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U.S. Justice Department Accused of Using Fake Cell Towers on Planes to Gather Data From Phones

danielsutton said:
Law enforcement agencies still need to get court warrants before they can conduct this kind of surveillance, so it is not like our constitutional rights are being violated.
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You are correct. After a warrant is issued from a local judge, these devices are loaded with typically the IMEI number of a cell phone a suspect is known to have in their person in regular use.

The DRT box then flies over a metropolitan area to find this IMEI number. While the diagram shows a small single engine plane, many police helicopters can have this equipment.

When a match is found, the cell phone is triangulated on via the nearby towers and a GPS location is generated. Then the Barney's on the ground get the APB's and description.

However, what they say about them vs. effectiveness is an issue. Triangulating in an urban canyon is not that accurate and many kingpins go through cell phones like tissue paper to avoid this very situation.

Wonder if there have been situations where Barney found the phone but it was a used one sold to someone else with no idea of the previous owner history. There are many iPhones out there with third and forth owners now.
 
eternalife said:
Privacy issues aside - What I don't understand is why we communicate things like this. If this is truly to 'catch the bad guys' why on earth do we put this out there.

Hey bad guy - here is the technology we are using and where we are using it. Here is how it works and what we do with the data. Nothing to see here, don't mind us.
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Because bad guys don't have SAMs to shoot down every Cessna airplane out there?

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CFreymarc said:
You are correct. After a warrant is issued from a local judge, these devices are loaded with typically the IMEI number of a cell phone a suspect is known to have in their person in regular use.

The DRT box then flies over a metropolitan area to find this IMEI number. While the diagram shows a small single engine plane, many police helicopters can have this equipment.

When a match is found, the cell phone is triangulated on via the nearby towers and a GPS location is generated. Then the Barney's on the ground get the APB's and description.

However, what they say about them vs. effectiveness is an issue. Triangulating in an urban canyon is not that accurate and many kingpins go through cell phones like tissue paper to avoid this very situation.

Wonder if there have been situations where Barney found the phone but it was a used one sold to someone else with no idea of the previous owner history. There are many iPhones out there with third and forth owners now.
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Yep!
My 9 year old daughter gave my old one to my 6 year old daughter, who gave it to my 5 year old son. 4 owners on that one!
 
ThunderSkunk said:
As if I needed more reason to become a luddite.
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Plenty of virgin forest in the middle of America to live in. Hobo'ing is making a big comeback.

Then there are those who complained that Victorian era public gas lighting was too much government interference since it illuminated one's home front removing their evening privacy of the dark.
 
foofan said:
our enemies don't have borders anymore. if it means capturing the next terrorist and their cell, go for it. I'm not doing anything wrong, so i'm not worried
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So addicted to technology and shiny phones that you let the government spy on you, and you THANK them for doing it.

Too bad for you you were born in the wrong time period, the nazis were already defeated.
 
Condemned to repeat

foofan said:
our enemies don't have borders anymore. if it means capturing the next terrorist and their cell, go for it. I'm not doing anything wrong, so i'm not worried
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Our education system has failed you. Before WW2, Germany had constitutionally protected free speech. Then the government started deeming certain types of speech dangerous. All of a sudden, people who hadn't been doing anything wrong had reason to worry.

The whole point of rights (including privacy) is to protect them BEFORE you need them.
 
wigby said:
What kind of a warrant covers the scanning of thousands of phones and recording data? When you wiretap someone legally, you must specify who and why.
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jeblis said:
The problem is that this surveillance is overly broad. It tracks all cell phones in an area. There needs to be protections that this can only be used on a specific phone with a specific court order.
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Why would a warrant be needed? This is about people voluntarily broadcasting their location using FCC licensed devices on Federally regulated radio frequencies. If your phone is on, you are broadcasting on public airwaves an unencrypted cell phone ID.

If you broadcast an identifiable radio signal, any radio amateur or electronics engineer (as well as the FCC, FBI, etc.) can build some antennas and RF receivers to triangulate your position, and without searching you or entering your private property.

If you don't want to be tracked, put your phone in Airplane mode (and, for the tin-foil-hat types, power it off and put it in a Faraday envelope.)
 
richardsonrs said:
Since I am not doing anything wrong there is no need for that.. see how that works? Without probable cause they can't do that. With probable cause they can anyway whether you like it or not so...
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Your naivety is a wondrous sight to behold. The authorities would of course never falsely claim probable cause. Perhaps not in your own sphere of experience but in many others', the authorities regularly lie and cheat and falsify evidence and statements.
 
firewood said:
Why would a warrant be needed? This is about people voluntarily broadcasting their location using FCC licensed devices on Federally regulated radio frequencies. If your phone is on, you are broadcasting on public airwaves an unencrypted cell phone ID.

If you broadcast an identifiable radio signal, any radio amateur or electronics engineer (as well as the FCC, FBI, etc.) can build some antennas and RF receivers to triangulate your position, and without searching you or entering your private property.

