Banks Now Eyeing Cell Phone Metadata To Determine Your Loan Risk
from the when-smart-devices-get-a-little-TOO-smart dept
We've long talked about how companies are only just starting to figure out the litany of ways they can profit from your cell location, GPS and other collected data, with marketers, city planners, insurance companies and countless other groups and individuals now lining up to throw their money at cell carriers, auto makers or networking gear vendors. For just as long we've been told that users don't need to worry about the privacy and security of these efforts, and we definitely don't need new, modernized rules governing how this data is being collected, protected, or used, because, well, trust.Automakers (and the cellular carriers that control the on-board infotainment systems) for example are collecting and sharing an ocean of data with only a casual glimpse toward security and transparency. No worry, however, as they promise that they're totally thinking about consumers as they use this data for a litany of new, utterly non-transparent purposes you hadn't even thought about. Like your automaker taking your car's GPS and performance data and selling it to insurance companies to potentially impact your insurance rates.
As yet another example of how your cell and location data may come back to bite you in unforeseen ways, reports suggest that researchers are now exploring the use of metadata to better determine whether you should receive a bank loan. It's relatively early in the effort, but the research is showing that it's not particularly hard to determine a customer's potential finance risk simply by studying their cell behavior:
"Daniel Björkegren, an economist at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, is working with EFL to predict whether someone will pay back a loan based on their cellphone data. He combed through the phone records of 3000 people who had borrowed from a bank in Haiti, looking at when calls were made, how long they lasted and how much money people spent on their phones.It's worth noting that despite the collected data being anonymized, researchers were able to identify people 90% of the time with just 4 pieces of information. That's yet another example of how anonymous data isn't really anonymous, and if the data gets into the wild -- the fact that it has been "anonymized" doesn't really mean all that much. And with the security on everything from "smart" TVs to home IOT devices usually being relatively flimsy, there's going to be an awful lot of new data on you out there floating around the ether to include in analysis.
The algorithm looks at this metadata to get a sense of a person's character. Do they promptly return missed calls and pay their phone bills? That suggests they might be more responsible. Are most of their calls made in an area far away from the bank branch? Then it may be hard for the bank to keep tabs on their whereabouts.
Björkegren found that the bank could have reduced defaults by 43 per cent by using the algorithm to pick better people to give loans to. The results were presented at the NetMob conference in Cambridge, Massachusetts, earlier this month."
And while such a system might be great for the banks, it's probably not so great for you if you didn't want your cell data used in this way. And as the article notes, should you protect your privacy and opt out of your cell data being used in tangential business relationships, customers in the not-so-distant future might find themselves labeled as "suspicious" by companies -- simply for not being in a sharing mood.
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Filed Under: bank loans, metadata, mobile phones
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Can we start calling it a dystopia now?
What?! How can you assign value to this? There could be a hundred different reasons for not returning a call in kind. Using a different communication method, emergency, avoiding harassment or prank calls, etc.
The imbalance of power in society is getting disturbing.
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Re: Can we start calling it a dystopia now?
That means that the other 57% could be fucked out of a loan by this algorithm, even though they would have paid it back.
I don't think this algorithm is worth a fuck, look how much business the bank has now lost.
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Re: Re: Can we start calling it a dystopia now?
I agree with the sentiment, but it says that the *defaults* would have been reduced by 43%. In other words, the other 57% were people who would still have defaulted, they're just the ones who the algorithm would not have filtered out.
There is definitely the question of how many customers who did not default under either scenario would have been refused a loan via this algorithm. I wonder if he accounted for that and/or compared the relative profitability of those customers vs. the amount lost through defaults. The algorithm is definitely useless if it loses more profit by rejecting profitable customers than it rakes back through reduce defaults.
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Re: Re: Re: Can we start calling it a dystopia now?
Without knowing the sample selection or algorithm it is hard to know better.
But, the banks do tread on thin ice, it will not take long for a minority to put a legitimate looking discrimination case on something like this if it is picked up in the USA.
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Re: Can we start calling it a dystopia now?
