Monday, November 26, 2007

DHS to firefighters: snoop on emergency victims for evidence of terrorism - Boing Boing:

The Department of Homeland Security is asking firefighters to snoop around in homes they're called to for emergencies. The DHS likes the idea because firefighters aren't bound by pesky warrants and probable cause and can therefore report on suspicious material like blueprints, anti-American literature, and potential bomb-making materials (e.g., the bedrooms of every friend I had, circa 1985). Firefighters are just the latest legion of potential snoops the DHS is leaning on -- they've also asked meter-readers to peer into our windows and sheds to find evidence of bad-guy-ery. This stuff doesn't work and won't work: amateur pecksniffs snitching on their neighbors just flood cops with bad intel, and turn the country into East Germany, a land where everyone is on alert lest they say the wrong thing and get turned in to the secret police.