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Did you go through a School Zone - YOUR CELL PHONE KNOWS

Edward Peruta

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Were you there or were you someplace else?


ACCUSED OF BEING SOMEWHERE YOU WEREN'T? CAN WE ACCESS AND OBTAINTHE INFORMATION IN A SIMILAR MANNER TO PROVE OUR INNOCENCE?

STOPPED BY A MEMBER OF LAW ENFORCEMENT AND THEY MAYKNOW WHO YOU ARE AND WHERE YOUV'E BEENIN REAL TIME.

ATTENDING A PRO SECOND AMENDMENT EVENT? THE GOVERNMENT MAY KNOW YOU ATTENDED?

WILL THE GOVERNMENT KNOW WHO ATTENDS THE SECOND AMENDMENT EVENT ON APRIL 19TH IN WASHINGTON?

DOES THE GOVERNMENT KNOW WHO ATTENDS THE TEA PARTIES?

WHEN WE THINK OUR CELL PHONES ARE NOT CONNECTED TO THE SYSTEM, CAN THE GOVERNMENT ACTIVATE THEM AND LISTEN TO WHAT WERE SAYING?

THIS IS SCARY INFORMATION!!!

INTERESTING.

The Snitch in Your Pocket

Law enforcement is tracking Americans' cell phones in real time—without the benefit of a warrant.

By Michael Isikoff | NEWSWEEK

Published Feb19, 2010

From the magazine issue dated Mar 1, 2010

Amid all the furor over the Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping program a few years ago, a mini-revolt was brewing over another type of federal snooping that was getting no public attention at all. Federal prosecutors were seeking what seemed to be unusually sensitive records: internal data from telecommunications companies that showed the locations of their customers' cell phones—sometimes in real time, sometimes after the fact. The prosecutors said they needed the records to trace the movements of suspected drug traffickers, human smugglers, even corrupt public officials. But many federal magistrates—whose job is to sign off on search warrants and handle other routine court duties—were spooked by the requests. Some in New York, Pennsylvania, and Texas balked. Prosecutors "were using the cell phone as a surreptitious tracking device," said Stephen W. Smith, a federal magistrate in Houston. "And I started asking the U.S. Attorney's Office, 'What is the legal authority for this? What is the legal standard for getting this information?' "

Those questions are now at the core of a constitutional clash between President Obama's Justice Department and civil libertarians alarmed by what they see as the government's relentless intrusion into the private lives of citizens. There are numerous other fronts in the privacy wars—about the content of e-mails, for instance, and access to bank records and credit-card transactions. The Feds now can quietly get all that information. But cell-phone tracking is among the more unsettling forms of government surveillance, conjuring up Orwellian images of Big Brother secretly following your movements through the small device in your pocket.

How many of the owners of the country's 277 million cell phones even know that companies like AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint can track their devices in real time? Most "don't have a clue," says privacy advocate James X. Dempsey. The tracking is possible because either the phones have tiny GPS units inside or each phone call is routed through towers that can be used to pinpoint a phone's location to areas as small as a city block. This capability to trace ever more precise cell-phone locations has been spurred by a Federal Communications Commission rule designed to help police and other emergency officers during 911 calls. But the FBI and other law-enforcement outfits have been obtaining more and more records of cell-phone locations—without notifying the targets or getting judicial warrants establishing "probable cause," according to law-enforcement officials, court records, and telecommunication executives. (The Justice Department draws a distinction between cell-tower data and GPS information, according to a spokeswoman, and will often get warrants for the latter.)