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"Do they promptly return missed calls... ? That suggests they might be more responsible"
Or, it might mean I'm too damn busy doing my actual job to return calls on my personal phone during business hours. Or, it might mean that I'm too sick and tired being cold called that I won't return any call from a number I don't recognise - anyone I actually care about receiving calls from can contact me in at least 2 other ways if I don't reply immediately. I'm not being irresponsible if I'm in a meeting and the person phoning me decides to email/text/tweet/Facebook/whatever me the information instead of forcing me to phone them back.
"Are most of their calls made in an area far away from the bank branch? Then it may be hard for the bank to keep tabs on their whereabouts."
Or, it might mean they commute a long way, and/or the nearest branch location is 20+ miles from where I live and/or I travel for business. I've had jobs where I'm regularly over 1,000 miles away from my job for days/weeks at a time, and I've know people who made a commute of 100 miles to come into the office on a regular basis. The logic is sound if you're only looking at a "how easy is this person to get hold of if they do default?" question, but it's worthless in working out how likely a person is to default in the first place.
Until I see actual breakdowns for this data, I can't make a real judgement. I also realise these are for a bank in Haiti, But, based on these descriptions, it seems that hard working professionals who would be low risk would be packaged along with the deadbeats.
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Re:
you have to realize that these are the factors that make sense to track in HAITI.. most Haitians don't commute 20 miles. Crank calls, although I'm sure they exist somewhere, aren't a general nuisance to (most) people, especially in third world countries. (Few americans want to spend the $ to prank call with international rates and locals don't want to spend the $ it would cost to do so. Most of their cell phones are charged for each minute of talk time, not like the U.S. 'chunk of time + overages'.
What they are saying is that in Haiti they used these data points in their algorithms. in the USA they will use other factors. This isn't going to be the ONLY data set they will use either. They will be checking your employment, your credit history, your social media data (not only your posts on FB but also who you associate with, etc)..
data analysts will find the algorithms that are "mostly accurate for most people". some people will lose out but it (should be) a fairly small minority.
overall it's useless to pick apart specific methods used in a different country. you can either rail against the concept of what will be done in the grand scheme or accept it.
but saying "this one data point doesn't apply well to my circumstance!" isn't really going to fix anything.
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Re: Re:
Of course, I recognise this, but so what? Sure, most might not, and I'm not totally au fait with Haitian culture. But, there might still be very good reasons why a person might spend a lot of time away from his branch's area that have nothing to do with his ability or willingness to pay back a bill. Just because most people don't do something, that doesn't make it suspicious or irresponsible to do that thing.
"Crank calls"
I didn't say crank call, I said cold calls, as in idiot salesmen trying to sell you shit you don't need, but who will call 10 times a day if your number happens to get on some list. They're the main reason I don't bother answering a call from an unrecognised number - if you're not in my contacts list, you go to voicemail.
"Most of their cell phones are charged for each minute of talk time, not like the U.S. 'chunk of time + overages'. "
So, surely even more incentive to use a different form of communication to return a missed call, making that an even more questionable metric?
"some people will lose out but it (should be) a fairly small minority."
I've been on the wrong end of that sort of crap a number of times, and it's bad enough with the way things are being done now without adding another layer of opaque red tape to wade through. Plus, from the bank's point of view, some of that minority might actually be their most potentially profitable customers. Which is why I say we need to see both sides of this, the non-defaulting customers that might have been filtered out, not just those who did default.
"overall it's useless to pick apart specific methods used in a different country. you can either rail against the concept of what will be done in the grand scheme or accept it.
but saying "this one data point doesn't apply well to my circumstance!" isn't really going to fix anything."
I'm opposed to the concept, since the data really doesn't tell you anything without further context. of all the criteria mentioned (and I can only go on the criteria listed), only the timely payment of the bill is really reflective of a person's credit worthiness, and that's the one that doesn't need metadata. The rest is a bunch of assumptions that have as many explanations that reflect a person who won't default as they do a person who will.
I reserve judgement for further reports, but on the face of this it's ripe for problems that will take forever to solve because the average person won't understand the algorithm, even as the bank blindly trusts its results.
