Uncle Sam's Gag Orders on "Dog Doors"
Will this get me shadow banned even harder than I already am? Honestly… they should think twice.
Because the moment the private sector is in joint action with the government — working on their behalf providing “compelled compliance or assistance,” conveniently skirting the Constitution through bad actors and no security controls — they don’t get to hide behind the “we are just a private company” and “we can make up community guidelines as we go” excuses anymore.
Congratulations: they’re now legally responsible for obstructing, blocking, limiting access and interfering with our First Amendment rights — constitutional birthrights — and are thoroughly intertwined with FISA as the distinctions between the two have conveniently collapsed.
Here is the “legal” arsenal that we are up against: Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (“FISA”); Executive Order 12333 (1981); Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (“CALEA”) (1994); the post-9/11 USA PATRIOT Act (2001); FISA Amendments Act (2008), which gave us the infamous Section 702.
Chief Justice John Marshall wrote: “Thus, the particular phraseology of the constitution of the United States confirms and strengthens the principle, supposed to be essential to all written constitutions, that a law repugnant to the constitution is void; and that courts, as well as other departments, are bound by that instrument.” — Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137, 180 (1803).
Let’s get down to the nitty-gritty.
Anyone here rocking Norton, Lookout or F-Secure “cybersecurity” on their phone or laptop? You might as well cancel. What you are paying for is not protection — it’s a false sense of security, at least where the government is concerned.
A low-level hacker? Sure, they may warn you about them. Otherwise, the “security” acts like a pacifier drenched with NyQuil in a toddler’s mouth, so mommy can drink her wine and watch reality tv.
So, how do these companies get away with marketing services and privacy that they literally cannot — and do not — provide?
Everyone stood at the podium around 2016, swearing there were no front doors, back doors or otherwise — pinky promise.
But then — whoopsie — they quietly signed gag orders and secrecy mandates with our federal government so they “legally” can’t disclose the betrayals afterwards. That’s not lying per se you see — that’s legal semantics — very different and yet, totally “respectable. ”
And per certain private sector’s exact linguistics on February 16, 2016: “They have asked us to build a backdoor to the iPhone…. In the wrong hands, this software — which does not exist today — would have the potential to unlock any iPhone in someone’s physical possession. The FBI may use different words to describe this tool, but make no mistake…”
So it’s not a backdoor — it’s not a front door — I like to call it a “dog door.”
Small. Innocent. Barely noticeable. Just big enough to squeeze through until suddenly it isn’t. Without warning it’s full blown, looky-loo control center with plausible deniability for their voyeuristic tendencies.
And I cannot stress this enough: Terminology matters. I may describe the access as direct line from the private sector to the government — segmented, compelled or facilitated — but unless we use the exact terminology they have assigned to whatever arrangement we are questioning, the response conveniently becomes “No, we don’t have that. We don’t do that.”
Meanwhile, the actual question remains unanswered. Because what are we supposed to call it if nobody will tell us its official name, process or technology?
My concerns extend beyond what these companies disclose to what the devices themselves may be capable of. Based on my direct experience, I have reason to believe that cameras and microphones can be accessed without triggering the green or orange notification lights. Best practice is to assume anything with Bluetooth capabilities has the ability to put a pin on our location and listen in for those keywords, secrets or our next moves.
And yes, before anyone asks — apparently, this is all perfectly “legal,” courtesy of a spiderweb of laws that manage to turn the Constitution into a demolition site, burying our privacy so deep beneath the rubble that it’s out of sight, out of mind — all while covering their six with executive orders and parading their routine statutory and legislative dog-and-pony show before Congress and the judiciary, who conveniently look the other way and wave it all through.
Legal, assuming a warrant — a warrant that exists in theory because it is blankly saved in someone’s outbox, pretending to be sent to the FISC courts.
According to public reporting, one FBI field office alone ran roughly 240,000 unauthorized queries.
So, let’s play dumb for a second. How exactly do you run a search on someone using top-secret or high-clearance software and technology without a warrant?
Their actions suggest that securing the requisite authorization is a problem reserved for the day they’re exposed. I say this because it’s only after they’re caught balls-deep in the violations with their pants around their ankles — Flock being a perfect example — that the government suddenly discovers the importance of protocols and assures us that additional training has been implemented.
Yet somehow, requiring judicial approval before violating our privacy is the one form of protection they refuse to strap on.
And if the private sector insists that our govies do not having direct access to their systems — excuse me — “compelled assistance” to comply because the exact verbiage is what they approve or deny — then why is private information continually surrendered without first verifying the requisite legal authorization? Can it be that our lovlie government has a direct “in” to the private sector?
I mean, take CALEA. Nothing says “your privacy matters” quite like federal legislation requiring telecommunications carriers to design and maintain networks capable of facilitating the interception of calls — a forced three-way, if you will — while capturing texts and other communications while identifying who you’re talking to, and funneling the intercepted information straight to govies systems.
All without disrupting our service… how thoughtful.
But the government would have us believe they don’t have “direct access” and that “strict protocols” are in place to verify a warrant before anyone starts fondling our Fourth Amendment rights.
Let’s pretend there’s an imminent national security threat and they need to look someone up immediately. Sure, we will generously assume they already have a FISC warrant in hand. Now imagine the process involves calling or emailing each company, waiting on hold, navigating a phone tree and politely asking an operator for permission to “take a quick peek” at the target.
Press 1 for Xfinity.
Press 2 for Apple.
