Domestic Surveillance in Coalition with the NSA Rand Paul, of the Wall Street Journal states, “How many records did the NSA seize from Verizon” (Paul)? Verizon is an enormous phone company that covers more than 308 million people. All of the phone information secured in the Verizon Company, is now being monitored and viewed by the US Government, which was initially kept secret from the people, under code name PRISM (Greenwald). The information under this code name was then leaked by a former NSA worker. Unfortunately, just like the book Big Brother’s Watching, it is the U.S Government that is conducting domestic surveillance on Verizon. Companies like Verizon, can’t simply shut off the eyes the government and they also cannot protect their users, now violated, Fourth Amendment rights. The use of domestic surveillance by the American government must not be implemented, in order to prevent the violation of American’s Fourth Amendment right, to ensure privacy for the American people, and due to American’s distrustful views toward domestic surveillance and the NSA. The U.S government should not monitor its people, and should not violate their rights to privacy. The National Security Association (NSA) monitors the communications without warrant or viable cause, except for the threat of terrorist attacks. Allowing the U.S. Government to monitor its people violates their Fourth Amendment right to privacy. Not only is monitoring a violation of right, but the NSA is also keeping
With new found ways of viewing American citizens personal information the federal government had to learn how not to get caught. American citizens have right to their privacy and with all the new Domestic Surveillance programs many were warrantless. In 2002 Bush signed a presidential order allowing the National Security Agency to monitor without a warrant. This presidential order applied to international telephone calls and e-mail messages of thousands of citizens and legal residents inside the United States. This program never had the requirements to obtain or produce a warrant from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court but, as the 4th Amendment to the Constitution
Over the last several years, cyber attacks have been continually rising. This is in response to emerging threats from rogue nations and terrorist groups. They are increasing their attacks on government, military and civilian installations. According to James Clapper (the Director of National Intelligence) these threats have become so severe. It is surpassing terrorism as the greatest challenge facing the nation. In response, the National Security Agency (NSA) began conducting surveillance on those who are involved in these activities and others which are threat to US national security interests. This program became so broad; it started continually collecting phone records and emails on ordinary Americans. This angered many, who felt that the US was acting in a way that circumvented established legal guidelines and procedures. To fully understand what is taking place requires focusing on the event, the government 's response and the ways it did / did not meet our national security goals. Together, these different elements will illustrate what occurred and the lasting impacts on everyone. (Greenwald 2014)
NSA infringes on the 1st and 4th Amendment rights. America was the safe zone: a lot of people came to the United States so that they would have the freedom to express who they are, what they believe, and their thoughts without punishment. Edward Snowden, NSA whistle blower, wasn’t allowed that freedom when he made it know what the NSA was doing with Verizon’s phone records. Snowden did break the law but he brought awareness of this dilemma to the average citizen, villain, and hero. In the end, it caused the NSA to change some policies but it doesn’t even make a difference because still the administration continues to collect data without a cause. Correction: the NSA uses surveillance to protect United States of America from terrorist, terrorism and terrorism related crimes… The agency’s interpretation: anyone and anything under the sun.
The United States government’s interpretation of the Fourth Amendment has caused them to believe they are justified in amassing a collection of American phone records, which creates a breach in many American citizens’ privacy. According to the FISA Amendment Act, the government has the authority to “target foreigners abroad” (ACLU) and the phone records of any communications between Americans and those foreign targets can be collected. However, this act does not allow amassing
Under the Bush Administration, the Protect America Act was passed in the wake of the terrorist attacks on September 11th, 2001. As a result, in 2007, the National Security Agency designed and operated a surveillance program called ‘Prism’. The programs’ intent is to gather web communications from major United States internet corporations. Under Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, Prism collects suspicious stored web communication and further employs communication companies such as, Verizon, to turn over all data that included court-approved terms, that indicated conspiracies targeted to compromise our national security. ("NSA PRISM Slides - IC OFF THE RECORD," 2013). Now, you may feel conflicted about their approach to securing our safety, but some are certain that this is undoubtedly a breech in our civil liberties. Lee (2013), states, “Civil liberties groups warned that the PAA 's vague requirements and lack of oversight would give the government a green light to seek indiscriminate access to the private communications of Americans. They predicted that the government would claim that they needed unfettered access to domestic communications to be sure they had gotten all relevant information about suspected terrorists.” Imagine we have a government that justifies spying on its citizens without any legal authorization to do so. The exploit our trust by suggesting that they
