alert systems
Governmental agencies such as the National Security Agency, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Department of Homeland Security, and state and local law enforcement agencies are known to intrude upon the private telecommunications of innocent inhabitants, collect a huge amount of data regarding who people call, and create data bases of what they consider suspicious activities, based on the unclear criteria. The ACLU goes on to say that while the collection of this private information by the government is in itself an unacceptable invasion of privacy, how they use the information is even more problematic to the point of abuse. Otherwise harmless data gets placed on a variety of watch lists, with harsh consequences. Innocent individuals are prevented from boarding planes, are unable to obtain certain types of jobs, have their bank accounts frozen and find themselves repeatedly questioned by authorities without knowing why. Once the government has such information, it can widely share it and retain it indefinitely American Civil Liberties Organization. The rules regarding who has access to this surveillance information and how it can be used have changed and changed again in secret without the public ever becoming aware. The government can also use it to justify changing rules or even breaking laws as it did after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. For example, after 9/11 surveillance data was used to indicate potential terrorists so that the CIA could capture them and obtain information that would prevent other terrorist attacks. Despite it being against international law and the law of the U. S. to torture anyone for any purpose Restatement of the Law Third, the CIA was known to have used torture to obtain information and confessions from a number of individuals after 9/11.Posted by Anonymous at 3:19PM | (8 comments)