"FBI SEEKS RIGHT TO TAP ALL NET SERVICES"

"Proposal would require public; private networks to have call
interception."

 From {ComputerWorld}, The Newspaper of Information Systems Management
June 8, 1992 - Vol. XXVI, No. 23

By Mitch Betts, ComputerWorld Staff

WASHINGTON, D.C. - A Federal Bureau of Investigation proposal to
modernize federal wiretapping law would require all public and private
networks to have a built-in capability for intercepting a criminal
suspect's communications.

     The draft legislation proposal covers not only the telephone
companies, but also other "providers of electronic communications
services, including private branch exchange operators."  Local-area
networks, corporate wide-area networks, electronic bulletin boards and
electronic mail services would all be covered by the broadly written
proposal, experts said.

     William A. Bayse, head of the FBI's technical services division,
said last week that the FBI needs the built-in wiretapping capability
so it can conduct court-ordered intercepts regardless of the
communications technology involved.  He said the FBI wants real-time
remote access to all data, fax, voice and video traffic in the U.S.

     Bayse defended the proposal as an effort to maintain the status
quo in the face of new technologies that make court-ordered wiretaps
more difficult.

     FBI officials complained the many businesses today are incapable
of providing such intercepts, so legislation is required to force
changes in electronic networks to meet the needs of law enforcement
agencies across the country.  For example, in the case of
packet-switched networks, the FBI proposal said the network operator
must be able to isolate the communications of the criminal suspect
from the stream of other network traffic.

     In essence, the FBI wants to hook up a leased line from its
remote monitoring post to a spare port on the telephone company's
switch or the LAN's router or smart hub, said Frank Dzubeck, president
of Communications Network Architects, Inc. in Washington, D.C.  Then a
software filter is needed to isolate the traffic of a single user --
the suspect -- and route it to the FBI site.

     The FBI wants remote access because it fears that monitoring
on-site would be too obvious and dangerous for its agents, but getting
remote and undetectable access to LAN traffic may prove difficult.

     Byron Comp, a LAN specialist at retailer Marshalls, Inc., in
Andover, MASS., said a protocol analyzer such as Network General
Corp.'s Sniffer could monitor the traffic between one network address
and the server, but he said he was not sure how to provide remote
access.

     Similarly, Lori Young, LAN consultant at Baxter Healthcare Corp.
in Deerfield, Ill., said it is conceivable that a LAN administrator
could monitor the traffic of a particular workstation address and its
E-mail.

     The FBI proposal has left many technical questions unanswered,
especially in the data communications field, said John Podesta, a
Washington, D.C.-based attorney who specializes in electronic
communications.  For example, would a LAN administrator have to add
another port to accommodate the FBI intercept?  "They haven't thought
that through," he said, because the FBI is focusing most of its
attention on maintaining the ability to intercept voice traffic.

     Podesta, retained as a lobbyist for the Electronic Frontier
Foundation (EFF) on this issue, said he hopes the FBI will drop the
data portion of it's proposal, the agency has shown no signs of
"throwing in the towel" on that section yet, he said.

     The main thrust of the FBI proposal is to ensure that old and new
technologies deployed in the public switched network do not impede the
government's ability to undertake court-ordered wiretaps [CW, March
16].

     FBI officials said wiretaps have been thwarted by technologies
such as call forwarding and speed dialing.

HEAVY OPPOSITION

     At a privacy conference last week, civil liberties groups
including the EFF, the American Civil Liberties Union and Computer
Professionals for Social Responsibility (CPSR) opposed the FBI
proposal on the grounds that it might encourage overly broad
government surveillance.

     The FBI wants carriers and equipment vendors to embed this
intercept capability in their products and services, but the industry
is balking at paying the cost of the FBI-requested modifications.

     "We're scratching our heads as to why new legislation is needed,"
said Jeff Ward, legislative counsel for Nynex Corp.  "Digital
telephony can be intercepted at the switch now."  He said the FBI
proposal could force telephone companies to withdraw those services
such as call forwarding that frustrate FBI wiretappers.

     Dzubeck and Marc Rotenberg, Washington, D.C. director of CPSR,
said they were concerned about the legality of giving the FBI built-in
intercept capability across the board before any crime is committed or
a court order is obtained.  "That's putting the cart before the
horse," Dzubeck said.  He predicted that the issue will wind up before
the U.S. Supreme Court.

Sidebar to the above article, entitled "Digital Snooping":

     The following are the major provisions of the FBI's draft
proposal on "digital telephony":

     - "Providers of electronic communications services and private
branch exchange operators shall provide within the U.S. [the]
capability and capacity for the government to intercept wire and
electronic communications when authorized by law."

     - Intercepts must be made in real time, undetectable by the
suspect and routed to a remote government monitoring site.

     - Carriers within the public switched network (including
cellular) most comply within 18 months.  Other providers of electronic
communications services (including PBX operators) must comply within
three years.

     - Some exceptions can be granted.

      - Enforced by the U.S. attorney general.  Penalty is a fine
of $10,000 per day.

