Hell Hath No Fury Like A Federal Law Enforcement Agency That Keeps Finding Some Way To Break Into IPhones

from the flow-my-angry-tears dept

Nothing has made the FBI more irritated than its ability to break into phones it swears (often in court!) it cannot possibly get into without the device maker's assistance. The agency doesn't want third-party vendors to offer solutions and it doesn't seem to want its own technical staff to find ways to get stuff from encrypted devices. It wants the government to tell companies like Apple to do what they're told. It will accept any solution that involves a mandate, whether it's from a federal court or our nation's legislators. It will accept nothing else.

The FBI and DOJ's foul mood over its phone-cracking success and its courtroom failures came to a head recently. A joint press conference announcing not-so-breaking news about the contents of the Pensacola air base shooter's phones contained a whole lot of off-target griping about a company whose only crime was selling consumer products. Here's Rianna Pfefferkorn for TechCruch:

You’d think the FBI’s success at a tricky task (remember, one of the phones had been shot) would be good news for the Bureau. Yet an unmistakable note of bitterness tinged the laudatory remarks at the press conference for the technicians who made it happen. Despite the Bureau’s impressive achievement, and despite the gobs of data Apple had provided, Barr and Wray devoted much of their remarks to maligning Apple, with Wray going so far as to say the government “received effectively no help” from the company.

If the FBI's ultimate aim was to bury the lede -- that it could either break encryption or exfiltrate contents without cracking devices -- it succeeded. Everyone talked about Apple and how its unhelpfulness led to this petulant press conference where it was stated clearly and repeatedly that Apple was harming the nation's security by... um... temporarily delaying the discovery of evidence linking the shooter to the terrorist group that had already claimed responsibility for the attack months ago.

As Pfefferkorn points out, Bill Barr and Chris Wray's roughly concurrent tantrums allowed them to avoid discussing something that should have been much bigger news.

By reviving the old blame-Apple routine, the two officials managed to evade a number of questions that their press conference left unanswered. What exactly are the FBI’s capabilities when it comes to accessing locked, encrypted smartphones? Wray claimed the technique developed by FBI technicians is “of pretty limited application” beyond the Pensacola iPhones. How limited? What other phone-cracking techniques does the FBI have, and which handset models and which mobile OS versions do those techniques reliably work on? In what kinds of cases, for what kinds of crimes, are these tools being used?

After all of this, we don't know what the FBI is capable of and how often these previously unmentioned techniques are used to bypass or break device encryption. With the only suspect dead, it's obvious FBI agents didn't beat the passcode out of him. But that's all we really know.

The FBI can break into iPhones. But it won't celebrate that victory because -- without a federal government derived mandate -- it doesn't feel like a victory. This "sick of winning" attitude dates back to the FBI's efforts in the San Bernardino shooting where agency officials were upset a third party solved their access problem before they could talk a court into precedent compelling assistance from cell phone manufacturers.

By portraying this victory as a loss to a tech company, the FBI can avoid talking about its tools and techniques. It can bypass its oversight by glossing over this breakthrough as a very limited success that won't scale and possibly cannot be used against any other phones. It can also keep its secrets from our nation's courts, ensuring defendants are left in the dark about the true origin of evidence being used against them.

And that's if we're thinking positively. Here's where we're at if we bring to bear all the distrust and cynicism the government (at all levels) has earned:

The worst-case scenario would be that, between in-house and third-party tools, pretty much any law enforcement agency can now reliably crack into everybody’s phones, and yet nevertheless this turns out to be the year they finally get their legislative victory over encryption anyway. I can’t wait to see what else 2020 has in store.

USA! USA! USA!

We, the people, are going to get what's coming to us, even if we haven't earned it or asked for it. Encryption is public enemy number one, right behind device manufacturers and developers of encrypted communication services. If the first enemy is killed dead, the rest will be manageable. And the general public will be forced into sacrificing their personal security for jingoism-spouting opportunists who will never see the United States as safe enough to entrust citizens with their own decisions about the level of protection they want for their communications and data.