Press 3 for Adobe InDesign.
Right? That is definitely how it works.
Absolutely no instantaneous systems already in place to jump on someone’s phone call that very second or input their name to confirm how much money they have in the bank while downloading all the skeletons in their closet in less than a minute.
I can already hear the explanation forming: “We accidentally collected that information. That’s how we were able to search it.”
Oh… Okay. Sure.
Which raises the far more sinister and menacing question: You can collect information without a warrant?
And please — I hope they spare us the Section 702 international collection speech.
As a prime example, I was sitting right there in Monterey, California when my life was accessed, calls were intercepted telling me to “check my breaks” and “you need burial insurance” while Jeffrey Epstein photos were placed as app icons to scare me into silence.
I was thoroughly infiltrated and efficiently exfiltrated.
But don’t worry — it was probably just an accidental international collection since January 2020 to present day. A very explicit, well-documented, repeatable… boo-boo.
Mind you, those 240,000 unauthorized inquiries were from one FBI office. Now imagine the rest of the Bureau. The CIA. How about Homeland Security?
Let’s contemplate on how many agents are going through a messy breakup or divorce? How many friends are just “helping a homie out?”
Now combine that level of emotional immaturity and low-grade personal vendettas with individuals who possess access to some of the most sophisticated government technology in the world — technology funded by taxpayers at a cost of at least $5 trillion since its inception. Then we’re expected to believe our privacy is hardly ever violated and that it only happens once every few years?
I say this because in Clapper v. Amnesty International USA, 568 U.S. 398 (2013), the Court concluded that the plaintiffs’ alleged injury was too speculative, effectively requiring someone with direct experience rather than a hypothetical future injury to establish standing.
Looks to me like the Office of the Inspector General operates on a “trust me bro” basis as their public track record appears to show a distinct lack of accountability for abusing intelligence privileges. If that is true, it is, in my humble opinion — a matter of grave public concern.
But we should relax and trust the government because “they are here to help” — there are safeguards.
Invisible safeguards.
Internal safeguards.
Self-policing safeguards.
But why not a cryptographic safeguard that verifies that the Court has actually authorized the invasion of our privacy before the search, exfiltration or interception of communications can even begin?
No one thought of that?
We can secure banking systems, nuclear bombs and classified intel with cryptographic verification, yet somehow requiring mandatory judicial authorization to protect our Fourth Amendment rights before accessing an American citizen’s digital life is suddenly where they draw the line.
To make things fair, are we really expected to believe that no one in the private sector — with access to virtually anyone’s personal information — has ever let curiosity click their mouse into someone else’s privacy hole to take a bite of their cheese?
And if social media platforms silence or shadow ban users on behalf of the very government that binds them with gag orders and secrecy mandates regarding this dog door access into our private lives, what meaningful recourse is left for the public?
What about the accounts they don’t silence — the ones they quietly prop up, boost and amplify to keep the narrative humming along?
That’s not coincidence nor community standards — that’s joint-action entwinement baaaby!
Private and public companies moonlighting as enforcement arms for the government, treating warrants like optional reading material because evidently, community standards now outrank the Constitution — all while providing a little loosey-goosey access for their government side pieces.
I will say this: Yes, the private sector can, under certain circumstances, be held constitutionally accountable when it becomes sufficiently entangled with the federal government. Allegedly, being a private company doesn’t automatically come with a complimentary Get Out of the Fourth Amendment Free card.
And right on cue comes the inevitable…“But you guys all agreed to be surveilled.”
Oh, f*ck all the way off with that one.
Bundled privacy agreements with little to no meaningful choices is not informed consent. We’re handed an all-or-nothing arrangement: accept the consolidated terms or lose access to the service. And even when those inconsequential opt-outs exist, they’re buried six menus deep, scattered across settings like a scavenger hunt and by the time we find them, twenty minutes has vanished just to decline something we never wanted in the first place — and that’s assuming we actually found the “toggle” we wanted to flip off.
A privacy policy is not a warrant and accepting terms of service is not surrendering the Fourth Amendment.
And now that we know… they say knowing is the real violation.
I contacted all of the high and mighty, “top tier” civil rights organizations — such as the ACLU, EFF, IJ, EPIC and countless others… but no answer is an answer. Their silence suggests that there is actually little enthusiasm for involving someone with direct experience of FISA abuse — precisely the sort of inconvenient detail that the ACLU famously lacked in Clapper vs. Amnesty. The ACLU’s decision not to help or even have a conversation, of course, is only my assumption — drawn from the unmistakable sound of complete radio silence.
The only viable solution, according to my unsolicited but highly-concerned opinion: A mandatory, cryptographically secured authorization code issued exclusively by the FISC, unique to the individual named in the warrant and valid for that specific authorization only. One person. One warrant. One code. No recycling, sharing, bypassing or accessing intelligence systems, technologies, programs — whatever they’re calling them today — without first validating that code against the Court’s authorization. Every use independently logged, time-stamped and subject to judicial audit.
Plain English: The code is what activates the systems — the technology remains nonfunctional without a valid, court-issued warrant code.
No cryptographic code — no access.
Expired warrant — access denied.
Want to surveil someone else — take your ass back to court.
Privacy should never be violated first and justified later.
To experience this sort of trespass literally knocked me on my ass. My life was torn apart — and that isn’t even the start.
At the end of the day, I will let them lie and fabricate — as I stand firm in my faith — that God will vindicate.⚖️
