Reno Agrees to Review Carnivore

Twenty-eight House members sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Janet
Reno this week urging her to suspend the operation of the Carnivore cyber
snooping system while it’s inner workings are under review.

House Majority Leader Rep. Dick Armey (R-TX) set up a Web poll asking the public
for their views on the issue of government surveillance and the Internet.

Currently 92 percent of the respondents say that Carnivore should be banned
because it allows the government to invade users privacy. Only 8 percent
believe that the government’s data tapping system should be maintained to
track criminal activity on the Internet.

In its letter to Reno, the gang of 28 expressed strong reservations about
the Internet monitoring system developed by the FBI.
Representatives asked that Reno suspend any activity involving the
development or use of Carnivore until serious privacy issues could be
addressed.

Reno responded Thursday, by describing the two-step process she would seek
to review the FBI’s use of Carnivore.

During her weekly Justice Department news briefing, Reno said the first
step would be for a group of academic experts to conduct a detailed review
of the program’s source code works.

“Those experts will report their findings to a panel of interested parties,
people from the telecommunications and computer industries, as well as
privacy experts,” Reno said.

FBI officials maintain the court-authorized data taps would only focus on
criminal suspects who are targets of an investigation. But privacy
advocates fear the system may cast too wide a net on the Net, and harvest
private information about legal activities, along with criminal’s e-mails.

Reno said the two-step process was worked out with the FBI, and that she
wanted the review to be done “as soon as possible.” She said the system
would not be suspended until the review has been completed.

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