Filed Under: backdoors, doj, encryption, fbi, phone cracking
Companies: apple

Senate Talking Points Say Warrantless Collection Of Internet Use Data Keeps Terrorists From Killing Us

from the it-doesn't-say-HOW-it-does-this dept

The Senate tried and failed to erect a warrant requirement for the FBI's collection of US citizens' internet browsing data. The amendment to the FISA reauthorization fell one vote short -- something that could have been avoided by having any of the four missing Senate supporters show up and actually support the thing. The House has a chance to pass this amendment before sending the bill to the president, but they've decided to engage in some unproductive infighting instead.

As it stands now, it still stands the way it has always stood: the FBI can get this information without a warrant. If we can't have this amendment, maybe we can have some answers about the FBI's use of this power. Senator Ron Wyden has sent a letter to the Director of National Intelligence asking how often government agencies have spied on Americans' internet usage. The answer will probably arrive sometime between "years from now" and "never," given how enthused the DNI usually is about discussing domestic surveillance originating from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Since there doesn't seem to be any good reason to allow the FBI to continue this warrantless collection, surveillance supporters in Washington have decided to craft some bad ones. Dell Cameron reports for Gizmodo that certain Senators think a warrant requirement allows the terrorists to win.

Requiring federal agents to have “probable cause” to eavesdrop on the internet activities of American citizens poses a direct threat to national security and would force the FBI to stand by while terrorist plots unfold on U.S. soil, according to a leaked copy of talking points distributed to Senate lawmakers this month.

Those talking points appear to have originated in Sen. Mitch McConnell's office and began circulating prior to the Senate vote on the FISA reauthorization. The talking points aren't very convincing, though. As Cameron points out, they're riddled with legal errors and give the appearance that the author(s) believes ginning up a little fear should be all that's needed to sway legislators who still think the Fourth Amendment should mean something.

At one point, the document erroneously claims that legally requiring the FBI to get a warrant to view U.S. citizens’ web browser data would hinder federal agents from investigating a “known foreign” spy caught photographing a power plant on U.S. soil “over the course of several days.” In this hypothetical, the spy goes on to blow up the Hoover Dam as helpless FBI agents presumably observe from a distance.

Whoa if true. One wonders how the FBI ever manages to investigate anyone. Of course, at some point in the several days between the detainment and the eventual blowing up of stuff the FBI could probably have obtained a search warrant to collect this information. Not that it would necessarily need to since this hypothetical involves a "known foreign spy" the FBI already has under surveillance and whose internet data could be legally obtained from NSA collections without doing anything at all to the Fourth Amendment.

Somehow, the talking points manage to get even dumber than this.

Unbelievably, the leaked documents go on to claim that search warrants for browser data would effectively mean the end of all domestic internet surveillance by the U.S. government: “Internet web browsing and search history information comprise data that forms the building blocks for national security investigations,” it says. “To require probable cause for the Government to obtain the Internet data effectively prohibits any Internet data collection.”

Let's see if we have this straight: seeking a warrant will irrevocably terminate an investigation. Limiting the government to things it has probable cause to basically sets fire to the national security fabric, leaving us completely at the mercy of terrorists, domestic and otherwise. It's as if the person writing this believes Constitutional rights and protections are something the government only extends to violent criminals and if they're respected, the end result is dead Americans.

I guess we should be grateful for these Senators and their efforts. After all, if we, the general public, hadn't allowed terrorists to attack the US back in 2001, we wouldn't be in the position we are now: being warrantlessly surveilled by our own government for our own good.

Filed Under: 4th amendment, doj, fbi, fisa, mitch mcconnell, nsa, patriot act, probable cause, ron wyden, surveillance, terrorism, warrants

So Wait, People Really Think The Barr DOJ's Investigation Into Google Is In Good Faith?

from the bad-faith-clown-show dept

Late last week, news emerged that the DOJ would likely be bringing a massive antitrust lawsuit against Google. Reports suggest this is the culmination of a full year of saber rattling by Bill Barr, who has made "antitrust inquiries" into "big tech" a top priority at the DOJ:

"the DOJ's antitrust inquiries into Google, Facebook and other Silicon Valley powers has become a priority for Attorney General William Barr, who has asserted greater control of the probes and has said he wants to make a decision on Google by the summer."

