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Domestic spying continues to spiral out of control this week as two ABC reporters were told
by a secret government source that their calls were being tracked by government agents:
A senior federal law enforcement official tells ABC News the government is tracking the phone numbers we (Brian Ross and Richard Esposito) call in an effort to root out confidential sources.
“It’s time for you to get some new cell phones, quick,” the source told us in an in-person conversation.
The piece appeared on ABC’s The Blotter as well as the Chicago Tribune.
The reason given for the tracking is an attempt to stop leaks of information from getting out of inner government circles. While leaking of classified information is a serious problem, is it any wonder that the press is relying on internal sources during such a tight-lipped administration? If this has a chilling effect on what little investigative reporting is still happening in this country, the citizens could be left with no independently gathered information at all.
Thanks to Iawgeek for the photo
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While I don’t like the idea of our government spying on us, I can’t help but feel some of the more recent scandals have been… blown out of proportion? Most notable is the database tracking calls between various phone numbers. If the conversations themselves aren’t being recorded, do we really have that much to be angry about?
Yeah, but you have to consider that you most likely aren’t calling any “suspect locations.” Imagine for a moment that you are an American citizen with family in Iraq or Afghanistan. Aren’t you going to be a bit pissed that the government may be putting you on a watch list because you talked to your grandma for too long on her birthday?
Yeah, I can see how that would be offensive, but from what I’ve read this technology is really inteded to detect links between different terrorist individuals. So if they know terrorist A is using a given phone number, they can utilize the system to find likely individuals or organizations that could be aiding him.
It’s sort of like 6 degrees of seperation, only with Osama Bin Laden instead of Kevin Bacon.