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Re:
I'm screwed. I don't pick up calls neither return missed calls promptly. I do it when I feel like (literally). Some people and most commercial calls are actively avoided unless I'm expecting them. But it's ok, I avoid loans like the plague and have enough reserves for most common disasters (can't be prepared for God's Wrath or something can we?).
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Go ahead
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Re: Go ahead
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Anonymous
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I am not a number
One of my daughters has a relatively low paid job(with prospects, ie she working her way up the slippery management pole) but she has a top end phone. A bad risk? An irresponsible young person? A person who will not prioritise the future or think long term (a young person who wants toys)? Well, her employer reimburses all her phone and internet expenses because they are essential for her work and they require that she has them. Not that any of this would be a bank's business.
"Do they promptly return missed calls... ? That suggests they might be more responsible"
I often email in response to voicemails. Sometimes in the old days I would send faxes in return for requests left by phone.
"Are most of their calls made in an area far away from the bank branch?"
Well they got me there. I have an account over 4500 miles away.
" customers in the not-so-distant future might find themselves labeled as "suspicious" by companies -- simply for not being in a sharing mood."
The day they give me access to the corresponding data on their management and branch staff (I do want to know that my money is safe and not in the dubious care of irresponsible crooks) is the first day I will consider sharing. And then I will still say no. Tough titties.
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Re: I am not a number
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Good to know
The public-facing avatar I'm creating is a tax-paying, credit-card-carrying, social-media-inputting replica of mousy civic responsibility. It handles all my public obligations. It has my dog's name.
I can see I'll have to get him a phone now, so he can return calls and pay bills.
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The Risk Here Is...
You still get lumped in with the baddies. Tough.
Paying higher interest rates because you "used your phone wrong" seems unfair.
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Re: The Risk Here Is...
If I were the regulator, I'd call that an undisclosed and unfair fee.
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Stupid assholes.
Too big to fail is too big to exist. Good riddance.
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So...
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Cell Phone Tracking
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Re: Cell Phone Tracking
For a lot of people, though, getting rid the cell phone is the exact opposite of an easy answer.
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The Unconstitutionality of SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703 (d)
Notwithstanding the fact that there is much good that can come from the legitimate (warrant based on probable cause) acquisition of Cell Site Location Information (stored/historical or real time).
Currently, the exact street by street traveled path of wherever you carried your cell phone is recorded and saved for several years by your cellular service providers (CSPs) and will be handed over to an investigative body who has obtained a court order under SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703 (d).
A court order is issued under a less stringent standard ,"a showing of specific and articulable facts”, instead of the highest level of 4th amendment constitutional protection, a warrant based on probable cause see, (http://www.volokh.com/2011/01/11/2703d-orders-in-the-news-no-really).
One may postulate, oh! I'll just get around this type of intrusion by carrying an old phone or burners (disposable phones). Yeah, sure, well guess what, we pass through hundreds of cell towers every day. If you have 2, 3, or 4 phones in your car every several seconds they send out signals to cell phone towers and this is how your location is mapped. Your 2,3, or 4 phones are the only phones that would have traveled that same mapped path so by them having your regular phone number they can easily see what phones followed the same cell tower to cell tower path and thus get your burner numbers as well.
One may rationalize by saying, “they can’t pinpoint my exact location”. That may have been the case as of yesteryear but in today’s ever changing world, because technology increases with our every breath they now have what’s known as a femto cell, (see, http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/data-center/pros-and-cons-of-using-femtocells/) which can pinpoint a cellular phone location up to within ten meters (i.e. to a particular floor, apt, address, etc.)
Another thing worthy of mentioning is the fact that local, state and federal police throughout the U.S. has purchased the ultra expensive stingray (cell tower simulator) device …see, (http://www.ibtimes.com/police-departments-18-states-use-stingray-tech-track-cell-phones-they-wont-t alk-about-it-1694552 ).
This device tricks a cell phone into thinking it's the cell tower and thus all information that would have been relayed to a cell tower is now relayed to the stingray device. No doubt this information has been used, to some degree, to help obtain a court order under SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703 (d).
Once a court order is obtained now law enforcement can get real time and stored/historical CSLI on a person’s regular phone and any additional phones that person may have and thus build a case based on this violation. Under the more stringent standard of a warrant based on probable cause a warrant would have never been issued under these circumstances.
