Here's How to Side-Step the Warrantless Wiretapping:

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By Kathryn Smith (about the author) Page 1 of 2 page(s)

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For OpEdNews: Kathryn Smith - Writer

Hello friends

Given the telecom immunity bill which was passed in Congress, against all Constitutional law, we the people now have to take matters into our own hands.

Wherever there is a big problem, there is a simple solution:

Sign up with phone and Internet companies which will not wiretap without court warrant.

First, let me qualify that I have zero affiliations or personal connections with any companies I am mentioning below. Neither am I intending to go on a commercial crusade. I am simply posting the solution to the problem, with the hope that others may benefit.

Credo, formerly known as Working Assets Long Distance, will not wiretap without court warrant. In addition to providing mobile, cell phone, and long distance phone services, they are an activist entity in their own right. One percent of their profits ($42 million to date) are contributed to progressive causes such as planting rainforests, the Center for Constitutional Rights and ACLU, gay and lesbian rights groups, and much more. They print their phone bills on recycled paper with soy-based ink. To boot, they have done many impeachment projects, such as the San Francisco "Impeach on the Beach" in which participants laid down on the sand to spell the word "impeach", and a helicopter flew overhead to photograph the entire scene. Credo , trust me, is good for their word when they say they won't wiretap, and in fact are fighting the warrantless wiretapping program as one of their activist projects. One percent of their credit card proceeds are also contributed to environmental and progressive causes.

Qwest will not wiretap without warrant, offering phone and Internet service alike. But they only service certain parts of the country. A percentage of their proceeds are contributed toward educational causes.

The ACLU, Center for Constitutional Rights ,and Electronic Frontier Foundation are part of the solution. Join them and you will be helping the cause along. The ACLU and EFF are litigating the new telecom immunity bill. See www.aclu.org, www.eff.org, www.centerforconstitutionalrights.com or www.ccrjustice.com . Make a contribution to these entities, small or large, and you will be helping to hold Congress in check while fighting the warrantless wiretapping.

Here's how to get around being tracked by RFID chips: Tuck your government documents (passports, driver's licenses, etc) which contain RFID chips into a mylar bag. The same one you would use to de-activate your Fastrack card. The radio wave chips bounce off the mylar, rendering it unscannable. If stopped by the police, the ACLU attorney Nicole Ozer, who convinced (for a while, anyway) the Dept of Homeland Security not to use RFID chips in our driver's licenses, says that a legal argument is to state that you are concerned about protecting yourself from identity theft. Because with scanners available on-line for under $200, it is easy for an identity thief to scan you and obtain your personal information from your chip-containing credit cards, driver's license, etc...they would know your name, home address, social security number, get some idea of your financial prowess.....so you can tell the policeman that you are not hiding from the law, but instead from identity thieves and home burglars. End of discussion!

In case you are curious about whether or not the FBI is spying on you, here is a link (one among numerous links) to the ACLU's facts about who is being targeted by the FBI as "Terrorists". Most of them activists. Check this out:

http://www.aclu.org/safefree/spying/17548prs20050518.html

"Since when did feeding the homeless become a terrorist activity?" asked ACLU Associate Legal Director Ann Beeson. "When the FBI and local law enforcement target groups like Food Not Bombs under the guise of fighting terrorism, many Americans who oppose government policies will be discouraged from speaking out and exercising their rights."

More here about peaceful activist and environmental groups like Greenpeace being spied on:

www.aclu.org/safefree/general/20073prs20050718.html

Here about individual citizens being wrongfully targeted by the FBI, several of them for the heinous crime of birdwatching, another for the crime of being Middle Eastern:

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This quote summarizes the nature of my concerns and the content of personal experiences which stir my activism: "Necessity is the plea for every infringement on human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves". --Paul (more...)

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