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November 26, 2014

FBI wanted access to a hotel guest's room without a warrant. So agents broke his Internet connection, and then posed as Internet technicians to gain access to his hotel room without a warrant

The FBI wanted access to a hotel guest's room without a warrant. So agents broke his Internet connection, and then posed as Internet technicians to gain access to his hotel room without a warrant.
From the motion to suppress:
The next time you call for assistance because the internet service in your home is not working, the "technician" who comes to your door may actually be an undercover government agent. He will have secretly disconnected the service, knowing that you will naturally call for help and -- when he shows up at your door, impersonating a technician -- let him in. He will walk through each room of your house, claiming to diagnose the problem. Actually, he will be videotaping everything (and everyone) inside. He will have no reason to suspect you have broken the law, much less probable cause to obtain a search warrant. But that makes no difference, because by letting him in, you will have "consented" to an intrusive search of your home.
Basically, the agents snooped around the hotel room, and gathered evidence that they submitted to a magistrate to get a warrant. Of course, they never told the judge that they had engineered the whole outage and planted the fake technicians.
More coverage of the case here.
This feels like an important case to me. We constantly allow repair technicians into our homes to fix this or that technological thingy. If we can't be sure they are not government agents in disguise, then we've lost quite a lot of our freedom and liberty.

2 comments:

  1. Actually, anyone coming into my home who is not a close friend or family member is steered away from any place I don't want them. They are never left alone. If they insist, they get steered to the door. It's up to the individual to protect his home from prying eyes. Be aware, and practice situational awareness and practical operational security procedures.

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  2. The SOLUTION is so simple- do as I have ALWAYS done, repair the computer problem yourself OR when you cannot,TAKE it to a technician you know and trust . NEVER ask a technician whom you do not know and trust to come to your office or home for repairs,

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