Quote:
Originally Posted by xenigo
It's a violation of the 4th Amendment, making it unconstitutional. Warrantless surveillance is illegal.
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But that's just it - Snowden hasn't said the US Government is doing warrantless surveillance on US citizens. What he has said is....
The N.S.A. has built an infrastructure that allows it to intercept almost everything. With this capability, the vast majority of human communications are automatically ingested without targeting. If I wanted to see your e-mails or your wife?s phone, all I have to do is use intercepts. I can get your e-mails, passwords, phone records, credit cards.
Well, yes. In order to access that information, you have to have a warrant. Snowden claims he could "do this from his desk". Well, maybe he could. At the end of the line, when a warrant is issued, someone has to have the ability to pull this information or data - but only in the event that a warrant has been issued.
If the US Government is getting such data we might have a huge issue. Then again, we might not - anyone can buy some of this data from customers.