Stingray Gives LAPD Power To Spy On Non-Suspects' Phones

By Cornelius Nunev


Civilian surveillance is alive and well, due to regional terrorism inspections mandated by the Patriot Act. According to L.A. Weekly, the most recent threat to an individual's privacy and liberty is a real-time cellphone spy gadget called StingRay. While meant for intercepting terrorist transmissions, reports suggest that the LA Police Department used StingRay 21 times in a four-month duration of 2012 for routine inspections, where non-suspects' private communications were exposed, unknowingly to the court system. Call it collateral damage, as the non-suspects lived near individuals the LAPD thought were terrorists. Better yet, call it collateral erosion of the individual privileges of complacent citizens.

Calls not private

StingRay technology has been used since 2006 by the LAPD. LAPD officials have not made any comment about whether or not it has the legal right to use the technology in inappropriate ways, but it has been using it in many cases, such as murder, drug and burglary investigations. The LAPD was only intended to use StingRay cellular phone technology for terrorism investigations, but certainly it did not just do that. Between June and Sept of last year, there were 155 StingRay cellular phone investigation cases, and 13 percent of them listened in on calls for non-suspects.

The First Amendment Coalition executive director Peter Scheer does not think the LAPD should be able to use this kind of technology. It is pretty much extremely hard to avoid intercepting other people with the StingRay technology, according to those who use the technology, but the LAPD manuals do not even make it clear whether or not this is unlawful.

Regulators getting around regulations

Civic privileges activists do not like the StingRay technology because it used to be that authorities had to get permission before they could use technology such as it. Now, authorities can carry around the StingRay technology and use it in secret if they want to.

How should StingRay fit in with privacy laws?

At this juncture, there's still a fantastic deal of disagreement over StingRay's place amongst privacy regulations. The sophistication of the technology has put it ahead of the judicial curve, and American Civil Liberties Union attorneys like Linda Lye see StingRay as something that demands legal reassessment, as the potential for privacy violations is tremendous.



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