Free Republic

Stewart Rhodes, the group's founder, has emailed me a statement about Snowden: He is an example of what needs to be done by anyone who has knowledge of such gross violations of our rights. We need more to stand up, because this is surely the mere tip of the iceberg of the infrastructure for a police state that is being built over us. This is about far more than supposed attempts to ferry out al Qaeda operatives. This is part of a growing Stasi and Checka style surveillance police state which tags, tracks, and prepares plans to detain dissidents with...

The rabbit hole just got deeper. A whole lot deeper. On Sunday we predicated that "there's one reason why the administration, James Clapper and the NSA should just keep their mouths shut as the PRISM-gate fallout escalates: with every incremental attempt to refute some previously unknown facet of the US Big Brother state, a new piece of previously unleaked information from the same intelligence organization now scrambling for damage control, emerges and exposes the brand new narrative as yet another lie, forcing even more lies, more retribution against sources, more journalist persecution and so on." And like a hole that...

Speaking at a fundraising dinner held in Silicon Valley for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee on Thursday night, President Barack Obama said that the government should play a critical role in creating the nation’s “broadband” infrastructure—a role similar to the one the government plays in building roads and bridges. “[G]overnment has a critical role to play in funding science and research, in creating the infrastructure—not only the old infrastructure of roads and bridges and ports, but the new infrastructure of smartgrids and broadband,” Obama said. Broadband is the medium through which many Americans now get Internet access delivered to their...

And to think they told us the War on Terror was over.With news that the National Security Agency is currently collecting the telephone records of millions of us through one of America’s largest telecoms providers, Republicans have a chance to dramatically recast themselves in the debate over state surveillance and privacy.An order requires Verizon on an “ongoing, daily basis” to hand over information on all telephone calls in its systems to the NSA — both domestically and between the United States and other nations. A White House official has already defended the actions: “On its face, the order reprinted...

In an urgent, important blog post, computer scientist and security expert Ed Felten lays out the case against rules requiring manufacturers to put wiretapping backdoors in their communications tools. Since the early 1990s, manufacturers of telephone switching equipment have had to follow a US law called CALEA that says that phone switches have to have a deliberate back-door that cops can use to secretly listen in on phone calls without having to physically attach anything to them. This has already been a huge security problem -- through much of the 1990s, AT&T's CALEA controls went through a Solaris machine that...

Big Brother has been outsourced. The police can find out where you are, where you’ve been, even where you’re going. All thanks to that handy little human tracking device in your pocket: your cellphone.  There are 331 million cellphone subscriptions—about 20 million more than there are residents—in the United States. Nearly 90 percent of adult Americans carry at least one phone. The phones communicate via a nationwide network of nearly 300,000 cell towers and 600,000 micro sites, which perform the same function as towers. When they are turned on, they ping these nodes once every seven seconds or so, registering...

As the lame-duck session of the 112th Congress begins, millions of Americans are looking to the elected members of the 113th Congress to fix a host of problems ailing the country. The economy and job creation aside, one of the most pressing issues is reining in out-of-control federal bureaucracies. The Environmental Protection Agency comes to mind, as does the Department of Agriculture's promotion of GM foods. But additionally concerning is the rapid expansion of the size, scope and reach of the Transportation Security Administration, which continues to usurp authority and trample constitutional rights of more and more Americans - especially...

Amnesty Intentional, Oxfam, Reporters without Borders as well as internet rights groups and the Council of Europe all spoke out against the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) at a European Parliament hearing on Wednesday (11 April). "The vision set out by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is at stake," warned Marianne Mollmann, senior policy advisor of the London-based organization human rights group Amnesty International. Mollmann said the trade agreement threatens the right to the freedom of expression, the right to health, the right to due process and fair trial, and the right of an author to benefit from the protection...

AUSTRALIANS could soon be paid for spotting crimes happening on the other side of the world. British company Internet Eyes will offer a reward of up to $1740 to people who detect shoplifting and other crimes on a network of UK security cameras. Subscribers will watch live footage over the internet on their home computers. The company believes the different time zones made Australia the ideal location for detecting night-time crime in the UK.

Rep. Al O'Brien, D-Mountlake Terrace, a retired Seattle police sergeant, has sponsored a bill to look into the possibility of surgically implanting tracking devices in sex offenders who have been released to the community. His proposal, embodied in House Bill 1142, would hire the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs to see whether implanting "subcutaneous" radio frequency identification devices could be used economically to keep an eye on offenders. The group would report back to the Legislature in December. That RFID technology is what the state uses on the Narrows Bridge to electronically collect tolls from motorist. It's that...

Checks will be made on all children to identify potential criminals under a further extension of the "surveillance state" announced by Tony Blair today. A Downing Street review of law and order policy also called for greater use of sophisticated CCTV, an expanded DNA database and "instant justice" powers for police. The review is intended to chart a course ahead for the next 10 years by focusing more "on the offender, not the offence." Most crime is committed by a small number of prolific offenders who could be identified almost from birth, ministers believe. After 10 years concentrating on tougher...

Those familiar with the political scene know the unexpected is often expected, and March 2 was an example of that when opponents to the National Animal Identification System (NAIS) and Trans-Texas Corridor (TTC) marched to the state Capitol in Austin. The event included people from all over Texas, either walking or riding one of the many horses, tractors, or flat-bed trailers. The march included a woman with a caged chicken on the head, children enjoying the excitement, and plenty of signs that ranged from “Don’t Tag Texas” to “Think green ... not pavement.” One person in the parade was NAIS...

Tommy Thompson Gets Chip Implant Implanted microchips are getting a plug from a heavy hitter - former Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson. Thompson plans to promote a product made by his new company � a medical info chip � by having one implanted in his arm. "It doesn't cause any pain," Thompson told Paul Bedard, who writes the Washington Whispers column in U.S. News & World Report. The chip is made by Florida-based VeriChip, which recently added Thompson to its board of directors. The rice-size chip contains a 16-digit identification code that can be scanned at hospitals and...