City Is Amassing Trove of Cellphone Logs

City Is Amassing Trove of Cellphone Logs

www.nytimes.com

When a cellphone is reported stolen in New York, the Police Department routinely subpoenas the phone’s call records, from the day of the theft onward. The logic is simple: If a thief uses the phone, a list of incoming and outgoing calls could lead to the suspect.

But in the process, the Police Department has quietly amassed a trove of telephone logs, all obtained without a court order, that could conceivably be used for any investigative purpose.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Is New York a testing gound for a Police State? (or am I just paranoid?)

These lists are of non-criminal phone activities, but what if you get a wrong number that happens to be connected to a crime. Does that mean you'll have to answer qestions to the police? Worse yet "what if" your number pops up in a connection with a terror group?

Is this system realy going to justify an investigation in to personal activities, and what happens with this information after the data is recorded. Who else is going to be using it?

www.nytimes.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

If the capability exists then it will be utilized for a number of things, it's human nature. I think we should all go back to smoke signals, it's a much more secure form of communication

I live in Canada. Have no idea if this is isolated to NYC or happens all over. I know cops ask for records when investigating murder, etc. But this just doesn't seem right to me. *holds onto my phone for dear life

new york is a testing ground to see what cops can get away with. However, in this case it just seems like the police found a loop hole in the law after the fact and are just using it to their advantage. It really isn't that sinister. But yeah. they should amend a law or two to prevent the abuse of such loopholes.

You know, the more the NYPD and others try to become their own little versions of the National Security Agency the more I chuckle softly and see them as less a threat than they otherwise may become with intrusive intelligence files.

An agency with a room full of records and files on individual people scare me. An agency with a WAREHOUSE full of that data just gives me amusement at their own belief that they can be effective. There is something to the concept of diminishing returns and NYPD is well on the road to getting there. Like the NSA in terrorism, the problem hasn't been a LACK of information for many years. Even 9/11 showed how clear it was looking back into the late 1990's for what they were doing....in hindsight.

When they collect an ocean of data, one thimble at a time, they need people to get that data back OUT in a useful form....one thimble at a time. ...and so, become a victim of their own overwhelming success. Let them keep collecting. The more the better. The faster they amass that ocean, the faster we can watch them become ineffecrtive by it and drown in the sea of data. ..just like the NSA has.

reply to post by Guyfriday


Do not worry brother. Terror groups are only a figment of your imagination. Live your life by your internal compass and keep your head up.

They don't need to use cell phone records as direct evidence in court. Historically recon evidence recovered from broken codes was always backed up with a second source of evidence. For example messages coded in the German enigma cipher were routinely broken by the British at Bletchley park. Messages that indicated something like a troop build up at a given location would trigger a second surveillance flight by a visible recon plane so the Germans would not get suspicious that their network had been compromised.

A couple of things seem off putting:

As a result, three detectives said in interviews, the phone companies’ response sometimes includes call records for not only the stolen phone, but also the victim’s new phone, depending on variables like how quickly the victim transfers the old phone number to a new handset and how many days of calls the subpoena seeks.

So the phone companies are just handing over not only your old phones activaties, but also your activaties on your new phone?

If my phone was taken and I report it stolen, then my phone company can just hand over all of my calling records? (whats to stop a person[like an authority figure] from taking the phone just so that my call records can get pulled?[say I didn't vote for so-and-so who got elected, can they do this to see who else didn't vote for them?])

In interviews, detectives said that if an arrest occurs, it is often a result of earlier investigative steps. Chief Pulaski’s memos from Sept. 28 instruct detectives to use any tracking or location application on the victim’s phone to track down a suspect. Victims are asked to immediately call the phone carrier and learn the details of any phone calls placed after the theft. In addition, detectives ask the victim not to transfer their phone number to a new phone for about four days. Finally, detectives are then required to prepare a subpoena, the results of which usually take a few weeks.

The end of the story doesn't add up either. If a victim of thieft is to call the phone company after calling the police and learn anything about their stolen phone activaties, then why does the police need this data base? I'm sure it can be useful, but having a networked system that can track and connect phone numbers seems too "Big Brotherish".

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000
You know, the more the NYPD and others try to become their own little versions of the National Security Agency the more I chuckle softly and see them as less a threat than they otherwise may become with intrusive intelligence files.

An agency with a room full of records and files on individual people scare me. An agency with a WAREHOUSE full of that data just gives me amusement at their own belief that they can be effective. There is something to the concept of diminishing returns and NYPD is well on the road to getting there. Like the NSA in terrorism, the problem hasn't been a LACK of information for many years. Even 9/11 showed how clear it was looking back into the late 1990's for what they were doing....in hindsight.

When they collect an ocean of data, one thimble at a time, they need people to get that data back OUT in a useful form....one thimble at a time.

...and so, become a victim of their own overwhelming success. Let them keep collecting. The more the better. The faster they amass that ocean, the faster we can watch them become ineffecrtive by it and drown in the sea of data. ..just like the NSA has.

It's like your picturing "TOP MEN" from "Raiders of the Lost Ark", but I'm looking at the American Policy Institute from the TV show "Rubicon".

My issue isn't that all this data is getting stored, but rather who is going to have access to all this data.

As you pointed out the more information gets stored, the less likely they are to easily access it. Which also means that if a person was using this data for personal reasons, then they wouldn't be as easily caught since the amount of data being collected is that vast.

SO - this prompts me to ask the question:
"Who would report their cell phone stolen in New York after reading this story in the Times?"

Me - I'd rather just get a replacement from the cell carrier and be done with it!

ganjoa

reply to post by Guyfriday


There is a very simple explanation that will clear the story and all the actions of the companies and law enforcement up.

You are the criminal the state is the victim.

Doesnt matter what you have or have not done. You exist in the land of the state and are therefore under suspicion.