The news was quickly met with celebration by numerous folks, many of whom have correctly noted that US antitrust enforcement has become toothless and frail, and our dated definitions of monopoly need updating in the Amazon era. The announcement was also highly celebrated by a litany of folks eager to see Google's domination of search, advertising, and other sectors disrupted -- for both justified and competitive reasons.

Oddly, much of the coverage of the DOJ's potential antitrust case operated under the premise that Barr's efforts are being conducted in good faith, and might actually result in useful remedies at the end of the battle. The problem with that assertion is multi-fold. One, Bill Barr just got done making it abundantly clear his DOJ isn't actually interested in the rule of law. The Trump DOJ has also made it abundantly clear it's not above weaponizing antitrust for petty grievances, as we saw with the ridiculous lawsuit against California over vehicle emissions.

Barr's DOJ also isn't what you'd call consistent on antitrust and monopoly enforcement, either.

Barr's DOJ, for example, just got done rubber stamping the $26 billion merger between T-Mobile and Sprint, despite a laundry list of warnings from economists that concentration in the telecom sector would reduce competition, raise rates, lower overall sector pay, and result in up to 20,000 to 30,000 job losses. Yet DOJ antitrust boss, Makan Delrahim, not only rubber stamped the deal without listening to experts, he used his personal phone and email accounts to help ensure deal approval. That is what "antitrust enforcement" looks like at Donald Trump and Bill Barr's DOJ.

The DOJ's lawsuit to hamper the AT&T Time Warner lawsuit was also treated with furrowed brow seriousness by the press, despite it being well out of character for a Trump administration that generally panders to AT&T, has a less than zero interest in consumer protection, and usually has no problem with industry consolidation -- provided you're an ally of the administration. There's ample indication the DOJ's lawsuit was driven by Trump's disdain for CNN and his ally Rupert Murdoch, who saw two attempts to buy CNN rebuffed by AT&T and had been working overtime to scuttle the deal for competitive reasons.

Why is monopolization in telecom and other sectors ok, and monopolization in Silicon Valley not ok? Because, as we've noted previously, much of the Barr DOJ's sudden, uncharacteristic interest in "policing monopolies" is being driven by the telecom sector (Barr you'll recall used to be Verizon's General Counsel). Giants like Comcast, Verizon, and others have been hungrily eyeing Silicon Valley's stranglehold over advertising revenues for the better part of the last fifteen years, and there's absolutely no doubt in my mind they're driving a lot of the anti "big tech" animosity you're seeing from the likes of Bill Barr and Marsha Blackburn, whose interest in consumer protection, level playing fields, monopolies, or consolidation is utterly nonexistent on any other Sunday.

A desire for stronger antitrust enforcement or concern for monopoly domination isn't what's driving the Barr DOJ here, and press outlets assuming this is a good faith effort are clowning themselves. It's being driven by telecom sector allies and Trump pals like Rupert Murdoch, who are eager to boost their own advertising market share. It's also being driven by heaps of partisan nonsense about how Conservatives are being "censored by big tech," which as we've documented repeatedly isn't based on anything remotely resembling reality.

None of this is to say that there aren't very obvious monopolistic problems Google presents that need addressing. And the separate antitrust inquiry by state AGs (expected this fall) is far more likely to be conducted in good faith, even though there too you have a lot of AGs that were just fine with monopolization in sectors like telecom. But anybody who thinks the Barr DOJ's effort in particular is driven by a genuine interest in reining in monopoly power simply hasn't been paying attention.

Filed Under: antitrust, big tech, competition, doj, internet, william barr
Companies: facebook, google

After FBI Successfully Breaks Into IPhones, Bill Barr Says It's Time For Legislated Encryption Backdoors

from the drawing-exactly-the-wrong-conclusions-from-the-evidence-at-hand dept

FBI Director Chris Wray's potshots at Apple during the joint press conference about the Pensacola Air Base shooting weren't the only ones delivered by a federal employee. Famous anti-encryptionist/current DOJ boss Bill Barr made even more pointed comments during his remarks, mostly glossing over the FBI's brilliant discovery that the shooter was linked to al Qaeda -- something al Qaeda had claimed shortly after the shooting took place.