The Justice Department doesn't keep statistics on requests for cell-phone data, according to the spokeswoman. So it's hard to gauge just how often these records are retrieved. But Al Gidari, a telecommunications lawyer who represents several wireless providers, tells NEWSWEEK that the companies are now getting "thousands of these requests per month," and the amount has grown "exponentially" over the past few years. Sprint Nextel has even set up a dedicated Web site so that law-enforcement agents can access the records from their desks—a fact divulged by the company's "manager of electronic surveillance" at a private Washington security conference last October. "The tool has just really caught on fire with law enforcement," said the Sprint executive, according to a tape made by a privacy activist who sneaked into the event. (A Sprint spokesman acknowledged the company has created the Web "portal" but says that law-enforcement agents must be "authenticated" before they are given passwords to log on, and even then still must provide valid court orders for all nonemergency requests.)[/b]

There is little doubt that such records can be a powerful weapon for law enforcement. Jack Killorin, who directs a federal task force in Atlanta combating the drug trade, says cell-phone records have helped his agents crack many cases, such as the brutal slaying of a DeKalb County sheriff: agents got the cell-phone records of key suspects—and then showed that they were all within a one-mile area of the murder at the time it occurred, he said. In the fall of 2008, Killorin says, his agents were able to follow a Mexican drug-cartel truck carrying 2,200 kilograms of cocaine by watching in real time as the driver's cell phone "shook hands" with each cell-phone tower it passed on the highway. "It's a tremendous investigative tool," says Killorin. And not that unusual: "This is pretty workaday stuff for us."

But there is also plenty of reason to worry. Some abuse has already occurred at the local level, according to telecom lawyer Gidari. One of his clients, he says, was aghast a few years ago when an agitated Alabama sheriff called the company's employees. After shouting that his daughter had been kidnapped, the sheriff demanded they ping her cell phone every few minutes to identify her location. In fact, there was no kidnapping: the daughter had been out on the town all night. A potentially more sinister request came from some Michigan cops who, purportedly concerned about a possible "riot," pressed another telecom for information on all the cell phones that were congregating in an area where a labor-union protest was expected. "We haven't even begun to scratch the surface of abuse on this," says Gidari.[/b][/b]

That was precisely what Smith and his fellow magistrates were worried about when they started refusing requests for cell-phone tracking data. (Smith balked only at requests for real-time information, while other magistrates have also objected to requests for historical data on cell-phone locations.) The grounds for such requests, says Smith, were often flimsy: almost all were being submitted as "2703(d)" orders—a reference to an obscure provision of a 1986 law called the Stored Communications Act, in which prosecutors only need to assert that records are "relevant" to an ongoing criminal investigation.[/b] That's the lowest possible standard in federal criminal law, and one that, as a practical matter, magistrates can't really verify. But when Smith started turning down government requests, prosecutors went around him (or "judge shopping,"[/b] in the jargon of lawyers), finding other magistrates in Texas who signed off with no questions asked, he told NEWSWEEK. Still, his stand—and that of another magistrate on Long Island—started getting noticed in the legal community. Facing a request for historical cell-phone tracking records in a drug-smuggling case, U.S. magistrate Lisa Pupo Lenihan in Pittsburgh wrote a 56-page opinion two years ago that turned prosecutors down, noting that the data they were seeking could easily be misused to collect information about sexual liaisons and other matters of an "extremely personal" nature. In an unusual show of solidarity—and to prevent judge shopping—Lenihan's opinion was signed by every other magistrate in western Pennsylvania.

The issue came to a head this month in a federal courtroom in Philadelphia. A Justice Department lawyer, Mark Eckenwiler, asked a panel of appeals-court judges to overturn Lenihan's ruling, arguing that the Feds were only asking for what amounted to "routine business records." But he faced stiff questioning from one of the judges, Dolores Sloviter, who noted that there are some governments, like Iran's, that would like to use such records to identify political protesters. "Now, can the government assure us," she pressed Eckenwiler, that Justice would never use the provisions in the communications law to collect cell-phone data for such a purpose in the United States? Eckenwiler tried to deflect the question, saying he couldn't speak to "future hypotheticals," but finally acknowledged, "Yes, your honor. It can be used constitutionally for that purpose."[/b] For those concerned about what the government might do with the data in your pocket, that was not a comforting answer.





Find this article at http://www.newsweek.com/id/233916
 

Gundude

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coolusername2007 wrote:
Yup, very scary. We need to contact our congressional representatives about this one.
Would you believe....I don't have a cell phone. If you want to contact me, send me an e-mail or call me at home. If I don't answer, leave a message.
 

