[iwar] [fc:Ashcroft.Permits.F.B.I..To.Monitor.Internet.And.Public.Activities]

From: Fred Cohen (fc@all.net)
Date: 2002-05-31 15:49:09
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From: Fred Cohen <fc@all.net>
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Date: Fri, 31 May 2002 15:49:09 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: [iwar] [fc:Ashcroft.Permits.F.B.I..To.Monitor.Internet.And.Public.Activities]
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New York Times
May 31, 2002
Ashcroft Permits F.B.I. To Monitor Internet And Public Activities
By Neil A. Lewis
WASHINGTON, May 30 - Attorney General John Ashcroft said today that he was
stepping up the fight against terrorism by expanding the F.B.I.'s authority
to monitor the World Wide Web, political groups, libraries and religious
organizations, including houses of worship like mosques.
Mr. Ashcroft said guidelines restricting the bureau, imposed a quarter of a
century ago in response to abuses by federal law enforcement officials, were
outdated and left investigators at a disadvantage in fighting terrorism
today.
"Men and women of the F.B.I. in the field are frustrated because many of our
own internal restrictions have hampered our ability to fight terrorism," Mr.
Ashcroft said to reporters.
"In many instances," he added, "the guidelines bar F.B.I. field agents from
taking the initiative to detect and prevent future terrorist attacks, or act
unless the bureau learns of possible criminal activity from external
sources."
Mr. Ashcroft said the old guidelines prohibited F.B.I. investigators from
surfing the Web "in the same way that you and I can look for information."
Justice Department officials said that under 1999 guidelines, the Policies
for Online Criminal Investigation, F.B.I. agents could not search for leads
on the Internet but could use it only in cases where a criminal
investigation had been established.
For example, one official said, agents would have been permitted in recent
months to look at Web sites for information about anthrax because of the
agency's broad investigation of anthrax-contaminated letters to officials.
But agents would not have been allowed to search the Internet for
information about smallpox's potential as a biological weapon, he said,
because it was not the subject of a criminal investigation.
Those guidelines are based on principles dating to the days of President
Gerald R. Ford and Attorney General Edward H. Levi that prohibited agents
from using publicly available sources of information like libraries to
collect information, except in a criminal investigation. An investigation
requires some complaint of wrongdoing.
The prohibitions were a reaction to Cointelpro, an F.B.I. domestic spying
operation aimed at disrupting political groups. Its best-known target was
the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The guidelines were based on the
principle that federal agents should not compile dossiers on people and
groups without some reason to be believe a crime had been committed.
The changes announced today by Mr. Ashcroft are certain to produce a new
chapter in the debate over whether the nation's security agencies are
updating antiquated policies to combat terrorism or simply taking advantage
of the Sept. 11 attacks and their aftermath to obtain new powers.
Kate Martin, a policy analyst at the Center for National Security Studies, a
civil liberties group in Washington, said Mr. Ashcroft's unilateral
announcement of the changes "shows that the administration continues to be
disdainful of any open policy-making."
Other changes imposed by Mr. Ashcroft will allow supervisors in the bureau's
56 field offices to initiate counterterrorism inquiries without approval
from headquarters in Washington. Agents will also be allowed once again to
search commercial databases without the need to show a crime may have been
committed, as was required before today.
As for attending events at places like mosques, the change reads: "For the
purpose of detecting or preventing terrorist activities, the F.B.I. is
authorized to visit any place and attend any event that is open to the
public, on the same terms and conditions as members of the public
generally."
As the bureau dealt in recent weeks with criticism that it mishandled
information that could have uncovered the Sept. 11 plot, senior officials at
the Justice Department and the bureau have adopted a posture of
acknowledging that serious mistakes were made. As part of that approach, Mr.
Ashcroft used the widely praised complaint of Coleen Rowley, a senior agent
in Minneapolis, to help justify his changes.
Ms. Rowley had said officials at F.B.I. headquarters stymied investigations
that might have uncovered the Sept. 11 plot. Mr. Ashcroft said his changes
would help agents in the field, like Ms. Rowley.
At the White House today, President Bush joined in sending the
administration's message that the bureau had serious problems but that
recent changes would put it on the right track.
"The F.B.I. needed to change," Mr. Bush said. "It was an organization full
of fine people who loved America, but the organization didn't meet the
times."
A joint investigation of the government's performance before Sept. 11 by the
House and Senate intelligence committees will begin next week.
An aide to Senator Bob Graham, Democrat of Florida and chairman of the
Select Committee on Intelligence, said today that the first closed hearings,
on Tuesday, would be for briefings by the committee's investigative staff.
The aide, Paul Anderson, said staff investigators would brief the members of
the House and Senate panels on their findings from a review of more than
100,000 pages of documents and testimony from 175 witnesses. No witnesses
are scheduled to appear in the first week of hearings, Mr. Anderson said.

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