The Washington Post finds that a majority of Americans don’t see the NSA data mining of domestic calls as a major threat to their privacy. That is, quite honestly, surprising. It’s one thing to have a narrowly targeted program that tries to uncover the connections between known al-Qaeda associates and others. It’s another thing to engage in surveillance of random American citizens. Yes, the contents of calls are not analyzed, but one would think there would be more of a backlash against this broad surveillance of the average Joe.
The new survey found that 63 percent of Americans said they found the NSA program to be an acceptable way to investigate terrorism, including 44 percent who strongly endorsed the effort. Another 35 percent said the program was unacceptable, which included 24 percent who strongly objected to it.
A slightly larger majority–66 percent–said they would not be bothered if NSA collected records of personal calls they had made, the poll found.
I admit to being conflicted about this program. I had few problems with the earlier NSA wiretapping as that was narrowly constructed to go after people with plausible ties to terrorists. The vast majority of people aren’t going to get calls from Pakistan from al-Qaeda suspects, so the total impact on the average citizen is minimal to non-existent. This program, however, effects nearly everyone, and as a former Verizon customer, that means my records have been given to the NSA. Granted, I’m not in the habit of calling Mohammad al-Qaeda in Karachi, but there still is something slightly worrisome about expanding our surveillance culture that far.
What are the possible benefits of such a program? Well, for one, this kind of aggregate data analysis can help reveal terrorist networks – but there is always the question of accuracy. How much value is this evidence as opposed to the standard NSA international/domestic wiretaps we already have heard about? Is such a broad program really accurate enough and truly able to provide timely intelligence that could stop a terrorist attack? I have my doubts, although the NSA undoubtedly has technology and software that’s significantly more advanced that what’s publicly known.
As Power Line points out, these records are hardly sacrosanct as it is – Ma Bell knows who you’ve been talking to, and their information security is a lot less stringent than the CIA. We’re all at the mercy of our phone company’s privacy policy, and they can and do share their information internally and even sometimes with third parties. If one wants to have absolute privacy when calling someone, it simply doesn’t exist. Your call is logged somewhere, and AT&T is hardly more trustworthy than Uncle Sam.
The IRS knows who we are, where we live, who employs us, how much we make, what we’ve purchased, and has ruined the lives of many innocent people. The chances of the NSA being anywhere near as cavalier with their data is much smaller – and chances are the NSA data is processed in an electronic system that only looks at the data in the aggregate. Arguing that the government shouldn’t breach our privacy when the government already knows damn near everything about ourselves as it is seems more than a little disingenuous. If the Congress wishes to restrict what data the NSA can collect in the name of national security, how about restricting the massive violations of privacy at the IRS at the same time. The difference between the two is while the IRS’ violations are arguably worse, the NSA makes a more tempting political issue for both sides.
In the end, the violation of privacy here isn’t all that bad. Phone call logs aren’t sacrosanct pieces of data, and we already trust the phone company with them as it is. Unfortunately, by leaking this program, it’s ensured that terrorists now know even more about our national security infrastructure and will change their tactics accordingly. It is quite clear that this information leak has once again compromised our national security and made it more difficult for this country to fight terrorism.
Seems kind of silly that a poll has been administered and released less than 24 hours after the story broke. Hard to give it much credibility before the story gets a chance to circulate and marinate for a few days. Nonetheless, I suspect an unhealthy amount of Americans, perhaps a plurality, will support Gestapo government “saving us from ourselves” by whatever means necessary, privacy be damned. Keep in mind, however, that these are the same people throwing property rights to the wind and supporting the enactment of smoking bans in bars, and mandating changes of recipes for our favorites entrees and snacks. Are any of these developments healthy to a “free society”?
That is true, although I suspect that the results won’t change all that much.
Except this is more a case of “saving us from people who have sworn to kill as many of us as possible”. There’s a much more compelling interest there than there is in banning smoking in bars, etc. The government’s first responsibility is the safety of the people, especially from foreign threats.
And I suspect that the people who support NSA wiretaps aren’t the same people who want to ban smoking in bars and soda in schools – in fact, I’d gather it’s quite the opposite.
That’s a question that’s worth asking – and even I’m a bit disturbed by how much information the NSA is collecting and how valuable it really is in winning this war – even though I’m not at all surprised to learn that the NSA is collecting it.
“That is true, although I suspect that the results won’t change all that much”
After all the arguments are made in the week ahead, I suspect the mood will be more along the lines of 50-50.
“And I suspect that the people who support NSA wiretaps aren’t the same people who want to ban smoking in bars and soda in schools – in fact, I’d gather it’s quite the opposite.”
There wouldn’t be complete overlap, but from conversations I’ve had, those willing to sacrifice liberty in the name of security are pretty consistent in their anti-personal freedom worldview.
I don’t really understand the hubbub. The phone company already has these records, going back years and years. They do the same kind of data mining all the time, except they use it to see if your calling patterns fit into one of their service plans. I fairly certain that there is no legal right to privacy on a telephone call, though that is an aside in this situation because this one is not dealing with actual call content. Merely who called what number and when, and what numbers called certain other numbers. I can see that this data could be used to fight both terrorism and crime; the government now knows who your “friends and family” are, to borrow one of MCI’s slogans. But the phone companies have had this ability for decades. So has NSA I’m sure. Are people’s objections based on an actual new erosion of freedom – couched in terms of their concept of privacy rights- or because they’re suddenly had it pointed out to them? I would not bet against the truth being that this has been going on for at least 20 years.