Thousands of Verizon users across the United States reported having little or no cellphone service on Monday morning in major cities, including in Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, New York and Phoenix and across a swath of the Midwest.
Woke up from my nap to see ‘SOS’ on my iPhone. I’ve never seen that before, so did an internet search for ‘iPhone SOS’. Good thing I still have a home phone.
For decades, the government has used the Third Party Doctrine to obtain massive amounts of phone records without a warrant.
Even prior to the creation of the Third Party Doctrine by the Supreme Court in 1979, government agencies were obtaining phone records using pen register requests that provided them with info on numbers called and the length of the calls. This method, however, required the government to supply some information of its own: specifically, a targeted source phone number phone companies could use to search for call metadata.
Ron Wyden Wants To Know Why The DEA Still Has On-Demand Access To Trillions Of Phone Records
The new policy for the service formerly known as Twitter says it will use collected biometric data for ‘safety, security, and identification purposes.’
X wants permission to start collecting your biometric data and employment history
Related:
The Coming Fight Over American Surveillance
But no threat of any kind is required to conduct surveillance under Section 702. The law permits surveillance of any foreigner abroad, as long as a significant purpose of the surveillance is to acquire “foreign intelligence information.” FISA defines this term extremely broadly to include any “information related to . . . the conduct of U.S. foreign affairs.” A conversation between friends about whether the United States should do more to support Ukraine would justify surveillance under this definition.
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EARN IT Act Is Back, And It’s Still Terribly Destructive
Related:
The STOP CSAM Act Is An Anti-Encryption Stalking Horse
So: In addition to opening the door to civil and/or criminal liability for E2EE services without ever mentioning the word “encryption” (as explained above), STOP CSAM is trying to lay the groundwork for justifying a later bill to more overtly ban providers from offering E2EE at all.
by John W. Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead | June 01, 2022
America, meet your new dictator-in-chief.
As the New York Times reports, “Newly disclosed documents have shed a crack of light on secret executive branch plans for apocalyptic scenarios—like the aftermath of a nuclear attack—when the president may activate wartime powers for national security emergencies.”< The problem, of course, is that we have become a nation in a permanent state of emergency. Power-hungry and lawless, the government has weaponized one national crisis after another in order to expand its powers and justify all manner of government tyranny in the so-called name of national security. The seeds of this present madness were sown almost two decades ago when George W. Bush stealthily issued two presidential directives that granted the president the power to unilaterally declare a national emergency, which is loosely defined as “any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions.”
America, Meet Your New Dictator-in-Chief: The President’s Secret, Unchecked Powers
Missing Links/Links Behind Paywalls:
Secret Emergency Orders May Include Focus on Internet, New Files Show
Report: Military may have to quell domestic violence from economic collapse
Known Unknowns: Unconventional “Strategic Shocks” in Defense Strategy Development (PDF)
End the Imperial Presidency Before It’s Too Late
Too Much Presidential Power — We’ve Got to Address the ‘Unitary Executive’ Question
Ms. Cat’s Chronicles 
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