If you've been meeting twice weekly with your phychiatrist, they know you were there.
If you've been cheating on your spouse at a hotel that info is saved, all mapped out, and waiting.
If you commit a crime at a particular time and you have your cell phone on you...busted.
If you've regularly attended AA meetings, church meetings, mind your business meetings they can pull all that up .
If you live an alternative lifestyle (undercover) and you visit those types of establishments ....guess what...there's a record.
If you just like to be alone and enjoy sitting in the park for hours on end there's a record of that.
If there is no semblance of fairness as to who is targeted (white, black, chinese, asian, etc.) this would most certainly "shock the judicial conscience" as well as help to upend much of the progress that has been achieved in the social arena.
We the People deserve to know the ratio of nationalities targeted via CSLI/HCSLI, people and crime types. Cellular phones and their residual matter (Cell Site Location Information [CSLI], and Historical Cell Site Location Information [HCSLI] ) have the potential to be a great benefit to humanity or a draconian tool to be used for sinister purposes, i.e. implanted chip.
Yes, I say implanted chip because a cellular phone offers the same, if not more, benefits or ill effects (depending on the person’s perception) as an implanted chip (i.e. location tracking, allows a person to buy and sell, etc..(see, http://www.thenewamerican.com/tech/computers/item/17688-rfid-implants-the-benefits-vs-the-dangers). Can we really name one pertinent thing that an implanted chip can do that a cellular phone cannot do? Just one example of many.
This is the way to correct this violation... (keep in mind, under this approach our current third party doctrine need not be amended on this issue. As we shall see, cellular service providers are “agents”, because they collect this data at the behest/instigation of the government ( as per FCC rule E911).
Since CSPs are "agents" as well as private entities, all said information they acquire and relinquish, regardless of ownership, can only be achieved under the fullest "panoply of constitutional protections".
In order to prevail on the issue of CSLI/HCSLI and mandate its requiring of a warrant to obtain, one must first attack the constitutionality of SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703 (d) which allows the obtaining of historical/real-time CSLI with a court order... see Auguststine (not agreeing with the courts sending it back to see if there was probable cause for a warrant. The standards of showing are different so they're not interchangeainble.
In order to prove this unconstitutionality we must first cleary understand that the “[The Fourth Amendment] is wholly inapplicable to a search or seizure, even an unreasonable one, effected by a private individual not acting as an agent of the Government or with the participation or knowledge of any governmental official.”...See United States v. Jacobsen (1984) 466 U.S. 109, 113 . We shall see that this is clearly not the case with this issue.
Secondly, we must significantly show that the private citizen/entity (cellular service provider) was acting at the behest or instigation of the government, or exhibited one or more of many conducts as outlined in the following court cases : Skinner v. Railway Labor Exec. Assn. (1989) 489 U.S. 602, 614. ALSO SEE Coolidge v. New Hampshire (1971) 403 U.S. 443, 487 [“The test [is whether the citizen] must be regarded as having acted as an instrument or agent of the state”] ; Lustig v. United States (1949) 338 U.S. 74, 78 [“[A] search is a search by a federal official if he had a hand in it”] ; People v. De Juan (1985) 171 Cal.App.3d 1110, 1120 [search at officers’ “behest or instigation”] ; People v. Fierro (1965) 236 Cal.App.2d 344, 348 [“In brief, the question is one of the extent of government involvement in an invasion conducted by the private citizen.”] ; People v. McKinnon (1972) 7 Cal.3d 899, 912 [Fourth Amendment applies if officers “hired and paid” the person to conduct warrantless searches,” or if he were to “open and search a specific package at [their] express direction or request”]; People v. Bennett (1998) 17 Cal.4th 373, 384, fn.3 [civilian was acting at an officer’s request]; Dyas v. Superior Court (1974) 11 Cal.3d 628, 633, fn.2 [exclusionary rule will be applied if officers “requested the illegal search”] ; People v. North (1981) 29 Cal.3d 509, 514 [search “performed in conjunction with, or cloaked in the authority of the state”] ; U.S. v. Bruce (6th Cir. 2005) 396 F.3d 697, 705 [“[T]wo elements must be shown in order to treat ostensibly private action as a state-sponsored search: (1) the police must have instigated, encouraged, or participated in the search; and (2) the private individual must have engaged in the search with the intent of assisting the police.” Citation]; People v. Warren (1990) 219 Cal.App.3d 619, 622 [“The relevant factors used in determining whether the governmental participation is significant, or de minimis, are (1) the government’s knowledge and acquiescence, and (2) the intent of the party performing the search.”]; U.S. v. Attson (9th Cir. 1990) 900 F.2d 1427, 1433 [the citizen “must have acted with the intent to assist the government in its investigatory or administrative purposes and not for an independent purpose.”]; U.S. v. Attson (9th Cir. 1990) 900 F.2d 1427, 1433 [the citizen “must have acted with the intent to assist the government in its investigatory or administrative purposes and not for an independent purpose.”] ; and, U.S. v. Shahid (7th Cir. 1997) 117 F.3d 322, 325 [a “critical” factor is “whether the private party’s purpose in conducting the search was to assist law enforcement agents or to further [his] own ends.”]
SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703(d) is unconstitutional because the U.S. Supreme Court decisions of Lustig, Byars, and countless succeeding federal and state cases that says, 'anytime the government (police, federal agent, etc) significantly use a private citizen/entity (cellular service provider) as its agent (state actor) in acquiring evidence against someone this invokes the "full panoply of constitutional protections" (i.e. ...a warrant based on probable cause is needed), see. Owen v. State of Indiana, 490 NE.2d. 1130, at 1136 (1986) in reiterating N.Y. v. Ray, 65 N.Y.2d 282, at 286, "Private conduct, however may become so pervaded by governmental involvement that it loses its character as such and invokes the full panoply of constitutional protections"., also; (People v Jones, 47 N.Y.2d 528; People v Esposito, 37 N.Y.2d 156, 160;People v Adler, 50 N.Y.2d 730, 737; Corngold v United States, 367 F.2d 1.) Relevant indicia of State involvement, which may transform private conduct into State action, include: a clear connection between the police and the private investigation (People v Horman, 22 N.Y.2d 378, 380); completion of the private act at the instigation of the police (People v Esposito, supra); close supervision of the private conduct by the police (People v Esposito, supra); and a private act undertaken on behalf of the police to further a police objective (People v Adler,supra).
When we apply the criteria found in U.S. v. Cleaveland (9thCir. 1995) 38 F.3d 1092, 1093 to determine if CSPs are "agents" for 4th amendment purposes, [“[T]he relevant inquiry is: (1) whether the government knew of and acqiesced in the intrusive conduct; and (2) whether the party performing the search intended to assist law enforcement efforts or further his own ends.”] we see that CSPs are "agents" for fourth amendment purposes.
In applying the criteria set forth in U.S. V. Cleaveland we see, with respect to (1), that yes, because of Rule E911, the government clearly knew of the intrusive conduct, and since the government created Rule E911, and set its parameters their level of acquiescence can only be said to be fully activated .
With respect to (2), since E911 mandates that all CSP's collect this information for E911 purposes , to be turned over to the government , their assistance to the government is etched in stone.
In U.S. v. Lambert (6th Cir.1985) 771 F.2d 83, 89 the court has said, [“First, the police must have instigated, encouraged or participated in the search. Second, the individual must have engaged in the search with the intent of assisting the police in their investigative efforts.”]. 29 (7th Cir. 1997) 117 F.3d 322, 326.
When applying the standard set forth in U.S. v Lambert we see that by the government’s implementation of Rule E911 they not only instigated and encouraged the search but orchestrated it as well. Secondly, we see that E911 requires all CSP's to turn over this information for E911 purposes, i.e. "to assist the police in their investigative efforts".
This statute also fails to pass constitutional muster when both the “public function test” as well as the "Lugar test” is applied to its situation.
The “public function test” states that a private entity will be considered a state actor if the private entity assumes or is delegated a power “ traditionally exclusively reserved to the State”, see Jackson v Metropolitan Edison Co., 419 U.S. 345, at 352 (1964).
