US Marshals asking local LE to lie on warrants.

[Safetyhit]

That isn't what is going on. Have you have any professional actual knowledge on the matter?

We'll be happy to let you set us straight when you're ready.

[fourXfour]

I have not had the opportunity to use Stingray but I am familiar with some basic info on it as it relates to CA law. Local law enforcement absolutely need a warrant to use it or have an exigent circumstances (kidnapping, imminent threat to life). Even exigent circumstances are followed up with a warrant as the info is still relevant and needed for court.

It was my understanding that the phone records are the. "Evidence". The carriers give permission if all legal requirements are met. I don't think stingray can eavesdrop, just provide a more accurate location.

There isn't an issue of lying or hiding it in a search warrant as the phone activity is the evidence you are seizing. The phone activity is provided by the carrier.

The method of using that evidence seems to be the concern.

Also the Feds don't want to be tied up in local courts and prefer to be left out of the report. Whether that is reasonable is the question.

We use various software programs to assist us everyday including analyzing phone records. At what point do the tools used to understand data records be brought into court? Should each software program engineer need to testify? Right or wrong there is case law protecting law enforcement tools and technology.

[montanadave]

I have not had the opportunity to use Stingray but I am familiar with some basic info on it as it relates to CA law. Local law enforcement absolutely need a warrant to use it or have an exigent circumstances (kidnapping, imminent threat to life). Even exigent circumstances are followed up with a warrant as the info is still relevant and needed for court.

It was my understanding that the phone records are the. "Evidence". The carriers give permission if all legal requirements are met. I don't think stingray can eavesdrop, just provide a more accurate location.

There isn't an issue of lying or hiding it in a search warrant as the phone activity is the evidence you are seizing. The phone activity is provided by the carrier.

The method of using that evidence seems to be the concern.

Also the Feds don't want to be tied up in local courts and prefer to be left out of the report. Whether that is reasonable is the question.

We use various software programs to assist us everyday including analyzing phone records. At what point do the tools used to understand data records be brought into court? Should each software program engineer need to testify? Right or wrong there is case law protecting law enforcement tools and technology.

Various sources contradict the statements bolded above:

"Privacy advocates are troubled by StingRay's "self-service" aspects: Police can use the technology to get around the now-routine process of requesting location data from cellphone service providers. Carriers like Sprint and AT&T usually require that LAPD get a court order.

StingRay could let police bypass the service providers entirely, and secretly.

LAPD won't comment on whether that's what it is doing." (http://www.laweekly.com/2013-01-24/n...inst-citizens/)

It seems the "Stingray" device permits the user to hijack cell phone data directly without the carriers even being aware ot its use.

[jpmuscle]

Just because something is lawful doesn't mean its constitutional, case law be damned..

But that's certainly a more wide spread problem in a lot instances.

Sent from my XT1060 using Tapatalk

[TAZ]

I have not had the opportunity to use Stingray but I am familiar with some basic info on it as it relates to CA law. Local law enforcement absolutely need a warrant to use it or have an exigent circumstances (kidnapping, imminent threat to life). Even exigent circumstances are followed up with a warrant as the info is still relevant and needed for court.

It was my understanding that the phone records are the. "Evidence". The carriers give permission if all legal requirements are met. I don't think stingray can eavesdrop, just provide a more accurate location.

There isn't an issue of lying or hiding it in a search warrant as the phone activity is the evidence you are seizing. The phone activity is provided by the carrier.

The method of using that evidence seems to be the concern.

Also the Feds don't want to be tied up in local courts and prefer to be left out of the report. Whether that is reasonable is the question.

We use various software programs to assist us everyday including analyzing phone records. At what point do the tools used to understand data records be brought into court? Should each software program engineer need to testify? Right or wrong there is case law protecting law enforcement tools and technology.

I don't think anyone is arguing for LEO to open source their technology during a trial. The root of the issue is how was the evidence gathered and why agencies are wanting to hide that information. If they had warrants or the needed exigent circumstances there is nothing to hide. If the didn't have warrants or the needed exigent circumstance then there is a reason to hide the fact that they used a device that wantonly gathered data from alarms segment of population the. They went fishing with an algorithm and found some evidence they then chose to disclose to locals.

If my understanding of the stingray device is correct they would not need to have the carriers involved at all. The data is intercepted before it gets to a carriers cell tower. The stingray acts as a repeater. It pretends to be a cell tower and offers a signal strength that appears better than the near by tower. Your phone chooses it over the actual tower because it's programmed to use the best signal available to save battery. The stingray then bounces your call to the real tower as it steals your information. It uses the same concept as a man in the middle attack on data service that is popular with identity theives.

