Tag: police state

FBI SEIZED CONGRESSIONAL CELLPHONE RECORDS RELATED TO CAPITOL ATTACK

WITHIN HOURS OF the storming of the Capitol on January 6, the FBI began securing thousands of phone and electronic records connected to people at the scene of the rioting — including some related to members of Congress, raising potentially thorny legal questions.

Using special emergency powers and other measures, the FBI has collected reams of private cellphone data and communications that go beyond the videos that rioters shared widely on social media, according to two sources with knowledge of the collection effort.

In the hours and days after the Capitol riot, the FBI relied in some cases on emergency orders that do not require court authorization in order to quickly secure actual communications from people who were identified at the crime scene. Investigators have also relied on data “dumps” from cellphone towers in the area to provide a map of who was there, allowing them to trace call records — but not content — from the phones.

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Absurdity: Automated Police Surveillance Will Reduce Racial Bias And Allow People To “Maintain A Safe Lifestyle”

As the pandemic enters its second year, two recent stories used to justify increasing public surveillance seem almost too incredible to believe.

Two years ago, I reported on an absurd claim about how the Riverhead Police Departments’ surveillance drones could be used to create a “community connection.”

Splitting Riverhead’s current police foot patrol sector into two sectors would “create more of a community connection in the area that the officers are patrolling,” Supervisor Laura Jens-Smith said. “There’s more eyes and ears in the area, and hopefully that will lead to more people coming to shop and recreate in downtown more.”

In my story I noted how the Department Of Justice’s guidebook the “Community Policing & Unmanned Aircraft Systems: Guidelines to Enhance Community Trust” was designed to help law enforcement convince the American public to accept surveillance drones.

The Police Foundation, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, has developed this guidebook to help public safety agencies successfully assess the appropriateness of acquiring a sUAS in their jurisdiction, all the while ensuring public support, avoiding public-relations pitfalls, and enhancing community trust along the way.

A recent Fox 5 DC story about traffic cameras could rise to the top of my absurd reasons to convince the public to accept more police surveillance.

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On the 56th Anniversary of His Murder, Watch Malcolm X Prophesize Today’s Police State

“They think they are living in a police state, and they become hostile toward the policemen. They think that the policeman is there to be against them rather than to protect them. And these thoughts, these frustrations, these apparitions, automatically are sufficient to make these Negroes begin to form means and ways to protect themselves in case the police themselves get too far out of line.” -Malcolm X – assassinated on Feb. 21, 1965, in New York City.

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New “See Something, Say Something Online Act” Turns Social Media Users Into Spies

Senator Joe Manchin wants to bring DHS’s spy on your neighbors, “If You See, Something Say Something”  program to social media, blogs, websites, and much more. Manchin’s bill, the “See Something, Say Something Online Act” would essentially turn social media users into Federal spies by forcing them to report suspicious people to law enforcement.

Just how bad is this bill?

This bill would essentially force anyone on social media to report suspicious “transmissions” to law enforcement.

“Known Suspicious Transmission.—The term ‘‘known suspicious transmission’’ is any suspicious transmission that an interactive computer service should have reasonably known to have occurred or have been notified of by a director, officer, employ, agent, interactive computer service user, or State or Federal law enforcement agency.”

Major Crime —The term ‘‘major crime’’ means a Federal criminal offense that is a crime of violence (as defined 13 in section 16 of title 18, United States Code); relating to domestic or international terrorism (as those terms are defined in section 16 2331 of title 18, United States Code)

What exactly is a known suspicious transmission or major crime?

The term “suspicious transmission” means any public or private post, message, comment, tag, transaction, or any other user-generated content or transmission that commits, facilitates, incites, promotes, or otherwise assists the commission of a major crime.

How could social media users, bloggers, web forum moderators, web conferencing users, etc. know that a comment left or uttered by someone would later lead to them committing a major crime?

The See Something, Say Something Online Act would force social media users into red-flagging every person’s comments just in case someone commits a major crime in the future.

This bill would effectively destroy the First Amendment as we know it, dispelling any vestiges of America still being a free country.

Social media users would be forced to submit a Suspicious Transmission Activity Report (STAR) on suspicious individuals within 30 days.

“In General.—If a provider of an interactive computer service detects a suspicious transmission, the interactive computer service, including any director, officer, employee, agent, or representative of such provider, shall submit to the Department a STAR describing the suspicious transmission in accordance with this section.”

As Reason warned, the See Something, Say Something Online Act would put reporting on your fellow American on steroids. It would create a glut of frivolous reports, including many that are politically motivated, or otherwise disingenuous.

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Mandate requires watermen to wear masks

Local watermen and charter boat operators don’t quite understand the logic behind President Joe Biden’s Jan. 21 executive order requiring passengers and crew to wear masks when their vessels are in federally regulated waters, but they have little choice but to follow the rules.

If they don’t, they could run into trouble with the Coast Guard, which is charged with enforcing the new regulation authorized by an executive order issued by President Joe Biden.

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