The DOJ never got the court battle it wanted. Its second attempt to talk a court into compelled decryption never gained momentum and FBI techs were eventually able to do the thing the DOJ couldn't make Apple do: access the phones' contents. Barr's comments had very little to do with the supposed matter at hand: the investigation of a shooting on a US military base. Instead, Barr gave perfunctory thanks to the hardworking men and women of the FBI before moving on to declaring Apple an enemy of the people, if not an actual enemy of the state.

Here's the first smear, which insinuates device encryption is a criminal co-conspirator.

Within one day of the shootings, the FBI sought and obtained court orders, supported by probable cause, authorizing the FBI to search the contents of both phones as part of its investigation. The problem was that the phones were locked and the FBI did not have the passwords, so they needed help to get in. We asked Apple for assistance and so did the President. Unfortunately, Apple would not help us unlock the phones. Apple had deliberately designed them so that only the user — in this case, the terrorist — could gain access to their contents.

Yes, this is a deliberate design decision by Apple. It secures all users' phones, not just users who engage in criminal acts. Barr wants insecure devices for everyone because it would make things easier for law enforcement. That it would make things easier for other criminals (phone thieves, stalkers, malicious hackers, etc.) never seems to cross his mind. Or if it does, he figures it's a sacrifice he's willing to force Americans to make.

That's not hyperbole. Later in Barr's remarks, he claims it's not even up to the public to vote with their phone-buying dollars on the subject of device encryption and the problems it poses for law enforcement. And despite this comment, Barr doesn't want it left up to citizens to vote with their actual votes.

Striking this balance should not be left to corporate boardrooms. It is a decision to be made by the American people through their representatives.

That sounds almost democratic. If you choose to stop reading here, it almost appears Barr will accept the will of the people even if they would prefer device security over encryption backdoors. But Barr doesn't stop there. He expands on this thought, dismissing the American people's momentary involvement in this issue.

The developments in this case demonstrate the need for a legislative solution. The truth is that we needed luck, in addition to ingenuity, to get into the phones this time. There is no guarantee that we will be successful again or that a delay of four months (or longer) will not have significant consequences for the safety of Americans. In addition, the costs in time and money of devising alternative methods of accessing encrypted information can be enormous. This is not a scalable solution.

There it is: a call for mandated encryption backdoors. If Apple and other device makers aren't willing to bend to Barr's will, perhaps the legislative branch can put its collective boot on tech companies' necks.

Barr's anti-encryption pitches are still as dishonest as ever. When not portraying encryption as almost solely beneficial to criminals, Barr deliberately misconstrues what's at stake. There's a reason he keeps discussing this in terms of privacy when it's actually about security. Privacy has wiggle room. Security doesn't. Encryption is secure. Backdoored encryption isn't. It's that simple. Barr's term-swap deceives listeners, many of whom are lawmakers.

Apple’s desire to provide privacy for its customers is understandable, but not at all costs. Under our nation’s long-established constitutional principles, where a court authorizes a search for evidence of a crime, an individual’s privacy interests must yield to the broader needs of public safety.  

It's not a privacy issue when the government demands all backdoors in the nation remain unlocked just in case law enforcement needs to enter them. It's a security issue. That's pretty much what Barr wants, using houses as an analogy for devices capable of holding far more sensitive info and data than any home possibly could. Barr wants encryption that can be bypassed at will. That's not a privacy issue. It's about securing devices users rely on to handle almost everything in their daily lives. Security helps protect their privacy, but the important thing here is the security -- not the government's lawful invasions of privacy when warrants are served.

If the FBI can break into a device without Apple's assistance -- as it has in at least two high-profile cases -- it can do it again. Weakening encryption shouldn't even be a discussion topic at this point. For all the talk about the problems encryption poses to securing the nation, arguing that a nation filled with insecure devices would be more secure than what we have now is ridiculous.

Filed Under: backdoors, bill barr, doj, encryption, fbi, iphones
Companies: apple

Richard Burr Steps Down From Intel Committee Following FBI Warrant; Feinstein Talks To FBI, While Loeffler Won't Say

from the insider-trading dept

Following the news that the FBI got a warrant and seized Senator Richard Burr's phone as part of its investigation into his alleged insider trading, Burr has announced that he's stepping down from being the chair of the powerful Senate Intelligence Committee, where he's long been one of the biggest boosters of the surveillance state.