In our society collecting evidence for criminal trials has always been traditionally exclusively reserved to the State/Government. When FCC Rule E911 delegated this resposibility to cellular service providers this provided more than enough "nexus" to satisfy the "signicant" requisite for classifying them as "actor/agents" for fourth amendment purposes.
When we apply the “two part test” that the “Lugar Test” outlines to this issue we see that it too dictates that cellular service providers are state/federal actors /agents for fourth amendment purposes.
The first part of the Lugar Test states that the deprivation must be caused by the exercise of some right or privilege created by the State or by a rule of conduct imposed by the state or by a person for whom the State is responsible.
The deprivation occurs in the relinquishing of a person’s CSLI/HCSLI by cellular service providers at the behest of the government under the rule of conduct as outlined in rule SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703 (d), and precipitated by FCC rule E911.
These two rules cannot coexist on the same platform without conflict. The very nature of FCC rule E911 rightly delegates all cellular service providers as actors/agents of the State and thereby activaties the fullest umbrella of 4th amendment constitutional protections , as well as, provides more than sufficient evidence of agency .
The only way FCC rule E911 can exist, that is to fulfill its mandated obligations is if all participants abide by the most strictest adherence to 4th amendment protocols, i.e., a warrant based on probable cause; Therefore, SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703 (d) is unconstitutional because it allows for a lesser standard (specific and articulable facts ).
The second part of the Lugar Test states, the party charged with the deprivation must be a person (entity) who may fairly be said to be a state actor. This may be because he is a state official, because he has acted together with or has obtained significant aid from state officials, or because his conduct is chargeable to the State.
The party charged with the deprivation are the cellular service providers while already established as "actors/agents" of the State /Government and their conduct is chargeable to the Government , both because of their obligations instigated by, instructed upon, and mandated by the implementation of Rule E911 prior to enactment of SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703 (d).
What had substancially officiated and cemented all cellular service providers statuses as agents/actors for the government was the "significant" nexus that was created in or around 2000 when the government's FCC issued a set of rules, called the Enhanced 911 rules (E911 rules), that mandated all wireless carriers to collect precise location information in the near future in order to improve the delivery of emergency services...See, The Mobile Wireless Web, Data, Services and Beyond: Emerging Technologies and Consumer Issues, pg. 9… published by the Federal Trade Commission, by Robert Ptofsky February,2002,..see, (https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1q7pqeJ0PWGbmJqNVVkVnJSN0h4cHRSQ2hyWnZienR5YlJz/view?usp=sharing) .
When you view this staff report you will get a unique pre-cell era view of this issue, uncorupted by the passage of time, from the mindset of a diverse consortium of individuals who we at the forefront of pioneering cellular technology, rules, and safeguards.
For instance, at the workshop which the aforementioned "report" pertains to, there was consensus as to the uncertainty of who CSLI (historical and real time) belongs to.
We the People deserve to know who designated this newly developed, highly sensitive, and clearly outside the traditional boundaries of normal protocol who designated a citizens CSLI the property of cellular providers when all cellular providers were required to collect and retain this information at the behest of the government (see Rule E911).
We the People deserve to know who designated this newly developed, highly sensitive, and clearly outside the traditional boundaries of past protocols, we need to know who designated that every U.S. citizens CSLI/HCSLI the property of cellular providers when said ownership was clearly uncertain back in 2000.
We the People deserve to know who, how, and when the original intent of the government to collect this newly developed sensitive information evolved and transformed into criminal investigations , without using the strictest safeguards of 4th amendment protections.
We the People deserve to know how the keenest legal minds in the United States government allowed legislators to enact SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703 (d) unchecked, knowing full well cellular providers were government 'agents' for fourth amendment purposes and thus any information acquired by them at the behest of the government could only be turned over by abiding by the strictest of 4th amendment constitutional protocol with respect to CSLI and HSCLI information? There must be accountability to curtail this behavior in the future.
Notwithstanding the meritorious work and energy sacrificed by our devoted hardworking legislators… We the People deserve to know if any other legislators who helped to vote SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703 (d) into being profited from the 5 to 9 billion dollar a year average the Harris Corporation (HRS) made over the years since this unconstitutional enactment, see . The Harris Corporation is the company that makes and sells the devices that capture CSLI and they have been selling these devices to police departments throughout the U.S. .
