Day: September 26, 2014

Update – 2014/10/01

A friend sent me a link to what must be one of the most ironic news items I’ve read recently. CNN is reporting that the creator of a “Spying” App has been arrested for creating and marketing the application.

Read the Article Here

While I agree that the Application is a bit creepy and speaks to the paranoia that spouses often feel when the relationship starts to go down the tubes. I completely fail to understand a couple of issues here.

This is exactly the sort of thing the FBI is whining about not being able to do anymore. Have they thought about corporate licensing??

This application and others like it, have been around for a while.  But ONLY now the FBI or justice department is interested? Can you say sour grapes? 

Then there’s this quote that made me blow coffee out my nose.

“As technology continues to evolve, the FBI will investigate and bring to justice those who use illegal means to monitor and track individuals without their knowledge,” said Andrew McCabe, assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office.

(Thinking about it, Perhaps Assistant Director McCabe need only wander the halls of the FBI, NSA, CIA, and IRS with search warrants, handcuffs, and a very large police van parked on the curb. Assistant Director McCabe might be the last honest man in the FBI hierarchy. A large part of me hopes so.)

Which is it FBI? Is spying on people via their phones legal… or not? Or are you saying it’s only legal when the government does it?

Is it just me???

Or are we looking at hypocrisy of Titanic proportions?

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The Director of the FBI has been complaining bitterly about the fact that IOS 8 and soon Google Android OS are securing the private information of their users in such a way that law enforcement can’t simply show up at Google or Apple and command those companies to unlock the phones data.

To him I say, “Quit your bitchin!”

This is the inevitable and completely logical response on the part of the American people to unwarranted government surveillance of average people who have committed NO CRIME.

I’ll tell you what, if the FBI or any other law enforcement officer shows up at my house with a lawfully obtained valid warrant to search my phone, I’ll unlock it for them.

I live under the protection of The US Constitution. Contained therein is The Fourth Amendment, and I quote;

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects,[a] against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized

I am seriously concerned that the Director of the FBI has been quoted as saying, 

He said he could not understand why companies would “market something expressly to allow people to place themselves beyond the law.”

When clearly the Fourth Amendment is the law

Perhaps Director Comey needs to re-read The Constitution and familiarize himself with that document more diligently.

The FBI can still obtain most, if not all of the information they need to pursue, and prosecute criminals, They just can’t do it unconstrained.  What happened to good police work, collecting physical evidence, and observing the suspect? In the days before cell phones, crimes were solved by law enforcement by these means. Cellphones made the job easier, but shouldn’t be the end-all, be-all in proving a case.

In the Washington Post article linked above, some law enforcement officials chose to try scare tactics, citing murder and pedophilia as valid reasons NOT to encrypt cellphone data. 

Here’s a reason that the data should be encrypted.

Do you really want to have your stolen phone lead a criminal to your friends homes, your parents, or your children via the contact list or one of the applications that allow parents to keep track of kids locations?  Plug an unencrypted phone into a computer with a little bit of free hacking software from the internet and all those horrors become suddenly viable.

So FBI and other Law Enforcement officials, You’re paying the price of the unbridled abuses of the NSA, CIA, DIA, IRS, and God knows how many other three letter agencies.  Stop the scare tactics, get a warrant, do your jobs, engage in old school police work, and…

QUIT YER BITCHIN!