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ACLU sues Homeland Security over 'stingray' cell phone surveillance

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Re: ACLU sues Homeland Security over 'stingray' cell phone surveillance

#51

Post by mrandish »

DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #46
2StepsOutOfLine wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Care to elaborate more on this?

> For two months last year, researchers at the University of Washington paid drivers of an unidentified ridesharing service to keep custom-made sensors in the trunks of their cars, converting those vehicles into mobile cellular data collectors. They used the results to map out practically every cell tower in the cities of Seattle and Milwaukee—along with at least two anomalous transmitters they believe were likely st…

That's super interesting. Those are international departure airports. I wonder if what they're doing is sniffing for phone numbers of interest showing up in the international terminal indicating a 'person of interest' is trying to leave or arrive. I assume people trying to leave or enter the country without permission might have false ID and a false name on their ticket but they probably don't think about changing their phone number.

Once you have a number pop up on the Stingray you distribute that person's photo to all the border agents.

Re: ACLU sues Homeland Security over 'stingray' cell phone surveillance

#52

Post by mrandish »

chaps wrote: post #43
calibas wrote: post #12

Stingray use requires a warrant and every case should be dismissed where one was used without a warrant. I'm sure that's the main reason they want to hide the use of stingrays, they know they're doing something wrong. Police having the ability to spy on everyone with little to no oversight is nightmarish authoritarianism, it's completely against the spirit of American democracy, not to mention in violation of The Con…

As part of some volunteer work I'm doing with Lucy Parsons Labs, I submitted a FOIA request to every single state's largest city, asking for search warrant records that would likely exist on complaints for search warrants, the warrants themselves, or from any audit. About 100 requests in total. After two months, only two cities have sent me their search warrant records. All other states have given me rejections sayin…

Thanks for sharing. Sounds like a useful project.

> don't make records on search warrants even remotely easily available to the public,

It seems like the right reform would be for all approved search warrants to be automatically posted online one year after issuance.

Re: ACLU sues Homeland Security over 'stingray' cell phone surveillance

#53

Post by hnick »

r00fus wrote: post #7
caconym_ wrote: post #3

Presumably Homeland Security and its child agencies are targeting everybody within 100 miles of a border (~65% of the population) with any and every form of surveillance they can think of, because why not? It's very legal, and very cool.

> It's very legal, and very cool. With who? I'd really like to know who is copacetic with this kind of surveillance state.

It's a Trump quote.

Re: ACLU sues Homeland Security over 'stingray' cell phone surveillance

#54

Post by mindslight »

pacala wrote: post #50
calibas wrote: post #12

Stingray use requires a warrant and every case should be dismissed where one was used without a warrant. I'm sure that's the main reason they want to hide the use of stingrays, they know they're doing something wrong. Police having the ability to spy on everyone with little to no oversight is nightmarish authoritarianism, it's completely against the spirit of American democracy, not to mention in violation of The Con…

OTOH, Google and Facebook, with annual incomes larger than the GDP of a medium European country, can log everyone’s every breath, on the internet and, more recently, in real life, with impunity. I just can’t wrap my head how the municipal police doing it is “nightmarish authoritarianism”, but big adtech, de facto way more powerful, gets a cursory pass.

Because people generally endeavor to stay on the topic of a discussion? You seem to be assuming that criticizing government surveillance is somehow an approval of corporate surveillance - it's not either/or, they're both attacks on Free society.

Re: ACLU sues Homeland Security over 'stingray' cell phone surveillance

#56

Post by drdeca »

pacala wrote: post #50
calibas wrote: post #12

Stingray use requires a warrant and every case should be dismissed where one was used without a warrant. I'm sure that's the main reason they want to hide the use of stingrays, they know they're doing something wrong. Police having the ability to spy on everyone with little to no oversight is nightmarish authoritarianism, it's completely against the spirit of American democracy, not to mention in violation of The Con…

OTOH, Google and Facebook, with annual incomes larger than the GDP of a medium European country, can log everyone’s every breath, on the internet and, more recently, in real life, with impunity. I just can’t wrap my head how the municipal police doing it is “nightmarish authoritarianism”, but big adtech, de facto way more powerful, gets a cursory pass.

Google et al don’t arrest people or hold them in jail, so that is one dimension in which they are less able to pose a threat.

That doesn’t mean that they don’t pose a threat though.

Re: ACLU sues Homeland Security over 'stingray' cell phone surveillance

#57

Post by fooey »

mrandish wrote: post #51
DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For two months last year, researchers at the University of Washington paid drivers of an unidentified ridesharing service to keep custom-made sensors in the trunks of their cars, converting those vehicles into mobile cellular data collectors. They used the results to map out practically every cell tower in the cities of Seattle and Milwaukee—along with at least two anomalous transmitters they believe were likely st…

That's super interesting. Those are international departure airports. I wonder if what they're doing is sniffing for phone numbers of interest showing up in the international terminal indicating a 'person of interest' is trying to leave or arrive. I assume people trying to leave or enter the country without permission might have false ID and a false name on their ticket but they probably don't think about changing th…

Or the reverse.

Since airports are one of the very few places where you can positively identify a certain person was there at a certain time, you can combine a passenger list with a device list to get some soft matches to previously unlinked devices.

Combine that linked metadata with other dragnet metadata, and you're going to learn a lot.

Re: ACLU sues Homeland Security over 'stingray' cell phone surveillance

#58

Post by m10i »

calibas wrote: post #20
fooey wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is knowing a Stingray was ever used in the first place. It's been documented that the police routinely utilize parallel construction when they discover things through illegal means in the first place. https://www.wired.com/story/stingray-secret-surveillance-pro...

Seems like the police casually breaking the law is the core of the issue. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

Latin for "Who will guard the guards themselves?".

Re: ACLU sues Homeland Security over 'stingray' cell phone surveillance

#59

Post by kjaftaedi »

thfuran wrote: post #55
rocqua wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the difference between a permanent stingray and a cell tower?

One actually provides cell service.

Stingrays provide cell service.

There are issues with some units that downgrade your data signal to a slower connection than you would get with a normal cell tower.. but otherwise you would never know the difference.

The person you are replying to is actually making an excellent point as most current methods of detecting stingrays are heavily reliant on the "tower" moving or changing.

Re: ACLU sues Homeland Security over 'stingray' cell phone surveillance

#60

Post by hanniabu »

chaps wrote: post #43
calibas wrote: post #12

Stingray use requires a warrant and every case should be dismissed where one was used without a warrant. I'm sure that's the main reason they want to hide the use of stingrays, they know they're doing something wrong. Police having the ability to spy on everyone with little to no oversight is nightmarish authoritarianism, it's completely against the spirit of American democracy, not to mention in violation of The Con…

As part of some volunteer work I'm doing with Lucy Parsons Labs, I submitted a FOIA request to every single state's largest city, asking for search warrant records that would likely exist on complaints for search warrants, the warrants themselves, or from any audit. About 100 requests in total. After two months, only two cities have sent me their search warrant records. All other states have given me rejections sayin…

Ahhh, good ol' government inefficiencies and obfuscation. I have no faith in there ever being efficient systems in place because it'll just make it harder to hide shady behavior.
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