We the people deserve to know if any of these legislators had investments in Harris Corporation, or its subsidararies , or in any one of the investment companies that hold Harris Corp stock and thus profited from the more than $100 billion dollars made to investors as a direct result of their unconstitutional enactment.
The Wise and Honorable Justices have said in Union Pac. R.Co.V.Botsford. 141 U.S. 250, at 251, "No right is more carefully guarded, by the common law, than the right of every individual to the possession and control of his own person, free from all restraint or interference of others, unless by clear and unquestionable authority of law"....and,
The Well-balanced Justices of the court has said in Terry v Ohio 392 U.S. 1, at 15 "Under our decision, courts still retain their traditional responsibility to guard against police conduct which is overbearing or harassing, or which trenches upon personal security without the objective evidentiary justification which the Constitution requires. When such conduct is identified, it must be condemned by the judiciary and its fruits must be excluded from evidence in criminal trials"...most notably,
The Honorable and Well respected Justice Frankfurter has said in Lustig v United States, 338 U.S. 74, at 78-79, "[A] search is a search by a federal agent if he had a hand in it***the decisive factor in determining the applicability of the Byars case is the actuality of a share by a federal official in the total enterprise of securing and selecting evidence by other than sanction means. It is immaterial whether a federal agent originated the idea or joined in it while the search was in progress. So long as he was in it before the object of the search was completely accomplished, he must be deemed to have participated in it"....also;
The Prestigious Justices of the court have said in Byars v United States, 273 U.S. 28, at 33-34, "The Fourth Amendment was adopted in view of long misuse of power in the matter of searches and seizures both in England and in the colonies; and the assurance against any revival of it, so carefully embodied in the fundamental law, is not to be impaired by judicial sanction of equivocal methods, which, regarded superficially, may be seen to challenge the illegality but which, in reality, strike at the very substance of the constitutional right."...in addition,
The Honorable Justice Bradley (S.D.N.Y.) Boyd v. United States, 116 U.S. 616, at 639 has said more than 85 years ago, in delivering the opinion of the court, " It may be that it is the obnoxious thing in its mildest and least repulsive form; but illegitimate and unconstitutional practices get their first footing in that way, namely, by silent approaches and slight deviations from legal modes of procedure. This can only be obviated by adhering to the rule that constitutional provisions for the security of person and property should be liberally construed. A close and literal construction deprives them of half their efficacy, and leads to gradual depreciation of the right, as if it consisted more in sound than in substance. It is the duty of courts to be watchful for the constitutional rights of the citizen, and against any stealthy encroachments thereon. Their motto should be obsta principiis. We have no doubt that the legislative body is actuated by the same motives; but the vast accumulation of public business brought before it sometimes prevents it, on a first presentation, from noticing objections which become developed by time and the practical application of the objectionable law."
Lastly, the initial violative action in our judicial system with regards to this issue occurred with the application of SCA 18 U.S.C. 2703 (d). A poisonous rule or statute is far, far more damaging and destructive than a single piece of poisonous fruit (evidence gained through illegal or unconstitutional means or methods) for it gives rise to baskets upon baskets of poisonous fruit that has already rotted the bellies of many of our citizens and which is poised to poison our very nation. So to correct the problem we must attack the problem at its roots, i.e. the initial violation.
In closing, our judicial system is not perfect but is a system that can only work if we meticulously safeguard all elements of our Constitution. When we sacrifice one mustard seed weight of our constitutional rights for a paltry gain, sinister intent, or for whatever reason the end result can only lead to chaos, nonconformity, and inconsistency in our courts decisions, judicial mindset, along with increased mayhem in society...as we see today with this issue, this, in addition to the countless snowballing detrimental effects from such violation(s).
We must send a message and put safeguards in place that will insure our predecessors will be spared the turmoil that we see is evident from such actions....
Still working on it...please add to it...
Thanks.
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Not the FULL STORY!
Here's Dan Bjork's research documentation: http://dan.bjorkegren.com/files/danbjork_creditscoring.pdf
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