CDR: U.S. Leads Global Snooping Drive

[David Honig]

Friday September 22 1:38 PM ET
     U.S. Leads Global Snooping Drive -
     Report 

     By Jim Wolf

     WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States has led a
     worldwide drive to build the groundwork for expanded
     snooping in the digital era, two civil rights groups alleged
     in a new survey.

     The Electronic Privacy Information Center and Privacy
     International highlighted what they called a push led by the
     U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation toward
     wiretap-friendly international communications standards.

     Washington also has sought to curb the development and
     sale of hardware and software featuring strong encryption,
     the communications-scrambling know how aimed at
     securing data from prying eyes, the survey said.

     ``The U.S. government has led a worldwide effort to limit
     individual privacy and enhance the capability of its police
     and intelligence services to eavesdrop on personal
     conversations,'' the report, ``Privacy & Human Rights
     2000,'' said.

     The survey, to be released next week at a privacy
     conference in Venice, Italy, said FBI (news - web sites)
     Director Louis Freeh had nudged countries such as
     Hungary and the Czech Republic to expand wiretapping.

     FBI spokesman Steven Berry said the bureau was
     reserving comment on the report. In the early 1990s, it
     spearheaded what became the 1994 Communications
     Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA), which
     requires telecommunications equipment makers to leave
     their gear open to wiretaps.

     U.S. authorities argued they needed such a law to keep up
     with criminals using sophisticated technology to dodge
     court-authorized surveillance.

     ``When the FBI was lobbying for CALEA in the United
     States, it also began working with the Justice and Interior
     ministers of the European Union toward creating
     international technical standards for wiretapping,'' the
     report said.

     It also cited the FBI's recently disclosed ``Carnivore''
     e-mail surveillance system, used with court orders to scan
     an Internet service provider's traffic for communications to
     and from a criminal suspect.

     Quoting unnamed Russian computer security experts, the
     report said U.S. officials had advised Moscow on
     implementation of such network surveillance systems.

     Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma, in turn, had proposed
     requiring Internet service providers to install surveillance
     devices based on a Russian system, the report said.

     David Banisar, a Washington lawyer who is chief author
     of the survey, said the United States had pressed Japan to
     adopt its first laws allowing wiretapping. In addition, it
     had been promoting surveillance through the G-7 group of
     the largest industrialized nations plus Russia, the report
     said.

     Banisar, in a telephone interview, said one result of U.S.
     policy had been to make it easier for repressive countries
     to maintain control over their citizens.

     ``And it also increases the amount of illegal wiretapping
     going on by making it technically easier,'' he said.
     Separately, the report detailed what is known about
     Echelon, the reported code name for a
     communications-interception system said to be operated
     by intelligence agencies in Britain, Canada, Australia,
     New Zealand and coordinated by the U.S. National
     Security Agency.

     ``The creation of a seamless international intelligence and
     law enforcement surveillance system has resulted in the
     potential for a huge international network that may, in
     practice, negate current rules and regulations prohibiting
     domestic communications surveillance by national
     intelligence agencies,'' it said.