gnu@hoptoad.UUCP (John Gilmore) (11/23/87)
Wayne@OZ.AI.MIT.EDU (Wayne McGuire) wrote: > It is > interesting to recall that under the reign of John Poindexter, of > Irangate fame, the NSC was seeking to gain legal access to the records > of these companies, which store sensitive information about the search > targets and patterns of their users. As I recall, the NSC was denied > legal access by Congress, but then there is always the problem of > illegal access... I'd appreciate a pointer to "NSC was denied legal access by Congress". I didn't follow the Irangate hearings, but the old boogaboo Electronic Communications Privacy Act, which Congress definitely passed, provides ways for medium level bureaucrats in government (federal & local) to force a computer service bureau to turn over everything they have on an individual customer (including all that customer's private files) without telling the customer for many months. They can also force the service bureau to make a special backup of that user's files in case the user gets wind of the investigation and erases them. I would hope that any service bureau that wants to keep MY business would refuse the order and force a court to decide its constitutionality, but it's hard to tell how many times this power has been used, with which service bureaus, and against whom. On the contrary, I think Congress handed NSC what they want on a silver platter.