Roving wiretap

In United States law, a roving wiretap is a wiretap that follows the surveillance target. For instance, if a target attempts to defeat surveillance by throwing away a phone and acquiring a new one, by moving, or by any other methods, another surveillance order would usually need to be applied for. However, a "roving" wiretap follows the target, and defeats the target's attempts at breaking the surveillance by changing location or their communications technology. In the US, it is allowed under amendments made to Title III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 (the "Wiretap Statute") in 1988 by the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, and was later expanded by section 604 of the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 1999.^[1][2]

History

On May 26, 2011, the U.S. Senate voted to extend the provisions of the 2001 USA PATRIOT Act to search business records and allow for roving wiretaps.^[3][4] The roving wiretap provision of the Patriot Act briefly expired on Jun 1, 2015, but was restored the next day by enactment of the USA Freedom Act.^[5][6]

External links

• Electronic Frontier Foundation's wiretap page
• Center for Democracy and Technology's wiretap page
• White Paper on The USA PATRIOT Act’s “Roving” Electronic Surveillance Amendment to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (mirror)

References

1. U.S. Government Printing Office.H.R. 3694
2. Fred E. Foldvary (1999). "Roving Wiretaps", The Progress Report. Accessed 30th June 2007.
3. "Patriot Act Extension Passes Senate, Rand Paul Amendments Fail". Huffington Post. 26 May 2011. Archived from the original on 26 May 2011. Retrieved 26 May 2011.
4. http://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/112-2011/s84
5. Daimond, Jeremy. "NSA surveillance bill passes after weeks-long showdown". CNN. Retrieved 12 June 2015.
6. http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/06/02/411534447/senateis-poised-to-vote-on-house-approved-usa-freedom-act?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=npr&utm_medium=social&utm_term=nprnews