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We rely heavily on our cell phones. And law enforcement increasingly relies on information gathered from those phones to investigate crimes. A victim or suspect's mobile phone records can tell police who they've been speaking to or texting with accurate time stamps. Some records also track the location of the call or text.
More surprising is just how often local, state and federal authorities ask phone companies for this information.
In 2011, law enforcement agencies made more than 1.3 million requests for customer cell phone records, according to a new Congressional report. Verizon says these requests have increased about 15 percent annually since 2007.
Congress is worried that the police may be gathering wireless data indiscriminately, grabbing information about innocent and guilty alike. Another concern is the fees charged to retrieve these records. AT&T billed law enforcement more than $8.2 million last year.
The data dump raises obvious privacy concerns. And reminds us that the more connected we are, the less privacy we can expect.
—Larry Greenemeier
[The above text is a transcript of this podcast.]
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8 Comments
Add CommentWhat privacy? Cant take what you don't have. $8.2 million is nothing thats not even pocket change for the government. Its taxpayer money. Much much more is spent than reveled here in many many more ways.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIf someone I loved was missing, the cell phone is a good place to start. The only people that would be concerned about their privacy are most likely up to no good.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisProtection and safety of everyone is more important than privacy of a few law breakers and criminals.
Bops, what if a police officer gets phone records for a politician and uncovers a nude photo. Are you saying that the police shouldn't be required to have evidence that a crime was committed before securing a warrant?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn any case, I notice how some poor people in Miami and New Orleans were moving around on their wheelchairs begging for change while talking on their cell phones. Cell phones pretty much have become cheap enough to be ubiquitous in society. Luckily, I haven't owned a cell phone since 2001, don't own a car, and don't pay for my weed. There is no valid reason for a police officer to detain me for a search on some "it's a privilege not a right" excuse because I got pulled over after making a call saying I was picking up some dank.
In this case, people who own technology are putting themselves at greater risk of unjust retribution.
Benefit of the doubt is better than running the risk of a government with too much power. History is rife with examples of abuse, and the protections granted by our Constitution for limited government need to be respected. You have the right to bear arms for a reason; protect yourself, don't rely on government to act like a hero for you. Safety is just an illusion anyway, because God has a million and one ways to off you in order to affect the lives of individuals left behind (who are we to judge that wrong? it could be a good thing). Assuming that everyone who wants privacy must be a criminal pretty much declares that everyone is, no-one is to be trusted, so they should all be punished equally.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisUnited States citizena have this annoying habit of calling themselves "Americans" as though they alone are "Americans" and this a bit of rubbish that first need clarified.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTry this, North America includes Canada, with a larger land mass that the United States. incidentally, so everyone in Canada is also an "American." So is everyone in South America's Brazil, et al, which has a larger land mass that the contiguous United States, and Brazilians are "Americans." That holds true for Latin Americans as well. Brazil has the Amazon River, which is eaqual to or greater than the Mississippi, and many of their "Americans" use that river for all manner of reasons. They also enjoy more privacy in Canada and Brazil that does any United States citizen.
The United States citizen does not know what privacy is anymore. bush took that away with the so-caled "Patriot Act," and decimated the Bill of Rights, and now there are hovering spy vehicles tracking everything that you do, just the same as those that are used in Afghanistan to track and kill so-called "Taliban."
Europe has privacy. Germany particularly has privacy. The United States is an open book, and United States police powers tracking cell-phone records is only one small facet of United States privacy violations. There are covert and overt cameras all over NYC, and should you haul out your camera and take a photo of a bridge, you can be arrested. Every time that you use a debit or credit card you leave a record of where you have been and what you have been doing. Data is continually being taken on virtually every move that you make.
What privacy and what freedom do you have in the United States? Both are illusions that the Government wants you to feel that you have, whilst that that same Government does everything in their power to deprive you of both.
well,i think it's not a good idea to record voice call and text in mobiles but it has some reason for the cops.in their opinion it's good for safety of people and their can rely to their cellphones also this information doesn't useful for them(some of them of course is useful)so people should rely to police and i think it's doesn't make problem for them and their private call.The cops do this for some
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thissecurity reason for example about innocent someone doesn't have crime.
In the name of God
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFirst thanks M.R Larry Greenemeier for this beautiful text.
Well,i think or maybe i can say i am sure it is kind of Eavesdropping.I can feel that what people must have thought those days. They could have said that: are innocent and guilty the same? Of course not.
That was too bad. what will you think when you find out that some one listen to you exactly word by word?
Of course you will have joined to those 1.3 million people in a minute.
They must have been so angry .If i were them, i would have used Radiotelephone.
But thanks God they use an other law today,and we can be sure that they do not Eavesdropping again (but not too sure , they do it always).
By the we should speak more safe and don't say some things that is not Clear.
Thanks and i hope you will be fine with no pine.
From aoteiwolog (M.H.M)
yes exactly now adays most of the poeple cant contonue their daily program without cell phone and yes thats true recently i mean in 5 last years lots of services added to phones and sim cards operators and it is continue may be a day we'll travelling with our phone who knows?
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