[IP] FBI's reading list worries librarians

[Dave Farber <dave@farber.net>]

BTW:

TECHNICALLY legal signs for librarians who hate USA-PATRIOT

http://www.librarian.net/technicality.html

Djf

------ Forwarded Message
From: "the terminal of Geoff Goodfellow" <geoff@iconia.com>
Date: Wed, 18 Dec 2002 12:10:14 +0100
To: "Dave E-mail Pamphleteer Farber" <farber@cis.upenn.edu>
Subject: FBI's reading list worries librarians

FBI's reading list worries librarians
By Martin Kasindorf, USA TODAY

At New York City's Queens Borough Public Library, director Gary Strong is an
uneasy draftee on the front line of the war on terrorism.

New surveillance laws that have made it easier for FBI agents to obtain
search warrants for library records have created a dilemma for librarians
such as Strong: Should they unquestioningly help agents track what a patron
has been reading, and perhaps help prevent a terror attack? Or should they
resist, and try to protect individual liberties and the library's status as
a haven of intellectual inquiry?

Few librarians across the nation say they have been approached by federal
agents in the terrorism probe; Strong won't say whether the feds have
visited him in Queens. But the questions raised by the FBI's increased
authority have made political activists out of some librarians, who are
filing lawsuits against the Justice Department and lobbying Congress in a
growing debate over whether American values are being trampled in the name
of homeland security.

At issue is the USA Patriot Act, the post-Sept. 11 legislation approved by
Congress that, among other things, gave federal agents broad new powers to
spy on people in this country. Under the Patriot Act, the FBI no longer has
to show a judge that it has probable cause to believe that a person under
surveillance has committed a crime to get a search warrant for a library's
circulation records or computer hard drives, or a bookstore's sales records.

--snip--

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2002-12-16-librarians-usat_x.htm

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