Of course, some are now wondering if that's part of the reason why the Trumpian wing of the GOP have come out against Burr. Because the Senate Intel Committee has released a report confirming that Russia tried to help Trump win in 2016. The report is not particularly surprising, highlighting many widely known points. However, in Trumpland, no one seems to be able to handle the nuanced differences between the campaign directly "colluding" with Russia (for which the evidence is more limited) with the idea that Russia independently sought to boost Trump (for which the evidence is overwhelming). So, Trump supporters have been clamoring for Burr's head on a platter for merely stating facts, which are not allowed in this world where pointing out that The Emperor is Naked is somehow deemed to be heresy.

Given Attorney General Barr's recent decisions to more fully weaponize and politicize the Justice Department, it can't be dismissed out of hand that there are political reasons for the FBI's sudden interest in Burr, but it still seems like a stretch. Sooner or later it's likely that there will be some fallout from which one can better assess the validity of the warrant, and whether or not Burr was engaged in insider trading.

One point that a few people have raised is to look at whether or not the FBI is looking into any of the other Senators who sold notable chunks of stock just before the pandemic hit, though as we explained in that original story, the situations and fact patterns with each of the other Senators is at least somewhat different than Burr's case. For what it's worth, there are reports that the FBI questioned Senator Dianne Feinstein, who also sold some stock during this period. However, as we pointed out in the original post, there's little indication that her sales were COVID-19 related, especially since it was mostly selling off biotech stocks (exactly the kind of stocks you'd think would go up in a pandemic).

The other Senator's selloff behavior that looked at least somewhat sketchy was Senator Kelly Loeffler, whose actions look worse and worse, as she denies things more vociferously. Just recently, she went on Fox News (natch) to claim that "this is 100% a political attack." Huh? What? You're the one who sold the stock. She also (get this) tried to blame socialism because why not?

This gets at the very heart of why I came to Washington, to defend free enterprise, to defend capitalism. This is a socialist attack.

Who knew that insider trading was "free enterprise"?

Either way, while Burr has had to hand over his phone and Feinstein had to answer questions from the FBI... Loeffler simply refuses to say whether or not the FBI has reached out to her. If it does turn out that the FBI has investigated the others, but left Loeffler entirely alone (whether or not her sales were aboveboard), that's certainly going to be some evidence to add to the pile that the focus on Burr was just as much political as it was about the legal issues at play.

Update: After this story was completed, Loeffler's office announced that she had handed documents over to the SEC and DOJ along with the Senate Ethics Committee. It's unclear if the DOJ/FBI asked for anything or if she just did this proactively. Just a few days ago, there was a report saying that her team was considering doing exactly this as a "hail mary" to try to get out ahead of this story that she can't seem to get rid of, and which appears to be having an impact on her campaign to retain the office that she was gifted a few months ago.

Filed Under: dianne feinstein, doj, fbi, insider trading, intelligence community, investigations, kelly loeffler, politics, richard burr, russia, russian election interference, senate intelligence committee

Uh Oh: FBI Serves Search Warrant On Senator Richard Burr, Seizes His Phone

from the how-do-you-feel-about-surveillance-now? dept

I'm wondering how Senator Richard Burr feels about phone encryption right about now? As you may recall, the notoriously pro-surveillance Senator has whined about phone encryption at great length and even introduced legislation that would effectively end encryption on phones.

And yet, the FBI just served a search warrant on him and seized his phone as part of its investigation into claims that he engaged in insider trading:

Federal agents seized a cellphone belonging to Sen. Richard Burr on Wednesday night as part of a Justice Department probe into stock transactions he made ahead of the sharp market downturn sparked by concerns over the coronavirus, a law enforcement official told the Los Angeles Times.

The North Carolina Republican turned over his phone after agents served a search warrant at his home in the Washington area, the official told the newspaper.