OPS MARINE

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I do not carry a cell phone. This is not the reason why, but it's a pretty good one. In the event the cell phone is off, you cannot be pinged. That is my understanding.
 

Chrisc411

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Well when it comes down to cell phones applications can make it seem like your phone is off but in reality its still on.

Here is how a family was terrorized by someone using their own cellphones against them and other methods they can be used against you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCyKcoDaofg




A few ways to test if your phone is bugged(not the only way and not 100% effective)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujosfSkHFrQ
 

ne1

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OPS MARINE wrote:
I do not carry a cell phone. This is not the reason why, but it's a pretty good one. In the event the cell phone is off, you cannot be pinged. That is my understanding.
From what I've heard, your phone can be tracked even if switched off. The only way to avoid this is to remove the battery.
 

dirtykoala

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I have a family member in the FBI, and a few that went through some FBI training, but never persued a career with it. All of them told me not only can they track you on your phone, but even if it's off they can activate the mic remotely and listen to you, this also goes for cars that have mics built in for your phone. The only way around it is to remove your battery.
 

Pace

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Blah, this is nonsense of the worse degree, and the person who wrote it obviously has no idea what the hell they are talking about as they are using the word "cell phone." Nobody uses "cell phones" anymore, we use "mobile phones" and there is a huge difference which has to do with the technology, plus encrypting.

1) Local police to actually access your "cell phone", would have to monitor it full time and get a warrant for probable cause to do this in the first place. It would be very hard for them, in California for example, to get a warrant to track if you went into a school zone, if not impossible.

2) Activating the microphone is part truth, part untruth. There is some technology that would allow downloading of software, that would allow the phone to remote dial a number and then listen as you would any cell phone conversation. This again, requires a warrant.

Unless you are a criminal, probably nothing to be worried about here. It's not going to be used to track where you go, 99.99% of the people out there have nothing to worry about. If you are involved with the Mafia or robbing banks, maybe you have something to worry about.
 

yelohamr

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Big deal, I drive through school zones a lot, with my gun locked up in a gun safe. I can't wait for the prosecuter to question my cell phone and get it to say otherwise.:celebrate
 

Fallschirjmäger

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mobile phone Synonyms:
  • mobile phones plural
A mobile phone is a telephone that you can carry with you and use to make or receive calls wherever you are.



cellphone Synonyms:
  • cellphones plural
  • A cellphone is the same as a cellular phone. Synonym mobile phone
A mobile phone or mobile (also called cellphone and handphone, as well as cell phone, cellular phone, cell, wireless phone, cellular telephone, mobile telephone or cell telephone) is a long-range, electronic device used for mobile voice or data communication over a network of specialized base
Obviously I'm missing something as each uses the other as a synonym but saying 'nobody uses X anymore" is just obfuscation. It doesn't matter if someone says to call my cell, celly, cellphone, mobile, mobile phone or Star Trek communicator, they are all understood to mean the same thing.

The "technology and encryption" is another non sequitur; the GPS coordinates of the cellphone aren't encrypted in any way as that would defeat the purpose of being able to locate said device by law enforcement (in emergencies).

Why would the police have to monitor a phone "full time"? If I recall, there was a case not long ago where the FBI used the historical records of ALL the cell phone ...oops, mobile phone... carriers of a Texas city (Dallas or Austin, maybe?) and weeded through tens or maybe hundreds of thousands of phones, and millions of call locations to find the only phone or phones that had made calls from the same areas as a series of bank robberies had occurred. Citation CNET news

A warrant is needed? Not according to the Justice Department's argument. To them the records are merely "... 'routine business records' that contain 'non content' data and are therefore 'unprotected' under the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution..." Citation - Newsweek

"Unless you a criminal ... you have nothing to worry about" Nothing to worry about except that whole Fourth Amendment thing. I'm not a criminal, does that mean I have nothing to worry about and should allow the police to enter my home whenever they wish? Or, perhaps, should I insist that they actually have suspicion of criminal activity on my behalf?
 

