ACLU Sues Over New Surveillance Act

from the ain't-over-yet dept

Thu, Jul 10th 2008 7:53pm — Mike Masnick

Following Congress granting President Bush the "get out of jail free" card he demanded, it probably comes as no surprise that he's signed the bill into law -- claiming (laughably) that the bill was designed to "protect the liberties of our citizens." It's unclear what in the new bill does that -- though there's plenty that does the opposite. Almost immediately, the ACLU has sued to challenge the constitutionality of the bill, saying that it appears to violate the 4th Amendment against unreasonable search and seizure without probable cause. Meanwhile, the EFF is also preparing to sue over both the telco immunity issue and the expanded surveillance powers. All of these efforts are probably long shots, but it means this isn't over yet.

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Filed Under: fisa, surveillance, telco immunity, wiretapping
Companies: aclu, eff

15 Comments

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Cynic, 10 Jul 2008 @ 8:43pm

Of course, in a free country where the rights of the citizens are guaranteed by a constitution, the odds of the ACLU succeeding in a supposedly independent and just court system would be a long shot.

I agree with others who have said that the terrorists did not win on September 11th, 2001, but they did on July 9th, 2008.
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Jul 2008 @ 8:51pm

Sign the ACLU's ad
Add your name to the ACLU's ad protesting this new law:

https://secure.aclu.org/site/SPageServer?pagename=Are_you_angry&s_s=aclu_FISA0708__web
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Anonymous Coward, 10 Jul 2008 @ 9:10pm

Re: Sign the ACLU's ad
sorry, shorter link to the same thing:

http://www.aclu.org/fisaaction
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Krubuntu, 10 Jul 2008 @ 10:01pm

Re: Re: Sign the ACLU's ad
Thank you so much for the link. Laws and amendments have been struck down by the courts before as being unconstitutional both at the State and Federal level. I can only hope and pray that the same occurs with this one.
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Another Bleepin Cynic, 10 Jul 2008 @ 10:17pm

OMG - WHO THE @#%^&* do they think they are?
Congress gave the executive branch the power to order Google, AT&T and Yahoo to forward to the government all e-mails, phone calls and text messages where one party to the conversation is thought to be overseas.

I want to know how Google, AT&T and Yahoo et all have to say about this
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ToySouljah, 10 Jul 2008 @ 10:23pm

Re: Re: Sign the ACLU's ad
Thank you both Anon's (lol) for the link(s). Also, threw in a donation while I was there :)
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Killer_Tofu (profile), 11 Jul 2008 @ 5:26am

Re: Re: Re: Sign the ACLU's ad
Re #6
Sooo, did you click on the little link that was for the one time donation? Or did you accidentaly just fill in the first form, which is for a monthly subscription, so to speak? Hope you picked whichever you were going for. The one time donation link was rather tiny. But at least it was before the amounts for the monthly.
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Anonymous Coward, 11 Jul 2008 @ 5:45am

Re: OMG - WHO THE @#%^&* do they think they are?
I want to know how Google, AT&T and Yahoo et all have to say about this

"That'll be $13.50"?
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Matt, 11 Jul 2008 @ 6:33am

Excuse me, Mr. Secret Agent
Excuse me Mr. Secret Agent in Charge of spying on us, I hate to tell you, i just wasted your time from actually tracking real terrorists because i just said the word "terrorists"

Once again, Sorry to waste your time.
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Max, 11 Jul 2008 @ 9:06am

Time to get a clue
Maybe read what it says before making yourself look like a fool when someone else takes the time to read it. Don't be a media zombie.

You write foolishly: "claiming (laughably) that the bill was designed to "protect the liberties of our citizens." It's unclear what in the new bill does that -- though there's plenty that does the opposite."

WRONG!
Get Educated:
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/C?c110:./temp/~c110IqRMxH

Techdirt is turning into dirt with such morons like this spouting off when they don't know what they're talking about.
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Dur, 11 Jul 2008 @ 9:19am

Re: Time to get a clue
Then why the hell do you read it?
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Won, 11 Jul 2008 @ 9:21am

Resumes too!
Any bets for Resumes also being shared and data-mined? I have a stack of crisp $100 bills that say all resumes posted on job websites are being collected and mined too.

Any takers? I'll mortgage everything I have to find a bookie in Vegas to run this. Can't get better odds than this, and I want to become a millionaire before this is done.

PLACE YOUR BETS!
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tubes, 11 Jul 2008 @ 10:36am

This is just a start. We will soon be the North American Union, say hello to the Amero & goodbye to your Constitution & freedoms (well what was left of them)!
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William C Bonner, 11 Jul 2008 @ 1:57pm

This issue finally got me to give money to the EFF
1984? Big Brother? NewSpeak? Orwell just had it wrong by 20 years.
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Anonymous Cowherd, 11 Jul 2008 @ 3:59pm

Re: Time to get a clue
404, you moron.
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