The NSA has just vigorously denied that their new Utah Data Center, intended for storing and processing intelligence data, will be used to spy on US citizens. The center will have a capacity of at least one yottabyte, and will provide employment for 100-200 people. With the most generous assumptions [200 employees, all employed only [...]
Panel Discussion on Privacy and Security, BU, April 24
by Alex Marthews on April 23, 2013
If you are in the BU area on Wednesday evening, come by to hear interesting speakers talking about privacy and security in the wake of the Boston Marathon attacks. Panelists will include Alex Marthews (that’s me!), James O’Keefe of the Massachusetts Pirate Party, and Gregg Housh. RSVP here.
Stingrays Can Do More Than You Ever Imagined: Law Enforcement, Cellphone Interceptions, and Countermeasures
by Alex Marthews on April 9, 2013
Previously, we reported on the existence of stingrays, also known as `IMSI catchers’, which are used by law enforcement as mobile cellphone towers. Stingrays intercept location and other data from all cellphones in the area, redirecting the traffic from regular cellphone towers. They can be used to get cellphone data without having even to go [...]
Microscope Monday: Massachusetts’ proposed Electronic Privacy Act (S. 796 / HD 1014)
by Alex Marthews on March 25, 2013
Howdy and good morning, lovers of the Internet freedoms! It’s time for another in our “Microscope Mondays” series, where we take a good hard look at pending legislation here in Massachusetts relevant to surveillance. Previously, we’ve covered a praiseworthy effort to restrict the use of drones for law enforcement purposes and Martha Coakley’s should-be-better-known “Let’s [...]
Not A Clown Car Law: Comparing Massachusetts’ Electronic Wiretapping Laws to Connecticut’s
by Alex Marthews on March 11, 2013
The way you hear Martha Coakley tell it, Massachusetts’ laws relating to when you can and cannot issue an electronic wiretapping warrant are about as effective as using a clown car to fly folks to the moon. They were passed in the 1960s, man! Don’t you know you can’t trust any law over 30? Of [...]
Alex Marthews, CDFAR President, and Jamie O’Keefe of the Mass Pirates, on Two Hotheads Radio discussing the Mass. electronic wiretapping bill
by Alex Marthews on February 5, 2013
Transcript runs from around 11-20 minutes: HEATHER MACK (host): We have some guests in the studio. We have Jamie from the Mass Pirates Party, whom we’ve had on before. We also have a new guest, Alex Marthews, from the Campaign for [Digital] Fourth Amendment Rights, also from the Pirate Party [sic], here to talk a [...]
The new Coakley bill, “An Act Updating the Wire Interception Law”, under a microscope
by Alex Marthews on January 30, 2013
Want to know the details of what the new Coakley bill, An Act Updating the Wire Interception Law, really includes? Wonderful. I can already tell we’re going to be friends. Here’s an advance hint: What do simple marijuana possession,annoying telephone calls, burglary, neglecting to depart a public assembly on the orders of police, failing to [...]