If you don't want to be tracked, put your phone in Airplane mode (and, for the tin-foil-hat types, power it off and put it in a Faraday envelope.)
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You could make the same argument about the cops catching ALL your data.

You could even make the same argument about the cops putting a gps on every car in America. If they're out in public, then they're broadcasting their position to the world anyway, right?

Well guess what, the cops need a warrant to GPS your car. And they should.

Put another way, why can't a private individual legally spoof a cell tower? So why would you think the cops should be able to? Rhetorical questions.

4th amendment, look it up before it disappears because of people like you.
 
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firewood said:
Why would a warrant be needed? This is about people voluntarily broadcasting their location using FCC licensed devices on Federally regulated radio frequencies. If your phone is on, you are broadcasting on public airwaves an unencrypted cell phone ID.

If you broadcast an identifiable radio signal, any radio amateur or electronics engineer (as well as the FCC, FBI, etc.) can build some antennas and RF receivers to triangulate your position, and without searching you or entering your private property.

If you don't want to be tracked, put your phone in Airplane mode (and, for the tin-foil-hat types, power it off and put it in a Faraday envelope.)
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Agreed, and to be honest, all that they would need to do is get a judge to sign their name on a subpoena to the phone companies who own the tower, and that is all the approval they need to conduct this.

This is the equivalent of panning for gold, while throwing out the gems, silver, and platinum that is the rest of our information.

BL.
 
elvisimprsntr said:
As long as they have a court issued search warrant for a specific cell phone, then any information "inadvertantly" collected would therefore be inadmissable in court as it would have been illegally obtained. If it keeps criminals off the streets, I don't see a problem with it.
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and from previous leaks we all know how well they work. Rubber Stamping at its best
 
kalex said:
and from previous leaks we all know how well they work. Rubber Stamping at its best
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Assuming they even bother to get judicial approval for spying. The DOJ is an agency for itself, not for the people of the U.S. They would much rather fool and arrest 1000 innocent people and toss them in prison than find 1 real terrorist and arrest him/her/it. The innocent people won't have the resources to fight false charges and the terrorists know better than to use cell phones that can be tracked to them.
 
bradl said:
Agreed, and to be honest, all that they would need to do is get a judge to sign their name on a subpoena to the phone companies who own the tower, and that is all the approval they need to conduct this.

This is the equivalent of panning for gold, while throwing out the gems, silver, and platinum that is the rest of our information.

BL.
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If that's all they need to do, and it is as easy as you make it out to be, then why don't they just get the warrant?

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aaronvan said:
And Net Neutrality will prevent it.
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No it won't, you seem to be in the wrong thread.
 
wilycoder said:
You could make the same argument about the cops catching ALL your data.

You could even make the same argument about the cops putting a gps on every car in America. If they're out in public, then they're broadcasting their position to the world anyway, right?

Well guess what, the cops need a warrant to GPS your car. And they should.

Put another way, why can't a private individual legally spoof a cell tower? So why would you think the cops should be able to? Rhetorical questions.
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I think you are referring to United States v. Jones. The S.Ct's decision was more narrowly constructed that that. It only held that gov't installed GPS devices required a warrant. It specifically did not decide whether a warrant was required for GPS data from a factory installed devices. So this is still very much a gray area of the law.
 
wilycoder said:
If that's all they need to do, and it is as easy as you make it out to be, then why don't they just get the warrant?
No it won't, you seem to be in the wrong thread.
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Because getting a warrant narrows it down to a specific person and intent on that person. The warrant also has to show probable cause and be presented to the person they are trying to get the data from. That means they would have to serve said person with the warrant before conducting any gathering of information. Also, any extraneous information they collect and keep would be grounds for a 4th amendment violation of the people whose information they have (read: illegal search and seizure).

This way, they get the judge to sign a subpoena to be presented to the phone companies (who are the third party in this process), get the data that way, and bypass all issues with warrants and the 4th Amendment altogether.

There is a separate thread on how they do this in this section of the forum that I started a year ago regarding your data versus the 4th Amendment. Well worth the read.

BL.
 
I have no problem with this. We've been monitored forever so if they wanted to do something specific to any citizen, it would have been done by now. I see nothing wrong with it in the era or terrorism. Its getting closer and closer to home so what ever it takes to protect my family, I'm okay with it.

Heck they could have even given an announcement written and auditory stating that if cell phones or transmitting devices are used during flights, data shall be monitored to ensure safety of the flight.
 
Until you are one of those people that are accused of doing something wrong.

foofan said:
our enemies don't have borders anymore. if it means capturing the next terrorist and their cell, go for it. I'm not doing anything wrong, so i'm not worried
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Would they be able to pick up a Sat Phone? Since it's not using cellular. Or is it grabbing all RF?
 
"the only thing we have to fear is fear itself - nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror" FDR
 
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