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IRS to read your email, Facebook, Twitter


Yamato

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That's right, folks. The IRS is "allowed" to read your email, Facebook, Twitter etc without a warrant.

http://youtu.be/SW9cISNBKmc

It makes me wonder how many of us are being mini-audited through our internet communications? Hope all my homeys did your IRS tax returns honestly and on time. ;)

big-brother-watching-you1.png

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My jaw is so sore from hitting the ground so often these days :o

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Sounds like they're getting desperate for money they think they got coming to them, every last red cent, if they're going to all that trouble.

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Not even surprised.

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That's right, folks. The IRS is "allowed" to read your email, Facebook, Twitter etc without a warrant.

[media=]http://youtu.be/SW9cISNBKmc[/media]

It makes me wonder how many of us are being mini-audited through our internet communications? Hope all my homeys did your IRS tax returns honestly and on time. ;)

big-brother-watching-you1.png

I totally believe this. Those guys suck...

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What suprises me, is that people are only just starting to realise what the government agencies are up to, concerning reading your FB and twitter accounts etc

Especially when some people that I have read about, posting on their FB / twitter accounts and getting a visit from the local police or FBI soon after, such as Brandon Raub (after posting a hip-hop quote on Facebook) and Justin Hallman (A 16-year-old high school student,whose video report for his American Government class, earned him a visit from the FBI) and the list goes on

Brandon Raub

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/aug/29/former-marine-facebook-sue-fbi

Justin Hallman

http://rt.com/usa/fbi-school-report-hallman-076/

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The Fourth Amendment (Amendment IV) to the United States Constitution is the part of the Bill of Rights which guards against unreasonable searches and seizures, along with requiring any warrant to be judicially sanctioned and supported by probable cause. It was adopted as a response to the abuse of the writ of assistance, which is a type of general search warrant, in the American Revolution. Search and seizure (including arrest) should be limited in scope according to specific information supplied to the issuing court, usually by a law enforcement officer, who has sworn by it. The Fourth Amendment applies to the states by way of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The "writ of assistance" they are refering to is:

A writ of assistance is a written order (a writ) issued by a court instructing a law enforcement official, such as a sheriff or a tax collector, to perform a certain task. Historically, several types of writs have been called "writs of assistance".[1] Most often, a writ of assistance is "used to enforce an order for the possession of lands".[2] When used to evict someone from real property, such a writ is also called a writ of restitution or a writ of possession.[3] In the area of customs, writs of assistance were first authorized by an act of the English Parliament in 1660 (12 Charles 2 c. 29),[4] and were issued by the Court of Exchequer to help customs officials search for smuggled goods. These writs were called "writs of assistance" because they called upon sheriffs, other officials, and loyal subjects to "assist" the customs official in carrying out his duties.[5]

In general, customs writs of assistance served as general search warrants that did not expire, allowing customs officials to search anywhere for smuggled goods without having to obtain a specific warrant. These writs became controversial when they were issued by courts in British America in the 1760s, especially the Province of Massachusetts Bay. Controversy over these general writs of assistance inspired the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which forbids general search warrants in the United States. In the United Kingdom, general writs of assistance continued to be issued until 1819

The Leon case applies only to search warrants. The Supreme Court ruled in Arizona v. Evans, 514 U.S. 1 (1995) and Herring v. United States (2009), that the exclusionary rule does not apply to evidence found due to negligence regarding a government database, as long as the arresting police officer relied on that database in "good faith" and that the negligence was not pervasive.[48][49][50] In Davis v. United States, 131 S.Ct. 2419 (2011), the Supreme Court ruled that the exclusionary rule does not apply to a Fourth Amendment violation resulting from a reasonable reliance on binding appellate precedent.[51] To what extent the "good faith" exception applies to warrantless seizures in other contexts remains unclear.

The rule has been held not to apply in the following circumstances:

  • probation or parole revocation hearings;[52] tax hearings;[53]
  • deportation hearings;[54]
  • military discharge proceedings;[55] child protective proceedings;[56]
  • sentencing hearings;[citation needed]
  • evidence seized from a common carrier;[57]
  • evidence collected by U.S. Customs agents;[58]
  • evidence seized by probation or parole officers;[59]
  • evidence seized outside the United States;[citation needed]
  • evidence illegally seized by a "private actor" (i.e., not a governmental employee);[60] and
  • illegally seized evidence used to impeach the defendant's testimony.

Taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution

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I keep telling my sister and my nephews that they shouldn't post things on face book (or anywhere on the internet for that matter) without understanding that the whole world is going to going to have access to it. The information you put out there is held and spread by companies and individuals that generally don't hold your privacy as a concern. And even if a company- facebook for example, did decide to hold your information private, there is no guarantee that a hacker or a government warrant wouldn't override them and get the information anyways. Seriously, how do you know if all your emails aren't stored in a Chinese government server that your email provider rents? Bottom line is: If you want to hide a criminal act or information then don't post it on the internet!

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Sounds like they're getting desperate for money they think they got coming to them, every last red cent, if they're going to all that trouble.

Unless you happen to be a billionaire.

In which case the IRS will look the other way I'm sure.

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Sounds like they're getting desperate for money they think they got coming to them, every last red cent, if they're going to all that trouble.

Yes, they are sharing information with the states and federal agencies. I've heard of several people losing all their refund to pay on student loans or other state taxes. If it's not really their debt they will be months disputing it. Doesn't surprise me that they would read email, face book, etc. No wonder they want you to file free forms for that quickest free method of refund. I filed mine over two months ago and I'm still getting "being processed". Maybe they are still trying to find my face book account that doesn't exist LOL

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What suprises me, is that people are only just starting to realise what the government agencies are up to, concerning reading your FB and twitter accounts etc

Especially when some people that I have read about, posting on their FB / twitter accounts and getting a visit from the local police or FBI soon after, such as Brandon Raub (after posting a hip-hop quote on Facebook) and Justin Hallman (A 16-year-old high school student,whose video report for his American Government class, earned him a visit from the FBI) and the list goes on

Brandon Raub

http://www.guardian....acebook-sue-fbi

Justin Hallman

http://rt.com/usa/fb...rt-hallman-076/

Yes, they are sharing information with the states and federal agencies. I've heard of several people losing all their refund to pay on student loans or other state taxes. If it's not really their debt they will be months disputing it. Doesn't surprise me that they would read email, face book, etc. No wonder they want you to file free forms for that quickest free method of refund. I filed mine over two months ago and I'm still getting "being processed". Maybe they are still trying to find my face book account that doesn't exist LOL

Not Good! Not Good at all! Next thing you know, they'll be wanting to check our bank accounts, saving accounts, IRA accounts or whatever account you may have.

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Not Good! Not Good at all! Next thing you know, they'll be wanting to check our bank accounts, saving accounts, IRA accounts or whatever account you may have.

Hate to break the news to you but they already can do that, usually it's called a garnishment when they discover a balance and they just take your money out of an account. They do contact financial instituions where ever they think you may have money and not just the accounts that reported 1099's. I know of several under the table small businesses that recently got caught that way, then they audit them years back. I don't really feel sorry for them since it makes the rest of us pay who are honest reporters pay more than our fair share.

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According to the current law, opened emailed and email older than six months does not require a warrant. Email that hasn’t been opened or is less than six months old does
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/04/12/irs-is-refuting-claims-it-is-snooping-on-americans-by-reading-emails-without/
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That's the dumbest rule I've ever heard. So any email you read is instantly public property? Well then, let's see all the email accounts of every elected official posted on a .gov.. Now that's transparency.

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That's the dumbest rule I've ever heard. So any email you read is instantly public property? Well then, let's see all the email accounts of every elected official posted on a .gov.. Now that's transparency.

Good idea but it will never happen

It is one rule for them and another rule for everyone else

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That's the dumbest rule I've ever heard. So any email you read is instantly public property? Well then, let's see all the email accounts of every elected official posted on a .gov.. Now that's transparency.

Yeah buddy if we're going to share we ought to share alike.

I do support government secrecy in some things (technology) but not in its policies (don't get me started) like this latest charade with pie in the sky stealth aircraft Obama parked in dangerous places. I have to admit Ron Paul was right about Hagel. This wasn't the guy for the smaller government or the more humble foreign policy.

All Obama had/has to do was pick up the telephone and agree with Kim that he doesn't want war either. I would consider that responsible foreign policy. Dennis Rodman came back with an invitation to Obama, as unorthodox as that was, it was an opportunity and it probably still is. As if Obama couldn't outsmart and outwit this kid in a conversation? Obama can't think of intelligent things to say? He's a silver tongued devil he should be more open to speak with other leaders with it. We should always talk to our enemies as a matter of course, right? I see no good results from silent treatment. To me, that is the far greater "isolationism".

