Boston Cops buy Stingray Spy Stuff—Spending Secret Budget

Police all over the nation are using IMSI catchers—such as the infamous Stingray device—to surveil suspects. For example, Boston police spent over $600K in 2019 from a hidden budget (despite Stingray use being effectively illegal in Massachusetts).

It’s not your tax dollars at work, so you aren’t allowed to know about it. Using “civil asset forfeiture” dollars seems entirely undemocratic. And the FBI wants the use of Stingrays to be a secret, too.

Shame about that, because the ACLU is off to court. In today’s SB Blogwatch, we plead the fifth (and the fourth).

Your humble blogwatcher curated these bloggy bits for your entertainment. Not to mention: All Toad wants.

Evil Twin Paid For by …

What’s the craic? Shannon Dooling, Christine Willmsen and Saurabh Datar report—“Boston police bought spy tech with a pot of money hidden from the public”:

Violation of the Fourth Amendment
Across the country, some law enforcement agencies have deployed controversial surveillance technology to track cell phone location and use. Critics say it threatens constitutional rights. … Elected officials and the public were largely kept in the dark when Boston police spent $627,000 on this equipment.

Also known as a “Stingray,” the cell site simulator purchased by Boston police acts like a commercial cell phone tower, tricking nearby phones into connecting to it. Once the phones connect to the cell site simulator’s decoy signal, the equipment secretly obtains location and other potentially identifying information … including yours.

The Boston police bought its simulator device using money that is typically taken during drug investigations through what’s called civil asset forfeiture. … Even if no criminal charges are brought, law enforcement almost always keep the money and have few limitations on how they spend it. … The police chiefs in Massachusetts have discretion over the money, and the public has virtually no way of knowing how the funds are used.

In 2019 … the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled that real-time surveillance of a person’s cell phone constitutes a search under the state’s constitution and therefore, requires a warrant, except in “exigent” circumstances. Federal courts in Oakland, California, and New York City, as well as a Maryland state appellate court, also ruled that police use of spy technology is a violation of the Fourth Amendment right not to be unreasonably searched without a court-ordered warrant.

Not just the Fourth. CoastalCoder alleges a violation of the next one, too:

Violation of the 5th Amendment
In my judgment, civil-asset forfeiture is a crime, full-stop. As a regular citizen without special legal training, it seems like as blatant a violation of the 5th Amendment as one could imagine.

I’m not ready to give the court system the benefit of the doubt on this. … If the SCOTUS can justify civil-asset forfeiture (in its current form), then I don’t see how the Bill of Rights offers any protection at all.

Am I dreaming? BytePusher stops short of a wake-up-sheeple polemic:

GOD BLESS AMERICA
Civil asset forfeiture should be a complete outrage for conservatives and liberals alike, but the reality of it is so preposterous … no one really believes it’s actually happening here: Literally police officers stealing from the public so they can buy police toys and military equipment.

Clearly the constitution was meant for ordinary citizens, not the police or government. GOD BLESS AMERICA.

The plot thickens. Dude, we’re hearing from Dell Cameron: [You’re fired—Ed.]

Concealing the existence of the devices
Lawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union are fighting to uncover more about the FBI’s role in helping local police acquire powerful cellphone surveillance devices known widely as “stingrays.” The true scope of their use against Americans has, by design, remained a closely guarded secret for more than a decade.

The ACLU accuses the FBI of violating the nation’s freedom of information law by refusing to even acknowledge the existence of any documents that contractually prohibit police from disclosing information. … These documents do, in fact, exist. … These documents are definitely real.

In plain English, the agreement instructs police to try to convict people of crimes using the data collected from such devices while also concealing the existence of the devices themselves from judges, defendants, and juries. … The FBI declined to comment.

But why? Heed u/outoftowner2’s analysis:

Gross violation of the constitution
Police departments nationwide are well aware that the “Stingray” devices cannot pass constitutional muster. We know this because prosecutors have dropped charges in cases in which the defense attorney demands testimony on the use of the device. They don’t want testimony on the use of the device because they know that if the use of the device ever reaches an appeals court it will be found to be a gross violation of the constitution.

How could innocent citizens protect themselves? With this idea, here’s mLuby:

Databases of known cell towers
Maybe Apple (and/or browser makers) could get away with a blanket “you’re not connected to a publicly registered cell tower; proceed with caution” alert—like happens with SSL certs and HTTPS. … Apparently there are public databases of known cell towers … some of which are crowd-sourced.

In a similar vein, bugs2squash ponders thuswise:

Sin of omission
Does the police department have an FCC licence to operate on those frequencies? Presumably AT&T, Verizon etc. do spectrum monitoring, I would think they are aware when a rogue “cell tower” suddenly appears. It seems like a sin of omission at least not to blacklist it or otherwise warn their customers.

ELI5 why this is bad? u/p1ym explains like I’m five:

Surplus data
Using these Stingrays is pretty dodgy no matter where the money comes from. It will always lead to the police gathering personal data on hundreds of people who have nothing to do with the case.

And no way to know if the surplus data is deleted afterwards.

Meanwhile, sbuttgereit plugs ij.org:

Institute for Justice
Time to plug one of the legal civil rights organizations that I try to financially support: … The Institute for Justice. … They are consistently fighting these kinds of abuses in the courts and through lobbying.

And Finally:

Glorious Japanese cover

Previously in And Finally


You have been reading SB Blogwatch by Richi Jennings. Richi curates the best bloggy bits, finest forums, and weirdest websites … so you don’t have to. Hate mail may be directed to @RiCHi or [email protected]. Ask your doctor before reading. Your mileage may vary. E&OE. 30.

Image sauce: Kabiur Rahman Riyad (via Unsplash)

Richi Jennings

Richi Jennings is a foolish independent industry analyst, editor, and content strategist. A former developer and marketer, he’s also written or edited for Computerworld, Microsoft, Cisco, Micro Focus, HashiCorp, Ferris Research, Osterman Research, Orthogonal Thinking, Native Trust, Elgan Media, Petri, Cyren, Agari, Webroot, HP, HPE, NetApp on Forbes and CIO.com. Bizarrely, his ridiculous work has even won awards from the American Society of Business Publication Editors, ABM/Jesse H. Neal, and B2B Magazine.

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