Coalition Urges Congress to Make Patriot Act Surveillance Information Public

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WASHINGTON, D.C. March 18, 2019—Today New America’s Open Technology Institute joined a coalition of 39 civil liberties organizations in calling on the House Judiciary Committee to hold public hearings and seek important information regarding surveillance conducted under the Patriot Act. The groups also called on Congress to end the Section 215 call detail records program, through which the NSA can obtain the records of Americans’ calls and text messages. The coalition urged that before Congress can consider reauthorization of Section 215 and the two other provisions of the Patriot Act that are set to expire in December 2019, it is critical that the Committee conduct vigorous oversight and make more information available to the public.

The coalition’s letter specifically requests that the House Judiciary Committee should:

  • Seek and make public information about what policies, if any, under the Patriot Act, have been implemented to prevent discriminatory targeting based upon race, religion, or political views;
  • Seek and make public information regarding the extent to which surveillance conducted under the Patriot Act may have resulted in the collection of information regarding the exercise of First Amendment protected activities;
  • Press the NSA to disclose whether it has ended the Section 215 call detail records program, and demand further explanations from the Intelligence Community regarding operation of that program; in particular, the Intelligence Community should comply with the requirement under the USA Freedom Act that it report the number of “unique identifiers” (unique accounts, persons, or devices) that have been collected under the Section 215 call detail records program and explain why the narrower call detail records program has continued to collect vast quantities of information;
  • Seek and make public information about whether the government has provided notice to criminal defendants regarding the use of Section 215 to obtain information related to their cases;
  • Press the Intelligence Community to explain how, if at all, the Section 215 call detail records program has been effective…

Continue reading at yubanet.com HERE.

Justices: Admission of warrantless cell location data was harmless

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By Olivia Covington, March 8, 2019.

Even though law enforcement conducted a warrantless Fourth Amendment search when they accessed of a man’s cellphone location data, the admission of the data does not warrant a new trial because any error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt, the Indiana Supreme Court ruled Friday, upholding a man’s four convictions in a case heard on remand from the U.S. Supreme Court.

In a unanimous opinion authored by Chief Justice Loretta Rush, the state’s high court upheld Marcus Zanders’ convictions of two counts of robbery with a deadly weapon and two counts of unlawful possession of a firearm by a serious violent felon in Marcus Zanders v. State of Indiana, 15S01-1611-CR-571.

The justices had previously upheld Zanders’ liquor-store-robbery-related convictions in May 2017, when they ruled police could obtain cellphone location data without a warrant. But after the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Carpenter v. United States, 585 U.S. —-, 138 S. Ct. 2206 (2018), the case was remanded to the Indiana high court for reconsideration. Carpenter held that the third-party doctrine did not apply to seven days or more of historical cell-site location information, or CSLI, so law enforcement must get a search warrant to obtain those records.

The Indiana Court of Appeals reached a similar holding in overturning Zanders’ convictions in May 2016. Zanders’ CSLI had been admitted over his objection at his trial, but a divided COA determined law enforcement should have obtained a warrant before obtaining the location data…

Continue reading at TheIndianaLawyer.com HERE.

Apple’s Anti–Snooping System Would Prevent Government Surveillance

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Mani Teja,  Mar 12, 2019

Apple has started to develop anti-snooping technology. The primary purpose of this new tech is to stop the government forces from tracking iPhone users’ location or reading any personal messages. The smartphone giant has patented a way to cypher the mobile signals that are sent between their users’ phones and mobile towers, to protect the users from the eyes of authorities.

As The Telegraph reports it, the innovation would obstruct the use of “Stingray” boxes, which act as mobile phone masts. These boxes can track locations of users or even listen to personal calls.

Stingrays are also sometimes called IMSI catchers. The police forces in the UK have been know to use them, but it’s not entirely clear how often. A stingray fools mobile phones by acting like a cellular phone tower to which the phones connect. As a result, the device can track down a phone’s location and also eavesdrop on calls or messages…

Continue reading at mactrast.com HERE

5G phones are here but don’t rush to upgrade

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This year’s Mobile World Congress — the CES for Android device makers — was awash with 5G handsets.

The world’s No.1 smartphone seller by marketshare, Samsung, got out ahead with a standalone launch event in San Francisco, showing off two 5G devices, just before fast-following Android rivals popped out their own 5G phones at launch events across Barcelona this week.

We’ve rounded up all these 5G handset launches here. Prices range from an eye-popping $2,600 for Huawei’s foldable phabet-to-tablet Mate X — and an equally eye-watering $1,980 for Samsung’s Galaxy Fold; another 5G handset that bends — to a rather more reasonable $680 for Xiaomi’s Mi Mix 3 5G, albeit the device is otherwise mid-tier. Other prices for 5G phones announced this week remain tbc.

Android OEMs are clearly hoping the hype around next-gen mobile networks can work a little marketing magic and kick-start stalled smartphone growth. Especially with reports suggesting Apple won’t launch a 5G iPhone until at least next year. So 5G is a space Android OEMs alone get to own for a while.

Chipmaker Qualcomm, which is embroiled in a bitter patent battle with Apple, was also on stage in Barcelona to support Xiaomi’s 5G phone launch — loudly claiming the next-gen tech is coming fast and will enhance “everything”.

“We like to work with companies like Xiaomi to take risks,” lavished Qualcomm’s president Cristiano Amon upon his hosts, using 5G uptake to jibe at Apple by implication. “When we look at the opportunity ahead of us for 5G we see an opportunity to create winners.”

Despite the heavy hype, Xiaomi’s on stage demo — which it claimed was the first live 5G video call outside China — seemed oddly staged and was not exactly lacking in latency.

“Real 5G — not fake 5G!” finished Donovan Sung, the Chinese OEM’s director of product management. As a 5G sales pitch it was all very underwhelming. Much more ‘so what’ than ‘must have’….

Continue reading at TechCrunh.com HERE

Force Your iPhone to Switch Cell Towers for a Stronger Signal

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By Matt Milano, 08/28/18

Having a dropped call can be incredibly frustrating, especially when you look down and see that your iPhone has full reception. While there’s any number of issues that can cause this, one common and often overlooked issue is your iPhone failing to switch cell towers as appropriately needed.

When you’re not switched to the appropriate tower, it means there’s a problem with the communication between your smartphone and cellular network. Either your iPhone tries to hold its connection to a cell tower that’s well outside the optimal range or the new cell tower is already overloaded with other connected devices.

How Cell Phones Switch Towers

Cell phones work with networks to determine the best tower to connect to based on range, signal strength, and the frequency being used. When a phone is connected to a cellular network, it continually checks the signal strength of nearby towers and communicates that information to the network. In theory, when a phone’s connection to a cell tower drops below signal strength of a nearby one, the network should switch the phone to the new tower.

Practically, however, this doesn’t always occur as smoothly as it should and common fixes, such as cycling Airplane Mode, don’t always work. While using the “Reset Network Settings” option will always work, it’s a drastic step that will also erase any saved Wi-Fi login credentials. Fortunately, there’s another simple way to force your iPhone to switch towers…

Continue reading at GadgetHacks.com HERE