Onstar: another way to spy on American citizens? (Bob Barr)

[chat_noir]

Outside View: On-Star online to U.S. gov.

WASHINGTON, Dec. 1 (UPI) -- Every time my wife urges me to look into getting OnStar, the digital, computerized communications device installed in many newer-model General Motors vehicles, I have resisted.

Yes, I know; I've heard the tear-jerk ads on the radio with the plaintive voices of supposedly real wives, mothers, and metro-sexual-sounding men fearing for their lives because they've locked themselves out of their cars and have called OnStar so someone can get them out of the jam into which they've put themselves. Still, I've not been convinced the loss of privacy is worth the remote possibility that I would find myself in a life-threatening situation from which the only possible salvation would be my ability to reach out and touch an OnStar employee.

Now, even my wife agrees that OnStar -- or similar tracking devices installed in non-GM vehicles -- would be a really bad idea. What changed her mind? In addition to the irrefutable eloquence of my arguments, it was a recent story, tucked away in an Internet news service, describing a recent federal court decision that confirms what my own conspiratorial-oriented mind always suspected was true. The FBI and other police agencies have been using these factory-installed tracking systems as a way to eavesdrop on passengers in vehicles, without the folks in the car even knowing the government was listening to their conversations! Unbelievable, you scoff? Nope, it's as real as the genetically engineered smells automobile manufacturers are now putting into their cars.

Even though the federal court decision -- rendered by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers several western states, including California -- concluded that the FBI could no longer surreptitiously listen in via computerized communications systems like OnStar, it did so only for a tangential reason and therefore left the door wide open for continued invasions of privacy.

http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:6o_Th7R-2IsJ:www.privacyassociation.org/docs/sum04/3Barr9001.pdf+Onstar+FBI&hl=en

[Beelzebud]

1. Times are strange when I find myself agreeing with Bob Barr...

[BeeBee]

2. I know.

The scary part is that I'm agreeing with him more and more lately...

[unblock]

5. even pat buchanan usually sounds sensible these days

:scared:

[shance]

3. Handy dandy little tool for the 'sneaky peak' searches into American's

homes when they are not there.

[Whoa_Nelly]

4. Hell, our cell phones have GIS

When your cell is turned on, you are "positioned".

An example--part of an article:

http://tinyurl.com/ce3f7

Now, 'cell phone map' of cities!

Enforcement authorities for long have been able to track movements of people with the help of the cell phone used by them, but now researchers at the Massachussets Institute of Technology have electronically mapped a whole city with the help of just the cell phone usage data, which in future could help authorities in responding to issues like traffic congestion and disasters in a city.

Using anonymous cell phone data, the researchers at the premier US institute created electronic maps of Graz, the second-largest city in Austria. "The real-time city is now real: a system that is able to continuously sense its condition and can quickly react to its criticalities" says Carlo Ratti, architect and engineer and head of the project at the SENSEable City Laboratory, MIT. A cell phone network operating in the city of Graz sent anonymous information about the density of cell phone calls made and the origin and destination of calls.

Combined with this, the team used the data of voluntary participants who agreed to get their mobiles ‘pinged’ by the team, to map a whole city in all its vibrancy. Ratti and his team used anonymous and voluntary data to offer traffic planners a new way to track congested areas in Graz.

[barbaraann]

6. I hear a lot of Onstar commercials on AAR.

It makes me uncomfortable.

[baldguy]

7. I bet he still supports Bush & the GOP, though - doesn't he?

Hypocrite.

[unblock]

8. this is actually LEGAL

at least, if done with a properly obtained search warrant.

and i don't mind this, i think it's a legitimate tool for nailing the tony sopranos of the world and whatnot.

the problem is when they do it without a warrant and/or take a scattershot approach, eavesdropping on everyone and trying to screen for the real targets.

[Ezlivin]

9. I'm so old I can remember a time when

Cars didn't have airbags, anti lock brakes or shoulder straps. Yet we still drove!

We didn't have a cellphone in our hand when we left home. When we left, we were cut-off. Yet we went out fearlessly.

Our phone didn't have voice mail. If someone called when you weren't home, the phone simply rang. Yet we left home and went out.

The television only had three channels and they went off at midnight. Yet we enjoyed ourselves anyway.

It seems that we are so damned afraid nowadays that we have triple-redundant back-up systems for everything. We can't leave the house without our cellphone, our GPS map, our sanitized hand-wipes, our Hummers/SUVs and our concealed pistol.

When did locking your keys in your car become a problem of such epic proportions that we need a satellite in orbit to help us out?

Gotta go. I got to check the messages on my voice mail and see if my TiVO got the shows I can't miss....

[napi21]

11. Hey Exlivin, I remember all that stuff too! Thing is, I still don't have

a cell phone, GPS, handi-wipes, or a concealed pistol. I don't want 'em. If I can't be reached by phone when I'm not home, TS! I did concede to an answering machine. I have a couple of grid maps to help me find my way around areas where I'm unfamiliar, and I don't figure I have to keep my snub nose hidden in my car either. I have to admit though, it is nicer to have more than 3 chanels on the TV.

I'm not afraid of much. Some of the younger folks should get a bottle of chill pills, huh?

[napi21]

10. This is frigin damn disgusting!

I don't have On Star, and I'm sure not planning on getting a new car, but I thought it was a really great idea! My thoughts wandered to locating my car if it was stolen, or getting directions if you're lost in a new area, and they even advertise they can do a remote engin check if you're having car trouble. The locked out thing didn't interest me since I've been driving for 46 years and have never done that!

I gotta tell ya, this secret listening has me pi**ed! I say a lot of things that George wouldn't like, and it's usually in my own home, or in MY car! Now these idiots are able to eliminate MY CAR from that secure list? BS!