White House wants to make wiretap access easier

Looks with some thing that GW Bush would do.

I was going to say Et tu, Obama. But reading it, what the white house wants is the technical infrastructure in place that would allow wiretapping to take place if a judicial order has been obtained for the wiretap. I agree with that - make the protection at the judicial level, but allow tapping to be technically possible in the first place. Otherwise all the bad guys will just shift to media that can't be tapped - probably not a good thing.

The problem is that the agencies wanting to do wiretaps use secret, unaccountable courts that do not exist within the judicial system to obtain their 'warrants'.

The problem is that the agencies wanting to do wiretaps use secret, unaccountable courts that do not exist within the judicial system to obtain their 'warrants'.

Did Obama introduce that, or did Bush? Anyway, that's what I'm talking about - that's where the protection should be - eliminate those courts. Or at least use them only when there's a defined terrorist emergency, with a full examination afterwards.

Neither. It was Truman.



The problem is that there is no after-the-fact examination and that these 'courts' are really no more than some bureaucrat rubber-stamping requests to raid people's information.

The potential for criminal abuse of such systems makes me ever thankful that we in the USA have the right to keep and bear arms and that, at least, we have some local and state police agencies that stop this nonsense when they come across it.

Then you all have had a long time to do something about this if you were worried about it. You're not really saying you want the govt to not be able to tap some media if warranted, are you. All those jihadi Muslims just conspiring away without any check on them what so ever?

The problem is that the agencies wanting to do wiretaps use secret, unaccountable courts that do not exist within the judicial system to obtain their 'warrants'.

Well that's just plain wrong Bart.

The US Title III authorizations set the bar for the Canadian Part VI counterpart. In short, the landmark 1967 Katz v. United States is what got the ball rolling on judicially accountable wiretapping. (USAPatriot Act notwithstanding, but that's national security which aren't criminal inquiries).

The FBI, ATF, DEA or any other agency (such as State Bureaus or local authorities) have to file their affidavits with the local District Attorney (or Federal Prosecutor) which are then reviewed by a Judge of competent jurisdiction. These affidavits in support of the authorization are kept and disclosed to the defence upon arrest, or at least in Canada, after a statutory deadline if no charges are laid.

Come national security protocols, wiretaps are granted in Federal Courts which may never be disclosed to the tapped party, you're right on that account. However, these wiretaps are useless for criminal proceedings; they violate S. 8 Charter rights or your 4th Amendment rights.

I think you'd find that criminal wiretaps are well-balanced in terms of interest of both state and citizen and easier technical access isn't a big deal at all.

Like having been saying all along there is very little difference between Bush, Clinton and Obama.