See
why you should secure your WiFi?
Mark
Wilson reports:
Evansville police officers investigating Internet posts threatening
law enforcement officials did not look into all of the user names
associated with an IP address to see who may have made the threats
before launching a SWAT
raid at the house in June 2012.
That was revealed in documents filed Thursday in U.S. District Court
at Evansville in a lawsuit filed by the woman whose home was
targeted.
Read
more on TheIndyChannel.
So
it would have been okay if the NCIS agent just happened upon the
evidence and passed it along, but because he did it “repeatedly”
that's not okay? How often is “repeatedly?” After “X”
times, the bad guys get a free pass?
From
the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, this summary from Justia:
United
States v. Dreyer
Docket:
13-30077
Opinion
Date: September 12, 2014
Judge:
Berzon
Defendant
appealed his conviction of one count of distributing child
pornography and one count of possessing child pornography. An NCIS
agent investigating online criminal activity of persons in Washington
state found evidence of criminal conduct by defendant, a civilian,
and gave the information to civilian law enforcement officials.
On
appeal, defendant argued that the fruits of the NCIS investigation
into his online file sharing should have been suppressed because
military enforcement of civilian laws is prohibited. In United
States v. Chon, the court held that the Posse Comitatus Act (PCA), 18
U.S.C. 1385, prohibits Army and Air Force military personnel from
participating in civilian law enforcement. The court reaffirmed
Chon’s holding that NCIS agents are bound by PCA-like restrictions
on direct assistance to civilian law enforcement. In this case, the
NCIS agent’s actions amounted to direct assistance to civilian law
enforcement and violated the regulations and policies proscribing
direct military enforcement of civilian laws. The court found that
the district court erred in denying defendant’s motion to suppress
where there was abundant
evidence that the violation at issue has occurred repeatedly and
frequently, and that the government believes that its
conduct is permissible. The court remanded for further proceedings.
View
Case on Google Scholar:
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&q=United+States+v.+Dreyer+13-30077&btnI=Lucky&as_sdt=2%2C57&scilh=0&utm_source=Justia+Law&utm_campaign=f9765f78b1-summary_newsletters_jurisdictions&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_92aabbfa32-f9765f78b1-406052753
Some
light reading...
Some
recently added articles on privacy that may interest you:
Thierer,
Adam D. The Internet of Things & Wearable Technology:
Addressing Privacy & Security Concerns Without Derailing
Innovation (September 10, 2014). Available at SSRN:
http://ssrn.com/abstract=2494382
(65 pp.)
Abstract:
This paper highlights some of the opportunities presented by the rise
of the so-called “Internet of Things” and wearable technology in
particular, and encourages policymakers to allow these technologies
to develop in a relatively unabated fashion. As with other new and
highly disruptive digital technologies, however, the Internet of
Things and wearable tech will challenge existing social, economic,
and legal norms. In particular, these technologies raise a variety of
privacy and safety concerns. Other technical barriers exist that
could hold back IoT and wearable tech — including disputes over
technical standards, system interoperability, and access to adequate
spectrum to facilitate wireless networking — but those issues are
not dealt with here.
The better alternative to top-down regulation is to deal with these
concerns creatively as they develop using a combination of
educational efforts, technological empowerment tools, social norms,
public and watchdog pressure, industry best practices and
self-regulation, transparency, and targeted enforcement of existing
legal standards (especially torts) as needed. This “bottom-up”
and “layered” approach to dealing with problems will not
preemptively suffocate experimentation and innovation in this space.
This paper concludes by outlining these solutions.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, we should not overlook the
role societal and individual adaptation will play here, just as it
has with so many other turbulent technological transformations.
Miller,
Akiva A. What Do We Worry About When We Worry About Price
Discrimination? The Law and Ethics of Using Personal Information for
Pricing (2014). Journal of Technology Law & Policy,
Vol. 19, p. 41, 2014. Available at SSRN:
http://ssrn.com/abstract=2315315
(64 pp.)
Abstract:
New information technologies have dramatically increased sellers’
ability to engage in price discrimination in retail consumer markets.
Debates over using personal information for price discrimination
frequently treat it as a single concern, and are not sufficiently
sensitive to the variety of price discrimination practices, the
different kinds of information they require in order to succeed, and
the different concerns they raise. This paper explores the ethical
aspects of the debate over regulating price discrimination
facilitated by personal information. By drawing distinctions between
various pricing practices and the motivations behind them, this paper
seeks to clarify the ethical principles that should guide legal and
regulatory efforts to control the use of personal information for
pricing.
Deeks,
Ashley. An International Legal Framework for Surveillance
(September 1, 2014). Virginia Journal of International Law,
Vol. 55, 2015 Forthcoming. Available at SSRN:
http://ssrn.com/abstract=2490700
(72 pp.)
Abstract:
Edward Snowden’s leaks laid bare the scope and breadth of the
electronic surveillance that the U.S. National Security Agency and
its foreign counterparts conduct. Suddenly, foreign surveillance is
understood as personal and pervasive, capturing the communications
not only of foreign leaders but also of private citizens. Yet to the
chagrin of many state leaders, academics, and foreign citizens,
international law has had little to say about foreign surveillance.
Until recently, no court, treaty body, or government had suggested
that international law, including basic privacy protections in human
rights treaties, applied to purely foreign intelligence collection.
This is now changing: several U.N. bodies, judicial tribunals, U.S.
corporations, and victims of foreign surveillance are pressuring
states to bring that surveillance under tighter legal control.
