Submitted by: Submitted by phosaasaka
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Category: Science and Technology
Date Submitted: 09/04/2014 03:21 AM
Domestic Spying (Patriot Act)
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Abstract
President George W. Bush signed the USA Patriot Act into law on 26th, 2001. The act is an anti-terrorism law drawn up in response to the attacks in Pentagon and World Trade Center in September, 11 2001. This law was intended to enhance the penalties that would befall terrorists and their accomplices (University of Denver. College of Law, 1985)
This paper discusses two different opinions regarding the signing of the patriot act into law. They include the positive opinion which agrees and the negative opinion which totally disagrees with the signing of the patriot act into law.
Invades Privacy
Before the provision of the patriot act, the FBI had to obtain a warrant for every communication device they wanted to tap. The process could take several days before it’s completed. By then the suspect could have finished the conversation and switched devises. The FBI would then be forced to start the process all over again. The patriot act however allows the FBI to obtain a blanket warrant to cover all devise that they want to tap into. (Stefoff, 2011)
This may lead to the invasion of privacy rights in that, if a suspected terrorist visits a friend, the patriot act gives the FBI the right to tap into the friend’s phone. The visit may have been entirely social and the suspected terrorist’s friend may have no connection to any plot by the suspected terrorist hence the FBI may be listening into a conversation of an innocent person. (Bamford, 2009)
According to the FBI, the suspected terrorist may be using his friend’s phone to plan an attack without the knowledge of the friend hence it is necessary to tap into the friend’s phone as well. (Andreopoulos, Barberet, Levine, & SpringerLink, 2011)
Potential for abuse of power
Marcovitz, (2008) argues that the patriot act is too broad. It could be used to...