This likely means that there's even more going on than has been made public so far, and it's unlikely to be good for Senator Burr. As former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti explains, to get that search warrant, it means that a judge was convinced that Burr likely engaged in insider trading and that there was evidence to that effect on his phone:

And as others have noted, the FBI -- for whatever faults it might have (and they are many) -- does not just show up at a Senator's home with a warrant on a hunch.

Of course, the bigger issue was that while he was selling all those stocks (including a bunch of hotel stocks), he was claiming publicly that everything was fine and that the US had COVID-19 under control. Frankly, that part should be the bigger scandal, but unfortunately it won't be.

Filed Under: doj, encryption, fbi, insider trading, phone, richard burr, warrant

One Vote Short: FISA Amendment Requiring Warrants For Browser & Search Data Fails

from the this-is-why-we-can't-have-nice-things dept

As noted yesterday, Congress this week is considering a new bill (the USA FREEDOM Reauthorization Act of 2020) that would not only renew already widely abused and heavily criticized FISA (Federal Intelligence Surveillance Act) powers, but extend the law to include warrantless access to American browsing and search data, a longstanding goal of the "there's no such thing as too much domestic surveillance" set. Given the well documented problems with the existing system, there's a large bipartisan coalition that believes this is, well, idiotic.

Enter Senators Ron Wyden and Steve Daines, who introduced one of three amendments today aimed at making a fleeting effort to rein in FISA authority and abuse. Their amendment would have required a warrant before law enforcement and government could peruse your browsing and search data, which seems like a good idea in normal times, but even more so in the Bill Barr era. Wyden had this to say today about the threat posed by the expansion:

"Back in 2001 when Congress passed the Patriot Act, Americans were rightly concerned about the government collecting their library borrowing records without a warrant. What we're talking about here today, looking at web history browsing history, it is thousands of times more invasive of privacy."

Despite significant support for the Wyden/Daines amendment, it failed with a vote of 59-37, just missing the 60 vote threshold needed to pass. You can find a total roll call here.

Ironically, many of the same GOP Senators you'll routinely see going on at length about the perils of the "deep state" voted to give said deep state more power than ever. 10 Democratic Senators quick to lament Trump's abuse of government institutions (like Tim Kaine) similarly somehow voted to give him more capability to do so. Four other Senators didn't vote on the Wyden/Daines amendment, including Bernie Sanders (who hasn't yet explained his absence) and Senator Patty Murray, whose staffers say she would have voted for it if she had, you know, bothered to vote for it:

Wyden, unsurprisingly, was politely unimpressed by his Senate colleagues:

This is, as they say, why we can't have nice things.

Filed Under: browser data, doj, fbi, fisa, mass surveillance, mitch mcconnell, ron wyden, steve daines, surveillance, usa freedom act, warrants, william barr

Even As The GOP Whines About Illegal 'Deep State' Surveillance, It's Preparing To Give More Surveillance Powers To The FBI

from the fucking-hypocrites dept

We've been pretty critical of federal surveillance powers going back, well, as long as we can remember. And while Trump's biggest supporters like to insist that FISA warrant abuses were some sort of new thing that were just used against his campaign in a politically motivated manner, the reality is that it's just been standard operating procedures for the FBI to abuse the same "backdoor warrants" that were first revealed in 2013, but go back years before that. While, yes, the problems with the Carter Page surveillance were concerning, they were no more concerning than tons of other crap the FBI has done in making use of so-called backdoor warrants to surveil tons of Americans without cause.

Indeed, just this morning we were writing about how the FBI couldn't even bother to meet the most basic procedural requirements regarding the use of these backdoor searches, and violated the Constitution over and over and over again in sniffing through this huge corpus of data.

Now, you might hope that even as we've had a new rash of misleading "deep state" complaints from Trump and his fans over the past few days, the government might actually look to pull back on the authorities granted to the DOJ/FBI to spy on Americans this way, but it appears that (of course) the opposite is happening. A draft bill to renew FISA powers would expand the FBI's ability to conduct warrantless backdoor surveillance of Americans by snarfing their way through NSA collections of data.

Indeed it appears that, rather than enabling these backdoor searches through, let's just say, creative interpretation of the words in the law, the new amendment would explicitly allow such searches.

