Nsa Spying or Protecting

Blake Wellsted

Dr. Kelley

English 101 B

16 November 2016

Do we as citizens of the U.S. want the government to be listening to our phone calls or reading our emails, text, and social media posts? I believe the government should be allowed to view these without a warrant if there is sufficient evidence before the seizing of the electronic data that a crime that will occur. Also, I believe there should be a watch list if someone visits certain websites or have connections to someone who is a suspected or convicted terrorists. The right to privacy is something we all believe in; we also agree that it is a big part of being an American, but at some point, domestic safety and protection of thousands of people is more important than a single individual’s rights. The NSA has the power to track every click of a mouse we make; some people believe they are doing it unconstitutionally but I believe that the safety of a nations people is worth more than the privacy of one’s electronic data.

Domestic terrorism has been put under the spotlight, especially since the September 11, 2001 attacks. Between 2001 and 2009 there were 91 homegrown domestic terrorist attacks (Muhlhausen, McNeill). Therefore, the government needs to consider stopping terror not only foreign attacks on the United States but also domestic attacks on the United States. That's why the government needs to break the privacy of certain people, which is covered under the Patriot Act. The USA PATRIOT Act is an Act of Congress that was signed into law by President George W. Bush on October 26, 2001. With (USA PATRIOT) expanded, the full title is "Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001 (Harper). This law allows the government to view online; banking, shopping, communication etc. this is only one of the three major laws that allow surveillance of electronic information. This law also allows surveillance of airports, docking ports and any roads into the U.S. This is not only the surveillance of United States citizens but also those who are traveling to the United States.

Add paragraph about flagging and blocking websites

The Government should be able to flag certain websites and once some individual accesses one or more of these sites they should be put on a list of suspected terrorists. The Boston Marathon Bombing is an example of a domestic terrorist attack, where website flagging would have helped. The men involved in the bombing had migrated here from Chechen and were freely living here. While living in the United States they self-radicalized, deciding to make a bomb and planned an attack not only on the marathon but were also planning to attack Times Square as later told in the interrogation of the second suspect. Also, while being interrogated he admitted that they found out how to make the pressure cooker bombs from a website that was based out of Yemen (McPhee, Katersky). This website was later found to be created and maintained by members of Al Qaeda. If there were stronger restrictions on sites like these or a flag system on these sites then the bombing could have been prevented by either not allowing these men to create the bomb by blocking access to the site or to flag them and others who viewed the site and continued to watch them and maintain surveillance of the men, they could have been caught before the bombing. The only way these men would have been caught before the bombing would have been breaking some privacy laws. So, the question still stands, is being able to hide data from the government more important than saving three lives, allowing 14 people to keep the limbs they had amputated, not injuring 264 people, and not traumatize everyone that was involved?

Once the government has sufficient evidence that someone is planning or even contemplating planning an attack they should be able track your web usage and communication. Take the Columbine school shooting as an example. Eric Harris was the leader of his high school clique, which was made up mostly of social outcasts (consider “goth” by many students who were later questioned about the group). In 1996, Eric Harris made a website used for gaming and communication (mostly related to gaming). Eventually the website changed though, Harris turned the site into his personal blog and began to make jokes and short journal entries about his thoughts on parents, school, and friends. By the end of the year the website turned into a way for him to share his views on how to cause mischief as well as ways to make explosives. He also started to write about the trouble he and Klebold were causing. At the start of 1997 the blogs began to show the first signs of Harris’s ever growing hatred toward society. The site only had a few visitors and wasn't of any concern till late in the year 1997 when Klebold gave the web address to Brooks Brown, a former friend of Harris. Once Brown’s mother had seen the site she filed many complaints to the sheriff's office concerning Harris, as she thought he was dangerous. The website contained many death threats toward Brown, therefore Klebold gave him the web address hoping the authorities would get involved. After Brown's parents viewed the site they called the sheriff's office again and told them about the site, they put an investigator on the case and he found that Harris had posted numerous violent threats directed against the students and teachers of Columbine High School. Other material included blurbs that Harris had written about his general hatred of society and his desire to kill those who annoyed him. He noted on the site that he had made pipe bombs, he also mentioned guns (no specific number) and that he had made a hit list (no names were posted on the site). After seeing all this the investigator wrote a report to try to get a search warrant but never turned the report over to a judge because of “lack of evidence” and fear of rejection of a search warrant and they dropped the investigation and deleted the original copy of this report. This was before the patriot act but with the Patriot Act they would have been able to search through all of Harris’s online information instead of just the public information and could've stopped the Columbine shooting by seizing the weapons and explosives that Harris and Klebold had. If the patriot act would have been implemented before this shooting 13 people would still be alive 27 people wouldn't have been injured and hundreds wouldn't have been traumatized.

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