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Unless you happen to be a billionaire.

In which case the IRS will look the other way I'm sure.

So long as you're a billionaire who's paying your taxes, yeah.

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Should our emails be protected by the 4th Amendment? Opinions?

Absolutely.

I can understand facebook and twitter, designed to be PUBLIC being accessible .. but personal communications should be off limits. in the 4th amendment .. It's called being "secure" in your papers ...

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So any email you read is instantly public property?

email is not a "private" medium. It never has been. Sorry.

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email is not a "private" medium. It never has been. Sorry.

excuse me ? If you get onto my computer and bypass my security to read my emails you have committed the crime of hacking. Anything that is password protected is the same. Because it is not enforced like the current gun Laws doesnt mean we need new Laws.

Its hacking for me or you or the Govmnt do it.

If it is shared in a public space for viewing by anyone. Not people that arent on your approved or "friended" list then you went through a backdoor to read that information. Most likely hacking again.

Even on this Forum the Govmnt would have to make an account to monitor whats being posted. If they read my private PM's then they have hacked my account. They should be prosecuted appropriately. Unfortunately this is only used to identify persons of interest and wont ever be used in a court of Law because they know the outcome.

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email is not a "private" medium. It never has been. Sorry.

No, turns out a warrant must be issued for the government to read your emails.

http://www.howstuffworks.com/stored-email.htm

Excerpt...

Not quite. It turns out that the U.S. government has been using the Stored Communications Act (SCA) to read private e-mails without a search warrant. These are e-mails stored on services like Gmail, Yahoo and Hotmail. If the government wants to read e-mails that on their way to a recipient, they need to have a special type of search warrant, a wiretap order. Wiretap warrants can be difficult to get. So instead of worrying about in-transit e-mails, the government secretly accessed stored e-mails, justifying its conduct under the SCA. Increasingly large amounts of storage space mean that many people never delete e-mails (this writer does so only rarely). So a person's entire history of electronic communication could be available to the government without a judge first signing off on a warrant. ­

The issue worried civil liberties and Internet rights advocates, and a recent court ruling was in their favor. On Monday, June 18, a panel of three judges from the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals declared the government's actions and the SCA unconstitutional. The result is that stored e-mails are now more secure from government eavesdropping, since the government now has to get a warrant to read the stored e-mails of someone they're investigating.

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excuse me ? If you get onto my computer and bypass my security to read my emails you have committed the crime of hacking. Anything that is password protected is the same. Because it is not enforced like the current gun Laws doesnt mean we need new Laws.

Its hacking for me or you or the Govmnt do it.

If it is shared in a public space for viewing by anyone. Not people that arent on your approved or "friended" list then you went through a backdoor to read that information. Most likely hacking again.

Even on this Forum the Govmnt would have to make an account to monitor whats being posted. If they read my private PM's then they have hacked my account. They should be prosecuted appropriately. Unfortunately this is only used to identify persons of interest and wont ever be used in a court of Law because they know the outcome.

That's not true either asteroid. I read this forum for many years before I made an account. IIRC I couldn't see or open attachments in the threads. Just sign off and browse the forums.

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That's not true either asteroid. I read this forum for many years before I made an account. IIRC I couldn't see or open attachments in the threads. Just sign off and browse the forums.

True. My main point was reading of emails/PM's but you are absolutely correct.

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excuse me ? If you get onto my computer and bypass my security to read my emails you have committed the crime of hacking. Anything that is password protected is the same. Because it is not enforced like the current gun Laws doesnt mean we need new Laws.

Its hacking for me or you or the Govmnt do it.

If it is shared in a public space for viewing by anyone. Not people that arent on your approved or "friended" list then you went through a backdoor to read that information. Most likely hacking again.

Even on this Forum the Govmnt would have to make an account to monitor whats being posted. If they read my private PM's then they have hacked my account. They should be prosecuted appropriately. Unfortunately this is only used to identify persons of interest and wont ever be used in a court of Law because they know the outcome.

The excuse the GOV will use in court is that the email application owner(s) allowed access to the individuals information. Everything the individual types into the internet becomes private property of the application owner(s). Without a valid hand written signature there is hardly a legal contract for the individual to present in a court of law.

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