The American Civil Liberties Union is calling on Congress to update federal privacy laws and ban what it says is the potential for large-scale scanning and analysis of e-mail by the FBI's Carnivore e-mail interception program. . . .
The American Civil Liberties Union is calling on Congress to update federal privacy laws and ban what it says is the potential for large-scale scanning and analysis of e-mail by the FBI's Carnivore e-mail interception program.

While the FBI says Carnivore can target the traffic of just one individual, critics say the potential for abuse is high because it's attached to an Internet service provider's network and can analyze all traffic as it passes through.

Carnivore is permitted by a Title III court order that allows the FBI to intercept the contents of electronic communications of a specific person. Investigators can also get a tap-and-trace or pen-register order to collect the "numbers" related to communications to and from the suspect.

But unlike a conventional phone wiretap that gathers just phone numbers, this type of surveillance on the packet-switched Internet allows the gathering of e-mail addresses, e-mail header information, and other data, including Internet provider addresses, dial-up numbers and e-mail logs.

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