Without a warrant, searching through a person’s intimate records is considered illegal and unconstitutional according to the U.S Fourth Amendment. However, these infractions are still being committed today, some are even being committed by the U.S government. When the government agreed upon the Patriot Act, after the law was signed, confidential agencies were formed, such as, the NSA. The NSA was assembled by the government to collect and store data secretly, this information is received from popular internet companies and phone companies. The NSA derives information from a total of nine American Internet companies, and tracks millions of Americans using data from Verizon, AT&T, and BellSouth. By court order, Verizon is forced to provide
The fourth amendment is designed to protect the privacy of its citizens, its ultimate goal is to protect the right of privacy from the arbitrary government. Due to the fourth amendment, the NSA can only record the phone numbers and the duration of citizen’s phone calls, not the content. Nobody can heedfully listen onto the content of your phone calls because of the fourth amendment. As well as phone calls, the NSA can also not read or document your personal emails. If the NSA does conduct any illegal recordings of any sort the information cannot be used in court or to prosecute an individual. Lastly, if the NSA wants to access any information of phone calls or emails of citizens, they must acquire a court order or a warrant to access the information
Every since 9/11, the surveillance in the United States has become stricter and of more importance. The security is more top-notch than it has ever been because of the fear a future terrorist attack striking once again. The United States government is doing this for safety issues and the protection of Americans, but many are against the whole idea of having the government spy on you and others actually agree with it.
In this day and age it is very hard to be secretive or private about affair, whether it be business or the other sense of the word when two people come together as forbidden lovers, ask Bill Clinton. One often acquires a feeling of eeriness while alone or when the phone rings and no one is there. And that individual labels these incidents as paranoia or thinks nothing of it. But what if this isn’t coincidence? What if someone has tapped lines and to ensure it is working the phone rings. Remember that “Collect call from”, the government you received yesterday? Wake up people. Surveillance of U.S. Citizens is real. The NSA is videotaping, tapping the phone lines and watching us watching them. That
The Fourth Amendment (Amendment IV) to the United States Constitution does not allow unreasonable searches and seizures and requires any warrant to be judicially sanctioned and is required to be supported by a reason. When the government spies on citizens internet there is no individual warrant and the inspection is not supported by a reason. The people have not agreed to their information being looked amongst and it is their individual choice if they want to share it with someone. The fourth amendment protects Americans from this unreasonable search due to its private information being accessed without a
While the Verizon aspect of the story is correct, the details of what PRISM does is not entirely correct. PRISM accesses information from nine internet companies (Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, PalTalk, YouTube, Skype, AOL, and Apple) (Barton). He claims that instead of outrage, critics on both ends of the political spectrum are attacking the NSA for their activities, which Thiessen claims are legal and follow the constitution. This is only partially correct, as for it would need to comply with FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) and its amendments. However, under section 215 of the Patriot Act, the government does not have to prove that a target in an investigation is a foreign power (Donahue). This, combined with the fact that the Supreme Court held that the Fourth Amendment does not cover foreigners from searches done abroad (Donahue), can potentially lead to this system being abused. From what the details of the Snowden leaks showed, it has already gotten to that
Ever since the American public was made aware of the United States government’s surveillance policies, it has been a hotly debated issue across the nation. In 2013, it was revealed that the NSA had, for some time, been collecting data on American citizens, in terms of everything from their Internet history to their phone records. When the story broke, it was a huge talking point, not only across the country, but also throughout the world. The man who introduced Americans to this idea was Edward Snowden.
Yes I do agree with the U.S. monitoring communications of U.S. citizens, however it should only for the individuals that pose a threat to the safety of U.S. citizens and the overall security of the U.S. The spying on innocent American citizens should never happen
The United States government has violated the fourth amendment by commiting the act of creating the National Security Agency, a government-funded program. The National Security Agency collects information from billions of people across the globe. The information that they collect includes but is not limited to phone calls, e-mails, text messages, and even personal information.
In today’s society, countless surveillance methods are in place. These can range from simple cameras to high-tech home monitoring. Times have changed from the large cameras of the 1900s. Cameras can now be as small as a pin’s needle. Full scale home protection systems use video surveillance to watch over the home 24 hours a day. While this is considered a great advancement in technology, the privacy of the people is a concern. Government surveillance is needed due to the terrorist threats, however, privacy is no longer available for the people. Strict rules depicting where and how the government can survey the people need to be put in place to make sure that our society does not fall under constant stress of being watched, while still being protected from threats.