Under cover of redressing what President Donald Trump and his allies call the FBI’s “witch hunt” over collusion with the Kremlin, McConnell, via an amendment to the PATRIOT Act, will expressly permit the FBI to warrantlessly collect records on Americans’ web browsing and search histories.

As always, Senator Ron Wyden is sounding the alarm:

“Under the McConnell amendment, Barr gets to look through the web browsing history of any American—including journalists, politicians, and political rivals—without a warrant, just by saying it is relevant to an investigation,” said Wyden, who has been trying to ban warrantless surveillance on such records.

It's no surprise that the DOJ/FBI want to retain these powers, and it's even less of a surprise that Attorney General Bill Barr, who has done more to politicize the DOJ than any Attorney General in decades, wants such easily abused surveillance powers. But it does make it quite clear that those who have been whining and complaining about the "deep state", and talking about how unfair it is that Trump officials were subject to FBI surveillance, are generally full-of-shit hypocrites.

Filed Under: 4th amendment, backdoor searches, deep state, doj, fbi, fisa, mitch mcconnell, nsa, patriot act, surveillance, warrants

Secret Service Sends FOIA Requester A Redacted Version Of A Public DOJ Press Release

from the spinning-secrets-out-of-public-web-pages dept

The government loves its secrets. It loves them so much it does stupid things to, say, "secure the nation..." or "protect the integrity of deliberative processes" or whatever the fuck. We should not trust the government's reasoning when it chooses to redact information from documents it releases to FOIA requesters. These assertions should always be challenged because the government's track record on redactions is objectively awful.

Here's the latest case-in-point: Emma Best -- someone the government feels is a "vexatious" FOIA filer -- just received a completely stupid set of redactions from the Secret Service. Best requested documents mentioning darknet market Hansa, which was shut down (along with Alpha Bay) following an investigation by US and Dutch law enforcement agencies.

The documents returned to Best contained redactions. This is unsurprising given the nature of the investigation. What's surprising is what the Secret Service decided to redact. As Best pointed out on Twitter, the Secret Service decided public press releases by the DOJ were too sensitive to be released to the general public.

Here's one of the redactions [PDF] the Secret Service applied to a press release that can be found unaltered and unedited at the Justice Department's publicly-accessible website:

And here's what the Secret Service excised, under the bullshit theory that a publicly-released press statement is somehow an "inter-agency or intra-agency memorandums or letter which would not be available by law to a party other than an agency in litigation with the agency."

“This is likely one of the most important criminal investigations of the year – taking down the largest dark net marketplace in history,” said Attorney General Jeff Sessions. “Make no mistake, the forces of law and justice face a new challenge from the criminals and transnational criminal organizations who think they can commit their crimes with impunity using the dark net. The dark net is not a place to hide. The Department will continue to find, arrest, prosecute, convict, and incarcerate criminals, drug traffickers and their enablers wherever they are. We will use every tool we have to stop criminals from exploiting vulnerable people and sending so many Americans to an early grave. I believe that because of this operation, the American people are safer – safer from the threat of identity fraud and malware, and safer from deadly drugs.”

Um. Is Jeff Sessions being Yezhoved by the Secret Service? Does the agency consider him to be enough of a persona non grata after his firing by Trump to be excised from the Secret Services' official recollection of this dark web takedown? This insane conspiracy theory I just made up makes as much sense as anything the Secret Service could offer in explanation for this redaction. The redaction removed nothing but the sort of swaggering statement Attorney Generals always make after a huge bust.

Needless to say, Emma Best is challenging the Secret Service's redactions. Pithily.

I am appealing the integrity of the redactions, as you withheld public press releases under b5, which is grossly inappropriate.

Yeah. That's an understatement. The Secret Service has no business redacting publicly-available info. Even if this was a clerical error, it's so bad it's insulting. And that's why you can't trust the government on things like this: when it's not being malicious, it's being stupid.

