According to leaked unsealed court documents, the Biden administration secretly ordered Google to unmask Americans who were searching for specific phrases that were of interest to the U.S. government.
Using controversial “keyboard warrants,” Biden’s DOJ asked Google to give them the private details of users who searched for specific keywords.
According to a Forbes report, the Justice Department inadvertently unsealed the documents in September (which were quickly re-sealed.)
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The first case of this Orwellian invasion of privacy was in 2019 when federal investigators were on the hunt for men they believed sex-trafficked a minor. According to a search warrant, the minor went missing but reappeared a year later and claimed to have been kidnapped and raped. Investigators ordered Google to reveal the IP addresses of anyone who had searched the minor’s name. The tech giant eagerly provided agents with the details of anyone and everyone who made those searches.
Zerohedge.com reports: There have been other rare examples of so-called keyword warrants, such as in 2020 when police asked Google if anyone searched for the address of an arson victim in the government’s racketeering case against singer R Kelly. Then in 2017, a Minnesota judge requested Google to provide information on anyone who searched for a fraud victim’s name.
Forbes also added this update post-publication:
After publication, Jennifer Lynch, surveillance litigation director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), highlighted three other Google keyword warrants that were used in the investigation into serial Austin bombings in 2018, which resulted in the deaths of two people.
Not widely discussed at the time, the orders appear even broader than the one above, asking for IP addresses and Google account information of individuals who searched for various addresses and some terms associated with bomb making, such as “low explosives” and “pipe bomb.” Similar orders were served on Microsoft and Yahoo for their respective search engines.
As for what data the tech companies gave to investigators, that information remains under seal.
You can read the orders on Google here, here and here. The Microsoft and Yahoo orders can be found hereand here.
Every year, Google responds to thousands of warrant orders, but the latest keyword warrant is an entirely new strategy by government investigators and is becoming increasingly controversial.
“Trawling through Google’s search history database enables police to identify people merely based on what they might have been thinking about, for whatever reason, at some point in the past,” Jennifer Granick, surveillance and cybersecurity counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union, told Forbes. “This never-before-possible technique threatens First Amendment interests and will inevitably sweep up innocent people, especially if the keyword terms are not unique and the time frame not precise. To make matters worse, police are currently doing this in secret, which insulates the practice from public debate and regulation,” she added.
Google responded news about secret keyword warrants and defended its decision:
“As with all law enforcement requests, we have a rigorous process that is designed to protect the privacy of our users while supporting the important work of law enforcement,” a Google spokesperson said.
Court records reviewed by Forbes show Google has given away data on people who searched for specific keywords, which is more evidence the US is transforming into an authoritarian state of monitoring and surveillance of online activities just like China’s.
Sean Adl-Tabatabai
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Puhlezzz.
They are one in the same. They give it all. There’s no asking necessary
OMG were all fraud victims “and in the end times the whole world shall be deceived” The Bible. “And they shall grow worse and worse deceiving and being deceived” The book of Job. “the people are totally fooled Marilyn Monroe.” Nothing is what it seems “QE2. If it isn’t what it seems then what really is it? Think about it.
Listen folks, Google has DOJ people in their facilites looking at whoever and what ever they want already. They don’t need to order Google to do anything. essentially Google is a government agency.
I want to know what t
C2, RDX, PETN, detonator, wires, switch, shrapnel, timing device pressure switch. PIES. power, ignitor, explosive mass, switch, and sometimes shrapnel. I used to instruct this stuff, but I can’t remember hardly anything anymore. My brain ejected much of my negative data when I left the government services. i used to be an expert in explosives, and chemical and Bio weapons., I seriously tried to impress everyone with my knowledge in the comment, and I truthfully can’t remember hardly anything about the subjects. I used to travel the world teaching classes on this stuff.
Thank you God for removing this crap from my brain. appreciate it. Love you for that.
Do unto others Creepy Joe. Trace his family tree Look on his closets Unmask him. Personalise your news article.
…like using the words “here, here and here”, is going to fool Big Brother.
Well how long ago did the Queen take those 10 children from Canada and all filmed? You know the 10 that have never been seen again.?