Should the Telecom Industry be let off the hook

The whole issue of warrant less wiretaps takes a completely new spin with the telecom companies wanting to have immunity for aiding and abetting the government in monitoring the communications of Americans as they call overseas.

Beyond the bad public relations, and the disaster that people who know that they are having their communications monitored as they call family and friends in other countries. There is a whole host of other communications being monitored that needs to have access to the big telco’s equipment to make happen.

After the disclosure two years ago that the N.S.A. was eavesdropping on the international communications of terrorism suspects inside the United States without warrants, more than 40 lawsuits were filed against the government and phone carriers. As a result, skittish companies and their lawyers have been demanding stricter safeguards before they provide access to the government and, in some cases, are refusing outright to cooperate, officials said. Source: NYTimes

The problem for the telecommunications companies is that they have the data that the NSA needs to look out for the latest and greatest group that hates America. It was not the NSA that caught Timothy McVeigh, nor was it the NSA that figured out 9/11 was going to happen. The requirement then for the NSA to monitor the vast stores of communications that people are doing has not deterred the last two major terrorist attacks.

Rather it seems more about monitoring for monitoring sake, rather than any real need, or any real example that NSA data has gone into busting terrorist cells. The desire to monitor is there, but the demonstrated need, and the demonstrated actionable information gleaned from such internal monitoring has not been proved.

But the liability for government sponsored spying aided and abetted by a service company is something that will either be approved or not approved of. There are people who are suing for this agreement, and rightly, the telecommunication companies will need immunity. There are a number of rules, laws, and constitutional rights that determine how this should be done, and they have not faired well in court.

If the only success story out of this is that this kind of wiretapping has been used to demonstrate connections between people in the “war on drugs”, then that is a waste of resources and becomes a voyeuristic dream park. The sad part is that this looks like it has been going on for years.