[An unnamed] telecommunications company received [an] ultra-secret demand letter in 2011 from the FBI seeking information about a customer or customers. The company took the extraordinary and rare step of challenging the underlying authority of the National Security Letter, as well as the legitimacy of the gag order that came with it....
After the telecom challenged the NSL, the Justice Department took its own extraordinary measure and sued the company, arguing in court documents that the company was violating the law by challenging its authority....
March 16, 2013
"Ultra-secret national security letters that come with a gag order on the recipient are an unconstitutional impingement on free speech..."
"... a federal judge in California ruled in a decision released Friday."
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17 comments:
They told me that if I voted for John McCain, the Justice Department would sue a private company for challenging its authority and a judge in California would rule against them, and they were right.
Didn't Obamacare have something in it about not being able to vote it out?
Cool that they can set this up and then set up rules that say you can't question it. /s
(Nice work if you can get it.)
Cheers for the judge.
From the article:
The lack of court oversight raises the possibility for extensive abuse of NSLs under the cover of secrecy, which the gag order only exacerbates. In 2007 a Justice Department Inspector General audit found that the FBI had indeed abused its authority and misused NSLs on many occasions. After 9/11, for example, the FBI paid multimillion-dollar contracts to AT&T and Verizon requiring the companies to station employees inside the FBI and to give these employees access to the telecom databases so they could immediately service FBI requests for telephone records. The IG found that the employees let FBI agents illegally look at customer records without paperwork and even wrote NSLs for the FBI.
Talk about ripe for abuse!
Also, notice that it was some small ISP that challenged the law. You know why? Because I'm sure the Feds let the big guys like Verizon, Sprint, Comcast, etc know that if they didn't play ball, their fed contract work would dry up. The little guy, while he lacked deep pockets, had a lot less to lose.
Tonight I will raise a glass in honor of U.S. District Judge Susan Illston.
Hooray for the court.
Question: Does anyone know if the ISP that received an NSL was, by the terms of the NSL, indemnified against irate customers suing the ISP over the release of the customer's info to the Feds?
For example, Joe X is charged as a terrorist by the FBI. Information from his Verizon email & phone records is used against him at trial. He's found innocent. Can Joe X now sue Verizon, who had no choice but to turn over the information, or is Verizon protected by a "penumbra of sovereign immunity"**?
** I just made that phrase up, but it sounds cool.
One of those good news, bad news things with more good than bad.
I guess that's why we haven't heard from the Benghazi survivors about what really happened that night.
Good for the Court. I'm not happy that the Govt sued in the first place.
Bravo to the judge. I wonder how long before a higher court reverses it?
Blindfold orders work better than gag orders.
The Department of Justice is, apparently, not subject to the jurisdiction of The Constitution. They claim an authority granted to themselves, by themselves, for themselves, which seems to be mostly at odds with the people it serves.
That said, there may indeed be a legitimate national security concern, but who would resign to use "the company was violating the law by challenging its authority" as a legal argument to defend their position.
It's ironic that the federal government is running an anti-bully campaign. They lead through example.
As Abraham Lincoln once (more or less) said, absolute power is a character test which most people fail.
The government suing a business or individual for daring to challenge its authority?
What the fuck!!!!
I thought that this well well settled law due to the Daniel Ellsberg/Pentagon Papers case in which the Supreme Court ruled against prior restraint.
I thought that this well well settled law due to the Daniel Ellsberg/Pentagon Papers case in which the Supreme Court ruled against prior restraint.
Another slapdown for the Bushobama (Bushbama? Bushama? Obusha?) Security State.
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