March 23, 2007 | Comments: (0)
Scary Article for Small IT Companies
The Washington Post (the only national daily in which I've ever had my byline) just ran a frightening and outrageous story, written anonymously, from the chief exec of a small US IT company. Seems this person received a "National Security Letter" from the FBI.
Over 140,000 of these letters have been sent out over the last few years, and they seem to follow the same pattern: (1) They want detailed and confidential information on one or more of the letter-recipient's clients. (2) They haven't be approved or even seen by a judge. (3) They carry a gag order saying the letter recipient can't discuss the client, the information request or even the fact that the they received the letter under penalty of criminal prosecution. Hence the anonymous publishing.
Whoever wrote this article took the gutsy road--didn't turn over the information and contacted the ACLU instead. The article details the years (still ongoing and the original letter was received three years ago) he/she has lived with this fight against a government behemoth that looks to be systematically abusing the powers it was granted under the Patriot Act.
See, this stuff tends to get worse before it gets better.
(via Slashdot)
Posted by Oliver Rist on March 23, 2007 07:59 AM
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He makes it all too complicated. I received one of these letters several years ago. I simply told them I could not provide the information they were seeking without a subpoena. Several weeks later they provided me a subpoena.
Since the request had been judicially reviewed, I sent them the information they were looking for. No big deal. No need to make a federal case out of it with the ACLU. However, the letter did portray the situation to appear that they expected a response without the necessity of a judge.
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