[Infowarrior] - FBI plans new Net-tapping push

[Richard Forno]

FBI plans new Net-tapping push

By Declan McCullagh
http://news.com.com/FBI+plans+new+Net-tapping+push/2100-1028_3-6091942.html

Story last modified Fri Jul 07 18:55:01 PDT 2006

The FBI has drafted sweeping legislation that would require Internet service
providers to create wiretapping hubs for police surveillance and force
makers of networking gear to build in backdoors for eavesdropping, CNET
News.com has learned.

FBI Agent Barry Smith distributed the proposal at a private meeting last
Friday with industry representatives and indicated it would be introduced by
Sen. Mike DeWine, an Ohio Republican, according to two sources familiar with
the meeting.

The draft bill would place the FBI's Net-surveillance push on solid legal
footing. At the moment, it's ensnared in a legal challenge from universities
and some technology companies that claim the Federal Communications
Commission's broadband surveillance directives exceed what Congress has
authorized.

The FBI claims that expanding the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law
Enforcement Act is necessary to thwart criminals and terrorists who have
turned to technologies like voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP.

"The complexity and variety of communications technologies have dramatically
increased in recent years, and the lawful intercept capabilities of the
federal, state and local law enforcement community have been under continual
stress, and in many cases have decreased or become impossible," according to
a summary accompanying the draft bill.

Complicating the political outlook for the legislation is an ongoing debate
over allegedly illegal surveillance by the National Security
Administration--punctuated by several lawsuits challenging it on
constitutional grounds and an unrelated proposal to force Internet service
providers to record what Americans are doing online. One source, who asked
not to be identified because of the sensitive nature of last Friday's
meeting, said the FBI viewed this as a top congressional priority for 2007.

Breaking the legislation down
The 27-page proposed CALEA amendments seen by CNET News.com would:

€ Require any manufacturer of "routing" and "addressing" hardware to offer
upgrades or other "modifications" that are needed to support Internet
wiretapping. Current law does require that of telephone switch
manufacturers--but not makers of routers and network address translation
hardware like Cisco Systems and 2Wire.

€ Authorize the expansion of wiretapping requirements to "commercial"
Internet services including instant messaging if the FCC deems it to be in
the "public interest." That would likely sweep in services such as in-game
chats offered by Microsoft's Xbox 360 gaming system as well.

€ Force Internet service providers to sift through their customers'
communications to identify, for instance, only VoIP calls. (The language
requires companies to adhere to "processing or filtering methods or
procedures applied by a law enforcement agency.") That means police could
simply ask broadband providers like AT&T, Comcast or Verizon for wiretap
info--instead of having to figure out what VoIP service was being used.

€ Eliminate the current legal requirement saying the Justice Department must
publish a public "notice of the actual number of communications
interceptions" every year. That notice currently also must disclose the
"maximum capacity" required to accommodate all of the legally authorized
taps that government agencies will "conduct and use simultaneously."

Jim Harper, a policy analyst at the free-market Cato Institute and member of
a Homeland Security advisory board, said the proposal would "have a negative
impact on Internet users' privacy."

"People expect their information to be private unless the government meets
certain legal standards," Harper said. "Right now the Department of Justice
is pushing the wrong way on all this."

Neither the FBI nor DeWine's office responded to a request for comment
Friday afternoon.

DeWine has relatively low approval ratings--47 percent, according to
SurveyUSA.com--and is enmeshed in a fierce battle with a Democratic
challenger to retain his Senate seat in the November elections. DeWine is a
member of a Senate Judiciary subcommittee charged with overseeing electronic
privacy and antiterrorism enforcement and is a former prosecutor in Ohio.

A panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C., decided 2-1 last
month to uphold the FCC's extension of CALEA to broadband providers, and
it's not clear what will happen next with the lawsuit. Judge Harry Edwards
wrote in his dissent that the majority's logic gave the FCC "unlimited
authority to regulate every telecommunications service that might
conceivably be used to assist law enforcement."

The organizations behind the lawsuit say Congress never intended CALEA to
force broadband providers--and networks at corporations and universities--to
build in central surveillance hubs for the police. The list of organizations
includes Sun Microsystems, Pulver.com, the American Association of Community
Colleges, the Association of American Universities and the American Library
Association.

If the FBI's legislation becomes law, it would derail the lawsuit because
there would no longer be any question that Congress intended CALEA to apply
to the Internet.