ACLU Sues The Government On Its Own Behalf, As A Verizon Customer, Arguing 4th Amendment Violations
from the to-which-the-feds-will-scream-national-security-and-shut-up dept
There have already been a few lawsuits filed about the various NSA surveillance revelations of the last week, but one to watch closely is the lawsuit filed yesterday by the ACLU on its own behalf. The ACLU frequently represents others, but in this case, it notes that it's a Verizon customer, so the mass sucking up of all phone call records on Verizon directly impacts the ACLU."This dragnet program is surely one of the largest surveillance efforts ever launched by a democratic government against its own citizens," said Jameel Jaffer, ACLU deputy legal director. "It is the equivalent of requiring every American to file a daily report with the government of every location they visited, every person they talked to on the phone, the time of each call, and the length of every conversation. The program goes far beyond even the permissive limits set by the Patriot Act and represents a gross infringement of the freedom of association and the right to privacy."As we had just pointed out, the ACLU lost its case before the Supreme Court on this very subject (the Constitutionality of the FISA Amendments Act) just a few months ago, because the Supreme Court argued that the plaintiffs in that case (Amnesty International) only had speculation that its lawyers had their records monitored. But here, the ACLU rightly points out, it now has the evidence that the ACLU's calls were sucked up in this dragnet.
The ACLU is a customer of Verizon Business Network Services, which was the recipient of a secret FISA Court order published by The Guardian last week. The order required the company to "turn over on 'an ongoing daily basis' phone call details" such as who calls are placed to and from, and when those calls are made. The lawsuit argues that the government's blanket seizure of and ability to search the ACLU's phone records compromises sensitive information about its work, undermining the organization's ability to engage in legitimate communications with clients, journalists, advocacy partners, and others.
In other words, this time, there should be no issue of "standing" to deal with.
Of course, the feds will respond the way they normally do in such cases: claiming national security and sovereign immunity. That's what let the feds off the hook on the only other case where evidence of actual monitoring had been leaked, and where the "standing" issue wasn't in dispute. In that case, an appeals court ruled, basically, that the government never actually has to have the Constitutionality of such laws determined in court, because it can claim sovereign immunity to kill off any such lawsuits. If that seems like a crazy result, you'd be correct. That ruling was in the 9th Circuit. This new case is being filed in the Southern District of NY, which is in the Second Circuit. Hopefully, the court rules the other way, setting up a Supreme Court case to resolve the circuit split. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court isn't known for being particularly great at protecting civil liberties lately, so even that may be risky. But, at least there's a chance.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: 4th amendment, aclu, lawsuits, nsa, nsa surveillance
Companies: verizon
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
I'm afraid that public statements aren't probative.
So I don't see the case going further now: they've already stymied it for the reasons you list.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Crazy???
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in thread ]
The government doesn't need to show that what it is doing is constitutional because it has sovereign immunity?
Danger!? Red Alert!?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Crazy???
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: I'm afraid that public statements aren't probative.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: I'm afraid that public statements aren't probative.
There is a specific entity hoovering up all the information by it's own choice. The US Government.
Megaupload just allowed people to upload whatever whenever. It provided a service, and copywrite holders could issue a DMCA takedown and that link would be removed, as it should be.
The violator of the rights is the individual doing the uploading. Not the company.
The violator of our rights is the government, because it's telling companies to give it all this information.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Sheep of history
Political LAZINESS is the most dangerous flaw in a society.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Ding
You got the magic phrase in there again... congrats!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: I'm afraid that public statements aren't probative.
Second, does that mean you have offered to filter through the quintillion of bits information created daily and let everyone know what is infringing and what isn't? You would be able to recognize what is fair use and what isn't? People are quick to say they know what is infringing and what isn't but when you look at the amount of data created daily, that is like only a drop of water in an ocean amount of data. I would not even know how to start but you seem sure of yourself about how to do it.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Sheep of history
Laziness might be the wrong word here. I was thinking complacency or apathy would be better.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Sheep of history
exciting times ahead.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
How well did that work for Al Haramain?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: I'm afraid that public statements aren't probative.
I know your handlers would like to think everything is copyright, but it just ain't so.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Case dismissed again!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: I'm afraid that public statements aren't probative.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: Sheep of history
[ link to this | view in thread ]
A chance..
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Re: Crazy???
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: I'm afraid that public statements aren't probative.
Uh, I mean
Mike Y U NO SPECIFICIZE!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re:
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: NSA surveillance
[ link to this | view in thread ]