liberation Front]
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has two cases dealing with telecommunications privacy set to begin August 1st— Jewel v. NSA (on appeal) and Hepting v. AT&T.
In Hepting vs. AT&T, the EFF sued AT&T on behalf of its customers for its collaboration with the NSA “in the massive, illegal program to wiretap and data-mine Americans’ communications.”
The Jewel v. NSA case has the EFF suing the NSA and other government agencies “on behalf of AT&T customers to stop the illegal, unconstitutional, and ongoing dragnet surveillance of their communications and communications records” in the warrantless wiretapping program. Jewel v. NSA was brought by five AT&T customers and is currently on appeal.
Jewel v. NSA “also targets the individuals responsible for creating, authorizing, and implementing the illegal program, including former President George W. Bush, former Vice President Dick Cheney, Cheney’s former chief of staff David Addington, former Attorney General and White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales, and other individuals who ordered or participated in the warrantless domestic surveillance.”
Hepting v. NSA included undisputed evidence from former AT&T telecommunications technician Mark Klein, who demonstrated that AT&T routed internet traffic to a secret room in San Francisco controlled by the NSA.
The EFF is arguing that the FISA Amendments Act (FISAAA) “is unconstitutional in granting to the president broad discretion to block the courts from considering the core constitutional privacy claims of millions of Americans.” (FISAAA, signed by George W. Bush, allows the U.S. Attorney General to require dismissal “of the telecoms’ participation in the warrantless surveillance program if the government secretly certifies to the court that the surveillance did not occur, was legal, or was authorized by the president.”
These cases are of prime importance in the ongoing battle Americans are fighting against a government that has vastly overreached its boundaries in the post-9/11 era—where anything and anyone can be branded a terrorist threat, such as Julian Assange and WikiLeaks.
Sooner or later—as it is now in the UK—”terrorist” will not simply be applied to radical Muslims, but to citizens who hold dissident or subversive opinions of the U.S. government’s actions at home and abroad.
Both cases are to begin on August 1st and are open to the public.
August 24, 2011 at 7:47 pm, Adam White said:
And what person or persons does the UK government classify as “terrorists” solely for holding “dissident or subversive opinions?”
August 25, 2011 at 5:08 am, D. J. said:
The Metropolitan Police have been defining Anarchists as “terrorists” by using powers designated for the latter to carry out pre-crime measures against the former, or those who find themselves defined as anarchists.
I’d collect the links for you, but that’s not my job. I trust that you can do your own homework.
August 24, 2011 at 7:47 pm, Adam White said:
And what person or persons does the UK government classify as “terrorists” solely for holding “dissident or subversive opinions?”
August 25, 2011 at 6:14 am, Adam White said:
There’s a difference between using powers granted by the terrorism act (like to search someone) and classifying someone or some group as terrorists. As it is now, I am unaware of any anarchist group that the UK government has on its list of designated terrorist organisations.
It’s all very easy to say that I should “do my own homework,” but that’s intellectually lazy. You’re the one that made the unsubstantiated claim. I was simply asking you, because you made the assertion in the article and I honestly had no idea what you were referring to.
As a side note, I have plenty of anarchist friends who have never been hassled by the police. I don’t agree with stop and search and other such tactics (and I remember when some people’s houses/squats/etc were searched before the G-20 summit simply because the police thought they *might* cause trouble). But I think there’s a difference between the police abusing the powers they were granted to combat terrorism and the government designating people as terrorists. The problem is actually that they’re searching people who AREN’T designated as terrorists by the government.
I’d say there is somewhat of a (potential) parallel there… how many people had their phones tapped without a warrant b/c someone somewhere decided to abuse or mis-apply the law? Who knows.
September 12, 2012 at 5:42 pm, Breaking: House votes to extend NSA’s warrantless wiretapping powers | Death and Taxes said:
[...] of the 9/11 atrocity.A number of lawsuits have been filed over the years, including EFF’s Hepting v. AT&T and Jewel v. NSA. More recently, EFF filed a lawsuit against the US government after Senator Ron [...]