PT111

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Actually the mobile phone VS Cell phone discussion is backwards. before cell phones came about many people (think back to Perry Mason) had a mobile phone install in their car. It was expensive and you had to call a mobileoperator to place a call. It was basically a two-radio connected into the phone system and unless you had a real need for it wasn't worth it. The cell phone was called that because of the way the towers were placed into "cells". As far asa I can tell the term "Cell Phone" is still the same as it was as you are still making calls to those same "Cell" towers. One of the problems with the "Mobile Phone" was when you got out of range on the tower you were using your call dropped. No handing it over to the next tower.

As for tracking you etc. I have heard all kinds of rumors but unless they want to get bored to death I doubt that they want to listen in on my calls or life.Evenif they track my phone going through a schoolzonethey still have to prove I was the one with the phone. I would be a lot more worried about them tracking me logging onto this site with my PC than tracking my cell phone.
 

CA_Libertarian

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Gundude wrote:
coolusername2007 wrote:
Yup, very scary. We need to contact our congressional representatives about this one.
Would you believe....I don't have a cell phone. If you want to contact me, send me an e-mail or call me at home. If I don't answer, leave a message.

Yeah, it's pretty amazing how technology has infiltrated our daily lives to such a degree.

However, I still know one person that has no internet, no cell phone, and no answering machine on his home phone. He says he has better things to do than return calls; anybody that wants to talk to him can come by his house and see him.

I met another person - a farmer in the eastern Central Valley - who doesn't even have a home phone, or even postal service at his address. He does keepa PO Box in the nearest town, and collects his mail once per week. Not surprisingly, directions to his home include "turn of the paved road and follow the river bank." That guy owns several hundred acres and has a profitible farming operation... not just a tent by the river as I suspected at first.
 

marshaul

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ne1 wrote:
OPS MARINE wrote:
I do not carry a cell phone.  This is not the reason why, but it's a pretty good one.  In the event the cell phone is off, you cannot be pinged.  That is my understanding.
From what I've heard, your phone can be tracked even if switched off. The only way to avoid this is to remove the battery.
Faraday cage.

The force of law (or even illegitimate state force) does not allow the government to violate the laws of physics.

The state does not possess magic, although they'd like us all to think they do.

Most of this stuff is like security theater. The more they try to track, the more stuff will get lost in the noise floor.

It's main function is to scare us into line like little children.

I suggest reading Cory Doctorow's latest book "Little Brother".

Cory isn't a libertarian, but his book won the Prometheus Award, and you can read it in its entirety for free:

http://craphound.com/littlebrother/download/

If you think you take this stuff seriously, then you'll read Cory's piece of semi-fiction. Otherwise, you're all talk. :) It's written with a "young adult" audience in mind, but it's a young adult audience who is a little more knowledgeable about the reality of this stuff than what I see in this thread.
 

yelohamr

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Make a foil pouch that encloses the cell phone.

I have some left over when I made my hat.:lol:

All kidding aside, the foil pouch does work.It's a McGyver Faraday cage.

I made one for my iPhone and called the number from another phone and my cell never rang. Took it out of the pouch and there was no indication I had missed a call.
 

Pace

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1) Cell Phones: Well, technically term Cellular refers to a technology that was 1G technology, but it also refers to the technology that allwos handing over calls from one tower to another, via a two way communication system. I wont go into details, but since 2G technology, which is digital the system has changed significantly, and isn't really "cellular" technology anymore as originally conceived.

2) Warrant: your quotes have nothing to do with listening on calls, but instead getting information from providers of who called where, and when, how long. Either way, their claim is that they don't NEED a warrant, but still the Mobile Providers in either case will force them to have a warrant. Meaning that the FBI can often walk into an office and "ask" nicely, but you don't have to give it to them. The laws in our country require the FBI to obtain warrants for certain information, prohibits them from asking nicely.

This is a real moot point since any provider that would want to change how they dealt with the FBI would probably loose customers as soon as they revealed in their privacy notices that they were giving stuff to the FBI without a warrant.
 
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