Etcetera

Bush Administration trying to squash lawsuit about its illegal eavesdropping

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is claiming in a lawsuit that AT&T acted improperly when it helped the Bush Administration to conduct unauthorized eavesdropping of U.S. citizens.

The government is attempting to use an arcane legal tool, the state secrets privilege, to stop the lawsuit by claiming National Security.

Here's a story from wired.com about the history of the state secrets privilege.

In this case, the government will be asking a federal judge in California to dismiss a lawsuit filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation against AT&T for its alleged complicity in warrantless government surveillance of its customer's internet and telephone communications. The EFF alleges that AT&T gave the government access to a massive phone billing database and helped the NSA spy on its customers' internet use.

My take on this is that the Bush Administration, in this lawsuit, is effectively one of the plaintiffs. And for the suit to be dismissed simply because one of the plaintiffs says it should be, is, well, very dangerous.

Posted by jackhodgson at May 2, 2006 08:14 AM