Smiling Bob stands up for privacy!
A federal appeals court on Monday issued a landmark decision that holds that e-mail has similar constitutional privacy protections as telephone communications, meaning that federal investigators who search and seize emails without obtaining probable cause warrants will now have to do so.
The ruling by the Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Ohio upheld a lower court ruling that placed a temporary injunction on e-mail searches in a fraud investigation against Steven Warshak, who runs a supplements company best known for a male enhancement product called Enzyte. Warshak hawks Enzyte using “Smiling Bob” ads that have gained some notoriety.
There have been no previous constitutional challenges of the SCA, likely because ISPs don’t want to cause trouble and targets of investigations don’t know that their e-mail is being read. “This demonstrates the importance of judicial review,” Susan Freiwald, law professor, said. “You don’t ask an agency to set its own governing rules.”
There aren’t relevant precedents – because no one has been recording the snooping. No one has responsibility for oversight and the snoops could care less.
YES!!!
I think we need to curb our enthusiasm until The Supremes weigh in on the subject, as they almost certainly will. That said, it does give a bit of reason for hope.
yea–cause very little difference between a “packet” containing a typed message and the same type of “packet” containing 3 minutes of some movie.
#2 has it right though. Supreme Court has too much interest in national security (a la Jack Bauer/Scalia) to let the decision stand. I’d bet money.
Maybe they can keep my employers out of my emails as well.
They expect you to be a slave – work 24/7. “Be glad that you have ajob”… weekends ,etc etc
And now “if you have email read it at 7 am at hone”
The Supremes are one thing, but I am happy that there are still people out there that care more about our rights than so called security.
Smiling Bob “stands up” for privacy?
LOL!
hopefully the supremes will stop in the name of love and put an end to the incessant erosion of my guarantees of being secure in my house, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, and get back to fundamental constitutional law that requires warrants issued only upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized
the use of terrorism as an excuse by the govnt to go trawling through me and my fellow americans’ personal records is egregious and tyrranical
go bob!
#7 – grog,
Yes, you clearly remember a happier time. Good luck with that. Unfortunately, when you try to avoid The Supremes’ latest Love Child(ren), you’re likely to find that there Ain’t No Mountain High Enough.
How come everytime I see his smiling face I get a hard on ?
There have been no previous constitutional challenges of the SCA,
It’s about time that Society of Creative Anachronism bastards were challenged on Constitutional grounds…
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Seriously though, while I appreciate everyone’s pause to hear what the Supremes say, I have to ask… Have they agreed to hear the case? They could just decide to let it stand where it is. They certainly should.
#10 – OFTLO,
Not to my knowledge. It was simply my assumption that at some point, this or a case just like it will reach them. It was another assumption that I won’t like their ruling. So, that makes it an assumption squared on my part.
But doesn’t some semi-secret USA security agency have an ear on the backbone of the internet, listening to and recording everything? OK, so sure they would discard imusic tunes etc. But they still have it, even if they can’t use it in court. It’s not like that April Fools joke from a computer mag decades ago, advertising WOM – write-only memory. Storage that can be written to, but not read. The mag got a dozen or so inquiries. It may be labelled WOM, but in the long run it’s wink! WOM.
Score one for liberty! Too bad we’re still trailing by a few thousand points in this millennium…