Filed Under: doj, foia, press release, redactions, secret service, transparency

Senator Wyden And Others Introduce Bill Calling The DOJ's Bluff Regarding Its Attempt To Destroy Section 230 & Encryption

from the should-be-called-the-do-your-job-bill dept

One of the key points we've been making concerning Attorney General William Barr and his DOJ's eager support for the terrible EARN-IT Act, is that much of it really seems to be to cover up the DOJ's own failings in fighting child porn and child exploitation. The premise behind the EARN IT Act is that there's a lot of child exploitation/child abuse material found on social media... and that social media companies should do more to block that content. Of course, if you step back and think about it, you'd quickly realize that this is a form of sweeping the problem under the rug. Rather than actually tracking down and arresting those exploiting and abusing children, it's demanding private companies just hide the evidence of those horrific acts.

And why might the DOJ and others be so supportive of sweeping evidence under the rug and hiding it? Perhaps because the DOJ and Congress have literally failed to live up to their mandates under existing laws to actually fight child exploitation. Barr's DOJ has been required under law to produce reports showing data about internet crimes against children, and come up with goals to fight those crimes. It has produced only two out of the six reports that were mandated over a decade ago. At the same time, Congress has only allocated a very small budget to state and local law enforcement for fighting internet child abuse. While the laws Congress passed say that Congress should give $60 million to local law enforcement, it has actually allocated only about half of that. Oh, and Homeland Security took nearly half of its "cybercrimes" budget and diverted it to immigration enforcement, rather than fighting internet crimes such as child exploitation.

So... maybe we should recognize that the problem isn't social media platforms, but the fact that Congress and law enforcement -- from local and state up to the DOJ -- have literally failed to do their job.

At least some elected officials have decided to call the DOJ's bluff on why we need the EARN IT Act. Led by Senator Ron Wyden (of course), Senators Kirsten Gillbrand, Bob Casey, Sherrod Brown and Rep. Anna Eshoo have introduced a new bill to actually fight child sex abuse online. Called the Invest in Child Safety Act, it would basically make law enforcement do its job regarding this stuff.

The Invest in Child Safety Act would direct $5 billion in mandatory funding to investigate and target the pedophiles and abusers who create and share child sexual abuse material online. And it would create a new White House office to coordinate efforts across federal agencies, after DOJ refused to comply with a 2008 law requiring coordination and reporting of those efforts. It also directs substantial new funding for community-based efforts to prevent children from becoming victims in the first place.

Basically, the bill would do a bunch of things to make sure that law enforcement is actually dealing with the very real problem of child exploitation, rather than demanding that internet companies (1) sweep evidence under the rug, and (2) break encryption:

• Quadruple the number of prosecutors and agents in DOJ’s Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section from 30 FTEs to 120 FTEs;
• Add 100 new agents and investigators for the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Innocent Images National Initiative, Crimes Against Children Unit, Child Abduction Rapid Deployment Teams, and Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Forces;
• Fund 65 new NCMEC analysts, engineers, and mental health counselors, as well as a major upgrade to NCMEC’s technology platform to enable the organization to more effectively evaluate and process CSAM reports from tech companies;
• Double funding for the state Internet Crimes Against Children (ICAC) Task Forces;
• Double funding for the National Criminal Justice Training Center, to administer crucial Internet Crimes Against Children and Missing and Exploited Children training programs;
• Increase funding for evidence-based programs, local governments and non-federal entities to detect, prevent and support victims of child sexual abuse, including school-based mental health services and prevention programs like the Children’s Advocacy Centers and the HHS’ Street Outreach Program;
• Require tech companies to increase the time that they hold evidence of CSAM, in a secure database, to enable law enforcement agencies to prosecute older cases;
• Establish an Office to Enforce and Protect Against Child Sexual Exploitation, within the Executive Office of the President, to direct and streamline the federal government’s efforts to prevent, investigate and prosecute the scourge of child exploitation;
• Require the Office to develop an enforcement and protection strategy, in coordination with HHS and GAO; and
• Require the Office to submit annual monitoring reports, subject to mandatory Congressional testimony to ensure timely execution.

While I always have concerns about law enforcement mission creep and misguided targeting of law enforcement efforts, hopefully everyone can agree that child exploitation does remain a very real problem, and one that law enforcement should be investigating and going after those who are actually exploiting and abusing children. This bill would make that possible, rather than the alternative approach of just blaming the internet companies for law enforcement's failure to take any of this seriously.

Filed Under: csam, doj, earn it, exploitation, funding, intermediary liability, law enforcement, section 230