> Most big tech companies very rarely/never let a human review private customer data. Therefore I'm fine handing all the data over to big tech companies.
This isn't true. Google and Apple and others turn over user data to human analysts at NSA and FBI and others without search warrants all of the time, on hundreds of thousands of user accounts per year.
To be fine handing all the data over to big tech companies, you have to be fine handing all of the data over to US federal cops and intelligence services, too, because that's what giving the data (in non-e2ee form) to big tech means.
Actually I have heard the exact opposite of what you are stating is true. Both Google and Apple fight very hard to avoid handing data to authorities. They don't want to be seen as some sort of easy conduit to government surveillance or shill. How does that benefit their reputation? I know of one case where Google spent millions on lawyers fighting government wanting access to an activist's email. Their FAQ here makes their policy pretty clear. https://support.google.com/transparencyreport/answer/9713961...
Apple’s own transparency report indicates they turn over data to the USG for over 100,000 different apple IDs each year in the no-warrant-or-probable-cause (FISA orders and NSLs) category.
(Mind you; this includes device location histories due to geoip logs, unique identifiers, iMessage histories, photos, documents, everything.)
The cases they are allowed to tell you about aren’t in this category. They aren’t even allowed to say exactly how many of the secret warrantless orders they received, or exactly how many users were affectee, only 500-count ranges.
For just Apple, for just January 2023 to June 2023 (six months):
National Security - FISA Non-Content Requests
Table for National Security - FISA Non-Content Requests Data
Requests Received
0 - 499
Users/Accounts
40,500 - 40,999
National Security - FISA Content Requests
Table displaying National Security - FISA Content Requests
Requests Received
500 - 999
Users/Accounts
50,500 - 50,999
National Security Letter Requests
Table for National Security Letter Requests data
Requests Received
0 - 499
Users/Accounts
1,000 - 1,499
National Security Letters where Non-disclosure Order Lifted
> Apple’s own transparency report indicates they turn over data to the USG for over 100,000 different apple IDs each year in the no-warrant-or-probable-cause (FISA orders and NSLs) category.
FISA “orders” are warrants and have the same requirement for probable cause as any search or seizure warrant (they aren't criminal warrants so the probable cause is not of there being evidence of a crime, but of the target being an agent of a foreign power.)
NSLs are administrative subpoenas accompanied with gag orders, not warrants, and correspondingly do not have a probable cause requirement; unlike warrants (and like other subpoenas), they are subject to precompliance challenge (and the associated gag order is challengable separately.)
> FISA “orders” are warrants and have the same requirement for probable cause as any search or seizure warrant (they aren't criminal warrants so the probable cause is not of there being evidence of a crime, but of the target being an agent of a foreign power.)
You put orders in quotes, but that’s what they are called, because it is illegal and inaccurate to call them warrants, because warrants per 4A are issued only upon probable cause. FISA orders are warrantless and do not require probable cause.
Snowden was very clear when he released the data on FAA702. No probable cause is required. They are not warrants. There is nobody in the room except a government petitioner and a government judge who rubber stamps them.
They are the #1 most used source in the US IC, and they make it possible for the FBI and DHS et al to read all of your gmail, all of your google docs, and all of your iMessages and phone photos without so much as a shred of criminal wrongdoing.
The idea that they are used only for foreign surveillance is patently false. There is ample hard documentation (again, thanks to Snowden) that they routinely use these to spy on americans. Their twisted logic is that if the data is replicated outside of the US (to say, a datacenter in Europe) then they are legally permitted to access it under the way the unconstitutional FISA Amendments Act (Section 702) is written.
> You put orders in quotes, but that’s what they are called, because it is illegal and inaccurate to call them warrants, because warrants per 4A are issued only upon probable cause.
Orders authorizing foreign intelligence surveillance purposes under FISA are warrants, and are often called warrants, and they, like all warrants, are issued only on probable cause. (It is not improper to call them “orders”, and they are often referred to that way, as well, it is just less specific; all warrants are [court] orders, but not all court orders, much less all orders more generally, are warrants.)
Subchapter I of FISA established procedures for the conduct of foreign intelligence surveillance and created the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC). The Department of Justice must apply to the FISC to obtain a warrant authorizing electronic surveillance of foreign agents. For targets that are U.S. persons (U.S. citizens, permanent resident aliens, and U.S. corporations), FISA requires heightened requirements in some instances.
* Unlike domestic criminal surveillance warrants issued under Title III of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 (the “Wiretap Act”) , agents need to demonstrate probable cause to believe that the “target of the surveillance is a foreign power or agent of a foreign power,” that “a significant purpose” of the surveillance is to obtain “foreign intelligence information,” and that appropriate “minimization procedures” are in place. 50 U.S.C. § 1804.
* Agents do not need to demonstrate that commission of a crime is imminent.
* For purposes of FISA, agents of foreign powers include agents of foreign political organizations and groups engaged in international terrorism, as well as agents of foreign nations. 50 U.S.C. § 1801
FISA warrants do not have the check and balance safeguards that other warrants have, and the system for getting FISA warrants has been extensively and egregiously abused
>they are subject to precompliance challenge
and it's weird you go to the trouble to mention this but slough over the problems with FISA warrants. You are not arguing honestly here.
This isn't true. Google and Apple and others turn over user data to human analysts at NSA and FBI and others without search warrants all of the time, on hundreds of thousands of user accounts per year.
To be fine handing all the data over to big tech companies, you have to be fine handing all of the data over to US federal cops and intelligence services, too, because that's what giving the data (in non-e2ee form) to big tech means.