EPIC — the Electronic Privacy Information Center — has released the latest installment in its ongoing Freedom of Information Act gallery of documents prised from governmental file-drawers. This one includes a lot of highly interesting material, including:
This internal FBI memo reveals numerous mistakes that agents made when using FISA. For instance, they illegally videotaped suspects, intercepted e-mails without court permission, recorded the wrong phone conversations, and allowed electronic surveillance operations to run beyond their legal deadline, during sensitive terrorism investigations. The existence of the memo was first revealed in documents that EPIC obtained through FOIA litigation…
An FBI anti-terrorism investigation involving Osama bin Laden was hampered by technical flaws in the Bureau’s controversial Carnivore Internet surveillance system. The incident, which occurred in March 2000, is described in FBI documents obtained under court order by EPIC. A written report describes the incident as part of a “pattern” indicating “an inability on the part of the FBI to manage” its foreign intelligence surveillance activities.
(via Interesting People)