If the agency had the appropriate warrants based on PC they wouldn't need to resort to these devices. Every carrier would gladly hand over your data stream once a warrant was produced. IMO these devices are used to fish in known trouble areas. We know east LA has drug dealers. Lest set up and listen till our algorithm finds someone talking about drugs and them pretend the info came from a confidential source instead of our wide net fishing expedition.

This is NOT how the 4th amendment works and it's definitely NOT the type of character I want out of the people who are supposed to uphold that law.

[TehLlama]

If used with an improper attempt, I can say that somebody competent but unscrupulous (or given illegal orders) is capable of gathering a sizable amount of data which should be inadmissible in any legitimate court. I can't disclose any more, but I can state that it's definitely possible with that sort of equipment to go on exactly the sort of fishing expeditions the 4th amendment is designed to protect from. There is a right way to use those systems, and there exists a much larger capability suite available if proper legal precedents are met - and those standards are not being applied from what this appears to indicate, which it seems to me these systems are being 'underused' because they lack justification for all of it, but more extensive use would end up with a far easier federal case.

[fourXfour]

I don't think anyone is arguing for LEO to open source their technology during a trial. The root of the issue is how was the evidence gathered and why agencies are wanting to hide that information. If they had warrants or the needed exigent circumstances there is nothing to hide. If the didn't have warrants or the needed exigent circumstance then there is a reason to hide the fact that they used a device that wantonly gathered data from alarms segment of population the. They went fishing with an algorithm and found some evidence they then chose to disclose to locals.

If my understanding of the stingray device is correct they would not need to have the carriers involved at all. The data is intercepted before it gets to a carriers cell tower. The stingray acts as a repeater. It pretends to be a cell tower and offers a signal strength that appears better than the near by tower. Your phone chooses it over the actual tower because it's programmed to use the best signal available to save battery. The stingray then bounces your call to the real tower as it steals your information. It uses the same concept as a man in the middle attack on data service that is popular with identity theives.

If the agency had the appropriate warrants based on PC they wouldn't need to resort to these devices. Every carrier would gladly hand over your data stream once a warrant was produced. IMO these devices are used to fish in known trouble areas. We know east LA has drug dealers. Lest set up and listen till our algorithm finds someone talking about drugs and them pretend the info came from a confidential source instead of our wide net fishing expedition.

This is NOT how the 4th amendment works and it's definitely NOT the type of character I want out of the people who are supposed to uphold that law.

Stingray absolutely needs carrier consent. I honestly learned quite a bit about the technology from reading the Wired Article. I knew it was available, but I really wasn't sure how it worked. The carrier will get you close to the phone and stingray provides a more accurate location by pretending to be a cell tower.

That being said there probably are other technologies available that can bypass the carrier, but they aren't available to local LE.

[montanadave]

Stingray absolutely needs carrier consent.

I'm way out of my lane when discussing this type of technology but several articles I have read (including the one cited above) directly contradict this statement.

[fourXfour]

I'm way out of my lane when discussing this type of technology but several articles I have read (including the one cited above) directly contradict this statement.

You are correct, I don't have first hand knowledge using Stingray. The article may indeed be 100% accurate. There is also a possibility "Stingray" could mean various hardware platforms for dealing with mobile devices. What is available locally may not be as advanced as what is causing the controversy in Florida.

[trinydex]

I'm disappointed that journalists basically forgot about that story as soon as it came out.

In this case this tells me the Marshals think it's ok to use our phones to track our location 24/7 via cell phones and intercept the data all without a warrant. Warrantless GPS tracking was struck down as unconstitutional so how is warrant less cell tracking legal?

Isn't part of the NSA issue the general warrants being issued by the FISA court for the metadata? That's controversial because general warrants aren't legal IMO. These guys are collecting that data BEFORE a warrant of any kind is issued. Not even a very legally sketchy general warrant.

the illegality of warrantless cell tracking is probably precisely the reason they are trying to lie and conceal the warrantless cell tracking. this is very poor law enforcement behavior and should be stamped out immediately and with great prejudice. additionally this is just laziness. a us marshal tracking a fugitive need only write the appropriate warrant to obtain a court order to legally track the fugitive. the probable cause already exists as the person is a fugitive, has already done what they've done, has already absconded based on the warrant for their arrest, law enforcement should do the paperwork, not doing so is laziness and leads to the courts punishing law enforcement and removing investigative options.