This New Bill Is Aimed At The Use Of Stingrays

This new bill targets the use of stingrays

The proposal would regulate law enforcement use of stingrays (aka stingrays phone trackers), which are often viewed as a risk to privacy.

This new bill targets the use of stingrays, which is good news

Law enforcement agencies may need to get a court order as soon as possible before using a cell phone simulator (often called a stingray).

Senator Ron Weeden of Oregon and Representative Ted Lew of California this week introduced a new law that prohibits the unauthorized use of trackers to track phone calls in order to protect the privacy of citizens. It’s good news. Wait a minute, what is a stingray? Manta rays behave like cell phone towers, but they are not. In the United States, various local law enforcement agencies, state law enforcement agencies, and federal agencies (such as the FBI) ​​use Stingray phone trackers. Usually, the police or other law enforcement agencies will drive through certain areas and leave traces on your car or truck.

When the line goes through the cell phone, the cell phone connects to it, thinking it is a cell phone tower. The idea is to find a specific phone or person and collect their location, sometimes even call logs, messages, and data. Why is the stingray a problem? Disturbingly, stingrays will not chase a person. They were persecuted indiscriminately. All cell phones nearby. This means that in addition to the data for the intended use, data of normal people is also collected. This is a problem encountered by data protection staff. Imagine if the police could access your location records, call records, and messages without an arrest warrant.

Please note that you have not committed any criminal offense; you only care about your business. However, many people believe that law enforcement agencies do not have the right to collect such data without the knowledge of ordinary citizens. There is also a security issue. Since the ramp is forcibly connected to the phone, you can connect the phone to the ramp to make an emergency call if needed. Imagine being unable to call 911 because your phone was tricked into connecting to feces by law enforcement officers.

They can be life threatening. “It has been too long since the cell phone simulator has been in no man’s land,” Wyden said. “Our bipartisan bill shatters the privacy and uncertainty surrounding stingrays and other cell phone simulators and replaces them with clear and transparent rules that stipulate when the government can use these intrusive surveillance devices.

What impact will the law have? The bill seeks to generally require law enforcement to obtain an arrest warrant before using skates and to inform the judge of possible side effects, such as B. Emergency call interruption; the law also requires to minimize the collection of data from unauthorized equipment and possible fines of up to $ 250,000 for the illegal use of stingrays. Some states have passed similar laws.

The law will cover all uses of stingrays. “[Stingrays] can collect a lot of metadata and content from various devices at the same time, ”Liu said. Lieu pointed out that since 2016, ramps have been used against BLM protesters, while others who use Wyden try to control the use of Rajids. In one case, law enforcement officers placed a stingray on a plane and flew over Washington, DC, looking for the suspect. Scat collected data from thousands of people who didn’t know they were being watched. Should this bipartite law be passed? , People’s use of cell phones has become more private. How should he be?

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