This article tackles three key, interrelated puzzles associated with
this sudden transformation. First, it explores why
international law has had so little to say about how, when, and where
governments may spy on other states’ nationals. Second, it
draws on international relations theory to argue that the development
of new international norms regarding surveillance is both likely and
essential. Third, it identifies six process-driven norms that
states can and should adopt to ensure meaningful privacy restrictions
on international surveillance without unduly harming their legitimate
national security interests. These norms, which include limits on
the use of collected data, periodic reviews of surveillance
authorizations, and active oversight by neutral bodies, will increase
the transparency, accountability, and legitimacy of foreign
surveillance.
This
procedural approach challenges the limited emerging scholarship on
surveillance, which urges states to apply existing — but vague and
contested — substantive human rights norms to complicated,
clandestine practices. In identifying and valuing new, objectively
verifiable, neutral norms, the article offers a more viable and
timely solution to the perils of foreign surveillance.
Smith,
Michael L. Regulating Law Enforcement’s Use of Drones: The Need
for State Legislation (September 5, 2014). Available at SSRN:
http://ssrn.com/abstract=2492374
or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2492374
Abstract:
The recent rise of domestic drone technology has prompted privacy
advocates and members of the public to call for the regulation of the
use of drones by law enforcement officers. Numerous states have
proposed legislation to regulate government drone use, and thirteen
have passed laws that restrict the use of drones by law enforcement
agencies. Despite the activity in state legislatures, commentary on
the drones tends to focus on how courts, rather than legislative
bodies, can restrict the government’s use of drones. Commentators
call for wider Fourth Amendment protections that would limit
government surveillance. In the process, in-depth analysis of state
drone regulations has fallen by the wayside.
In this article, I take up the task of analyzing and comparing state
laws regulating the government’s use of drones. While the oldest
of these laws was enacted in 2013, the thirteen laws passed so far
exhibit wide variations and noteworthy trends. I survey this
quickly-expanding list of laws, note which regulations are likely to
constrain government drone use, and identify laws that provide only
the illusion of regulation.
I
advance the thesis that the judiciary is ill-suited to address the
rapidly-developing area of drone technology. Long-established
Supreme Court precedent leaves the judiciary with very little power
to curtail government drone use. And were the judiciary to attempt
the task of restricting law enforcement’s use of drones, the
solutions proposed would likely be imprecise, unpredictable, and
difficult to reverse. In light of these concerns, privacy advocates
and law enforcement agencies alike should support the regulation of
government drone use by state legislatures, and should look to
existing laws in determining what regulations are ideal.
Perspective.
Starting off with access to 83% of the market? Could anyone but
Apple do that?
iPhone
Takes a Bite of the Mobile Card Payment Apple – Fitch
by
Sabrina I.
Pacifici on Sep 13, 2014
Fitch
Ratings-New York-11 September 2014
[All opinions expressed are those of Fitch Ratings.]: Tuesday’s
unveiling of Apple Pay is widely expected to further bolster growth
of the evolving mobile payments
landscape. Apple may be better
positioned to succeed where other institutions have had limited
success given the company’s financial resources and history of
strong new product adoption, according to Fitch Ratings. We believe
that the impact of any success on the payments industry remains
uncertain and will depend on a number of factors including customer
acceptance, merchant conversion and continued support from the
payment networks (e.g. Visa, MasterCard, American Express) and banks.
Thus far, 11
banks, representing 83% of the credit card purchase volume in the US,
have or are expected to agree to support Apple Pay.
Over the short term, card issuers could benefit from higher
transaction volumes and enhanced security, but a key unknown lies
within the undisclosed contracts and how much of the card economics
and control of transaction data will be ceded to Apple. Fitch does
not view the unveiling of Apple Pay as a watershed moment for the
nascent mobile payments industry, but we recognize its potential to
disrupt the payments landscape longer term. We see Apple’s present
strategy with Apple Pay as enhancing the brand by contributing to the
company’s services while boosting the attractiveness of its suite
of products that consumers are increasingly integrating into their
lives. As mobile payments continue to grow and Apple is able to
drive substantial consumer adoption of Apple Pay, Fitch believes
Apple could re-evaluate its strategy and attempt to renegotiate its
contracts and erode the card companies’ incremental volume gains.
Other technology firms behind mobile payment methods could ultimately
do so as well. In the US, Apple’s
timing appears ideal given that the
payments industry is transitioning to Europay, MasterCard and Visa
(EMV) technology in 2015. As part of this transition, merchants will
be upgrading their point-of-sale terminals and, depending on the
early results of Apply Pay, could decide to include the ability to
accept near field communication (NFC) technology in their upgrades.
Fitch believes this could significantly bolster consumer acceptance
and growth in mobile payments, while serving to reduce data breaches
and fraud more prevalent with the existing card payment framework.
The
NFC technology on the iPhone is not a new development
and has been made available previously on other types of mobile
phones and cards, yet has failed to become widely used by consumers.
The security features of touch pay, including no visible card
numbers, dynamic transaction identifiers and finger print
identification at the point of sale are advances beyond traditional
card payment means. Apple’s capacity to educate consumers on how
security is improved could lead to greater acceptance and higher
usage of mobile payment technology. Wider use of phone payments
could trim back card fraud over the longer term, which alone may be a
rationale for banks and card firms to be amenable to the Apple Pay
service.”
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